This Is Nature by Chaos Inc

It has been a while since I have posted about themes here on Dotsisx, but I know that a great part of the traffic I get is due to themes so I won't let you down very often. Here I present to you This Is Nature, a theme by Chaos Inc or Ishtiaq Saddam, as I have grown to know him, a talented theme maker from Bangladesh (yes, we're out of Italy now). Just look at the screenshots taken from the N95 8GB and judge by yourself. I won't say a word.

If I could only describe how shiny that green leaf appears on the screen! Kudos Ishtiaq, looking for more of your work!

Gold Mine For Italian Themers & Themes

Let's face it, I am a theme maniac. I change themes at least once a week, sometimes even once a day. I have been a fan of many, many theme makers for a while, and never found their original homeland. I always ended up with one of their themes on some viral russian or chinese forum. Not too convenient. I wanted all the collection, from the master himself/herself. One themer in particular was always on my must-find list: Jendell.

So recently I was browsing, googling or whatever (can't remember), and I ended up finding Nokioteca. What is Nokioteca? The homeland of all glorious Italian themers. Turns out all the theme makers I was longing to find were italian, and all had a thread, on Nokioteca, made by them, with all their collections, from scratch: Jendell, Ivanov, Giambi and Gnokkia. Add to that the very well known Babi, Pietro (or Pasco to many), Pizero, Luca and Lillium, and you've got yourself an amazing idea of how many great and even GRAND might I say theme providers are Italians, flourishing in that hidden Nokioteca forum. Along the way, I jumped on some other threads, and started looking at other themers, like Luciola, Martina, Rugge89lau and Ciuppy.

Yes, the forum is in italian and first off you won't understand a word, but you'll easily recognize the theme screenshot and the huge "DOWNLOAD" link below.

Finalmente, molto bello!

Yeah I am starting to catch up on a couple of italian words myself, thanks to Pasco's blog being on my RSS feeds and him posting in italian, and now to Nokioteca. What are you waiting for, jump up to the theme threads in Nokioteca (S60 3rd and FP1) and I seriously recommend Ivory and Steel by Ivanov, Blox and Symphony by Jendell, Shockin'Red by Giambi, Xmas for me by Gnokkia.

Now tell me, don't you think these themers need to get a blog of their own? I already made an ultimate request for that, seems like some liked the idea, but I am still waiting. Join me in that request, please.

Small Site Updates

Well, I don't know if you have noticed but Dotsisx has quite evolved since the first post I made here after shifting from Vox. The left column used to contain just the "About Me", "Labels" and "Archive" sections. Now it includes much much more, but I'll only highlight a few of the new additions:

1 - Interact with me
In this section you have the option to send me a free SMS to my mobile phone, to know my email address, to visit my MOSH page, my own poetry page and the Amicale FP website, which is the USJ Faculty of Pharmacy Student Board's Website, designed from scratch by yours truly (it's in french).
I also noticed that many people ask me to send them my themes (which are shown in the My Current Theme section) so i decided to upload my current theme to MOSH and share it with you guys. And while I am at it, I added a link to download my current ringtone, sms ringtone and feeds subscriptions addresses (in an OPML file, IE7 compatible)... I know I'm probably stealing some of Ricky's ideas here, but I suppose he'll be OK with it :)

2 - Get Dotsisx RSS
Dotsisx always had RSS but only if you cared enough to scroll down, down, waaaay down to the bottom of the site. I suppose it wasn't practical so I added the feed address (in feedburner) right on the left column, along with an RSS feed subscription counter and quick buttons to add to Google or Yahoo readers.

3 - Favourite ... of the Moment
This one has been here for a long time, but I haven't emphasized on it. It's actually a nice list that let's you see what are the latest apps / games / themes / ringtones / blogs / ... that I am checking and liking :D If there's another category of favourite you'd like me to add to the list, just ask ;)

4 - Nokia & Symbian Bookmarks
We love Nokia don't we? But we just hate that every little or big service of theirs has a different web address. Well, let's be serious for a while: you have to be a Symbian geek to know all of Nokia's ins and outs. So I added all the links to Nokia or Symbian services & sites that I know of. Hope you find something here you didn't know about ;)

5 - Free App Friday @ Handango
Handango have started making every friday one of their applications free. Click on this link and you immediately access the offer's page. Over the last 5 Fridays, they rotated between different platforms of which Windows Mobile, Smartphone, Blackberry, Palm and Windows Mobile again. I don't know if they'll ever offer a Symbian application, but I sure hope they do. And don't worry, if they do I'll instantly let you know!

