Well known media player manufacturer Xtreamer, has just launched a new media player, called the iXtreamer. It is aimed squarely at iOS users because not only is this a media player, it also has a dock on the top which accepts virtually all iPod / iPhone devices as well as the iPad. When a device is in the dock, it offers a full charging solution; but more importantly, provides access to your music, video and photo libraries all via your HD TV. The iXtreamer has its own on screen UI to access and play your content via a remote control from the comfort of your living room.

Experience your iPad music collection on the spectacular artistic GUI on your TV screen with amazing picture quality of HD video and crystal clear sound clarity of 7.1 CH digital audio. Use your iPhone or the included remote control to navigate through your entertainment choices using crisp, animated HD menus.

Now combine this with a media player that can also play content from a local hard drive, USB Drives or network attached storage and the package starts to look particularly attractive. File support is well covered, the iXtreamer supports, BluRay image files, MKV, AVI and a lot more besides, all in 1080P HD. YouTube access is also included along with internet radio and TV streams.

Xtreamer has big plans for the device; they are currently investigating the possibility of getting access to apps and games on your iOS device and showing them on your HDTV too. They do state that this will depend on Apple’s willingness, so I think you can rule that one out for the foreseeable future.

This does look like a very good media player with some special features to attract iOS users. The iXtreamer is currently priced at 199 Euros ($270). Shipping is available worldwide and it is available now.

Although this has much greater file support than the Apple TV, does it offer enough for the extra cost? Let us know in the comments!

[Xtreamer]

UPDATE: iPhone 3.1 does indeed fix this.

Matt Janssen has discovered what looks like a bug in iPhone 3.0 Spotlight, whereby the search feature keeps emails in the index/cache even after they’ve been deleted from the inbox and purged from the trash (and even obliterated from the host server). Janssen claims in the video above he’s found emails he deleted several months ago using this method.

Email is likely cached to speed up searches. Initially tapping on a deleted email in a search result will launch Mobile Mail, which will promptly crash, but searching and tapping a second time will actually show the email, albeit in a buggy manner.

Engadget (via CultofMac) has heard this bug might be fixed in iPhone 3.1, now on Beta 3, and perhaps to be released as soon as Apple’s next iPod/iTunes event rumored for the week of September 7.

Google Blogs (via Gizmodo) has announced that the long-rumored Geo-Location based services in Mobile Safari are indeed included in iPhone 3.0 and being put to use in “My Location” searches by Google.com on the iPhone.

As of today, when you visit www.google.com from Safari on your iPhone 3.0, you can choose to turn on My Location by tapping on the link on the homepage. When you tap on the “update” link, your location will be updated and displayed right there on the homepage. Whenever you want to refresh your location, just tap the “update” link. Testing this in New York, my search for “jazz clubs” returned a handful of places within walking distance. I picked one, tapped the phone number, made a reservation, and we were set for the night.

As to privacy concerns, Google stresses the service is opt-in and can be turned off via the Preferences link at the bottom of the page. Also, it currently only works in English in the US and UK, though other languages and regions are said to be coming soon.

Good news for those looking for a local burger joint, bad news for those hoping Latitude wouldn’t be stuck in the browser…

Back when Apple re-introduced Push Notification at the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview Event, Scott Forstall claimed that, unlike background multitasking that could cause an 80% drop in battery life, Push Notification would only cause a 20% drop. While some debated the truth (or truthiness) of his claims, it did set the expectation that users running Push Notification-enabled apps would see lower battery life, and gave an indicator of just how much less.

So, while it too a while, now that we finally have Push Notification, and some of the more popular messengers and games are implemented it, how’s your battery life doing?

Are you seeing a hit compared to your pre-Push Notification days, and if so, is it in the 20% range? Let us know which iPhone you have, how often you’re getting Push Notifications, and how your battery is holding up!

Looks like Apple wasn’t quite done unveiling new iPhone 3GS commercials, as a a third one began airing last night focused on video recording, editing, and sharing.

Like the previous two, which highlighted copy and paste and Voice Control, Apple’s keeping them all about the new features — and the ease of use of the new features.

So that means compass and landscape keyboard are next, right?

[Apple.com]

Two new iPhone 3GS commercials are now being aired by Apple, the first one focusing on cut, copy, and paste and the second on Voice Control.

While it’s interesting that the original iPhone 2G commercials were targeted at “the internet in your pocket” and the iPhone 3G commercials at “there’s an app for that”, new features aside, we’re not sure what overarching theme Apple’s going for this time — if any.

Some internet coverage has been less than kind about the new direction, however, welcoming Apple to cut, copy, and paste about a decade too late. That’s a little “inside baseball”, however. While many tech-savvy users — and bloggers — upgraded to the iPhone from Treos, BlackBerrys, or other smartphones, arguably most of the iPhone’s growth has come from consumer adaption — people who upgraded from Motorola RAZRs.

For them, and many of the close to 20 million iPhone users (2G, 3G, and 3GS alike) now able to run iPhone 3.0, copy, cut, and paste will be a decidedly new experience and one whose ease-of-use they’ll likely enjoy.

