[JDEV] Nokia Series 60 and Wireless Village

[Tijl Houtbeckers]

"Richard Dobson" <richard at dobson-i.net> wrote on 24-12-2002 11:51:18:
>
>Hello everyone,
>
>I have just come across this info on the Nokia website that shows that
>Wireless Village is not dead as someone here has claimed but is very 
>much alive, it shows Nokia is building Wireless Village instant 
>messaging into the Series 60 platform and has even got their own 
>Wireless Village im server software on the way.

For the original "vision" of what Wireless Village was supposed to be, 
Wireless Village requires a lot of operator support, not just Nokia 
making some software for it. In this vission it would be just another 
service, like SMS, MMS, voicemail etc. that comes with the standard 
package. It's unlikely though that this "vision" will ever come true. 

>Series 60 Terminal Software Suite
>http://www.nokia.com/nokia/0,5184,2802,00.html

This doesn't have to do much with Wireless Village, it's just a set of 
API's that *could* be used for creating a Wireless Village messenger 
(or a Jabber Messenger). 

>
>Nokia Presence Server
>http://www.nokia.
>com/networks/product_catalog/pc_product_announcement/1,5561 ,,00.html?
>prod_id=MIA00035&path=ann 

Well, Nokia is always looking for an oppertunity to sell some kit 
ofcourse :). But this product is not even being positioned as something 
meant for the operators anymore (well maybe still a bit). 

>So I think we need to start seriously looking at Wireless Village
>interoperability.
>

Wireless Village is not dead. But it didn't become what many hoped it 
would be. In fact, it's just another protocol out there. There's no 
reason you can't use XMPP instead, or SIP/SIMPLE etc. Most of the 
operators and manufactorers are partnering with a non-open network 
(mostly AOL and MSN), or use Jabber or something like OpenWave. 
Wireless Village is *not* THE "default" or "standard" way of 
interacting with mobile devices, merely one way. 

IMHO XMPP is a much better standard then wireless village. However espc.
 for new JEPs people tend to be very "Desktop" oriented. It's important 
 to keep bloat out or jabber and think beyond just the desktop clients. 

As for interoperability.. that's nice to say but it's not like Jabber 
that you can just connect to any server on the network. So even if 
there's an operator that will use this, then there still has to be an 
agreement to let a jabber server or all jabber servers connect. Espc. 
if they already have a deal with eg. AOL this will not come easy. 

BTW: the Wireless Village discussion took place on SJIG, not JDEV.

-- 
Tijl Houtbeckers
Java/J2ME/GPRS Software Engineer @ Splendo
The Netherlands