Lucian Tomuta's Forum Nokia Blog

Load your application in a running emulator

ltomuta — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:00:49 +0200

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.

Nokia N97 SDK v1.0 released

ltomuta — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 17:00:00 +0300

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.

Can you write an antivirus?

ltomuta — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 11:00:31 +0200

The blogosphere is buzzing with a hot subject: a worm attacking Symbian smartphones. The creature has a name too, not a latin one as the living worms but a rather techie one: Trojan:SymbOS/Yxe.A. Or, among its friends, "Sexy view".

You can read Gabor Torok's analysis of the incident at Mobile worm, Yxes.A - an analysis but in this post I want to challenge you with a more hands-on task: how to protect yourself from this worm?

We all know (I hope) the good old security advices published by Nokia at http://europe.nokia.com/get-support-and-software/learn-how/security/your-device:

Exercise caution when accepting applications sent via Bluetooth or opening MMS attachments as they may include software harmful to your phone or PC.
Do not approve or download content to a mobile device from an unknown or unreliable source.
In general, keep your Bluetooth connection on hidden mode unless you specifically need to be visible to others.

For the sake of this post however, let's pretend that we want to ignore these advices and instead ensure that we can install any sis file that finds its way to our devices ... except this virus, of course.

So, given that the info we have about the virus is whatever we can find from this picture from F-Secure's blog,

the requirement is to design a component that blocks the installation of the worm without affecting any other application. If multiple solutions are proposed the winner will be the one with the simplest design and less Platform Security capabilities requirements. Only public APIs can be used for creating the solution.

Do you have the answer? Post it here or, if it has any attachments, send it to ltomuta@ovi.com

Fine print:
Since the task is trivial there will be no prize in this challenge, except of course for the antivirus protection you will implement for yourself :)

A few reminders

ltomuta — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 17:08:20 +0300

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?

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

ltomuta — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 10:00:20 +0300

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.

S60 SDK and tools on Windows Vista - a success story

ltomuta — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 20:30:56 +0300

The following is a copy of a Discussion Board post from a thread discussing - again - the level of support of the S60 tools and SDK for the Windows Vista, or more likely the lack there of.

This thread finally made me curious enough to try installing the SDK on Windows Vista. Here are my results:

OS: Vista Home Premium + SP1
SDK: S60 3rd FP1
IDE: Carbide.C++ 1.3 Pro (eval)
Tools: Active Perl 5.6.1 build 635, GCCE 2005-q1c

1) Install Carbide
setup.exe -> next -> ... the usual ... -> finish.

To be noted that the installation is done in C:\Apps rather than the protect c:\Program Files\...

2) From the html page displayed by Carbide at the end of the install download Active Perl

Since Perl was already reported to be tricky (and since it will try to touch at least the %PATH% env. variable) I've made sure to run the setup.exe in Administrator mode. All went just fine.

3) SDK download

Again, the SDK installs files under c:\Program Files\... so Admin mode is preferable. All went swell until I was prompted to ...

4) Install GCCE

Since I was not sure if the installation is to be run in Admin mode I've decided not to perform the install at that time. Once I've answered NO to the prompt the SDK install finalized with OK status.

Now, the GCCE installer can be found under %EPOCROOT%Epoc32\tools\distrib so the next step is to start the install from there with Admin rights. And all goes well.

5) Quick inspection of the tools (like in How do I start programming for Symbian OS?) and environment settings. Since all seems fine is time for ...

6) Carbide.c++ test

The usual restart after detecting the SDKs. Then example project import and build for emulator. All seems ok except for some warnings about non-existing pipe, I guess they are safe to ignore.

Unfortunately here I pause with the good news since I find that the emulator fails to start somewhere in the area of font loading.

Resuming the good news flow the GCCE build worked just fine and I ended up having a signed SIS file.

My conclusions:

- Installing the environment on Vista is not impossible and, at least when it comes to the actual install sequences it does not require any extra effort, maybe just a bit of patience and environment awareness
- Since there are some known problems with the emulator and certain hardware drivers I cannot blame Vista for the emulator problems. Not yet anyway :)
- Despite of the relative success of the test, and even after I'll solve the emulator issue, I still do not see Vista as the OS of choice for Symbian development. If anything I'll try to get back to XP which is more stable, less bloated and more importantly fully supported by the tools.

