The iPhone 2.1 is out. It contains the following updates as listed by Apple:
- decrease in call set-up failures andcall drops
- significantly improve battery life for most users
- dramatically reduced time to backup to iTunes
- improve email reliability, notable fetching email from POP and Exchange accounts
- faster installation of 3rd party applications
- fixed bugs causing hangs and crashes if you have lots of 3rd party applications
- improved performance of text messaging
- faster loading and searching of contacts
- improved accuracy of the 3G signal strength display
- repeat alert up to two additional times for incoming text messages
- option to wipe data after ten failed passcode attempts
- Genius playlist creation
The 2.1 firmware is build 5F136 (weighing in at 237.8MB) and can be directly downloaded through iTunes. The new firmware also contains a number of security fixes including the well publicized passcode flaw.
AppBackup is a program for the iPhone/iPod touch that lets you back up and restore the saved data and settings for your App Store apps.
To back up one app, open AppBackup, select the app, and then select Backup. To restore an app, select it and then select Restore. (If there is no restore option, then it hasn't been backed up yet.) To back up all apps at once, tap All at the top-left of the screen, and select Backup. To restore all apps that have been backed up at once, tap All and select Restore. (You must have at least one app backed up in order to see this option).
Avaliable for free via Cydia Istaller.
A jailbroken iPhone or iPod touch running iPhoneOS 2.0 or later, with Cydia and at least one App Store app.
iLightr is a virtual cigarette lighter for iPhone and iPod touch that is available in the App Store now. It's only US$0.99 and is an amazingly good simulation of a lighter. Next time you're at a concert and just gotta have an encore, don't pull out a cigarette lighter. Instead, launch iLightr!
Today Twenty08 released a new instant messaging client for the iPhone/iPod touch. MobileChat (iTunes Link) allows you to connect to multiple IM services, including:
AIM/ICQ/.Mac/MobileMe
Windows Live/MSN
Yahoo
GTalk
Jabber
This application is well known to many iPhone users. This application is feature rich, allowing you to take and send images or IM a phone number from any of your 10 supported IM accounts. Application cost is $2.99.
In the month since Apple opened an online software clearinghouse called the App Store, users have downloaded more than 60 million programs for the iPhone, Chief Executive Steve Jobs said in an interview at Apple's headquarters.
While many of the applications were free, Apple sold an average of $1 million a day in applications for a total of about $30 million in sales over the month, Mr. Jobs said.
If sales stay at the current pace, Apple stands to reap at least $360 million a year in new revenue from the App Store, Mr. Jobs said. "This thing's going to crest a half a billion, soon," he added. "Who knows, maybe it will be a $1 billion marketplace at some point in time."
Apple is keeping only 30% of the proceeds from application sales -- about enough to cover expenses from credit-card transactions and other costs of running the online store -- while the programs' creators keep 70%.
Newly arrived in the App Store is pTerm, an iPhone port of the PuTTY terminal emulator. It supports SSH and Telnet, among other things, and has a built-in Control key.
Eric Maland says that a 1.1 update is already on its way (it has been submitted to Apple and is awaiting approval). Unfortunately a handful of "major crashy bugs" (as Eric puts it) were discovered after the 1.0 release had been submitted.
Planned features for future releases include multiple simultaneous connections, custom sizes and colors, port forwarding and lots more.
And in the meantime, if you download and experience crashy behavior, Eric's message is: be patient. The fixes are done, but when they reach the Store is out of his hands.
Qik has released its mobile video streaming application for jailbroken iPhones to the public. The service allows users to broadcast video live from their phones using Wi-Fi or the EDGE network which can be viewed on Qik’s site or through its embeddable player. Unfortunately, the application is only compatible with phones running the 1.1.4 firmware.
Users running the 2.0 version of the software will need to wait for Qik to release a compatible version, which the company expects to do in the near future. Unfortunately, it’s likely that the application won’t be available through the official App Store, as Apple still hasn’t enabled video capture using the phone’s integrated camera.
NetShare is one app we never thought would make it onto the official iPhone App Store. The $9.99 application promises to allow you to share your iPhone's network connection with your computer. All it does is set up a SOCKS5 proxy for you to get your laptop/computer online through use of the 3G/EDGE connection. Does it work? Yes. Yes it does, much to our surprise. EDGE works just fine, although Mahoney says it's slow as balls. 3G impressions in a sec. Be careful of how much bandwidth you're using, since your provider probably makes a frowny face at you using their network to power your laptop, however "unlimited" your plan may be. How this got passed Apple and AT&T who knows.
Update 2: The application is gone. Now we're getting the message that it's not available in the US store
Update 3: Just an official reply from Nullriver:
"We're not quite sure why Apple took down the application yet, we've received no communication from Apple thus far. NetShare did not violate any of the Developer or AppStore agreements. We're hoping we'll get some feedback from Apple tomorrow. Sorry to all the folks that couldn't get it in time. We'll do our best to try to get the application back onto the AppStore if at all possible. At the very least, I would hope Apple will allow it in countries where the provider does permit tethering."
Update 4: The application re-appeared in iTunes. It is avaliable through direct link: NetShare.
The iPhone 2.0 software is pretty good. We like the App Store a lot; it adds a boatload of new functionality to the iPhone. But it's certainly not perfect. Having used it for a few weeks, we've discovered a number of little quirks that we really hope are addressed in the upcoming update. From bugs to missing features, here are ten things that would make the iPhone a much more attractive device.
1. Make it Less Crashy
The iPhone with 2.0 software feels a little… buggy. It'll randomly crash or slow down to the point of unusability until you restart every few days with normal use. That's not right; this is a cellphone. It shouldn't feel like an unstable computer.