Archive for February, 2010

Macrumors found interesting information in the latest Beta 3 iPad SDK. Apple's private framework which controls the camera, has 3 additional camera characteristics that are not found in the iPhone 3.x SDK:

It looks like Apple built in API support to test if your iPad had a Front Facing Camera, Zoom and a Camera Flash. The front facing camera could be used for video chat, while Zoom and Camera Flash are often requested features for the iPhone's back camera.

9to5Mac made further investigation and found the following icons which clearly show an interface to accept or decline a video chat:

The size of these buttons show that they will be used on the the iPad's screen rather than the iPhone.

It is still unknown, if these new features will be available in the first version of iPad. We hope to see them in future versions of the iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch.

Apple has added the ability to set the wallpaper for iPad Home Screen in the latest beta 3 of the iPhone OS 3.2 SDK. Such functionality is not currently available for iPhones and iPod Touches.

On iPad in the Photos app when you select an image, you can choose to set it as the "Lock Screen" or "Home Screen" wallpaper (or both). It is also possible to have different images as the lock screen and home screen wallpapers. Here are the screenshots:

Yesterday Apple released new firmware and new SDK. Today 9to5Mac has posted an interesting video walkthrough of the Photos app from the latest iPad SDK (iPhone OS 3.2 Beta 3). Take a look:

Apple released the third beta of the iPhone 3.2 SDK for iPad. There are no official reports on what changes are included in the update. Here are several screenshots: the newly included Photos app and the Camera tab in the same application:

Rumors that iPad could have a camera have been around for a while. These new photos might be one more evidence.However the iPad has a USB interface for camera and SD card reader, so this might just be the interface for importing pictures.

Update: According to MacRumors Apple pulled the Beta 3 release shortly after its initial release due to a major bug.

Update2: It's back.

Update3:

• iPad SDK 3.2 Beta 3 Photos.app video walk-through
• iPad SDK adds ability to set home screen wallpaper
• Front Camera, Flash, Zoom and Video Conferencing found in latest SDK

A few hours ago we wrote about new group of hackers who claimed to have found a new exploit for the iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch with new iBoot. With this Gull1Hack utility you should be able to perform the untethered Jailbreak even on new devices. Here is a new demo video:

What do you think? Fake?

Apple has posted three new iPhone ads on their website. "Family Travel" and "First Steps" utilize a female first-person narration rather than the standard male voice.

First Steps:

Read the rest of this entry »

A few days ago in an IRC channel the DevTeam and GeoHot discussed and summarized the state of the exploits found in the new baseband 05.12.01 in firmware 3.1.3. GeoHot explains that an exploit that had previously discovered and used in blacksn0w is still present in the new firmware released by Apple. It appears that both he and MuscleNerd are working on the same exploit, and if this were true, it would be a really good start to team up and release a new unlock tool.

Here is their discussion:

< visnet_ > What does geohot tweet mean?
< %geohot > its my bb exploit for safekeeping
< %Par4doX > geohot: did you turn that over to the dev team or are you doing something with it?
< %geohot > my days of turning things over are done
< %geohot > i hope its different from the one they have
< %geohot > but they prob already have it
< %geohot > its the one i orig wanted to release blacksn0w with
< %Par4doX > it’s still there in the new bb
< %geohot > yep, just checked
< %geohot > but then opted to use xemn since it was public
< Evan > Oo, it carries over from 05.11 to 05.12?
< %geohot > why wouldn’t it, apple doesn’t fix things proactivly
< @MuscleNerd > geohot we prob should figure out a way to know if we have same exploit double blind, otherwise we may release 2 different ones at same time
< %geohot > any suggestions?
< @MuscleNerd > not sure how to do that without making it easy to brute force tho
< %geohot > yea, i salted the hash
< @MuscleNerd > yeah
< @MuscleNerd > hmm maybe if we both hash the stack dump
< @Confucious > Can you two take this out of public sight?
< @MuscleNerd > the stack itself, not the header before it or the registers after it
< Her > muscle: any notice about the exploits are the same ?
< %geohot > we are working on it
< %geohot > cryptography, perfect for people who don’t trust each other

We should not expect much for the firmware 3.1.3 since the rumors predict the firmware 3.2 for mid-March. However these news are really good for owners of locked devices.

