Due to the lack of a built-in file manager on Harmattan a native-look file manager has been developed. The goal was to make something that looked like it was shipped with the OS and replicated the ease of use of a desktop file manager (eg, no marking files, hitting copy and then having to trawl through a custom folder menu -- with this app you simply hit 'Copy', navigate to the destination and tap 'Copy Here').
File Manager aims to bring the ease of use and functionality that one usually expects from a PC file manager into a mobile app. It uses a simple copy/paste methodology for copying and moving files, gives you detail on the copy process and if there are copying errors it lets you know and asks you what you want done next. You can rename files and folders, and easily see the type of files using intelligent filetype recognition. It even gives you thumbnails of any images in your current folder.
File Manager will also soon allow you view archives as folders and to 'mount' popular cloud storage systems such as Google Docs, Dropbox and Sugarsync as folders, meaning you can copy and move files between just as if they were on your phone.
Key features are:
- Simple to use with a native look and feel (light and dark theme)
- 'Copy/paste' methodology for copying and moving files (no trawling through a separate folder menu)
- Flexible options on error or duplicate file
- Smart icons and image previews
- Share files using the system share menu
It seems that cuteTube is clearly the most well-made app till today for MeeGo Harmattan, It has a sleek, fast and well designed GUI. All functions are working properly (except vimeo, which was removed in the latest version which I not yet installed) and everything is just perfect. Everything works cleanly in landscape and portrait mode.
MusiKloud is a Soundcloud application for MeeGo Harmattan N9/N950 allowing search, download and playback a song ! When downloading, you can choose either the 128kb MP3 stream, or the original format ;)
Maemo 5 version will be on the way, once the Meego-Harmattan version is finished according to the developer ;)
To continue our N9 FAQ series here's some additional informations about the beast via sapiensbryan ;)
- “Import Contact” feature is compatible with Nokia, Android & Apple iOS devices and contacts can be imported easily via Bluetooth.
- Nokia Maps are separated into 2 parts :
1. Maps is optimized for walk & normal map navigation.
2. Drive is optimized for turn-by-turn in-car drive navigation.
--> Therefore, Maps is displaying in portrait mode while Drive will only be in landscape mode.
- When you click an embedded flash video on a website, a video player will pop up to play the video as recent Android and iOS devices.
- According to Nokia Malaysia, web browser in Nokia N9 will not support Flash in the future and it’s built for wide HTML5 support, which offers access to rich web application and fast video playback.
- Developer Mode is available in Settings of Nokia N9, which enables some advanced feature such as X-Terminal, etc.
Stay in touch, a lot of informations and hints to come !
After the N9 FAQ N°1, it's time for a second part to have a view of what we missed !
How Nokia N9 built-in Webkit2 Browser performs on Html5/Acid3 vs Opera & Fennec? (via nokiablog.ch)
- Built-in Webkit2 Browser
Fennec
Opera
NFC in Nokia N9 Won’t Support Mobile Wallet or Payments
The N9 lacks support for either an embedded secure element or the Single Wire Protocol (SWP). According to NFC World, these elements are needed for use in secure NFC applications such as mobile wallet, ticketing and payments. Instead, Nokia is concentrating on the ‘connectivity’ aspect of NFC for file sharing, device pairing and tag reading.In fact the mobile wallet is 12 to 18 months away from being widely used. In the meantime, Nokia’s upcoming NFC applications seem cool and simple. For example, you’ll be able to stream music wirelessly by tapping your Nokia N9 on Nokia Play 360° speakers, or share photos, videos, contacts and more by tapping another NFC-enabled device.
The Nokia N9 comes with a selection of security features (Via conversations.nokia)
- Autolock feature, which is where you can have your Nokia N9 ask for a security code every time you awaken the phone from its sleep – or when trying to unlock the screen, anyway. If you want, you can have the phone ask for the security code every single time you do this, or after certain time intervals, such as: 5 minutes; 10 minutes; 30 minutes; or 60 minutes, if you so wish.
If somebody tries to unlock your phone and doesn’t know your security code, the phone will delete all your data that’s stored. This way you feel safe in knowing that should your phone be stolen, the thief will not be able to access email accounts, notes you may have saved or even have access to your online accounts like Facebook or Twitter. So your identity remains yours. You can change the Number of tries a person can have in the drop down list.
