Gizmo

Gizmo project uses the Internet connection to make free calls to anyone with a Gizmo account, just like the Skype does. Furthermore, it allows to call other voice networks for free with the one client: Yahoo Messenger, Windows Live, Google Talk and of course Gizmo project. It is also possible to chat with AIM & MSN buddies directly from Gizmo project.

With inexpensive Call-Out feature, user can call any normal phone (mobile or landline) at some 2 cents per min. With its Call-in option, at about $3 per month, user gets a phone number in over 50 US/UK cities that goes (roams) with him and lets people call him at local rates. Other features like file exchange, chat history, voicemail with customisable messages, Instant messaging (IM), conference calling and call recording are pretty useful too.

Except the chargeable Call-In add-on, the free Access Numbers (unfortunately they're all US/CA numbers) enable the user to receive call to his Gizmo account from the traditional phone system.

Unlike Skype, it always assigns a SIP number (looks like 1-747-XXX-XXXX) with your Gizmo identifier so you can make calls to and receive calls from over 100 VoIP networks all over the world, for free.

GizmoProject introduced 4.0 beta with video calling and a new look in Dec. Except free video calls, it allows Meta-IM to chat with AIM, Yahoo, Windows Live, GTalk, iChat and more. Chat logging and tabbing are also of interesting features.

Gizmo project is also available on Nokia & Treo handheld, called GizmoVoIP. It saves money making Internet calls with the WiFi phone. The GizmoVoIP plug-in is tested with N80, N96, E61i & E65. A special version for N800 is available.

Gizmo5 beta is recently released to generic mobile phone users. Note that calls are charged differently than with Gizmo project (it charges for the two legs of the call). For example, USD 3.8 cents per min. for calling China from Singapore, as compared to USD 1.8 cents with Gizmo project.

WidSets

WidSets uses multi-applications called widgets to push updates of pre-selected web service directly to your phone. User can find news & information, stay in touch with email & blogs, play games, share pictures and more. He can keep his favorite web content with him in his phone memory and read news update, blogs or mails at his convenience, e.g. offline.

There are currently over 2700 widgets in the library to choose from, such as the BBC News, AccuWeather, eBay or Wikipedia. User can also easily create his own widgets in a few min. which works with the web feed.

A web feed is a data format used for providing users with frequently updated content. Content distributors syndicate a web feed, thereby allowing users to subscribe to it. Making a collection of web feeds accessible in one spot is known as aggregation, which is performed by an Internet aggregator. In the typical scenario of using web feeds, a content provider publishes a feed link on their site which end users can register with an aggregator program (also called a feed reader or a news reader) running on their own machines; doing this is usually as simple as dragging the link from the web browser to the aggregator. When instructed, the aggregator asks all the servers in its feed list if they have new content; if so, the aggregator either makes a note of the new content or downloads it. Aggregators can be scheduled to check for new content periodically.

Nokia N80 firmware 5.0719.0.2

There is a new N80's firmware version V5.0719.0.2 available since May. Feedback on this most recent version has been positive at many forum boards. Many think it's a relief of their currently very buggy v4.0707.0.7 firmware and experience far more stable and slightly better performance -- mainly with photo galley. Some even commented that the photo quality & memory management are also improved. Someone posted the following informal change log:

Messaging -

• Correction for SMS receiving problems
• Correction for received SMS timestamps
• General stability improvements for Messaging application
• Fix for Freemail email download

WLAN -

• Correction for using WLAN wizard from Active Standby in encrypted networks. WLAN wizard help localisation corrections
• Correction for VoIP call when in edge of WLAN coverage

Diverses -

• Correction for USSD commands
• Fix for voice activated dialling and contact name playback
• Fixes for forwarding DRM protected content
• Fix for Multimedia key customization

It is still not yet available for my phoneset (model 0543906) at the online Nokia firmware update service; but I managed to upgrade it at the Nokia service centre. I have so far not experienced any problems so I consider that I'm lucky :)

However, I have not discovered any noticeable improvement either, except that the WLAN seems more stable now (WiFi always disconnects gracefully when a user application exits). The photo galley is not noticeably faster, though probably due to that I store large photos on the 1GB memory card instead of the phone memory. It can zoom-in to 50% that is probably enough for usual cases; but anything beyond that will cause insufficient memory alert.

After re-install the default smartphone software such as Quickoffice, Adobe, SettingWizard & Nokia Search to the memory card, I managed to get 38MB free phone memory (out of total 47MB shared with the system). However, I still can't run the web browser or Yahoo!go without its automatically killing off all other background applications even if it is tiny like Screenshot.

Besides, I've some additional minor complains:

• the warning tone is pretty loud
• After the display goes off, the screen remains light up for about 30 sec. before completely dark. This consumes unnecessary battery power.

3G SIM

Finally I decided to upgrade my GSM phase 2+ SIM to a 3G card. I've been reluctant to do so as the old SIM was actually coded by myself when I was with a SIM card vendor. It was the first STK offer in Singapore, with Info-On-Demand SIM application on it. This fact has kept me loyal to that telco and to the particular SIM card for the past 8 yrs as I'm able to load additional STK applications therefore turn it into a live test card.