[Via Apple.com]

Sebastiaan de With — aside from gritting his teeth and almost blinding himself in one eye while reproducing the incomprehensibly pin-striped logo above — has bent his design-focus and Cocoia blog towards an analysis of Apple’s new iPhone 3.0 user interface:

Sometimes, I’m considering if other companies in the cellphone / personal media player market have caught up to Apple’s care to details and design sensibilities, but then things like these make the reality very obvious to me:

Apple’s still the leader of the pack by several tail lengths.

If you’re into the details of user interface and design, give it a read and let us know what you think about the look and feel of iPhone 3.0.

Paul Haddad from Tapbots let us know just how fast he’s seeing users update to iPhone 3.0. Based on the headers included when their app Convertbot checks with its servers to get the latest currency information, Paul figures:

The data seems pretty clear. Prior to June 8th we have a fairly low adoption rate of ~3%. Starting on June 9 this jumps up to 6-8%, which can be directly tracked to the developer release at WWDC. Starting on June 17th we get a huge jump as all the non devs start upgrading. We’re currently running at an overall 75% upgrade rate which is pretty insane considering the number of devices and the fact that its only been 5 days.

Outside enthusiasts who regularly follow the news, users are only alerted to updates when they tether their iPhone to iTunes to sync. Looks like a lot of people are either enthusiastic enough to know about the update and want it, or fairly regular about syncing with iTunes.

Either way, these uptake levels are amazing.

iPhone 3.0 features Calendar Subscriptions, where you can enter the URL for a shared calendar and near-instantly add it to your iPhone.

That’s all well and good to share a family or business calendar, but what about more wide-ranging ones? What about national holidays, religious events, movie release dates, sports team schedules? Luckily, Apple’s already made this simple for Mac OS X iCal users, and even more luckily it works just as simply for iPhone 3.0 users as well.

We’ll share how, after the break…

Adding Subscription Calendars

Just point Mobile Safari on your iPhone to: http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/calendars/. Apple provides categories for Most Recent, Most Popular, Alphabetical, Staff Picks, plus a handy search box. Once you find a calendar that interests you, click the Download link.

Your iPhone will ask if you want to subscribe (see image above), and once you confirm, will offer to take you straight to your calendar events to see what’s new.

Viewing Subscribed Calendars

Each subscription is given its own calendar in the iPhone Calendar App, so you can choose just that calendar to view. All views, month, day, and details are supported.

Removing Subscribed Calendars

Not all shared calendars are created — or maintained — equally. Movie Release Dates doesn’t seem to include June or July yet (making it rather useless at the moment), though national holidays and others seem quite up to date.

If you subscribe to a calendar that later disappoints, just head on over to Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendar. You’ll see all your subscriptions listed under Accounts. Choose the one you want to edit or remove, and hit Delete Account if it displeases you.

Share Your Favorites

If you have or find any great shared calendars, please drop a comment below and let us know about them!

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Join Dieter, Chad, Leanna, Matt and Rene for iPhone 3.0, iPhone 3G S, and all the latest news! Listen in!

Background Reading

• Show notes coming soon!

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

The wait is over ladies and gentleman. The Dev-Team has released their latest software to unlock iPhone 3G’s running the 3.0 software. Again, it is important to remember when a 3G S jailbreak application is released do not use Ultrasn0w with the iPhone 3G S.

To unlock your iPhone 3G 3.0 is as simple as jailbreaking your device, downloading Ultrasn0w via Cydia, and running the software. For full detailed directions be sure to check out the Dev-Teams blog.

Before you decide to jailbreak and unlock there are a few things you should know. If you do not know what you are doing – please do not attempt this as there is a possibility you can permanently damage your device. Regarding jailbreaking, remember most of the apps available will not work on 3.0 due to the developers not updating their apps yet. So be careful on what you install.

Want to learn more? Visit Jailbreak Central in TiPb forums.

Today iPhone 3G S was finally released and the madness is simply beginning. So what a better way to learn more about your new device by visiting TiPb’s very own forums? The past two weeks our forums have exploded, and we thank you for that!

So one of the new features Apple added to the iPhone is some nice updates to the camera. If you want to see the quality of pictures this new device takes or want to show off some pictures you have taken stop by the thread! Post photos taken with your iPhone 3G S here!

Next up we have a thread that Duvi beat me to the punch to, if you got your hands on a 3G S what are your initial thoughts regarding your purchase? Are you happy? Not happy? All I can say is Palm Pre what? This thing screams…

Last for today, Shawnluke wants to know, is anyone having issues with the iPhone OS 3.0 software? This is a great thread to share any bugs you may have found while using the latest software.

To be able to post in our forums be sure to register first, and welcome to our growing community!

*** If for some reason you need any help with your new device be sure to stop in the iPhone Help forum.

I’m going to go play with new my device now, see you on the forums!

Someone in iPhone documentation has been busy lately. Not only did Apple post an iPhone guide for Enterprise today, but now here’s the iPhone User Guide for iPhone OS 3.0 Software PDF (via iLounge).