Couple days ago Antonio De Rosa posted a very beautiful 3D concept for the future iPhone 4G. Now there is a video available. Take a look:

A new group of hackers claim they found a new exploit for the iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch with the new BootRom. This means that jailbreak for iPhone 3GS (late models) and iPod Touch 2G (MC) and iPod Touch 3G will be available.

We just found an amazing Exploit in the Boot-System of the 3GS with the new Bootrom! This Exploit works on ALL iPhone and iPod Touches!

The tool will be called Gull1hack. The operation is very simple and the code is sent when the device is in recovery mode, just like Blackra1n and Redsn0w do. This jailbreak tool has been neither confirmed by Geohot nor from the DevTeam. Many users think this is fake. We'll see.

Here's a video with Gull1hack in action:

Read the rest of this entry »

ScreenDimmer is a new app that provides longer battery lifetime for your iPhone by either dimming the device’s screen or switching off the backlight.

Auto-lock setting can be an alternative method of saving the battery, but it is not convenient to lock and unlock the device while you are waiting for something. It also provides power save by backlight reduction if not to use the phone for a time predefined by the user.

In whole ScreenDimmer is a convenient and easy in operation application for your iPhone. You can download it in Cydia Store via BigBoss repo, and its cost is only $.99.

Someone who calls himself Epoc is the author of this new concept of Time Machine integration on the iPhone/iPod Touch.

Time Machine, the utility created by Apple was primarily designed for the Mac. It is intended for the automatic saving of the latest copies of documents, settings, videos, photos, music, etc. you happened to work with. In case you delete something you can always take a step back and restore everything.

The iPhone variant of Time Machine will be a very much welcomed application. Initially it is sure to consume much power and data, but we can expect its further modifications will be very interesting.

According to AppleAdvice forecasts the pre-orders of iPad can probably start on February 25. Initially only Wifi iPads will be pre-ordered, and only in the US. They vaguely cite some reliable source familiar with the issue that puts Friday as a traditional day for a new Apple product launch. Taking this into account, March 26 seems to be the actual day of iPad’s release.

One last thing to be done by Apple is to receive the official approval from the FCC prior to iPad’s sales in the US. If AppleAdvice forecasts are true we'll witness this approval next week.

Few days ago we wrote about Steve Jobs' biography that will be written by Walter Isaacson. While most of the people are waiting for the book to be published, one of the Flickr members decided to think about how would its cover look like.

Here is a series of the cover mock-ups for the rumored forthcoming Job biography by Flickr member flypig:

The last one is commented by its author like this:

No matter what design style the English version will be, after importing to China, the cover will look this way.

Gameloft has finally released Brothers In Arms 2: Global Front game for iPod Touch and iPhone.

In this game you can challenge up to five friends to multiplayer battles. Connection needs to be established via Bluetooth or Wi-fi.

Key features:

• 5 locations and 13 levels in detailed 3D-world
• 3 different game mods (Free For All, Team DeathMatch, Domination)
• 3 different vehicles
• wide variety of historically accurate weapons

You can purchase Brothers in Arms 2: Global Front for 7.99$ here.

These icons on the picture below were found by 9to5Mac in the 3.2 SDK. They seem to be a definitive evidence of video calling capability in future generations of Apple devices.

Searching for more evidence the source explored the code and also found a more direct mention of video chat in the telephony UI code:

And here is a reference to something called iChat:

So it is almost obvious Apple will bring video calling to their devices. But what will happen with 3G networks if millions of new iPhone users will start to make videocalls instead of common calls?