Spotlights for design

Snow Report

Developed for Windows Phone, this application has everything users need for their next trip to the mountains. Users can track their day, post their activities to social networks, or get snow conditions, weather forecasts, and full trail maps for hundreds of resorts.

Foodspotting

Developed for Windows Phone, this application makes finding good food easier. Instead of reviewing restaurants, users can recommend specific dishes and see what others have recommended wherever they go. They can see the nearest, latest and best dishes around them, search for a particular food, or look up a restaurant to discover its most popular dishes.

Dollar Rent a Car

Developed for Windows Phone, the Dollar Rent A Car app enables users to search for and book thousands of cars in more than 640 worldwide locations.

KAYAK

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to search hundreds of travel sites at once to find a flight, hotel or rental car. Users can set alerts and even keep track of a flight's progress in real time using Bing maps.

Branding your Series 40 full touch app

Are you thinking about how to make your brand more visible in your apps for the full-touch UI on Series 40? Mikko Kaipio, Senior UX Designer, provides you with tips and techniques to achieve that, without breaking the overall UX consistency with your target phone.

For more information see the Branding section of the Series 40 Full Touch Design Guidelines.

eBay

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables eBay members to search, bid, and check their activity on the go. Buyers can submit that last-minute bid on a hard-to-find item, sellers can check on their sales, or act on time-sensitive information on the spot.

The Weather Channel

Developed for Series 40, this simple yet elegant full-touch application gives users access to a rich and detailed selection of forecasts, radar maps, and severe weather information.

World of Red Bull

Developed for Series 40, this full-touch application introduces users to the fascinating world of Red Bull. Users can enjoy an infinite loop of behind-the-scene news, updates and content featuring sports and culture events, festivals, music highlights and background stories from Red Bull athletes.

Tourist Attractions - A location-aware city guide example app with in-app purchasing

Tourist Attractions is a Nokia Developer example app written in Java for Series 40 phones. It demonstrates the use of the Location API for Java ME (JSR-179) and the HERE Maps API for Java ME (formerly the Nokia Maps API) to retrieve and show location information as well as details of nearby attractions. In addition, it incorporates the In-App Purchase API to enable the purchase and download of additional city guides.
This application works on most Series 40 phones, ranging from entry-level models to the highly successful Asha family of smartphones.
For downloads, source, and more information, please visit the app's project.
For more information on in-app purchase, please see the Java Developer's Library.
For more Java example apps from Nokia Developer, please check out the Java Examples page.

Optimising Graphics for Series 40 Apps

Are you wondering what to consider when designing and optimising graphics for your Series 40 apps? In this video Mikko Kaipio, Senior UX Designer, provides you with tips and best practices for graphics in Series 40 apps.
He also briefly reviews the key decisions that need to be made when porting your Android app graphics to the successful Nokia Asha family of Series 40 phones.

The apps featured in this video are available from the Java Code Examples section.

For more information, you may want to review the following library and wiki articles:

• Adaptive Design and Development on Series 40
• Code-based gradients
• Graphics scalability approaches for Series 40 Java ME apps

Updating Custom Series 40 UI Designs for Nokia Asha Touch Phones

Do you have a custom Series 40 UI design that you want to take to the full-touch UI? Or are you creating a new custom design for the successful Nokia Asha family of Series 40 phones?
Mikko Kaipio, Senior UX Designer, shows you what to consider in your custom app design when taking it from non-touch or touch and type phones to full-touch phones. His advice is equally useful if you are starting with a new app's design. If your app is based on LCDUI, also check the Updating Series 40 UI Designs for Nokia Asha Touch Phones video.
The aMaze app featured in this video is available from Nokia Developer Projects.

Series 40 UX Design Resources Tour

So you want to create outstanding UXs for your Series 40 apps. In this video you get a tour of the resources available in the Nokia Developer Design and User Experience library, which will get you on the road to a winning design. Covering resources for Java and web apps, this video also includes key general design resources that will help you navigate the design process. With information on where to find examples, mock-up stencils, and icon templates, viewing is a must whether you are new to Series 40 or simply want to refresh your knowledge of the design resources available.

ESPN FC

This Series 40 web app provides comprehensive FC football coverage from all major leagues and tournaments from around the globe. Features include blogs, live scores, match stats, and player and club profiles.

