Database Info

REVIEW: New, 3.2.00 version of TomeRaider3

TomeRaider is a well-known book/dictionary/reference work reader having a lot of useful application areas, most important of them being reading Wikipedia on your PDA. As I definitely wanted to add a complete, comparative review of TomeRaider to my series of dictionary / reference roundups (links in the article below), I spent quite a lot of time evaluating it.
Note that in this article I both compare the brand new (3.2.00) version to the previous (3.1.30) one and to the dictionary / reference alternates. Yeah, killing two birds with one stone
Also note that I directly compare TomeRaider3, as far as its dictionary engine is concerned, in the Definitive Roundup of All Pocket PC Dictionaries Part I – WordNet-based English Dictionaries. You will also want to check out the comparison chart in there to see how it compares to the alternates as a dictionary engine.
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Availability, compatibility
It’s available here, compatible with all Pocket PC platforms (yes, even MIPS/SH3 Pocket PC’s – I’ve even tested it on my MIPS Casio E-125 and was very happy with what I saw) and costs $38.00. The upgrade is free for all 3.x users – previous registration numbers will work.
What’s new compared to the previous, 3.1.30 version?
There have been major changes in mostly the GUI and how the screen dragging mode works.
The new version no longer has the icons at the bottom and the taskbar at the top – it defaults to full screen mode. This also means the Action button (or, the center switch of the Jog dial, if present) no longer switches between the normal and full screen mode, but between the index (subject) and the article view. (Also see the “Navigation” section for more information on how the hardware controls work.)
Now, all the necessary functionality is available via the additional icons on the vertical scrollbar and the context menu (there was no context menu in the previous version, except for a single “Copy” item after selecting some text; the same stands for the old vertical scrollbar, which was a plain one without additional icons / functionality). For example, in this screenshot showing in-text searching, the previous/next icons are also placed on the vertical scrollbar, along with the previous/next article icons (the latter are always displayed. That is, you don’t end up having to tap-and-hold and, then, click the needed menu item).
In cases, the new GUI is highly advantageous. For example, in the old version (as opposed to the new one – see below for more info), if you explicitly enable the Page dragging mode in Options, you won’t be able to click links and, if you really want to do that, you need to click the Opt icon again, then, Preferences and, then, disable the “Page dragging” checkbox and click OK. This is four clicks as opposed to one click in the new version (the “T” (“Text Select Mode”) icon, which is always displayed on the scrollbar).
Also, as has already been pointed out, another great advantage of the new version is the ability to click links in page dragging mode too. This has long been waited for.
Incidentally, the new version is much smaller (613k as opposed to 1800k) than the previous. Part of this can be easily explained by the missing skins and icons (the new version contains no fancy icons / skins), part of it by missing functionality (for example, the removed history list).
What are the newly-introduced problems and bugs?
There is an unfortunate bug in the new version. While the old version had absolutely no problems with rendering text, the new does (see how the word “Soviet” is rendered). This isn’t a VGA problem: it is equally a problem on QVGA devices as can also be seen in this screenshot. Also, you can’t fix it by changing the character size and/or switching screen orientation either and is also present on all operating systems (yeah, checked them all - even Pocket PC 2000! That is, on the WM2003SE Pocket Loox 720 , the WM5 Dell Axim x51v (A12), the WM5 hx4700 (2.01), the WM5 HTC Wizard, the Pocket PC 2002 iPAQ 3660 and the Pocket PC 2000 Casio E-125).
This problem is clearly related to the application’s using a non-native scrollbar (remember the beta1 version of Opera Mobile? It had exactly the same problem with its non-native text input area). Earlier versions used native Windows scrollbar controls (widgets); this doesn’t. This may be the reason the end of the last words are often invisible (and they can’t be scrolled, even if you enable the horizontal scrollbar in Preferences).
Finally, I seriously miss the backward / forward history. It seems it has been completely removed from the new version.
