Find your true calling with Nokia and TrueCaller

OviPublisherSuccesses | 23 November, 2011 16:35

The free TrueCaller Symbian app connects phone number directories from all over the world into one easy to use resource. The application automatically engages when you make or receive a call to a number that’s not already in your address book, and it enables you to match phone numbers to names, addresses, social networks and pictures.
 
TrueCaller works by searching online information that’s associated with any phone number. Within seconds, the app’s technology is able to display public information including the other party’s name, their address and the region in which they live. If available, TrueCaller will even pull in the caller’s picture or most recent status message from Facebook or LinkedIn.

When the Sweden-based co-founders Alan Mamedi and Nami Zarringhalam started TrueCaller back in July of 2009, they realized the need of being able to see who the unknown caller is, no matter where the call comes from. While there were myriad smartphone platforms at that time, there were no other directory services in the emerging markets for sourcing this kind of public data.

“Even in the U.S. market, a lot of information is blocked and there’s no comprehensive public directory for phone numbers,” said Mamedi. “We saw an opportunity to connect all the public white and yellow pages around the world into one source, and that’s why we founded TrueCaller.” In addition to searching for publicly available information, TrueCaller also opened an opt-in for enhanced search in which users can share their phone book information. This feature also helps TrueCaller identify prepaid phone cards and unlisted numbers. Should you have the misfortune of being the target of a spam caller, TrueCaller can help you identify and flag that number.

Making the right calls
With a team of five developers – one specifically dedicated to the Symbian platform – TrueCaller was able to develop the TrueCaller app in C/C++ for Nokia in eight weeks. Since that time, the team has been working to improve the app experience and add new functionality. 

“The possibilities for Symbian are huge – the global platform without a lot of development hurdles or limitations makes it fun for us as developers,” said Mamedi, who also told us that they are looking forward to seeing the Windows Phone platform grow given the ease of the development process on that platform. “We made our first release of TrueCaller for Windows Phone 7 in less than a week, thanks to the development tools, which are very well developed and easy to use,” said Mamedi.

TrueCaller’s app development challenges include keeping things light-weight, simple to use and continuing to deliver high quality information. The Nokia developer team helped TrueCaller overcome these challenges and deliver a positive experience to their customers. “Working with the Nokia team has been a great pleasure for us. They’re very helpful and supportive, which is unique in this industry,” continued Mamedi.

Available globally for Symbian, Windows Phone, Android and iPhone, TrueCaller supports users in English, Swedish, Norwegian, Finnish, French and German. Unique application features include: 
• Global caller ID and number look-up service across platforms
• Social caller ID to give you the latest information about the caller from Facebook or LinkedIn, before you even answer the call
• Call filter to block unwanted calls based on a crowd-sourced database of unwanted phone numbers

Within Nokia Store alone, TrueCaller has achieved more than one million global users. The app has more than two million total users, making more than 70 million number searches per month. The company continues to improve their app by listening to their users and by working with the Nokia Developer support team.

Find out more about TrueCaller on their blog, Facebook page or Twitter.

Europe , Utilities | Permalink | Comments (2) | Trackbacks (0)

N-Desk: Making you love your Nokia more!

OviPublisherSuccesses | 17 November, 2011 16:09

Mobile developer Anderson has been studying Symbian programming since 2005, when touch screen phones were few and far between. But when the popularity of touch screen phones began to spread, so too did consumers’ demand for apps. So in 2010, Anderson decided to apply his programming skills to mobile app development, and developed N-Desk.

 

N-Desk is a desktop app which provides a sliding menu and variable key lock options. The app runs on Nokia’s S60 touch screen phones and provides users with an easy way to manage applications in a fun and creative way. The N-Desk application enables users to slide the screen and change the icons’ positions seamlessly and customize the image color, background picture, menu icons’ layout and text color. Anderson’s one-man company is gaining popularity through Nokia Store, with over 2 million downloads of N-Desk to date.

