Skyfire Beta for Symbian, I Have Invites
I really could have used this on my vacation, as I lacked access to a proper desktop computer. The Skyfire browser, which recently became available in a Symbian version, provides a desktop-like experience on a mobile phone, or at least that’s the goal. I previously gave the Windows Mobile version of Skyfire a look.
Yes the browser supports Flash–well enough to play video from YouTube and from cbs.com, where I watched The Twilight Zone for a few minutes on the Nokia N95 over WiFi before the browser crashed unceremoniously.
The browser seems to die frequently, particularly when it loses connectivity to the proxy server, which does a fair bit of the work rendering the page for the client. The client doesn’t even try to reconnect, it “gracefully” exits. The client should be more tolerant of these breaks and offer to try another access point.
Scrolling around on large pages works, but you have to wait a bit while the page “depixelates” and becomes clear. Sometimes it’s fast, sometimes it’s slow. It did go “full screen” when I clicked on a YouTube video to zoom in, but it left off the edges of the movie.
Something else the client should do: allow the screen to be rotated. Bonus points if you use the accelerometer and automatically detect the screen being rotated.
The application certainly has promise, but it’s still very much beta quality. Once they sort out the bugs, it should be a fine addition to your Nokia S60 device. If you want to experience the browser for yourself–bugs and all–leave a comment on this post. I will send you an invite beta code that will get you right in.
Edit: Unfortunately, you must have a U.S.-based mobile phone number in order to take advantage of this offer.
Edit 2: It’s actually called a beta code, not an invite code. My apologies for the confusion.
