Tag Archives: Nokia Developer

Adobe, Devices, Flash, Flash Lite, Games, IGameStudio, Mobile, Nokia, Nokia Developer, Open Screen Project, Series60

Flash Lite games on OVI Store

March 23, 2011 Mariam Dholkawala Leave a comment

I recently uploaded 2 games on the OVI Store which have been developed using Flash Lite for the Symbian platform.

The first Green Dweller – is a gaming application which was approved for the Open Screen Project Fund.
Green Dweller aims at creating awareness about the environment and how it impacts our lives. Green Dweller encourages sociability through gaming, at the same time provides a message of saving the environment by reducing the carbon footprint. Green Dweller is developed for mobile phones using the Adobe Flash Lite technology.

The second is Gear Wager – this game was nominated by the IMGA Awards in the Best Casual Games Category when it was originally developed for Symbian S60 3rd Edition phones. With Symbian^3 devices such as the Nokia N8 now having amazing processing speed, it made the game development experience with Flash much more better, thus the decision to port the game.

Gear Wager is a casual game where you have to help a fallen star escape back into the sky before dawn. Besides a new and innovative game-play, the game has the feature of Facebook Connect to post messages on the user wall.

Please download the games and post reviews (good or otherwise 🙂 )!

Mariam

General, IGameStudio, Mobile, Nokia, Series60

Blog app now available on OVI Store

May 10, 2010 Mariam Dholkawala Leave a comment

My blog is now available for Nokia devices and can be downloaded from the Nokia OVI Store.

I used the OVI App Wizard to create this application which had a very simple procedure to follow. I was required to be the copyright owner for my own content, which I was, so I could easily submit the blog feeds. I then created my blog banner/logo images as per the blog design, set the mobile application color schemes and let the wizard do the rest; i.e create the mobilized content without any more input from my side.

The process did come with it’s share of minuses as well, such as a wait before the content went live on the store, besides from other minor issues without which the wizard could have performed better.

Overall I think the App Wizard is an extremely easy way to mobilize web content without having to manually write a code.

You can read about the OVI App Wizard on the OVI Blog.

Mariam

Adobe, Articles and Guidelines, Device Central, Devices, Flash Lite, Games, Series60

Article launch on the new Adobe Game Technology Center – Developing games for Nokia S60 touch devices

December 22, 2009 Mariam Dholkawala 2 Comments

I’ve authored a new mobile gaming article titled Developing games for Nokia S60 Touch devices. It covers game development details for Nokia S60 5th Edition devices using Adobe Flash Lite 3.1. The article was launched last evening to coincide with Adobe’s launch of the new Adobe Game Technology Center.

The Adobe Game Technology Center is a fantastic resource for Flash game developers across platforms. It has articles, sample files, videos, tutorials – almost everything required to learn game development and enhance skills.

I hope that the article and new Game Center will prove to be a valuable resource for game enthusiasts like myself.

Mariam

Adobe, Device Central, Flash Lite, Mobile, Nokia, Nokia Developer, Series60

Forum Nokia Flash Lite Components V2.0

September 25, 2009 Mariam Dholkawala Leave a comment

Forum Nokia released a set of components last week which can be useful while developing applications for mobiles using Flash Lite 2.0 and higher. The components can be installed and used within the authoring environments of Flash CS3 and CS4.

There are ten components resources released with source files and component guides and include the Button component, Calendar component, Checkbox component, Contacts component, List component, Media data component, Messaging component, Pop-up component, Radiobutton component, and Scrollbar component.

Forum Nokia Flash Lite Components — Working Example of components (List, Button, Pop-up) on a Nokia 5800

The Forum Nokia component page mentions –
“The resource is closely related to Guide to Flash Lite Components. Please give feedback on the components through the Flash Lite Discussion Board. For possible additional components and guidelines from the community, check Forum Nokia Wiki.”

Mariam

Adobe, Device Central, Flash Lite, Nokia Developer

Upcoming Flash Lite/WRT eSeminars for January

January 16, 2009 Mariam Dholkawala 1 Comment

Coming up this month are a couple of interesting eSeminars relating to Flash Lite and WRT technologies for mobiles. The eSeminars require prior registration and are being conducted in different time zones, so make sure you check your time.

Mobile Workflow in Adobe Creative Suite 4
Date : 21 January 2009
Time : 2:00pm to 3:00pm Australian EDT
Description : This eSeminar session will look at the various ways the new Adobe CS4 products work for mobile developers and designers, and show you how Device Central acts as a central piece of the workflow.

Flash Lite Distributable Player Seminar
Date : 21 January 2009
Time : 9:00am – 10:00am PST
Description : A presentation and discussion on the upcoming Flash Lite Distributable Player, everything you ever wanted to know but were afraid (or haven’t had the opportunity) to ask. The presentation will go through the plans for the player and how developers can get involved in the project, resulting in you having greater access to get your content to market.

