Common Paradox Tech Blog

Qt (pronounced ‘cute’) is Nokia’s attempt at creating a ‘write once, run anywhere’ programming platform – learn more here. It’s a big deal for them as they deal with supporting S60 and their new Meego linux platform (which Maemo will be merged into). The idea is that developers will be able to create their app in Qt and have it run on both S60 and Meego – and darn near everything else they can get it running on.

Add one more platform to that list – webOS. Darron Black successfully ported Qt to webOS in time for a demo at Mobile World Congress. Nokia was naturally thrilled and blogged it up themselves (twice).

We don’t know whether Qt is going to be a viable programming platform for Nokia – ‘write once, run anywhere’ has been a cruel, unreachable pipe dream to many would-be mobile moguls in the past - but now that it’s up and running on webOS, count us as behind it. We’ll take Qt apps, we’ll take iPhone ports, we’ll take it all. As Black noted in his post, webOS is ‘OPEN’ (but not, technically, open source). Add in that it’s arguably more accessible to more programmers than Android and we’re feeling pretty darn good about the platform’s potential.

We’ll have Matthew Miller of Nokia Experts and ZDNet on PalmCast Live tomorrow – you can bet that in addition to talking about his new Palm Pre Plus happiness, we’ll be talking Qt.

Thanks to muchtall for the tip!

Ovi Maps has been a focal point for Nokia in the last few weeks since they gave it all away for free, so it’s not surprising a hardware company wants to use their turn-by-turn navigation for cars.

If you’ve got an Alpine car system with a dashboard or speakers, then you’ll be able to connect your Nokia handset by either Bluetooth or USB, with navigation displayed by Ovi Maps on the dashboard. Navigation updates and music can come through your car’s speakers rather than the Nokia’s puny little speaker, and even information about the fuel levels and engine health can be integrated into Ovi Maps, so if you’re in need of fuel for example, Ovi Maps will tell you where the next petrol station is.

No products have been shown off just yet, but this Terminal Mode will be available on Nokia phones soon apparently—and with well over 3m downloads of the free Ovi Maps, upgrading your car system could prove very tantalizing for some. [Alpine via Engadget via SlashGear]

Cloudmark, a provider of messaging security solutions, has scored a massive $23 million funding round led by new investor Summit Partners and joined by Nokia Growth Partners, the mobile giant’s venture capital investing arm.

Existing investors Ignition Partners and Industry Ventures also participated in the round, which is the first financing Cloudmark has closed since 2004, when it raised $11 million from multiple VC firms. The new funding is said to have been used to assist in Cloudmark’s acquisition of former rival Bizanga.

Skype for Symbian has gotten out of beta and appeared in Nokia’s Ovi Store today, enabling users of Nokia’s Symbian-based smartphones to make free voice calls over 3G or WiFi connection.

Besides free Skype to Skype voice calls, the app enables you to send and receive instant messages, share pictures, video and other files, receive calls to your online number, and import names and numbers from your phone’s address book.

The app works on following Nokia models: Nokia N97, Nokia N97 mini, Nokia X6, Nokia 5800 XpressMusic and Nokia 5530 and the following non-touch devices: Nokia E72, Nokia E71, Nokia E90, Nokia E63, Nokia E66, Nokia E51, Nokia N96, Nokia N95, Nokia N95 8Gb, Nokia N85, Nokia N82, Nokia N81, Nokia N81 8 Gb, Nokia N79, Nokia N78, Nokia 6220 classic, Nokia 6210 Navigator, Nokia 5320.

See a video demonstration of the Skype app for Symbian below.

You can download the app from Skype or from the Ovi store.

Tags: Nokia, Skype, smartphone, Symbian, voip

Pretty huge news in our book: Skype has published a free mobile application for Symbian in the Ovi Store, basically enabling over 200 million Nokia handset users to easily download the program and start making free Skype-to-Skype calls from their phones.

If I were a carrier, I’d probably be feeling rather nervous right now – and / or infuriated.

Skype for Symbian, which you can also download the app straight from the Skype website, will run on any Nokia smartphone using Symbian^1, the latest version of the Symbian platform.