ESPN F1

This Series 40 web app enables users to keep up-to-date with F1 action including news, live results, commentary, race summary, standings, and stats. The application provides complete driver and team profiles along with maps of many circuits on the season calendar.

CNN

Developed for Series 40, this full-touch application enables users to keep up-to-date with the latest top stories in business, world sports, entertainment, and technology. Key features include push notifications, quick sharing of articles using social media, and the ability to submit news stories through the iReport service.

Updating Series 40 UI Designs for Nokia Asha Touch Phones

Do you have a Series 40 UI design that you want to take to the full-touch UI? Or are you creating a new design for the successful Nokia Asha family of Series 40 phones?
Mikko Kaipio, Senior UX Designer, shows you what to consider when designing for a move from non-touch or touch and type phones to full-touch phones. His advice is equally useful if you are starting with a new app's design.

Hotels.com

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to search for and browse over 14,0000 hotels in 200 countries. Users can search for hotels by city, or browse a list of what's nearby using their location.

National Geographic World Atlas

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to search for and browse maps for over 7 million worldwide locations. Users can search by keyword, country, or view a map of their surrounding area using location detection.

KPMG - Infrastructure

Developed using Windows Phone, this application provides the latest installment of KPMG's Infrastructure magazine. The magazine seeks to share some of KPMG's insights and experience in the development of worldwide infrastructure.

Jobsite Job Search

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to browse more than 40,000 UK jobs. The application includes a full-featured search along with interview tips from top entrepreneurs and business leaders.

First Great Western

Developed using Windows Phone, this simple yet versatile application enables users to browse First Great Western train schedules, plan a route, retrieve electronic tickets, and complete a booking.

Domino's Pizza

Developed for Windows Phone, this easy to use application enables users to order a meal including pizza, snacks and desserts.

Create a simple prototype for your next Nokia app

This video will show you simple methods for taking the idea for your next app and put it on paper. From there, you can use various software to make your prototype a reality. Adobe Illustrator is one solution for this. Other tools used in the video are Balsamiq and Inkscape. Be sure to check out the Nokia Icon Toolkit for some template icons you can use in your app. With the visual design stencils you can easily sketch how your app will look.

Avoid pitfalls when designing apps for Symbian devices

This 'how to' video shows you some common pitfalls you may stumble across when designing apps for Symbian, and using the Qt Quick Components. The pitfalls are also discussed in the Symbian Design Guidelines library found here. Be sure to check the Remote Device Access service for testing your applications.

London Tube

This colourful Windows Phone application enables users to find London Underground stations, plan routes and view information about current and planned network delays. Users can review route maps in an easy to read list format, or choose to visually review the route superimposed onto the system map.

Yell.com

Developed for Windows Phone, this easy to use application enables users to locate contact information for local and regional businesses. Users can use location services to discover businesses nearby, or search for a specific type of business using a keyword.

Amazon Kindle

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to read Kindle eBooks and make book purchases from the Amazon Kindle store. The application includes a full-featured eBook reader that automatically synchs with a user's other Kindle apps or devices.

AccuWeather.com

Developed for Windows Phone, this colourful application provides users with weather forecasts for hundreds of worldwide destinations. Users can view hourly, daily and weekly forecasts, or watch a series of short regional video clips.

PhotoFunia

This whimsical application enables users to apply artistic effects to the photos they've captured on their Windows Phone device. Users can then share their creations to their favourite social network.

Engadget

Developed for Windows Phone, this application enables users to browse Engadget's extensive collection of technology news and articles. Users can also listen to podcasts using the application's built-in audio player.

Linkedin

Developed using Qt, this simple yet versatile application enables users to easily keep track of their connections, send and receive messages, or reconnect with people within their extended network.

The Guardian

Developed using Qt, this simple yet engaging application provides an ideal companion to The Guardian's desktop offering. Users can search for and browse articles, personalise their view by adjusting the font size, tag favourite articles, or share them with friends on social networks.

Sainsbury's

Developed using Qt, this colourful and application enables users to track their grocery shopping loyalty points, review weekly specials, and browse specialised meal plans. Users can also locate stores nearby using GPS and view directions directly on Ovi Maps.

