Interview with Tam Hanna, CEO of Tamoggemon on Symbian^3

Introduction

Tamoggemon has made some great software for the Symbian S60 platform. At Best of Symbian, we have reviewed TouchCalc Lite and LocaNote, two 4 star applications.

Here’s an interview with Tam Hanna, the founder, CEO and head developer of Tamoggemon about his views on Symbian^3 and Qt. Tam, as always has been very candid and outspoken about his experiences with Symbian. Some of his comments are highly technical and more tuned towards the developer but nevertheless very interesting overall. In a nutshell, Qt has improved the development experience greatly, but there’s more to be done. There is a strong integration of Ovi as one should expect, considering its the focal point of Nokia’s mobile business in the coming years. With Qt being released every quarter or six months, we will hopefully see periodicity in software updates for Symbian^3 devices. The image below shows Tamoggemon’s latest game, BallZ developed using Qt, running on both a Symbian 5th edition phone, N97 Mini and a Maemo (now MeeGo) device, the N900.

Read on.

1. Tell us about your experience with Symbian^3?

I have not had too much hands-on time with Symbian 3 as of this writing. I did have some hands-on timer with a Nokia N8, but cannot comment further as this was unofficial.

However, the OS looks sensible to me.

2. Will Tamogemmon’s applications run out of the box on Symbian^3 or is there are porting work involved?

I have been able to test LocaNote, and can say that it will run out of the box MOSTLY. I say mostly, because some parts of the GUI system don’t work perfectly and need to be reworked especially due to the way Nokia handles events from the capacitive screen. And, the improved landscape mode also needs some more “engineering” to make it look as good as it should.

Once again, the product works. But it is not perfect; but this is unsurprising, as the drawing engine of LocaNote is heavily optimized.

The “landscape mode eeker” was a bit disappointing, as almost every application currently on the market uses more than two CBA buttons. Nokia should have invested more energy into that – as it looks now, their implementation works but looks ugly.

3. How has Qt enhanced the development experience?

Greatly. You can see the attached image, which, btw, is the first-ever public appearance of JezzBall for Maemo.

It makes porting really easy. Even porting to new, yet unconquered platforms is possible…but more on that another day.

4. What’s are your favorite features in Symbian^3 as a developer and as a user?

From an user point of view, it is definitely the improved use of screen real estate in landscape mode.

As a developer, its probably the significantly stronger integration of Ovi. For example, if you look for a theme, you automatically see an Ovi icon telling you “there’s more on Ovi”.

I know that quite a few of you will now expect me to state that I consider the integration of the Qt libraries a must. But I have to admit that this is not as serious as it is perceived by many: keep in mind that Nokia is legally obliged to release an update to Qt at least once every 12 months to prevent loosing the rights to the product.

Given that Nokia tends to push out a new version every three to six months (please kill 4.6.3 already – the UI in 4.6.2 worked a lot better), every library would be outdated by the time it hits the ROMs of user handsets anyways.

5. Tell us about the improved Graphics architecture on Symbian^3 and how you will leverage it for your applications?

Probably not. At Tamoggemon’s, we see ourselves as a business application developer rather than a games house.

So it is very unlikely that we will ever need advanced 3D visualization, etc.

6. How does Symbian^3 compare with other Smartphone OS – iOS 4 and Android 2.2

Beats iOS 4 IMHO – if just because there will be devices with QWERTY keyboards.

As for Android, I don’t really know as I didn’t have enough hands-on time with the platform yet.

Interview with Tam Hanna, CEO of Tamoggemon

Introduction

Tamoggemon has made some great software for the Symbian S60 platform. At Best of Symbian, we have reviewed TouchCalc Lite and LocaNote two 4 star applications. Palm OS is another platform for which Tamoggemon has many applications to offer.

Here’s an interview with Tam Hanna, the founder, CEO, head developer all rolled into one.

Interview

TouchCalc Lite may be called Lite, but it actually is one of the most fully-featured calculators for S60. It supports graphing, and allows you to enter functions as you would find them in a maths text book.

What will the Pro version contain?

Some loose ends which were left in the Lite version due to lack of time will be added.

Right now, I am thinking about support for degree parameters in trig functions, window settings, and maybe logarithms and arcsines. The latter two depend on the underlying engine – I am not sure how far I will be able to push it. Maybe, I will also add complex numbers – but this is a decision I have not made yet.

Customers who currently have the Lite version will likely be allowed to upgrade for little money – expect the Pro version to run around 5 euros…

What are the other Symbian apps from Tamoggemon? What’s the next one and when is it coming?

Well…we always have LocaNote. It is a hand-written note taking application which was our first-ever release for Symbian. Even though it is outsold by TouchCalc by far, I remain committed to it. Expect LocaNote Pro soon – and also a bunch of speed-ups across all versions.

The next really new thing will be a port of our JezzBall clone for Palm OS. It essentially waits for a few Qt modules – once they are done, it will be released.

After that, it’s either a voice recorder or a stock manager. And don’t forget TouchCalc – I might also make a version for touchscreenless devices.

Pragmatism. I saw that there are few developers with touchscreen experience – and pounced on the opportunity when my wife undug a MWC co-promo. The development experience is not too smooth – but its bearable mostly.

