Happy New year to all!

On the onset of the new year, lets talk about the Forum Nokia Wiki. In learning to develop for S60, Forum Nokia Wiki has been an invaluable resource and it looks like the information available will grow more and more. From the birth of the Wiki till date, many mobile developers including FN members, FN Champions and experts have shared their knowledge and expertise with their aricles and many people work behind the scenes to organize them. Forum Nokia Wiki currently has 5889 articles. I, on behalf of Wiki Admin team, extend our deepest appreciation and thank all those who have helped in making the Forum Nokia Wiki a better community resource.

Here, I would particularly want to highlight an element of the Wiki which has emerged in the middle of the last year. In mid July 2008, we had introduced in the Wiki, a section for Featured articles. Since then each week, a deserving article is chosen as the Featured Article of the Week and is featured on the home page. Featured articles are considered to be good quality articles in the Forum Nokia Wiki, as determined by the  Forum Nokia Wiki administrators. Before being listed here, these articles are reviewed for accuracy, neutrality, completeness, and style. Featured articles are indicated by a small tick in the top right corner of the article. All the articles that are selected as featured articles can be found here. This week we reached our 25th Featured article.

Forum Nokia also continues to honour one member every month for their outstanding contribution to our community’s Wiki. The contributor of the month is awarded a new S60 device. The honor is given to people that have contributed outstanding work for the month in number of articles and quality of the articles. You too can be a  Contributor of the Month by simply contributing useful articles, example codes or white papers. Over and above, Forum Nokia Wiki also organizes special contest at regular intervals and rewards the winners. 2008 witnessed four such competetions including 2008 Code Example Challenge, The Asian Wiki Quest for Students, 2008 Widgets Contributions Contest and S60 5th Edition UI Contribution Contest.

Thus, it has been a great progressive year and Forum Nokia Wiki continues to become more versatile resource. And if you develop or are interested in developing for S60 or mobile platforms in general, check it out and feel free to contribute useful articles. 

See you at the Wiki !

Boxing day, and PyS60 has just completed 4 years today

History of PyS60:

 * 1.0 STABLE release (26.12.2004)
 * 1.0.1 (a minor update 02.04.2005)
 * alpha 1.1.0 (03.06.2005)
 * alpha 1.1.3 (17.06.2005)
 * alpha 1.1.5 (30.06.2005)
 * alpha 1.1.6 (26.07.2005)
 * 1.2 STABLE release (22.10.2005)
 * 1.3.1 (27.01.2006)
 * 1.3.8 (07.07.2006)
 * 1.3.11 (10.10.2006)
 * 1.3.12 (24.10.2006)
 * 1.3.13 (10.11.2006)
 * 1.3.14 (20.11.2006)
 * 1.3.15 (05.12.2006)
 * 1.3.16 internal release
 * 1.3.17 (11.01.2007)
 * 1.3.18 (13.02.2007)
 * 1.3.19 (12.03.2007)
 * 1.3.20 (26.03.2007)
 * 1.3.21 (24.04.2007)
 * 1.3.22 (01.06.2007)
 * 1.3.23 (24.06.2007)
 * 1.4.0 RC1 (02.7.07)
 * 1.4.0 STABLE release (06.07.07)
 * 1.4.1 STABLE release (16.10.07)
 * 1.4.2 STABLE release (21.01.08)
 * 1.4.3 STABLE release (05.05.08)
 * 1.4.4 STABLE release (27.06.08)
 * 1.4.5 STABLE release (03.12.08)
 * 1.9.0 (24.12.08)

It started on 26 December in 2004 with vesion 1.0 stable release  of PyS60. In October 22, 2005 updated to 1.2, Python for Series 60 1.2,with lots of improvements: camera, calendar, audio(play & record), telephone & contacts, and graphics and available also for N70, N90!

In February 2006 - PyS60 becomes OPEN SOURCE ! However, unofficially there were PyS60 packages available till PyS60 1.4.0. Officially with version 1.3.1 - support for the 1st edition devices was abandoned.  After a series of version 1.3 releases and a release candinate on July 6, 2007 - Python for S60 1.4.0 FINAL was released. This release was officially Nokia signed. The capabilities for the PythonForS60 component were "ALL -TCB -DRM -AllFiles", so the DLLs are usable with almost all applications as is and thus there is no longer a need for a separate unsigned-freedevcert version of this package. Lots of bug fixes and new additions, till 1.4.0 Final.

