2. Option 1 : Using the stock Symbian Web or Opera Mobile, or Opera Mini, you can access your Google Plus account using http://m.google.com/+. BUT, this URL will open the basic version. And sometimes the pages are not displayed very well.

3. True. You can use the basic version of mobile Google Plus but the basic page is too… well… Like the name suggests, basic…

4. Option 2 : is using Opera Mobile or Opera Mini to visit the HTML5 mobile version of Google Plus but the layout is effed up.

5. Option 3 : is to use the latest Opera Mobile 11, change the user agent to Desktop, go to http://plus.google.com. This opens the full desktop website of Google Plus with all bells and whistles. It’s very heavy on RAM and clunky to navigate on mobile.

6. Option 4 : designed for HTML5 enabled advanced mobile web browsers. It offers a better Google Plus mobile experience because it offers more than just basic html.

7. The full URL for this HTML5 version of Google Plus for mobile is https://m.google.com/app/plus/?force=1

8. Try typing that URL on your Symbian touch smartphone on the alphanumeric virtual keypad. Your brain wil pull a stunt and synchronising your thumb is painful.

9. Therefore, for all Symbian touch users all over the world, I developed this Widget launcher. Go download this Zip file, extract the “sweetgplus.wgz” file inside it and install. There will be an icon called sweetGplus in your Application folder.

Here is how it looked like :

10. Do take note that Google Plus is a new service and it requires registration before you can use it.

11. If you like what I do, and want to see more cool WebApps for Symbian, send me some PayPal love will ya!

Download the file HERE!

- Asri al-Baker
- For i-Symbian.Com
- July 21st 2011

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If you like what we do, please help us to maintain the Independent Symbian Blog.

1. Viewing office documents, is very important for road-warriors in modern day smartphones. It’s a must have feature which determines buying decision.

2. PDF, DOC, XLS and PPT are the most common file formats that people use. To some extent, there are those who use Open Document format.

3. By default, Symbian smartphones today, shipped with an application called Quickoffice. But it has not been updated for modern day use. The look and feel of Quickoffice feels the same today and five years ago.

3. With Quickoffice, viewing and editing is supported. But you need to be very patient to use it because it suffers when dealing with big files such as 200MB powerpoint.

4. There are also other office app for Symbian called Documents To Go. In my opinion, it is easier to use than Quickoffice and has better round-tripping compatibility but like Quickoffice, the Documents To Go UI is also a pain in to use.

5. Another important requirement for a good office app in my opinion is PDF file support. Both Quickoffice and Documents To Go did not have PDF viewer component.

6. But Quickoffice includes Adobe Viewer LE which is another relic from the S60 3rd Edition days. It is very painful to use and suffers a lot when rendering PDF files.

7. Enter Picsel Smart Office, an office app in steroid. It views common office file formats PDF, DOC, XLS and PPT, as well as JPG, PNG, BMP, GIF and TXT and it throws a beautiful UI.

8. It is also a document editor but I am not very fond of it’s editing feature.

9. For viewing office files, hands down, it is the best for Symbian at the moment. The rendering is fast, it doesnt eat a lot of RAM. Zooming and panning using one finger is also supported.

10. Take a PDF file for example, a 1.5MB file takes 9 seconds to be opened by Adobe Reader LE but Picsel Smart Office only took 3 seconds to open it. And the rendering is better, you can smoothly pan around the document.

11. Picsel Smart Office implemented a very visual UI. When the main interface is loaded, called the Visual Explorer, it allows users to browse the device for documents. It’s some kind of a file-browser actually.

A doc file, without "Reflo" function. Need to scroll left and right

With Reflow on, just scroll up and down

13. There’s another cool feature called Reflow. At the moment, it is only functioning inside DOC files. Would be great if it is also implemented when viewing PDF files. What Reflow does is reflowing the text to fit screen. No need to scroll left and right.

The "cover-flow" page viewer to scroll between pages in a document

14. For viewing Powerpoint file, it is also very fast and smooth. A 25MB 86 pages PPT file can be opened in 5 seconds. While Quickoffice took more than 10 seconds to render the first page…. Oh and Picsel Smart Office has this unique way to scroll between pages. It’s like “cover-flow”. Very nice and smooooootttthhh…..

15. There are many more functions inside Picsel Smart Office which makes it a valuable purchase for those need to view office documents on their Symbian smartphones.

16. More information at : http://www.picsel.com

17. Buy it from Ovi Store : http://store.ovi.com/44983

- Asri al-Baker
- For i-Symbian.Com
- March 23rd 2011

2. Again, to be honest, the current options to read PDF files on Symbian smartphones (since aeons ago) is pathetic.

3. On other platforms (iOS and Android), reading documents is a joy. For example, GoodReader is a very good documents reader which can read a number of formats.