Note that the application is still (as with older versions) unable to copy any text to the clipboard on WM5 devices. When you select some text (if you switch off the default Screen drag mode with the T icon), you will end up being unable to copy it to the clipboard – there is just no “Copy” context menu item. It’s only on pre-WM5 devices that you can copy text to the clipboard.
What is still missing?
Unfortunately, there is still missing any advanced index searching (“Subject Lookup” – in older versions, “Quick Find”) capabilities. Everything it offers is plain character matching. It doesn’t even offer in-string (substring) searching (some dictionaries like those of ReferenceToGo refer to this as ‘Smart word list’), which is common in many (also) Pocket PC-based dictionaries. For example, Revolutionary Software Front’s reference/dictionary applications (Lextionary, Lexipedia) etc. are far better in this respect.
The lack of fuzzy search and typo / spelling mistake correction capabilities is a pain in the back too. In this respect, for example Lexipedia (please see ROUNDUP: Read / browse WikiPedia on your Pocket PC for more information), Lextionary or ReferenceToGo’s Dictionary and Encyclopedia Personal Reader (DEPR) are far superior to TomeRaider3.
Also, it still (?) lacks the ability able to open and handle multiple databases at the same time. This is especially important with dictionaries and reference works where you may want to search for a given word in several dictionaries or lexicons at the same time. See for example the example of Paragon’s SlovoEd 2005 and DEPR in the Definitive Roundup of All Pocket PC Dictionaries.
Navigation
Speaking of hardware buttons, it’s worth mentioning how the jog dial (when present) and the D-pad can be used to navigate pages.
On Pocket PC’s equipped with jog dials, it scrolls link-by-link in articles.
Under pre-WM5 operating systems, D-pad scrolls page-by-page. Under WM5, on the other hand, it scrolls link-by-link. You can, however, override this by explicitly overriding the Registry as is explained in the full tutorial & roundup “Windows Mobile 5: How do I modify the default scrolling behaviour of Web browsers?”. This is certainly good news.
In the index, both the jog dial and the D-pad scrolls entry-by-entry.
As far as devices (for example, the HTC Wizard or the Universal) with plain volume sliders (as opposed to jog dials) are concerned, unfortunately, the otherwise excellent SmartSKey (see this article for more information) doesn’t work in articles (which is certainly bad news), only in the index, where it scrolls page-by-page (tested on both the HTC Universal and Wizard). In this respect, the previous and the new version behaves in the same way.
The left/right D-pad buttons move to the previous/next article.
How does it compare to the alternates?
As far as dictionaries are concerned (if we plan to use it as a dictionary), it has both its weaknesses (really restricted searching capabilities, no studying support, no copy to clipboard under WM5, unable to use more than one databases at once, no system-level means of quick word lookup etc.) and strengths (a lot of freeware dictionary databases already available, including a WordNet 2.0-based one etc). I’d say many of the alternate dictionary engines (using the same database) are better (for example, the free MDict); therefore, I would NOT go for TomeRaider3 as a primary dictionary engine. Give MDict, or, as far as WordNet is concerned, Lexisgoo and/or WordBook a try instead first.
As far as reference works are concerned, the situation is completely different. Most of the Pocket PC-based references have a really bad front-end: for example, the PocketDirectory reference works (IMHO) have a definitely worse (for example, it uses pixel doubling on VGA devices) front-end than TomeRaider3. The same stands for Lexipedia, the other, remarkable Wikipedia port – except for the excellent fuzzy search capabilities, it’s much worse (mostly because of the complete lack of HTML support.)
Unlike all of the alternate reference works, it has excellent filtering / categorizing capabilities. It may prove useful in some (pretty restricted) cases – for example, in IMDb categorization. If you want the Internet Movie Database on your Pocket PC, TomeRaider3 is the way to go - you'll love it.
Verdict for upgraders only
I’m not sure you will want to upgrade to the new version. Particularly the “end of the rows is invisible” problem and the lack of history are clear steps backwards, while bugs like the missing copy to clipboard under WM5 are still not fixed. Let’s wait for a bugfix release, which fixes at least the rendering problems – that is, for the time being, it’s better to stick with version 3.1.30.

