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Official and unofficial happenings

Register for the 2nd Symbian Japan Forum now!

Aug 25th by Michiko Nagai

The premier Japanese networking event for the Symbian ecosystem, the 2nd Symbian Japan Forum, will be held on Tuesday, 12th October 2010 in Tokyo.

The agenda will include presentations by NTT DOCOMO, Fujitsu and other core Japanese members, as well as two presentations from Nokia. These will be the introduction of the Nokia N8, the latest Nokia N-series handset and the first Symbian^3 device, and an introduction to Qt, a cross platform UI framework.

Please take this opportunity to learn all about the latest enhancements to the Symbian platform, and hear about the Japanese market for Symbian-based products.

Registration is required for attendance, and the deadline is 16:00 GMT on Wednesday, 15th September. For more details on the event and registration, please visit http://www.symbian.org/japanforum2.

See you in Tokyo!

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SXSW 2011 PanelPicker is now open

Aug 19th by elisabethgettelman

March next year may seem like a long time away, but if you’re planning to attend SXSW 2011 in Austin, Texas, then now is the time to start thinking that far ahead. The SXSW PanelPicker is open between now and Friday, August 27th for you to select which proposals you want to see at the event.

Symbian has submitted a proposal of its own, Mobile Apps – When New Technologies Go Mainstream, which, if you like the sound of, we’d encourage you to vote for. In this presentation we will be talking about the recent explosion of location-based services and augmented reality apps. You’ll be able to hear from the founders of top apps in these areas and how they were able to predict the popularity of these trends several years ago and create compelling apps that leverage the still cutting-edge technology. Read more »

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Setting Java™ Applications Free with JRT

Aug 12th by aarnos

We’re Jyrki Aarnos, package owner for the Mobile Runtime for Java™ Applications (JRT), and Aleksi Uotila, product manager for JRT within Nokia. Together with a talented team at Nokia we’ve been working to create an open runtime for Java applications.

Jyrki Aarnos

Recently, Nokia contributed the JRT to the Symbian Foundation and it is available in the latest Symbian^3 PDK. This means that developers can write Java applications for Symbian^3 devices, like the Nokia N8. More importantly, the JRT is now open source so the community can modify and add to the JRT implementation under the terms of the Symbian Foundation’s EPL license.

The JRT contribution is compatible with shipping Symbian devices and fully supports the Symbian^3 feature set, including hardware accelerated graphics. The contribution of JRT includes the following open source API implementations: Read more »

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Vodafone Mobile Clicks 2010

Aug 5th by andrewkl

This year’s Vodafone Mobile Clicks competition is now open, and they’re looking to find and develop the best mobile internet start-ups, including those from the Symbian community. If you’ve got an innovative mobile internet idea that utilises the Symbian platform, or any great mobile internet idea for that matter, you could be in with a chance of winning the €150,000 prize.

The competition is open to any start-up from the Netherlands, Portugal or the United Kingdom with a great idea for a mobile site, service or application. The closing date for applications is midnight, August 22nd, 2010 and the winner will be chosen at the PICNIC Festival in Holland on September 24th, 2010.

For more details on the entry requirements, judging process and criteria, or to enter your company, please visit www.vodafonemobileclicks.com.

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SEE 2010 – Call for Speakers

Aug 4th by toddbsymbian

We are excitedly preparing for SEE 2010 in Amsterdam and Symbian is looking for inspired individuals to bring the industry’s hottest topics to life at the event. The Call for Speakers is officially now open and anyone can submit to present.

This year SEE 2010 will feature four dynamic tracks, allowing the community to share its experience and knowledge on engaging topics. These are:

  • Application Developer Track
  • Horizon Track
  • Platform Developer Track
  • Business Track

To learn more about the audiences and suggested themes in each category please visit www.see2010.org/call_for_speakers.

The deadline for entry is 3rd September 2010 and all submissions will be reviewed by experts in each area to ensure that the line-up for this year is the most comprehensive and compelling to-date.

See you in Amsterdam!

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The numbers are in for Q2 2010…

Aug 4th by andrewkl

… and although they show just how fiercely competitive the smartphone space is becoming, it’s also fair to say that it’s been a record breaking three months for Symbian. Canalys’ latest market trends report, which analyses the volume of smartphone shipments in the second quarter of 2010, has revealed that Symbian shipped on more than 27 million smartphones around the globe during this timeframe.

Or to look at it another way, that’s 207 shipped every minute from 1st April until 30th June!

