Apple opening iPhone to other software
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SAN JOSE, Calif. - In an apparent about-face, Apple Inc. will allow third-party applications to work directly on the iPhone, chief executive Steve Jobs said in a posting on the company's website yesterday.
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Software lets iPhone owners swap out SIM cards so that the device can make calls on cellular networks other than AT&T's.
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IPhone owners who have unlocked their handsets so they could use carriers other than AT&amp;T Inc. may end up with a phone that doesn't work after the company's next software update, Apple Inc. warned Monday.
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Developers of third-party applications can build features for iPhone, but only through the Safari browser.
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Although iPhoneSIMFree announced last week that it had devised a software unlock that would allow iPhones to work on networks other than AT&T, it only plans to sell the solution to resellers -- not individual iPhone owners.
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(InfoWorld) - If the mountain won't come to Mohammed, then Mohammed will come to the mountain, goes the saying. Now, the high-tech version of that saying might read: If the iPhone won't come to the enterprise, then enterprise will come to the iPhone. The announcement this week that NetSuite, a Web-based-only service provider for ERP and CRM to the midmarket, runs on the iPhone without any major tweaking almost as well it runs on a desktop has a lot of people rethinking the capability of the iPhone as a business tool. To make matters even more interesting, NetSuite didn't spend one day in Cupertino to figure out how SuitePhone, as it's now called, would run on Apple's new device, though the two companies worked together in the past to ensure that NetSuite's SaaS (software as a service) solution ran well on Apple's Safari desktop browser. "For the iPhone, we didn't have to do additional development work," says Malin Huffman, senior product manager at NetSuite. Whatever improvements were made to NetSuite 07 in order to work with the latest version of Safari for the desktop "carries over to Safari on the iPhone." While most mobile solutions are limited in what they can accomplish -- dialing directly from a contact manager is typical -- Huffman claims NetSuite customers already use the iPhone and the SuitePhone solution in the field to look up customer history, process credit cards, and even do payroll. So is this a unique circumstance due in large part to the way NetSuite was built originally? After all, it does not use Flash or need Java to run, making porting to the iPhone, which lacks support for both, that much easier. Huffman says no, the NetSuite build is not that unique for a SaaS application, but it may be too early to tell. While the iPhone famously does not support Flash or Java, it does support JavaScript and all the Web standards that AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript and XML) is built on. Plus, it supports PDFs and Microsoft Word documents. "The AJAX technology allows [NetSuite] to work faster over the slower network than it would otherwise," notes Huffman. Also, because AJAX allows users to drag and drop from selected environments without having to refresh the entire contents of a page, the SuitePhone version makes for a more seamless experience.Â  Of course, there are a number of limitations, as InfoWorld pointed out in its review by Tom Yager. Yager notes that the device will not upload or download files. However, in a SaaS solution like NetSuite, this limitation may not be a deal breaker for purchasing the device. The strong suit of any SaaS solution is in accessing data directly from the server. Focusing on real-time instant access rather than offline access, says Huffman, is what its users care about the most.Â  But Yager also says, "Safari does not allow a Web page to sense finger motion using standard events, so drag, slide, and drag/drop operations require special effort." True, says Huffman. "You wouldn't want to do a lot of configuration of NetSuite on the iPhone. You would do the configuration on the desktop."Â  Safari also lacks the "ability to adjust a Web page's text size," notes Yager. It is a valid criticism, says Huffman, but it doesn't affect NetSuite because users can pinch or drill down. So have too many industry reviews underestimated the iPhone's usefulness in the enterprise? While the iPhone is not perfect, there is no denying that NetSuite ports to this handheld device easily. The apparent ease with which it does that comes from a very obvious but often overlooked fact: Apple has duplicated the Safari browser almost exactly as it exists on the desktop. If you can re-create a browser for a handheld that is almost identical to the desktop version, everything that can be done on the Web on the desktop can, in theory, be carried out on the handheld browser, too. Where Apple has gone the extra mile is in creating a user interface that makes up for many of the small-screen limitations: for example, the so-called two-finger pinch that allows a user to drill down and expand what they are looking at. Huffman adds that users also can customize their views to suit the small screen by setting up dashboards in a one-column format or creating forms that are better suited to the iPhone. There is nothing really new here other than a better-thought-out, user-friendly interface. But Apple took the obvious -- what others have tried -- and put all the pieces together in a single package. Some believe it is so unique that the device may become, in essence, a wake-up call to the entire high-tech industry, especially handset manufacturer designers and software developers.Â  And what that wake-up call from Apple and NetSuite says is that if you build it right, they, the enterprise, will come to the mountain, er, the handset manufacturer.
