Posts Tagged ‘iphone’

iPhone 2.2 Firmware Released

Apple has released its 2.2 version of the firmware for its iPhone and iPod Touch. The iPhone has been hit hard over the past few months over some security issues and this release addresses several of them including: emergency calls not being restricted to actual emergency numbers, SMS messages can be revealed before unlocking the device, VPN encryption too low, browser vulnerabilities, and malicious Excel files being able to execute arbitrary code. The update is made available to iPhone and iPod Touch users via iTunes.

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Filed under News : Comments (0) : Nov 21st, 2008

Google iPhone Search App Problems with British Accents

On Monday, Google’s new voice search application for the iPhone hit the iTunes AppStore. It’s a free application that allows users to speak their search text to perform Google searches. The application works great.. as long as you have an American accent. It’s been reported to be returning especially strange results for users with British accents. The Daily Telegraph, a newspaper in the U.K. has reported that users had the device interpret the word “iPhone” for several different words including “sex”, “sledding”, “my sister”, and “Einstein” (I hope they’re not related..). Google has stated that the application is available in U.S. English only so far, but there were definitely some confused users before the clarification was made. The application actually works quite well with an American accent but has made for some confusing and funny search queries.

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Filed under News : Comments (0) : Nov 19th, 2008

Adobe Bringing Flash to More Platforms

It seems that Adobe is seeing the threat of Microsoft Silverlight to its Flash platform and is taking Flash to more platforms. The two most noticeable platforms that Adobe is missing in its lineup are 64-bit Linux and iPhone support. Yesterday, news reached the blogosphere that support for both platforms was coming. An alpha for the 64-bit Linux platform has been announced and Adobe will finally support both 32 and 64 bit versions of the “big three” desktop operating systems: Windows, OS X, and Linux. Adobe support for the iPhone rumors have been flying for some time, but yesterday Adobe announced it would be focusing on a build for the ARM platform. Of course, the iPhone isn’t the only phone that runs on ARM processors, but it’s evidence that Adobe is focusing its efforts on mobile phones, possibly the iPhone. Steve Jobs has said a few times that Flash was too heavy for the phone to handle and that Flash Lite was too stripped down to be useful. The lack of Flash and Java support were the two biggest complaints that Apple received in its lawsuit in the U.K. over its ads claiming you can get to “all the Internet”. Microsoft’s Silverlight platform is still missing on the iPhone and is sounds as though that won’t happen for the time. Flash support on more devices and platforms will help Flash remain the dominant platform in multimedia web content, no matter what technology comes out as being the easiest and most efficient.

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Filed under Tech Trends : Comments (0) : Nov 19th, 2008

Googles Do It Too

Silver bullet syndrome has struck again. This time in the form of Google Android fans. Apple has taken a lot of flack from the media and blogosphere lately over its attempts to control what applications can be installed on its devices. Of course, this all comes just before the release of the Google Android-based phone. For months we’ve been listening and reading about how the Android will be an answer to the iPhone after all this controversy. It would seem, however, that Google either hasn’t learned from or drinks the same Kool-aid as Apple. The Register points out that Google states very clearly in the terms and conditions that Google has the capability to remotely remove applications from the phones:

Google may discover a product that violates the developer distribution agreement … in such an instance, Google retains the right to remotely remove those applications from your device at its sole discretion.

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Okay, so Google was a bit more open about its policies. I’ll give them that. Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter if you walk in to a bank with a gun in plain sight or steal the money secretly over the web: you’re still guilty of the crime. I’m tired of hearing about the Android as the answer to everyones woes. Please don’t take this as an anti-Google entry.. I am simply becoming tiresome of people claiming the Android as the iPhone but without the limitations. Just like the Apple iPhone, yes the Google Android is less than completely open. I’m sorry to those who thought the grass was going to be greener on the other side.

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Filed under Tech Trends : Comments (1) : Oct 16th, 2008

Apple Gives a Little on Its NDA

Last week I talked a bit about the potential damage Apple could be doing to its iPhone by making potential developers for the platform angry. Apple today has finally lifted part of the NDA policy, though not quite all the way. Obviously their statement is riddled with marketing garbage, but it made me change my views of the issue just slightly.

We have decided to drop the non-disclosure agreement (NDA) for released iPhone software.

We put the NDA in place because the iPhone OS includes many Apple inventions and innovations that we would like to protect, so that others don’t steal our work. It has happened before. While we have filed for hundreds of patents on iPhone technology, the NDA added yet another level of protection. We put it in place as one more way to help protect the iPhone from being ripped off by others.

However, the NDA has created too much of a burden on developers, authors and others interested in helping further the iPhone’s success, so we are dropping it for released software. Developers will receive a new agreement without an NDA covering released software within a week or so. Please note that unreleased software and features will remain under NDA until they are released.

Thanks to everyone who provided us constructive feedback on this matter.

Perhaps this statement gave us a little insight into why Apple may not want developers who’s applications that failed to ‘make the cut’ to disclose the reasons. Apple has a very fine line to walk and from what I know, no one has tried to walk this line before. Apple is, of course, continually getting ready for the new iPhone and is notorious for not being open about its new product roadmaps. The whole Apple community almost thrives on the conferences when new products will be announced. Usually some sort of rumor will leak, but often software features are not solidified to the public until just months before their release. This gives Apple its edge on its competition since they can’t see what’s coming.

So what does this have to do with applications that fail to make it to the iTunes App Store? Now, I can’t promise anything, but I read the press release as though Apple doesn’t want to let the public know of applications that were shot down due to similar functionality because that functionality might be on the roadmap for a future release. If Apple allows developers to tell others that an application has been rejected due to similar functionality that doesn’t exist, they could be showing their hand on future features.

While their slacking off a bit on the NDA wasn’t quite what I would have been looking for, I think Apple has shown a bit of the other side of this issue. Apple has placed itself in an awkward position. It is wanting to provide some sort of quality of its product by filtering out applications that could have similar functionality to built-in ones that could confuse the users, yet it has to try to be as open as possible so as to not make developers angry. Dropping the NDA on released software was a definite step in the right direction for being more open with developers and not disheartening its community in the process of keeping its Apple mystery.

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Filed under News, Tech Trends : Comments (0) : Oct 1st, 2008

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