Apple is using its strong patent portfolio to fight iPhone competitors in court. Its latest target is HTC. Apple has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against the cell phone manufacturer. The suit involves “20 Apple patents related to the iPhone’s user interface, underlying architecture and hardware.”

Steve Jobs is quoted in a press release saying: “We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We’ve decided to do something about it. We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours.”

It’s subconsciously getting drummed into us from all sides, but just in case you haven’t heard it yet: the Nokia N900 is the most hackable phone around. It may not be the best phone, but it sure is open source.

A blogger at DoItDifferent created a widget for the N900 using Shutter—which uses LIRC to control the Nikon remotely—and Flashlight, which turns the N900’s flash into a torch. Then, using the IR transmitter in the phone, it paired up with the Nikon D40’s IR receiver for the remote shutter release. When the widget was clicked on the N900, the LED flash strobed and the D40 was triggered, taking a photo instantly.

The video below shows the hack at work, but for a more detailed explanation head on over to the blog. [DoItDifferent via NokNok]

newVideoPlayer( {“type”:”video”,”player”:”http:\/\/vimeo.com\/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=9753952&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1″,”customParams”:[],”width”:500,”height”:375,”ratio”:0.75,”flashData”:”",”embedName”:null,”objectId”:null,”noEmbed”:false,”source”:”vimeo”} );

Using an N900 as a remote flash with a D40 from Iain W on Vimeo.

Remember Nokia? They make cellphones (still!), and at CeBIT they’re hinting hard that two more, possibly the C5 and C6, are about to join their ranks.

The hint was packaged in the Nokia Conversations newsletter. C if you can figure out what it is:

“Of course, we don’t comment on rumours or leaks, but we are looking forward to C BIT for the next series of Nokia announcements. Right we’re off to pack our rucksacks and lederhosen, C you there.”

Do you C? Because they’re laying it on pretty thick (and so am I!). So coy, that Nokia. Too bad they’re doomed. Maybe these phones will help. Otherwise, C ya later. [Engadget]

Besides being the most awkwardly named mobile operating system ever, Symbian^4 (that’s the official name) is also a very important step for Nokia, who (although Symbian still dominates the worldwide smartphone market) has been struggling to make Symbian competitive with touch-friendly Android and iPhone OS.

Now, Fierce Wireless has managed to briefly try out the upcoming iteration of Symbian, as well as a couple of videos and yes, it really does look like Android and iPhone OS UI. Two short videos (embedded below) show some Android-style widgets, sliding screens, a scrolling photo app – in a nutshell, it’s nothing that’ll make your heart skip a beat. But in terms of Symbian catching up with its younger competitors, it seems good enough.

Bear in mind that Symbian 4 is expected to be released in the second half of 2010, with actual devices shipping in 2011, so we can probably expect many changes before the final version comes out.

Tags: Nokia, Symbian, video

When Palm issued a release announcing lowered guidance and sales expectations for this year, Jon Rubinstein didn’t even try to cushion it, admitting, “driving broad consumer adoption of Palm products is taking longer than [he] anticipated.” OK. Now what?

The implication of “longer than expected” is that success will come if everyone just waits long enough. But to say something like that in February of 2010, over seven months after the Pre launch, three after the Pixi launch, and weeks after a by all counts anemic launch for their barely differentiated Verizon counterparts is to tacitly admit that there’s a serious problem. If Palm’s current lineup doesn’t have momentum now, it never will.

For Palm, this leaves two options: either build a new product—something they may not be able or positioned to do—and hope it’s a wild success; or sell out. So who’s buying? BusinessInsider throws the regular suspects on the table—RIM, Nokia, Dell, HP—but they seem chosen because they’d be interesting buyers, not because they’ve shown any real interest. Hey, wouldn’t it be neat if Nokia or BlackBerry absorbed webOS, so they could both have truly modern, user-friendly smartphone operating systems? Yeah it would! Someone should tell them.

This leaves Palm with nothing to do but wait: to die; or to be saved by a hero it hasn’t even glimpsed yet, and that probably doesn’t exist. [BusinessInsider]