Not happy with just the GUI of iphone on your 5800 (assuming you have installed MyPhone by MMMOOO)? Another Chinese developer has just an application to bring an iphone style interface for your SMSes. This is a free application called Free iSMS by Junni Kokuki, an independent Chinese developer who has come up with an amazing list of applications for the symbian 3rd and 5th edition devices. Free iSMS v1.02 is still in its development stage and as such, users have to sign the application on their own prior to installation.
Free iSMS v1.02 is the latest version of iSMS and can be downloaded for free from mobicreed.com. As mentioned earlier, the users need to sign this application on their own before proceeding to installation. There are several methods for signing an unsigned application but the most reliable is the one by OPDA. If you are a non Mandarin speaker, please follow the instructions from this forum post in dailymobile.se which has pictorial explanation for getting a certificate and key from OPDA. Please note that you may have to wait for around 4-5 hours to get your certificate and key after submitting your files with OPDA. Its a long procedure no doubt, but the outcome is satisfactory nevertheless. After spending like around 5-6 hours to download and sign this application, am very glad that I could get it working on my 5800.
Once you install the application, you can synchronize it with your inbox and all the messages in your inbox will be archived in chat style conversations. Since by default, the sent messages folder stores only the last 20 outgoing messages, your conversations prior to the last 20 outgoing messages will be absent from this archive. By default, the application starts at startup and is not displayed in the tasklist. You can change these settings in the options menu of this application.
As can be seen from the screenshot at the right, hitting on reply will open up an empty bubble and you can type and send your SMS. The bubble is updated once the message is sent. The application not only tries to mimic the interface of iphone SMS but also provides some value added features like scheduling SMS, fake SMS and sender name notification in the system notifier. SMS scheduling works great and is much easier than the SMS timer to configure. Fake SMS is very much functional and the best part is you can insert this message at the right time in the chat window to fool your friends. Too bad I didn't have this application on the FOOL's day. The new option of adding the senders name to the system message notifier was a much desired option for me. There have been times when I have been patiently waiting for a message from a certain someone and pounced on my 5800 on hearing the incoming message notification, only to realize that it was just a promotional SMS from my cellular operator. With free iSMS installed on my 5800, I can get the sender's name in the system notification.
Nothing is perfect in this world, is there? Just when I was thinking this is a perfect application, I stumbled upon a few issues with this application. As you may know by now, there is no smiley support in the built in SMS application. I am in hunt for a third party application which can fix this and so far haven't been able to find one. I dont think lack of smileys is a serious issue but after playing around with smileys in the VOIP clients like Talkonaut and Nimbuzz, am just eager to use them in my SMSs too.
One serious limitation is the inability to directly call or save a number in the SMS. This comes in very handy for like in the screenshot above. There is no way to directly dial the number without having to memorizing the number and dialling it in the dialler. Since this option is present in the default SMS application on most mobiles today, most users will sorely miss this feature.
Pros
- Impressive bubble style chat like interface for SMS
- Synchronisation with the message inbox
- Value added features like fake SMS, schedule SMS and sender name in system notification
Cons
- Lack of smileys
- Inability to directly call the number in the message
Verdict
Free iSMS is no doubt one of the best third party applications for symbian 5th edition devices today. Its easy to configure, use and its FREE. Great work, Junni Kokuki! The only thing bugging about this application is getting it signed and I dont blame the developer for this, since he is still working on it. If the developer can fix certain issues highlighted in this review, this application can straight away be launched as a paid application for it covers all the bases for a complete SMS package. Free iSMS is definitely a must on your 5800s.
Related posts:
- Nokia 5800 Free Services: Send free to India, Kuwait, UAE, Saudi, Singapore, Philippines & Malaysia www.160by2.com provides a free sms service which you can...
- Nokia 5800 Buzz: Vopium Voip Service offers 30 mins of free call time and 30 free SMS as a Signup package Vopium is a voip service for Nokia 5800 and...
- Nokia 5800 Help Guide: Making free calls to US Toll Free numbers using SIP In this post, i will be guiding you on how...
- Nokia 5800 App Review: Bye Bye Caller – Receive fake calls on your phone Most of the time, we are stuck in situations like...
Good app I liked it especially the fake SMS option
Plus, I also like the new design of the blog
Nice app. If it was signed then even better, would have saved a lot of trouble getting it self-signed. (FYI, I used http://s60.vgooo.com/ and http://www.gosymbian.com/SSIS_download.html to self-sign the sis)
And a walkthrough of the features… (In Chinese, translated by Google)
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=zh-TW&u=http://www.ringhk.com/news2.php%3Fid%3D1941
And remember to increase the Max. Sent Items (e.g. 50, 100 or more if you’re a SMS addict), otherwise the conversations will look weird.
[...] unsigned and it was indeed, prompting me to sign the app using the method described in my earlier post. Well, now I was all set to get a feel of eyeCall on my [...]
sms chat has the option to use smileys but it is far less intuitive than free isms, at least on my e71
why is it saying ‘feature not supported’ at the time of instalation in my 5800…? & then set up terminates.
Hi,
I just installed this about half an hour ago. Every thing works as expected. I’m really digging it. However, there’s one small problem: I can’t get it to display my contacts’ names. I’m getting their numbers right now and it’s really troublesome having to remember which number is whose. Can you help??
Hi ThienTin,
I had the same problem with some of my contacts but then i found if i copied my contacts from my sim to my phone memory, then use my phone memory as default for my contacts that iSMS works fine.
I just installed this on my 5800, getting it self signed wasn’t that much bother I went to the following site http://cer.opda.cn/en/index.php?module=certificate&action=my& the night before and selected the english version and after about 15mins navigating around the site i found the cert section and filled in the required details, then checked the next morning and the status was ‘normal’ (cert application approved). I then uploaded the app from my C drive, the app got signed then I downloaded the signed version and installed on phone…all works and looks great!
been banging my head to install this on my e71 since i bought it in november. tried a lot of things that failed. i settled for smschat for a while, but i was really bothered by drag when loading a chat and lot of other little things. until i stumbled upon the opda online signing thing. now, free-isms is working great and i’m very happy with it.
so i still need to pay $200 to get me signed in to my Symbian Signed?? goodness/.
tnkssssssssssss mn
HEY!!! I just installed this marvel and I love it!!!! It is so beautifully convenient!!!. Sushant, I realised I could dial the number in the message, being able to directly call the number in the message. I just gotta press and hold any empty space outside the bubbles and I would get a drop down list saying: “delete”, “forward”, “copy to clipboard”, “dial”. I just love this application! I hope I don’t have any problems in the future!!!!
uhh! I forgot. I am in doubt now. Is it possible to see how many characters I am using? In my country sending sms is quite expensive, so I gotta take care on the amount I send…
why is it that I cannot apply? it’s telling me that my IMEI is wrong.. but I checked it under the batt of my phone
Hey i installed the app but it gave Certificate error