Gig Finder

Gig Finder enables users to search for, discover and book tickets for local and regional gigs. A home screen widget is also provided to enable glanceable content updates. The bookings view provides one click access to booking provider web sites, or the option to initiate a call directly from the application.Download Gig Finder!

Tunewiki

The Forum Nokia UX Evaluation and user testing also showed the TuneWiki team the importance of integrating UX thinking into their processes. Originally, TuneWiki developers relied on the software industry’s traditional model of ‘Build it, ship it, then fix it’. Now that has changed. ‘We understand better the importance of looking at the UX as a whole, and not just saying we’ll build it, and then we’ll fix it with feedback’, Tarsi says. ‘Now we’ll try to make it right — or as right as we can — as early as we can’. Read more

Shazam

Shazam recently participated in Forum Nokia’s UX Evaluation, which helps developers improve and optimise their applications for their users. As part of the program, Shazam received two rounds of evaluations: one by a Forum Nokia UX expert evaluator working with mobile usability heuristics; the other by a panel of test users who were familiar with mobile applications in general, but not Shazam in particular.  Read more

BBC

The BBC's mobile web site brings a wealth of information to mobile users in a straightforward and efficient way. Content is formatted to allow users to browse headlines easily and drill down to relevent information. The amount of graphics on the site can be customised by the user to accomodate different connection speeds, data costs, and device capabilities.

Evernote plug-in

The Evernote sharing plug-in enables users to select, tag and upload media to the Evernote service; directly from a natively integrated N900 menu. The accompanying Evernote mobile web site acts as a dashboard, enabling users to browse, edit and organise their content collections. The Evernote plugin and web site are seamlessly integrated into common behaviours and activities on the N900. Download Evernote plug-in!

Skype

This application enables users to easily use Skype on the move, over either a WiFi or mobile data connection. The application includes familiar Skype functionality such as chat, Skype-based calls and image sharing. The native S60 on Symbian components provide familiar controls while enabling users to retain the look and feel of their current theme. Download Skype!

Metro

The Metro widget features an extensive collection of multi-language news and entertainment content. Users can browse, search or share content with friends using social networking services such as Twitter. The interface is high-contrast and makes strong use of colour to define content areas and controls. The Metro application is well designed with a simple, intuitive user interface. Download Metro!

Mobile Documents

To help Visiarc create  an indispensible application, Forum  Nokia stepped in to run both a  user experience (UX) evaluation and user  testing. In its  User Experience  Evaluation, a Forum Nokia UX expert evaluator  reviewed the  application for adherence to platform style guidelines and  overall  usability, suggesting improvements to flow, layouts, and graphics.   Next, feedback was obtained from everyday people who were familiar  with mobile  applications in general, but not Mobile Documents.   Read more

SpeedHero

Faster = better. That’s the premise behind Speedhero, a mobile ‘sports radar’ app that measures the top speed of a struck football, volleyball, tennis ball, or hockey puck. But ‘faster = better’ is also the premise of Entertrainer Ltd., the app’s Espoo, Finland-based developer. This was especially true as the company enhanced Speedhero based on a user experience (UX) evaluation and user testing with help from Forum Nokia. Read more

AA Breakdown and Traffic

Developed using Qt, this application enables users to request automotive breakdown service, and forward their exact location to the AA. Users can also check local traffic problems, and manage common automotive reminders such as vehicle tax and insurance renewal.

Our Recipes

Developed using Qt, this colourful and engaging application enables users to locate helpful recipes and meal ideas. Users can browse the extensive list of recipes, bookmark favourites, or request suggestions based on the ingredients they have on hand.

Virgin Train Tickets

Developed using Qt, this simple yet versatile application enables users to find train schedules, retrieve electronic QR code based tickets, and book a reservation.

PayPal

Developed using Qt, this simple application enables users to easily send and request money. Users can also perform simple tasks such as checking their balances, or complete useful real-time actions such as splitting a restaurant check with a group of friends.

Red Bull TV

This engaging application provides access to exclusive sports and cultural entertainment videos from around the world. Users can view videos using the app’s custom video player, tag their favourites, and easily forward link to their friends.

Mercedes Benz

This site is lightweight, engaging, and provides an ideal companion to Mercedes Benz’s desktop offering. Users can view photos and specifications for available models, locate a 24-hour repair centre, or book a test drive at one of the brand’s many dealerships throughout Malaysia.