The best of the best : There is a Trusted person option in the settings too, so should you forget your security code you can have the code sent to that other person in the form of a text message, if the security code has been filled in incorrectly on the lock screen that the screen will be turned red and ask you to input the correct code or press the recover button. If you can’t remember the code at this point, press that button and your code will be sent to the trusted person !
Track & Protect (a preinstalled app) enables you to do some cool things. From the phone you’re able to activate or deactivate the app, or decided to have the SIM card swap option active, or not. This means that if your phone does go missing, should somebody try to remove your SIM card and insert theirs, the phone won’t work.
It’s from the Web service that you can do some cool tricks. Let’s say you’ve stored some important documents on your Nokia N9, the type that you wouldn’t want anybody looking at. You can wipe all the information from your phone remotely, by logging onto the Track&Trace website and pressing Wipe! and by pressing the Lock button you can do exactly that, lock the phone. But before you do either of these, you should press the Get location button. This will locate your phone and show you where it is using Ovi Maps !
The N9 is the first phone ever to feature something called non-destructive photo editing (Via conversations.nokia)
Which means that you can take a photo, crop it, resize it, change the contrast or any other function – all with the option of being to reverse these edits at any time.
Konttori (the Coach for Harmattan Applications Framework) has responded to some queries, enjoy !
"N9 has exchange support. We use it internally a lot, so it's in stellar shape. "
"Qt is easy to develop on. You use QML to do the UIs, which is like turbocharged HTML. Then the additional logic you either code in c++ or python. Really easy. SDK has a one click packaging tool. Development easyness is definitely in the same ballpark as android. "
"Qt will live on at nokia also in other areas than just Symbian. I think officially the next billion strategy is the one we refer to. More details come later. And I won't go into those. "
"DLNA stack is there on the device by default, but not in use. We didn't have the time to make sure it works just perfectly, so we'll either roll the UIs out later or 3rd parties can enable it very easily. N9 doesn't have HDMI. "
"Package management is still debian based in N9."
"Flash is supported in fennec, but not in the default browser. We wanted to keep a clear differentiation between "desktop" -alike browsing and mobile browsing. Default browser focuses entirely in one handed use and relaxed browsing, where as fennec just does it all and acts like a desktop browser (tabs and all)"
"Landscape home is not available as default. You will need to install a theme that pretty much just inherits the default theme and overrides one property. I'm sure that will be available on sales start."
The deal has been rumored for months and even i predicted it but as a short term trial strategy, but before today, it was hard to believe !
Once upon a time, Anssi Vanjoki likened Nokia adopting Android to someone who pees in their pants to keep warm, but hey it's another story with WP software...
I'll not play the role of an "analyst", i prefer to let that job for some well respected folks, but i'll just expose briefly my simplified take on this as "user" (consumer) who just one something that works smoothly and greatly from Nokia !
Today’s announcements by Nokia (there are many to sort through) have shocked a lot of people. The major focus here is that Nokia will now use Microsoft (Windows Phone 7) as their primary platform for smartphones which mean only one thing : near-term investment in MeeGo from Nokia will drop (Symbian to follow later) as illustrated here :
Open-source is gone from Nokia’s revenue-generating strategy ! What does happen is that Nokia now can’t be relied on as someone that will put a strong brand on a range of MeeGo products and MeeGo now MeeGone (somewhat for Nokia at least)...
The potential of Qt to attract developers is now a big question mark !
By pure coincidence, i've tweeted a couple of days that i got my hands on an HTC HD7 and that i was amazed by the smoothness and intuitiveness of the WP7 OS, it's one of the most beautiful OS out there, original and social-network ready, Anyone who said Nokia needs to get a facelift should not be complaining and i was like : "ah i understand now why Marko Ahtisaari talked with enthusiasm about WP UI paradigm" :
With the actual state you should know that with the WP7 there's :
- No system-wide file manager
- No videocalling
- No Bluetooth file transfers
- No USB mass storage mode
- No multitasking
- No copy/paste
- Too dependent on Zune software for computer file management and syncing
- No music player equalisers
- No Flash or Silverlight support in the web browser
- No DivX/XviD video support
- No internet tethering support
- New ringtones available only through the Marketplace
- Swapping memory card requires hard reset;
- Cards not readable by computer
- Etc
I expect Nokia and Microsoft to dress up things up because even if OVI Maps will be integrated in Windows Phone 8 (Jan 2012) and we'll see some 14Mpix and 1080p recording capabilities, but it wont be enought to me to get a WP Nokia device ;)
Anyway what i expected to hear from the announcement is :
- "We have decided to partner with Microsoft until MeeGo is ready. We will still support Symbian" and then they could have seen if WP7 would sell.
