A very long time ago there was a generation of computers called Psion (some of us can still remember it and someone event worked on those computers). They were created by the Psion Company and worked under Eros operating system. This company in cooperation with Ericsson, Nokia, Motorola has developed EROS 32 (Symbian OS).
Symbian OS development history
The Symbian OS development history consists of the following periods :
June 1998 –Symbian LTD Company appeared as an independent private company owned by Ericsson, Nokia, Motorola and Psion.
1999 – the Company becomes the most promising on the mobile devices market. Matsushita (Panasonic) also becomes a joint owner of the company
2000 – Symbian gets UMTS forum award in Barcelona for successful development of UMTS solutions, as a component of the world informational space. Sony and Sanyo Companies grant license for Symbian OS. On the world economical forum in Davos, Symbian company gets an award for technical innovations. The first smartphone working under Symbian OS – Ericsson R380 is produced
2001 – A new version of Symbian OS - 6.1 for GPRS devices is developed. Siemens grants license for Symbian OS. Symbian becomes a sponsor of the SyncML project. The first communicator Nokia 9210 is developed. The first 2.5G mobile phone with Symbian OS – Nokia 7650 is announced. Fujitsu grants license for Symbian OS.
2002 – Sony Ericsson becomes a joint owner of Symbian. A new version of the OS is developed by the Company – Symbian OS 7.0 on the world concern 3GSM. Sony Ericsson announces the Sony Ericsson P800 smartphone. Samsung grants license for Symbian OS.
2003 – Samsung becomes a joint owner of Symbian.
And though the birth of Symbian brand was in June of 1998, the first release of EROS 32 Psion Company made in April of 1997, marking the birth of new OS generation
Originally for development of such OS C++ programming language was used as the most powerful and functional object-oriented programming language of that time. Time shows that the choice was very felicitous and well-founded
What makes Symbian OS so attractive for such different groups of people like users, developers and programmers?
Symbian OS for developers and programmers
Developers find it very attractive that Symbian OS from the very beginning was developed in purpose of getting licenses for wide circle of Companies that develop the telecommunication equipment.
In the beginning of the OS for mobile devices development the necessity of full compatibility with different types of processors was declared. Symbian failed this task, but they found an alternative option - as the basic platform ARM company processors were used, which have the best combination of productivity, output power and price. Processors were licensed by Intel and Nokia companies.
Another advantage of Symbian OS is the built-in multi-language support.
On the mobile devices market there are no standards for screen size, keyboard, buttons etc. And Symbian has definite division of the graphical interface from other components system. It allows to adapt the system for any screen size and resolution, presence of the touch display easily. It allows to create of brand unique design and use of hardware acceleration.
For programmers Symbian is very attractive because of the wide circle of development tools for Symbian OS. Programs on standard C++ language are created on PC with the help of Microsoft Visual Studio environment and the emulator, which is very useful. The main advantage of Symbian OS is that the system is open. All set of programming tools is absolutely free and is available at this address: www.symbian.com/developer, this means any person is able to bring a useful modification to Symbian OS functionality. Naturally, these conditions make the number of programs for Symbian platform enormous, but don’t forget that not all programs are harmless.
Advantages of Symbian OS for users
The most important is - what attracts common users to Symbian?
Handy keyboards of pocket PCs e.g. Nokia 9210, and well designed applications allow working with huge amounts of data. Small dimensions of computers working under Symbian OS allow having them with you all the time and adding data to them when necessary.
The handy and intuitively understandable interface allows users to make all necessary settings themselves right after purchasing the device. Then it allows installing additional programs while user progresses.
But the most important is that this OS is especially created for mobile devices with limited recourses. I.e. unlike pocket PCs they have small dimensions and weight, therefore they have a smaller number of chips and schemes, that’s why they are very reliable. So during all the exploitation period they can be turned on (everyone wants to be always on-line).
If Symbian is so good, why do they regularly release new versions?
