Nokia Developer Newsletter

Seats at the inaugural Nokia Developer Summit are filling fast. Register now to ensure you have a spot at this premier event, taking place on 28 – 29 April in Monaco.

The 2009 Nokia Developer Summit will offer something for everyone. That includes traditional developers looking to sharpen their skills and business executives who want to get the latest go-to-market opportunities through Nokia's Ovi Store.

The 2009 Nokia Developer Summit agenda is filled with experts from the world of mobile technology. Attendees will hear directly from Nokia leaders and visionaries, operator partners, and others, including:

• Tero Ojanperä, Executive Vice President, Nokia Services
• Lee Williams, Executive Director, Symbian Foundation
• John Faith, Vice President and General Manager of Mobile Operations, MySpace
• Andrew Shorten, Platform Evangelist, Adobe
• Danielle Levitas, Group Vice President for Consumer, Broadband and Digital Marketplace, IDC

Register now to attend the 2009 Nokia Developer Summit.

Who else is attending the 2009 Nokia Developer Summit? Find out on:

Bantora
LinkedIn

Attention Flash Lite applications developers: Two funding opportunities from Forum Nokia and its partners could offer you a real win-win.

First is the $10 million Open Screen Project Fund, which makes grants to developers of applications and services for mobile, desktop, and consumer electronics devices using the Adobe Flash® platform. The initial areas of focus are: entertainment, social networking, productivity, gaming, news, and information. Those projects with the broadest appeal — and that make the best use of Nokia's platform capabilities — are likely to catch the interest of the combined panel of Nokia and Adobe experts who are reviewing the entries. Requests for funding will be reviewed on an ongoing basis.

Second, developers who are awarded funding by the Open Screen Project can then use the money to create and submit applications for the Flash category of Forum Nokia's 2009 Calling All Innovators contest. This year's prizes include both cash and several valuable business opportunities with Nokia:

• Premium placement of your application in Nokia's Ovi Store, where consumers will find the best mobile applications for Nokia devices
• Paid travel to demo your application at a Nokia-specified event
• Review by Nokia for possible preload of your application on future Nokia devices

To be eligible for Calling All Innovators a Flash application must work on Nokia devices, either S60 or Series 40, using either a Symbian Signed .SIS (for S60) or .NFL (for Series 40) format. All entries are due before midnight (GMT -4) on 30 June.

Explore Flash Lite on Nokia devices.

Apply for funding with the Open Screen Project Fund.

Submit your Flash Lite application to Forum Nokia's 2009 Calling All Innovators contest.

Starting in May developers will be able to reach tens of millions of Nokia users worldwide through the new Ovi Store. But if you want consumers to discover and download your applications you will need to publish the content to Ovi first. In this one-hour webinar on Wednesday, 9 April, Forum Nokia's Bill Perry will cover the requirements for a developer to become a publisher for Ovi, review the steps for uploading content to the intake system, and answer questions about the publishing to Ovi process. Attendees will also learn how to promote their content and applications, elevate their brands, and drive more downloads with premium placement in the Ovi Store.

Register now for this webinar:

EMEA & APAC Session: 6am San Francisco | 9am New York | 4pm Finland | 9pm Beijing.

Americas Session: 11am San Francisco | 2pm New York.

As a preview, if you are planning to publish your content on the Ovi Store, you can watch this video to learn more about the publishing process.

More channels, more revenue, and more social networking are on the gaming horizon, according to a presentation by Tero Ojanperä, Executive VP of Services at Nokia, at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) 2009, held recently in San Francisco. Emerging markets will account for 40 per cent of mobile gaming revenue by 2012, he said, and in developed markets games continue to be the most popular third-party applications installed on devices. Ojanperä also emphasised the importance of social networking with the recent announcement of the Ovi Store, Nokia's next-generation media service, and the launch of Publish to Ovi, which lets content owners upload and monetise their content to reach millions of Nokia devices.

Additionally, Parsons The New School for Design and the Upper Austria University of Applied Sciences were named the two winners of Forum Nokia's Mobile Games University Competition 2009; both teams won free trips to GDC earlier this month. The competition invited students from the Forum Nokia PRO University Programme to design, prototype, and showcase new ideas for future mobile games. In all, 44 games were submitted.

