Every Symbian developer knows that most mobile applications for new Symbian devices have to go through a special certification, Symbian Signing. For many small development companies this new Symbian initiative has become a bum and made developing Symbian applications economically uninteresting. The Symbian market becomes dominated by companies, not individual developers.
What does Symbian Signing bring? There are some benefits and some drawbacks, as always.
Beneficial is this consumer-first mobile software certification system. By purchasing certified applications, the consumer can be sure that there is a certification authority that has tested the application, so it cannot crash the system or include viruses.
The main drawback is felt by the developers. They have to pay more, wait for unforeseen time for certification, and have to fill out a lot of paperwork to pass Symbian Signature.
There are some general tips on how to pass Symbian Signing in the first round of testing. These tips were drawn from actual company experience, so they may help your company or team, too.
Preparing for Symbian Signing begins with planning the application. Please make your request as simple as possible. Remove all steps that are not easy to test or might cause questions. If the application is difficult to use and test, you will surely receive questions from the Symbian Signed teams.
During application installation, don’t forget to place banners for the user that warn you about any exceptions your application has (such as application cannot be installed on MMC). At the first launch of the application, you must inform the user about all the functions of the phone that the application uses and inform the support mail in case of questions. You should place feature usage warnings on every first use of features, even if it sounds strange to you.
Make sure that your application does not crash and close unexpectedly, and that it does not have obvious errors that are actually errors, and cannot be considered normal application behavior. Bugs and crashes will surely add a round to your trial.
Before sending Symbian Signed, make sure you have run the latest Symbian Signed tests in your application. Yes, it takes a long time, but it’s worth it. Note that for every test you can’t run, you have to write exceptions with explanations: Why this test cannot be run or why you think this test is not applicable to your application. It’s also worth making sure you’re using the latest version of the tests, as they change frequently and for no reason.
In your texts and explanations that you are sending to the proof house, you must be as precise as possible. If you are sure the error will occur, find a good reason for it. But if you know that the bug is small and very hard to find, it is recommended that you just don’t mention it and hope for the best.
Symbian Signing is not as difficult as it seems. If you are precise enough and treat the process with humor, you may soon be able to get the application accepted in the first round.