Congratulations to Sajid Ali Anjum, our Nokia Developer Champion of the month for August. Based in Pakistan, Sajid has worked on mobile platforms since 2008. Having earned a bachelor’s degree in computer systems engineering from the college of engineering and technology at the Islamia University of Bahawalpur, he now focuses on building his company, SajiSoft, and on developing for Nokia Asha Touch phones. Sajid’s special interests include social networking, location-based services, mobile utilities, and games.

On Nokia Store, Sajid’s company offers several games and utilities, including Math n Fun, a game for practicing math; Brain Bash, a cartoon game; and mLocker, a file-locking utility. His most recent app is Tangle Craze, an arcade puzzle game optimized for the full touch UI for Series 40.

Sajid shares his skills with the Nokia community as a frequent contributor to the Nokia Developer discussion boards and Wiki, where he can be found under his username sajisoft. In addition, his skills have won him several developer awards, including the Nokia Calling All Innovators 2011 competition and Nokia Qt Ambassador. Sajid engages the wider developer community through his blog on the Sajisoft site. He also speaks publicly on topics that include getting started with mobile programming, and developing mobile games.Bravo, Sajid!

Meet Sajid Ali Anjum.

Learn what it takes to join the Nokia Developer Champion reward and recognition program.

The Nokia Developer Champion for July is Firstman Marpaung, a developer with iComm International in Indonesia and president of the Nokia Indonesia Community Enthusiasts. Recently, Firstman helped organize a Web Apps Roadshow that visited more than 10 campuses in Indonesia and produced 355 apps that were submitted to Nokia Store. He was also recently honoured as a Most Valuable Professional for Windows Phone, and he also has expertise in Symbian C++, Qt, Series 40, Themes, and UI design. Firstman has been a member of the Nokia Developer community since early 2011, and under his username firstmanm, he contributes regularly to the Nokia Developer discussion boards.

Meet Champion of the Month Firstman Marpaung.

Explore the Nokia Developer Champion program.

Portuguese-speaking developers now have a great opportunity for training on Nokia platforms: 13 webinars over the next two months.

All these Nokia webinars will be conducted in Portuguese, and all will held at 4 p.m. Brasilia time.

Sign up now or get more information for any or all of these Nokia webinars:

12 June: Qt Network explained

13 June: Dicas de otimização para aplicações Qt

14 June: Qt SDK: debugging e profiling

19 June: O que há de novo no Qt 5

20 June: Usando Qt Mobility em suas aplicações Qt

21 June: Entendendo Model-View Delegates no Qt

26 June: Utilização de sensores com Nokia Windows Phone

27 June: Game API – J2ME S40

28 June: Web 1.5 SDK para Série 40

3 July: Introdução ao XNA Game Programming no Nokia Windows Phone

5 July: Como montar uma App em diversas resoluções de tela

10 July: Apps de consumo de APIs de Internet para mobile phones

11 July: Apps de consumo de APIs de Internet para Windows Phone

Nokia Developer Champion Craig Miller founded Spatial Minds — a U.S. geo-spatial research, development, and consulting firm — in 2004 and has more than 20 years of experience designing, implementing, and managing location-based services (LBS). He is also an advocate of Qt, Nokia’s application and UI framework. Craig is a cofounder of the Seattle (Washington) Qt User group, and he recently organized the group’s booth at LinuxFest Northwest, which featured local businesses and their Qt apps. Craig is also an active member of the Cascadia Users of Geospatial Open Source (CUGOS) and the author of Spatial Minds’ Hello World blog.

Prior to forming his company, Craig was a Senior Software Engineer with Autodesk Location Services, where he developed innovative LBS products, designed the COM plug-in API for the tablet-based Onsite View, and earned an LBS-related patent. Craig holds a master’s degree in Spatial Information Science and Engineering, and he has done research at the University of Maine National Center for Geographic Information Analysis and Battelle Pacific Northwest National Labs’ Remote Sensing Group. Craig also has hands-on experience and formal training in nearly all aspects of wired and wireless enterprise, mobile, and desktop location-based solutions. He has been a Nokia Developer member since 2010.

Meet Champion of the Month Craig Miller.

Nokia Developer Champions are rightly celebrated for their developer skills. But they are also extraordinary people.

Take Simon Botes, a Nokia Developer Champion based in South Africa. Simon recently undertook an epic road trip of more than 5,000 km. He travelled to a farm outside Lyndenburg, in the South African province of Mpumalanga. There, Simon provided seven days of training on mobile phones to nearly a dozen quadriplegics living in a home run by Ama Wheelies, a non-profit organisation that helps people with spinal-cord injuries. The 32 Nokia C5-03 devices he trained them on were donated by Nokia Connects. ‘Helping these disabled people really is a life-changing feeling’, Simon says. ‘I’m glad to be able to help.’

Such was Simon’s commitment and pride at being a Nokia Developer Champion that he had his Nokia Developer Champion t-shirt couriered to the next stop on his driving route when he realised he hadn’t packed it. The next day, T-shirt in hand, Simon set off for the Ama Wheelies farm. When he finally arrived in Lyndenburg, he trained several of the residents and their caretakers to use their new Nokia C5-03 device.

Moses Mlombo is one of the Ama Wheelies residents now using a Nokia phone. Paralyzed from the neck down after being shot in the chest six years ago, Moses uses a specially adapted Nokia C5-03 phone, both to communicate with others and run a small business that recycles printer cartridges. He uses a prosthetic on his wrist to hold the phone and taps on the phone’s keys with a mouthstick. In this way, Moses says, ‘I can still have a meaningful life.’

As for Simon, after his seven-day training session at Ama Wheelies, he visited nearby Kruger National Park to document wildlife species for a new mobile app he’s working on – and to take some vacation time. ‘This was one of the most awesome outreach programs I have helped on’, Simon says. ‘A HUGE thank-you to Nokia Connects…you guys rock!’ We think Simon rocks, too.

Simon Botes, standing in black t-shirt, training Ama Wheelies residents Amos Nkosi (on left) and Bethuel Manyika.