Create Mobile Phone Wallpaper
Date : 22 January 2009
Time : 4:00pm to 5:00pm Australian EDT
Description : This session is for non-Flash designers who might use Illustrator, and learn how to create mobile specific artwork and test using Device Central.

Nokia WRT Plug-in for Aptana Studio v1.0
Date : 22 January 2009
Time : EMEA/Asia session: 7 a.m. London, 9 a.m. Helsinki, 3 p.m. Singapore/Bejing – Register>>
Americas session: 11 a.m. San Francisco, 2 p.m. New York – Register>>
Description : Join this webinar to learn about the Nokia WRT Plug-in for Aptana Studio, which provides features for using the Aptana Studio or Aptana Studio Pro IDE to develop Web Runtime (WRT) widgets. You can then use features such as full JavaScript™ code completion for the Web Runtime 1.0 API to write WRT widget code rapidly. Once you’ve coded the widget, you can use other plug-in features to preview, debug, package, and deploy it.

S60 Platform Services — Reaching Further with Flash on Nokia Devices
Date : 28-29 January 2009
Time : EMEA Session: 10 a.m. London, noon Helsinki – Register>>
Americas Session: 7 a.m. San Francisco, 9 a.m. Dallas, 10 a.m. New York – Register>>
Description : This webinar will look at the new S60 5th Edition Platform Services and how Flash developers can make use of them. Nokia will give an overview of the opportunities on offer and the techniques used to access location, sensor, calendar, contacts, and other functionality in your Flash and web applications. Join us to learn about some practical examples of how you can use S60 Platform Services to extend what Flash Lite can do on Nokia platforms.

GetJar and their Flash Lite content distribution solution
Date : 29 January 2009
Time : 12:00 PM EST
Description : GetJar will present their Flash Lite content distribution solution through this eSeminar hosted by the Boston Adobe Mobiles and Devices User Group.

Mariam

Adobe, Articles and Guidelines, Devices, Flash Lite, Nokia Developer, Series60

Flash Lite Services API articles for the Nokia S60 5th Edition devices

January 8, 2009 Mariam Dholkawala 2 Comments

Mariam

Devices, Flash Lite, Mobile, Nokia, Series60

Forum Nokia releases Public Beta of the WRT Widget Plug-in for Aptana Studio

December 19, 2008 Mariam Dholkawala

I thought of writing today about an exciting new plug-in that I’ve been playing with for creating, testing, debugging and deploying mobile widgets, to be precise – The Web Runtime Widgets.

Forum Nokia recently went public with their WRT Widget Plug-in for Aptana Studio and Aptana Studio Pro. Of course the plug-in is still in Beta, but the coolest thing about this plug-in is the ease with which it allows widgets to be created and tested. It not only cuts down the development time but also saves us the trouble of continuously packaging our files for testing within the S60 Emulator and for debugging within Firefox.

What’s even cooler is that it supports Flash Lite widgets, unlike the S60 emulator. You can test plain animations or interactive Flash content packaged as a widget.

Vertical Widget View in Aptana — Portrait orientation of my first widget

Landscape orientation of the first widget that i created — Landscape orientation of my first widget

Two of the features I like from the testing and deploying perspective are –

The ability to mark and unmark files that need to be packaged in the widget before the plug-in actually creates the complete widget for you.
The ability to deploy your widget directly to your phone via Bluetooth or to the S60 Emulator for testing.

Another feature that I would like to mention is the ability to pull down a panel and select a phone from a list of widget supported devices and test the content as per the screen resolution and orientation.

Although this widget testing environment is not yet exactly similar to the S60 emulator or a real device in performance, and it is always advisable to test content in a real environment, this plug-in really helps to cut the initial debugging time. It is something like how the Flash Lite emulator was during its previous versions.

There are a number of resources currently available for using the WRT plug-in with Aptana –

1. Information on the WRT widget plug-in for Aptana Studio (Contains all the important links)
2. WRT Plug-in for Aptana Studio QuickStart Guide
3. WRT Plug-in for Aptana Studio on Forum Nokia Discussion Board
4. WRT Plug-in Basics on the Wiki (An excellent walk through on installation, and creating your first project)
5. Packaging Flash Lite content in a Widget

Note:
I’m sure most of us would know about WRT widget development and packaging, but for those who would like to know more, widgets are small applications that can be installed and run in the same way as other S60 applications (jar & sis files). WRT widgets are generally suited for websites or web services that need to be optimized for use on devices. They consist of a basic .html, .plist and an icon file. The additional .css, .js and image files are optional. Flash Lite files too can be packaged and deployed as a widget.

