I am Effie Vraka, looking after the Multimedia Applications on the Symbian platform. Today I have some great news to share, as Ixonos have been AC (Architecture Council) -approved as the new package owners of the Symbian Image and Video Editor packages.

The two apps play an important role in the multimedia user experience as they complete the chain between creating and sharing content through your mobile: take photos/videos on your handset, edit them fast and easily on the spot and share them instantly with your friends via the MMS/email/your favourite social media app!

The significance of this announcement is even greater, as this is the first time packages have changed hands in Symbian Foundation and is setting the precedent.

Ixonos is regarded one of the most valued Symbian members, having contributed important features multiple times to the platform including Major Contribution Proposal to remove double tapping from platform applications, mini qwerty-improvements study and dial screen improvements.

They had been looking for an opportunity to own and manage part of the platform code; Ilkka jumped on the opportunity when I first approached him at SEE 2009 to discuss the two packages’ potential ownership. But let me give you some more background:

Ilkka Syrjälä works as Symbian Technology Manager at Ixonos. He is responsible for company visibility, strategy, competence, coordination and critical project/venture follow-up regarding the Symbian technology area; one of his key tasks is to increase co-operation between Ixonos and Symbian Foundation.

Mikael Laine is going to act as a PO for the two packages. He is a Software Architect at Ixonos; in his past he has also worked as Assistant Teacher and Lecturer at the University of Turku. He holds a Master of Science degree from the University of Turku, where he studied CS, Mathematics, Physics, educational science. He is currently working on a PhD.

In order to consider what this opportunity would entail, Mikael formed a group in Ixonos to do an assessment on the current state of the packages and a gap analysis. The previous PO, Senthil Ganesan from Nokia, helped with all the necessary information and knowledge transfer to ensure a smooth handover. Following is a short interview I had with Ilkka and Mikael about this venture:

Ixonos is making a significant allocation of resources to the Symbian Foundation. You seem to be embedding SF open source tasks into your business model – is that how you see it?
Ilkka: Open source software has an important role in our business strategy.  Symbian Foundation with the open Symbian platform offers us one way to collaborate more closely and also expand our expertise.

What exactly have you committed to with the Image and Video editor packages?
Mikael: Our team is studying ways to make improvements to the image and video editor application. More information about this will be added on the Image Editor and Video Editor landing pages.

Tell us a little bit more about Ixonos and its business aspirations in the areas you have taken on as PO.
Mikael: Ixonos is striving to become an internationally recognized and respected solution provider brand. Our most important development areas are innovation and solution capability, quality and cost-efficiency. We want to be a known and trusted player in the Symbian field. We’ve had deep and intricate involvement with the Symbian OS through our customer projects, and we are now seeking to leverage that in a product ownership role in Symbian Foundation.

Do you, as a company, have a long history of involvement in open source development or are you still feeling your way?
Ilkka: Ixonos has offered customer specific solutions utilizing open source technology platforms and components for years now, so the involvement in open source development and communities is familiar to us.

Other members might find it useful to hear about the process – how did you come to the decision and what have been the business steps in identifying what can and should be developed within the packages?
Ilkka: The decision to co-operate with Symbian Foundation and influence the development of Symbian platform has always been there. Image and video editor applications in their current state are almost ready, so we have a good baseline to continue the development towards some innovative solutions.

Mikael: We’ve had some great ideas brewing at the level of individual developers in the past, and this trend seems to accelerate as an actual channel for those innovations is provided. Some of those ideas can now slowly find their way in to the actual Symbian Foundation packages.

And so what we can expect to see emerge from that in S^3 and S^4 ?
Mikael: Symbian^4 is still in a bit of a blur for us, but for Symbian^3 we are aiming to add some drawing functionality to the image editor. I would like to encourage people to visit the idea we posted on the Symbian Ideas page and leave their comments on it. We are also trying to identify ways to improve the applications’ UX. The ideas page or the forum are ideal ways to exchange thoughts.

How has the handover gone from Nokia?
Mikael: It’s been smooth. There is not much to do since most of the material is available from Symbian Foundation and the package backlog was empty. The first task for us is to transfer the source code to EPL license, as the Symbian platform is soon going fully-open.

Are you happy with the support you are getting from the Symbian Foundation?
Ilkka: Definitely. Symbian Foundation has done enormously well in keeping everybody informed and pushing things forward.

Does the open source model have wider implications for how you do business? I mean, is it driving a broader openness strategy?
Ilkka: Openness is one of our key business principles and we promote this value constantly with different stakeholders. We are, and have been, interacting with open source communities – such as Symbian Foundation – and are looking to increase this in the future. We continue to promote the openness now as the role of PO, and encourage the community to involve both in terms of improvement ideas, forum discussions and source code contribution.