| May 2001
 Opinion: Symbian Seminar and the 9210 Posted Saturday, May 26, 2001 by Rafe
The talk itself was excellent. It did not particuarly focus on Symbian products, but the ideas behind the mobile internet. That said the speaker was keen to point out that the mobile internet is what we make it, each person will have a different interpretation. Symbian goal is to help move towards a system where some of the best mobile services will be available. The best (or even a necessary requirement) way to achieve this is through open standards, thus explaining one of Symbian core beliefs (in supporting open standard such as Bluetooth and SyncML.
Some of the services highlighted were those such as location based services that could be used to get tourist information, maps, call for help automatically (e.g. when your car breaks down) and many more. Also mentioned were Voice SMS services, and other new communication services. Also the idea of personal profiles (setting your phone so people know where you are, and therefore how to contact you (e.g. in meeting so use SMS). This could be linked in with personalisation (so your phone could reflect your moods). All of this was very interesting and I shall try and describe it in more detail in the write up.
As part of the talk we were shown a short Ericsson promotional video with a concept device showing off some of these services. If we see something like that soon... well lets just say it will become an everyday device.
Interestingly the speaker also suggested while that 3G and 2.5G woudl help with these services, they were by no means prerequisites, and instead lack of handsets and incompatiable systems were the main problems.
I also got to see and briefly use the Nokia 9210. It is a really nice machine. The screen is amazing, and the usability (which with the lack of a touchscreen has been a concern to some) is very good too. I did not notice that there wasn't a toucscreen to use! It also smaller than I realised - its not that much bigger than you standard Nokia mobile - just a bit longer. Its slightly thicker than the Series 5, but about the same length, and perhaps slightly less wide. All in all it is a very machine and I am now getting more and more tempted by it. Guess I'll need a job - any offers :) ?!
The final seminar in the series is being held on Thursday 7th June 2001 and is on 'Operating Systems for the Wireless Information Device', the speaker is Billy Gibson, Senior Technical Consultant at Symbian.
Source:/epochelp/
 Nokia 9210 Availability Posted Tuesday, May 22, 2001 by Rafe
Originally general availability was expected to be June 2001. However this has been pushed back to Q3 2001. Orange and BT cellnet both say that the phone probably will not be available to August. The phone is currently undergoing testing on the Orange network (Orange supports HSCD and the testing is extensive - they will not use the phone unless it works well with thier network). Intial indications suggest a price point of between �399 and �499 depending on the contract. Most mobile phone shops have now stopped selling the 9110 and are telling customers to wait for the 9210. Some sites are now offering the 9210 for pre-order:
http://www.mobileshop.co.uk/comingsoon/index.htm
http://www.clove.co.uk/products.asp?product=NK-9210
http://www.expansys.com/product.asp?code=NOKIA-9210
Other sites and even people on e-bay are offering the product for sale. Do not buy one of these phones it will be a beta pre-production model. Buy from a company you trust once the phone is released.
In Germany the 9210 will be sold with Concord digital photo camera (however quantities of the camera are limited). The 9210 will therefore be available without the camera, and later the camera is expected to be available as a seperate item. First indications suggest
a price point of 2199 DM (with camera) and 1949 DM (without the camera).
Please note all this information is subject to change and I can not guarantee its accuracy! (Thanks to LW for some of this info).
The Asian version of the phone should be available in a similar timeframe, although there are suggestions it could be a little longer.
Source:/epochelp
 Symbian update Paper on Generic Technology Posted Sunday, May 20, 2001 by Rafe
This update actually took place nearly 5 days ago, but I hadn't got round to posting it until now...
Symbian have updated their paper on ER6's Generic Technology. Although this paper is very technical it very worthwhile for developers trying to get a grasp with developing for both Crystal and Quartz. Only read it when you can be sure to concentrate for a while! It has important details on the implementation of various technologies such as bluetooth.
Symbian’s Generic Technology (GT) is the common core of APIs and technology which is shared between all Symbian reference designs. GT is at the heart of the Quartz, Crystal, and Pearl reference designs, and includes the kernel, middleware for communications, data management and graphics, the lower levels of the GUI framework, and application engines.