The New York-based Parsons team submitted Weekness, a game developed for the Nokia E71 mobile device. To play, two people use a single device to guess the most commonly used words in each other's text messages for that week — their 'weakness' words. The team from the Upper Austria University of Applied Sciences in Hagenberg, Austria, entered MooLan, a game based on the classic Moon Lander. Their manoeuvring game uses an S60 device's accelerometer, proximity sensors, and camera. Players tilt the device to steer the game's space craft, shake it to fuel its tank, and hold their palms over the proximity sensor (Nokia 5800 XpressMusic based on S60 5th Edition) or camera (S60 3rd Edition devices) to accelerate through space and explore four planets.

View all Nokia presentations at GDC 2009, including Tero Ojanperä's keynote, in the GDC Vault.

Explore Nokia activities at GDC 2009 on the N-Gage™ Industry Insider.

Meet the winners of the Mobile Games University Competition 2009.

Nokia recently introduced a multifunction device, the Nokia 7205 Intrigue, which features a stylish case, multimedia and productivity services, and environmental aids. The CDMA device is available in the U.S. from operator Verizon Wireless, both through its retail stores and its Web site. The phone's stylish black exterior includes a hidden-until-lit external display, internal colour keypad (silver or pink), and 2-megapixel camera with one-touch dedicated button. Also included is V CAST Music with Rhapsody®, a service that lets consumers choose from over 5 million music tracks over the air; download master copies to their PCs; and sync tracks, albums, and playlists between their PCs and phones. A productivity service called Visual Voice Mail is also included; it helps consumers prioritise their voice messages. To promote environmental awareness, the Nokia 7205 Intrigue offers a built-in reminder to unplug the charger when the device is fully charged, a low/no-load charger that reduces energy use, and packaging made from 100 per cent recyclable materials.

Available now, the Nokia 7205 Intrigue retails for $129.99 after a $50 rebate with a new two-year customer agreement. The V CAST Music with Rhapsody service is available for $14.99 a month, and Visual Voice Mail is available for $2.99 a month per line, plus airtime, megabyte, and messaging fees, depending on the plan.

Check out the Nokia 7205 Intrigue.

Forum Nokia partner T-Mobile wants to connect developers with OEMs and platform providers to help the developers reach more customers with their applications and Web sites. To do so, the operator recently updated its T-Mobile Partner Network. The changes, effective 1 April, include:

• An increase in developers' revenue share for application sales, to 70 per cent
• The addition of Games as an accepted applications category
• Changes to several programme policies, including streamlining the steps needed to get started

T-Mobile has also updated the Participation Agreements for both Mobile Apps and Mobile Web Sites to reflect these programme changes. Developers can review the updated contracts at the Partner Network site. If your company previously signed either Participation Agreement, please review the updated agreements. Also, before your company submits new applications or sites, your contract signatory will need to sign and acknowledge the changes by signing in to the Partner Network site, navigating to the agreements section, and electronically signing the updated version.

Check out the T-Mobile Partner Network and register today.

Explore collaborative resources offered by the Forum Nokia Partner Hub.

Post your questions and comments to the T-Mobile Partner Network Forum.

Subscribe to the T-Mobile Partner Network news feed.

Starting with S60 3rd Edition, Feature Pack 2, Java implementations will be versioned separately from the underlying S60 platform. All Nokia S60 devices come equipped with an implementation of the Java Platform Micro Edition (Java ME), also known as Java Runtime for S60 (also known as JRT). For example Java Runtime 1.3 for S60 (JRT 1.3) is the latest version shipping with the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, a device based on S60 5th Edition. (In fact, the exact version returned by Java environment is 1.3.4.). Developers can check the Java Runtime version by using the standard mobile information device profile (MIDP) system property microedition.platform. For example, with the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, the system property would return:
NokiaN5800/20.0.012/sw_platform=S60; sw_platform_version=5.0;sw_java_build=1.3.4.

For details of the version features, download two Forum Nokia Wiki release notes.

Java Runtime 1.3 for S60 release notes.

Java Runtime 1.4 for S60 release notes.

To learn how to create a MIDlet for asking the property and parsing the individual details, download this Forum Nokia Wiki article.

Learn more about Java Runtime for S60 releases and their versioning from this Forum Nokia Wiki article.

A new Forum Nokia Knowledge Base article offers help for developers of any S60 application that requires numeric input. This can be challenging, as there are several keyboard layouts on S60 devices, including standard ITU-T, full messaging keyboard, and mini-full messaging keyboard. Applications that handle key events directly, instead of relying on S60 UI controls for text input, may have problems supporting all these keyboard layouts. This Forum Nokia article offers a few lines of code that developers can use to work around this issue; once the code is added, pressing the number keys on any S60 device will produce the correct results, without the need for also pressing a modifier key.

