Symbian in Motion

This post is going to be short and sweet, just like the app. SmartLight by PhonePhreak Software (sorry for the handango link but the author does not appear to have a website) is a very useful utility that has been seeing a good amount of usage on my device lately. It performs only one function, but I’ve found it to be quite a useful function and I think that you guys will as well.

When running in the background, SmartLight will keep your device’s backlight on at all times on any screen other than standby. This means that while using an app or playing a game that involves some breaks in button-pushing, you no longer have to deal with the backlight going dim. It’s safe to say that we all have our backlight timeouts set relatively low in an effort to do everything we can to preserve every little bit of battery life. This great app allows you to keep the screen lit while reading/ watching/etc, but still take advantage of a short backlight timeout once you’re ready to let your device rest.

The app itself is wonderfully simple. So simple in fact that it doesn’t even include an icon! Once open, there are really only two options; hide the app and keep it running in the background (Options -> Hide), or exit the app to disable it.

I’ve been loving this app while using my browser, reading emails, reading long Jaikus and using a variety of different apps. It’s nice to not have to push a button every 15 seconds to bring the display brightness back up to full. The only complaint I’ve seen so far on forums is the lack of autostart support, but this of course is no longer an issue with any app thanks to the awesome free utility PowerBoot by Wireless Labs Technologies. I personally don’t autostart this app. Instead, I have it assigned to a hotkey using NStarter so I can quickly and easily enable/disable SmartLight any time I want from any screen.

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I’ve come across countless people posting pleas on various forums seeking what seems to me to be some very basic functionality; “I want to be able to quickly access my most frequently-texted contacts!” I think I may have even seen a request for this on the S60 Applications Wishlist (which is looking quite snazzy these days by the way :) ). It makes perfect sense to me and it sounds simple enough, but time continued to pass and no developers stepped forward to address this issue.

Sometimes the most useful apps you’ll find for S60 3rd devices come in very small packages and TextQuick is a perfect example of this. Mind-Flip’s freshman effort for the S60 3rd platform is in my opinion, an absolute necessity for our devices. It is wonderfully simple - as it should be - and it does exactly what it needs to do cleanly and efficiently.

The first time TextQuick opens it performs an analysis of the messages currently stored on your device, making note of the senders and recipients. TextQuick then presents you with your list of contacts ordered according to messaging popularity. Contacts that you exchange messages with most frequently are listed at the top and those with the least frequent correspondence are further down the list. Contacts with whom you have not exchanged any messages are then listed beneath in alphabetical order. There is also a search bar where you can type a contact name (first or last) and the list will drill down as you type.

Scrolling to your desired contact and pressing the select key will cause TextQuick to promptly open a new SMS window with your desired contact in the recipient field and your cursor will be ready to receive your message. It really couldn’t get any easier!

After running this app for the first time, TextQuick makes note of the last recorded message scanned. Subsequent launches prompt TextQuick to scan only for new messages that have been sent or received since the last scan. I find that it opens on my device in just about one second with no new messages present, and my initial scan of roughly 350 messages probably took somewhere between five and seven seconds. Yes, it’s that fast!

Currently TextQuick is available as a free open beta and I really can’t recommend it enough. During the beta, the author only asks that you email him with any feedback that you might have. I’m sure that I’m not in the minority when I say that I use my device for messaging as much as for voice calling, so an app that makes messaging easier quickly jumps up near the top of my list of ‘must-haves’. In fact if I had discovered TextQuick earlier in the day it surely would have been included in my “What’s on a Blogger’s Phone” post. :)

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A few fun memes have been flying around lately and I’ve been tagged with a few of them. The “8 Random Things” meme actually found its way to me several times but I think I did enough damage the first time I participated… ;)

The latest meme that I’ve been tagged with comes from Tarek of Symbiano-Tek as he asks “What’s on a Blogger’s phone?” - or what apps do I use most? Because of the nature of this blog I go through so many apps that it’s hard to keep track of them all. It would be VERY hard for me to say which apps are my favorites, but I can surely talk about a few that have been getting a lot of face time on my E61i these days.

• Jaiku - The Jaiku team was nice enough to include me in their closed beta program and I have to say that I am absolutely loving their app. At this point it is one of the few apps that is running on my device at all times - excluding background apps of course. If you’re not already on Jaiku definitely check it out - it is my social network of choice and in my opinion it’s leaps and bounds above others that i have sampled such as twitter and pownce. The latest beta should be released to the public very soon and when it is you will surely read about it here.
• Palringo - I am pretty much logged on to Palringo at all times; either on my mobile or on my PC. In fact, it’s the only IM app that I use regularly (aside from Skype for business). If you haven’t tried it yet, you’re crazy. Palringo gives you IM, group IM, vocal IM (aka Walkie-Talkie/PTT), group vocal IM, photo IM and group photo IM… all for free! Beyond that, the team behind Palringo is amazingly fast and responsive when it comes to development. They have so much in the pipeline right now - including one big announcement that I’ll be posting about in the coming week or two. :)
• S60 Internet Radio - At my office we try to limit unnecessary bandwidth consumption for a number of reasons and this was a big problem for me until I cam across the S60 Internet Radio app. This open source freeware app from Nokia lets me listen to all of my favorite internet radio stations over my EDGE/WLAN connection and I would be lost without it.
• Handy Weather - There are a few apps now that give you access to weather conditions and forecasts, but none that I enjoy as much as Handy Weather. I love the set up, the features, and the fact that I can glance at my screen saver and see the current and next day’s weather conditions.
• NStarter - I recently revewed NStarter here and I’ve been using and loving it ever since. NStarter gives you 12 hot key shortcuts that can be assigned to just about anything on your device - including language changes as of version 1.03!