Article slightly updated.

New, 2.6 version of Pocket Internet Explorer plug-in Webby Released!

It was some months ago that the previous, 2.5 version of the Pocket Internet Explorer plug-in (enhancer) Webby was released. Now, the new, 2.6 version has just been released.
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I really recommend the above-linked article to see what the advantages and the disadvantages of the previous version were. Here, I “only” elaborate on the new features and whether the problems or, at least, missing functionality I’ve emphasized in the previous version(s) have been fixed / implemented.
Webby is available here. It requires CF2 to run (make sure you download and install SP1, NOT the old, original version), which also means it’s “only” compatible with WM2003+ devices (bad news for pre-WM2003 (PPC2k, PPC2k2) users).
It has two versions: a free, severely “dumbed-down” (two tabs at most, two buttons definable – hardly any good, particularly when compared to the generous 2-4-week fully functioning trials of all comparable products, except for the slightly less dumbed-down NetFront) and a full (Pro) version. The latter costs $20, which is, in my opinion, quite much compared to the price (and capabilities / speed / compatibility) of Opera Mobile, NetFront or PIEPlus, the best, highly recommended alternatives (not to mention the free Mozilla / Firefox port Minimo, which gets better and better all the time and, now, is a pretty decent alternative at least on WM5 devices), particularly taking into account that the new add-on extension mechanism (still) doesn’t work in Webby.
Pros; new functionality
Add-in modules
Probably they are the most important features of the new version. These (are supposed to) implement additional functionalities like the URL builder known from MultiIE / PIEPlus.
Their list can be found here. Note that you should only visit this page from either Opera or Mozilla / Firefox on your desktop computer; for IE, it only returns the first part of the page.
Installing them is (that is, is supposed to be) pretty easy: just go to the above-linked plug-in homepage from inside Webby (you can use the “Get More Extensions” link in the Extensions tab in Options) and click the extension you’d like to download and install. It’ll ask you whether it’s allowed to install it; after the install, you’ll need to restart the browser.
The problem with these extensions is that they (still?) don’t exist on the homepage of the developer. Webby states them to have been installed but, in reality, nothing is downloaded (you can also check this in the \Program Files\Webby\extensions\ directory in the file system of your Pocket PC if interested). To make sure I'm not missing something, here’s a HTTP-level communication trace (two pairs of requests from Webby / PIE and two 404 Not found answers (that is, there indeed isn't anything in there; not even the linked extensions remote folder!) from the server): 1 2 3 4.
That is, you will want to wait until this problem is fixed, which I’ll surely report of. In the meantime, don’t even try to download extensions - it's just a waste of time because nothing will be downloaded.
Button support
The second most important new feature (which I probably missed the most from earlier versions) is the hardware button support.
As can be seen in this and this screenshots, the most important functionality (Back/ Forward; Previous/Next tab, Close everything but the current one / the current only; Full Screen toggle) is accessible.
It only allows for configuring six buttons on all PPC models (with wildly varying number of buttons). It seems all Pocket PC developers should read all my articles as I’ve elaborated on how all the available hardware buttons can be (very easily!) read out of the Registry more than one year ago ( Where does the PPC Registry store button mapping info - a tutorial (alternatives: PPC Magazine, BrightHand; make sure you also follow the link to More Programmers'/Hackers' Stuff, along with some cool Pocket Loox 7xx Hold Button Tips: More on Pocket PC Hardware Buttons for more info.)
Unfortunately, there is no way of for example using the tap-and-hold buttons of the WM5-upgraded hx4700 or the Pocket Loox 720. It’s not possible to define additional functionality for WM5 softkeys, unlike in PIEPlus 2.0+ and MultiIE 4.0+ either. However, it’s possible to enable WM5 softkeys for menus as can be seen in here: 1 2. This is certainly good news.
Also, it should be noted that the free version only supports two button redefinitions.
Cons
View: One Column mode still not supported
One of my biggest grieves with the past versions was the native support for the One Column mode of the underlying PIE. Unfortunately, this hasn’t changed.
This means if you must work on the full (unstripped) version of a page and, therefore, can’t use any Web compression / content stripper / online cruncher service like Skweezer, MobileLeap, Google Mobile or WebWarper (the four services Webby 2.6 supports out of box), you may end up having to switch to the normal view mode, which will result in a need for horizontal scrolling on a LOT of pages. This is a VERY bad bug in Webby!
Lack of context menus
Unfortunately, there are still no image / link / page context menus as can be seen for example here (which shows clicking an image link will bring up the traditional PIE context menu and nothing else).
This means you need to access all advanced functionalities like link target saving from the main menus. It’s only saving images (in WM5 IEM’s; it’s not available in pre-WM5 PIE’s) that is accessible via the context menu – as with IEM. Please also consult the Download Bible for more info on all these questions.
Verdict
The plug-in architecture is indeed promising. Too bad it doesn’t work yet. Hope it’s only a temporary problem, which will be fixed really soon. When it’s fixed, I’ll return to testing and let you know about how these plug-ins fare agains the competition (for example, the Address Bar plug-in against PIEPlus / MultiIE's comparable capabilities).
Plug-in problem aside, I still don’t really recommend this title over the latest version of stand-alone browsers like Minimo, Opera Mobile or, to a lesser extent, NetFront or Thunderhawk.
The same stands for PIEPlus, which I consider currently by far the best PIE plug-in. The latter is just far more capable (just compare their capabilities one by one!) and faster (don’t be mislead by the seemingly small download times: Webby uses the compression / content stripping service Skweezer by default; this is why it seems to be faster than any else PIE plug-in by default) than Webby.
Recommended links
The Web Browsers category in the Smartphone & Pocket PC Magazine's Expert Blog

