The most useful iphone accessories

One of the most used accessories when it comes to an iphone is the well known Bluetooth set; with the help of this particular handset together with other skype accessories, one can actually enjoy a convenient and clear audio when it comes to the wireless connection that is provided by almost every service. You can actually have a clear audio while you are talking to your iphone thanks to the existence of these iphone accessories that are likely to transform every conversation into a crystal clear one when it comes to its audio features.

This type of headset is likely to feature a single button that will allow you to make and receive calls; this quite innovative design will draw everyone’s attention thanks to its present facilities. In nutshell, this new accessory is likely to offer a sort of user-friendly and convenient wireless connection. Probably, this accessory is one of the most used ones together with other skype accessories; one should not be concerned about its way of working because this type of accessory will work in a convenient and simple manner when it comes to almost every iphone.
This is to be regarded as a different device that is likely to make the wireless communication easier by sending the necessary data. By using this present device, every cell phone will be able to talk to its own headsets. The user can also pay attention to the fact that this accessory has a special design. This design is quite a minimalist one because there is no pinhole when it comes to placing the microphone. This type of device will also lack the required ear clip in order to gain the necessary stability. Actually, there was some complain about all this secured fitting because these ear buds can actually fall out of your ears.

But, in spite of the existence of this little loophole, this entire device is to be considered as impressively light and small. Another good feature of this device is the fact that it can be quite cheaper when compared to other iphone accessories. Its screen is likely to display the entire charge level when it comes to both the headset and the iphone and the voice quality is to be expected to be quite good too. One has also to pay attention to the fact that all these accessories are likely to be related to the main features of each iphone. Such a multitasked iphone is likely to require special accessories that can provide it with a smooth functioning.

These items are to be regarded as really essential ones because they can actually help you in order to do your work; this type of mobile phone has boosted the entire industry and it has also paved all the way when it comes to the wireless accessories. A huge market is expected to develop when it comes to providing the iphone users with all the necessary accessories; this industry is also expected to grow really fast in the near future. For the effective use of your personal iphone, you should consider buying several accessories such as the screen saver, adapter and charger. For its protection, you should choose to buy a silicon case or even a screen guard and all these accessories are likely to be available to every iphone seller.

Apple not ‘bricking’ hacked iPhones for revenge, they’re fixing iPhone’s OS

"Beautiful as it is, the iPhone isn't finished -- its OS is a hack, rushed out to meet Jobs' demanding product deadlines. Last week's update brought the iPhone closer to perfection, but it still isn't fully baked," Leander Kahney reports for Wired.

"The iPhone bricking problem has been a PR disaster for Apple, making the company look punitive and obsessed with control. But Erica Sadun, a technical writer and blogger at TUAW.com who contributed to an iPhone unlocking application, said Apple's update wasn't designed to disable hacked devices. Just the opposite: Sadun thinks Apple worked hard not to brick iPhones -- even hacked ones," Kahney reports.
"'It wasn't intentional at all,' she said. 'If they wanted to brick hacked iPhones, they could have done a much better job of it.' Sadun said the software update disabled some hacked phones because it was a 'troublesome update' -- it even caused problems with iPhones that hadn't been touched. 'They messed up,' she said," Kahney reports. "The new iPhone software appears to be a ground-up rewrite, unrecognizable under the hood to the older version, which Sadun said was 'very unfinished' and, in some places, 'a complete hack.'"

Kahney reports, "The new iPhone software closely resembles the software on the iPod touch. But it's hard to know what it looks like in detail because it's very secure. 'Everything is certified, everything is encrypted, everything requires a checksum,' Sadun said. 'Apple wants no one else on the platform. It's a pretty strong statement of that.'"

More details in the full article here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader "Another Irish Dude" for the heads up.]

MacDailyNews Take: For a "hack," the iPhone sure worked well-enough at the outset, but - we must say - the current iPhone software does work even better with more stable apps and a snappier UI.

