 Recently, while much of the business world's attention was on the Nokia / Navteq deal, a team from Nokia (I should say Forum Nokia) was hard at it in Chicago at the annual Adobe MAX conference. I have to admit, I wasn't sure what to expect when I first got there, however, that soon changed once I started hearing all the news and putting all the pieces of the puzzle together. This article looks at how Adobe and Nokia are making it simple for developers to create rich mobile applications using Flash Lite.
Nokia – The Internet Company
If there’s one thing that struck me while I was there it was an opening comment from Forum Nokia Director of Marketing, Eric John who firmly and confidently pointed out that Nokia is indeed an Internet company. I felt this was an appropriate opening from the relatively new exec given that he’s just jumped onboard with team Nokia from Yahoo!, perhaps one of the most recognizable Internet companies on the planet! This may not seem like anything new to many of you, however, this fact does indeed firmly lay the groundwork for the company’s direction. All one needs to do is to recognize that there are more than 900 million Nokia devices in use around the Globe. Add to this that Nokia connects more users to the Internet than anyone… indeed I would have to say Nokia is not just “a” Internet company but “THE” Internet company. One example of mobile connectivity can be found in a recent market research study (see http://www.symbianone.com/content/view/4889/) that revealed 92% of the male survey respondents claimed to work away from the office each week. Some 89% of the same respondents claim that mobile e-mail makes it simpler to provide better and faster service to customer – Indeed the mobile Internet and mobile connectivity is indeed an important space.
Note: Recall Nokia recently rolled out MOSH (Mobilize and Share) the dynamic social community web resource where mobile device users can easily connect to the service (via PC or mobile) and then browse, upload and share mobile content – photos, video, documents, applications, product demos or ?? It should be noted that MOSH is accessible from any web enabled device and not just a Nokia handset! MOSH is a fine service that is a testament to the fact that Nokia is indeed an Internet player!
Nokia is connecting mobile device users to the Internet and providing a fun, social networking experience via MOSH.
The News
It was first thing Monday morning when I saw the press announcements... Adobe had rolled out Flash Lite 3 (http://www.symbianone.com/content/view/4879/108/) and in a timely manner, Forum Nokia had launched a new developer community (http://www.symbianone.com/content/view/4881/108/), one focused on Flash and dedicated to helping the developer port Adobe Flash content to the mobile environment. The developer portal is part of a larger mandate of the company to support Adobe Flash Lite 3.0 as part of a strategy to deliver a rich Internet experience to Nokia device users. So to recap, simply put, the Creative Pros developer community now exists to help the developer optimize existing Flash desktop content for the latest Nokia mobile devices. See www.forum.nokia.com/creativepros.
Creative Pros offers everything the developer needs to help with Flash Lite development
More on Flash Lite 3…
Simply put, the software enables the delivery of dynamic web content on mobile devices (no, not just Nokia or S60 devices). With support for Adobe Flash player compatible video, mobile devices that support Flash Lite 3 will be able to provide users with the delivery of dynamic web content and rich video. The good news so far, Nokia and NTT DoCoMo have both committed to start delivering Flash Lite enabled devices – I believe Nokia has already proclaimed that at least 10 such devices will come to market in 2008, with many more down the road.
To date, Nokia already has some 56 devices that support Flash Lite, these falling under the S60 and S40 umbrella. These devices come with Adobe Flash Lite pre-installed. These include:
- 8 S60 3 FP1 devices including the N95, 6110 Navigator, E90, N76
- 21 S60 3 devices including the 3250, E50, N80, N91 and more
- 4 S60 2nd Edition FP3 devices
- 23 S40 devices including the 6500, 6300, 6125 and many others
As far as the current “state of the union”… there currently exists more than 300 million flash-enabled devices and get this, Adobe expects that there will be more than one billion flash-enabled devices in the hands of users by 2010… can you see where this going? Enter the developer…
With an expected billion+ mobile flash users just around the corner both Nokia and Adobe are starting to encourage developers to create supported applications, games, and web services.
More than 50 announced Nokia device models support Flash Lite.
• Eighty percent of the mobile devices shipping in Japan today can run Flash software.
Handango, Iguana Mobile, and MOBIBASE, three of the world’s leading content aggregators, have signed up to accept Flash Lite content (source: Adobe).
With the rapid growth of devices that can run Flash software — from 38 million in 2005 to more than 220 million in early 2007 — Adobe expects the number of such devices to reach the 1 billion mark by 2010.
Flash Lite also adds features that are uniquely mobile, including the ability to vibrate the devices and send text messages. For Flash developers, it's an easy transition: They can use the same powerful Adobe tools to create Flash content for mobile devices as they do for desktop computers.
