Symbian Style: Dude, where’s the apps?

Say hello to our new staff member of sorts. Or guinea pig, to be precise.

The Nokia 5800 Xpress Music, otherwise known as the first official phone running S60 5th Edition. To herald this new arrival, RG will now also have a new column, dedicated to S60 with a focus on 5th Ed and of course, the 5800 Xpress Music.

Disclaimer: I’m also a S60 ambassador. You can be one too by signing up at S60.com and joining its Ambassador program. What you basically do is spread the word about what’s great about Symbian and why owning a S60 phone makes sense. Which is what I’m doing here. Because seriously, between Windows Mobile, the late-out-to-gate Android, and the iPhone – there are needs those platforms can’t fulfil. That’s where Symbian comes in.

Not that I can’t gripe on occasion. I’ve had the 5800 for nearly a week and the first thing that comes to my mind is…dude, where’s the apps?

Now, supposedly 5th edition is backwards-compatible with 3rd edition apps. Not in all cases. I’ve tried installing a random app or two and I keep getting the “This application is not compatible with your phone. Install anyway?” question. Irritating.

Nokia’s Download! is pretty much as useless on this phone as it is others. Too few apps, but at least unlike on the N82, I don’t have to reload the entire catalogue every frickin’ time I open up Download!

Handango’s created a new app it calls InHand. Think Download! but with Handango apps. I’ve downloaded it and well, it has barely any choices either.

I have finally answered my own question why there are too few apps:

Because S60 is not as easy to program for as Apple’s iPhone is. See, I’m an S60 ambassador and saying that. Reason for justification? Even a Roman Catholic priest without a technical background managed to create a Vatican-approved app for the iPhone. A priest.

While coding Symbian, on the other hand, requires working knowledge of C++. Yes, the language of pointers which can lead to massive headaches all around. Making an S60 app is more challenging, and more time-consuming which makes developers far less inclined to, you know, give apps away for free?

This reminds me of the heyday of Palm development. Coding for Palms wasn’t too hard and developers were incredibly enthusiastic about churning app after app. Buy a Palm and you’d be ensured a wealth of apps that were free, fun and extremely functional.

Not that the Symbian Foundation and its new parent, Nokia, hasn’t been trying to remedy the situation. They now have a wealth of resources for developers absolutely FOC. The recommended IDE, Carbide 2.0, is now free of charge. Before, only the Express Edition was free and you needed to fork out money for the OEM or professional versions. The SDK, various tools and booklets are also available to registered members of Nokia Forum. Registration is also free.

Besides the caveat of C++ knowledge, pretty much everything is on hand for wannabe Symbian developers. Nokia’s resolved to make it as easy as possible for people to get started. Now, why should you?

Reasons to program for Symbian:

1. There are more phones running Symbian than any other OS. So you’ll get to see your app on more than just one phone which totally expands on your potential for either fame or (piddling) fortune.

2. Unlike, say, Apple’s Cocoa, C++ is still a language useful in other programming environments. Say you don’t want to develop for mobile anymore – your C++ knowledge could still be applied to desktop applications

3. Wider audience reach. Yes, Download! still sucks but you don’t have to just rely on Nokia to get your app out. Pitch it on Handango and other mobile app stores, or just sell it yourself. That’s why they invented PayPal, dude.

4. The world doesn’t need another iBeer or silly pointless app for the iPhone. But you can make plenty of silly apps for the rest of the iPhone-less world. Do it for the kids. Or virtual beer lovers.