Some 200+ pages long, you can read it while waiting in line for your shiny iPhone 3G S tomorrow, or roll it up into a cudgel-like wad and use it to fend off any would-be line-jumpers. Either way, this is the grand-daddy of iPhone references for this year!

BeeJive is my IM solution of choice. I don’t use a lot of the more advanced features, but the reason I keep going back to it is just this: speed. It gets me in, working, and back out fast. And BeeJive IM 3.0 with support for iPhone 3.0‘s new Push Notification service is no exception. In fact, it rules.

One of the problems with Push Notification is that while the actual alerts are speedy, acting on them is not. Take IM for example. If you enable Text Alerts, an SMS-style popup window presents, tells you the IM app has a new message, and lets you Dismiss or View. If you View, the iPhone then has to 1) close the alert, 2) launch the app, 3) re-establish the app’s server connection (Push Notification uses a different, Apple-powered server), 4) download the IM to the app, and potentially 5) issue the app’s own internal alert if that’s enabled as well.

That can be some overhead. Sure, maybe iPhone 3G S (for speed, remember) will quicken the pace, but BeeJiveIM on an iPhone 3G was impressively responsive already.

Testing it over the last couple days, alerts presented, I tapped them, and everything listed about was handled smoothly and quickly. So, again, I was able to get in, work, and get back out fast. It’s everything that was great about BeeJiveIM 2.0, plus the convenience of Push.

BeeJiveIM 3.0 for iPhone and iPod should be hitting the iTunes App Store any time now. We’ll update with the link as soon as it’s live.

Screenshots after the break!

If you’re anything like us, the moment iPhone 3.0 hit iTunes, you hit the update button. For many, it was smooth sailing from that point on. For others…?

Not so much. We’re hearing about several issues, from disconnecting Wi-Fi in 2nd Gen iPod touches (hello BT radio!) to missing apps, to sync issues, to push problems, to seach nulls, to my own little bizarre issue:

All my media is fine on my iPhone, but when I plug it in to iTunes, it’s read as gigabytes of “other” data and I get a helpful message saying my iPhone is already full.

Of course, the nu-cu-lar option is always a clean restore, but if you want to troubleshoot first, check out TiPb’s iPhone Forums. Our users are among the smartest in iPhone — and iPod touch –space, and with our cracker-jack mod team in place, we can all help each other to… help each other.

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Last week’s show — better late than never… right?

Join Chad and Rene for the post-WWDC show. New iPhone 3.0 GM features, MobileMe updates, and… introducing the iPhone 3G S! Listen in!

Background Reading

• TiPb WWDC 2009 Live Meta Blog
• Apple Posts WWDC 2009 Keynote Live Stream
• Apple Announces iPhone 3G S – Ships June 19
• Apple Posts iPhone 3G S Guided Tour
• iPhone 3.0 Release Date: June 17
• 2008 iPhone 3G Now Priced to Move! $99 Starting Today!
• iPhone 3G S — What We Didn’t Get
• AT&T — MMS Later. Tethering… Um… Er… Bai!
• AT&T Responds: iPhone 3.0 MMS and Tethering
• Rogers/Fido to Sell iPhone 3G S in Canada, $199/$299 on June 19
• iPhone 3G S — Apple Delivers Mobile Video to the Masses
• Apple Demonstrates Voice Control for iPhone 3G S
• iPhone 3G S – 2x Faster, but Still no 802.11n
• MobileMe Update Coming June 17: Find my iPhone, Remote Wipe, iDisk Mobile, File Sharing, Public Folders
• Apple Releases iPhone 3.0 Gold Master to Developers

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Waiting to download iPhone 3.0? Trying to figure out exactly what’s included in the new OS? Wondering what’s changed since iPhone 2.2.1? Need a handy link to send your friends who may have questions? TiPb’s got your back with our complete iPhone 3.0 Software Walkthrough.

Previously, we took you through all five beta versions, now we’ll take you through the final GM (gold master) seed. (And when it goes live on iTunes for one and all, we’ll update any changes we find as well, so consider this your one-stop-shop for everything iPhone 3.0).

And we’ll get started, right after the break.

iPhone 3.0 software offers a host of new features (100 according to Apple). However, not all of these are available on every hardware generation. Here’s a list of the differences, and we’ll mention them again, as appropriate, below.

• 2009 iPhone 3GS: All features
• 2008 iPhone 3G: no video camera, voice control, compass, or related features.
• 2007 iPhone 2G: no video camera, voice control, compass, stereo Bluetooth, MMS, or related features.

Also note: iPhone 3.0 launches 2 days before iPhone 3GS, so until we can get our hands on the new hardware and take proper screenshots, we’ve included captures from Apple’s video. We apologize for the lower quality and will swap them out as soon as we can.

What Hasn’t Changed

As has become our custom, we’ll start off by listing what hasn’t changed in iPhone 3.0. It’s amazingly short this time:

• Weather: Still unchanged from iPhone 1.0. Still no HTC TouchFlo 3D-style animations, and no landscape mode with more/different information. Nada.
• Calculator: Previously upgraded for iPhone 2.0 with landscape-activated scientific mode, calculator doesn’t sport any additions this time around.
• That’s it!