But I still hoped that finally their several euro billions investment comes to fruition and their „Holly Trinity”Symbian - Qt - Meego ecosystem gains momentum. They were almost there, more and more applications being ported to Symbian / Qt, the expectations for Meego were really high, Symbian 3 looked promising with the refreshed UI dynamics which was supposed to be released later this year. I was expecting Meego like nothing else and planned to develop for their ecosystem. They have ruined every competitive advantage they had just for the sake of a disruptive change.
It was a good decision to name as CEO somebody with a good software expertise. It was a WRONG decision to choose somebody from North America who considers the same construction approach for gothic cathedrals as for skyscrapers. Somebody who comes directly brain-washed by Microsoft's business tactics. Somebody who does not understand too many things about the european culture in general and about the scandinavian cultures in particular. The marketshare Nokia currently has was there just because people supported them and not because they deserved it. They were hoping and waiting and waiting and.... waiting. Nokia didn't deliver but having a tight partnership was not the solution at all. Reentering the US market while disconsidering their previous promises to the end users / developers / workers has the price of becoming soon extinct in Europe. Please, take somebody away Stephen from the burning platform and call the firefighters and the ambulance as Nokia is in the town center and not in the Pacific ocean. They even have a recovery plan to follow and a community to (in)directly support them. Come on Nokia, invest those billions of euros in BETTER maintaining and expending your current assets and DO NOT blindly follow the stratagem written by the american "analysts". The eye-candy lovers should be satisfied with a good firmware update which should be already in your pipeline. The number of sold smartphones just passed the number of PCs. It means that the relevancy of Wintel monopoly is decreasing and this is your time: MOBILE COMPUTING. Where are your promises and hopes? Why do you throw away all those billions when they came to fruition and jeopardize all your communities? Take that butcher away, send him to the psychologist to better understand that the platform fired up just today and avoid suiciding yourself.
Now i wont hide that it was a sad day for me like it was something missed or lost but mainly because i lost the chance to get a great successor of my N900, a maemo system that I liked the most and for that i find no reliable alternative to replace with...
At the rate the stock is falling I not sure the current Nokia board will survive 18 weeks let along 18 months. It is good to say that Nokia will lose a lot of customers (going by the blogs / comments) and that from a share holder pointer of view is unforgivable.
But in other hand, I think that the decision to use the Windows Phone 7 platform is a good idea. Not only will it benefit Nokia and Microsoft but it will also benefit consumers in the sense that it will provide them with excellent services and a world-class ecosystem upon which they all can depend. The Windows Phone 7 OS is an excellent platform that provides excellent services, such as Outlook, Office, Internet Explorer and Zune just to name a few. By using WP7, Nokia will be able to focus more on pleasing its customers with the latest and greatest technology, instead of worrying about falling behind the competition. This is interoperability! Both companies benefit and in turn so do the consumers.
Anyone who said Nokia needs to get a decent hardware will be pleased that Microsoft has imposed a specific and tough list of minimum hardware requirements on those manufacturers:
- Screen: Capacitive, 4-point multi-touch screen with WVGA (800×480) resolution
- Processor: Min 1 GHz or better processor
- Graphics: DirectX9 rendering-capable GPU
- Memory: 256 MB of RAM with at least 8 GB of Flash memory
- Camera: 5-megapixel camera with an LED flash
- Physical Buttons: 6 dedicated hardware buttons – back, Start, search, camera, power/sleep and Volume Up and Down
- Others: Accelerometer with compass, ambient light sensor, FM Radio Tuner, proximity sensor and Assisted GPS
Finally, just to say that :
- I expect(ed) Windows Phone 7 based devices as "Enterprise devices" targeted for the same users as the original E series (E90, E7 for example) with a deep office integration.