Read the paper at: http://www.symbiandevnet.com/techlib/techcomms/techpapers/papers/v6/over/gt2/index.html
Source:http://www.symbiandevnet.com
 Free Symbian Seminar on Using the Mobile Internet Posted Sunday, May 20, 2001 by Rafe
This Thursday (Thursday 24th May) Symbian are holding a free Seminar in Cambridge on 'Using the Mobile Internet'. Giving the presentation will be Simon Garth, General Manager, Symbian Cambridge.
All lectures begin at 7pm (tea and coffee will be served at 6.45pm), and are one hour long. Afterwards, beginnning at 8pm, an informal reception provides an opportunity for attendees to discuss further topics and questions with Symbian staff members.
The lectures will be taking place in the Diamond Room of Selwyn College, Grange Road, Cambridge CB3 9DQ.
This promises to be the least technical of the lectures taking place and should be well worth attending.
Source:http://www.symbian.com
 Details of five news pieces of software uploaded Posted Sunday, May 20, 2001 by Rafe
I have been busy this weekend writing a few pieces in between feeling ill. These include a comprehensive review of Monnaie from Kylom as well as some details on the new Nokia games.
Monnaie is a currency converter from the weel know ER5 software producer Kylom. The review linked below has more than 25 screenshots and as one of the first ER6 apps I have personally been able to test shows how ER6 apps integrate and work on the new operating system.
Nokia early this week announced several new games. Linked below are pages with a short description and a screenshot from each game.
Added comprehensive review with screenshots of Monnaiefrom Kylom. Added the Nokia Games Bounce, TriplePop, Mobile Soccer and Golf
Source:/epochelp/
 Get talking in the new Forum! Posted Monday, May 14, 2001 by Rafe
All About ER6 now has its own forum where you can post your thoughts or question on ER6, the Nokia 9210 or anything that takes your fancy.
Please feel free to post anything you like, although I would espeically appreciate feedback on the new site design.
You can visit the forum here /epochelp/er6/board/
Current topics include the Nokia 9210 touchscreen and feedback on the sites new design.
Source:/epochelp/
 Nokia 9210 Web Round Up Posted Monday, May 14, 2001 by Rafe
With the Nokia 9210 soon to be availble in the shops it seems that other websites are finally taking some notice of the new machine. I've been blowing its trumpet for a while (although I still think that some of the other ER6 devices coming are potentially even more exciting).
Some people have been getting beta versions of the new machine and posting comments about it (I hope thet are not breaking any NDA's!). Unfortunately I'm not one of them, however we do have a first look at the new machine coming soon. In the mean time check out the reviews from the website below.
The first is My Communicator which is a site dedicated to the Nokia Communicator series (9110, and 9210). They have a great 'user test' with some good images including some of EPOC Connect 6. They also have some other interesting features on the 9210. Check it out! Second up is EpocCity who have posted another first look review. The article doesn't have much information that we don't already know about, but does promise some future articles. There is some information on the screen which the author says is even better than the IPAQ's, and the battery performace doesn't seem to bad. He also comments on the success of syncronisng with Outlook 2000.
Visit:
http://my-communicator.com/9210/review_eng.htm
and
http://www.epoccity.com/reviewshow.php3?reviewid=300038
If you want more details on some of the applications I suggest you check the Crystal screenshots where you can get a comprehensive look at the software available. Both of these previews do this, but not in as much depth.
See: /epochelp/er6/crystal/screenshots/myscreenshots.htm
Finally if you want breaking news like this deleivered to your inbox remember to sign up to the mailing list
See: /epochelp/er6/site/mail.htm
Source:/epochelp/
Our friend Irma - a device for the 9210 Posted Saturday, May 12, 2001 by Rafe
Extract from our Irma Page:
Flander have announced this rather interesting device for the 9210. Basically the device looks like an IR pod, but its not. Although it does receive data over IR the intention is that the device then transmits this via a VGA cable to some sort of display device (either a monitor or a projector). It works by transmitting .jpg file (JPEG) to the box and then these are sent to the display device.
The unit comes with software to enable converison of Powerpoint software, but many other presentation packages also allow outputting to .jpg files of individual slides. The purpose of the device is to enable the Nokia 9210 to run presentations. This means you no longer need to take a laptop or other computer along with you. It seems most ingenious if somewhat limted to me. (e.g. why couldn't you run it off the serial port [or indeed keep the iR] and have the box convert it to a signal so it could be used as a true VGA output - then you could have constant updates from the 9210 - something similar to the Psion Series 7 GA PC Card?). Having said that this is a very nice device... and it weighs only 175g and is less than 10cm x 10cm and is about an inch thick!