Moving on - Just before the smartphone show on October 16, 2007, Python for S60 1.4.1 FINAL was released. Improved telephone and position modules; autostart support added; sensor module added for N95 and 5500; video camera support added to camera module was added.

In the year 2008, January 21 Python for S60 1.4.2 FINAL was released. This release came with a new Logs module - phone's log module added : SMS , received calls etc. and 13 bug fixes. Following in quick succession on May 5, 2008 PyS60 1.4.3 FINAL was released. 3 new feature additions one of which included - Increased the maximum length of the message that can be sent using messaging.sms_send()to 39015 characters and some bug fixes.

Next, PyS60 1.4.4 FINAL came out with a new module globalui for displaying notes and queries from background applications; Added functionality to mark SMS's in the inbox as read or unread and added support for S60 SDK 3.1. In the beginning of this month- 3 December 2008, PyS60 1.4.5 was found embedded in the latest Mobile Web Server release by our own Cyke64, before it was officially made public and announced. This was just a mantaince release probably specially for MWS ;)

Finally this X'mas eve Santa gave us PyS60 1.9.0 which was based on new Python 2.5.1 core. A GUI version of Ensymble for packaging scripts into sis files and more extensive documentation in the form of HTML documents are  now made available. Thus packaging is made more easier. Unfortunately, S60 2nd Edition no longer supported with this new release.

Let us wish PyS60 a very happy birthday. Also credits go to PyS60 Team for working hard and providing us with desired results.

Long live PyS60 !

It has been a wonderful X'mas morning today, and the new PyS60 version 1.9.0  released on Forum Nokia Discussion Boards.

This post summarizes new features of PyS60 1.9.0 and PyS60 2.0 expectations.

So whats new with this major release? Below is the list,

•  Python 2.5.1 core, with much better compliance to the standard Python than before. Most of the modules in the standard library are included - basically almost all that make sense on this platform and even some that don't (for regression testing purposes). This includes such goodies as the Expat XML parser, ftplib, smtplib, urllib2, xmlrpclib, SimpleHTTPServer, cPickle, asyncore and especially the much more compliant socket module. Garbage collection is enabled, so there is no need to dismantle reference cycles anymore.

• Packaging Python applications to SIS files is much easier. The user-friendly Ensymble tool is now the official packaging tool, and we've made a GUI for it so packaging your application is now just a button press away.

• The environment for SIS packaged applications is closer to the script shell environment, since the script shell is no longer a special case but just a regular application packaged using the Ensymble tool. This should make testing your application easier.

• SIS packaged applications are now more robust:

• If the runtime is missing and you try to launch the application, a human readable error message is displayed instead of the application just failing to start, like before.

• If the application raises an exception on start-up, the traceback is printed on the screen instead of the application quitting silently.

• The applications have a default text console just like in the script shell environment, so printing text using the print statement works the same way in SIS packaged apps and the script shell.

• On S60 3rd Ed FP2 devices, access GPS out of the box without signing hassle! Since S60 3rd Ed FP2 devices now permit the Location capability for self-signed applications, that capability is now enabled by default in the S60 3rd Ed FP2 binaries.

• Almost all of the old 1.4.x Python APIs are included. The rest should be added during the 1.9.x series.

• The interpreter start-up time is considerably longer than in 1.4.x. We'll optimize this.

• The runtime package is much bigger than with 1.4.x. This'll get smaller once we have the modified packaging model working - estimate is that the final base runtime would be less than 1MB.

• There is an additional dependency to the OpenC libraries, which must be installed for the runtime to work.

• Sadly, S60 2.x devices are not supported by the new code-base, and never will be. This is because OpenC libraries aren't available for S60 2.x.

• This initial release is aimed at script developers, not extension developers, thus no plug-in to the C++ SDK is included. The C++ SDK plug-in should follow soon.