4. On Symbian, years ago, to deal with common office files (ecept PDF), there was Documents To Go on Series 80, UIQ2 and UIQ3 but it never made itself available for Series 60 (S60) and also the modern Symbian^3. Why? I dont know…

5. Reading PDF on Symbian smartphones is a pain in the ass. I tell you.

6. The only software which I recommend on older Symbian smartphones is mBrainSoftware’s PDF+ which has a function called “Text Reflow”, no other software can read multi-megabytes PDF files on current Symbian smartphones comfortably.

7. Adobe’s implementation of it’s famous PDF Reader is a mess. It’s very slow, always freezes and the UI is not optimised for touchscreens. On Symbian^3 smartphones, it doesnt even support “pinch to zoom” and page rendering is slower than a snail climbing mount Everest!

8. So… What’s the best way to view PDF files on our beloved Symbian smartphones? At the moment, NONE!

9. But AlternateReader is a good option. It’s nowhere as good as other solutions on other platforms but it does the job satisfactorily.

10. Here are among it’s functions :
- Rendering PDF and Djvu documents
- Tap to go to next screen
- Tap to scroll down
- Go to Page
- Zoom in and out
- Full screen mode
- Accessing menu in fullscreen mode by press and hold

11. I have used it since I got my Nokia N8 and it does what it supposed to do. However, sometimes, when opening large documents, it struggles.

12. Get AlternateReader from http://sourceforge.net/projects/alternatedjvu/. It’s FREE! GRATIS! PERCUMA!

*** The file showed in these screenshots is from Tomi Ahonen‘s latest book called “The Insider’s Guide to Mobile”. It is a FREE eBook and can be downloaded from Lulu. If you are interested to know what’s happening in the mobile industry, read this book. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

2. Knowing that Nokia/Symbian devices are also using an internet browser based on WebKit, I thought, maybe I could try…

3. With my limited HTML skill, I wrote this very simple WRT Widget to launch Gmail iPhone web interface on Nokia/Symbian built-in Web browser, without the need to enter the long URL. Just click on the icon and the page will be opened. It’s just a shortcut to the correct Gmail GP (Grand-prix : the codename for Google iPhone interface) URL.

4. It is compatible with WRT enabled devices only (S60 3rd Edition FP1, S60 3rd Edition FP2, S60 5th Edition and Symbian^3). The screenshots below was taken from Nokia N8.

5. If you use supported Symbian devices from Samsung or Sony Ericsson, you can tell us whether it works or not

Enjoy! Oh!… It’s free… as in air, and seawater

Instruction :

1. Download the ZIP file from : Our Download Page

2. Please extract the ZIP file, there’s a “Gmail.wgz” file inside. Transfer it to your device and install.

2. During Nokia World 2010, among interesting stuff that were presented was the Foursquare app demoed running on Nokia N8.

3. Upon closer inspection, the application was jointly developed by Foursquare and Nokia and it’s now available from Ovi Store from early this week.

4. The application looks and functions as a Foursquare app should. Many Foursquare functions are available such as Check-in, viewing profile, adding and accepting friend request, add or edit venue and more.

5. For those who are more technical, knowing this app was developed using Widget Runtime or WRT is a letdown.

6. The overall performance of this app also varies. It can be very fast if you are using high-speed connection, but if you are using GPRS or EDGE, you may experience slow loading of it’s functions.

7. The fact that it was developed using WRT also doesnt help when it comes to speed. Most of the time, you will face the loading icon all the time when you navigate from one function to another.

8. For those fancy checking in, it’s slow. Certainly not as quick to use as Gravity.

9. But the app is pretty comprehensive. It has tons of features not available in other Foursquare solutions for Symbian.

10. You can get it for free from Ovi Store. And it is compatible with a lot of Symbian smartphones including S60 3rd Edition FP2, Symbian^1 and Symbian^3.

Video via The Nokia Blog

2. Have you ever experience one (or more) of the following situations? :
- Your phone is stolen. All information in the phone are lost. Including phone numbers, important text messages containing your girlfriend’s birthdate (and her number!), as well as your landlord’s phone and bank details and your house payment is due anytime.
- OK, maybe the above scenario is too extreme How about after buying a new Symbian phone, you want to transfer your contacts list from the old phone to the new one? Sure, there are some ways to do it like using the PC Suite, or Mail for Exchange or using Bluetooh or using an application inside Nokia phone called Phone Switch? But can you really transfer all the information without a glitch?
- You left your phone at home and you need to access a very important information which is in the text inbox. Nobody is available at home to ask for assistance…

3. Actually, you can free your mind with an application for Symbian smartphones called SyncLion. It’s a small utility that’s designed not to be obstrucive, it runs in stealth mode in the background and you dont have to interact with it all the time to make it work.