Mostly because of the viruses, nowadays there are more than on hundred viruses that can operate under Symbian. New connection protocols and other mobile devices’ characteristics are also released regularly and Symbian needs to be up to date to work with these new features.
Lets take a closer look on Symbian versions.
Symbian OS 5.0 – 7.0
The first official release was Symbian version 5.0, it was released on such devices as Psion Revo, Psion Netbook, netPad, Ericsson MC218
The next version Symbian OS 5.1. started working with UNICODE. It was released on Ericsson R380.
Symbian OS 6.0 and 6.1 – the first generation of so called "open" phones, i.e. they have possibility to install additional programs, e.g. Nokia 9210. After this release all devices were divided into “families”. Now there are 3 "families" of devices: keyboardless PPC, looking like Palm and Pocket PC (Sony Ericsson P800), smartphones Pearl (Nokia 7650) and keyboard communicators Crystal (Nokia 9200 Series).
Symbian OS 7.0 and 7.0s – this is a very important Symbian release, which appeared to have all modern user interfaces, including UIQ (Sony Ericsson P800, P900, P910, Motorola A925, A1000), Line 80 (Nokia 9300, 9500), Line 90 (Nokia 7710), Line 60 (Nokia 6600, 7310). In the same year the self copying virus for phones with Symbian OS was created, it was called Cabir. It used Bluetooth, to get to other phones.
Symbian OS 8.0
Symbian OS 8.0 – it was a dual-core OS version, 8.0.a and 8.0.b accordingly. 8.0.a was chosen by many developers for compatibility with old device drivers.
Symbian OS 8.1 – is the reworked version of 8.0.b. which was also available in two versions, with 8.1a and 8.1b cores respectively. 8.1b version, with single-chip phone support, but without any additional security level was popular among Japanese phones.
To make the difference between versions and cores clear we can point out the changes in features:
- Cheaper memory chips support (can be used by developer).
- Voice recognition interfaces support. Data stream encoding for 3D applications and sound data.
- WCDMA connection support.
- Several Video calls’ protocols support.
- Ability to highlight e-mails and links for future use.
- Files with other companies’ rights can not be transferred to other devices. They can only be used on the single device.
- For compatibility with different screen resolution devices pictures can be transformed before sending e.g. via Bluetooth.
- Headset profile for bluetooth.
Symbian OS 9.0
Symbian OS 9.0 – this version was released for internal purposes of Symbian Company only. The higher security and compatibility with versions from 6 to 8.
Symbian OS 9.1 – the main feature of the version is improved security. Bluetooth 1.2 support, and control devices OMA 1.1.2.
Symbian OS 9.2 –Bluetooth 2.0 support (changed from 1.2), and control devices OMA 1.2 (changed from 1.1.2)
Symbian OS 9.3 – Higher loading speed and built-in Wi-Fi support. Support of HSDPA standard, UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access) specification, which allows receiving IP calls via Wi-Fi and automatic redirection of call to the mobile network when out of Wi-Fi. zone
The list of basic features of 9 Symbian OS version is:
- New OS core, supporting real-time work.
- In v 9.0 the higher speed data access and common productivity were reached, but the compatibility with older versions was lost. At the moment of the new smartphone and OS version release hits the problem of necessary programs and tools absence and the old ones simply won’t start.
- New security platform – so called structure of «signatures». All applications have to be digitally signed and the limited access is set on all folders.
- Support of HSDPA communication standard is implemented.
- High loading speed and built-in Wi-Fi support.
- Bluetooth 2.0 support.
Now you have your first notion of the basic operation system for mobile phones and smartphones Symbian OS. According to statistics every third phone has this OS specially designed for mobile devices. Symbian OS is good in all aspects except the viruses protection. (in this aspect is better), that’s why in the end we would like to advice using antivirus software, turning off Bluetooth, when it is out of use, because non-secured contacts are dangerous.
Except for this, Symbian OS is completely reliable and handy, and because of that it is widely used all over the world.