• Binary compatibility between 1.9.x versions isn't guaranteed until 2.0. We won't break it without good reason, but it can happen.

Bogdan summarized them as follows,

Pros:

• Python 2.5.1 core. Yes, that means more modules and improved versions of the already existing ones will be available. This is very good when it comes to stability.
• Official packaging method. This is my personal favorite. The very useful Ensymble has been given a rather nice GUI which makes it easier to use.
• Better error handling. If the application raises an exception on start-up it doesn't just terminate silently but prints the traceback on the screen.

Cons:

• Much longer installation and start-up time. Really, you'll notice the difference. But like the thread says, this will be fixed.
• No support for S60 2nd Edition. Sadly, this part of the S60 family will no longer be supported now or in the future, because there are dependencies on OpenC libraries, which aren't available for 2nd Edition.

Notes:

• This release works on S60 5th Edition like the previous ones did, but it doesn't explicitly have any special features for it (like support for touch events).
• In a strange yet understandable way, the runtime isn't signed by Nokia with all capabilities like before. We only get the user-grantable set this time.
• Apparently PyS60 has moved from sourceforge and has a new home: https://garage.maemo.org/projects/pys60/
• The documentation no longer comes as a pdf file (at least this time it didn't) but as a much more comprehensive collection of HTML documents. I think this is better in pretty much every aspect.

This is not a stable release, but just one of the first in series of 1.9 to make a solid and a satisfying PyS60 2.0 !

 The PyS60 team has the following targets for PyS60 2.0:

• Better usability for the developer and the end user

• Easier runtime deployment. It must be possible for a developer to package their application in a way that the end user doesn't need to think about the runtime installation. Note that we're not saying the end user doesn't have to _install_ the runtime, we're just sayingthey don't need to _think_ about it.

• Easier tools installation and SIS packaging for Python applications. Especially packaging Python applications to SIS has proved to be pretty tough with all the dependencies you need to install. The 1.9.0 release improves things with the new all-in-one installer that gives you the packaging tool, the documentation and the SIS files you need for development in one package. The user-friendly Ensymble tool is now official, and there is a GUI for one-button package creation.

• Easier and more robust ways to use and distribute 3rd party extension modules with your application. Free use of third party extensions isone of the main advantages of Python, and we want to enable and encourage that. We'll improve the Ensymble packaging tool to automatically bundle modules not included in the base runtime into your application SIS, as well as specify how a module author can distribute their module to other developers so that the module can be easily used.

• Integrated HTML documentation: The S60 specific documentation is now a part of the full Python documentation so you no longer need to switch between them.

• Reliability and compliance with the standard Python. We've put effort into automatic testing on multiple target platforms as well as fixing any noncompliance revealed by Python's own regrtest.py test suite. The compliance isn't perfect yet, but it's much better than with the old 1.4.x code-base.

• Quicker start-up and smaller base runtime package size than with 1.9.0.

• Selected API additions. Qt support is definitely on the roadmap. Schedule we can't give yet.

• Support for non-Windows platforms for things other than C++ extension development. Already preliminary support is available in 1.9.0, which contains an all-in-one archive that gives you the packaging tool, the documentation and the SIS files.

The plan seems good, and the packaging process is getting simpler with the availability of GUI based Ensymble.

Just hoping that one day, PyS60 ships preinstalled with the Nokia devices. May be with PyS60 2.0 ?

Merry Christmas!

Christmas approaching, and its time for gifts  

Originally Posted by jplauril View Post Ye olde 1.4.x modules are (mostly) ported. The first rough developer release of the new 2.5 codebase - PyS60 1.9.0 - will be out soon. Stay tuned.

At present the latest PyS60 release was 1.4.5 which was released few weeks ago, just another maintenance release. As quoted above by Jukka Laurilla, there is some thing good to come very soon. Yes, the all new PyS60 1.9.0, which would be based on Python 2.5, seems to be underway to be released soon.

This would be the biggest change in the hierachy of PyS60 releases, even if it would be a rough developer version initially. Again Jukka says, in another post of his, that the touch support would not be present in the 1.9.0 version, but only in the next 2.0 stable release. Well, just thinking about time between 1.9.0 and 2.0....

