Test touch game w/o a real device is a pain

Some weeks ago, I finished my Poulpytris port for Android (using AIR for Android).
It's pure AS3 so I would like to port it to Nokia's FL4 devices

I think it works, but how could I seriously release a game for a device without real touch tests ?
I tried with Remote Device Access but I don't know if my game is slow or if the web is slow ;) Emulate touch throught Web is almost impossible....

So I think I'll keep this version for me until I got, perhaps, a FL4 enabled device (which I doubt since I'll soon receive an Android based one)
Plus I can't release it since I need to package it in a .sisx file and, so, need a valid IMEI....
why don't they support .nfl on S60 devices ?!!!
It's been so long we're asking for... :(

Back to Nokia ?

I was very busy these last months trying to develop for Android Froyo.
It was a real pleasure to, AT LAST, develop using AS3 !
But I must say it was painfull to handle multi res, multi input, etc....
It was strange because it made me remember my first tries with Flash Lite 2.0 with a MAJOR difference : I was able to handle ANY device screen size on Flash Lite 2.0

I'm pretty sure we'll meet a LOT of problems we almost solved on Symbian in a near future :
- screen size
- screen orientation
- device os version (Froyo doesn't mean FP10 every times) with a come back of WURFL ?
- system call (need to test AIR as soon as possible for this)
- size (look at FP runtime weight...and AIR runtime weight)
- os update breaking previously working app...and so handling update OTA

At the same times, Nokia is releasing Symbian^3 devices with FLite4 support (AS3!) and drop the OVI Publisher cost...
I think it's time for me to came back to a platform I knew a lot :)
I wonder if I could easily port my AS3 game to FLite4.....

perhaps it's because the roadmap of Android isn't clear enougth or because my HTC Desire keeps crashing for nothing...or because it's clearly interesting

If at least I could win some bucks at Flash Game License compo, I'll be able to pay my Android Market registering cost to (try to) make money with AIR ;)

Forum Nokia Online Flash Lite Packager quick review

From Alessandro, the Forum Nokia Online Flash Lite Packager is back.
It's not exactly the same (you can't package to NFL nor choose the S60 version) but you can download the generated source and choose you own UID.
I got a 404 Error (doh!) trying to generate a test sis but I was able to download the source.
I find one MAIN problem :
CAPABILITY ReadUserData

I already fight with this problem so, for now, I'll still use my own packager.

Why the Nokia OTA isn't a great feature

I recently got a N97 at work.
I won't talk about how I was deceived by the S60 5th UI/UX (if it was mine, I'll be happy to change it for an Android or even an Iphone!) but about a feature I first thought was a great improvement : OTA firmware update

We know how much this feature is needed to solve the problem we, FLite developers, had with the buggy N95 and 5800XM.
"No problem, just update your firmware and it will rock"

Sure. But it isn't that simple, it's even IMPOSSIBLE for some people...like me :(

Currently, the N97 firmware available in France is the 21.0.045 (from http://www.nokia.fr/support/logiciels/mise-a-jour-de-lappareil)
I have the 11.0.021 so I should be able to update it to fix some of the issues I had (what is this pityful sensitivity ?! what is this pityful UX ?!)

Unforunatly, I tried OTA and the Nokia Updater without success
Oh, sorry, actually it updated something : all the games I moved on the "Games" menu cames back to the "Applications" menu...GRRRRRRRR!!
So, in fine, it didn't update. Why ? it seems it's because my phone is locked to SFR (Vodaphone) and the firmware too!
So unless SFR/Nokia released a SFR dedicated 21.xx firmware, I can't update...

I really hope I missing some point but, anyway, the real problem is : if I was unable to update my phone (for whatever the reason is), do you really think a 'common' user would get a better result ?
I doubt....and ever worst, he thinks he have the latest version !

So I have to admit I can't rely on the available firmware and tell 'update your phone to play my game' : I had to make my game works on ANY firmare version.

Some month ago, people talked about what is the better : FL update by firmware or by AMP. I'll really miss AMP !

Lesson learned.

Nokia API Bridge

Another thing I missed is the Nokia API bridge.

When I read the presentation of the technologie, 2 things came on my mind :
Capuchin and KuneriLite

KuneriLite adds functionnality throught plugins
Capuchin "enables developers to bridge the Java™ ME and Adobe® Flash Lite™"
Nokia API bridge "provides a plug-in mechanism that can be used to make features of Symbian and third-party native Symbian applications available to Java applications, web apps, and Adobe Flash Lite content"

You can't create your own plugin on KuneriLite
YOu can extend Capuchin throught the Service API
You can extend Nokia API bridge throught a Plugin API

KuneriLite supports any S60 phones (?)
Capuchin supports Java Platform JP-8.4 SE phones
Nokia API supports any S60 FP1+ phones (ie FL2 phones)...even SE, Samsung..?