- MeeGo Communicators for power users which enables unrestricted use and no lockings of the system or even Multimedia targeted (as the N900) In those cases good cameras etc are on offer, music players etc.
- And symbian devices for the rest (including some touch & type devices)
Please, i don't wanna go Android, i hate it !
Give me some more time, i'm still under the chock, i'll wrap up an "objective" write about that later on...
I usually do not write articles like this, but it becomes heavy to bear to read negative reviews about Nokia, Symbian, Maemo and the future of symbian ^ 4, in a fierce market more increasingly "dominated" (mindshare) by Android and Apple platforms IOS ...
That said, my idea for a while was that the staff management nokia does not really have a "clear" idea about their environment (clear targets : where are we, where we would come, do we care about other brands?)... and this has been the case since the launch of the ridiculous iPhone (that i own now!), a ridiculous phone (one and only one phone) that establish "standards" of the smartphone market every time !
It is as if Nokia has ever existed ! Which is true in some ways, Nokia was not a real product competitive in the smartphone market touchscreen (N810, 770 etc.) except the 5800 and in some ways the N97 ... but never an iPhone Killer. .. I say iPhone because it's the one that changed the strategy of all firms in the mobile's area in the last 3 years ! including Nokia ...
It's true that Nokia has made an ashamed move by releasing the N900 (Maemo 5) and i was really happy to see finally an iPhone Killer, but things weren't as expected, the N900 and Maemo 5 is one of others (or another) project in dust by Nokia, a beta testing platform not destined for the large public, and "abandoned" by Nokia itself to make MeeGo... WTF !?
I mean, what Nokia are doing is just catching up with Android and IOS until now...but let me make things more clearer...take a second and think about it a little :
- MeeGo will be rolled out on Media phones, Netbooks, Pocketables/Handhelds, In-car entertainment systems as well as Connected TVs, that's really great, Nokia will probably have a great opportunity to implement OVI services everywhere i guess ! Meanwhile, the open-Community is getting really excited about MeeGo being an open platform.
But is MeeGo the way to go?
As we learned till now, Manners maketh a man, Services maketh a platform !
How can they bring back the massive “Faithful” user-base which Google has acquired with Android !? The constant support and community interest is currently reflected in the constantly evolving ANDROID
What i mean, i'm afraid of the fact that "whatever MeeGo or symbian^4 can do, Android and IOS already does and Does it Better" but i'm still confident and sure that Meego will be an iconic plateform and will establish "standards", and i can give many reasons with out thinking much:
- MeeGo can work on any Hardware platform like intel chips, X86 and ARM.
- MeeGo Platform is completely open source.
- MeeGo contains QT as UI development.
- MeeGo is not locked to any language like JAVA.
- MeeGo comes from already proven platform like Maemo.
- Develop the application once and use it on many devices.
Android and IOS sure have probably the bigger mindshare for now, but I believe MeeGo platform is intrinsically superior, because they share more of their platform with upstream project and use a Native SDK by default. Ultimately I don’t see any of those two die soon.
Are they going to become the new enemy brother in a long genealogy : vi vs emacs, gnome vs kde, MeeGo vs Android ? I don't think so because already stated that it'll compete with ANDROID and IOS by Symbian^4 but meego will be mainly for tablet and pc like superphone, but hey wait a moment ! We are not talking anymore about OS and Services here but also about User Interface !
Nokia, did you see some videos on youtube demonstrating some UI wow effects on some iPhones and Android phones? Do you certainly agree when i say it's just something you're dreaming about in your promo videos (Except the N900) !
Do you want me to show you something about the iPhone's one (with the latest IOS 4)? No, not really ;)
So what you have to do really is making UI as close to real life experience and that is easy to operate as it is our natural way of acting - this may change way we operate mobiles, Symbian^4 has to deliver something... of top quality and be the most intuitive and attractive one beside MeeGo ! But then, why didn't you buy WebOS? Are you happy now that one of the most talented WebOs User Interface Designer has gone to Apple? That sounds good doesn't it?
And android 3? Do you know that the whole interface will be something like this :
Or let's talk only about windows 7 !