There's also the My Current Theme, MyBlogLog, Bookmarks with my favourite blogs and sites and the Webrings and Carnivals.

I have been adding these changes day after day over the past months, and always trying to choose the most efficient and useful tools to add, whether it's for you readers or even for me, without generating much cluster. I hope you like what Dotsisx has become and if you have any propositions for useful widgets to add, shoot me a comment or an email. I'm open to suggestions.

Mac'alicious Standby

Installing themes is one of my favourite hobbies over my 3250. A sleek theme is something that makes browsing through the phone, using applications and listening to music really enjoyable. That's why I always love to have a fresh new look on my mobile, because it's something that I'll have to bear no matter what I am doing with my mobile. One of my favourite theme providers nowadays is Luca, not that Babi is detroned but I've gotten quite used to her style and her icon packs so Luca brings this new sparkle into my mobile. I love his iTunes theme. I find that it has the clarity, simplicity and colors that I love to have in a theme, while still being very graphical. Yet today, I decided to keep the theme and try some different wallpaper. One wallpaper pack grabbed my attention as to what it would fit Luca's iTunes theme very decently : it's Mac by Matalo which I found over at Pasco's latest Sunday Themes edition. I tried most wallpapers, and they all looked quite nice, but the one that struck me with an amazing marriage was "wall003". And the result: just look down. I think this is the wallpaper that was MEANT to go with this theme. I'm in LUV.

Ketchup post

Ok, so it's not ketchup, it's catch-up, sue me!

Ketchup 1 - Reasons behind my disappearance

Things have been seriously crazy over here: I just started my internship at the hospital and with 2 clinical cases reports due every week, a Masters report due sometime soon, a laboratory training report due also sometime soon, and a 100-page thesis due in june, it's pretty much understandable. Add to that a hospital/university schedule from 8am to 7pm, you get the picture. Now try to keep on with all of that and an addiction to all-things symbian and comic tv shows, you barely get time to eat, let alone shower or even sleep!

So I may not be able to blog all that often on Dotsisx anymore, which is somehow against my will. During the summer, I had planned a couple of great features to add to this blog: a YoYap! video podcast (I even made the first YoShow, that's what it was going to be called), shifting Dotsisx to games reviews and focusing more on head2heads, but I guess I was being TOO optimistic.

One week after starting the intership, I know I won't be able to do any of that. I have been asking myself this question over and over again for the last week: do I or do I not make the move on Dotsisx? Then I found out my answer was through 2 other questions: Do I or do I not want to graduate as a serious pharmacist (not one who just happened to pass those final tests) and do I or do I not want to later grab a PhD and work in research? The answer was I do, to both of these, so I figured it was I don't to the Dotsisx changes.

Somebody get these readers a tissue. Ok, I know I wasn't making that BIG of a difference in the blogging world, and that, well, Nokia and Symbian could manage to survive without my constant nags/applauses but I think there may be at least 2 or 3 loyal readers here that would have welcomed the changes I was planning. So it's back to (or remaining on) the same land here on Dotsisx.

Ketchup 2 - Some links

Good grabs over on Symbian island:

- Jukka Silvennoinen (know to many as DrJukka), developer of Y-Browser, has just launched the beta of his Y-Alarms, a multiple alarms manager for those unfortunate enough to not have them already on their phones. As always, it's a freebie, so go grab it and don't forget to give him feedback! To me, I would prefer a more native interface, being able to change the alarm sound and the ability to repeat alarms every x amount of time, with x being my choice, which could be used for pill reminders for eg.

- Through Jukka's post I was able to take a sneak peak at MOSH, and I wondered why I never bothered to check it. Nice feature. Could've been great to add Themes to the categories and freeware / shareware subcategories to Applications.