Web browsing news: new version of Opera Mobile and NetFront out with major upgrades

Anyone having read my well-known Windows Mobile Web Browser Bible know NetFront and Opera Mobile are leading Web browsers on Windows Mobile. Betas / Technical Previews of forthcoming versions (3.4 for NetFront and 8.65 for Opera Mobile) have been constantly released; the last ones, of both browsers, recently. In this article, I elaborate on these brand new versions.
NetFront 3.4 Technical Previews 007
NetFront, while not really having gained new features (except for support for Flash), has been enhanced: now, the current, free (!) Technical Preview isn’t less usable than the commercial version (except for some, for most of the users, not THAT important, really advanced plug-ins like the Java Virtual Machine). This means you can have a fully-fledged Web browser without having to shell out any money – as is exactly the case with the new Opera Mobile, to be discussed below – till 08/31/2007 (it only expires then).
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Getting and installing
Download the CAB file HERE (the main TP page is HERE).
Pros
No longer requires a lengthy initial setup (involving even a soft reset) phase at the first start or when you switch to proportional fonts
You’re no longer restricted to 10 bookmarks (favorites) in the TP version
It no longer restricts the number of the tabs to be opened to two either
The TP version too supports Flash as can be seen in for example HERE (showing Bomberman). It’s even capable of playing YouTube videos as can be seen in HERE. Unfortunately, its YouTube playback is WAY slower (that is, pretty useless) than that of Opera Mobile or, for that matter, the latest TCPMP Flash plug-in (of which I’ll soon publish an article), therefore, should be avoided. If you DO want to enable it, go to Menu / Tools / Browser Settings / External Tools / Plug-in and enable the given checkbox as can be seen in HERE.
Cons
Unfortunately, when you open a link in a new tab, the current settings (for example, rendering / one-column / image display mode) aren’t inherited, as opposed to ALL the other (decent) multitab-enabled browsers on both the desktop Windows and Windows Mobile. Sure, you can quickly apply pre-defined profiles at Menu / View Profile, but it’ll take a LOT of time to re-render the pages. Inheriting view settings would have been the best way to go.
The 5-tab restriction is still here (you can’t open more than five tabs at a time)
The Flash plug-in is as bad (CPU usage-wise) as was in version 3.3 (you will want to keep it deactivated in order to avoid your handheld to really slow down)
No MS Smartphone (WM6 Standard)-compliance: while the CAB installer can be installed on a WM5+ Smartphone, the main GUI isn’t displayed when you start the browser. (tested on the HTC Vox/s710 in both orientations)
Not compliant with WM operating systems prior to WM5
You must still manually switch to proportional fonts in Menu / Tools / Browser Settings / General / Font / Use proportional font (don’t forget to do this!)
Opera Mobile 8.65 beta 2
In my opinion, the best Windows Mobile Web browser, particularly on the Smartphone, is Opera Mobile. The new beta has recently been released and is available HERE for free (!), unrestricted (!) download. The major update is it no longer having driver memory problems (see my previous reviews of these problems) and is, therefore, a must install. To my knowledge, there aren’t other new features.
The trial expires on 10/01/2007 – that is, you can surf the Net for free until then. I, however, recommend going and buying a license – Opera certainly deserves the support, not only because Opera Mobile, but also their top-notch desktop Opera browser and Opera Mini.
The Smartphone (Windows Mobile Standard) version of Opera Mobile is a REAL must – way better than anything else. I’ll publish a big upgrade of the Windows Mobile Web Browser Bible, concerning Web browsing on the Smartphone, in the near future.

