When it comes to Twitter applications (perenially popular, it seems), Symbian and S60 have no shortage of choice. Guest author David Gilson has done a mass review of all the Twitter applications he could find for S60, and presents us with a detailed feature comparison, along with a number of recommendations.
Read on in the full article.
You forgot Dabr ?
For me the best free Twitter app for my N97 😊
I agree Gravity totally rocks, and this is my main mobile client. However Snaptu has drawn my attention also and does a reasonable job - it does a number of things and well worth adding to table IMHO
Hah - David, you just knew some extra contenders would get 'added'!!! - back to your table for a version 2 next week?
8-)
There are a few missing from your collection too.
TMN Pond, which has a lot of potential.
TweetBreeze, which is kind of like a Beta at the moment, but both are available for free in Ovi Store.
Good article.
Gravity does hide avatars and some things more.. not mentioned..
Janole is working on import from bookmarks and url-shortener..
Great review and table David - your research is appreciated. I find that I lean towards 'simpler' Twitter apps but do like to be able to post photos on-the-fly. That cuts out half the contenders. And if you want kinetic scrolling, there's only one left! I'm happy to use Gravity though don't use half the features - and I agree about porting across to new devices - the Nimbuzz model works very well here with 'sign-in' on their server, not device, so it doesn't need all setting up again.
Tim
Slightly off topic I use twitter alot and recently brought an N97 Mini and installed Tweets60, but I got frustrated when scrolling tweets with the hestitation and jerky scrollin, I put this down to the N97 being as rubbish as everyone said but 2 days ago I installed Gravity on a trial and the whole phone suddenly felt responsive and slick (I know only when I was tweeting but it was a lot of the days usage). What I trying to say are some apps better written and if so does this taint an experience of a phone when (lets say)inferior apps are used in a phone from new.
Excellent review David and the table idea is very clear to read and understand.
Now, if only someone would do the same to find out what is the best Symbian RSS Reader!! :icon14::icon14:
"What I trying to say are some apps better written and if so does this taint an experience of a phone when (lets say)inferior apps are used in a phone from new."
I think so. Just compare Gravity with the email client of NokiaMessaging. It's like two different worlds.
If the system software of the N97 would be as fast and slick as Gravity you'd have another, better, user experience entirely.
I began using Twibble last year in my E71 and was very good. I picked it up from a comparison table (http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=rreBWsGcMJEwZK7tqd8Debg) I cannot remember from which blog came, probably E71Fanatics or NokiaAddict (sorry if I'm wrong). It was the 3rd after Gravity and Twittix, and the 1st free.
I moved to Gravity when Twibble became paid, and have missed it.
Twibble was fast and readable, with functions I did use. Gravity looks is better and has more functions but drains too much battery and has a important negative issue: when one opens a link it misleads the system to think that the browser is Gravity, with the consequence that one cannot switch back and forth between the twitter timeline and whatever links you have opened (can be more than one in Twibble). To come back to the timeline one needs to close the browser! Thus, Gravity does not allow me to follow the timeline independent from my reading of the external links. For me that is a mayor drawback
Halfway solution has been to copy links onto clipboard to open with Opera (less than ideal solution)
@dabr for me too. Simple, efficient.
Hello everyone,
Thanks for the comments. I see there are a lot more Twitter clients.
I'll begin testing ...
Also, S60 RSS Readers, good idea. I'd be willing to give those a similar treatment. However, this time, if any of you have an application you'd like including, please let me know in advance!
Okay folks,
The S60 Twitter grid will be back, but next time I think it might be too large to fit on the website. So I think we might be having a PNG or PDF download instead.
Depending on my schedule it will be published any time in the next four weeks, I'll be adding more than the five apps/services mentioned here too!
I also want to state that some errors crept in and J1ck.tweet ended up being four points short of what it should have been, robbing it of third place. I've already spoken to them about this, but apologies to all you readers too. Although for the next grid, we'll have J1ck.tweet v2.0 to look at.