Home Screen

At first glance the SpringBoard app behind the iPhone 3.0 Home Screen seems identical to earlier versions. Sure, SMS is now labeled Messages, the Stocks icon has had a make-over, there’s a new Voice Memos icon and app and — exclusively for iPhone 3GS owners — a new Compass icon and app.

With iPhone 2.x, Apple introduced 9 Home Screen pages, allowing 148 apps total. iPhone 3.0 expands that to 11 pages, allowing 180 apps total (11 built in, leaving 159 for 3rd party apps and WebClip Safari bookmark shortcuts — rumor has it you can load more, but their icons won’t be visible).

Not much else looks different. There are still tiny dots above the dock that signify your additional app screen. However, there’s now an equally tiny magnifying glass icon to the left of them…

Spotlight

On the Mac, Spotlight is the system-wide indexing and search feature that allows you to find files by scouring through metadata and text strings. Apple re-purposes the name and icon here for a new, system-wide iPhone search feature that serves up Contact names, App names, iPod media file names, Email headers (from, to, and subject), and Calendar event names.

You can access Spotlight from the main/primary Home Screen by swiping from left to right, or by clicking the Home Button. When on the Spotlight Screen, you can return the main/primary Home Screen by swiping back from right to left, or clicking the Home Button again. (Yes, clicking Home will toggle you back and forth between those two screens).

Spotlight starts with a blacked-out screen with a search box on top and the portrait keyboard on the bottom (no landscape mode for Spotlight thus far). As you type, results begin to populate the screen, narrowing as you refine your search term. At any point, you can tap on a Spotlight search result to launch the app and/or take you to the resulting content within an app.

Hitting the blue Search button at the bottom right will slide the virtual keyboard away and give you full screen results. Or almost full screen. Since Spotlight is integrated into the Home Screen, the Dock is revealed along with the results so you can quickly launch any of your four docked apps (Phone, Mail, Safari, and iPod if you’ve kept the defaults).

Voice Control

With iPhone 3.0 when used in conjunction with iPhone 3GS, holding down the Home button (or the center button on earphones) sounds a tone and launches Voice Control, which takes the VoiceOver feature introduced in the iPod shuffle to the next level by allowing you to talk to the iPhone.

Voice Control’s interface is simply a wave form with the various commands floating by, and a cancel button. Currently, supported commands include: call/dial [contact name], call [contact telephone number], play [playlist name, album name, artist name, song name], what [song, group] is this, play more songs like this (creates Genius playlist), shuffle.

A second tone is followed by VoiceOver (which is computer generated) repeating back your command and then your corresponding call or music starts.

(It’s not hard to see this eventually expanded to include things like: email Bob at work, launch app Peggle, take voice memo, etc. now is it?)

One of the most impressive aspects is how many languages will be supported by Voice Control at launch:

Chinese (Mainland), Chinese (Taiwan), Czech, Danish, Dutch (Belgian), Dutch (Netherlands), English (Australian), English (UK), English (U.S.), Finnish, French (Canada), French (France), German, Greek, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Romanian, Russian, Slovak, Spanish (Mexico), Spanish (Spain), Swedish, Thai, Turkish

Force Quit

Under iPhone OS 1.x and 2.x, holding the Home button down allowed you to force a frozen application to quit, clear the RAM, and return to the Home Screen. Since, as mentioned above, holding down the Home button now launches Voice Control on the iPhone 3GS — and does nothing on the iPhone 2G or iPhone 3G, Force Quit has be reassigned.

Now, to Force Quit an app you hold down the sleep button until the the red “slide to power off” control appears. Then hold the Home button down (it can take a while so keep holding!) and — presto! — the current process will be terminated, memory cleared, and you’ll be taken back to the Home Screen.

Messages

Messages is the new SMS, and is renamed to signify the addition of MMS (multi-media messaging service). It allows, in the case of the new iPhone OS 3.0 software, for you to receive, vCards (contacts), audio, location, and — for iPhone 3GS only — video to be sent using the Messages interface to any other smartphone or feature-phone that supports MMS and those file types.

Once you receive an MMS, you can tap the icon in the message bubble to get a better look at it. In the case of a contact, you’ll see a page similar to what you get when you call up a contact in Phone, except at the very bottom you’ll have extra, saving and sharing related options that we’ll cover later in the Phone app section.

Location opens in Google Maps as you’d expect, audio and video in iPod, and images pop up full screen where you can tap the share icon to Save Image — but strangely not re-share it…

Note: The details of MMS vary carrier to carrier. While many international carriers do have MMS enabled with the iPhone 3.0 launch, AT&T is the largest and most notable exception.

When it comes to sending MMS, only picture sending can be initiated from within the Messages app itself. Everything else starts a “share” function from another app (i.e. Share Contact is in Contacts, Share Location is in Google Maps, Share Audio is in Voice Recorder, etc.)