Read more now!
Source:/epochelp/
 Site Redesign and new URL Posted Saturday, May 12, 2001 by Rafe
epochelp.com design has been updated - take a look around and tell mw what you think. Vote in the new site poll and get talking in the new forum! We've also tried to make navigation easy. Hope it works!
Our new URL is /epochelp/ - yes that's right we now a .com! Woo hoo! You can also use the http://www.epochelp.co.uk/ address.
There's lots of new stuff on All About ER6 too check it
out.
Source:
ER6: New Design, New Content and New URL Posted Saturday, May 12, 2001 by Rafe
All About ER6 design has been updated - take a look around and tell mw what you think. Vote in the new site poll and get talking in the new forum! We've also tried to make navigation easy. Hope it works!
Our new URL is /epochelp/er6/ - yes that's right we now a .com! Woo hoo! You can also use the http://www.epochelp.co.uk/er6/ address.
While I was redesigning there was plenty happening and there lots of new content. We have 3 new software items in Crystals software pages. A piece about Irma. And some other small updates which you can catch in the site update boxes on either the main page or the Crystal page. Let me know what you think.
There is more on the way two with details of yet more multimedia stuff, some developers and user comments and a whole slew of links. Keep checking back!
Source:/epochelp
TI announces OMAP™-based multimedia extension Posted Saturday, May 12, 2001 by Rafe
We will have a few pages on this soon, but for now please read the press release. Basically TI has released some programming extensions that make the Symbian platform even more multimedia friendly. They are free to use too, so we should see many more rich media applications.
New Plug-ins to Symbian Software Development Kits Offer Seamless Access to Real-time DSP Performance
DALLAS (May 4, 2001) -- Driving the development of emerging 2.5 and 3G wireless applications, Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) (NYSE:TXN) today announced the availability of a new TI OMAP™-based multimedia extension that can be used with Symbian's software development kits. The new plug-ins enable developers designing real-time applications such as multimedia messaging, video and Internet audio to take advantage of the multimedia capability in the Symbian software platform enhanced by TI's fully-open, digital signal processor (DSP)-based OMAP platform.
"TI's new extensions with the industry-proven Symbian SDKs will accelerate the introduction of multimedia capabilities for 2.5 and 3G applications," said Jouko H�yrynen, Vice President, Strategy and Business Development, Nokia Mobile Phones. "Symbian and TI have created a robust value proposition for developers who are creating multimedia applications that require the real-time performance of TI's DSP-based OMAP platform."
Developers Gain Seamless Access to Optimized DSP Algorithms
Building on Symbian's platform offering for next generation mobile phones, the new OMAP-based plug-ins further enables Symbian's licensees and independent software vendors to easily enrich their applications with multimedia-rich features for Symbian / TI based devices. With these extensions, developers can also leverage the best-in-class performance and power efficiency of TI's DSPs, by utilizing high-level application program interfaces (APIs) that provide seamless access to optimized DSP algorithms.
The TI extensions to be released will include multimedia service APIs for applications such as video, speech and audio services. Addressing the demand for video services, TI today offers an MPEG4 decoding API extension for the Symbian C++ SDK and is scheduled to follow with speech and audio API extensions such as MP3 and speech recognition in the third quarter of 2001.
"Having delivered our open, software platform to licensees, Symbian is working closely with partners to drive the creation of thousands of innovative software solutions for Symbian based devices," said Mark Edwards, Executive Vice President of Marketing and Sales for Symbian. "TI's plug-ins for our software developer kits will further drive the creation of compelling multimedia applications and services targeted for Symbian / TI based devices."
The Symbian platform is an open, mobile operating system designed for wireless information devices that combine voice communications with data capabilities. Licensed by the world's leading handset manufacturers, devices based on the combination of Symbian's technology and TI's DSP-based OMAP architecture are due to ship in the second half of 2001.