Finnair

This simple, well-optimised site enables users to check-in, view timetables, check the status of their flight, and learn more about Finnair’s worldwide destinations. Users can also easily complete an online form to join the airline’s rewards and loyalty plan.

River Cottage Every Day

Developed using Qt, this colourful application enables users to search the extensive River Cottage collection of recipes and food preparation advice. Users can also view videos and share cooking tips with others in the community.

QML Templates

The QML UI Templates Library is a set of reusable user interface elements and templates, used in RSS Reader and Restaurant example applications. The contents of the library provide the basic building blocks of QML applications, while the templates are designed to be as flexible as possible. Use these elements to quickly get started with app development without having to construct your own UI from scratch.

Download the templates!

IdeasProject

The IdeasProject is an online community for everybody from all around the world to brainstorm. It enables the two-way exchange of ideas between users and developers around innovation powered by Nokia.

By sharing your ideas here you expose them to a huge number of other enthusiastic people who can help you evolve them into real innovations and products. We offer challenges and concrete rewards for the best ideas.

Audioboo

This application enables users to search the extensive Audioboo collection of short audio notes and podcasts. Users can also record and upload a Boo directly from the application. Recording a Boo is simple and intuitive as controls are clearly labelled, provide good feedback, and are ideally sized for touch manipulation.

Rightmove

This site is lightweight, engaging, and provides an ideal companion to Rightmove’s desktop offering. Users can search for properties, create lists of favourites, and easily generate alerts based on their location and ideal property characteristics. Quick access to the web site is also facilitated through a launcher application, available on Ovi Store.

Dremel

This simple, well-optimised web site provides an introduction to the Dremel product line of power tools for professional and do-it-yourself use. The site includes product descriptions, photos, and a handy series of videos showing the tools in use.

NHL GameCenter 2010

This application enables users to explore and keep track of their favourite hockey players, teams, and games. The extensive collection of data is enhanced using charts, graphs, photos, and game play diagrams.

The Guardian

This simple, well-optimised web site provides access to The Guardian’s extensive collection of news, sports, and lifestyle content. Users can easily search for articles, access their favourites, and browse the site’s content by category.

Facebook

This site is lightweight, engaging, and provides an ideal companion to Facebook’s desktop offering. Users can keep track of new message, accept invitations from friends, respond to comments on their Wall, and even tag friends within photographs.

Earthcomber

This website and accompanying mobile app, available on Nokia’s Ovi Store, helps consumers find and share the locations of shops, cash machines, post offices, hotels, restaurants, and more — anywhere in the United States.

So focused was Earthcomber’s development team on delivering this functionality, that they sometimes overlooked the app’s user experience (UX). ‘We would ask, “Does this menu make sense?” But it wasn’t holistic’, says Jim Brady, president of Earthcomber LLC, the app’s River Forest, Illinois-based publisher. ‘We didn’t go through the app and see what people encountered at different points’. Read more

Make My Trip

The developers behind Make My Trip had shown a beta version to travellers at Indian airports and gotten their feedback on features, navigation, and general look-and-feel. They had also done some usability studies with sample users, asking them to complete specific tasks with the app.

But a rigorous user-experience evaluation by design experts? That was still in the realm of ‘good idea’ — unfortunately, a typical attitude in India, says Ankur Dubey, MakeMyTrip’s product and strategic alliances manager. ‘There is always user experience talk in India’, he says. ‘But only now have Indian companies woken up to what it takes to make an app with a good user experience’. Read more

Conceptual design in 2 minutes

Sketching and brainstorming are a great way to experiment and explore ideas with all members of your team. The following video provides a short introduction to brainstorming, sketching, and ways to involve stakeholders in the conceptual-design process.

Auto Trader

The Auto Trader widget enables visitors to browse a large collection of vehicles, tag their favourites, and contact the seller using their mobile phone. The widget also includes a wealth of options that are ideally suited to the mobile context, including prompts to “Call Seller”, “Visit Dealer’s Website” and “View Dealer’s Location”

TripAdvisor

This remarkably versatile web site and widget work as a pair; enabling users to research nearby hotels, restaurants, and activity destinations. On GPS enabled devices, the widget detects the user’s location then passes this information to the web site providing a truly customised user experience.