Mariam

Adobe, Device Central, Flash Lite, Mobile, Nokia, Series60

Flash Lite Development with Adobe CS4 and Nokia Platform Services API

November 7, 2008 Mariam Dholkawala 2 Comments

Earlier this week, I attended an online webinar hosted by Forum Nokia and Adobe and learnt in depth about the new opportunities that will soon to be available for Flash mobile developers with the release of the Nokia Platform Services API.

Adobe’s presentation by Peter did a fine job of describing the features and workflow within Adobe Flash and Device Central CS4 with demos from their partners (coincidently the CS4 Design/Web/Production launch event in Mumbai happened on the same day, with no discussion on mobile designing/development 🙁 ).

But the most interesting part of the webinar was Nokia’s presentation of their newly announced Platform Services API for Flash Lite technology. This Platform Services API was introduced with the S60 5th Edition platform, and the first device to support it will be the eagerly awaited 5800 XpressMusic.

Nokia mobile services such as the Application Manager, Calendar, Contacts, Landmarks, Location, Logging, SMS/MMS Messaging, Media Gallery, Sensors and System Information will now be enabled from within Flash Lite using the new set of APIs. These will definitely extend Flash Lite capabilities on devices and stimulate more ideas and flexibility in the creation of mobile content. And finally, these will be accessed directly from ActionScript with no dependencies on other programming languages.

There are various resources available to follow up on for this platform and API –

Mariam

Adobe, Flash Lite, Mobile, Nokia, Series60

With S60 5th Edition, Nokia provides ActionScript extensions for Flash Lite

October 3, 2008 Mariam Dholkawala 6 Comments

During a Forum Nokia Code Camp in Bangalore earlier this year, we had witnessed samples of an excellent set of APIs to use with Flash Lite on Nokia handsets. These APIs provided all those features that Flash Lite does not have complete support for at the moment.

Now officially announced is the S60 5th Edition platform for mobile developers with all the supported runtimes (Symbian C++, Open C/C++, Java technology, Web Runtime, Flash Lite and Python) having those additional API’s/enhancements.

To describe the S60 5th Edition platform, it is based on the Symbian OS v9.4. It’s UI now supports 640×360 Quarter High-Definition(QHD) in addition to the 240×320 Quarter Video Graphics Adapter (QVGA) screen resolution. It also has a touchscreen capability with tactile feedback. The first device to support this platform is the 5800 Xpress Music.

So what is available for Flash Developers? Read the note below to find out more –

“Developers of Flash Lite from Adobe applications benefit from the UI enhancements in S60 5th Edition, with more screen real estate and touch interaction enabling users to more easily and intuitively navigate Flash Lite content and applications. The on-screen keyboard also is available for text and data entry.

S60 5th Edition continues to support Flash Lite 3.0, with the addition of ActionScript extensions to take advantage of S60 Platform Services. These extensions provide access to:

The application manager.
Calendar records.
Contacts records.
Log information.
SMS and MMS messaging.
The media gallery.
Device location.
Landmarks.
System information.
Sensors.

These new APIs enable Flash Lite developers to access device-application data, such as that held in Calendar and Contacts, as well as information on a device’s location.
Together, the UI- and platform-access enhancements enable Flash Lite developers to create a completely new breed of context-aware applications and services that provide users with information unique to their own experiences.
”

Read what the S60 5th Edition has to offer to developers
Download the S60 Platform SDK for Symbian OS

Mariam

Flash Lite, Games, Nokia, Series40, Series60

Participate in Contests…be showcased at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona

September 17, 2008 Mariam Dholkawala 2 Comments

Forum Nokia recently announced the “Calling All Innovators Competition” for mobile developers worldwide. The competition is aimed at content which is unique and innovative on both the Series60 and the Series40 platforms and will close on 15 December 2008.

The highlight of the contest is that the winners can win $25,000, opportunities to promote and distribute to mobile consumers worldwide, and a showcase for the application at next year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

Of the 3 categories for submission, the “Technology Showcase” category specifically mentions that the application can be developed using either Flash Lite, Java, Python or any open source.

“This category offers the opportunity to show off your technical kung fu and introduce the world to your true killer app! Open to all technologies, if it runs on S60 or Series 40, then we want to see it! Regardless if it has just been created or you have been selling it for a while, casual or commercial, we want to showcase the best of the best. Be it on Flash Lite, Java, Python, or open source. If it’s a game, enterprise solution, Web-based widget, or just a cool application that will enhance the mobile user experience, then this is the category to enter.”

This contest comes close to the heels of the IMGAwards Submissions (closing September 22) which too is giving an opportunity to developers to submit games and win a chance to showcase their company and the winning entry at the Mobile World Congress in February next year.

Mariam

Games, Devices, Technology