With all the new additions, I can already see there is going to be a BIG mix up to the rankings. I already have a new second place winner!
Thanks for the table!
There are two rows that you might want to add in the next version:
- Geolocation tagging
- Native re-tweet
They are both Twitter features which have been introduced fairly recently (in August and November, respectively).
Really good read and gave me good overview of the other twitter clients.
I'm not a very active user of twiter although that has picked up as I've had it on my N97, I'm definitely a consumer rather than a generator and I think really I'm using it as a kind of "glorified" RSS feed. Not for friends but a "heads up" seervice and business engagement.
Currently I'm using Nimbuzz having previously trialled Fring for a bit (which I found less controllable although it's connectivity and I thought twitter interface were better - though not according to your grid) and I haven't tried any of the dedicated twitter clients. Couple small things on Nimbuzz - it actually does have kinetic scrolling (v2.2.0 r2249) on the tweet feed although it's differently weighted to the broad SF^1v20 one. The big advantage Nimbuzz seems to offer to me (and Fring too) is that whilst I'm a low level twit I'm also logged into YahooChat and GoogleTalk and Facebook chat and Skype and could make phone calls out etc etc. all on one programme runnig - Oh and it's free too 😊 . As a result I now tend to have all these services rather than just switching to them when I want them which is giving me a very differnet realtionship with them on a phone. ps Nimbuzz's tweet alerts is a bit hit and miss (mostly miss for me)
rvirga wrote:Thanks for the table!
There are two rows that you might want to add in the next version:
- Geolocation tagging
- Native re-tweet
They are both Twitter features which have been introduced fairly recently (in August and November, respectively).
Thank you for that. I've only heard of Geolocation coming in Gravity, which would make it worth while including, if it's ready by the time I publish the next grid, but I suspect I'll be ready to published before geolocation is officially in Gravity. Do you know of any other S60 Twitter applications covering it yet?
Native re-tweet - This is something I considered, and to be fair, I should have set out in the article that I had made an active decision on how to regard it. I decided to leave it as non-specific, because I find in the mobile applications it is hard to tell whether something was retweeted in the old style or the new style. So it seemed to me that as long as it would do retweet, either way, that it deserved the point.
snoFlake wrote:Really good read and gave me good overview of the other twitter clients.I'm not a very active user of twiter although that has picked up as I've had it on my N97, I'm definitely a consumer rather than a generator and I think really I'm using it as a kind of "glorified" RSS feed. Not for friends but a "heads up" seervice and business engagement.
Currently I'm using Nimbuzz having previously trialled Fring for a bit (which I found less controllable although it's connectivity and I thought twitter interface were better - though not according to your grid) and I haven't tried any of the dedicated twitter clients. Couple small things on Nimbuzz - it actually does have kinetic scrolling (v2.2.0 r2249) on the tweet feed although it's differently weighted to the broad SF^1v20 one. The big advantage Nimbuzz seems to offer to me (and Fring too) is that whilst I'm a low level twit I'm also logged into YahooChat and GoogleTalk and Facebook chat and Skype and could make phone calls out etc etc. all on one programme runnig - Oh and it's free too 😊 . As a result I now tend to have all these services rather than just switching to them when I want them which is giving me a very differnet realtionship with them on a phone. ps Nimbuzz's tweet alerts is a bit hit and miss (mostly miss for me)
Glad to hear it was of interest to you!
Thanks for letting me know about Nimbuzz. Disclaimer: (To date) I've only been able to test on E-Series devices. Gravity does kinetic scrolling even on those, although everything else I tested, scrolled the old fashioned way when I used my d-pad. Although based on your feedback, I will update Nimbuzz - thanks 😊
Just as a teaser for you all, version 2 of the grid is already pretty much laid out.
So, here's the scale of testing I'm looking at doing. Every block in that large red patch are things I have to check for between now and whenever V2 is published.