in netfront i can't find any progressbar or similar indicator for the current status of a loading page. is there something like that or doesn't netfront provide this feature?
edit: i will try netfront for some days. compared to opera mobile 8.65beta it seems that netfront offers an more acceptable browsing experience without changing a page's layout to one column on my qvga device(page overview and virtual canvas).
but opera mobile's one column view looks better than netfront's.

REVIEW: a new iPhone-alike Web browser, Touch Browser

Web browsing is one of the major application areas of portable devices – no wonder the iPhone is also Web-centric with its excellent Safari browser.
The “accelerated” scrolling mode of Safari is widely copied in the Windows Mobile world. The latest title to support this kind of screen dragging mode is Touch Browser by Makayama available for purchase and, now, trial download HERE (manual HERE).
It’s an external wrapper to Internet Explorer Mobile (IEM), just like Webby and unlike traditional IEM plug-ins like Spb Pocket Plus, PIEPlus and MultiIE. This also means it has some of the inherent problems common to all these solutions; more on this later.
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OK, enough talk, let’s get straight to the facts: frankly, as of version 1.0.2, I’m not at all satisfied with this app. Currently, there are far better alternatives. Why? Let’s take a detailed look. (Note that this list is pretty much terse. If you don’t understand it, make sure you read my other Web browser reviews and Bibles; in them, I’ve thoroughly elaborated on all the issues I’ve referred to in this review.)
The keyboard is either vowels on top or numbers – there’s no QWERTY layout, unlike on the iPhone or with, say, Spb Full Screen Keyboard. This itself makes URL input very hard – iPhone’s QWERTY inputting is just far better and, if you’re (as most people) used to QWERTY, faster. Screenshots showing this: Landscape 1 2, Portrait 1 2. System-level auto-completion works in URL input mode (see THIS), but there’s no address completion (based on the history / the favorites) the like in Opera Mini 4.1 or all versions of Opera Mobile. Also note that it’s impossible to enter symbols like ~, ? and & - this is a MAJOR problem too! All you can do is assigning a hardware button to <Input Panel> and use it to quickly bring up the keyboard and enter anything on it, unrestricted.
It’s in no way possible to access the standard menu. Fortunately, it’s possible to access favorites via the context menu and the usual PIE / IEM context menu items, including for example Save Image for images (which doesn’t work?!), are all accessible. The lack of menu access results in, say, the inability to switch between low and hi-res modes on VGA Pocket PC’s on the fly. What is worse, it’s not possible to access the three (One Column / Fit to Screen / Desktop) different rendering modes in View, should you want to switch between them on-the-fly. Yeah, sure, ZB does have an entire button for one-column view, so, the problem is mitigated to some degree. Nevertheless, the default mode seems to be the desktop (!!!) view, which is, in most cases, completely useless and to-be-avoided. That is, you’ll end up having to switch to the one-column view, which, with some kinds of content (for example, charts) results in a huge decrease in readability (in general, the “Fit to screen” mode, which isn’t supported by Touch Browser, is the best of the three modes).
Speaking of the (W)VGA hi-res mode switch introduced in WM5 AKU 3.5, independent of its state, documents will ALWAYS be rendered in low-res. This is not what you may want to prefer if you have a hi-res device and want to take advantage of the resolution to fit as much data into the screen as possible.
The Settings menu has been hastily designed for Portrait devices and needs scrolling in Landscape – (this is, of course, a minor issue, compared to the major problems of the app)
No tabs or other enhancements; the only enhancement is the one-column mode, which doesn’t add much to WM2003SE+ devices (it was in WM2003SE that One Column mode was introduced). Compare this to the tab support of Spb Pocket Plus
No way to switch to text copy/paste mode – VERY bad!
No hotkey support at all – all you have is the D-pad (and, of course, the on-screen menu) for shortcuts
Dynamic scrolling is just far less spectacular and far slower than with Spb– mostly because of the slow CF-based engine
