Ever had to connect to the Internet using your phone and PC? You know, in the middle of nowhere. Needing desperately to send a file or two to your boss. With no Internet access for your PC. My attempts with this have often ended with no success. And even more desperate to send the files to my boss.

But not anymore. Enter PC Suite and One Touch Access! It doesn't get more simple than this really. What you need is the most recent version of PC Suite (6.6), a Nokia S60 phone (at least starting from Nokia 7610), basic settings for your phone, a USB cable (in the sales pack) and network coverage. And your PC of course.

What do you do then? First, connect your S60 device with the USB cable to your PC. Then open the PC Suite and click "Connect to the Internet" icon. Then choose "Settings" where you need to select the modem (i.e. your device over USB) and finally your network operator.

And to get to the Internet? Just click "Connect", wait for about 10 seconds and start surfing. Regular GPRS works just fine, but if you happen to be under 3G coverage - even better. At least with my Nokia 6680 under 3G I get a far better connection speed than with my so called fixed "broadband" access I used to have at home.

Before you go and cancel your fixed broadband access, you might want to check the data pricing from your mobile operator. The all-you-can-eat data rates are not offered by every operator and the cost per megabyte can be a
nasty surprise ;-(. But for situations where you absolutely need to get a connection regardless of the price - this works like a charm.

P.S. You can get the most recent version of PC Suite for Nokia's phones from Nokia's website http://www.europe.nokia.com/nokia/0,,72014,00.html. And you can get the needed settings for your phone http://www.europe.nokia.com/nokia/0,,71993,00.html. (You may need to copy-paste the urls to your browser)

Today, I'd like to ask you for comments on a number of topics that I believe are interesting.... Obviously, I and my colleagues working for S60 are interested to get your inputs and feedback on your experiences with S60 devices, your hints and tips, and perhaps also new features and technologies that you would like to see in future devices.

Also, it would be great if you have tips on applications that you would strongly recommend to other users.
So, folks, your feedback on the above would be great. So sharpen your virtual pens and let us hear from you.

Leaving you today with one of my newer hobbies, namely Sudoku: Since this is a number-based "game", it is exceptionally suitable for mobile devices. So this time I went to Handango and look what I found! You can download trials and evaluate which game is the best one for you. Some are not expensive either. Let me know which ones you like!

Cheers,

BWi.

One of my favorite uses of S60 phones is it’s browser. Lot of my friends have remained skeptic about the capabilities, or actually about the benefits, that new advanced phones like S60 devices can provide. Lately there have been two examples that have converted them to “believers”: firstly photos that are taken with over 1Mpix camera and printed on real photographic paper, and secondly the opportunities that the combined wap/web browser of the phones offer. I, for an example, commute to work by my own car, and while driving I typically listen to Groove FM via my car’s radio. The nice thing about Groove FM is that they display the playlist on their website in real-time, and if I missed the information on who’s playing and what’s the song title in the FM broadcast, I can always check it on their website with my phone, and even save the page on my phone for later revisit. This way I can easily collect list of songs that I might purchase later on. Just click Options->Advanced options->Save page, and the page is stored in phone memory. Moving to Saved pages is easy: when on Bookmarks page, right-clicking your 5-way navigation key takes you to Saved pages. Screenshots are taken with Samsung SGH-D730 (which is btw a great phone but more about that in a separate post).

As we all know, devices are constantly becoming more advanced, packed with new features and capabilities.
At the same time, some things do not change considerably: We still have (and we still WANT) reasonably sized devices (with reasonably sized screens and keypads, etc.). In almost all areas of activities, performance and usabililty are (and must continue to be), top-of-mind areas - the mobile industry strives to make the mobile the preferred device not only for voice, but also for data. Mikko already wrote about the new S60 browser, which is taking mobile browsing to a totally new level; application interworking is being developed to further ease the usage of the device; active idle is enhancing usability, and so on. But also access to portals and protected websites can be made easier. Industry standards such as the Liberty Alliance's ID-FF/ID-WSF/ID-SIS specifications are good news also for mobile users, since they enable very secure and very easy access to services. The idea is that you only need to log on once to access a number of password-protected sites (the so-called Circle of Trust). Also, the services that you are offered can be personalized according to your personal profile, in a highly automated way. This development is of course good news for the mobile device users, as it helps us users to focus on the actual usage of services rather than trying to access them with multiple user names and passwords. Win-win for everybody! These Single Sign-On implementations are going to become more widespread in the next years to come, and several mobile operators are looking into this area as a method to offer smoother access to applications and content.

-BWi
(For more about Liberty Alliance, check www.projectliberty.org or send me a note.)

