Java Takes A Step Forward With The SE P990i
Sony Ericsson have unveiled their much talked-about replacement for the P910 - the P990i. The new model is a fundamental redesign compared with the previous P800/P900/P910 family of phones. This looks like a pretty impressive phone. Out of the box, it has some of the key features that I think are important to compete effectively in the smart phone market. That is: a QVGA screen; what looks like a useable QWERTY kepad; great web browser and RSS newsreader; good messaging; and WiFi, 3G and Bluetooth support.
The phone is a massive step forward compared with the P910 - and has loads of great features that I think consumers will love. What really caught my eye, however, is that this looks like a potentially great phone for Java ME developers. Here’s the list of Java ME APIs the phone supports:
JTWI 1.0 (JSR-185) consisting of Connected Limited Device Configuration (CLDC) 1.1 HI (JSR-139), MIDP 2.0 (JSR-118), WMA 1.1 (JSR-120).
- PDA Optional Packages (JSR-75)
- Bluetooth (JSR-82)
- Wireless Messaging API 2.0 (JSR-205)
- Web Services (JSR-172)
- Mobile Media API (JSR-135)
- Mobile 3D Graphics (JSR-184)
- Nokia UI API 1.1
Connected Device Configuration (CDC) 1.0 (JSR-36)
- Foundation Profile 1.0 (JSR-46)
- Personal Profile 1.0 (JSR-62)
- PDA Optional Packages (JSR-75)
The thing to note here is that not only does the phone support CLDC, but it also supports CDC. It’s great to see companies starting to think about incorporating CDC as phones get more powerful. The P990 is the first phone I’ve seen that is likely to be a genuinely big seller and have CDC. Of course the devil in the detail as regards the user experience of Java software on phones. But, from looking at the form factor of the phone and the Java specs, it’s very possible that SE have done a great job here.
jianwu wrote:
J2ME on the phone for personal usage might be for developing game,
then a lot of new features might just mean wasting battery power.
J2ME on the phone for Enterprise Application requires more than
device itself, reliability, connectivity, often a lot of new features might
mean not reliable at all, considering all these new features are actually
software
Posted 22 Dec 2005 at 3:31 pm ¶
simon wrote:
In general, hardware/OS platforms on phones are not yet as stable as we have come to expect with PCs. However, it’s really important to understand what “Enterprise Application” means in the context of mobile phone software. Expectations that businesses have for software running on mobile phones are rather different than the expecations they have, say, for their server infrastructure.
The Java ME platform is currently more than adequate for developing software for the Enterprise; and it’s only getting more powerful over time with business-focussed APIs e.g. for software manageability, security etc. being introduced.
Having said all that - the devil *is* in the detail. If it turns out that SE have poor implementations of these APIs, then (by definition) they will not be usable for serious applications.
Posted 22 Dec 2005 at 8:41 pm ¶