Introduced in May 1999, TI's DSP-based OMAP architecture is a fully open platform capable of supporting all wireless industry standards. Delivering the required performance and low power to enable real-time communications-based applications, the OMAP platform is quickly becoming a defacto standard for 2.5 and 3G wireless devices as with manufacturers such as Nokia, Ericsson and Sony. TI's OMAP platform is also supported by a broad network of developers who design popular applications including multimedia, security, m-commerce, gaming and location based services.
"Today's announcement is an extension of our strategy to enable the development of 2.5 and 3G next-generation wireless applications," said Alain Mutricy, OMAP platform general manager for TI. "Moving ahead, TI will continue to work with its customers and partners to facilitate software development efforts for new applications for a variety of end equipments."
Availability
Software Developer Kits for the Symbian platform can be downloaded from http://www.symbiandevnet.com/
TI's OMAP extensions to Symbian's Quartz SDK can be downloaded from www.ti.com/sc/omapforepoc
Source:http://www.symbian.com/News/2001/pr010504.html
 elata and Symbian alliance Posted Saturday, May 12, 2001 by Rafe
London, April 30th, 2001 - elata plc, a UK based software company, today announced it has formed a strategic partnership with Symbian to provide an information management solution to enable network operators to control and distribute data services and applications to Symbian based Smartphones and Communicators.
The elata senses platform will be supported through Symbian's Technology Partner Program with both companies working closely together to provide an intuitive model for provisioning information and data services to next generation handsets and Symbian-based devices.
Java based, elata senses supports all device-side platforms including Symbian and the elata senses Server has been designed to integrate seamlessly within an operator's existing IT infrastructure. As a highly scalable operator-grade framework, elata senses models the consumer and enterprise subscriber base by creating a hierarchy of proposition groups, individual users, their handsets and devices. This is controlled by a graphical interface that can be run concurrently across the network and is used to update information, user or device changes through drag and drop technology.
The elata senses platform enables the operator to easily profile and segment the subscriber base and manage the delivery of targeted information such as news services, games, enterprise information, advertisements, promotions and applications to the operator's consumer and enterprise customers alike, irrespective of the device or the user's location.
Jeremy Copp, VP Business Relationships, Symbian, said: "To compliment the Symbian platform offering, we look to partner with market leading technology suppliers that give our customers competitive edge. elata's information management platform elata senses, is an example of value-add technology for network operators, which will help Symbian to lead the way for its customers and the new generation of Symbian based Smartphones."
Matt Hooper, director of marketing and customer support at elata, commented: "Multi-channel delivery of billable data and applications is a key constituent of a network operator's offering for their enterprise and personal customers. By partnering with Symbian, we are able to offer organisations a platform that provides a management framework for profiling and delivering data services and applications to Symbian enabled mobile devices, without necessarily having to use a browser portal. This allows the deployment of locally installed data whether web content, whole applications, files or multimedia."
http://www.symbian.com/News/2001/pr010430.html
Source:http://www.symbian.com
Free Symbian Seminar on Mobile Java for Wireless Devices Posted Wednesday, May 9, 2001 by Rafe
Tomorrow (Thursday 10th May) Symbian are holding a free Seminar in Cambridge on 'Mobile Java for Wireless Devices'. Giving the presentation will be Jonathan Allin, Senior Developer Consultant at Symbian.
All lectures begin at 7pm (tea and coffee will be served at 6.45pm), and are one hour long. Afterwards, beginnning at 8pm, an informal reception provides an opportunity for attendees to discuss further topics and questions with Symbian staff members.
The lectures will be taking place in the Diamond Room of Selwyn College, Grange Road, Cambridge CB3 9DQ.
Source:http://www.symbian.com
 EMame upgraded to Version 1.2 Posted Wednesday, May 9, 2001 by Rafe
EMame is the port of MAME to EPOC32.
MAME stands for Multiple Arcade Machine Emulation and supports over 1500 classic arcade games.
This version of EMame brings you 592 free games to your Psion device, most of which now support sound.
See http://www.yipton.demon.co.uk for more details and download.
New in version 1.2:
- Massive performance improvement on the Series 7 (1.5 x faster) and Netbook, less so for the Series 5mx. I simply compiled EMame using the gcc toolchain in ER6, so I could finally use some decent optimisation options. Apparently they are more effective for the Series 7 than the 5mx. On the Series 7, games run at full speed with almost perfect sound.
- Enabled sound by default on the Series 7.
Source:http://www.yipton.demon.co.uk/
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