Symbian OS Simplifications
I have previous written about the need for some wrapper classes or a framework to simplify Symbian development.
EUserHL Core Idiom Library has recently become available on the Symbian Developer Network. It provides a much simplified string management class, cleanup management helper templates and a helper macro that enables single-phase construction.
The documentation advises…
"Use of this library is recommended for all new code. Only if you know you can do better by managing your own memory with traditional descriptor APIs, cleanup stack idioms, and two-phase construction, should you continue to use the traditional Symbian OS features instead of Core Idioms."
As Andreas mentions on the Forum Nokia blogs, the additional classes might confuse beginners and there will always be re-used code that uses older idioms. It’s the same in the Windows Mobile world. There are so many ways of doing the same thing that it can be difficult for beginners to know which to use. The key is to document the various ways and provide advice when each way should be used.
I see these classes and macros as a great start at simplifying Symbian OS. However, there’s a lot more that could be done to provide framework classes that might compress many lines of code down to more readable, understandable and maintainable alternatives.
Related Articles:
- Detecting Symbian Memory Leaks
- Porting Code to Symbian
- Symbian Development Search
- Why Open C ?
- Symbian PIPS and Nokia Open C
- Consumer View of Symbian Binary Break
- Symbian Signed AllFiles and TCB
- First Series 60 3rd Edition Freeware
- Symbian OS 9.1 Implications
- Symbian OS Basics - Workbook
- Symbian OS 9 Platform Security
- Signing and Certification
- Symbian Break in Binary Compatibility