Sun Blew its "iPhone" Java Opportunity to AJAX

Today is US Independence day and I stopped at the Apple store to see the iPhone, and ask questions about the new MacBook Pro. I wanted to see the iPhone in person to learn what I should expect from mobile phone people interaction and feature sets. And I wanted to learn which MacBook Pro model I'll be upgrading to in the next few weeks.

iPhone is beautiful. It is smaller than I expected. Just a little larger than my current Samsung D807. iPhone has a nice feel and the touch keyboard worked very well for my big fingers. iPhone was suprisingly hot - temperature wise - but what mobile Apple device isn't! (The CPU in my PowerBook constantly wants to burn its way through my lap on its return to the molten core of Earth.)

Being a Java and Mac guy I looked for Java on iPhone. Java is no where to be found.

For years I've listened to Jonathan Schwartz, CEO at Sun Microsystems, talk about monetizing its Java investment because of the wide-spread availability of the Java runtime - today on 700 Million mobile phones.

Rumors have it that Apple sold 500,000 iPhones in the past week. While a $500 mobile phone won't be able to keep up that sales rate, I just don't see Blackberry and Windows Mobile-based products in their current state being able to make a long-term run against iPhone. iPhone will be a significant part of the high-end mobile phone marketplace.

So where does that leave Java and Sun? Unfortunately, nowhere. There is no Java on iPhone. iPhone is a gated community and Java is on the outside.

Add to this my experience of developing Java applications - like TestMaker - on Mac OS X and I have to wonder where is Java 6? Unfortunately, an unstable developer-only dont-run-this-in-production release of Java is available. The real Java 6 is months away from release and depends on upgrading the entire operating system. Mac OS X is now the getto for Java 6.

Sun might blame both of these problems on Apple, but I see these as evidence that Sun is blowing its Java opportunity. There is no Java on iPhone, and only a very old alpha-quality release of JDK 6 for my Mac laptop.

I love Apple and Java. I wish Sun would do more to get Java on iPhone and Java 6 on Mac OS X.

Report: Access Gained to iPhone 1.1.1 Files

Hackers have gained access to the upgraded iPhone's file system. This feat, if reliably repeatable, marks a major step toward cracking Apple's 1.1.1 update. The Unofficial Apple Weblog is liveblogging its attempts to apply the method, which involves using symbolic links (Unix's equivalent to shortcuts) to confuse the iPhone during upgrade.

Here's the basic outline of the proposed hack:

1. Using ssh: cd /var/root

2. mv Media backup

3. ln -s / Media

4. Upgrade to 1.1.1

5. Upse iphuc to access the changes and hopefully get execute access.

As of 10:30 a.m., however, Erica Sadun is reporting problems getting her SIM card (a "proper" AT&T one) recognized.

UPDATE: She's in! Erica reports gaining full access. Bear in mind that this doesn't unlock the iPhone, allow third-party apps or any other end-user useful thing — but it does lay bare the system for close inspection and manipulation.

BlackBerry communicates growing rivalry with Apple iPhone

BlackBerry yesterday threw down the gauntlet to Apple’s iPhone, outlining an aggressive push into the Californian group’s core consumer market after doubling profits and sales.

After sewing up the corporate market for wireless e-mail devices, Research in Motion (RIM), the company behind the BlackBerry, is forging into the high-end individual market.

Second-quarter results from the company, released to Wall Street late on Thursday, revealed its success. For the first time in the North American market, new subscriptions to the service from individuals outstripped those from companies.

The group said that individual consumer subscribers now account for about 30 per cent of its subscription base, which has broken through the 10 million subscriber mark and sent posttax profits in the three months to September 30 to $287.7 million (£140.8 million) – up from $140.2 million a year ago on sales that more than doubled to $1.37 billion, up from $658.5 million a year ago.

Jim Balsillie, co-chief executive of RIM, said: “This outperformance was driven by the strong product cycle we are in the midst of as well as the diversification of our base across multiple geographies and market segments.”

The move to shed its reputation as a work-only tool and appeal to what it has dubbed the “prosumer” market of affluent, style-conscious consumers, was helped by the release of more BlackBerry models, including the Pearl, which is modelled like a traditional mobile handset, and the Curve.

The Ontario-based group has further tailored its products to the consumer by launching them in an array of colours and adding services such as music players, memory cards and cameras. They have long been standard on mobile phones but BlackBerry had regarded them as gimmicks.

