Symbian in Motion

Since the dawn of Flashlite and S60, convergence enthusiasts have waited for an application that would allow them to fully access the Holy Grail of time wasting and entertainment - YouTube.

Whilst Flashlite 2.1 gave us optimism and a taste of what’s to come we could only anticipate the days when we would have full access to sites such as Youtube on our S60 device. With the release of Flashlite 3 for developers it was only inevitable something would come along to finally give us what we have craved for.

Samir Oueldi gave us YTPlayer which was reviewed here a while back and showed us the way. It gave us access to YouTube but with restrictions. Whilst YTPlayer is a very good application and can be seen as the catalyst, emTube simply expands on this and takes it a few steps further. Created by Sebastian Jedruszkiewicz, it has full integration of the same features you would have when browsing the YouTube website itself and direct access to the huge catalogue of videos available on YouTube directly on your S60 handset.

Moving on…

Starting up emTube brings you to the main screen which gives you the options to search, view featured, top rated, most viewed and your favourites. Most of these are self explanatory do what exactly what they say. Selecting any one of the options will show you a thumbnail list (set to 5 at a time by default) of the results along with their ratings, title and author. Highlighting any of the results and hitting options pulls up a menu list of options available to the user which include the ability to view, download, check the details of the actual clip, add to favourites, find other related videos and find other user videos by this author.

The most interesting out of these options are the details and download. It’s advisable to view the details of the clips before starting to view it as obviously streaming videos is bandwidth intensive and also good to know how long or large a clip maybe before opting to view it. I’m glad to say emTube does this perfectly as it gives you a very detailed description of the actual clip. Title, Author, Duration, View Count and Average Rating are all included, but what is missing is the actual size of the clip, something which would be a welcomed option to have.

Playing and downloading videos is extremely easy. There are two options: the ability to download and view videos from YouTube or play a local file saved on your handset / Memory Card. The latter is done via the addition of flv recognition, another great feature that is ideal for those without a fast connection available to them on the go so they can view their clips downloaded or transferred using a desktop computer. I would advise that users make use of a WiFi connection when viewing clips from YouTube on the handset as even HSDPA takes a while to load longer clips and view them.

Whilst viewing clips there are some cool OSD controls that show the volume level, progress bar and pause and play buttons. Aesthetically these are very good added features as they give the user a good understanding and control over what is happening. One of the greatest features is the use of the built in accelerometer (Nokia N95 only) which changes the orientation of the screen depending on the angle of the handset, seriously cool! It’s great to see applications making use of this.

One thing I would like to bring to attention is the fact this application comes with its own user guide in PDF format and a list of bug fixes - a fantastic touch, as this gives you the option to know exactly how the development is going and also understand and troubleshoot if you are having problems. emTube does a fantastic job of both providing what the user wants and showing us that great developers can bring wonderful applications to the S60 platform if given the proper tools. What’s even better is that the application is FREEWARE! Note however that emTube is currently unsigned so you will still need to sign the application yourself.

You can donate to Sebastian Jedruszkiewicz via Paypal if you like this application, and he deserves it in my opinion! You can also report bugs and errors to him via the emTube homepage.

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Sorry for the slow week guys but I’ve been swamped. I know tons of readers love getting their hands on free themes so here’s some restitution for you… ;)

Flawed by giambi (SVG, includes new icon pack and default version)

Lights 2 by ICEman (includes new icon pack and default version)

leopard2 by niimai (SVG)

montagne by niimai (SVG)

And what would a theme post be without a new gem from from Taieb??

Blue Sunshine by Taieb (SVG, includes new icon pack and default version)

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Now that the rotateMe beta has gone public, Samir has started sending out NokMote to the first round of donors. Woo hoo! If you’ve been living under a rock recently, NokMote allows you to control your N95’s d-pad by gesturing in the appropriate direction with your phone. Here’s a quick vid for your viewing pleasure:

Actually I have to say that since I’m not a gamer I’m really not excited about this one. Outside of gaming, the app is a bit of a pain in the ass in my opinion for a few reasons - namely because you have to keep your phone perfectly horizontal to the ground with the screen facing up in order to use it. In day to day use, the app is little more than a novelty. Using it with apps like music player, gallery etc is pointless because as soon as you move the phone away from the stationary position, you’re pressing up/down/etc and your phone goes crazy. You can enable and disable it with a hotkey shortcut (pen + c, I wish he had chosen something that wasn’t already used by NStarter) which is nice because once you’ve exited the game you’re playing, your menu highlight will be going crazy again until you disable the app.