As for the SF…too early to say much. But they seem to be genuinely concerned for developers – some of their staff have helped me a lot with the TouchCalc recall…

How is the Ovi Store helping app developers?

This is a very, very difficult thing to say. On the one hand, it makes life easier as it simplifies distribution – on the other hand, it places loads of new constraints onto you.

For example, text lengths are extremely limited, and images should be generated by hand for maximum quality. Its sort of like SEO, to be honest. We even call it OEO in-house:)

What’s your primary mobile device? What are your favorite applications?

I have to be perfectly honest – it’s an XPERIA X1. I use it because of one application, which is FlexMail – its just a killer email client. Then I also always tote around my Nokia 5800 for TouchCalc and LocaNote…and often, I also have an MSI Wind U100 on me.

So, robbers, better target me – loads of loot to be had if you don’t mind the scratches.

Introduction

While there are hundreds of web sites and blogs for mobile devices and applications targeted at the consumer, there aren’t any “serious” websites that serve as a community for the mobile application developer for all platforms and hobbyists.

When I talked to Rafi Ton, the founder of Mobiledevworld.com, he felt the mobile industry lacked an open community for mobile developers, professionals and enthusiasts to exchange ideas, discuss technologies and explore this exciting field of mobile technology.
Rafi Ton also heads Vufone, which provides a service of back up in the cloud. We have also reviewed Vufone at BestofSymbian.

Rafi Ton further says, “During the years I’ve been involved in mobile development the issue of organized resources, code examples, deal flow leads etc was a major problem especially for small and starting companies – I would like to create a service (again, free) to help all these small developers and companies who are trying to get in to mobile technology, development and marketing.”

For the mobile enthusiast who wants more than just un-boxing videos, device specifications and reviews, I find mobiledevworld.com to be the definitive place where one can find in-depth Opinions and Articles,  Code Examples, News, Presentations, Press Releases, Resources, Sales and BD, Tutorials and many more.

There is also a phone database that contains information that’s highly focused at developers. Mobiledevworld.com is not limited to a single mobile platform. That would defeat the purpose of an open community which facilitates the meeting of various professionals. It is growing into a vibrant mobile social community. Read on for a detailed interview with Rafi Ton.

Interview

BestofSymbian: Tell us about Mobiledevworld?
Rafi Ton: MobileDevWorld is our attempt (as professionals within the mobile industry) to create a social network where professionals within the mobile industry can find answer, discuss with other professionals any issues relating to the mobile industry. There are many sites and blogs about mobile technology, but most of them are not targeted to mobile professionals. MobileDevWorld is actually not a “site” or a “blog”, but rather a community or a social network of mobile professionals who can share, discuss and create opportunities to promote the mobile industry. Our users can create blogs and post their thoughts and ideas, they can participate in forums and groups, look for projects or jobs, get the latest specs of more than 2300 mobile phones or read the latest industry news – all from a professional point of view.

BestofSymbian: What’s the motivation behind creating MobileDevworld.com?
Rafi Ton: I’ve been involved in the mobile industry for more than a decade – worked for and founded companies in this industry. In every company (small or large) there was always one issue that bothered us all the time – information. Information about mobile phone specs, leads about deals, information about finding the best agent for a country we wanted to expand to. MobileDevWorld tries to create this community where information about the industry will be available freely and openly to all members.  We are not trying to make a commercial service, but to create a service where we can exchange information freely and openly.

BestofSymbian: What are the kinds of visitors who frequent Mobiledevworld? How is the traffic like?
Rafi Ton: We currently can see two major groups of users that visit our community regularly: developers of software for mobile phones and sales/marketing people who look for the latest news and updates relevant to their worlds and seek to exchange information about deals, leads etc. With respect to the traffic – it exceeded my wildest expectations. We just launched the service, only friend-brings-friend and the traffic grows exponentially on a daily basis. And most importantly, these are users who visit mobiledevworld almost daily.

BestofSymbian: What are the highlights of Mobiledevworld?
Rafi Ton: I can summarize it in one line. “A free social network made by mobile professionals for mobile professionals”.

BestofSymbian: How many members do you have now? Can you give a break up of members for specific mobile OS technologies?
Rafi Ton: As I noted, we are very young and didn’t even start to actively promote the service. As of today we have about 120 active daily users but these numbers are growing very rapidly. We plan to start marketing the service next month and our target is to get 1000 active mobile professionals in the first month.

BestofSymbian: What’s in it for the smartphone consumer?
Rafi Ton: Every smartphone user who would like to dive into the world of mobile technology will find a lot of interesting content in our service. Moreover, one of the items I’m promoting is writing simple tutorials to convert web developers to mobile developers. Today we have the right technologies such as Nokia WRT for Symbian, PhoneGap for the iPhone and the Palm WebOS which allow web developers to write mobile applications using html, css and javascript. This can really turn mobile apps to become the next Web.

BestofSymbian: Are there any other websites similar to Mobiledevworld.com?
Rafi Ton: To the best of my knowledge there is no single site/service that is doing what we are. There are many sites about mobile news, many sites for developers but they are all fragmented. mobiledevworld is building a community and a network of mobile professionals to help each other.