Introduction on Series 60 Phone File System

Nokia devices feature PC-like filesystems. The Gallery application supports limited access to media files. But using special software, you can get around these limits and do a lot of cool things with the files.

With all the talk about how a smartphone is supposed to have PC-like functionality, it still does not quite feel like a PC. On a PC, the data and applications are separate; the data is stored in files in the PC's hard drive, and you can use any application to manipulate any datafile in the system. For example, you can use a text editor instead of the email program to open an email message and see what's going on inside. That gives you the flexibility to determine how to use your data.

A mobile phone, on the other hand, integrates the data with its handling application. For instance, the email messages are accessible only from the Messaging application and the contacts are accessible only from the Contacts application. However, under the hood, the phone still organizes data and executable programs into files and folders. In this hack, I'll cover the concepts of the mobile phone filesystem, the tools you can use to explore it, and what you can do with the raw files.