Lucian Tomuta's Forum Nokia Blog

Load your application in a running emulator

2009-11-09T17:00:49+02:00

Everybody loves to hate the Symbian SDK emulator. The first reaction to it usually is: "It is slow, really slooooooow, it takes ages to start it" ;)

Yes, it is true, the emulator is slow, but considering the task it has to perform and the complexity of the system it emulates such slowness is to be expected. However, the problem is not as bad as one may think. Yes, the emulator takes time to load, but then why don't you start it in advance and let it load while you browse your recent emails, so that you have it up-and-running at the moment you really need it.

Many developers already with some Symbian experience will tell you that you cannot do that. But yes, you can! The following video will show a basic Qt application being created, built and run into an already running emulator.

Coming up next: Rebuild without restarting the emulator.

Build without an SDK, test without a device

2009-11-08T17:50:08+02:00

How many SDKs do I need? Which SDK is best for me?

For a newcomer to the Symbian development world those are among the first questions asked. There are many S60 SDKs on offer, some with feature packs and plugins, some with compiler specific binaries and on top of that many plug-ins. Quite a lot to handle and figure out and nobody likes having all possible SDKs installed.

So what will happen now that Qt is added to the picture? I can design my app using Qt for Windows (or Linux, or Mac) and, according to the "code once, compile anywhere" promise I should be able now to compile this application for Symbian and Maemo devices, with minimal changes. But that means that now I need to install at least one Symbian SDK for building, or a Maemo one, and I should have at least one smartphone for testing. Or do I?

Yes, probably one will have an SDK installed and use its emulator for testing some really complicated solutions, with Symbian components part of the design. And yes, nothing can really replace hand-on-testing. But for simple use cases and for getting started trials one possible solution could be building and testing in the cloud. What you need is an IDE plugin, web hosted SDK and build tools and Forum Nokia's Remote Device Access solution, all mixed together in a rather simple build, deploy and test solution.

Here's a live demo (boring parts speeded-up a bit) of such a solution:

So, what do you think? Do you like the idea? Would you use it for your projects?

Nokia N97 SDK v1.0 released

2009-07-16T17:00:00+03:00

Those engaged in developing applications for Nokia N97 will be interested to know that the final version of the Nokia N97 SDK has been released today.

The new SDK version provides:

Improved support of home screen features.
Updated SDK documentation.
Support for the Chinese version of the full keyboard.
Updated example applications.
Updated default emulator theme.
Fixes for all other important bugs.

Read more about features and known issues in SDK's release notes.

It is probably worth making clear a few points about this SDK:

Nokia N97 is and S60 5th Edition (Symbian^1) device and it is fully compatible that that platform release. Any application developed for S60 5th Edition devices using the S60 5th Edition (Symbian^1) SDK will be compatible with smartphone as well.
The Nokia N97 SDK is only provided as an alternative, mostly beneficial to those developing applications targeting N97's specific features, features not supported by the platform release and thus not supported by other devices based on it, as for example the home screen widgets.
While the APIs in the S60 5th Edition SDK are covered by platform's binary compatibility promise, all the additional device specific APIs provided by the Nokia N97 SDKs are provided "as is", without binary compatibility promise.

That's it. Enjoy the new release and don't forget to let us know what you think about it.

Carbide.ui Theme Edition registration

2009-02-20T16:00:14+02:00

The Forum Nokia site and the Discussion Boards are frequently bombarded with one simple question: Where can I find the registration key (serial number) for Carbide.ui Theme Edition?

This post is yet another attempt to help themes designers get past this problem and hopefully, with the help of Google's search engine, the videos provided here will be the final answer to this apparenly really complicated issue :)

Carbide.ui Theme Edition - online registration

Carbide.ui Theme Edition - offline registration

A few more things to be noted:

Carbide.ui Theme Edition is the IDE to be used for creating themes for Nokia phones, be they from the S60 or Series 40 product ranges.
The same registration technology is used by Nokia Series 40 Theme Studio 2.2 and it does work just the same. However, the tool is old and deprecated and Carbide.ui should be used if at all possible.
Don't post here requests for the even older Nokia Series 40 Theme Studio 1.2 and its serial number. If the registration wizard does not work anymore for that tool then there is nothing I can help with ...

And, as a final comment, this is not a totally useless post for C++ and Java developers either as the S60 emulator uses an identical registration procedure :)

S60 development on Windows 7

2009-01-15T11:00:40+02:00

One of the first comments to my S60 SDK and tools on Windows Vista - a success story article was that we should hurry up with making the tools compatible with Vista because what do you know, Windows 7 is around the corner and we will be again trailing behind ... :)

Well, Windows 7 (beta, Ultimate edition) is now available for download and is surprisingly stable. On a modest IBM Thinkpad T41 the OS installs ok and although it has some bells and whistles disabled (or because of that, after all Aero is cute but resource hungry) I find it to be fast and fresh ...

So, how do Carbide (now version 2.0) and the S60 SDK (now the S60 5th Edition SDK v0.9) behave on this Windows release?

