SYMBIAN APPLICATION

Proxy-based, data compressing web browser UCWEB is worth having on your phone for the tabbed browsing alone.

The latest beta test version is now available in english. Unfortunately it’s the mobile Java version. My advice: stick with the previous beta test version or the oficial non-test version until a new real Symbian version becomes available.

New in the latest test version: a better download manager, URL history in the URL entry box, bug fixes, and more.

• UCWEB 6.6 beta for mobile Java translated by New88

• UCWEB 6.6 beta (native Symbian version)

The official non-beta version is compatible with the patch by jbpseudo which removes the sponsored links from the start page, uses Google search without the limitations of the official program, and adds an online synchronisation option to the side panel.

• UCWEB 6.3 (official non-beta version)

The latest beta test version of proxy-based, data compressing, tabbed web browser UCWEB is translated into english by Akushah.

New in UCWEB 6.6 beta: many bugs were fixed, and page rendering has been sped up. Unfortunately it doesn’t use T9 predictive text yet.

• UCWEB 6.6.5.0.30-999 28-09051212 EN (beta test version, unsigned)
• UCWEB (latest official non-beta version)

Symbian VoIP and instant messaging program Talkonaut connects to Jabber (including Google Talk), ICQ, MSN, AIM and Yahoo, and with just about every VoIP service that uses the SIP protocol.

It doesn’t connect with Skype, but Talkonaut lets you store multiple SIP VoIP settings, which competitors Nimbuzz and fring do not.

The latest Talkonaut update comes with bug fixes, can show unread messages on your standby screen, and the best change of all: Talkonaut finally uses your Symbian phone contacts list.

Talkonaut can also organise your contacts in groups, which appear as tabs in the user interface. That’s a good way to separate your phone numbers from your instant messenger contacts.

• Talkonaut

Switch Off can switch off your Nokia. At night, in planes, during meetings… just enter a time and Switch Off will switch off your phone for you. It has an inactivity timer to ensure your phone doesn’t get switched off when you’re using it.

It works on phones with Symbian S60 3rd and 5th ed.

Switch Off is unsigned. You can sign it yourself with a developer certificate, try to get it signed on Symbian Signed Online, or use the SIS Installer Mod so you can install any unsigned program you like.

• Switch Off official site (in russian)
• Switch Off v2.0.2 on Mobile Castle (english)

Smser is an SMS viewer which displays your messages in threads the way Nokia Conversation does, and it can protect messages with a password, somewhat similar to Active SMS Lock.

Smser only reads SMSs from your inbox and sent folder. If you have messages in custom folders then Smser won’t see them.

If you remove Smser from your phone, it leaves copies of your messages behind in c:\system\apps\smser, so make sure you delete that folder if you want to keep your phone memory clean.

• Smser v1.0.0

Skype Lite is updated, but Skype didn’t release a changelog.

Unfortunately Skype Lite is useless if you’re not in Australia, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Chile, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, New Zealand, Romania, Poland, Sweden, USA, or UK, because the number one reason to use Skype (making calls) only works over there. The rest of the world can only use Skype’s instant messaging feature.

But why bother with Skype Lite? You can chat and call on Skype with Nimbuzz and fring anywhere on the planet. These programs also let you connect to many other chat and VoIP networks as well.

• Skype Lite

• for Nimbuzz, fring, and other VoIP programs check the VoIP and Skype label

The latest edition of proxy-based mobile phone web browser Skyfire for Symbian launches a bit faster, lets you click links without zooming in, zooms smoother, and when you send the program to the background it disconnects to save battery power.

Skyfire still doesn’t support T9 predictive text input, in-page links, and scrolling through inline frames. And it won’t fit web pages to the width of your phone screen the way browsers like Opera Mini and UCWEB do. And compared to other mobile phone web browsers Skyfire is still horribly slow.

So why would you use such a horrible browser? To watch video! Skyfire plays YouTube movies and other video that no other mobile phone web browser will play. Skyfire is not the browser of choice for text and pictures, but it’s a good idea to keep a copy on your phone for watching web video that other browsers won’t show, because Bolt is not ready for the job yet.

• Skyfire

SajiOS is an alternative for your Symbian S60 standby screen that makes your phone look like a Windows desktop.

SajiOS gives you twelve standby icons instead of the usual six or seven. But you’ll lose the custom actions of the softkeys, and there’s no quick access to the calendar, search box, etc. through the active standby items, so the net gain is not that much. SajiOS won’t display the usual application icons either, because it can only handle icons and background images in flash format. The built-in icon set is quite limited. For example, there’s no suitable icon for the SMS application.