There are two ways to insert a picture into MMS. The first is to tap the camera icon, bottom right. A requester will ask if you want to Take Photo or Choose Existing. Take Photo will call up an embedded version of the Camera app. Frame your picture, tap the camera icon, look at the preview and either hit Retake to try again or Use to insert the picture into your MMS window. (If you want to erase it later, just backspace over it like you would a text character you want to delete)

Choose Existing will call up an image picker (like the Photo App). Pick an Album, pick a picture, and tap Choose to confirm.

The second way to insert a picture into MMS is to paste it…

The new, system-wide Cut, Copy, and Paste service has also been introduced into Messages. It works in a similar way to the implementation in the Notes app, and we’ll cover it more fully there. One difference is that double tapping a previous SMS will give you the Copy popup allowing you to duplicate the entire contents of the SMS to the clipboard. Tapping on an empty entry box will launch the Paste popup, so you can stick the contents back down in an message of your own. If the entry box already contains text, double tapping will select the closest word, and double tapping an holding will select the closet word and popup the loupe.

Again, we’ll cover this more fully in the section for the Notes app.

Messages also now includes line-item deletion and forwarding. Tap the Edit button at the top right, select the messages you want — as many of them as you want — and then hit the red Delete button at the bottom, or the blue Forward button beside it. Edit still isn’t the most elegant name for the combination of deletion and forwarding, mind you, but the functionality is consistent with the Mass Edit feature introduced for Mail in iPhone 2.0.

Lastly, Apple has also answered the call for pervasive landscape-style keyboards, and Messages is one of the text-entry apps that received it. For those who want a Cadillac-wide typing experience, enjoy!

(Note to Apple: a way to “lock” the iPhone in portrait or landscape mode would be appreciated, especially when typing while reclining and every little angle change sends the UI spinning.)

Calendar

Calendar appears largely unchanged from the perspective of the app itself. No landscape rotation for week view — still no week view of any kind.

There are, however, two very welcome new features for Exchange users. You can now add Invitees and set Availability when adding a new event.

Tap Invitees to open the Add Invitees pane, then start typing to search for contacts or hit the blue + icon to pull up the embedded Contacts picker. You can add more than one invitee.

Tap Availability to choose between Busy, Free, Tentative, and Out of office.

The other changes occur in the plumbing and are — somewhat counter-intuitively for us at least — hidden almost entirely away inside the Preferences app (see that section for more details). That’s a shame because they’re rather significant: support for CalDAV and Subscribed Calendars (i.e. holidays, sports schedules, etc.).

Once added via Preferences, however, here’s an example of how Subscribed Calendars look:

Photos

The Photo app receives an update in the form of integration into the Copy (no Cut or Paste here!), MMS, and — for the iPhone 3GS — video camera systems.

For iPhone 3GS users, the Camera Roll now also includes any videos you’ve shot with the device. Similar to how iPhoto on the Mac handles video thumbnails, they’re shown intermingled with still pictures, a transparent black bar along the bottom showing the video icon and the run time of the video. Tabs along the top let you switch from the All view to Photos only or Videos only as well.

When in the Gallery view mode (where pictures are tiled in four columns of thumbnails), tapping on the Action button at the bottom left corner will no longer slide up a menu, but will place two or three buttons along the bottom. For Camera Roll, these are Share, Copy, and Delete. For any other galleries, you’ll still get Copy and Share, but not Delete (yes, you still can’t delete synced photos, only ones you’ve taken with the camera itself).

Tapping on a thumbnail will select it (or de-select it if it has already been selected). Selected photos are labeled with a red check mark icon in the lower right corner, and number of photos selected is reported in parenthesis and continuously updated beside each of the buttons. However, if you select more than 5 images, Share will no longer be enabled (you can still copy them and paste them into Mail, however.)

Tapping on Share button will let you send the photos via Email or MMS, Copy will place them on the clipboard, and Delete (Camera Roll only) will trash them.

In single photo viewing mode, you can Copy an image to the clipboard by touching and holding. A Copy button will pop up just above you finger. Tap it and the image is copied.

Also in single photo viewing mode, the Action button now brings up a longer list of options: Email Photo, MMS, Send to MobileMe, Assign to Contact, Use as Wallpaper.

iPhone 3.0 also now presents the Action button in Landscape mode, though the list view isn’t as attractive for some reason. When in Landscape mode, f you choose to share via Email or MMS, for example, the Email or Messages app pops up in Landscape mode as well. Expected, but we don’t always get what we expect so it’s still nice to see.

Sharing to MobileMe now does double duty, publishing photos and video alike. For photos, you can choose any existing MobileMe gallery, but can’t create a new one. Video is similar, though adds YouTube to the list of supported targets. We’ll cover that at the end of this section.

For iPhone 3GS users, you can view and share videos in much the same way as photos. Tapping on a video in the gallery bring it up full screen, portrait or landscape, along with a big Play button in the center. Hitting the play button, of course, plays the video.

If the controls are up (tap the screen to reveal or hide the controls), you’ll see similar options to photos, though the play button here will play the video, not start a slide show. The biggest difference is the Trimming control along the top. Similar to how Voice Memo works (we’ll cover that later), you can drag to select a point you want to see in the video, or you can drag either end — at which point the outline turns yellow — to cut off part of the beginning or end of the video. Tapping the yellow Trim button will re-save just the selected part of the video.