Flash Lite features:
support for rendering of SWF files for Flash Player 8
optimized through more efficient resource management
FLV support
Improved web browsability with support for most Flash 8 content
Faster performance
MMI extensions for UI design
Integrated authoring environment
Multiplatform support
What kind or mobile applications are using Flash you might ask? Plenty... including animated Flash games, advertisements, dynamic wallpapers and screensavers, websites, album skins, Flash video and desktop Flash 8 multimedia. Advertising is expected to be a HUGE growth area for flash application developers and those looking to monetize their mobile applications. We heard at MAX that last year alone there was more than $400 million spent on mobile ads last year… that number is expected to explode to more than $4 billion by 2011… kaching $$$
Kevin Lynch, Adobe lead architect noted at MAX that with the recent product launches from Adobe and the supporting Adobe Developer Connection, developers are already rolling out simple yet engaging web applications and services. Skilled Adobe application developers are rolling out social networking websites and other compelling and engaging web 2.0 resources. Now, with the release of Flash Lite 3 (see http://www.adobe.com/products/flashlite/) developers have the tools needed to migrate these traditional web resources to a mobile environment with relative ease, creating compelling mobile applications that offer a similar experience that is found on the traditional web.
Adobe Chief Software Architect, Kevin Lynch at MAX
At MAX during the opening session we were treaded to advice from Adobe technical leads on how to create exciting applications. Shantanu Narayen reminded us how to make content exciting: the customer is front and center; the developer needs to focus on the individual; address human and emotional needs through a captivating user experience… all are good pieces of advice. Perhaps most important, and not to be forgotten, content is king! Narayen reminds the developer to focus on the content first and foremost then address the user interface. He notes how we can’t go wrong with that thinking… and remember that great digital experiences adapt to the user… so in short, be sure to give the user what they want. Finally, he left us with a couple of other “words of wisdom”… make it personal, make it phone, but most important, remember that less is more! (what he’s referring to is that the developer needs to make sure he simplifies the user experience)
Test your Apps - Adobe Device Central CS3
Adobe Developer Connection is a must visit resource at http://www.adobe.com/devnet/ - take note of the Mobile developer section – image devcenter1.jpg. Of particular interest is the Adobe Device Central CS3 section, specifically for creative professionals and mobile developers who want to produce innovative and compelling content for a broad range of mobile phones and consumer electronics devices. Users can easily design, test, and preview their mobile content - http://www.adobe.com/devnet/devices/device_central.html. Device central provides a comprehensive list of Flash and Flash Lite supported mobile devices. Search the device directory to obtain detailed device specifications and other technical data. Then, preview and test the performance of your flash applications to see exactly what kind of experience the end user will enjoy. Developers can interact with their apps and devices via an online emulator – you can even see a n updated meter that shows system performance and memory consumption as it will occur on the device while running the actual application.
One Step further… Enter Forum Nokia and the Creative Pros
As I already mentioned, Forum Nokia elected to use Adobe MAX 2007 as the forum to officially roll-out the new “creative Pros” website - a community to help the mobile developer, Adobe Flash developer community (a whopping 1.5 million strong!), and other design professionals to grow and extend their business opportunities to mobile devices. Users of Creative Pros (www.forum.nokia.com/creativepros/) are immediately treated to a number of supporting documents, tools and more. Developers can immediately locate the following:
- Documents - including visual guidelines, UI examples, help docs. To start, the following white paper is a good read: "How to Prototype Applications with Flash"
- Tools and SDKs
- sample code, usability tricks
- discussion boards and a knowledge base
- tricks on porting from other platforms
It should be should be noted that Flash Lite is not only supported by Symbian OS and S60 3 devices. Flash Lite also runs on Qualcomm BREW, MS Windows Mobile 5, and countless other OEM platforms. Developers looking for more information on which particular devices are supporting Flash Lite should consult the following www.adobe.com/mobile/supported_devices
Committed To Mobile Flash and the Developer
Nokia reiterated at MAX that they are firmly committed to Flash and that at least 10 devices supporting Flash Lite 3 will come to market in 2008. For more information on devices supporting Flash I suggest you check out http://www.flashdevices.net/. For a complete list of Nokia devices that support flash see this useful document [PDF]. Developers now have access to a rich, community resources via Adobe developer central http://www.adobe.com/devnet/ and the Nokia Creative Pros Community… everything you need to introduce you to mobile Flash application development. Perhaps your next Flash Lite enabled mobile application will be featured on stage at MAX 2008.
Some Suggested weblinks:
Cool Flash Apps:
Additional Notes...
For developers taking advantage of the demand for mobile video, the announcement of Flash Lite 3 and the support for Flash video is HUGE! The Adobe® Flash® Lite™ 3 runtime supports FLV, the most popular video format on the Internet, best known from popular sites such as CNN, YouTube, and MySpace. With Flash Lite 3, users can engage with web video on their devices just as they do on the desktop, either by streaming video or by downloading video clips as standalone applications or when integrated with a mobile web browser.
Developers can build, preview, and test Flash Lite 3 content using Flash CS3 Professional and Adobe Device Central CS3. The perfect way to get started is to register (free) at the Adobe Mobile & Devices Developer Center. Developers looking for a starting point should register and then grab the Download the Flash Lite 3.0 Update for Device Central CS3 in order to author, test, and publish Flash Lite 3.0 mobile content.
Images From MAX
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