Read the 'Numeric Input' Knowledge Base article.

Are you optimising your content, or your Web site, for the mobile Internet? If not, you could be missing a huge opportunity. Today more than 4 billion mobile phones are in use worldwide. That is three times the number of TV sets, and four times the number of PCs. In fact, 40 per cent of all Internet users today have mobile Internet access. And by 2012, fully half of all devices accessing the Internet will be mobile devices, predicts market watcher IDC.

To help developers adapt to this increasingly mobile world of Internet access, Forum Nokia is offering several resources. The site's Mobilise Web Sites section features articles on getting started, Nokia technology and tools that can help, user experience, and more. And a Forum Nokia Webinar, scheduled for 23 April, will help developers mobilise their sites. Get on board — you could win big!

Explore Forum Nokia's Mobilise Web Sites resources.

Find out more about the business opportunity and technologies behind mobilising your Web content.

Register for the Forum Nokia Webinar on mobilising your Web site:

• EMEA/Asia: 23 April, 10 a.m. EET (GMT +2); 3 p.m. Beijing (GMT +8).
• Americas Session: 23 April, 11 a.m. PDT (GMT -7); 2 p.m. EDT (GMT -4).

Exploit the materials and learnings to submit an entry in the Calling All Innovators contest.

Developers can take advantage of new camera controls introduced on selected Series 40 6th Edition devices and the JSR-234 Advanced Multimedia Supplements. The devices include the recently announced Nokia 5330 XpressMusic; the additional camera controls in this device are zoom, focus, and flash. Developers can use the Series 40 6th Edition SDK to compile and build applications using the new camera controls.

Start using Series 40 camera controls with a new Forum Nokia Wiki article.

Check out the technical specifications for the Nokia 5330 XpressMusic.

Download the Series 40 6th Edition SDK and release notes.

Forum Nokia is co-sponsoring a pre-conference workshop for Near Field Communication (NFC) developers at this year's WIMA conference in Monaco. The pre-conference workshop, held on 22 April, will feature presentations from NFC experts at Nokia and NFC Research Lab Hagenberg. Topics covered will include NFC architecture and integration, Nokia NFC devices, and NFC coding examples. Also, Forum Nokia members can receive a 20 per cent discount on selected passes for WIMA 2009, being held in Monaco on 22 – 24 April. WIMA 2009 will cover all aspects of the business, technical, and developer chain for both established players and newcomers to NFC technology. Leading industry experts will present a programme with parallel tracks for business and technical participants. Other evnt highlights will include the NFC Forum Global Competition Awards Ceremony, a dedicated NFC Forum track, and an update on the deployment of NFC. Also, the Competition Demo Space will feature innovative applications from finalist developers.

Learn more about WIMA 2009, the global NFC business and technical developers summit.

View the agenda and speakers for the WIMA 2009 pre-conference workshop on 22 April.

Forum Nokia members, register with Reduction Code FN09 to enjoy a 20 per cent discount on the following passes: Full Access Business & Technical Track Pass, Technical Track Pass, and Pre-Conference Workshop (only).

Starting in May, developers will be able to reach tens of millions of Nokia users worldwide through the new Ovi Store. But if you want consumers to discover and download your applications, you will need to publish them to Ovi first. In this one hour webinar, Forum Nokia's Bill Perry will cover the requirements for a developer to become a publisher for Ovi; review the steps for uploading content to the intake system; and answer questions about the publishing to Ovi process. Attendees will also learn how to promote their content and applications, elevate their brand, and drive more downloads with premium placement in the Ovi Store.
Register »

Starting in May, developers will be able to reach tens of millions of Nokia users worldwide through the new Ovi Store. But if you want consumers to discover and download your applications, you will need to publish them to Ovi first. In this one hour webinar, Forum Nokia's Bill Perry will cover the requirements for a developer to become a publisher for Ovi; review the steps for uploading content to the intake system; and answer questions about the publishing to Ovi process. Attendees will also learn how to promote their content and applications, elevate their brand, and drive more downloads with premium placement in the Ovi Store.
Register »

Starting in May, developers will be able to reach tens of millions of Nokia users worldwide through the new Ovi Store. But if you want consumers to discover and download your applications, you will need to publish them to Ovi first. In this one hour webinar, Forum Nokia's Bill Perry will cover the requirements for a developer to become a publisher for Ovi; review the steps for uploading content to the intake system; and answer questions about the publishing to Ovi process. Attendees will also learn how to promote their content and applications, elevate their brand, and drive more downloads with premium placement in the Ovi Store.
Register »