Note: trimming video is current destructive — you save over the full clip with the trimmed clip, and can’t go back. iPhone 3.1 Beta, however, looks to provide a Save As function for non-destructive video editing.

Options for sharing video include Email Video, MMS, Send to MobileMe, and Send to YouTube, though video will be highly compressed for sharing, and file size limits may not let all videos be shared via all options.

Camera

For iPhone 2G and iPhone 3G, the Camera app gets a minor tweak. Now, after you take a picture, instead of the Camera Roll icon at the bottom right, you see a tiny thumbnail of the last photo taken. (Even if there are additional items in the Camera Roll, like screen-captures, only the last actual camera photo taken is shown).

iPhone 3GS gets the above tweak, and a major upgrade thanks to the new auto-focus lens. Now, Camera will try to focus on what it thinks is the most important element of your photo — even macro! If, however, you want to focus on something else instead, just tap the iPhone screen to re-focus. A handy square overlays the sweet spot, so you can make sure the lens is set exactly where you want it to be.

Perhaps the biggest addition for iPhone 3GS is the ability to shoot not only still pictures… but video as well. To switch from still picture to video capture mode, simply toggle the slider at the bottom right of the screen. When you do, the camera icon, used to take a still picture, is replaced with a red recording icon that stays dark when in standby mode but blinks when video is being taken (keeping the common vidcam metaphor alive and well). Like with still pictures, video can be taken in portrait or landscape mode.

YouTube

The big news for the YouTube app in iPhone 3.0 is account integration. You can now enter your YouTube login information for access to your Subscriptions and Playlists.

Stocks

The Stocks widget is still powered by Yahoo, and still lists your favorite stocks on top and a handy graph at the bottom. You can now swipe across that handy, however, to change it into a news feed or a more detailed set of information including opening price, high, low, volume, P/E, market cap, 52 week high, 52 week low, average volume, and yield.

Rotating Stocks to landscape mode now expands the graph to full, wide screen mode. But there’s more: youch a point on the graph and you get the exact price for that day, touch a second finger somewhere else on the graph and you get the difference in value between those two days (delta).

Maps

For iPhone 2G and iPhone 3G owners, Maps is the same as 2.1. Sure, under iPhone 3.0 developers can now embed the maps in their App Store apps, but from the built-in point of view — nothing. (Google Latitude will, apparently get support via the browser, go figure?)

For iPhone 3GS owners, however, Maps will now leverage the new digital Compass hardware. Tap the Get Location button to find your coordinates via GPS, then tap it again to get your directional heading via the Compass (shown as an expanding white spotlight effect extending out ahead of you).

Voice Memos

Following iTunes and App Store, Apple’s third new built in app since launching the iPhone is also it’s first new, non-Storefront app. Voice Memos is also the first new app to shove its way into the middle of the existing apps (iTunes and App Store were added to the end).

(Note to sticklers: Remote and Keynote, though from Apple, aren’t built in to the software and require download or purchase separately from the App Store.)

Voice Memos, from icon to main screen, pays homage to an old-style microphone (though, unlike Calculator, we don’t believe it’s one ever manufactured by Braun…). The bottom has buttons for Record and (a rather non-intuitive-looking stack of three horizontal lines) to access Voice Memos that have previously been recorded. In the middle is a sound level meter.

Tap Record to begin and the Record button becomes Pause, the More button becomes Stop, and the top of the screen flashes red to show you you’re recording and the duration of the recording.

When you’re finished recording, the More page shows Voice Memos in a similar fashion to Visual Voice Mail in the Phone app. Tap a Voice Memo to play or pause it, toggle Speaker on or off, or use the buttons along the bottom to Share (via email or MMS) or Delete.

You can also tap the blue circles at the far right of each recording to slide into an Info screen where you can further tap to slide across to a Label screen pre-populated with tags including None, Podcast, Interview, Lecture, Idea, Meeting, Memo, and Custom. Choosing Custom slides another screen over where you can input your own Label names.

Back on the Info screen, tapping on Trim Memo slides up a bare-bones editing interface for taking off any unwanted content from the beginning and/or end of your recording. Interestingly, Apple chose yellow for trim slider and Trim Voice Memo action button.

Share on the Info screen does the same thing as the Share button on the Voice Memos screen. Convenience through repetition?

Notes

First up, you can now “swipe to delete” notes from the main contents screen, just as you could “swipe to delete” email all the way back to the original iPhone OS. Consistency points!

Next, like messages, Notes benefits from the several system-wide — or at least multi-app-wide — improvements in iPhone 3.0. The first is the pervasive landscape keyboard. Just rotate and the accelerometer does the rest.

The big thing, of course, is Cut, Copy and Paste. It works similarly for text — though not identically — across all supported applications, so we’ll do the heavy lifting here.

To start, double tap on some text. That will highlight the word and pop-up buttons for Cut, Copy, and Paste (the last of which only appears if there’s already text in the clipboard). You can also tap on an empty area to pop-up buttons for Select, Select All, and Paste. (Select highlight the closest word to the current cursor position, and again you need text already in the clipboard for Paste to appear).