The BlackBerry has been given a further boost by photographs of celebrities including Victoria Beckham and Britney Spears using them.

However, the strongest sign of its intentions came with the introduction of new software, BlackBerry Unite, which allows up to five people to share pictures, music and documents. The software will be available free to subscribers.

Ben Wood, of CCS Insight, the telecoms research group, described Unite as the “boldset step so far towards making the BlackBerry a consumer product”.

In addition, rumours have been sweeping the internet that RIM is preparing to launch a BlackBerry with a touch-screen – a key feature of Apple’s iPhone.

The move into this area pitches RIM in direct competition with “converged” device makers including the iPhone – a combined mobile handset, iPod music player and web browser.

RIM could also seek to exploit the alleged weaknesses of the iPhone. Critics in the UK, where it was recently unveiled ahead of a launch next month, complained that it does not offer 3G speeds, making its e-mail and internet capabilities less efficient.

In a further blow for Apple, analysts at Goldman Sachs said RIM has also hinted at relationships with Google and major music companies.

From iPhone to iBrick?

Since Apple released the iPhone 1.1.1 update last Thursday, some adventurous iPhone users have been treating it with the suspicion usually only seen in gun-shy Windows users contemplating one of Microsoft's more far-reaching Service Pack updates.

That's because iPhone 1.1.1--in addition to providing security fixes and such useful new features as support for the WiFi iTunes Store--also nukes any third-party programs you've installed on an iPhone. And if you've used any of the various hacks available to unlock an iPhone for use with wireless carriers besides AT&T, the 1.1.1 update can nuke the iPhone itself, "bricking" it into an inert, unusable lump of metal and plastic.

That possibility is stressed in the intimidating "Important Information" screen iTunes presents at the start of the update:
IF YOU HAVE MODIFIED YOUR IPHONE'S SOFTWARE, APPLYING THIS SOFTWARE UPDATE MAY RESULT IN YOUR IPHONE BECOMING PERMANENTLY INOPERABLE.

Sure enough, one reader wrote to say that the iPhone he'd modified with third-party software "crashed and could not be recovered" after he installed the 1.1.1 update. (The iPhone I reviewed, which had also been hacked to run additional programs, survived the update fine.) That reader did note that Apple warns against putting third-party applications on iPhones, saying "I learned my lesson here." But he still wasn't happy about the outcome.

The 1.1.1 update also blocks a program, Ambrosia Software's iToner, that merely lets you make ringtones from music you already own and add them to an iPhone--instead of paying 99 cents each for them at the iTunes Store. Ambrosia President Andrew Welch--one of the most prolific Mac developers around, as well as one of the smartest observers of the Apple ecosystem--complained about Apple's conduct in an interview:
We're not putting anything but data on the iPhone, and we're doing it in the right way, and we're putting it in the user area of the iPhone. Apple is intentionally making sure that products like ours don't work.

Apple's defenders say that the iPhone is clearly marketed as a closed platform. If you don't like that, you can buy any other phone. If you insist on tinkering with an iPhone, you have to be prepared to own the consequences of your actions. Further, Apple can't be expected to test its own updates against every random hack out there, not least those that tinker with the deepest guts of the iPhone to let it use other wireless carriers' SIM cards.

True enough. But business isn't a matter of balancing rights and obligations as if you're in court. If the best thing a customer can say about a company is "they were within their rights to do this with me," you don't have a healthy relationship. This isn't Niccolo Machiavelli's politics; in a market populated by customers who can shop around, it is better to be loved than feared.

And the problems with the 1.1.1 update go beyond unfortunate, unavoidable interactions with unauthorized hacks. How else can you explain Apple going out of its way to break a program that just adds ringtones to an iPhone? That is classic cell-phone-industry control freakery. I might expect that from Verizon, but not from the "think different" company.

Apple works against its own long-term interest with this kind of conduct.

In the short term, it encourages users (such as Macworld columnist Rob Griffiths and my colleague Mike Musgrove) to opt out of its updates--which leaves them without important security updates and leaves Apple without the opportunity to sell them more songs through the WiFi iTunes Store.