4. SyncLion is one of those applications that can be left untouched after it’s been configured. It can be trusted.

5. All you need to do is to specify your email address and password (make sure it’s IMAP compatible), the type of data that you want to be sent to your email server (messages, notes, contacts) and the schedule time for automatic synchronisation. And you are done!

6. You can choose from the pre-configured email server (Gmail, OviMail, AOL) or you can also enter your own IMAP server details.

7. I use my Google Apps email address which is the same as standard Gmail and SyncLion works without problem.

8. In my Gmail Inbox, SyncLion creates 3 Labels to store data that are sent from mobile phones. They are Mobile/Contacts, Mobile/Notes and Mobile/Messages. This is a convenient solution because the data are not mixed with the existing emails in the inbox. They are separated and it’s good to see all synchronised data from phone are organised.

9. Here are screenshots of Mobile/Messages label which contains the text messages including the sender details and (the list and the message contents) :

10. Here are some screenshots for Mobile/Notes label. It is the placeholder for all data synchronised from the built-in Notes app in Symbian smartphones, not Active Notes :

11. For Mobile/Contacts label, it was created to host contacts data synchronised from the phone into Gmail. The good thing is, it doesnt mix itself with the existing Contacts database in your Gmail system. SyncLion exports contacts database into some readable details, with tables for easy glance.

12. Being able to access phone’s data without even touching it is very convenient.

13. I use text messages for all kinds of things, e.g. to send addresses, or to receive bank numbers, or products request and orders.

14. And I am very happy to be able to backup and sync my notes. Many articles (for this blog and my other blogs) and ideas are written using Symbian Notes.

15. SyncLion ranks as one of the must have apps for my Symbian smartphones (in league with Gravity, Pixelpipe Send and Share, SwissManager Pro, Free-iSMS, Opera Mobile 10, Best ScreenSnap and last but not least, SPB Mobile Shell).

16. The developer, Trismer Technologies, is a newcomer into the Symbian application world but they produce a useful and high-quality app. Lets hope they will produce more apps for us in the future.

17. If you fancy getting your phone’s text messages, contacts and notes into your email boxes, I highly recommend SyncLion.

18. It can be purchased from Ovi Store at only USD3.89 and a 7 days fully functioning trial is also available.

19. Last but not least, it’s compatible with most Symbian smartphones on the planet (S60 3rd Edition, S60 3rd Edition FP1, S60 3rd Edition FP2, S60 5th Edition & Symbian^1).

Get it NOW!!!

Asri al-Baker

1. Nokia Betalabs just announced yesterday, the availability of Swype Beta for Symbian^1.

2. While many people are excited about it, I cant help myself to be a little bit of “WTF”?…

3. I mean, come on!… Swype is not better than the existing stock qwerty in Symbian^1! And in some ways, as far as I can see, it sucks…!

4. While swiping fingers on top of a virtual keyboard may look cool and may feel cool, in REAL LIFE situation, it SUCKS!

5. It sucks when being used one handedly. You need to stay or sit standstill. You have to look at the screen all the time. And the keys on the virtual keyboard is no bigger from the stock qwerty. Did I mention that our thumbs blocks the qwerty when using Swype, making it pointless and making us play the “guess-what’s-the-next-alphabet-to-swype” game?

6. Dont get me started on how hard it is to use Swype for other languages, non-english especially. Yeah, it can learn and we can type abbreviations, or non-english words. But what’s the point of having a SWYPE text input if we still need to do TYPE? You get me or not?

7. I dont hate Swype. Infact, I love the fact that there are alternatives to the awful text entry method on the current Symbian devices (the other alternative is Dayhand Keyboard). But I dont feel that Swype is going to revolutionise entering texts anytime soon.

8. Some said using Swype is faster and easier than the stock keyboard. Yeah?… after 6 months of training that is…

9. One more thing, even with Swype’s intelligent word recognition, I find it cumbersome and unintuitive. And the design… why they have to include that text entry box on top of the qwerty? Why? oh Why?…

10. Or maybe, I’m just an old-school who still prefer hardware qwerty or T9

Cheers!

Asri al-Baker

1. Foursquare. The latest craze in the social networking services.

2. They have released official apps for iOS, Android and Blackberry but they never support Symbian. This is where something needs to be done.