If you want to change the length of your selection, grab one of the blue dot’s that form the handles on the top left or bottom right of your current selection and drag them in or out to add or subtract text. As you move the handles, a magnifying loupe will appear, similar in function to the round curser placement loupe that dates back to iPhone 1.0. This loupe, however, is a wide, horizontal, rounded rectangle and lets you more precisely adjust your text selection.

Selected text can then be Cut or Copied to the clipboard, or replaced by Pasting over it with text from the clipboard.

Text can also be pasted at the current cursor location by double tapping to bring up the Select, Select All, and Paste pop up.

If at any time you either type or paste something in by mistake, Apple has added a gimmicky yet semi-cool undo feature — just shake your iPhone to call up an Undo, Redo, and Cancel dialog.

(Note: While the Mail app, discussed below, gets similar Cut, Copy and Paste functionality, so do most 3rd part App Store application that use standard text input controls. Awesome).

Finally implementing functionality that Steve Jobs listed off during his iPhone 1.0 introduction at Macworld 2007, Notes now sync via iTunes back to your Windows PC or Mac.

Lastly, predictive text in general seems to have been improved as of Beta 3. Or rather, the dictionary that tries to guess and replace words as you type seems to have been updated.

Clock

The Clock app gets a minor tweak — you get a lap display in the upper right hand corner of the Stop Watch. While the main stopwatch shows total time as always, the lap counter shows only the time passed since you last hit the lap button.

Settings

Apple typically tucks numerous changes, large and small, neatly away inside the Settings app, and iPhone 3.0 is no exception. Due to the volume of changes, we’ll break them down by category.

Wi-Fi

Auto-login increases the ease of logging into commercial-style Wi-Fi services (the kind that typically present a web-based password form for authentication, like at hotels or coffee shops). In Settings, you now have the option to toggle on Auto-Join, which saves passwords and then automatically uses it next time to return to the same network.

Also, when you login, you get a special slide-up window with some new controls and an embeded web-view — no more inconvenient app-jump to Safari.

An added benefit for fans fans of super-strong, pseudo-random passwords — the kind almost impossible to type by hand — paste works in the password field. This means you can copy it from an email or text file of any kind and paste it right in. Very welcome!

Notifications

Push Notifications gets its own top level button in Beta 3 and as of Beta 5 and Apple beginning Push Notification testing, not only can users globally or individually enable or disable Sounds, Alerts (text boxes), and/or Badges, but each app gets its own sub-screen to do likewise. (i.e. if you want Twitter to badge but not alert, IM to sound but not badge, etc. you can have it your way).

As with GPS on iPhone 3G under OS 2.0, Push Notification-enabled apps will ask permission on launch, and give you a chance to choose “Don’t Allow” or “Okay” on a per-app basis as well.

General Settings: Network

New to Network Settings is Internet Tethering. On supported carriers (and no, AT&T isn’t supporting it yet and there’s no word on when they will) Internet Tethering will display current status, Off or On.

Tap the button to go to the Internet Tethering Settings, then toggle the switch to On. If Bluetooth isn’t currently enabled, an alert will pop up asking you if you want to enable it, or to leave it off and tether via USB.

When tethering is on, a blue bar appears at the top of the screen, similar to the green bar that appears when a phone call is in progress. Unfortunately, unlike the green phone bar, it tapping the blue tethering bar doesn’t seem to send you back to the tethering Settings to quickly toggle it off.

General Settings: Restrictions

iPhone 3.0 now provide more in the way of Parental Controls. First off, iPod has been removed from the top menu and Location has been added. A secondary menu has now been added below to provide more granular control over iPod content, allowing you to select which country/region ratings you use, and then set Music & Podcasts, Movies, and TV Shows. Control for Apps is at the very bottom.

App Restrictions can be based on age-ratings. Currently supported options are:

• Don’t Allow Apps
• 4+
• 9+
• 12+
• 17+
• Allow All Apps

General Settings: Home

Additional options are now available for you to assign to a double-click of the Home button. They’ve grown from Home (i.e. same as single click), Phone Favorites, and iPod to now include Search (epic win for mobile accomplishers) and Camera.

A sub-menu for Search Results allows you to check on or off the exact types of information you want called up in a Spotlight Search. Options include Contacts, Applications, Music, Podcasts, Video, Audiobooks, Notes, Mail, and Calendar.

You can also tap and hold down the line icons on the right side of any category and drag them to change the order of how search results are presented (i.e. you could move Applications on top of Contacts, and Spotlight will then list Apps first).

General: International

Courtesy of BGR, it looks like Voice Control’s languages settings will be found here when iPhone 3.0 is running on iPhone 3GS hardware.

General: Keyboard: International Keyboards and General: International, Keyboards

Even more international language keyboards are now available in iPhone 3.0: Arabic, Greek, Hebrew, Indonesian, Malay, and Thai. Good news for people in those regions eager to get their iPhone on. (And let’s see a hardware keyboard do that!)