So my question is "WHY CAN'T THEY MAKE A COMMON TECHNOLOGY?!" ;)

Return of the Evil Publish dilemma

My return from a 5 days trip was hard.

Last week, Google came to the mobile scene (yes, for me it's a bad news).
This week, I learnt throught Alessandro, that Adobe will drop the Distributable Player

I already said what I think about the Distributable Player solution, so I won't personnaly miss it....apart it was the only solution for CAB packaging!

From what I read, there are 2 kind of views :
- AMP was a solution to the fragmentation (installing the last FL player)
or
- AMP was a packaging tool

Since I can't see AMP like an answer to the fragmentation problem (the FL player installed isn't compatible with Nokia's Services), I used AMP like a packaging tool.
A CAB packaging tool because I use Nokia/Kuneri SWFPack for SIS and NFL packaging.

I must say I USED SWFPack since it was also shut down this week end!

So, until today, I lost
- my mobile website ad provider
- my CAB packaging tool (sort-of since I still can use it...but will it still install FL on WiMo 5 ?)
- my SIS/NFL packaging tool

Exactly what you need to stop everything, sell your computer and start playing in the garden

Hopefully, I'll need more to drop everything.
So I get back to my old SIS packaging solution:
- Nokia stub application
- Leonardo Risuleo's SWF launcher

While I was fighting with Symbian C++ evilness, Alessandro posted some hope : SWFPack will be back soon !

What 'soon' means ? I don't know...and even Nokia doesn't know :)

Sorry, Poulpytris free version won't be released soon :
I have to make some progress on Symbian C++ programming then on VisualC++/C# ...

Nokia X and others series

Nokia devices names are becoming more and more difficult to read...not as much as Samsung but ...
Not so long ago, you could say, according the name of the device, if it was a S40, a S60, a entry level or a professional phone...
Now, we have a 5310 (a S40 entry level) and the 5320 wich is a S60 entry (?) level....
I assume it's following Nokia announcement to make S60 for every one and not only professional (sorry, I can't find the link...)

And today, Nokia announced 2 phones
- the X3 : after the E & N series (for professional phones), here comes the X...for S40 6th Ed phones...so not professional phones !?! oh, and why X3 ? not X1 ? because of Xperia1 & Xperia2 of SE ?! ;)
- the N97 mini : do they try to make like Sony or Nintendo with their "buy the same device than 1 or 2 years ago but smaller !!!" ?

I must say I'm very confused...and I'm very happy Nokia helped me to fix my Flash Lite phones browser because I'm totally lost without it (no, it's not a self promoted advertising!)

Maemo day

Sometimes, life plays with you.
It's fun because Nokia announced the N900 the day I received my....Nokia 770 :)
The Nokia 770 is the first (?) device based on maemo. I'm now playing with it (can't wait to play SCUMMVM games on it) for some days and I like it. I'm a little sad to not be able to access anything I want (like a TRUE file explorer) but it's not why I bought it.
In fact, I needed a cheap internet tablet, pdf reader and universal media controller ;)

The N800 is far better (with webcam and SD support) but twice the price of the 700 (on eBay)

FlashLite Phone Browser - Nokia unavailable

It seems I won't be able to release a fully working version of Flash Lite Phone Browser!
For some days now, Nokia's Mobile Device Specifications Database is not working.
I don't know if it's final or not, I don't have a reply (yet) on my post on Forum Nokia.

I'll of course let you know if Nokia's phones list comes back.

FlashLite Phone Browser v1.1

This morning I released the new version of FlashLite Phone Browser (see on the right side the AIR badge to install it)

This version uses a database to store information and include Sony Ericsson phones.
You could also filter the Flash Lite version wanted.



Unfortunatly, when I made v1.0, I missed an important point about update so v1.0 users have to uninstall their versions before installing v1.1.
Sorry for that !

Nokia's RDA tips

I'm only able to test my stuff on Nokia's RDA.
So I would like to share with you some tips I found playing with my daily 8hour/day on RDA (no, not EVERY day)

Quickly Test SWF (unique file)
Until recently, I had to transfer my swf to the device throught the File Browser then launch it from Gallery
I found a faster way : simply choose "Install", on the dialog box, select "all files" (its "sis, sisx, jar, wgtz" by default) and open your SWF...et voilà !