In the long term, Apple is wasting its employees' time fighting an unwinnable battle. Apple's attempts to lock out third-party developers have about the same odds of success as the movie industry's campaign against DVD-unlocking software. Wouldn't Apple rather keep its programmers occupied with features and tools that customers actually want?

The iPhone's closed nature concerned me when I first reviewed it, and it bothers me even more now. This device is a breakthrough in many ways, but in others it's starting to look no better than any other cell phone. Apple should do better than this.

Use your iPhone to pay for parking

Parking in Chicago just got a little easier. Now you can pay for a spot at the meter using your iPhone.
Actually, it works with any phone, but think of how cool you'll look saving quarters on your iPhone.
The Chicago Tribune reports the limited pilot program uses a service called Park Magic, and requires a credit or debit card to get started.
Those who participate will get a pager-sized in-car device that drivers leave on the dashboard. It blinks green if time remains and red if your time is expired.

The Tribune reports the cost is $15 and the initial charge will be applied as a credit to a parking account. To pay for parking, drivers call a toll free number and provide a "parking zone," which is listed on each of the city's 33,000 meters.

So, callers ... do you see yourself using something like this? Personally, I don't drive downtown much at all, but I'd love the chance to not have to worry about how much time is on the meter.

Apple In Business: Riding The iPhone Wave

Apple's iPod made its way into business environments as employees realized that, in addition to all those MP3 files, they had 60 Gbytes of portable storage to take into the office. Then came the iPhone and its growing array of browser-based business applications. Is Apple's grassroots popularity translating into more business sales?

Apple officials won't answer that question directly, but the anecdotal evidence suggests that Apple is riding the "prosumer" wave for all it's worth. "We're seeing a lot of growth in business use," Apple's COO Tim Cook said at a press event in August. "Mac is growing, and a lot of that is business."

At Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference in June, CEO Steve Jobs noted that Apple has more than 950,000 registered developers, up from 750,000 last year. With the new, fast Intel(INTC)-based processors, Apple's innovative design, the stability and security of the Mac OS X operating system, and software like iChat videoconferencing and the latest iWork productivity suite, businesses have many reasons to switch to the Mac, says an Apple spokesman. Apple's roster of customers includes Google(GOOG) and several other large business users.

Apple doesn't distinguish between sales to consumers and businesses, but Gartner reports that $897 million of Apple's revenue in the United States in the second quarter of this year came from the professional market, compared to $610 million from consumers. The revenue is for destop and notebook computers only, and excludes software and consumer electronics devices such as the iPod. Within the professional segment, 50% to 70% of Apple's revenue comes from the education sector, 20% to 30% from small and midsize businesses, 5% to 10% from the government, and 5% to 9% from enterprise customers, according to Gartner's estimates for the past four quarters.

Microsoft(MSFT)'s doing its part to help. Microsoft on Sept. 25 said it will ship a Macintosh version of its new Office productivity suite in January. Office 2008 for Mac will come with Word 2008, Excel 2008, PowerPoint 2008, and Entourage 2008, a contact and scheduling application.

Entourage 2008 will make it easier to adjust out-of-office settings, which previously had to be accessed through Apple's Safari Web browser in Outlook Web Access. Office 2008 will be the first to use the Aqua toolkit, making it a native Mac OS X application rather than a port of an older technology. That means the user interface will be more conformant to Mac standards. Users of Mac Office 2004 will be able to upgrade to Office 2008 for $239.95. The full retail version is priced at $399.95.

Several vendors also rolled out storage products for Macs at the Apple Expo 2007 in Paris. Iomega(IOM) introduced the UltraMax Pro Desktop Hard Drive for Apple's professional line of computers. The $600 drive comes with 1.5 Tbytes of storage. LaCie unveiled a two-disk RAID (redundant array of independent disks) system, a collection of drives that comes in 1, 1.5, and 2 Tbyte capacities. Western Digital introduced My Book Studio Edition external hard drives, with capacities from 320 Gbyte to 1 Tbyte.

Apple last year switched to using Intel chips in Macs, promising a complete transition to Intel by the end of this year. Previously, Apple used IBM's PowerPC processors. The switch gives Macs higher performance, according to Apple. It has also "instilled confidence" among IT managers in Apple, says Michael Fey, a software developer at PAR Government Systems, a provider of system design and IT services to the U.S. government. "Intel is the market leader for processors," he says. "Now Apple users can take advantage of their proven performance."