I sense that they are all ready with the PyS60 1.9.0 and would be releasing it in the next few days - Best X'mas gift to the PyS60  developers. And we are all ready to test the new release... Bring it on !

What else are you expecting in the new release? Would like to hear your comments- but be sure to punch them in before the release announced

How many times has it happened to you, that you need to send an urgent email, and you just don't find internet with you? 

How many times, while travelling, did you want to  send an email, but again no internet/GPRS?

Like the above two questions indicate, sometimes do we find ourselves caught up in situations like this. Moreover, if WLAN connection is not available, sometimes GPRS/WAP connection is expensive to use, particularly in India, where operators have trap tariff data plans for the same. Today as the world goes deeper and deeper into the internet, email has become the basic necessity of life for some people - Ask yourself!

Q: So what is a sensible thing to do in a situation like this?

A: Send an SMS

Well, the catch is establishing a mobile email server on a phone and using the same through other phones. A group/firm/family can use the email services by accessing the mobile email server (phone) remotely. I have been working on a similar project since last few days. The idea to turn the phone into an email hub is accomplished by an application SMS2EMAIL which serves this purpose.

The SMS2EMAIL application has to be installed on one of the phones from the group/firm/family. This phone now acts as a gateway for sending emails. Group members can send emails by merely sending an SMS to this phone (syntax specific ofcourse). The SMS Syntax is demonstrated in the screenshot below. The users can be configured on the application ofcourse, and they are authenticated before sending emails. 

Sometimes it even serves lazy people who just care to type an SMS rather than browsing the web or the webclient to send emails, and I am one of them :-)

Would love to hear comments, and below is a video demonstration, Enjoy!

At croozeus.com we have a section where we feature a PyS60 Application every 10 days.

The prominent aim of the PyS60 Applications section is to help the developers of PyS60 build standalone applications on PyS60. Also the source code of the featured application is made available so that other developers can learn from it or modify it according to their needs.

You can find the first 5 featured PyS60 Applications here. Yesterday, we just completed next 5 featured applications, which are summarized in this post. Visit here to find the list of all the Featured PyS60 Applications.

Featured PyS60 Application #6 is PyCalc by Bogdan Galiceanu

PyCalc is a PyS60 Calculator with a similar approach, for S60 devices. PyCalc is a calculator with two modes : Basic and Scientific.

The basic mode has most frequently used options like - add, substract, multiply, divide, square, square root, etc. The Scientific mode has advanced options in addition to basic functions, includind - trigonometric functions like sine, consine, tan and logarithmic and exponential functions as well. The basic and scientific modes can be toggled according to the usage. Both modes are shown in the above screenshot.

Source code of PyCal (Zip format)

Presentation for PyCalc

Featured PyS60 Application #7: Unity by Jouni Miettunen

 Unity was originally invented in Japan 1985 as “Chain Shot!” by Kuniaki Moribe. After that it has spread all over the world with names such as SameGame, TumeGame, KomeGame, MameGame,
DebaGame, TileFall, Cabeem, MaciGame, GD-BMD etc.

The idea is to clear the whole playing area by removing tiles in groups. The more tiles you remove at the same time, the more points you get !

Currently, there have been updates to this game. Sensor support and difficulty levels have been added. Find more info on the updates on the Python Dibo.

Twin Featured Application #8: BH BlueJack and BH Text-to-Speech by Christian Shtarkov

        

BH BlueJack an open-source bluejacking application for S60 3rd edition devices, while BH Text-to- speech - as the name suggests is text-to-speech application for 3rd Editon devices. Read more about the features of the twin applications here.

Source code for BH BlueJack

Source code for BH Text-to-speech

Featured PyS60 Application #9: NShaver by Jacksonproductions.net and wook

Do you like to make fun? Have you ever wanted to shave off, your friends hair?

Wanna now someones reaction, when he/she thinks his/her hair is shaved off?

This is your chance. Use nshaver and have fun.

Watch video demonstration of Nshaver

Download Nshaver here

Source code for Nshaver

Featured PyS60 Application #10: Genius by Rafael Tavares