Don't use 30 minutes when you only need 15 !
When you select your phone on the "Phones" main page, it's at most 30 minutes.
On "Reservation", you can take a phone by 15 minutes timeblock (even started timeblock, if you only need 10min and it's 08:20PM)

Check firmware
Firmware info isn't visible on the "Phones" page but if you roll over each phone on the "Reservation" page, you'll see their firmware. Actually, there are 4 5800 devices available : 2 with firmware v11 & 2 with firmware v20

Test as soon as possible
If a phone is available and you have some credit, test your app now! Never wait for tomorrow! Phone models sometimes disappear, without notice, from some day to forever

Ovi Store launched...hard debut

Well, I didn't check Ovi Store myself but, from what I read on the web (here and here for ex), Ovi Store launching wasn't that well received...

"Total Disaster", "a failure", "fiasco"...these are the words coming up when you googled "ovi store launch".

It seems this launch was so much wanted that users crashed Nokia's servers !
Nokia fixed the issues but they'll have to work hard to make people forgot about this day...

and I won't talk about all the angry posts on ForumNokia from individuals who can't submit their work or can't afford the money to symbian sign them !

I hope Nokia will find a way to make users like developers happy.

For Flash Lite developper, via Biskero, check OviFlash!

Local vs Network vs Trusted

In Poulpy's Game, if you press Left Soft Key on menu screen, you'll open WillNa.com

Yesterday, I discovered this feature doesn't work on N95 & N95 8GB.
After some research on Forum Nokia, I found this KnownIssue

If SWF/SIS game isn't installed in Data\Others\Trusted, with Access to the local file system, getURL("http://www.willna.com") won't work

If SWF/SIS game isn't installed in Data\Others\Trusted, with Access the network only, getURL("http://www.willna.com") will work

If SIS game is installed in Data\Others\Trusted, with Access to the local file system or Access the network only, getURL("http://www.willna.com") will work
BUT the SWF will also be available throught Gallery and so can be deleted by user, resulting in error when launching game

Compiled your SWF with Access the network only seems the best solution.
But remember you won't be able to access local file.

After more reading on Forum Nokia, I found an interesting reply from Mark Doherty : SIS compiled with Adobe Mobile Packager are trusted and can access local AND network files.
Another point for AMP...

I'll need to check it harder for ad-based model...

Poulpy Game results after 1 month

Poulpy's Game was released one month ago, at the same time we opened WillNa.com
It is our first game so I planned to make some analysis of its results
Poulpy's game is hosted in 4 websites : Playyoo (historic), GetJar, Voeveo and coming-soon-one
This FL2.x+ game is available in SWF, NFL, SIS (using Nokia's Packager) & CAB (using Adobe Mobile Packager) format

Download
+7500 downloads in one month
+300 per day when Poulpy was recommanded by GetJar
-100 per day when not recommanded
20% for the WiMo version

Models (+100 download each)

You'll notice Nokia's 6300 and no FLite enabled phones results.
I also suspect some errors in GetJar mobile detection (7610 or 7610 supernova?)
The first SE phone isn't Capuchin enabled

Countries
GetJar doesn't provide countries stats, so I'm relaying to willna.com results
Indonesia : 54
India : 32
Netherlands : 12
United States : 11
United Kingdom : 10

You'll notice the very important part of Asia.

Unfortunalty, you'll also notice the very low convertion rate : 2%
7500 download vs 150 connections to WillNa.com

WillNa connections (Top10)
6120c : 18
6300 : 15
MSIE 7 : 9
Windows Mobile : 9
E71 : 8
E63 : 8
N95 : 7
E90 : 7
Opera Mini : 6
iPAQ HX4700/Treo700w : 6

Revenue
Poulpy's game was a 'pay-if-you-like-ware' which gives us 0.70$
I also expected some money from the ads shown on willna.com
- PC version : 0$
- Mobile version : 0.6$

Result
I'm very proud our game was downloaded +7500 times in 1 month
To be recommanded really impacts your download rate.
Unfortunatly, I also must face the bad revenue result :
It was fun to make this game but it only generated 1.3$, because people doesn't want to pay for a free game and rarely visits game's website

My next game will try another selling model, I'll see if revenue will increase or not.

ps: I really need a 6300 ! Nobody to send me one ? ;)

Nokia's Install Notes

Nokia's Flash Packager allows you to define "Intall notes", which will be displayed during the installation process.