As with Vista, the key is to be careful and as much as possible in control of what you're doing. There seems to be only two rules to follow: install the tools with admin rights and verify the result after each step.

I've followed roughly the same steps and compared with the previous results the following are to be noted:

The only ActivePerl package I've found for download was in *.msi format. This is basically a document to be handled by the Windows Installer and does not have a "Run as Administrator" option.
Holding the Shift key down while accessing the context menu one can find a "Run as other user..." option but in an attempt to use that I found out that the Administrator account was by default disabled.
I ended up enabling this account, setting a password for it and then running the Windows Installer from the command line (just to be sure):

> runas /noprofile /user:administrator "msiexec /i c:\users\lucian\desktop\ActivePerl-5.6.1.635-MSWin32-x86.msi"
Aside from this small complication all went ok and at the end I could verify that Perl was correctly added to the path and can be invoked (tools verification as described in How do I start programming for Symbian OS?).
As in the previous post, I've chose to install the GCC compiler myself rather than let the SDK setup to start it. However, despite running it with administrator privileges the installer was not able to modify the %PATH% environment variable so I had to edit it manually and set it as %PATH%=c:\Program Files\CSL Arm Toolchain\bin;%PATH%
The emulator is running OK with no hacks applied (like DEP deactivation), just the usual firewall blockage removal

That's it. Unofficially and with a "only for hackers" recommendation I declare the S60 development tools Windows 7 ready. :)

Btw, as in the previous tests, I found that I don't need the official Vista patch provided with the SDK or any of the many hacks documented in the Migrating to Windows Vista wiki article. Or at least I did not need them ... yet.

How about a new version of the GCC compiler?

2008-12-10T21:30:54+02:00

Last time I've asked my colleagues from Symbian about updating the compiler used in the Symbian/S60 SDKs the answer was something like ... it's on the list, we're looking into it. I don't know what the status is now but it seems we no longer need to wait for an official release (ok, it depends on how much we're ready to risk "hacking" the SDK).

Forum Nokia user MKechlibar just announced that he has managed to tame the beasts and, judging by the nicely documented Wiki article he wrote, everybody should be able to follow his lead.

Have a look at the article, its title is How to use GCCE 4 with Symbian SDKs, and why not, give it a try!

A few reminders

2008-10-14T17:08:20+03:00

I want to remind you a couple of things about the S60 5th Edition SDK:

The current version is 0.9 and that shoud indicate that it is a beta SDK. We are still descovering problems with it and trying to fix them when possible even before the next SDK release. To save youself from some troubles you should remember to check periodicaly the content of the Wiki article KIS001048 - S60 Platform SDK - Workarounds and Updates or better yet you should register for page update notifications (click on the Watch tab).
Presumably the SDK does not contain all the APIs one needs for implementing some "must have" application features. That is why we are constantly asked when the next SDK API Plug-in will be released. At the same time, a request for feedback on which APIs should be included in the package is completely ignored.
Am I correct to read this as a sign that those APIs are not really needed?

S60 5th Edition's new features

2008-10-10T16:26:04+03:00

At 11:00 AM Finnish time today, we had the pleasure of virtually meeting some of the S60 developers in a webinar that aimed at presenting what is new and hot in the S60 5th Edition release. The overview presentation covered topics such as: SDK content, new and updated APIs for Symbian C++ and Runtimes, touch UI support and the building blocks it provides for creating applications which are both easy and fun to use. The presentation also included an updated on the Calling all innovators competition as well as the latest about the Forum Nokia Launchpad program.

The slides from the presentation can be seen below. It seems that some of the content cannot be rendered (Adobe Share is still in beta) but you can also download through this plug-in a copy of the presentation in the original PPT format.

More webinars with similar topics are scheduled in the coming days so please join in. Also, Touch UI, sensors and S60 WRT widget technologies would be the subject of the next Forum Nokia events.

The S60 SDK emulator: faster if you do not start it

2008-07-29T23:00:41+03:00

Just now I've run across a thread in the Forum Nokia's Discussion Boards promising an 1000% improvement of emulator's startup time.

Two things came to my mind seeing this thread: a paradox attributed to Zeno of Elea and ... the S60 3rd Edition SDK, supporting Feature Pack 2.

First, Zeno's paradox, adapted so that it fits the topic:

In order to satisfy the developers, the emulator would have to be fully up and running in about 10s. But, in order to do so, it would have to be in a "half way there" state first, which it cannot do unless it reaches half of that state to begin with. And so on, ... and so on, ad infinitum.

I have seen at least two conclusions of this paradox, pick your choice:

The "logical" conclusion is that the emulator cannot actually ever start since it will have to pass through an infinite number of intermediary states in a finite time interval.
The "logical" conclusion is that in order for the emulator to achieve the desired performance it is mandatory that the emulator is not even started.

Ok? No more complaints about the emulator please!

Now the serious part:

The S60 3rd Edition SDK FP2 does implement two start modes for the emulator, a partial one, with only a few critical servers started, and the full slow start-up mode with which we are all accustomed by now.