The iPhone: What We Know, What We Don't Know

Apple has released quite a few tidbits about developing web applications for the iPhone, however, this information is not complete. The iPhoneWebDev community has discovered many missing answers to help you better create rich AJAX-based web applications for iPhone. This session will discuss what we know, what we don't know, and a little about creating native iPhone applications that can also access the internet.
Speaker Bio:
Christopher Allen is an long-time entrepreneur, advisor and technologist, whose many ventures center on tools and facilitation of online communities. As the founder of Consensus Development, Christopher helped develop SSL, the world's dominant internet security protocol, and was co-author of the IETF TLS internet-draft. More recently Christopher has been an angel investor of numerous technology startups, founder of an multiplayer online game company, and current authors his blog "Life With Alacrity" on the topics including collaboration, security, privacy, social software and internet tools. He is the founder of the www.iPhoneWebDev.com, which is the largest iPhone developer support community.
The world’s leading Rich Internet Applications & Web 2.0 event is expected to attract more than 1,000 i-technology developers. AJAXWorld grew from a single track, one-day seminar, less than a year ago, into a four-day international conference & expo with more than 150 sessions delivered in ten simultaneous tracks, by more than 150 faculty members.

Track 01: Rich Internet Applications
Track 02: Web 2.0 Enterprise Mashups
Track 03: Enterprise AJAX
Track 04: RIA Frameworks & Toolkits
Track 05: Security in RIA Applications
Track 06: Hot Topics
Track 07: iPhone AJAX Applications
Track 08: Advanced AJAX
Track 09: Platform Choices / Real-World AJAX
Track 10: OpenLaszlo Diamond Track
The conference now includes the world famous AJAXWorld University's AJAX Developer Bootcamp, OpenLaszlo Track and Adobe Flex 3 Developer Bootcamp. This year’s AJAXWorld Expo Floor is expected to display bleeding edge RIA technologies from more than 75 leading AJAX vendors.

Apple Sued Over iPhone Bricking

An anonymous reader writes
"The week's debate over the iPhone 1.1.1 has finally resulted in legal action. InfoWeek reports that on Friday, California resident Timothy Smith sued Apple in a class-action case in Santa Clara County Superior court. The suit was filed by Damian Fernandez, the lawyer who's been soliciting plaintiffs all week for a case against Apple. The suit doesn't ask for a specific dollar amount, but seeks an injunction against Apple, which prevents it from sell the iPhone with any software lock. It also asks that Apple be enjoined from denying warranty service to users of unlocked iPhone, and from requiring iPhone users to get their phone service through AT&T."

Apple's iPhone: A 100-day Report Card

This weekend marks the first 100 days of the iPhone era and the world, as we know it, will never be the same.

OK, so maybe that's a little dramatic. But it certainly is changing the market, it's dominating many discussions and it's going to be here for a long time ahead. So what have we learned in the first 100 days? We've learned that Apple really does want to control every aspect of its technology, hardware and software, hackers be damned. We've learned that aggressive pricing tactics can bite back. And we've learned that Apple's competitors are more than three months behind -- and counting -- in coming to market with anything competitive to the iPhone.

Despite the feature-rich nature of the iPhone, with multi-touch technology, iPod integration, Web-anywhere features, it's been a lightning rod for criticism for everything from its lack of support for Adobe Flash to a recent software update that turned hacked iPhones into pretty paperweights. Forgetting for a moment the passionate debate over whether the iPhone should be an open device, whether the price cuts were too steep too fast, or whether AT&T is a lousy service provider, here's a 100-day report card that grades various aspects of the device itself after more than three months of use:

Call quality - It works! In three months, used mostly in the New York area but also up and down the East Coast, I experienced only one dropped call. Voices are clear. Visual voice mail works perfectly when the phone is shut off. A Nokia bluetooth headset was a nice addition, but the ear buds with the built-in microphone work well, too. Grade: A.

