[jje007]

Hi everyone-

I'm a research assistant at Stanford University and know very little about actual software development for the phones, but was hoping that someone would be kind enough to clear up a few questions I have about accessing 3rd party apps on the **Series 40 phones**:

What's the fastest way of going from the default screen display to actually running some 3rd party app that the phone user has downloaded or somehow installed? In other words, does the user have to actually go through all the menus and scroll and everything, or can you enter numbers for the menu items and get to it quickly like that?
If so, about how many button pushes in total would it take to get to and run a given 3rd party app (I'm especially curious about this)? And beyond that, is it considered reasonable that users will memorize little number shortcuts to frequently used programs?

Also, is there any way to set up a little shortcut on their phone's main page or set up a special key code they can enter? I'm looking for the fastest possible way to get to an app and am wondering what people think of the various options.

Thanks so much for you help!

Jonathan Effrat
Stanford University

[aed02]

Hi
I am looking into the same thing at the moment and I was wondering if you found an answer for this? I realise that no one answered your question but if you did find out, I would be really interested in knowing if its possible to set up a shortcut on the phone's main page.

Thanks
Alex

[grahamhughes]

You can use a number to shortcut through the built-in menus, so on my phone (6100, Series 40), you can key Left-Soft-Key, 9, 1 to skip straight to the application list. (Left-Soft-Key activates the main menu from the default screen, "Applications" is menu item 9, "Select application" is item 1 in the Applications menu).

Once at the application list you must select an application (top one always seems to be the most recently installed and is selected by default - don't quote me) and press send. You *must* wait until the application list appears before pressing send, or nothing happens.

The items listed as "applications" are actually "MIDlet suites". A MIDlet suite can contain one or more MIDlets - a MIDlet is something that the phone can execute. MIDlets in the same suite are delivered in the same file, and have access to the same code and same data. MIDlets in different suites are completely isolated from one another. If a suite contains a single MIDlet (which is common), then opening it from the application list executes the MIDlet. If a suite contains several MIDlets, then a second menu appears.

So assuming that you have a suite with one MIDlet only, and it is the top of the list, the shortest key sequence (on my phone) would be LSK-9-1-(wait)-Send.

In my experience, non-technical end-users are unlikely to remember such a sequence, unless they are told "this is how you start the program", and never told that there is an alternative. They're more likely to make the effort to remember a shortcut if they use it several times each day.

So far as I know, there is no way to setup a "speed-dial" to an application.

Would your application have to be a Java app? If you built something that works through a WAP interface, the WAP browser can be started by press-and-holding the zero key. It automatically goes to its home-page, which is configurable.

Graham.

[aed02]

Thanks for your reply. That has given me some new information to work on.

More specifically, I was wondering if its possible to install an icon on the "desktop" of the phone - as a shortcut to a website. The idea being that one could send this as an MMS message and it installs an icon on the main screen, allowing the user to go straight to that webpage when chosen.

Hope that makes sense! Thanks
Alex

[grahamhughes]

Good question. Not on a series 40. You can send a WAP bookmark as an SMS, I think. Other phones - I don't know. You could try asking in the WAP part of the forum.

Graham.