Microsoft launches a "Windows like" application for Nokia Java ME phones

firt — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 18:14:02 +0200

A new free Java ME application was launched by Microsoft: Windows Live Search for Mobile. The first thing I've noticed after installed it on my Nokia N90 was the UI design. It's very, very similar to a Windows Mobile Smartphone UI application. Is it a good idea?

Windows Live Search for Mobile is a connected application available for Java ME and Windows Mobile phones that allows the user to search content into Live Maps service (similar to Google Maps, an application reviewed in a previous post here). You can find addresses, traffic information, business, restaurants, hotels, etc. in US and inside a map you can pan, zoom in and zoom out. When you are typing your search, it has a very useful autocomplete feature.

After opening the application you'll see a full-canvas design with many Windows Mobile Smartphone UI components and features, like:

Full width list items with horizontal scrolling labels when they are focused
A textbox that works a bit different as Nokia's one. You should start typing wherever the focus are, and you don't have an “editing” or “non editing” status inside the textbox.
The Command area for softkeys is a bit diferent than Java's one. They are two commands rendered like visual buttons, with their labels centered (not aligned to the edges).
The “Options” or “More Options” command is called “Menu” and opens a mini-submenu in a pop-up style where you can browse with up-down or use [1] to [9] keys to select the option (similar to Opera Mini too)
The “Ok” or “Select” Command is called “Go”.
There is a “Home” command to go the the Main Menu and you have an “Exit” application command in every screen. Sometimes there isn't a back command, so you should use “Home” instead (a bit confusing).
The alert messages are similar to Windows Mobile.
When you are typing in the search box, the autocomplete feature replaces the Home menu options with new ones. But you must clear characters with the left arrow (I've to try many keys to detect that). Right key acts as "Select". If you keep pressed a key, it doesn't appear the number corresponding to that key, you should cycle between letters and numbers, for example "abc2ABC".

I think if you are a Java ME phone user, like a Nokia's one, you can feel yourself lost inside this application for a while. The usability guidelines aren't the same between Windows Mobile and Nokia/Symbian/other vendor OS.

I like the visual design and some of the “original” UI behaviour like the dynamic options based on the user partial input (similar to an autocomplete), but I'm not sure if it's a good idea for the usability to have a totally different UI compared to the device's where the application is running and different from other applications installed.

Download the application free from http://wls.live.com and tell me what do you think.

The Future of Java ME II

firt — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 06:26:09 +0300

Following my last post, I’m analyzing the Future of Java ME (J2ME).

Designing new UI with SVG

Standard Vector Graphics format, will be one of the revolutions in Java UI designs, using an SVG subset called Tiny SVG. Everyone who developed a Graphic User Interface using LCDUI Canvas (or FullCanvas in Nokia UI) knows how difficult is to design a cool UI interface; we have to do everything with Java code with a few shape methods (like fillRect), or loading heavies PNGs.

Many vendors, all of them in JCP (Java Community Process) are supporting the SVG API (JSR 226). Many SDKs and emulators are supporting it, and Nokia’s devices are supporting it from Series 40 3rd edition Feature Pack 1 and Series 60 3rd edition Feature Pack 1. You can find a great document from Forum Nokia about this API here

SVG has many advantages, as the following ones:

It’s a standard.
It’s XML based, so it is a text file, easy to store and transmit.
It allows to design vector graphics that scales automatically to fit the canvas size of the device.
It allows vector animations.
It allows to define hotspots over the image, to be navigated and selected by the user (yes, we can “listen” to this events).

So, from Java code we can capture when a user selects a hotspot, and we can also animate and modify the SVG elements structure dynamically. For example, we can change an object property (color, size, rotation, etc.), we can add new elements (like shapes, other SVG document) when we need it.

Using this technology, not only we are having greats advantages over using Canvas and Graphic classes, we can integrate graphic designers in our team easily. SVG is a format that every graphic designer can export from a vector tool (like Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator), so we won’t need to convert designs into PNGs and Java code anymore.

And JCP team is working on a newer API that will extends this one: JSR 287 (SVG API 2.0). This API will work with SVG 1.2 format, that supports multimedia, audio and video, alpha transparency and gradients objects.

Other format waiting in Java ME community is CDF (Compound Document Format, JSR 290). But this is for other post...

Internationalization

For everyone who develops applications for a non-English market (as me), the ability to generate multiple versions for each language is a great feature. JCP (leader by Nokia in this case) worked in the Mobile Internationalization API (JSR-238). Using this API installed in the device, we can handle external resources files per language, and we can format dates, numbers and currency depending on the culture of the user’s country.

This API is currently supported in many IDEs for working in design mode. A great feature of some IDEs is the ability to generate many JAR packages, one per language or group of them.

Contactless

Contactless Communication API (JSR-257) allows mobile devices to read information available around in the environment, using many technologies, like visual tags (bar codes or similars), or RFID (Radio Frequency Identification). This will allow mobile phones to read URLs, number phones, semantic information, prices or other information from the “real world” to the Java ME application.

What’s next

In next posts I’ll talk about MIDP with CDC, Next Generation Mobile Platform, MIDP 3.0 and new tools and IDEs.

See you on next post!

Maximiliano Firtman's Forum Nokia Blog

Microsoft launches a "Windows like" application for Nokia Java ME phones

The Future of Java ME II