UnlockMe! FAQ

Frequently asked questions about UnlockMe!, preserved from the original FAQ page, with the compatibility answer expanded from the product page because it is the question that was actually asked most.

General

Is UnlockMe! compatible with UIQ phones? Is it compatible with Series 80 phones?

Not at the time the page was written. As with the other programs in the catalogue, ports to UIQ and Series 80 were offered conditionally: work would begin once donations earmarked for "UnlockMe! UIQ" or "UnlockMe! Series 80" reached a minimum amount. Neither was released. The program remained a Series 60 application throughout its life.

Which handsets did it support?

The archived compatibility list named the Nokia 3230, 6260, 7610, 6600, 6620, 6630, 6670, 6680, 6681, 6682, N70 and N90; the Panasonic X700 and X800; the Samsung SGH-D720 and SGH-D730; and the Lenovo P930.

Will it recover the code on a phone that is asking for one at startup?

No, and this was stated plainly on the product page. UnlockMe! had to be installed and run on the handset, and a phone sitting at a code prompt will not run anything. The program was for someone who could still use their phone and had lost a code, not for someone locked out of a device.

Contributions

How did donations work?

Contributions were made by card or through a payment provider, following a link on the site. They supported development rather than unlocking the program, which was distributed freely.

Does any of this still apply?

No. The project ended and nothing is collected or issued here. See the release archive for where the source code was published in 2021.

Why the answer to the port question was always the same

Three of the programs in this catalogue — UnlockMe!, FlashSMS and Guardian — carried the identical conditional offer for UIQ and Series 80 versions, and none of the three ports was ever released. That consistency is not coincidence. UIQ and Series 80 were separate user-interface layers built on the same Symbian core, with different screen geometries, different input models and, crucially, a different application framework; supporting them meant a substantial rewrite of everything above the platform APIs rather than a recompilation. For a one-person project giving software away, that was a project-sized commitment, which is why it was priced as one and why it never cleared the bar.

Both interface layers were in decline by the time the question was being asked with any volume. Series 80 ran on Nokia's Communicator line and was effectively finished after the E90; UIQ, used by Sony Ericsson and Motorola, wound down at the end of the decade. Series 60 outlived them both, which meant the correct engineering answer and the correct economic answer happened to agree.

What the program actually read

One question the original FAQ did not cover, but which follows from the product page: UnlockMe! reported the code the handset was already configured to expect. It did not derive, calculate or defeat anything. That is the whole reason it had to run on the phone with the phone unlocked, and the whole reason it was useless against a device sitting at a startup prompt. The product page states the limitation in the project's own words.