Spin

This colourful and well-optimised web site enables visitors to browse a large collection of music-related articles, reviews, and special features.

Forum Nokia User Experience Offering

Have a quick look at what mobile app user experience is all about and what Forum Nokia can offer you to aid your application development. For more on this subject, see Forum Nokia's Design section.

London Bike Finder

This simple application enables users to locate bicycles and track the cost of usage as part of London’s cycle hire scheme. The application is easy to use and makes strong use of device capabilities such as GPS and the device’s native mapping functionality.

lastminute.com Hotels

This remarkably versatile widget enables users to research European holiday destinations, then locate and book a hotel from lastminute.com’s extensive collection. Users who prefer not to complete the booking on their mobile can also easily request a call-back from the lastminute.com sales team.

Yahoo

This lightweight, mobile optimised web site enables visitors to browse Yahoo’s extensive collection of news and entertainment content. Easy to configure customisation options are also provided, enabling users to control which content appears within each section.

Wired

The Wired web site enables visitors to browse a large collection of articles, reviews, and curated sub-sections. The site is colourful, with well-integrated branding that has been creatively implemented, using simple background colours and lightweight high-contrast graphics.

Grocery

Tesco’s easy to use Grocery widget enables shoppers to create shopping lists, search for and select products, and book a home delivery directly from their mobile phone. The application’s visual style is fun and well aligned with Tesco’s in-store and online branding.

Florin

Florin is a friendly and intuitive, touch-optimised finance tracking application. Florin provides easy access to multi-currency expense tracking and incorporates a handy series of reports and visualisations to track your progress. The application makes excellent use of visualisations to enable users to track and understand complex numerical data. Download Florin!

Brightkite

The Brightkite service enables users to keep up with friends, meet new people, and discover new places while on the go. Registration is quick and can be accomplished directly within the mobile application. The Brightkite application is seamlessly integrated with common behaviours from the desktop service. Download Brightkite!

Lonely Planet

Lonely Planet mobile provides access to an extensive collection of mobile-optimised travel destination content. The site is lightweight, easy to navigate and well optimised for browsing on a wide range of devices. The home page provides an excellent entry point to search, browsing and content discovery. Images are used sparingly to enhance content related to major travel destinations and points of interest.

Spotify

This application offers mobile users full access to Spotify's extensive social music service. The application is multi-faceted, easy to use and incorporates views and actions that will be familiar to users of their desktop service. Varied font sizes and brightly coloured, high-contrast button highlights, create a highly glanceable user interface. Download Spotify!

Introducing Flowella video

In this video Tim Brooke, Senior Design Specialist at Nokia, explains why Flowella was created, provides an overview of its features, and outlines what to expect in future versions of Flowella.

Conceptual Design in 2 Minutes Video

This video provides a short introduction to brainstorming, sketching, and the conceptual-design process.

UX Meets Code: Liqbase Calendar Video

Gary Birkett discusses his Maemo application LiqCalendar. Sanna Nordling walks through the improvements that can be done to it that can increase user experience.

UX Meets Code: MaStory Video

Daniel Martin Yerga introduces his application MaStory, and how collaborating with UX specialists has helped him to make the iconography and user experience of his navigation application easier to use. Annu-Maaria Nivala provides the UX perspective.

UX Meets Code: Mapper Video

Alberto Mardegan and Javier de San Pedro discuss how the Mapper application for N900 functions, and how it can benefit from simplification of the user interface.

UX Meets Code: Video Editor Video

Zaher Merali discusses what he's learned about concepting, and how it can be applied to his soon-to-be created application for the N900, Video Editor. We also see Patricia Montenegro's designs for the app and Alia Merali's opinions.

UX Meets Code: Xournal Video

Aniello del Sorbo discusses the desktop-to-mobile design improvements that he discovered for his notation application that allows people to open and share PDFs. Kirsi Rönkkö offers a few words about the interaction design challenges that are faced when porting applications from one platform to Maemo's N900.

UX Meets Code: gPodder Video

Thomas Perl and Tuomas Kuosmanen collaborate on improving the user experience of gPodder, an application for the N900 that enables users to download podcasts or stream audio and video.