The D-pad can’t be used for scrolling and the Action button to select links – it’s strictly for bringing up / hiding the menu (up/down), navigating to the previous/next page (left/right) and showing the actual position of the viewport in the page (Action). The latter (displaying the actual position with scrollbar-alikes) doesn’t let for scrollbar-based scrolling and is far-far inferior to, say, Opera Mini 4’s or NetFront’s minimap / page overview solution. That is, there’s absolutely NO way of scrolling the page without using the touchscreen, only via the buttons. This is a REAL disadvantage compared to ALL other browsers or PIE plug-ins, where you can not only use the D-pad for scrolling, but you can also configure how scrolling should be done (link / line / page-based scrolling) or, in cases, can even use other hardware buttons for scrolling. Touch Browser doesn’t allow for the latter (that is, assigning scroll or page down functionality to hardware buttons as is explained in the Button Enhancer Bible.) It isn’t compliant with SmartSKey either, configured to page scrolling using the volume slider – unlike with most other Web browsers (or plug-ins).
Sometimes it just crashes – for example, when just entering http://www..com or the random URL given in the system input panel tip above. The latter can only be helped with the phone buttons. Also, upon exiting the app with the X icon, it always throws exceptions (like THIS and THIS). This certainly shows it needs some HEAVY, additional debugging.
Absolutely no feedback on the state of loading pages – unlike with the underlying IEM.
Verdict
While I pretty much liked Makayama’s past Windows Mobile-related software titles, all I can say is you’d better stay away from this title for the time being – that is, before it undergoes a real facelift and enhancement. It’s just worse than the alternatives. If you do need iPhone-like accelerated (!) scrolling, go for any of the newer browsers: Opera Mobile 9.x, NetFront 3.5 or, if you plan to stick with IEM, Spb Pocket Plus 4. If all you want to have is screen-based dragging (without the nice “acceleration”), then, other, even older browsers will do: NetFront 3.3/3.4, Opera Mobile 8.6x, Thunderhawk, Opera Mini (all versions) or the two traditional IEM plug-ins: PIEPlus and MultiIE. Technically, these browsers are ALL far superior – far more reliable, far more feature-packed, easier-to-use (buttons, fast scrolling, minimap etc.) and, with some of them (Opera Mini, for example) even free.
Also, this browser (as with Webby) certainly shows Compact Framework is just unsuitable for writing fast-scrolling apps. Use native C++ for implementing applications that rely on quick (!) graphics.
Knowing the Makayama folks are pretty adept and knowledgeable people, I really hope they do improve this browser and that, once, Touch Browser will become a decent alternative to screen-dragging solutions. For the time being, I don’t recommend it, however.
Acknowledgements
Thanks for the Makayama folks for providing me with a test version. This was about a day before the trial version has been released. Should I have known beforehand they were going to release a trial, I definitely wouldn’t have requested a test (read: registered) version, though – after all, I hate biting the feeding hand. Exactly this is why I’m asking ALL software developers to ALWAYS release trial versions of their titles. Then, I would have a far easier time writing bad reviews of titles I’ve received a test version (practically, a freebie) of.

What to come?
Now that I’m getting prepared for my W3C speech at Saturday, I plan to quickly update my YouTube playback & browsing-related stuff, particularly now that
1, CorePlayer 1.2.3 has just been released - with enhanced YouTube support;
2, a new and, according to the dev, somewhat faster compile of the YouTube TCPMP plug-in has been released
3, finally, firmware version v21 for the Nokia N95 has been released, adding Flash Lite 3 and, consequently, native YouTube support in Nokia Web. So far, I’ve found it excellent with its full features like stereo (!) audio playback, full screen mode etc – it’s certainly worth updating my Windows Mobile articles too to see how they compare to the native Flash Lite 3-based solution of Nokia.
Other reviews
JAMM’s review - definitely worth a read

Nice review, I think i'll stick with Opera Mobile...
On the youtube front I'd suggest this as an alternative. It uses TCPMP Codecs, but is so much faster and more efficient...

