Multitasking

The Symbian Belle UI style allows multitasking (that is, working with more than one application simultaneously). To accomplish this, an application can be left running when switching to another application. It is possible to swap between running applications and interact with them.

To open an application without terminating the one presently being used, the user can either press the Home/Menu key to go directly to Home, from there to Menu, and then select the other application; or use the Task switcher.

The Task switcher shows the currently active applications. The most recent task is shown on the left; the second most recent task is centered; and older tasks are displayed on the right. The Task switcher can be opened by a long press on the Home/Menu key.

Users can either activate or close the task in the Task switcher. A task is activated by tapping it or by pressing the selection key. The application is closed by pressing the Close badge on the upper right corner or by pressing the hardware backspace key on the focused application. Touch down and hold on an item opens a stylus pop-up menu with the possibility of closing one or all applications.

The number of simultaneously running tasks is limited only by the available memory in the device. When a new task process cannot be created because of limited memory, the system can automatically shut down applications to gain more memory space.

Figure: Visualized multitasking: Task switcher