You can switch between the two start-up modes by modifying a setting in emulator's Preferences dialog (through the Tools -> Preferences menu option).

The SDK release v1.1 also adds a graphical indicator to the emulator's window so that the developer knows all the time whether the emulator runs in partial or full startup mode. This is intended as a reminder likely to be useful should you experience some strange application error, which can be a side effect of the chosen startup mode.

For tweaking the emulator of the previous platform releases we are each on our own, but it should be quite safe to try ...

How to enable support for old SDKs in Carbide.c++ v1.3

2008-07-16T10:00:20+03:00

Let's start with a bit of a warning: the tool no longer supports the old SDKs and this decision is final. Applying the hack described here will at best restore the support for the old SDK to the 1.2 level but enhancements are not to be expected. You should not ask for support from the Carbide.c++ team ( nor from me ) for any issues that might be a side effect of applying this hack.

OK, now that all this is clear let's start hacking.

Task 1 - Restore the S60 2nd Edition and Series 80 project templates

This is going to be quite easy since none of the needed files have been removed from the instillation, instead the templates have been commented out from the xml file that acts as a index in the templates collection. So, go to the installation folder (let's call it $(INSTALL)), and open the file .\plugins\com.nokia.cdt.templates_1.3.1.036\plugin.xml (you should make a copy of the file before modifying it).

The lines we're looking for are clearly marked

You can either remove these comment pair lines or neutralize them by closing the comments tags on the same line, with nothing in-between. That's it, now the project templates should be fully visible in the New -> Symbian C++ Project dialog. Start Carbide.c++ and check the templates.

Note: it may happen that the templates are not visible when you start Carbide, there seems to be some sort of a cache mechanism. Here's how you flush that cache: close Carbide.c++ then go to the installation directory and locate the file .\plugins\com.nokia.carbide.templatewizard_1.3.1.036.jar. Change its extension so that Carbide.c++ cannot recognize it anymore and then start Carbide.c++. There might be a error message and the entire templates dialog is gone but that is fine. Close Carbide.c++, restore the extension of the templatewizard file and then start Carbide.c++. If all goes as expected you should see the welcome screen again, sign that the cache was flushed, the templates dialog is back in and all the templates are visible (unless filtered out based on the available SDKs)

You can start creating projects and if you're going to use Carbide.c++ Express only then you're done hacking, the rest of the story is only relevant for commercial versions of the product.

If you start creating a GUI project using the UI Designed feature, you will pretty soon run into problems since, while the project compiles just fine the IDE reports some UI Designer validation errors (like toolbar member not found in the definition of com.nokia.sdt.series60.CAknView). So here comes the next task:

Task 2 - Troubleshoot the UI Designer

It has to be said from the start that I have not tested the entire set of GUI application types and components. I've only tried one empty container design and only fixed its problems. Shoud you run into other problems, with other type of UI Designs, the fix for it must be similar and I'm sure you can manage it. Having a copy of the Carbide.c++ v1.2 plug-ins at hand would of course help you identify what is different and thus how to workaround the problem.

So, here we go: I've started from a reference to a toolbar missing from the definition of com.nokia.sdt.series60.CAknView

A search for the above resource identifier led me to .\plugins\com.nokia.sdt.series60.componentlibrary_1.3.1.036\components\view, a promising looking directory with some files that appear to be holding the definition of the same resource, the CAknView.

The relevant files are: CAknView_2.8.component and CAknView_common.inc. As the file name suggests, one file contains the definition of the resource with 2.8 and later specific tags while the other includes the resource elements that are common to all the variants of that resource. The common file is included with a special tag in the specialized component description thus keeping together the resource description. It is in this CAknView_common.inc that I've found the toolbar resource and to fix my problem I need to get rid of it.

The initial situation:

CAknView_2.8.component defines the component for S60 2.8 or later using the common elements from CAknView_common.inc

After the change the file structure should be:

CAknView_2.8.component defines the component for S60 2.8 using the common elements from CAknView_common_2x.inc
CAknView_3.0 component defines the component for S60 3.0 or later using the common components from CAknView_common.inc

To do that: make a copy of CAknView_2.8.component and name it CAknView_3.0.component. Make a copy of CAknView_common.inc and name it CAknView_common_2x.inc. Next, from CAknView_common_2x.inc remove the "toolbar" definition, the <select property="[com.nokia.sdt.series60.Toolbar]"> … </select> element.

Now, in the CAknView_2.8.component file, locate the include tag

<!ENTITY common_srcgenAndSourceMapping SYSTEM "CAknView_common.inc">

and make it point to CAknView_common_2x.inc

<!ENTITY common_srcgenAndSourceMapping SYSTEM "CAknView_common_2x.inc">

Finally review all the files containing the component definitions, make sure that the minimum and maximum SDK version values are appropriate (e.g. minSDKVersion="2.0" maxSDKVersion="2.7.9") and that they include the proper CAknView_common*.inc file.

Ok, that's it. Refresh the project in Carbide, build (hopefully without further errors) and enjoy the IDE.