With the introduction of Web services in S60 3rd Edition, enterprises (and also consumers) will be able to consume Web services end-to-end from the device to the various back-ends. For instance, mobile workforce can then with the help of Web services-enabled applications handle a number of tasks such as logistics, sales reporting, database searches, etc., directly from the device.

Furthermore, dedicated applications could be made available for services that already today use Web services protocols - many consumer-focused service providers on the World Wide Web are currently rolling out Web services as the enabling technology.

Web services are the protocols that enable Service-Oriented Architectures, and the SOA for S60 platform will initially focus on enabling end-to-end Web services, either as "vanilla Web services" with basic functionality, or more advanced Web services - for instance using Liberty Identity Web Services Framework (v1.1), which is the leading open protocol for Identity-based Web services.

But a SOA does not necessarily need to be enabled by means of Web services - for instance in the home environment, Universal Plug-and-Play (UPnP) is a protocol that is increasingly used to inter-connect devices at home. S60 will also introduce support for UPnP in upcoming platform releases.

-BWi

A majority of S60 devices support Bluetooth. More and more laptop computers also contain Bluetooth functionality by default. But still today, many users who purchase new mobile devices discover that they still need the cable to for instance synchronize their calendar, contacts, etc. with PC Suite.

If you have a S60 device, but your PC/laptop does not have support for Bluetooth, it might be well worth the investment to purchase a Bluetooth device that can be plugged into the USB port. It certainly makes your life much easier, and if you look around in for instance on-line stores, you will find that the cost is not too high. I purchased my Bluetooth USB Adapter a year ago for 25 Euros. Probably one of my better IT investments... ;-)

-BWi

Where’s S60 head office located? Who are the stakeholders of the S60 company?
These are examples of the questions that were asked from us when we were demoing S60 platform at the 3G World event in Hong Kong this week. The new look and feel of our stand may have confused the audience a bit. An explanation about what S60 is and what is does was missing as the only thing we had printed on the stand was the Open to new features tag line and the licensee logos. The questions worked as great starting point for demo tours around the stand. At the same time, they indicated that not everyone is familiar with S60 brand yet even at an industry event like the 3G World.

Adding to Björn's posting about Active Idle personalisation, I'd like to share my favorite Active Idle tip. This feature has been available on devices starting from Nokia 6680. And what it is? Controlling the music player from the Active Idle.

First go to Media Gallery, select the tracks you want to play and press Play. After this return to the Active Idle (e.g. by pressing the red key) - and voilá. The currently playing track has appeared to the bottom of the screen (see picture).

Now, by scrolling to the track (a couple of down presses on the 5-way scroll key) you can control the volume (left & right on the scroll key) and return to the music player (press select on the scroll key). This way you can concentrate better on your morning emails while sitting on the bus and still having easy control over your music player.

Anyone recognize the classic track I was listening to this morning?

For the past couple of days, I've had the pleasure to use one the new S60 3rd Edition based devices that will be coming to market in Q1 2006. One the best new applications there is the new browser - It's just great. I've been using my web-based email (Kolumbus), my banking service (Nordea), and my other favourite web sites without any problems. The new UI makes orientation and navigation easy, and coupled with the high-resolution display and fast WLAN or 3G network makes browsing really enjoyable.

Some of the other new features that I really like include RSS feeds, Visual history (shows the previously visited pages as thumbnails, rather than just a list of url's), text search as you type, and pop-up blocking (though support for multiple windows is also nice). Please check www.s60.com/browser for a demo

One of the more exciting technologies that are being "mobilised" today is Flash. In Japan, Flash Lite is already a de facto component in most devices, and the number of available applications can be counted in the thousands. Elsewhere, both developers and operators have started projects on developing Flash content and applications for mobile users. From a S60 perspective, the first devices that support Flash Lite is the Nokia N90 and N70 (both in selected markets). But that is just the beginning - there is a strong expectation that many, if not most, S60 3rd Edition devices will include Flash Lite player by default. Also, there will be a browser plugin for these devices, which means that much of the Flash content that today cannot be viewed in the mobile browser can now be displayed too... In addition, the browser plug-in opens up for possibilities to use Flash (and also SVG-T) components in User Interface design too. We can already today see that many extremely nice applications are made availabel using Flash, and soon there will be millions of phones (also outside of Japan) - the Flash ecosystem is taking shape on a global scale....

- BWi

In the more recent S60 devices, Active idle (aka Active standby) has been added to enhance the usability of devices. It is great how one can get easier access to the most used applications directly from the Active standby. What is even better, it is so easy to change the short cuts according to your favorite applications:
1. Menu 2.Tools; 3. Settings; 4. Phone; 5. Active standby.
From here, you can both change the soft keys (Left/Right selection key) and the Active standby applications.

My device is personalised as follows: Messages and Contacts as soft keys. Bluetooth, Clock, Browser, New message, and a Flash Lite game as the active standby applications.