Thanks, Menneisyys ... for another excellent review. Personally, I use PIEPlus 2.2, and am pretty satisfied with what it has to offer, outside of the fact that the History Menu feature is extremely buggy.
I recently installed a test upgrade of SPB PocketPlus, from 3.x to 4.0.2, and find that it's implementation of IE features is not going to make me uninstall PIEPlus anytime soon ... Too bad, as I don't see any new development from ReenSoft at all, and fear they have abandoned their software efforts. PIEPlus 2.2 is really pretty good, but it is not perfect. I would have loved to see them DO something with it in the past two years.
Oh well ... the wait goes on (and on and on and on )
-pvs

.... or
http://www.skyfire.com/

UPDATE (04/23/2008): version 1.1 has just been released with the following fixes / enhancements:
- Qwerty keyboard option
- Button to turn TouchFlo on/off
- Improved animation algorithm (smoother)
- Sound on/off
- Saves custom home page
- Options page screen lag fixed
- (compared to pre-1.0.2 versions,) Added hyphen (-) on the keyboard
I keep you posted of the future versions. When most / all of my grieves are fixed, I post an entirely revised review.

REVIEW & COMPARISON: Another Web browser, UCWEB: is it any good?

It was over one and a half year ago that I reviewed the Windows Mobile version of UCWEB, the (then) new, Chinese, multiplatform Web browser.
In the meantime, it has received a lot of additions and enhancements; therefore (and also as an answer to one of my readers at XDA-Developers), I’ve spent some time on evaluating the current version and directly comparing to the other two Java-based browsers, BOLT and Opera Mini.
Note that UCWEB isn’t only Java-based, unlike the other two browsers mentioned. There are native versions for both Symbian and Windows Mobile. These are a bit different from the Java version; for example, they both support bold and italic characters and viewing pages using their original layout (not that it would work in most cases…) As I, in general, prefer writing multiplatform stuff, I decided to thoroughly test all the three (Java, Symbian and Windows Mobile) versions of the browser to see whether it’s worth switching to them from other, competing browsers.
So, you want to know whether it’s worth moving to this browser from your Nokia Web / SkyFire (Symbian S60), Opera Mobile / Iris / Netfront / SkyFire (Windows Mobile), Opera Mini / BOLT (a Java-only feature phone)? The answer is no. In most cases (assuming you very rarely need the unique features of the app: the download manager, the copy features etc.), I’ve found the alternative browsers much better, quicker and cleaner.
Why? You might ask. Let me show you some screenshots. Let’s start with the (dumbest) Java version, which I’ll directly compare to Opera Mini and BOLT, the two main alternatives. (Note that, while this version is indeed the least capable of the three UCWEB versions, it still has some [small] advantages over the Windows Mobile version. For example, it can search for the first occurrence of a string or can close all the tabs except the current one in one step or you can very thoroughly configure its button / key shortcuts.) Let’s see what character styles / sizes it can render:
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}
Wow! Nothing at all! Now, let’s take a look at Opera Mini’s doing the same:
…and, finally, BOLT:
While BOLT has certain drawbacks compared to Opera Mini (e.g., no bold support), it’s still way better than the way UCWEB renders different styles / character sizes.
The W3C compliance results aren’t very nice either. (Here, I show you a screenshot of the native Windows Mobile and Symbian clients as the Java client isn’t capable of rendering pages using their original layout; this would have made its compliance results even worse.):
(Windows Mobile + UCWEB)
(Symbian + UCWEB)
Now, take a look at how Opera Mini renders the page:
BOLT is much nicer too:
Pay attention to not only how the actual square is rendered (how many cells are green, showing compliance with the related test case), but also the other texts on the page. They’re pretty much messed up in UCWEB’s rendering, while perfect when rendered by the other two browsers.
Again, note that the Java version of UCWEB doesn’t support any kind of styling / character formatting (in this case, italic), unlike the native WinMo / Symbian clients, which do.
Native (Symbian / Windows Mobile) versions
