InfoTart

I gave a presentation on user interface design and marketing on mobile phones this afternoon for a boutique ad agency in Cambridge. It was a lot of fun and we had some great discussions.

One of the questions that came up was how to take screenshots for mobile phones. That’s an excellent question and one that has bedeviled me in the past, as well. So here are links to the software programs I use for taking screenshots on these types of phones.

• S60: I highly recommend the free utility called Screenshot from Antony Pranata. It’s a very good free product.
• UIQ: There are now two products I can recommend.

1. CellPhoneSoft AutoCam: This is a good product at a good price, just $15. Note that the license key is locked to your phone’s unique IMEI number.
2. Screenshot from Antony Pranata: He has ported it to the UIQ platform. I haven’t tried it for UIQ yet, but considering that the S60 version is great, I expect this turned out well, too. Price: Free.

• BlackBerry: There’s an excellent utility called BBScreenShooter and its’s free. However, it’s pretty complicated to set up. Also, it only works when the device is connected to your computer with a cable. Still, it’s free and it works well.
• Windows Mobile: Illium Software offers two free applications, one each for Windows Mobile Smartphone/Standard and PocketPC/Professional. The product can be a little tricky to use sometimes. There are also commercial (non-free alternatives), but I’ve relied on Illium’s free utilities in the past.
• PalmOS: LinkSOFT GMBH offers a screen capture utility for Palm devices, but I haven’t tried it yet. The price is a reasonable $15.
• Nokia 770 running Maemo OS2006: There’s a free utility called CPU/Mem/Screenshot which can take screenshots of the 770. I’ve used it before and it works fine. I’m not sure if any utilities are yet available for the newer generations of the Nokia Internet Tablet, the N800 and N810, but a simple search of the Maemo application catalog will hopefully turn up something.
• Apple iPhone: There’s nothing official yet, but if you’ve jailbroken your phone, you could give the iPhone ScreenShot utility from Rabota a try. Note the version compatibility warnings! Hopefully, once Apple officially opens the device to third party software, we’ll see more official — and stable — products.
• Google Android: Since the OS is still under development and there aren’t any devices released yet, your best bet at this time is to take screenshots of apps running in the emulator. I’ll update this item when I run across a screenshot utility.
• S80: For owners of these older devices, you can use an excellent utility called Remote S80 by Mobileways.de. You might need to get the software from a third party such as Handango or Motricity as I don’t think they support it any more.
• Motorola RAZR: Here’s a link to an excellent post at ModMyMoto on how to take a screenshot on a RAZR. It’s not for the feint of heart.
• All Other Phones: Sorry, no information! Worse yet, it’s probably not possible due to basic software restrictions common in most other phones. A good alternative for Java (J2ME) software is to install an emulator on your PC and take regular screenshots of the product running in the emulator.