News tagged ‘Google’

Starting from today Google allows looking for iPhone apps on its mobile search page. The feature was announced on its official Mobile Blog. The idea, according to software engineers Paul Hadfield and Milena Nikolic, was to help users quickly download a necessary application while searching information about it.

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In this video Steve talks about Apple's relationship with Google.

If you want to install Android on your iPhone 2G/3G it is now very easy. Site FunkySpaceMonkey shows us how to do it.

You will need:

• Jailbroken iPhone 2G or iPhone 3G running firmware 3.1.2 (NOT 3.1.3).
• The device should be jailbroken with PwnageTool, RedSn0w or Blackra1n. Won’t work with Spirit.
• OpenSSH installed with default password (alpine)
• Macfuse installed on your Mac
• iPhodroid

How to:

• Download iPhodroid and extract
• Install Macfuse
• Run iPhodroid and hit run – the process should take around 5 minutes

Yesterday Digitimes posted an interesting interview with its own senior analyst Ming-Chi Kuo who disproved many rumors about upcoming iPhone.

He told that Apple once considered using OLED display in iPhone 3GS, but it was found to be unsuitable for displaying text, and now this is a key direction in which Apple is improving its iPhone since the company promotes iBookstore for it. Moreover, in February scientists unveiled that Apple iPhone 3GS' LCD display is much better than the OLED screen in Google Nexus One, because the latter doesn't reproduce colors accurately and has lots of artifacts.

Ming-Chi Kuo also revealed that the work on iPhone 4G was started at the end of 2008. Its codename is N90, and not many people knew about this, but Gizmodo found exactly the N90 prototype. There is another iPhone with codename N91 that is a lesser upgrade that must be used «in case there are major delays [of components] due to significant modifications.

With regard to the iPhone 4G's processor Ming-Chi Kuo told:

"Since the launch schedule of the Cortex A9 processor is estimated for year's end and iPhone 4.0 is not ready to fully utilize a multi-core processor, the A4 is the most likely candidate".

This is not the first words of Ming-Chi Kuo about iPhone 4G, previously we posted another information revealed by him, you can read it here.

Because of Apple and Google success on a mobile device market Microsoft is going to conduct "major organizational changes" in its Entertainment and Devices Division that is currently responsible for Xbox, Zune and Windows Phone. It looks like first step has been already taken - the work on the dual-screen tablet named Courier had been canned. This allegedly caused its main developer J Allard to leave the company. Further changes will affect on the team that develops Windows Phone 7 mobile OS. The latter must be introduced this fall.

Nick Wingfield from the Wall Street Journal wrote Microsoft lose its positions mainly because of its Windows Mobile OS that had been criticized much for years.

Microsoft's division of Entertainment and Devices also develops portable media players named Zune. The latest Zune HD received many positive reviews but couldn't rival with tremendously popular iPod touch.

Yesterday Dell officially announced its first 5-inch Android tablet. The announcement was made on the company's official blog.

So the device is now called the Streak. Previously it was shown at Consumer Electronics Show 2010 as a concept and called the Mini 5. The tablet has a 800x480 pixel capacitive multitouch screen, 1GHz Snapdragon processor from Qualcomm, VGA front-facing camera for video chatting, 5MP autofocus camera with LED flash, removable battery, 3.5mm headphone jack, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and MicroSD-card support. The Streak runs a customized version of Android OS with multitouch support and "Dell UI enhancements".  The system allows accessing to 40,000  apps in the Android Market, navigation with Google Maps, support for Google Voice and Microsoft Exchange Connectivity.

Blogger from the Round Rock company in Texas Lionel Menchasa thinks the Streak may be very perspective:

"I've been at Dell for 16 years, and I don't think there's ever been more buzz around a single Dell product than this. In my view, that's for good reason. Hardware and design-wise, this thing impresses. Add the ever-increasing capability that Android brings to the equation, and you've got a mobile device that offers a ton of flexibility while looking cool in the process."

The device will be shipped to the UK on June 4 and will be exclusive to the O2 network. Still there is no information on prices, data plans and American partners, but Menсhasa said everything will be soon announced.

In a video above one of the device developers Kevin Andrew tells and shows how useful the Streak may be in the everyday use.

If you are an active Google Reader user and also have an iPad, then you should be waiting for Reeder release for an iPad. But guys from MacStories have already obtained its first beta version somehow. They say it's pretty fast and beautiful with an original user interface. Here are its first screenshots.

Recently Billboard published a report that reveals new information on Apple's share on music sales market. When the first generation iPhone was presented, iTunes had only 12,7% of American music market. In 2008 Apple almost doubled it and made 21,4%. 2009 reveals five percentage points increase - now iTunes has 26,7% of music sales.

Such mobile providers as AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon Wireless on the contrary lose their positions, downing from 6,6% to 4,9% in 2009. Partly it is explained by lower priced ringtones in iTunes and its free tools for making custom ringtones. Both of these factors eventually attracted more people.

Physical media music in turn loses its popularity from year to year. Numbers reveal its share fell from 57,5% in 2008 to 49,3% in 2009. That means that iTunes actually makes a half of all digital music downloads overall.

iTunes' closest rival Amazon also increased its sales. But in digital MP3 sales the company's share grew from 0,8% in 2008 to 1,3% in 2009, which is not even close to Apple's 26,7% share. Such results, according to Billboard, were "still well short of where major labels had hoped Amazon's download store would be by now, dimming earlier expectations that it will be able to significantly reduce the labels' heavy dependence on iTunes for digital sales."

It is interesting to look forward for Google which recently acquired Simplify Media to expectedly turn it into iTunes rival for Android users. But for now the company's subsidiary AdMob reveals the amount of media bought or even downloaded by Android users is still so small that it cannot be compared with iTunes success.