If you have any tips on how to increase usability, then feel free to send them to me: bjorn.wigforss@nokia.com

Yes, and by the way, in future devices (devices available in the second half of 2006), both the structure and the layout options of the Active idle screen is going to be further increased.

- BWi

Wanted to share also my favourite tip for S60 users - how to easily toggle between Normal and Silent profiles. I'm sure most of you know that pressing the power key shortly will bring up a list of all profiles and allows easy switching to any of those. But there is an even faster way of toggling between Normal and Silent profiles - in case you need to do this frequently as I do, constantly running from one meeting to another - just press the #-key for a bit longer time. If you are currently using some other profile than Silent, then the phone will be turned to Silent. And from Silent, this will always take you to General profile. It's as simple as that.

The mixed feeling of excitement, panic and fear hits me before any public presentation. Yesterday this happened in Vienna, where I talked about the results of our recent Smartphone360 study on the last day of the Mapos conference. Nevertheless, I managed to show all my slides and I guess the presentation went pretty ok.

Smartphone360 is our nickname for a study where a Symbian application in a S60 device is used to collect data on the device usage.

Some excellent questions were raised after the presentation. The study results on 3rd party application installation, usage and traffic generation were very encouraging. Moreover, device personalization in many forms was popular, and the audience seemed to agree with these conclusions. However, there was a question whether the frequent usage of add-on applications continues after the ‘honeymoon’ period with a new device is over. As far as I know, observing this kind of long-term usage patterns is excluded from the current study. Perhaps that’s something which should be added in the method when developing it further.

There was also a good discussion on how applicable the results are in general. Here we must be careful. The study does provide interesting, valuable and reliable data on how consumers really use their S60 devices. However, the results only tell how those who took part in the study were using their device during the study period, nothing else. Nevertheless, this is valuable information which works as a great input to product planning, operator service planning, application design etc.

Tip of the day (1):
I almost always have a number of applications running in parallel on my S60 phone. Recently, I discovered how I could close them in a very easy way to free up system resources... This is how it is done:
1. Press the menu button approximately one second. A menu will appear with the applications that are currently open on your device.
2. Select the one you would like to close.
3. Press "C" and "Yes".
(Note that you cannot close the "telephone" application - it is always on).

Tip of the day (2):
If you are located in Hong Kong or are planning to go there next week, then it would be great to meet you at the S60 stand at the 3G World Congress & Exhibition!

-Björn

MAPOS (the Mobile Application Platforms and OS) event, produced by Informa telecoms &media, is obviously one of the few conferences focusing on mobile software strategies and usability. This is the first time I participate the event. The first day is now over, and it’s good to look back on what happened today.

The structure of the event is the usual one: registration-presentations-coffee break-more presentations-lunch break-presentations-panel discussion-coffee break-still more presentations. And as always, some of the presentations were interesting whereas some of them seemed to miss the point a bit. Luckily, there were some drinks at the end of the day. It is surprising how sitting in a conference room can make you thirsty…

There were two topics today that were particularly interesting to me.

Mr.Nabeel Mardi from T-Mobile International woke up the audience with his excellent opening speech in the morning. Introducing services “cheaper, faster, quicker and more reliable” was the message he repeated several times, stating that choice in terms of platforms is a positive thing but currently there are too many variations. He wants to have more terminals from multiple manufacturers using the same platform, and a longer lifecycle for a platform.

In the afternoon, several presentations discussed the impact of open source approach on the mobile software industry. Listening to the speakers, several companies seem to already offer open source based solutions or are at least considering doing so.

Overall, this was a good start for the event, and it’s exciting to see what happens on Day 2.

We had recently one of our major S60 customer events in the great city of Shanghai, China. While working through the days, we managed to fit in some free time activities as well. Always when traveling, a S60 camera phone becomes very handy for taking photos and sharing them with family and friends. As an example, in the attached picture, taken with my Nokia 6630, you can see what we had for dinner in a good Chinese restaurant. Believe or not, they are eggs. The dish is called “Century eggs”, and the name comes from the fact that the eggs are stored in mud- or clay-like substance at least for three months, and apparently the longer they have been preserved, the better they taste. And, in fact, they did taste pretty good...

This blog is discussing hot topics, news and our views around S60. We call this blog simply 'See into S60'. The name allows certain flexibility regarding the content, doesn’t it? This is good as writing blogs is a brand new (and exciting) thing to most of the S60 team. Yes, there are a number of people who are writing to this blog so for sure you will see many different topics, writing styles and opinions expressed here. Our intention is to share our thinking, feelings and findings that are somehow related to the S60 platform. It would be great to get your feedback to the posts here. And if you find the blog interesting, feel free to spread the word about it.