Antony’s Mobile Blog

I am sorry to announce that there will be no further development of Screenshot for Symbian OS. The last versions can still be found here:

• Screenshot for Symbian OS (for S60 3rd) version 2.60
• Screenshot for Symbian OS (S60 1st/2nd) version 2.50
• Screenshot for Symbian OS (UIQ 2)

The full source code is still available at SourceForge.net:

• Source code of Screenshot for Symbian OS

What is the reason behind my decision? It is because Symbian Signed for Freeware is more or less dead now. There is no official statement from Symbian yet, but my last freeware application has been stuck there for more than 3 months. I have sent emails to some Symbian persons who might be able to help; but got no response.

Here is a response from R.H. (initial of a person who works for Symbian) on July 3, 2007.

Hi Zishan,
Could you please let Antony know the state of his application?
Regards,
The Symbian Signed Team
EMail: symbiansigned@symbian.com
www.symbiansigned.com
*** NOTE : When responding please ‘reply with history’ to ensure your responses are handled in a timely manner. ***

I got no further follow-up from him or Zishan. For your information, Zishan was the person from CellMania who used to do signing. I have sent email to him several times as well, but got not a single reply.

Here is another response from H.W. (another Symbian guy) on July 22, 2007.

Hi Antony
FYI SymbianSigned let me know that their looking into this on Friday … I haven’t heard back from them yet though.
Regards
H
—————————————————
[… name removed]
Developer Consulting, Asia/Pacific Region
Symbian Ltd. (Australia)

Did I try different channel to get my application signed? Yes, indeed. As a Forum Nokia Champion, there was an offer for signing from Forum Nokia.

    Hi,

VTT is handling the Symbian Signed for Nokia test house evaluation process on behalf of us so please contact them directly, [… email removed]

…………………………………………………………
[… name removed]
Project manager, Application Testing Services
Forum Nokia
Tampere, Finland

http://www.forum.nokia.com - The developer site

I have sent my application to the email address given above on July 4, 2007. Unfortunately, I don’t get any reply either after 1 month.

I have also tried to raise the issue about Symbian Signed for Freeware to many discussion boards and blogs. Here are some of them:

• Freeware Symbian Signed at Symbian Discussion Board
• Selling my applications at Forum Nokia Discussion Board
• An Open Letter to Symbian Signed Authority at Antony’s Mobile Blog 

Bonus Links

• Death of the Bedroom Coder Part I
• Death of the Bedroom Coder Part II
• Is Symbian Trying to Kill Off Small Developers

This is really frustrating. I just got a new device and couldn’t request for a new developer certificate from SymbianSigned.com. I have sent a request to activate my account on July 5, but still got no confirmation yet. They said it would take only 48 hours to enable the account. It’s been 5 days (120 hours)!

To Symbian Signed team, please enable my account…. I am the developer of Screenshot for Symbian OS, an open source project for this platform. Right now, I couldn’t get a new developer certificate for my new device. My certificate for my current device is going to expire next month (August 14, 2007).

Please, help me….

Update (12-July-2007): Finally, after posting a comment on Symbian discussion group (http://developer.symbian.com/forum/thread.jspa?threadID=20855&tstart=0), my Symbian Signed account is enabled now. I am relieved….

This is really not funny. I sent an email to Symbian Signed (symbiansigned@symbian.com) and got an automatic reply.

I will be out of the office starting 06/07/2007 and will not return until 16/07/2007.

Dear Symbian Developer,

We would like to apologise for the technical difficulties that we are having at the moment. If you have sent a request for enabling the ability to request Developer Certificates please allow up to 48 hours for this to happen (note that over the weekend no accounts will be enabled). If you are a Platinum Partner of Symbian, please contact your Partner Manager for more information on how to enable Developer Certficates on your account.

Best Regards,
The Symbian Signed Team

Seriously, this drives me crazy!

My application has been stuck there for more than 2 months. Now they are out of office! How many people are working behind Symbian Signed? Are they all out of office?

Bonus Links

• Symbian is Not an Idiot
• An Open Letter to Symbian Signed Authority

Update (11-July-2007): There is an update from Symbian Signed regarding out-of-office reply.

Hi Antony

With respect to the out of office reply, this is not as bad as it looks. The auto-reply functionality has been enabled to allow developers to know that we’re looking at devcert requests, and that these have a 48 hour delay, since the response will not be instant.
Unfortunately the auto-reply functionality on Lotus Notes, as used by SymbianSigned email group, automatically inserts this bit “I will be out of the office starting 06/07/2007 and will not return until 16/07/2007.“

So the out of office bit is not true … its supposed to reflect when things should be back to normal with the site.

Cheerio
H