I know a lot of people have been waiting for this app, which is why I’m posting. Kudos to Samir because A LOT of gamers are clamoring for this app and it will deliver as expected. If you plan to use this app realistically for anything more than gaming though, you’re going to be a bit disappointed I’m afraid. Either way, if you’ve donated for NokMote then start checking your inbox! If not, the public free release should be along soon enough.

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If you’re lucky enough to currently be enrolled in Psiloc’s closed beta of Locatik then you should already know that the latest version 0.91 is now available for download. What you might not know is that while the beta is still closed, you now have the ability to invite friends!

Simply go to the Locatik site and click the “Invite” link that now resides in the upper right-hand corner. Enter the email address of a friend you’d like to invite and they’ll be hot on your trail before you know it. If you have no idea what I’m talking about here, let me explain a bit about this cool upcoming app. Locatik (pronounced LOW-KAA-TIK) is an app that I spoke about briefly here while I was at the Symbian Smartphone Show.

Locatik lets you make use of your S60 device’s GPS to display your whereabouts to your friends. The app can broadcast your coordinates publicly or privately in the background on your device. You can also browse your friends and see if they’re nearby. Through a wonderful Google maps integration you can also log onto their site (www.locatik.com) and view all of your friends on the map. Zoom, apply satellite view, etc. The app provides some additional features and plenty more is planned. At any rate, if you’re in the beta then start inviting your S60-wielding pals and if you’re not currently in the beta then start looking for friends who are!

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Today marks the end of an interesting week for me; it was the first full week in a long time that I’ve gone without even powering up an S60 device. Since I first took delivery of an N80 about a year ago I’ve been through several non-S60 devices. I even enjoyed using a few of them (like the HTC Touch). Even still, I never went more than a day without an S60 phone and typically carried one along with whatever non-S60 phone I was playing with at the time.

For the past seven days however, I have not even looked at an S60 device. Instead, my daily carrier has been an iPhone - and I like it. Now before you exit this window and make a promise to yourself that you’ll never visit SiMo again, hear me out…

I equate going from the N95-3 to the iPhone to taking a good vacation. Ideally, a good vacation brings to somewhere beautiful and exotic. You can rest, relax and basically shut your brain off while you unwind from all of the tasks and trivialities that you deal with in your every-day life. From time to time of course you can explore a few new things and exert yourself to some extent but overall you’re there to chill out and soak it all in. Such is the iPhone.

The iPhone is a true beauty inside and out. The user interface (UI) is a masterpiece - a work of art. In my opinion there is no widely-available mobile UI that even comes close to achieving the look, fluidity and wow-factor that Apple has created. It is simple, elegant and incredibly attractive. Outside, the iPhone is sleek and sexy. It has a great weight to it and the feel is phenomenal. To compare the feel and build of the N95 to the iPhone is like comparing a 1998 Honda Civic to a factory-fresh Mercedes S-Class.

Vacations can’t last forever though and the N95 is represented by every-day life in this analogy. My life is fast-paced. I’m constantly working on something different - typically several things simultaneously - and I need a wide range of knowledge and skills to accomplish the many tasks I face every day. Versatility is equally important as I need to be able to shift gears on a whim and go from blogging an article, to finishing a presentation, to closing a new partnership deal, to researching a potential new market; all at a moment’s notice. To cap it all off, I have to be very good at everything I do in order to maintain my desirability. Such is the N95.

The N95 is the jack of all trades. It has an amazingly wide set of features and the versatile S60 platform holding it all together. When you find something it can’t do the odds are good that there’s a great third party app that can take the phone in a new direction and accommodate your needs. Even though my iPhone was jailbroken and packed with apps within the first hour of being in my possession, the majority of current app offerings are relatively trivial and extremely limited in functionality and interfacing capabilities. Once the Apple SDK is absorbed my the masses of developers waiting in line to issue “legal” iPhone apps we might see some change in this but for the time being the iPhone’s lack of flexibility is a huge barrier.

Over the coming week I’ll be publishing a multi-part series comparing the N95 to the iPhone. Keep in mind that I am most certainly not doing this in an effort to say that one phone is better than the other. This is merely a comparison between two very popular high-end mobile phones that people love to put next to each other and bicker about. While most will continue to argue over apples and oranges (no pun intended) I am going stick to what I do best and give you as much detail as possible about the few areas where these two great devices do intersect. Perhaps it was a bit odd to start with what most would consider a conclusion but I’ve done this intentionally so as not to be misleading. The title includes “vs” but this is a friendly fight with no losers, only winners. Some of the areas I cover may be things you’re already aware of and others might just surprise you. I hope you enjoy the installments to come and if there are specific things you’d like me to cover please do leave a comment and I’ll do my best.

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