3. Enter ThinkChange’s Sym4Square or Symbian FourSquare. A free application designed and developed by the same people who brought us AutoInstaller, and a few other cool Symbian apps.

4. However, the designed is too Android-y if you will. I think the developer should do something to make it look unique and exclusive.

5. In the long run, this Android looking design will give them more headache. With Symbian going to use Qt as the application layer, they need to do a lot of reesigning in the future.

6. Our friend at AllAboutSymbian has published an excellent review of this app and I agree to what Ewan Spence said in the review.

7. I like the fact that us Symbian users can use Foursquare with a dedicated app. But I dont like the Android design.

8. I still prefer using Gravity for my Foursquaring needs. How about you?

9. Get Symbian Foursquare from : Sym4Square. For Symbian^1 only at the moment though.

1. Cloud synching is the future. More and more services offer cloud synching to backup, sync and feel safe without worrying many things.

2. Enter SugarSync. A cloud synching service with a comprehensive mobile support. It announced the availability of it’s free Symbian S60 5th Edition (Symbian^1) app. This makes it the most complete cloud synching service with support for most major mobile platforms i.e. iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, and now for Symbian.

3. The free Symbian app can be used with the the free 2GB account. Registration is free but there are some limitation for the free 2GB account.

4. It is also compatible with the paid SugarSync services which is offered at various price range for various storage from 30GB at $4.99 month to 250GB at $24.99 a month.

5. A 30 days trial is available for the paid services.

6. Get the free Symbian app from www.sugarsync.com/symbian

Press Release

Announcing the first all-in-one sync, backup and sharing service for Symbian users

Today we have some great news for Symbian enthusiasts: SugarSync is now available for Symbian smartphones. This is the first all-in-one sync, backup and sharing service for Symbian phones! This new, free app powered by the cloud gives you an easy way to easily access, manage, and share files at anytime, and anywhere.

SugarSync for Symbian features the ability to remotely access, open and easily share files via your mobile phone. This means documents, photos, music and more stored in a SugarSync account can be tapped anywhere you have phone service. Plus, with an appropriate document editor, files can even be edited and synced back to the original. You can finally feel comfortable leaving your laptop behind when you go on vacation.

As our CEO Laura Yecies proudly points out in our press release: “No other cloud company offers such a broad range of mobile applications for consumers. We’re working hard and fast to build an all-inclusive ecosystem to ensure our customers can choose to work from virtually any location, on any device.”

The free SugarSync for Symbian app can be downloaded using your phone at www.sugarsync.com/symbian. SugarSync’s app supports Symbian S60 5th Edition.

Welcome to the family, Symbian OS users!

https://www.sugarsync.com/
http://www.sugarsync.com/blog/2010/08/18/announcing-the-first-all-in-one-sync-backup-and-sharing-service-for-symbian-users/

1. For a blogger, who uses WordPress system, having a dedicated mobile WordPress client is very important.

2. The developers are working hard preparing a Symbian and Maemo version of the popular app which was available for iPhone, Android and Blackberry previously.

3. The latest version for Symbian is numbered 0.71. Compared to the previous versions, this one improves a lot especially the UI.

4. Developed using Qt, and utilising the new QtMobility APIs, this WordPress app is a joy to use and to behold.

5. However, getting Qt onboard is not easy. In order to be able to use WordPress app, you must install the Qt runtime first.

6. Version 0.71 comes with Qt Smart Installer which will automate the download and installation of the necessary Qt components required by the app such as QtMobiliity and QtWebkit. Here is a video by Lucian Tomuta showing how Qt Smart Installer works on Symbian^1 smartphones :

7. If you are more adventerous and would like to explore Qt universe on your Symbian smartphones, you can also install the complete Qt runtime from :

ftp://ftp.qt.nokia.com/qt/symbian/4.6.3/qt_installer.sis

8. With this WordPress app, you can do some WordPressing such as creating new posts or editing existing ones, approving or rejecting comments, view statistics, and more, and all wrapped in a nice clean UI.

9. There are rooms for improvements and clearly, the developers are looking to support future Symbian devices such as the Symbian^3 powered Nokia N8 because it will be pre-installed with Qt and beginning from Symbian^4, Qt will be the application layer for Symbian, replacing Avkon.

10. I hope, the developers can continue improving it, adds functions like adjusting the font display and managing plugins. Which will make the experience more complete.

11. More information and download from :

http://dev.nokia.wordpress.org/2010/07/09/minor-0-7-1-maintenance-release/

- Asri al-Baker