- Conversation, a threaded SMS feature has been launched by Nokia Beta Labs, quite useful if you don't have a 3250 (which isn't supported)

- NSeries by LucaP, which copies quite nicely the theme we saw recently on the Nokia N95 8Gb and the N81 is my favorite for the moment. Absolutely marvelous theme. Amazing graphics. I usually hate black themes because they show poorly on my 3250 and make every little screen scratch appears very obviously. But with this one, I don't care! It's too good to let go! If the original theme by Nokia looks 50% as good as the Luca version, I would say "Nokia, you've finally made it: a good sexy theme" because honestly, I hate the ones they've already made. I know that Pasco has his version of the theme too, but I didn't download it since I already had Luca's. You'd better check both and choose :)

Dotsisx Picks - Top 50 Themes for S60 3rd

I have been preparing this one for a while now, downloading themes, trying them on my 3250 for a couple of days, deciding if it's a keeper or not. And everytime I thought I had it right, I found out there was a new theme worth checking, and said "here we go again".

Anyway, today I say "no more" : Dotsisx has picked, and here are the top 50 themes for S60 3rd.

Of course, this is not a limitative list, there are hundreds of good themes worth checking, but I had to pick, so I tried to include different styles, categories, colors, icons, providers... so that everyone can find at least a couple of themes to his liking. At first this post was meant to be a top 20 pick but seriously, I couldn’t narrow it down to less than 50. With several thousands of themes available, it was quite a challenge to make a choice.

Anyway, you’ll find the 51 themes (yes, I had to put that extra theme since Babi took me by surprise and recently produced the must-add “Tweety in Blue” and I couldn’t decide which theme to exclude in return) divided in 5 categorized packs, making it easier to upload and download (the total size is a little bit over 60MB). I used mihd to upload because it is mainly the easiest file sharing service I’ve come to use so far: no useless ads, no IP limitation, download managers are supported. The zips include all themes installation (.sis) files + screenshots taken sometimes from the provider’s website and sometimes from my own phone with active standby on or off, accordingly.

I, by no means, take credit for these themes, hence I would love to give the credit to theme providers featured in this pick: Babi, Pasco, PhilTheWebSurfer (PTWS), Luca, Aqualux, PZero, Supertonic, Zanyyeisk, Atlantis, Jendell, Zukzuk, UA. And I apologize for the themes for which I couldn't find a creator name. Thanks to you too :) All of these guys have worked their butt off so we can enjoy highly graphical looks on our beloved mobiles *Applauses*.

Now click-on and enjoy :)
Sports and Cars : pack of 4 themes
Elegant and Girly : pack of 10 themes
Graphical : pack of 10 themes
Animals and Cartoons : pack of 13 themes
Nature and Landscape : pack of 14 themes

P.S: You will see that most themes (23 out of 51) are created by Babi. It’s not a discrimination or a personal preference, it’s just that she’s the most frequent, diversified, abundant and constant theme provider out there, and I even had trouble picking those 23 themes out of the hundreds of amazing themes she produces.

P.P.S: You will also notice that the blue color is predominant amongst themes, be it in any category. It’s just that after one year of constant theme trial, I believe no color can suite your phone screen better than blue, no matter what. Just look at Mask by PhilTheWebSurfer, or InBlu by Babi and you’ll instantly see what I mean.

New theme maker - Luca!

While browsing through SiMo's Quick Clicks 4, I got around this blog of a new theme provider. The blog is simply called Themes4Nokia and the guy behind it seems to be called Luca. From the menu items on the screenshots and the contact details, you can tell that he's Italian.

As his fellow italian theme makers, Babi and Pasco, Luca brings really neat, simple and highly graphical themes, with a good pack of icons. Best of all, they look amazing and flawless on my 3250, which I can't say about other themes.

Here are, and from left to right, screenshots from 3 of his themes: F340, Aqua Orange, Sea and Sun. As per now, there are 13 themes on his blog, but I believe a little encouragment will raise this number.

Babi Strikes Again!

I can't begin to say how much I like symbian themes made by Babi, her icons are amazing, they work on my 3250 (which I can't say about many themes out there), they are cute, cool, sexy, sweet, funny, depending on your mood. But they are also neat and amazing. I think Babi gives her best when doing a theme :D
Babi's latest theme In Blu is far sexier than I could say. I have just installed it and I have yet to say, that after Aqua Blue, I expected nothing less from this theme. It is rocking!