http://betalabs.nokia.com/betas/view/contacts-ovi

I installed it yesterday, but I don't see anything new. It's the same as the old one, only the icon changed to "ovi". Right? Or am I missing something?

(btw: in the betalabs blog, they admitted now for the first time that they won't allow the S60 version to connect to other XMPP servers. I can see why they do this, but I don't think it'll work the way they expect. Maybe the managers who make such decisions should use instant messaging in real life…)

I don't get it, isn't nokia chat, er, contacts-on-ovi just another jabber server and yet another separate island of IM to sign up to?

I find more and more of my friends are on googlemail, but you don't have to sign to gmail to use their chat service, just register any email with them!

I think that's what Ovi is all about. Users not getting it.
There's not one single service I came across there that works (or works as expected).


As for "Contacts on Ovi" (what a bizarre name):
Yes, it's a Jabber server, and that's about the only thing that's good about it. It means that you can use any XMPP-client on your desktop (and any non-Nokia XMPP-client on your mobile phone) to connect to this service. If you want to.
(There's some drawbacks, still: AFAIK, one of the main features is implemented in a non-standard way: location-sharing. There's a XMPP-extension that they could have used, but they preferred to lock this feature with their proprietary client. S60-client, to be precise - it doesn't even work with Maemo.)


The problem is not really the server. Having a new reliable XMPP-server is a good thing and I'm happy Nokia offers one.

The problem is the client. Nokia offers a nice client, but doesn't allow you to use it for any other XMPP-service than Ovi. There's simply no setting for a server-name.


The intention is obvious: They try to push Ovi, make people use the service for everything. What they don't realize is that nobody will buy Nokia instead of SE/Samsung/HTC/... only because they can subscribe to Ovi (especially if Ovi as a whole is so fundamentally broken). They'll buy Nokia if the phone comes with a smart IM-client that will let them use their existing account, the way Pidgin lets me use the accounts I already used with Kopete.

well, I already had an ovi account since I signed up to other nokia stuff, and simply added the ovi account to tablet chat to see it work. no magic at all.

then I disabled it as I once found that the more SIP/VOIP and IM accounts I had active, the faster the battery ran down, so now I have only one voip and one IM. on the odd occasion I fire up fring if I really really need other IM networks.

Oh boy, that's a bummer. I didnt know that the additional service could eat battery. Even I installed the OVI (although I have absolutely no friends on Ovi) and its just sitting idle (the Ovi on Contacts or whatever they called it).

I guess I will also uninstall the dam thing.
I am surprised that today (after so many years of experimenting with walled garden apps), Nokia still feels that having a walled application will attract users. Come-on, everyone else has already realised this truth). Open up your services or die.

Well:

AllI can say is ovi is really really bad implemented.

On the cellular phone side, I was never able to receive my configuration SMS (my operator to blame, yes... but Nokia should implement another reliable way to ge the configs to their users)

On the Tablet side, OVI chat sometimes work, sometimes (most) doesn't... The login/password servers or services must be really screwed.

There is no integration between login/pwd and all the subscibed services. Sometimes I have to manually login to each one of the services, even tough I am already logged in the "main" ovi.

My profile looses its cofiguration all the time. I log-in, correct the stuff and within 3 minutes everything is lost and changed again.....

There are huge intermitent problems with OVI when being used with Firefox 3.x no redirection to the main portal screens from "www.ovi.com" and many issues.

In short, OVI is totally screwed.... I have given up on it... a shame for Nokia.

it's simply that the more things which are online, e.g. IM accounts active, the more CPU networking activity, and the more power is drained.

similar, if you have more RSS feeds and make the polling faster, that will also use battery faster, as will active apps on the home screen like weather.

I just use Nimbuzz on S60... the 1.0.1 version is pretty good supporting tons of protocols, and having a relatively clean interface and set of features.

We should all leave feedback on the page, that's what it's there for