Symbian

It has been suggested that EPOC (computing) be into this article or section. (Discuss)

Symbian OS is an operating system with associated libraries, user interface frameworks and reference implementations of common tools, produced by Symbian Ltd.. It is a descendant of Psion's EPOC.

Symbian is currently owned by Ericsson, Panasonic, Nokia, Samsung, Siemens AG and Sony Ericsson.

Design

There are multiple user interface flavours that use the Symbian OS, such as UIQ and Nokia's Series 60 and Series 80. The adaptability of the user interface enables the use of Symbian OS on various form-factors of hand-held devices: clam-shell or tablet, keyboard and/or pen, PDA or mobile phone, and others.

Symbian OS, with its roots in Psion Software's EPOC (which itself had similarities to the internals of VMS, a grown-up operating system for mini-computers in the 1980s) is structured like many desktop operating systems, with pre-emptive multitasking, multithreading and memory protection.

Symbian OS's major advantage is the fact that it was built for handheld devices, with limited resources, that may be running for months or years. There is a strong emphasis on conserving memory, using Symbian-specific programming idioms such as descriptors and a cleanup stack. Together with other techniques, these keep memory usage low and memory leaks rare. There are similar techniques for conserving disk space (though the disks on Symbian devices are usually flash memory). Furthermore, all Symbian OS programming is event-based, and the CPU is switched off when applications are not directly dealing with an event. This is achieved through a programming idiom called active objects. Without using these techniques properly, an application can wear down the battery of a phone in just a couple of hours; with them, the battery lasts for a week.

All of this makes Symbian OS's flavour of C++ very specialised, with a steep learning curve. However, many Symbian OS devices can also be programmed in OPL, Python, Visual Basic, Simkin and Perl - together with the J2ME and Personal Java flavours of Java.

History

In 1980, Psion Software is founded by David Potter.

EPOC16. Psion released several Series 3 devices from 1991 to 1998 which used the EPOC16 OS.

EPOC OS Releases 1–3. The Series 5 device, released in 1997, used the first iterations of the EPOC32 OS.

EPOC Release 4. Oregon Osaris and Geofox 1 were released using ER4.

In 1998, Symbian Ltd. is formed as a partnership between Ericsson, Nokia, Motorola and Psion.

EPOC Release 5. Series 5mx, Series 7, Revo, netBook, netPad, Ericsson MC218, and the Ericsson R380 were released in 1999 using ER5.

Symbian OS v6.0 and v6.1. Sometimes called ER6, the first phone, the Ericsson R380, shipped in 2000.

Symbian OS v7.0 and v7.0s. First shipped in 2003.

In 2004, Psion sold its stake in Symbian.

Also in 2004, the first worm for mobile phones using Symbian OS, Cabir, was developed, which used Bluetooth to spread itself to nearby phones. See Cabir and Symbian OS threats.

Symbian OS v8.0. First shipped in 2004.

Symbian OS v9.0. Early in 2005, the newest version of Symbian was announced. Improvements in the OS mean that applications and content, and therefore a developers investment, are better protected than ever. The new ARM ABI binary means developers need to retool and the security changes mean they have to recode.

Devices that have used the Symbian OS

• Ericsson R380 (2000) was the first commercially available smartphone based on Symbian OS
• Nokia 9210 Communicator smartphone (32-bit 66Mhz ARM9-based RISC CPU) (2001), 9300 Communicator (2004), 9500 Communicator (2004) using the Nokia Series 80 interface
• Sony Ericsson P800 (2002), P900 (2003), P910 (2004), Motorola A920, A925, A1000, BenQ P30, P31 using the UIQ user interface.
• Nokia Series 60 (2002)
  • Nokia Series 60 is used in various phones, the first being the Nokia 7650, then the Nokia 3650, followed by the Nokia 3620/3660, Nokia 6600 and Nokia 7610. The Nokia N-Gage and Nokia N-Gage QD gaming/smartphone combos are also Series 60 platform devices. It was also used on other manufacturers' phones such as the Siemens SX1 and Sendo X. Recent, more advanced devices using Series 60 include the Nokia 6630, the Nokia 6680 and a next generation N series, including the Nokia N90 and Nokia N91.
• Nokia 7710 (2004) using the Nokia Series 90 interface.
• Fujitsu and Mitsubishi phones for NTT DoCoMo in Japan, using an interface developed specifically for them.

External links

• My-Symbian Symbian OS Communicators and Smartphones Info Center: news, software, hardware, downloads, tips, FAQ, on-line store, reviews, discussion forum
• SymbianOne.com An active Community portal for mobile developers, device makers, and carriers interested in symbian devices
• NewLC a very active Symbian C++ developer portal with news, forums, tutorials and much more...
• Symbian Company Website
• Other Symbian OS devices
• UIQ
• Series 60 platform's official site
• All About Symbian, Community Website with news, reviews and a very active forum
• eBooks and eNews on Symbian OS smartphones with Mobipocket
• Symbian Directory
• Symbian OS OpenSource Community Center, This site is dedicated to the development of Open Source programs for SymbianOS.
• History of Symbian, 1980-2004
• History of OPL