N-Desk Development and Results

Leveraging the Symbian API, Anderson combined a keylocker API to create the lock/unlock screen functions in addition to sensors that enable users to lock and unlock their screens without using the physical keys. The first version took Bai only a few weeks to create, and even less time to update and create new versions, as Nokia’s free signing program made it easy to distribute. Anderson offers both a free and paid version, with the paid version having no ads and multiple skins available to users online. After developing several apps, Anderson decided to reach users around the globe, and turned to the Nokia Store to do so. With help from various developers from Germany and Italy, Bai En created localized versions of his applications to broaden the appeal and gain exposure of N-Desk.

 

Unlike other channels, the Nokia Store really allows developers to localize apps beyond translation, making them both relevant and more appealing to a broader audience. The Nokia Store, available in more than 190 countries, and in 32 languages, makes it easier for developers to receive feedback and advice from other developers, and review the latest feedback from users all over the world. After receiving an overwhelming amount of downloads through the Nokia Store, Bai was able to tweak and perfect his application based on user feedback from around the globe.

 

“I enjoy it when I receive good feedback from users, and I use their criticisms to help improve my application,” said Bai En. “Leveraging the Nokia Store’s global reach and popular platform has given N-Desk the exposure it needs to be successful.’ Now available in more than 190 markets worldwide, N-Desk continues to garner downloads every day, and is available in both a free and paid version.

S60 , China , Nokia Store | Permalink | Comments (1) | Trackbacks (0)

Spin and solve: Revolve, a Fluid Pixel success story

OviPublisherSuccesses | 09 November, 2011 23:46

 

Fluid Pixel was founded in 2007 and has remained on the front lines of innovation and app development, ever since releasing eight stimulating apps in the Nokia Store. One of the most popular Fluid Pixel games is Revolve, an addictive and mind-twisting puzzle game. Revolve is a classic game that uses simple controls to rotate a maze to get the ball to the hole. It has 70 challenging levels that put your logical thinking skills to the test, and Fluid Pixel is actively designing more levels to meet increasing customer requests.

Considering the fresh and talented competition in the mobile gaming market, the UK-based Fluid Pixel team, with a strong background in console game development, set forth to create a game that matched the capabilities of Nokia’s mobile phone technology, appealed to a wide audience and that didn’t rely on language, reactions, skill or knowledge. Anyone can download and play a game like Revolve, but it still takes time to master. The Fluid Pixel team knew it would be a challenge to increase visibility for Revolve but knew the growing popularity of the Nokia Store would put them squarely where they needed to be to get noticed: on a targeted number of devices with worldwide reach.

Results:

In just one month, Fluid Pixel created Revolve using Adobe Flash and AIR for mobile. The app is now available on Nokia Series 40 devices, as well as Nokia S60 3.x, 5.0 and Symbian^3 phones.

The release of Revolve on the Nokia platform was an ideal opportunity for Fluid Pixel to implement ad-supported games. “We chose innerActive as they were willing to work with us to get the Flash implementation of their system in place, as none of the other platforms had support for Flash at the time or were willing to work with us,” explained Stuart Varrall, Director of Fluid Pixel. “Due to the worldwide reach of the Nokia Store, we were able to gain a large number of users. We now get over 150,000 ad requests every day at a fill rate of about 85%.”

Fluid Pixel is the first company in North England to reach more than four million downloads from the Nokia Store and is now part of an elite club of eight other UK members of the Nokia Store to achieve a record amount of downloads worldwide. Current app downloads on Nokia Store are over five million.

“We are excited to reach this download milestone in such a short amount of time,” continued Varrall. “This motivates us to build on our momentum and, with the help of the Nokia Developer team, we plan to continue exploring new technology, business models and interesting content to keep up with the mobile industry’s fast pace.”

The company was also recognized with an Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2010; and Best New Business Award in 2009 in the North England region.

The Revolve app and others by Fluid Pixel are available to download for free in the Nokia Store.

       

 

Europe , Games , Monetization , BusinessSuccess , Series40 , NDSuccess , GeneralSuccess , CrossPlatform | Permalink | Add comment | Trackbacks (0)

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