Download SmartNet from Android Marketplace

One of the reasons why I had decided to support Smart’s efforts as a consultant early this year was due to their shift in direction, moving away from the “archaic” cellular business (i.e. SMS and calls) and shifting attention to data and mobile applications. From the words of Bong Mojica at Mobile World Congress, SMART is slowly shifting their culture and products to that of a web company.

Today, SmartNet released the Netphone app into the Android Marketplace (for those of you asking for the iOS version for your iPhone, that’s in the works too). Download the SmartNet app and turn your Android device into a Netphone. If you’re on mobile, simply do a search for “SmartNet” in the Android Marketplace and download it for free. Enjoy!

*Note that this is compatible up to Android v2.3 Gingerbread. The v4 Ice Cream Sandwich update is in the works.

SmartNet is simply a suite of applications that works closely with the Smart Network which makes using the services easier than ever. These services are the Global Directory, Social Stream, Netphone Messaging, Safe Browse and many more.

This application currently supports Smart subscribers only. Non-Smart subscribers may visit www.smartnet.ph on the web or m.smartnet.ph for mobile.

As of today, the latest version of SmartNet lists the following changes and improvements:

SmartNet Widget
Alignment of widget content
Widget layout adjustments
Updated Internet On/Off icons
Increased touch area of arrow button in Smart Center Widget

Internet On/Off
Adjustment in Internet On/Off spiels when turning off
Additional spiel for Internet Off state
Fixed Internet On/Off crash in toggling of widgets
Fixed Internet On/Off behavior to check for enable/disable state on every widget refresh
Added additional check for cases that “Clear Data” is enacted for widget to make extra network call to align value.

Phonebook
Moving Account Creation logic block to application start
Fixed GD search screen landscape text spiel margins for low resolution screen
Fixed GD search screen landscape empty screen message display trigger bug
Fixed GD welcome spiel landscape bug
Fixed Phonebook tab being clickable when disabled
Fixed search text box character limit bug
Fixed Import SIM crash bug
Supported Group SMS for Samsung devices (Issue #35)
Fixed bug on multiple GD tagging matches for a single contact showing a blank page instead of list with GD tagging results (Issue #32)
Fixed and adjusted Phonebook GD screen empty spiel

Smart IM
Fixed FX playback layout issue
Fixed XMPP reconnecting mechanism by removing 5 mins auto-reconnecting during timeout, changing reconnect delay to 30 seconds, disabling reconnect mechanism if internet connectivity is not available, and enabling it again when internet connectivity becomes available

Social Stream
Fixed marital status bug on Social Stream
Fixed bug during accepting friend request in Social Stream causes notifications tab to pop out when viewing feeds tab (Issue #30)

Smart Inbox
Fixed Smart Inbox force close on launch

Availment
Fixed bug on availment dialog not automatically being closed when continue button is tapped twice rapidly (Issue #38)

Others
Implemented unified GD search
Implemented search bar skin adjustment in Phonebook, Smart IM and Social Stream
Adjusted unified search skins for Phonebook, Smart IM and Social Stream
Adjusted maximum length of the editable text for unified search to 128
Enabled “Everyone” button for Social Stream and Smart IM
Added “clear search box” functionality
Added checking if compression is enabled before adding header
Implemented Launcher modification (sign-in option)
Implemented Internet On/Off button behavior in Launcher similar to Homescreen Widget
Supported accepting of incoming compressed response data