For people using PKG file, it will use FILETEXT.
Great! So I tried with the text

Thanks for installing our first game !
If you want more games with Poulpy,
please visit WillNa.com

Here are the results on some phones :

On N85, 5730 XpressMusic & 6220 classic

On N95, E63 & E51

On N95 8GB & 5800 XpressMusic

3 different ways to renders this text !
You will notice
1/ font isn't fixed so no way to define a max char per line
2/ word isn't a line break delimiter on some version
3/ it's not related to S60 version

It seems the only way to have my text to be displayed the same way is the ugly

Thanks for installing our first
game !
If you want more games
with Poulpy,
please visit WillNa.com

...finally I doubt I'll use this option...
It will be more interesting to add this text on the game itself.

From Nokia Wiki, this option is designed to display disclaimer where text doesn't need a layout.

Flash Lite on Nokia 5800

Finally, after some days waiting, I was finally able to make some test on RDA's Nokia 5800
I noticed 2 changes

The virtual keypad

Hopefully, thanks to Dale's tip, you can hide it...but what will happen with

The getURL confirmation

Test generated SIS file on emulator - part 2

To check SIS files on emulator, I tested
- unsigned SIS
- selfsigned SIS
- open signed SIS to emulator EMEI (00000000)
nothing...well, install start then emulator freeze

Then, to be asolutly sure, I launched Nokia RDA and...tada, I successfully installed any SIS I was unable to install on emulator some hours ago !(apart unsigned one, of course)

I came to the conclusion than running a SIS file generated by SWFPack/Nokia Packager on S60 3rd Emulator isn't possible.

Now, RDA is my friend ;)

Test generated SIS file on emulator

It's been so long I'm on this one !
What ever I do, SIS files generated by Adobe Mobile Packager or SWFPack/Nokia Packager don't want to run on S60 3rd Emulator : "file corrupt"

I tried to fix icon file, file name, file size, phone configuration, etc...I'm still unable to launch anything.

I finally found the answer : the S60 3rd doesn't come with defaut certificates!
Just follow the instructions on this Nokia Technical Solution

You could also bookmark this page, which list every error message on S60 3rd

Flash Lite will have access to S60 OS !

...Well soon ;)

From Biskero, Nokia released a new document on S60 5th Ed with some API for Flash Lite.
I quickly downloaded the SDK but, unfortunatly, the S60FlashLiteExamples folder is empty.

Wait and see...
With NFL and this, I really start to think SE's Capuchin made Nokia move !

NFL and cache issue

With my new phone and Mocket's SWF2NFL, I tested NFL deployment.

2 ways to do it under Apache :

1. add 'application/vnd.nokia.flashlite-archive[insert_tab]nfl' on the file 'mime.types' (see TypesConfig in your 'httpd.conf' to know where it is) then restart apache with apachectl restart


2. create/update a '.htaccess' file on the folder when you uploaded the NFL and add 'AddType application/vnd.nokia.flashlite-archive nfl' inside (works only if .htaccess are authorized via 'AllowOverride All' in the 'httpd.conf')

I uploaded 'test.nfl' on the correct folder of my server and downloaded it to my mobile throught Opera Mini.
After some tests, I found a bug and so updated 'test.nfl'.
I then tried to download the new version to my mobile but I was unable to overwrite the previous one, I so gave it a new name 'test1'.

Problem step 1 :
I don't have 'test' and 'test1' but 2 'test' files.
I so thought it was because I used the same version number.
So I made a new 'test.nfl' with a new icon and a new version number.

Problem step 2:
Download, call it 'test2' and....3 'test' files on the folder with the same icon !

Problem step 3:
Ok...I deleted these 3 files, cleared cache from Opera and restarted download to another folder...Still the old one!
I'm lost : old one was 12ko, new one is 23ko...Opera tell me it is about to download a 23ko file and...I have the old 12ko on my mobile ?!

Answer :
After some googling, I found a link to clear 'nokia cache'
I followed the instructions, restart the download and....finally got my 23ko file !

Conclusion:
I must say I'm a bit disappointed...
1/ an user can't update (overwrite) a file
2/ if cache isn't cleared, user still download the old one

Note, I don't know the life time of the cache but it can be an issue.
I wasn't aware of download caching, it's my first experience : always delete a file and clear cache before downloading the new version.
It still strange for me to have to clear Opera cache AND Nokia cache to download the right file.

I also know why the files kept 'test' as name, it's the FL-Name which is used, not the filename...but I must say it's strange to have 3 differents files with the same name !
Why not use this FL-name and FL-version to update the file, not create a new one ? or use a FL-UID ?

Well, first step to easier deployment....for easier ONE SHOT deployment. Forget about update.

If your phone doesn't work the same way, tell me !