Update:

Ok, solved the emulator problem too. It was the much debated "FAULT: Exception 0x10000000" problem, with the fix being a change on Vista's Data Execution Protection (DEP) settings.

So, now I have a fully working environment. The next task will be to delete it, but that can wait until tomorrow. ;)

Well, I hope someone will find this useful.

Are you ready for more ... drives?

ltomuta — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 19:00:24 +0300

It has become a reflex for Symbian developers to think of the available drives as being at best four:

Z: the ROM drive where the firmware resides
C: the internal flash memory drive (aka. phone memory)
D: the RAM mapped drive used as a temporary fast access file cache
E: the mass storage drive, usually a removable memory card but on some devices replaced by an internal flash drive or even HDD.

Out of the four drives two are usually ignored, one for being read-only and the other one for being volatile. So the developers are focusing on the C: and E: drives, the ones used for storing application's files, the ones where the user stores the mp3 collection that the application needs to scan for.

The N96 phone was announced some long time ago but I have not seen many comments regarding the fact that this is the first phone to have both internal mass storage drive (16GB flash) and support for removable SD cards (up to 8GB). Good news for the end-user but how is this feature seen from the developer perspective? Is your application ready to handle one more drive?

But wait, there's more. N96 is a S60 3rd Edition phone, supporting Feature Pack 2. That means it supports another nice but rather ignored feature that this platform release brings: Remote drives, the network drives based on the WebDav protocol. More drives for your applications to handle.

So, how should an application handle all these drives? Well, to start with, one should simply stop assuming and start querying. How many drives does the device have? What type of drives are they? Can I use them? The answer to all this question is dynamic and so should be the code that handles it. Remove all the hardcoded paths, all predefined drive enumerations.

The APIs needed for adding support for multiple drives to your application are now available as a dedicated SDK plug-in. Documentation and example application are included so … Happy coding! ;)

S60 SDK API Plug-ins

ltomuta — Thu, 22 May 2008 14:10:57 +0300

The S60 SDK API Plug-ins have been updated today.

One change affecting all the plug-in versions regards the click-through Limited License Agreement (LLA), updated to reflect developer's concerns about the use of the provided APIs in 3rd party projects, both closed and open source. The LLA template can be viewed online (also included in each package) and one of the Discussion Boards threads discussing it, and the need for change can be found here.

The plug-in targeting the S60 3rd Edition SDK, supporting Feature Pack 2, is now in its "final release" version. One of the big changes in the package is that the Audio Proxy Server (APS) is deprecated and while the old releases are expected to be still fully functional developers are encouraged to use the new VoIP Audio Service API in their projects.

The VoIP Audio Service API as well as the Call Audio Control API are also available for S60 3rd Edition SDK, supporting Feature Pack 1, therefore the corresponding plug-in has been also updated. I am sure VoIP applications developers will find these two APIs quite interesting.

Should you find any of the APIs useful do take them into use but remember that there is no binary compatibility promise for these non-SDK APIs. If you still need access to features which are not accessible with the SDK or with APIs from these plug-ins you can still use the S60 API Partnering process and request access to the needed features.

Leo Laporte knows the truth about S60 ?

ltomuta — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 21:30:22 +0300

I've hear it so many times that I surprise myself for not believing it by now. Bashing S60 is by now the most popular sport, at least until the Olympic Games are started in Beijing. S60 is said to be difficult to learn (when compared to the Finnish language), difficult to understand (compared to the string theory) and definitely uglier than Miss South Carolina.

This week Leo Laporte had something to say about S60, you would not believe what he had to say in his "this Week in Tech" podcast, episode 139: 4-TWiTty. If you want to go straight to the chase forward to minute 59:50 (easier with the Nokia Podcasting application than on his web site). So, is he right?

Platform Security and Symbian Signed

ltomuta — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 16:00:46 +0200

Here's another "mind map" that I hope will help developers understand what are the implications of Platform Security on the Symbian Signed process. To me it is self-explanatory but I would happily answer any questions you might have on the topic.

Updated on 25.03.2008: Now showing some hints with regards to the signing/certification costs. This however is a complex story as the fees charged by the test houses are variable, e.g. based on the targeted market. For more details (including prices) see the wiki article on Test houses.

Updated on 11.06.2008: Click the following link to download the mind map.