Nokia opened the source code of Symbian last February. And now, in about six months time the world of technology has shown love towards one of the earliest of mobile OSes. “The world’s most popular mobile browser is now optimized for the world’s most popular smartphone platform” – says Opera, Norway which released the beta version of Opera Mini 5.1 last week.
The reason why Nokia went on to open the source code is, Android.
Major manufacturers like Motorola, HTC jumped to play with Google’s Android early on. At the same time Apple whipped a brilliant product – the iPhone – with a neat OS under it. The duo – i.e. Android vs. iOS – competed so much that both left very little on the plate for Nokia to chew on. There wasn’t enough coolness-left-to-do left in Symbian or may be Nokia didn’t have the bandwidth to pursue it that way. The market share of Nokia fell. Eventually, Nokia was cornered with two choices: be quicker than the rest to one-up their operating system, or be submerged under. The third choice, of course, was to open the source. And so did Nokia.
BTW did you also notice that, in the chip-set based mobile segment too, Nokia is seeing massive competition (read erosion) in the markets of its stronghold. What exactly is the reason for it, can you guess? Among smartphones, the announcement by Opera is a sign of relief for Nokia. A resurrection of Symbian, their move for survival in the face of stiff competition.
Well here are some details of the new faster Opera Mini for Symbian handsets:
It carries all the innovations Opera Mini is known for, such as Speed Dial for the users’ favorite websites, tabbed browsing and an attractive user interface. Supports more devices than ever (read about too many models ), faster start-up time, improved page-load and scrolling performance, especially on older devices, full support for device text input methods, better fonts, integration for copy & paste, email client and an option to choose default access point without annoying dialogs.
Opera claims “ Nokia smartphones based on Symbian are very popular among Opera Mini users, and this release translates into a better browsing experience, while saving on data traffic charges and fees“. Well great move Nokia, or else how could Opera have made a better browser on top of your handset?
And if you are a Nokia smartphone lover then you may perhaps want to download the latest Opera Mini for your handset. Go surf, tell us if it felt better!
IMG credit: Cast Away, Hollywood
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