And now what? I'll drop my complaint right here : as you know, i own many many symbian devices from Nokia 7650 to Omnia HD and Vivaz, i'm going to buy the N8 also, because till now symbian plateform is the only one that offer a rich and advanced multimedia experience in a well balanced combination... i own also an N900 which is a really great multimedia and social ready device...Ok till now :
What you don't know probably, is that i own an iPhone 3Gs and i'm thinking to sell my N900 or at least don't use it as my primary device, but why? In one word : the iPhone is simply great ! (yeah i was one of those heaters...) :
- Apple's sense of design and integration is impeccable. (and i don't have iPhone 4 yet !)
- Fantastically capable, flexible device (no lags, fluid UI even while surfing and listening to music etc)
- You don't have to be smart about how you use apps to avoid draining the battery
- I have the right applications for all my needs, games all of kinds and needs (even a METALLICA games, my favorite band) and while im a Muslim, i've a plenty of Islamic apps, especially in this Ramadan holly month ! With N900 : Zero (one or two) !
- Great inboard keyboard, i don't need a real keyboard anymore...
Wake Up Nokia ! Sooner, I'll make a side by side comparison with N900 vs iPhone and you'll be blowed !
Nokia has published a demo application for N900, available in extras-devel repository, that shows a preview of Maemo 6 (Harmattan) user interface.
The source code for many components of Harmattan release have been released yesterday at gitorious. That is great if one is interested in digging through the code or compiling it.
For those who just want a quick test drive there is demo available for N900. It is actually rather simple:
- Click this link.
- Follow the installation steps
- Launch “Widgets Gallery” from launcher
Easy, enjoy, but beware, this is rather heavy, prefer WLAN.
Here there are some screenshots of the demo:
Demo application main window
Question dialog
Text entry dialog
Progress indicator
Information banner
Event banner
You can find more pictures in this Flickr album. Please note that installing this demo will also install Qt 4.6.2 on the N900 and about 52 Mb are required.
MeeGo is an open software platform – an operating system – for a wide range of devices. It’ll run on X86 and on Arm based hardware. It will be developed as an open project hosted by the Linux Foundation.
So what does it mean? Many things.
Joint development
We will merge Maemo and Moblin projects. Their architecture is already very similar. They share many components but sometimes use different versions. But they build and integrate releases independently. And while Maemo is for ARM, Moblin is for X86. Now we merge them to get the best of both. A good Moblin build and integration, Maemo’s mobile optimizations and ARM support, Qt etc. We can also now make the bright engineers of Intel and Nokia to work close together.
And even more. I invite all active Moblin and Maemo community members to now join the MeeGo project. It’ll give you all a much bigger pond to swim in. And it’ll get your work into much wider use than either of these projects separately.
Freedom
MeeGo is free. Code will be available for everybody under proper open source licenses. No strings attached other than making your contributions also free. The development and integration will be open, too. Everybody can invest in MeeGo and participate. It is a genuine open source project. Free for everybody to participate, contribute, and enjoy. Free. No papers to sign. Just show up!
Compatibility
MeeGo offers the broadest possible compatibility for application developers. It uses Qt as the framework and toolset for application developers. It means very good tools and possibility to run your apps in a wide range of devices. Code once – deploy everywhere.
MeeGo also means compatibility and full compliance with leading open source projects. We will not fork projects if we can possibly avoid it. We will work with leading open source projects using the open source best practices.
A perfect target
MeeGo will aim high. Nokia and Intel are the biggest investors in mobile Linux based technologies and now – together—even more significant. We will put all our force behind making MeeGo THE operating system.
So, for chip-set companies, hardware vendors, software companies, application developers, device manufactures, operators … this is the place to go. Make you stuff work under, inside, or on top of MeeGo and you get your stuff deployed all over the place. Nokia will ship tons of MeeGo devices, Intel, too. And others will use MeeGo in their devices. It is open, free, powerful and compatible.
Devices
So what’s with Maemo6? Maemo6 will be MeeGo compatible.....consider Maemo6 already a MeeGo instance.
Digia to acquire Qt from Nokia
-
Digia today announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire Qt
software technologies and Qt business from Nokia and further extend the
cross-platform ...