But the main problem is that SajiOS turns your navigation button into a very inefficient mouse, which makes launching the twelve shortcuts very slow. The program would be a lot more efficient if the 4-way navigation button would toggle the highlighted shortcuts in the same way as GDesk and Symbian’s own menu.

SajiOS shows an analog and a digital clock on your screen. Both work as shortcuts to the clock app. The calendar image does not launch the calendar application, and the program doesn’t offer a way to show the current calendar entries on the standby screen. There’s no network signal strength indicator either. The mini music player on the SajiOS desktop didn’t respond to the volume buttons of my phone, and crashed when I tried to exit it, which made SajiOS enter an endless shutdown/restart loop. Fortunately KillMe came to the rescue.

SajiOS is a good idea, but in its present state it just changes the looks of your standby screen without improving its functionality. But if future versions get better it may become a lightweight alternative for GDesk.

• SajiOS, a Symbian Active Standby alternative

• GDesk, another Active Standby alternative

PowerMP3 plays music in mp3, ogg, aac, and mp4 format, and m3u playlists too. It comes with a sleeptimer, an equaliser, an “exclude” option for small files and files of low bitrate (to keep your ringtones out of your music library), album art display, and it can download album art for you. It sorts your music by mp3 tags and folder structure.

The latest edition fixes a bug in the sleep timer, and lets you edit the keypad functions if you know how to edit xml files. A very welcome change is that PowerMP3 now shows the names of artists everywhere. In the playlists, all over the music library, and in the play queue. That’s a big improvement, because it’s often quite difficult to identify songs by their title alone.

PowerMP3 is still in beta testing, and you can use the test versions for free. So get a copy before Mobifactor starts asking money. If you try to install the latest version of PowerMP3 on top of an older version and it doesn’t work, try uninstalling the older version first. If the old version refuses to go away just switch your phone off and back on.

The beta test should continue for a while. Not only because it means we can keep using the program for free, but also because there are still things left to fix. For example, the music library sorts your music by artist, album, and genre, but it ignores the composer tag. Newer Nokias have a Navi wheel for easy scrolling, but you can’t use it to scroll through lists of songs in PowerMP3. And PowerMP3 still has problems with m3u playlists that it didn’t generate itself. If you’ve made m3u playlists with WinAmp or edited them with Symbian’s built-in music player, PowerMP3 refuses to pick up the changes, and it ignores songs if the names contain characters like ã, é, ç, etc. So if your playlists have french or brazilian music, don’t expect PowerMP3 to play them right.

• PowerMP3 v1.11 at Mobile Castle

Older versions of PowerMP:

• PowerMP3 v1.10 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 v1.09 at Ziddu
• PowerMP3 v1.08 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 v1.07 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 v1.06 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 v1.05 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 beta 2 at Mobile Castle
• PowerMP3 beta 2 at Mobifactor

PowerMP3 plays mp3, ogg, aac, and mp4 files, and m3u playlists too. It has a sleeptimer, an equaliser, and an “exclude” option for small files and files of low bitrate (to keep your ringtones out of your music library). It shows album art, and it can download album art for you. It is the best mp3 player for Symbian, but that doesn’t mean the program is exceptionally good. It simply reflects the fact that all other music playback programs for Symbian are exceptionally bad.

PowerMP3 sorts your music by mp3 tag like Symbian’s own music player, and it plays folders the way LCG Jukebox does. Unfortunately PowerMP3 still doesn’t know how to read m3u playlists that it didn’t generate itself. If you’ve made m3u playlists with WinAmp or edited them with Symbian’s built-in music player, PowerMP3 refuses to pick up the changes, and it ignores songs if the names contain characters like ã, é, ç, etc. So if your playlists have french or brazilian music, don’t expect PowerMP3 to play them right.

The latest PowerMP3 update fixes an .aac file playback bug, but its playlist handling got even worse. The latest version won’t get the sort order right, which is very annoying if you made a playlist that runs from slow and quiet to fast and loud or the other way ’round.

PowerMP3 is still in beta testing, and you can use the test versions for free. So get a copy before Mobifactor starts asking money. If you try to install the latest version of PowerMP3 on top of an older version and it doesn’t work, try uninstalling the older version first. If the old version refuses to go away just switch your phone off and back on.

• PowerMP3 v1.10 at Mobile Castle

If you don’t like version 1.10, there are plenty of older versions to try.