There is a lottery whenever you download an application for your Symbian Samrtphone. I don't mean the lottery of whether you'll be able to re-download the app (although that can still be a concern); I don't mean the lottery of getting the right platform variation in terms of 3rd or 5th Edition or something even older (although that can be a concern as well); nor am I thinking about the “will the security certificate still be in date” when I install the app (seriously – who thought that expiring apps would be a good idea?)
Read on in the full article.
The fact there isn't even a separate folder or category in OVI for widgets I think shows how little thought Nokia have given to assisting users find an appropriate/best app within OVI. The rating and review system is poor and not nuanced enough and the information provided on what an App actually does is similarly very poor. They really need to shake up the quality of some of the Apps or at least make sure there's some way to tell if you're getting a decent natively written package or some cheap Java knock off. I think decent information and peer review would go some way to limiting the spread of poorly designed packages as would limited working demo or at least multiple screen shots.
I agree I'm not sure QT is going to solve a lot of problems - yes it should result in better and nicer looking programs but I still can't believe that as you say coding down to a lowest common denominator isn't going to be the result as they try to support SFx and Maemo. Maybe only user review is the solution to differentiating well and specifically written software from generic clones? Although user review tends to be a very poor system widely open to abuse/spamming.
Maybe Nokia need a more benign dictatorship approach a la Apple, mind you Apple do back that up with very accessible SDK and low entry threshold and slightly goes against the new Nokia open source group think.
I agree with you that a lot of App fuss will die down as we revert back to the browser but still seems a bit of a quandary.
seriously � who thought that expiring apps would be a good idea?
Probably the same person who figured out that they could fleece developers out of hundreds of dollars/euros for certificates and signing programmes.
Great article.
Qt will be the future SDK for client apps on Symbian.
Web runtime and widgets will be supported as well as on other platforms, with highly hoped convergence to a sort of W3C+BONDI inspired widget engine.
JM2C
http://meedabyte.wordpress.com
This did totally not come as a surprise at all.
When downloading and trying different applications none of them are really separated in the OVI Store.
While the performance is a less eminent problem on 5th edition handsets (which basically can chunk down all of them), this can be more eminent on 3rd edition handsets with poorer experience than a counter application made specifically for Symbian.
On 5th edition handsets the emulated navigation keys are the only indicator that the application is a java application and for widgets that it requires an internet application. (Exceptions are widgets that don't require this.)
It's probably a matter of personal taste, but I find that being able to differ what type of an application is, plays a big part for my user experience.
(Java applications like to fail on 3rd edition, less likely on 5th. Widgets don't work well in 3rd edition and so on.)
Moving away from the user experience the points you made are very valid, about the lowest common denominator. This is unfortunately the case when you look at "mass productions".
Just look at the quality of the gadgets that are out there today. Build quality gets worse (Nokia creaking battery covers)
and same goes for applications.
The assumption is mainly based on that the user won't mind what application type of application is on the store as long as it "works", and as you pointed out it doesn't.
That's great! That's quite a very informative post. Thanks for your share.