Web browsing - No Flash support is a drag, but you learn to live without it when you're on the go. Other than that, the iPhone-customized Safari browser is fast and compensates fairly well for a slow EDGE network. It is helped greatly by the multi-touch aspect of the screen -- which will be graded separately -- and bookmarking is easy and convenient. Grade: A minus.

Keyboard - The more you use it, the more you like it. Here is where Blackberry and Treo users generally turn their noses up at the iPhone, but the simple fact is, the pop-up, touch-screen keyboard is simple. And for those folks who don't know, or like to use, abbreviations for SMS text messaging, the keyboard is perfect for texting complete sentences very, very easily. Grade: A

Email - Very disappointing. Apple sets a very high bar for quality and usability, and in many other aspects of the iPhone it does great. But it slips when it comes to email. Sometimes the "push mail" feature will seem to go to sleep. Or just stop checking for new email. This is easily enough resolved by manually hitting the "Update" button, but if you're waiting for a stock or news alert, for example, sometimes you'll miss it or get it late. It doesn't happen all the time, but it's happened a half-dozen times in three months and that's too often for many people. It should do better. Grade: C+

Business Applications - Apple doesn't support most third-party business applications for the iPhone, at least not natively, so you've got to live with what it provides itself. The notepad application, Google maps, alarm clock and the calendar are fine. They work, and are useful. But it leaves you wanting more, like easier search functionality and voice recording. Grade: B

Entertainment Features Nobody else is even close to what Apple provides with its iPod functionality, both audio and video. But its camera only takes still photos, not video (although the still photos are decent quality and integrate well with Email.) The YouTube button is pretty neat, and works, but it would be nicer if Apple simply integrated Flash with its iPhone Safari browser so you could access it that way. Grade: A minus

Multi-touch If Apple ever decides to put multi-touch functionality into its Macintosh systems, it would have potential to destroy the competition. For now, though, we do get to use it on the iPhone and it's a tremendous feature. It simply changes your approach to accessing information. "Point, click and scroll" becomes just "scroll and touch." Expanding your view to the word, phrase or aspect on which you need to focus is a big help. Grade: A

Reliability and Battery Life It boots quickly and works reliably, so that's refreshing for anyone coming from a Windows world. But on battery life? Eh. The iPhone is capable of getting between eight and 10 hours of battery life, but if you use bluetooth or Wi-Fi a lot, or if you have to make lengthy phone calls, it can cut the battery life down to five or six hours. If you're on the go for an entire day, your schedule might outlast your battery life. That needs to be improved. Grade: B minus

Overall Should the iPhone be graded on a curve, measured against the rest of the smart phones in the market? Should it be graded on its own, since it really is a one-of-a-kind product? After 100 days, it's clear that there's really nothing else like it in the market. There will be knock-offs and copycats, (in some geographies, there already are.) Bottom line: It's a great product, it appears to be worth the hype, but there's certainly room for improvement. Overall Grade: B+

Apple iPhone Bricking Update Disables Bluetooth Headset Indicator

Earlier today my colleague Alex Wolfe blogged that the number of complaints for the software updates on the iPhone were beginning to lighten. Now, however, it looks as though software update 1.1.1 is breaking the Bluetooth headset indicator on the iPhone for many users.

Here's a look at the Bluetooth indicator issue affecting many iPhone users:
As we continue to report on general troubleshooting issues (not unlock or hack-related) for iPhone firmware/software update 1.1.1, this release has broken the Bluetooth Headset indicator that appeared in firmware/software versions 1.0.2 and prior for some users.

Craig Crossman of the Computer America radio show initially identified this issue for iPhone Atlas, and Apple subsequently confirmed it.
While it looks like Apple is both aware of the problem and working on it, this issue highlights, once more, just how little Apple seemed to care about its customers with this firmware and software update.

By keeping the iPhone locked and pushing out software updates that render the device useless for thousands of customers, one has to wonder how Apple will continue to grow its user base in the wireless market. I am sure many people out there who had previously considered buying an iPhone have now decided against it, or they have decided to buy the iPod Touch instead.

What do you think? Have any of you encountered any issues with the Bluetooth headset indicator on your iPhone after the update with 1.1.1.? And does Apple owe its customers another apology for this latest iPhone fiasco?