Lee Williams, Executive Director of Symbian, gave the foundation’s official response to these results earlier today, saying: “These figures make for very positive news for the Symbian community. The smartphone market place has become more crowded than ever. So the fact we continue to outsell our competitors by such large margins, combined with all the feature commitments and developments published on our roadmaps, make us highly confident in our outlook and we will continue to embrace the challenges ahead.”All told, these figures point to a solid performance in Q2 and highlight the opportunities available to the wider Symbian community, including a larger target audience for Symbian-related apps, products and services. To give a little more perspective, the Symbian platform has now been shipped in over 389 million smartphones around the world to-date, which means we’re closing in on that huge milestone of 400 million. Watch this space…

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docomo SMART series™ SH-09B, based on the Symbian platform, is now available in Japan

Aug 2nd by Michiko Nagai

The docomo SMART series™ SH-09B, manufactured by the Sharp Corporation, has a sophisticated stainless steel panel with a HairLine finish and a slim design, and is just 11.4mm thick. It comes with convenient dictionary applications such as the New Words Dictionary and Spelling Dictionary, in addition to Japanese, English-Japanese and Japanese-English dictionaries.

The handset also has a rich line-up of handy functions for both private and business use: such as Business Card Reader, an application that allows you to register company names and addresses simply by taking photos of business cards; Mail Referring Reply, which allows you to create a reply email whilst referring to a received email by horizontally splitting the screen into two; Shot Memo, which helps improve the quality of shots of meeting minutes written on a whiteboard, and; Triple Clear Talk, which emphasises human voices and makes it easier to hear callers by cutting out surrounding noise and echo.

The device comes in three body colours of bordeaux, white and black, and will be sold at all NTT DOCOMO shops in Japan.

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SEE 2010 – Amsterdam

Jul 29th by toddbsymbian

We’d like to announce that SEE 2010 is happening this November 9th and 10th, and we’ve made some great changes to this year’s program – most notably the location!

We’ve moved SEE 2010 to Amsterdam – a city that, much like the Symbian ecosystem, is comprised of a unique cultural fabric and deep creative roots. The SEE 2010 venue, Beurs van Berlage, was originally designed as a commodities exchange – a place custom built to facilitate the sharing of information and ideas. Influenced by modernist architects to reject the styles of the past, the venue for SEE 2010 will be an open arena for creators and innovators to engage, exchange, and explore the opportunities that will drive the industry forward.

Just as Symbian has broadened its mission to driving innovation throughout the mobile space, we are also redefining the landscape of our annual event to engage and inspire the brightest and most enthusiastic minds in the industry. SEE 2010 is not a tradeshow – it’s a place for the wider community to come together, make cross-industry connections, conduct conversation, share ideas, educate each other and realize some of the vast possibilities that exist in the market.

There is truly something for everyone – we’re talking open forums, keynote sessions, seminars, hands-on labs, interactive demos and, as always, the much anticipated Symbian Party.

…and remember, this year, it’s all about feeling free – free to attend, free to connect and free to help shape the future of the mobile industry! Register now, mark your calendars and see you in Amsterdam!

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New Symbian^2 device – Raku-Raku Phone 7 released by NTT DOCOMO

Jul 27th by Michiko Nagai

The Raku-Raku Phone 7, manufactured by Fujitsu and based on Symbian^2, is now available in Japan in all NTT DOCOMO stores.

The main feature of the Raku-Raku (meaning “easy-to-use” in Japanese) Phone 7 is the ease with which you can connect to the Raku-Raku iMenu by simply pressing the newly added “Raku-Raku Site Button”. Fun and useful information about the weather, news, train routes, share prices and fortune-telling is available via the Raku-Raku iMenu and they can all be accessed quickly. It’s now possible to create Deco-mail (decorated mail messages) too.

The new phone inherits the popular waterproof and dust-proof features from the Raku-Raku Phone 6. Other services include iConcier, an application that delivers and displays information tailored to the individual user and makes life easier, and i Bodymo, which helps you stay healthy whilst you simply enjoy the applications of “Walking” and “Eating”. In addition, Walking Clinic by Naoko Takahashi is an application in which Ms Naoko Takahashi (Japan’s Olympic gold medalist and former marathon runner) advises you on how to walk correctly by diagnosing the way you walk. As you can see, the device is full of attractive functions and is even easier to use.

The model comes in four body colours of gold, dark silver, pink and red. You can find more information in Fujitsu’s press release.

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It’s easier than ever for Symbian developers to build mobile apps with PhoneGap

Jul 19th by elisabethgettelman

Guest post from Andre Charland, Nitobi

Here at Nitobi we’re excited to be contributing PhoneGap to the Symbian Web Runtime. PhoneGap will now be included as part of the web extensions package in the Symbian^3 platform.

By contributing code that converts PhoneGap APIs to the Symbian WRT API, we’ve made it easier for Symbian developers to write applications using PhoneGap. You no longer need to include any extra code which, of course, makes deployment faster.

PhoneGap developers benefit by getting even better support for the Symbian WRT platform.

PhoneGap supports WRT 1.1 and implements these APIs: geolocation, accelerometer, camera, vibration, contacts, SMS, sounds, orientation change, storage and network availability.

If you’re new to PhoneGap, it’s worth checking out. PhoneGap is an open source development framework for building cross-platform mobile apps that run on Symbian as well as iPhone/iTouch/iPad, Google Android, Palm and Blackberry. The PhoneGap open source code has been downloaded more than 250K times and there are thousands of PhoneGap apps in app stores and directories.

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