The non-Java (that is, native) versions of UCWEB are a bit better (except for some missing functionality, particularly in the Windows Mobile version, like setting the User-Agent or searching for occurrences of a string) than the Java version but can’t really match the best, established browsers on the platform. It’s probably the Symbian version of UCWEB that you might want to consider using but if and only if you’re absolutely sure you’d never use the full page overview, in which the built-in Nokia Web browser is much-much better. On Windows Mobile, almost all other browsers are better, particularly if you hate the one column mode.
Strengths of UCWEB
I’ve already mentioned UCWEB has some unmatched strengths. For example,
- It allows for fine-tuning the hotkeys on Java and Symbian (but, unfortunately, not under Windows Mobile). Very few alternative browsers do the same (and definitely not Java ones); for example, Opera Mobile.
- It has a built-in download manager. If you download a lot of stuff off the Web and would prefer doing this in the background, UCWEB is the way to go. Unless, of course, you are on a platform where there already are browsers with download managers or downloader add-ons for existing Web browsers (see my dedicated reviews). For example, on Windows Mobile, there are several of them.
- It natively supports multitabs – a huge omission in, for example, the built-in Internet Explorer Mobile in Windows Mobile. (Nevertheless, I still think – unless you REALLY need some of the other functionalities of UCWEB like the download manager – it’s better to purchase a decent plug-in – MultiIE, PIEPlus or Spb Pocket Plus – for the built-in Internet Explorer Mobile, let alone switching to Opera Mobile 9.5+ completely.)
Comparison chart
It’s HERE and, as usual, is full of screenshots. Note that it also has extensive information on both Opera Mini and BOLT (the latest version of both); in this regard, it’s way better and more informative than the chart in my previous Opera Mini vs. BOLT comparison http://www.smartphonemag.com/cms/blog/9/battle-two-web-minibrowsers-opera-mini-vs-bolt .
Please do consult my other, earlier Web browsing articles, speeches etc. for the meaning of each individual row. I simply don’t have the time to explain things I’ve already shed light on in my earlier articles.
Verdict
While, in some respects (for example, tabbing, download managers, user-agent settings or copy capabilities), it's way ahead of Opera Mini or BOLT (and even some native, non-Java browsers on Symbian / Windows Mobile), it still has major problems.
As a rule of thumb, if you use your Opera Mini almost exclusively in the full layout mode (as opposed to the one column mode) and wouldn’t want to switch back to one column, you’ll hate UCWEB. If you are on a platform with a native UCWEB client (WM or Symbian but not Java-only feature phones), you can use the full layout mode of the browser but I’m absolutely sure sooner or later you’ll disable it, it’s so bad. Even the lowest-quality Web browsers on Windows Mobile (for example, the built-in Internet Explorer Mobile) are far better at rendering ordinary Web pages and reflowing text so that they are readable without any horizontal scrolling. On Symbian S60, Nokia’s Web is way-way better, particularly now that all new(er) models and/or firmware upgrades have Flash Lite 3.1.
It’s only on Java-only phones that you might want consider switching to it. I, however, only recommend this if and only if you absolutely need its unique features the better alternatives (Opera Mini or BOLT) aren’t capable of: copying from pages; quick tab switching on touchscreen-only devices; multipage support (where BOLT – but not Opera Mini! – seriously lacks), support for non-Western languages (which BOLT isn’t capable of) etc. Otherwise, I simply don’t see any point in using it as your main browser, particularly not if you don’t want to stick to the confined one column view mode: both Opera Mini and BOLT have way better rendering engines.
Currently, I only recommend UCWEB to the developers of Opera Mini (and BOLT). After adding the, in my opinion, most important features (first of all, italic support and copy support the way UCWEB does – both are, programmatically, pretty easy), the other niceties (for example, the tabbing system, which is a god-send for touchscreen-only people) could be added to Opera Mini.

Perspective
Well, being the tester he is Menneisyys raised interesting points about the browser. Points that I did not think of. Interesting review.

I downloaded the CAB and it's in Chinese language, does anyone know how to switch the language?