Chapter 1

Nao previously worked on GPS car navigation for six years and has a Master's degree in
Software Engineering from Toyohashi University of Technology, Japan.
Acknowledgements
Eagle-eyed readers will observe that Symbian OS C++ for Mobile Phones resembles one of
its predecessors, Professional Symbian Programming, published in February 2000. Symbian
OS has evolved a great deal since Professional Symbian Programming was written, but the
previous publication served as an excellent framework for the new book. Therefore, the
current authors owe a debt of gratitude to the original writers – lead author Martin Tasker
and his team. Thanks also to the Laughing Gravy for providing vital fuel to us all. Cover
design by Jonathan Tastard.
Symbian licenses, develops and supports Symbian OS, the platform for next-generation
data-enabled mobile phones. Symbian is headquartered in London, with offices worldwide.
For more information see the Symbian website, http://www.symbian.com/. 'Symbian',
'Symbian OS' and other associated Symbian marks are all trademarks of Symbian Ltd.
Symbian acknowledges the trademark rights of all third parties © Copyright Symbian Ltd
2002. All rights�referred to in this material. reserved. No part of this material may be
reproduced without the express written permission of Symbian Ltd.
Chapter 1: Getting Started
Overview
It seems to be traditional to start a book on computer programming with a 'Hello World'
example and, although this is a book that is more about an operating system (OS) than a
programming language, I'll follow that tradition. In the process I'll introduce you to the
emulator, and to the tools for building C++ programs, so that by the end of the chapter you
will have found out the basic information on how to build and run a Symbian OS application.
I won't get too involved in describing Symbian OS programming conventions, application
programming interface (API) functions, and so forth. Instead, I'll concentrate on the tools you
need, and how to use them, leaving the more specific details until later chapters.
First, I'll briefly describe the emulator. Most Symbian OS software is developed first on the
emulator and only then on real target hardware. The emulator also includes a number of
Symbian OS applications, and so mimics a real Symbian OS phone very closely. You will
need to get familiar with the emulator and, while doing so, we can use the opportunity to take
a look at the applications and some of the distinctive features of UIQ, one of the various
graphical user interfaces (GUIs) used by Symbian OS.
Then we'll create a program. The easiest things to build are text- mode console programs,
so that's the form of the classic 'Hello World' application that we'll use. I'll demonstrate how
to compile it for either the emulator or a target Symbian OS mobile phone, and how to
launch and debug it using the Metrowerks CodeWarrior IDE.
1.1 Using the Emulator
The emulator is a fundamental tool for all the Symbian OS SDKs, so it's vital that you get to
know it and learn how to use it.