Well, that’s enough for now I think. Beyond apps that just run in the background without any need for interaction (such as Best Profiles, IVCM, TimeBar, etc) the above definitely have been getting a tremendous amount of usage on my device lately. So with that I’ll tag Jonathan of atmaspheric endeavors (by way of Jaiku). I’m curious to read about what Jonathan uses most on his N95 and if/how he accomplishes similar functionality on his new iPhone!

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Was it a result of the public outcry? Was it all a big misunderstanding due to a mis-worded preliminary announcement? Is Bounty really the quicker picker-upper? We may never know answers to any of those questions but from the looks of the new statement on the Symbian Signed homepage, we all have done a superb job in getting through to them:

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Web site maintenance and Developer Certificates

Please be aware that the Symbian Signed web site is undergoing a hardware upgrade to resolve the performance issues that are present on the site currently, this will be complete early next week. The issues that we have had have forced us to disable Developer Certificates for users. This is to reduce the load that there currently is on the hardware. We understand that users will require Developer Certificates before the hardware installation is completed next week and this is done by the following process:
If you require Developer Certificates for testing an application you are developing please send an email with the following information to symbiansigned@symbian.com
Subject: Developer Certificate enable request:
User name
First Name Last Name
Application Name
Application Version
Company Name
Company Address
Please only send this request if you urgently need Developer Certificates and cannot wait until next week when ALL accounts will have this functionality enabled. If you are a Platinum Partner of Symbian please contact your partner manager.

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The second to last sentence is the interesting part. Apparently they will be restoring ALL accounts rather than just developer accounts as we were pretty clearly told by their first announcement. This means that once their maintenance is complete we all should be able to continue getting out developer certs.

What ever the case was, if this is true then we all owe Symbian Signed a ‘thank you’ for listening to the people who keep them in business - the customers.

A big thanks to the friendly, warm and fuzzy mooninite for pointing out the new message and inspiring me to appreciate the value of literacy. :)

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Now that Skyestream has conquered the S60 3rd full screen caller ID image/video ringtone market with their superior product Sykecaller PRO, they have set their sights on another aspect of mobile communications - MMS, but with a twist! No this isn’t your grandpa’s MMS we’re talking about here.

YOYAP! is a fun new tool that lets you create customized 3D movies (in 3gp format) starring a wide range of characters, add your own audio message (voice, music, or anything else), change the background image, and send the finished product via MMS or bluetooth. You can even control the character’s facial gestures (eyes, eyebrows, blinking, etc)! The character’s mouth will automatically move in relative accordance with the audio that you add and you can also set the character’s overall mood to match your message (happy, sad or angry). If all of that isn’t enough for you, YOYAP! can also engage with voice calls and provide live animation that mimics the audio pattern of the caller on the other end of the line so that it looks like the character is talking to you! Long story short, YOYAP! packs a whole lot of punch into a fun little package.

To start things off we’ll look at the characters in YOYAP! The app itself comes with one character included but there are several additional characters that you can add to the app and have some fun with. Once the app is installed on your device you can purchase additional characters (at 50% off!) at the link in the previous sentence, and you can download them from the Skyestream site or directly onto your mobile using the download links within the app.

Once you have your desired character there are a few different customizations that you can use. The app comes with several different background settings to choose from and as mentioned before, you can also adjust your character’s mood.

Looking at the Movie maker portion of YOYAP! everything is presented very logically, making movie creation quite easy. The current selected character will be used for your new movie and the app walks you nicely through each step of the creation process. To start off YOYAP! prompts you to record or import previously recorded audio, then you can add some facial gestures while your audio is played back and the character ‘yaps’ along with it.

The various available facial gestures such as eye movement, eyebrow movement and blinking are control by the directional pad and a few other buttons. All gesture controls are explained in the user manual available for download on Skystream’s site. The next step will allow you to preview your movie and then go back to adjust any of the previous components if desired. Once you’re happy with your movie, you can save it on your phone memory or your MMC. YOYAP! then walks you through the sending process - either by MMS or bluetooth - and your masterpiece is delivered. Remember YOYAP! movies are created in 3gp format so your recipient does not need the app to play the movies. Just about every mobile phone these days can play 3gp movies.

The second main function of the app is the Live Animation feature. When enabled, YOYAP! will run in the background and open automatically when a voice call is engaged. Your current selected character and customizations will still apply to Live Animation and it is enabled and disabled from within the app settings.

It’s quite an interesting experience putting your mother on speaker phone and watching her talk as a “Rastaman”. :)

As if I even have to say it, YOYAP! is a very unique app that makes excellent use of the S60 3rd platform. You can get really creative with it and have some good fun with your friends. There are also a wide variety of characters to choose from and I’ll enjoy the next time I speak to my boss on my mobile while he talks to me through the lips of Phil McCrackin! Beyond the 50% discount currently being offered on the price of each character, Skyestream is also offering a 10% discount on YOYAP! itself. Of course there is a free time-limited trial available for you to have a play before you commit.

Make a particular note of the list of compatible devices. While YOYAP! will work perfectly on most S60 3rd devices, there are a few Eseries devices such as my E61i that are not supported in the current version (3.00) due to audio codec limitations. I’m sure that Skyestream will have these issues sorted soon though and I can confirm that the app worked wonderfully on the other devices I tested it on. If you’re ready to have some fun with interactive MMS and live animation, head on over to the YOYAP! product page and give the free trial a whirl.

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