Ewan returns to a familiar theme (for long time AASers) in the second part of his video diary with the qwerty-side-sliding Nokia E75, pointing out the apparent complexity of S60's application menu for new users. He's also found inconsistencies in this area that are new to the E75. Some of his concerns are addressed in S60 5th Edition, of course, but that's not going to help those who buy the E75. Video below.
Read on in the full article.
I AGREE!!! S60 is awesome!! But so is it's complexity!!! I recently scored a N95. Awesome phone, but I had to spend a day modifying it so that I could use it.
My sister gave me the N95 because she couldn't drive it. It was too hard to use and too confusing.
I really hope that the symbian foundation fixes this quickly. Android and Iphone are flying straight past it.
The Good - nice fresh and interesting approach to reviewing gear. Ewan has an enthusiasm which is infectious even for devices/features that are wrong/poor! It's refreshing.
Constructive criticism - out of focus close-ups and everything is so *fast* - Ewan's speech/delivery (though as before, I guess this comes with the enthusiasm) but nore importantly his hands and 'flashing' glimpses of the unit - by the time the eyes have focussed on it, it's gone!
Good stuff though - appreciated here.
Tim
Absolutely spot on with your critisim of S60's UI I'd say, it's starting to slide down the same slippery slope that Windows Mobile fell in years ago. The Symbian Foundation need to address the issue of over compexity as well as simply jazz things up and make it a bit less old hat, otherwise it's going to be a huge uphill struggle against WebOS and OSX Mobile with a very real risk of having handset manufacturers defect to alternatives like Android.
As hinted in the news item, I believe that S60 5th Edition addresses many of Ewan's points. There are much less (obvious) apps, much better rationalisation and integration of Settings, etc. My main beef with 5th is that the all important 'Sync' utility has now been utterky buried.... grr.....
Is Ewan Spence a hippie?
I shifted from My HTC to Nokia N82 buti found it to be better that touch screen. I think its always hard to switch to other brands at first and then you get use to.
Hiya. excellent but just a tad too fast when showing the phone and blurry close ups as was said earlier. i love the way the menu system was portrayed using cards. iv found thinking inside the box or better still the 4x4 grid on screen is for me the best way to arrange your menu after sorting out your home screen short cuts. if you just work on the 4x4 page you first eliminate scrolling therefore allowing you to use the keypad for each icon selection.so for example if office is on your main menu and you have 16 officey apps put them all together under office therefore having just 3 keypresses to open the application needed.that is unless you already have the needed app on the home screen.the plan somewhat falls down in the case of having more than 16 my own or installations apps but with a little thought the use of extra folders or some menu juggling can sort that.
Thanks for the info... I agree, Symbian is sliding down a slippery slope. I'm a power user but ... how does Nokia expect to grab a whole market of new users when the OS can only be used by a power user??
Anyways, I'm sure the E75 will be my next phone (once the NAM variant comes out) and I'm really looking forward to your further topics on the E75. (Please try and focus on using the E75 with Nokia Messaging Service VERSUS simply using the new client (that LOOKS like NM, but isn't really NM) and how the default client on the phone would work with IMAP-IDLE / auto-reconnect.
Thanks Ewan!
slitchfield wrote:As hinted in the news item, I believe that S60 5th Edition addresses many of Ewan's points. There are much less (obvious) apps, much better rationalisation and integration of Settings, etc. My main beef with 5th is that the all important 'Sync' utility has now been utterky buried.... grr.....
Just click battery indicator and then tranfer data. Sync should be there 😊
nickE10mm wrote:Thanks for the info... I agree, Symbian is sliding down a slippery slope. I'm a power user but ... how does Nokia expect to grab a whole market of new users when the OS can only be used by a power user??Anyways, I'm sure the E75 will be my next phone (once the NAM variant comes out) and I'm really looking forward to your further topics on the E75. (Please try and focus on using the E75 with Nokia Messaging Service VERSUS simply using the new client (that LOOKS like NM, but isn't really NM) and how the default client on the phone would work with IMAP-IDLE / auto-reconnect.
Thanks Ewan!
Uh....the default client IS the Nokia Messaging client, albeit in slightly different form. You can't even install the downloadable Nokia email client over it. There is no other default client. It is the only email client built in. I have no idea why Nokia Email allows a download to exist for E75 on the site when it can't even be installed. 😃
trying to install the client downloaded via visiting the site with the phone browser gives this message
"An incompatible version of this product is detected, and has to be uninstalled first."
There's no way I can uninstall something that's in firmware. 😃 So yes, the Nokia Email client is built into E75.
Only just got around to watching this one. Absolutely spot on, and one of those occasions when I really hope somebody from Symbian Foundation follows these pages.
(And I'm sorry, but I disagree with Steve that these matters have been addressed with v5; it's still a shambles.)
It's a problem that can be easily resolved, will take time to do it but not difficult. When I get a new S60 phone the first thing I do is create about 6 folders. In particulra; Game, Office, Music, Video, Tools and Net/Web. As the folder name implies I think almost any S60 application will fit into one of those categories.
Now, all S60 have to do is force (make it a requirement) for developer to label their apps as one of the above. So when you install the new app it goes to one of the above folders.
So when you hit the menu button the layout would then be the 6 folders and then all the apps inside the respective folders by default. This will create a 2 layer navigation, Folder and App within - no more subfolders within folders.
Users can of course regoranize things as they want, but those 6 folders will always remain on the menu screen and cannot be modified/deleted.
Yes "cannot be mofiied." S60 have given "too much freedom" to their users thus it becomes "chaotic". A modified quote from Jackie Chan... Lol