Here are the latest news from Google I/O conference: Tablet based on Android operating system. This one is 8.9 inch widescreen from NVIDIA that runs a multicore ARM Cortex A9 processor and has a front facing camera and two USB ports. The video below shows it running the football. However this is only a demo at a tradeshow, not an actual shipping product.

This Friday Judge Clifford Cretan from San Mateo County in California unsealed the affidavit of the lost iPhone prototype case. Cnet was first who studied the document and concluded that Steve Jobs personally called Gizmodo editor Brian Lam to return iPhone:

"Jobs requested that Lam return the phone to Apple. Lam responded via the e-mail address...that he would return the iPhone on the condition that Apple provided him with a letter stating the iPhone belonged to Apple."

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According to a new report revealed by Silicon Alley Insider on Wednesday iPhone OS 4 may possibly have built-in integration with Facebook.  The feature will probably be presented on June 7 at the annual Worldwide Developers Conference conducted by Apple.

An author of the report Dan Frommer says he doesn't have any details on how it works.

"...We also hear that Apple could be integrating Facebook Connect directly into its software developers kit so programmers can more easily add Facebook 'social' features to their apps".

There is also information about bringing Facebook messaging features to the upcoming versions of iPhone OS making it possible to send messages via Facebook Chat as easy as sending an SMS.

An idea of integration with Facebook was already implemented by Google in its OS Android 2.0. Windows Phone 7 is also expected to support strong Facebook connectivity.

Recently The Wall Street Journal had reported that Verizon collaborates with Google to create new tablet device that will compete with the iPad. The information was confirmed by Lowell McAdam, who is a Verizon CEO, in his interview to the paper.

"What do we think the next big wave of opportunities are? We're working on tablets together, for example. We're looking at all the things Google has in its archives that we could put on a tablet to make it a great experience."

Still there were no information revealed about the device's hardware and its manufacturers. McAdam said that collaboration with Google has already led to success in company's efforts to combat the iPhone with Android-based handsets, so he's looking forward for the same result in creating new tablet device.

Verizon CEO also told that the company now will close the gap with AT&T which offers exclusive only 3G data plans for the iPad in the USA. In early 2011 Verizon will present 4G-capable device along with its new high-speed network, which by the end of 2010 will cover 25 to 30 cities. It is planned that there will be more price plans for every selling device, and it may be more expensive than current offers of other carriers who have 3G network.

AT&T seems to not support such policy (at least the company have been repeatedly denying such information), though its CEO Randall Stephenson thinks the industry will be proposing variable pricing once.

"For the industry, we will progressively move towards more of what I call variable pricing. The heavy consumers will pay different than the lower consumers."

According to TechCrunch, Wireless Quattro had recently contacted iPhone app developers to introduce their new "Verification of iTunes Purchase" program. The company is an Apple subsidiary,and it currently develops forthcoming iAd program.

ViP helps developers to promote their apps in App Store via ads which appearing in iPhone apps. With this feature they can track download conversion rates in real-time. Such information is proprietary to Apple, so Quattro promotes the product and its "exclusive integration with the App Store", because such a feature is unavailable to other ad networks, and such information mentioned in the e-mail:

"Verification of iTunes Purchase uses no SDK or server-side integration — this cannot be duplicated by any of our competitors".

Other advertisement companies such as Google's AdMob can only estimate conversion rates, but such data cannot be as precise and detailed as Quattro's one. For enabling conversion tracking every developer that uses AdMob must integrate the company's advertising API into his code.

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According to a report by Marketwatch (which in turn refers to a figures revealed by Strategy Analytics), smartphones now take 18% share on the market of all mobile phones.

"Sales are driven by healthy operator subsidies, competition between vendors, and a rising number of cheaper models built around operating systems such as Google Inc's Android and Nokia Corp's key smartphone platform Symbian."

It is interesting that different smartphone makers sometimes compete on different markets. Strategy Analytics reveals that Nokia shows good results in India and China while Motorola focuses more on US.

As we wrote before, Motorola raised up its profits after producing its Android-based Droid/Milestone, which is frequently called the closest rival to Apple's iPhone.

Nokia's purpose is to gain the leadership on the markets that are only emerging. In the first quarter the company has 21.5 million smartphones sold, but these are mostly cheap models that were shipped primarily to South America and China. North America remains a "problem child" for Nokia. The company's sales make 40% of all the sales in this quarter.

RIM has 10.6 million BlackBerries sold and takes second place with its 19.7% share.

Globally Apple has 16,4% market share in selling smartphones in this quarter and became a mobile vendor number one in the US. The company made record 8.8 million iPhone sales. Among all mobile phone makers Apple hold 3% global market share.

Few days ago John Batelle from the Searchblog wrote an interesting post about his thoughts on Siri, an app that was recently acquired by Apple. His says with devices like iPhone or iPad we starting to use apps more than browse the Internet. Apple understands that and looks forward to increase its share on a market of apps. And Siri is a wonderful choice - its perspective, functional, unusual enough for nowadays. With cash that Apple has, it doesn't need strong and focused reasons to make such a deal.

Batelle's another thought is that with Siri Apple may become a rival to Google. Just imagine yourself saying to the app "Chicago rental car» and after that it answers:

"...You don't need to rent a car. You can use the Chicago Transit. Here's an app for it. You can get from the airport to everywhere you want to go without having to rent a car. Plus, you'll save $150 which we know is a goal of yours because you've been interacting with the Mint application..."

The idea of searching the information will also be implemented in applications we will use. And if we'll get used to it, it will seem to be much more convenient than launching a browser and typing something into the search pole.