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(InfoWorld) - One of the groups that claims it has developed an unlock hack for Apple's iPhone is now saying it will only offer the software to resellers, not to individuals, a popular technology blog reported Monday. According to an e-mail message sent to interested volume sellers -- and posted by Engadget Monday -- iPhoneSIMFree said it would not sell the unlock directly to iPhone owners. "iphonesimfree.com is a wholesale only company," read the e-mail. "Although we could, we do not and will not sell directly to end-users because we want to work together with our valuable resellers as a team and not interfere in their business." Late last month, iPhoneSIMFree said it had created software that would let iPhone owners make calls on mobile networks other than AT&T, the smart phone's official and exclusive carrier in the U.S. Unlocking the iPhone is contrary to Apple's intent; according to the company, iPhones must be activated only with AT&T, and buyers must subscribe to a two-year AT&T calling plan. Even so, Apple has made no public announcement about iPhoneSIMFree or any other of several unlocking schemes that have been publicized. iPhoneSIMFree's e-mail also outlined the unlock process and spelled out its pricing structure. The unlock requires that a file be installed on the iPhone and a connection made to the iPhoneSIMFree servers; the latter, said iPhoneSIMFree, links the specific iPhone to the unlock. Resellers will handle part of the process. Prices will range from $25 per unlock (in lots of 5,000 or more) to $36 (in lots of 50). The company, which has no mailing address, has kept its composition and the identity of its developers, under wraps. Its Web site, for example, uses an anonymity service to cloak the usual address, phone number, and contact person information searchable via WHOIS. iPhoneSIMFree also said it would not guarantee that the unlock would work in the future. "It does currently work on all firmware versions, up to and including, 1.02," said iPhoneSIMFree in the e-mail quoted by Engadget. "We will naturally try to provide our resellers an updated version of our software for each firmware update, it is in our interest, but we do NOT guarantee that we will be able to do so." Apple's iPhone updates have required users who installed hacks or work-arounds to restore their devices from scratch, which erased the modifications. The most recent update, 1.0.2, however, did not cripple most hacks as had the first firmware update. An Irish company that announced another unlock has been silent on the subject for a week. UniquePhones last mentioned its iPhone unlock on Aug. 28 when it posted video of an unlock in progress. Prior to that, UniquePhones had said it would start selling its unlock Aug. 25 but backed off after receiving a phone call it said came from a California law firm representing AT&T. Another unlock, a Czech product dubbed TurboSIM, is currently unavailable; its maker's Web ordering site had been inundated, and now sports messages such as "Sorry, temporarily closed" beside the unlock product. Computerworld is an InfoWorld affiliate
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Blog: Getting that new iPhone up and running will require an account with the iTunes Store, perhaps to reinforce the notion that Apple's the primary source of legal digital content.
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One of the developers of the Metasploit hacking package has added support for the iPhone to the software's framework -- a "first step," as he puts it, for those wishing to mod their devices in certain ways.
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While the Apple iPhone lacks support for native applications -- the kind users can download and install -- developers have been busy building programs for the iPhone's version of the Safari web browser. Here's a look at the best.
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Apple released an update for iTunes on Friday in preparation for the iPhone. Version 7.3 allows the user to activate their iPhone service through the application.
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Apple&#39;s iTunes might be changing into a general e-commerce platform that also contains a massive media-distribution center. This evolution is one possible result of the news that iPhone users, who will have an account with AT&T Wireless for service, will need an iTunes account.
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Apple has released an update for iTunes to let iPhone users activate and sync their phones.
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News that Apple is open to third-party iPhone apps has software developers salivating.
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Launched in public beta on Wednesday, HyperOffice's enterprise communications tools will enable Apple iPhone users to synchronize with Microsoft Outlook, since the iPhone doesn't support Microsoft Exchange.
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With the iPhone, Apple offers a glimpse of what's to come.
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According to David Needle , customers of NetSuiteâs âon-demand, integrated business management applicationsâ are already using iPhone to take advantage of its web-based services. It was âApple putting Safari on the iPhone [that] made it a simple processâ for the company to extend service to iPhone customers, says Sean Rollings, NetSuiteâs senior director of product marketing. Using the built-in Safari browser, says Rollings, â âsalespeople will be able to get a lot of their work done on an iPhone. You have the ability to check inventory for the availability of a product and get an answer in real time.ââ