Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

An interesting article on the Register:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/08/02/nokia_new_coke/

which not only divulges the dark origines of the Hildon interface, but gives Nokia a good (and IMHO well-deserved) thrashing on its E90 craptastic non-communicator.

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Interesting (and depressing for me) story. The writing style was torturous but he got his point across.

I hope the re-org helps this sort of situation...

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Not a huge fan of the Register but I can corroborate with anecdotal evidence of my dad who used the communicator series since the debut years ago. He wanted to upgrade from an 9300 to E90 but hated the new UI so much that he didn't bother. He ended up getting a S40 phone instead (not sure which one).

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Hey Karel,

Great article. I am still getting an E90 for very simple reasons. The same software that I run on my N95, I can run on the E90. This is one thing the article did not mention or I missed it. Many people, many, many people did not like the fact that they had to purchase two different licenses for the same piece of software. If I want to run x on my N95, I can, while I can run the same software on the E90. Also, there is a plethora of biz software out there (some of it not free) that users can install that is often better than what Nokia has bundled. I pitched the E90 to the State Department and they are seriously taking a look. It fits more than most needs and has a nice feature set. Yes it is more expensive than the N95 but they are two different types of phones. For me, I could not care less as I either get the devices for free from work, or I buy them myself. I make enough money. I will agree though that the E90 is sort of a buzz device but then again so what. What is wrong with having a device that generates interest. Marketing is all about this. Personally, I am glad to see a standardization on the Series 60 platform, and there is nothing wrong with Nokia trying to save money.

Anyway, are you still in Belgium or did you finally bail?

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

I just can't bring myself to believe this part :

"Psion developed the user interface, codenamed Hildon after the bottled water, on which Nokia would base a range of Symbian products.
(...)
Today, the user interface lives on almost unchanged, in Nokia's promising Linux-based Tablet, and the (now) open source user interface API still bears the Hildon name."

A Gnome-based GUI descended from Psion by way of Symbian ? Bottled water ?

If this isn't a hoax, it's definitely the funniest (and most ironic) thing I've read this year...

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Good Lord, it's not like some enterprising 3rd party won't come along with a application for sending/receiving faxes on the E90.
First one to do so will easily cash in...unless Nokia pulls a fast one and codes one themselves and releases it for free, ala their podcasting and internet radio applications.
And yet another will probably come along with a different "launcher" application that will turn the current E90 interface into something more resembling the look-n-feel-n-usability of the older Communicator lines.
And guess what? Those same apps will probably run on an N95, N73, etc. and is actually GOOD for developers since they now only have to compile it once for one environment and they can now "tap in" to BOTH the E-series and N-series markets at once.
Of course, that little observation must have slipped El Reg's columnist's mind at the time.
I swear, the Reg is on an anything-other-than-the-iPhone-bashing stint as of late.

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

I think you are stepping on my original post here :) but you are spot on. I just don't get the whining over something that is easily fixed. A one compile of software that will run on all of Nokia's S60.v3 phones? This is a great idea. At least to me anyway. I don't have to get the same app twice for two different versions.

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Exactly. That article was just plain ol' Nokia-bashing. I mean, you don't see people running around wishing Microsoft had never abandoned Windows 95 or Apple leaving OS9/PPC behind. Replacement applications that are native to the new operating systems come out and fill the void.
And it's not like the S80 developers can't do a little tweaking and recompile their applications to work on S60 either.
Sometimes consolidation to a single platform is a GOOD THING.

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

Yup. Go to www.my-symbian.com for example and you will see quite a few apps that fit nicely to fill the void.

Re: Article to read, about E90 and Hildon.
 

There are some good points made here supporting the changes, of course, but I still sympathize with customers looking at the E90 as a progression (ie, upgrade) only to be surprised by a loss of expected features.