Now with 3G or even 3.5G network having phrased in and offering much faster data rate & more features, I can't hold on any more but to upgrade (I now have to pay for it!) & switch to the 3G network. Moreover, SIM application has become the past story though most handsets still (quietly) support STK. The VAS platform has changed from SIM card to Java application and now to the smartphone OS e.g. Windows Mobile or Symbian. WAP did not even get a chance to really fly. The role of SIM card has been demoted to its original function, i.e. subscriber identification and storing network parameters; it is no longer the key player in VAS development, nor is SIM vendor.

Actually, many of the original SIM functions become insignificant in today's mobile experience. For example, the SIM phone book is seldom used and SMS is not even stored into SIM any more. My new 3G SIM (btw, I can recognize it as Gemalto card by its contact-pad shape :-) is said to be 128K card with the capacity to store 1000 phonebook entries. But who really cares it? The phone usually provides megabytes (if not gigabytes) of dynamic memory that effectively stores unlimited number of contact & SMS records. It also offers a more sophisticated phonebook with, for example, voice tag, customised ring tone, face image, email & address that the SIM phonebook doesn't.

The world changes fast. The eight years are long due to flash the concept about GSM VAS...

Nokia N80 firmware v4.0707.0.7

It's lucky that I checked forums before connecting to Nokia firmware update service. There is a newer version v4.0707.0.7 released on the 28th of March (seems only in Europe market?) but many are annoyed by its full of bugs & its damaging their previously-working features. The only good thing I read so far is that it enters the sleep mode sooner to improve battery life. So, don't rush to upgrade it & stay on the current v4.0632.0.38.

More S60 App

Searching for more Symbian S60 3rd Edition freewares, I discovered the following applications:

Y-Browser (v0.80) by Jukka Silvennoinen is a full & extendable file management application with most standard features on files (such as copy, cut, paste, etc) & folders (create, remove, etc).

Screenshot (v2.60) by Antony Pranata captures screenshot on S60 mobile phones and saves it to a file in JPEG, PNG, BMP or MBM format. Actually those captures posted here are by the Screenshot.

MetrO (v5.5.1 / May 2007) by F Van Caenegem & P Bernard helps you find your way in the public transport systems (subway, bus, trams) in more than 350 cities around the world. It is originally for PalmOS and Windows Mobile devices and extended to Symbian Nokia phones. The Singapore database is not too useful though -- it only covers MRT/LRT but not the most needed bus system. One can easily find his way on the graphic route map being posted everywhere at station and on the train.

smart2go

I like the S60 (3rd edition) application 'smart2go'. The beta version is a freeware for S60 mobile phone that allows you to load maps from around the world, discover interesting places nearby and find your way: with optional GPS receiver hardware and navigation license (an extra subscription-based service: for Sin/KL/BKK area, $12 for 7-day, $15 for 30-day, $142 for 1-yr and $162 for 3-yr), one can get turn-by-turn navigation by a voice prompt in your chosen language. Even without GPS or the navigation subscription, one can still get the route planner (completely free-of-charge) that is equivalent to the yahoo map service.

The Singapore map (1.9MB) is with 'okey' details -- at street level (without street number) that is similar to the google or yahoo maps but definitely not as useful as streetdirectory whick includes building details & other searches besides by street name. For example, you can't search & locate Vivo City unless you know a nearby street name. And no building is marked on the map so you can't confirm the location. Once at there, the nearby restaurant search reports Sentosa Food Ctr (900m), Seafood Sentosa (920m), Lakshimi Vilas Restaurant (1.0km) and Telok Blangah Cres Market & Food Ctr (1.5km) etc. The route planner to Changi airport reports the distance 24km and travel time 19 min. by car:

* Harbour Front Walk
* after 216m turn right & continue on Telok Blangah Rd
* after 1.3km keep right & enter AYE/ECP
* after 19.4km keep right & leave ECP
* after 1.9km keep right & continue on T2 Blvd
* after 857m keep left & continue on T2 Blvd
* after 225m destination reached on T2 Link North.

The navigation simulation (if GPS is unavailable) is also interesting and demonstrates the voice instructions... Since Singapore is such a small downtown place, the navigation at only street level is however not very useful.

The China map (18.5MB) is totally disappointing. I would say that it is not useful at all as there is absolutely no content other than a few unnamed inter-city roads. For example, the city 'Beijing' is marked at the cross of two unknown roads.

Other maps that I tried out are acceptable in general: KL (Malaysia map has 10.5MB but it seems only KL area is good -- Malacca is not, for example), HongKong (0.7MB), Taiwan (7.7MB), California (74.5MB) & Paris (17.3MB). They recommend nearby hotels, eateries, public transport and so on and calculate effective route to your destination.

Fring 3.02

While searching for a good IM client, I found this freeware (http://www.fring.com/).

It's so great that links multiple IM and VoIP services in one place. Your contacts at Skype, MSN, Google Talk and other SIP VoIP such as Gizmo are all collected together and present in the Fring frame so you can invite or be invited for a chat or voice call. It also allows to call a normal phone number using your Skype CallOut credit, which is useful in saving the IDD call charge. Fring gets connected via GSM data (e.g. GPRS) or WiFi.

So far I noticed some drawbacks. it seems to consume the phone battery a little bit too much especially when the connection is lost or intermittent (I guess it then keeps searching for the WLAN). There is sometimes a noticeable delay in the Skype voice (due to the transport server like Jabber?). By the way, it does not support Chinese -- my MSN contact with a Chinese alias does not show up correctly. Well, let's hope it gets improved in next release...