Settings: Mail, Contacts, Calendar

You can add a MobileMe account, just like before, but now if you already have bookmarks, contacts, or other data on your iPhone (for example, if you synced it over via iTunes) and you enable MobileMe, a menu will slide up asking if you want to Merge the data, Not merge (i.e. replace), or Cancel.

Once you’ve added a MobileMe account, there’s now a new option called Find My iPhone. Turn it on, then go to www.me.com, login to your Account tab, and choose Find My iPhone from the sidebar. A map will show you the current, approximate GPS coordinates for your iPhone. There are also options to send a text and/or sound alert to your iPhone (e.g. a number where you can be reached if someone finds it), and to remote wipe your device if you think it’s been stolen or permanently lost and you want to protect your data.

As mentioned previously, also hidden here are the new LDAP (contacts directory), CalDAV, and Calendar Subscription, features under Add Account, Other.

Settings: Safari

Options can be found here for the new AutoFill feature, and a submenu for choosing who’s Contact Info you want to use for the fill, as well as an option to allow Names & Passwords to be stored and AutoFilled, and a button for Clear All to wipe the AutoFill database clean. This, at least, gives us some control as to whether we want the security of not storing and filling our passwords on a device that could be lost or accessed without our approval, or the convenience of saving us a lot of typing.

Likewise, the new anti-Phishing Fraud Warning can be toggled on and off. Keeping it on, of course, provides some level of safety when encountering malicious websites made to look like ones we trust, intent on stealing our login info and/or credit card data. Of course, no list of Phishing sites is ever complete or completely up to date, so keep surfing safely.

Settings: Messages

With the addition of MMS in iPhone 3.0, now, of course, Settings follow to includes an MMS Messaging On/Off toggle.

Settings: iPod

New to the iPod Setting is a toggle to enable the Shake to Shuffle option that Apple debuted with the latest generation iPod shuffle.

Settings: Store

Not as elegant as it looks in iTunes or App Store apps, but Settings give you a third, convenient point for on-device switching between iTunes store accounts. You can sign in, view account details, and sign out. Then you can sign in under a different account (i.e. spouse’s account, different country’s store, etc.)

Note: There was some confusion about whether or not Apple would let you re-download paid apps if you enabled multiple accounts (so you couldn’t log in as your buddy, for example, and get all his or her apps for free) but the restrictions that were in place during the beta period seem to be gone (for now?)

ITunes Store

As mentioned above, iTunes Store now allows management of multiple iTunes accounts. Scroll down to the bottom of a main page (i.e. before you’ve selected a specific piece of content to look at) and you’ll find a button containing your account username.

Tap on the button and you’ll be given options to View Account, Sign Out, or Cancel. Much more convenient than having to exit, launch Settings, navigate, switch accounts, go back, etc.

iTunes also adds to the previous music and podcast on-device download capability with support for Movie, TV Show, Music Video, Audio Book, and iTunes U content.

To make room, the tabs at the bottom lose Top Tens and Downloads and now include Videos (movies, TV, music video) and a standard More icon, which gives access to a screen offering Audio Books and iTunes U, as well as the displaced Downloads and relocated Redeem (for gift certificate codes).

Like with the iPod App, an Edit button lets you drag around tab icons to lay things out just the way you want them.

When you find a video you want to learn more about, tap on it and you get a detailed description. Like with music, you can sample before you buy. Tap the Preview button to see a short clip or trailer. Instead of just playing like music, however, iTunes opens an embedded iPod video player.

Also, like with video podcasts, music, and App Store apps, 3G isn’t an option for anything over 10MB — which for video we imagine will be almost everything — so have your Wi-Fi standing by.

App Store

App Store gets the same iTunes account management functionality as the iTunes store, above.

Also, Apple has also and again changed the way screen shots appear in the App Store. Now, you get full screen shots, side by side, with the ability to swipe through them. You can see additional screenshots on each side when more are available backward or forwards. (Similar to how you swipe through multiple Safari tab pages).

In-App Purchases and Subscriptions

Two other changes coming to the app store, in-app purchases and subscriptions, are more difficult to document right now because no apps that make use of them have currently been released in the App Store. So, we’ll base this for now on what Apple has presented and update it as soon as real-world examples go wide.

By way of example, if you previously wanted commercial E-Books, a developer had to wrap a reader app around each E-Book, and then sell each E-Book as a separate app on the App Store. This led to dozens upon dozens of apps that were just more books, or otherwise variations on the same functionality with different content.

With iPhone 3.0, a developer can now sell you an E-Book Reader app, and inside that app, they can sell you the individual E-Books. If you choose to buy another E-Book, the same type of iTunes confirmation and password requester will pop up as when you buy a stand-alone app, and the same iTunes-side billing and processing happen.

This can also work to buy additional levels or extra content in games, and theoretically map packs for navigation apps, etc.

Yes, Apple just invented the $0.99 “scaleware” model. Buy the low-price, entry-level version of an App, and if you like it, buy more. It’s not a demo, it’s not shareware, but it does let developers a way to create a cheap evaluation model for users to try before they buy… more of it.

Why $0.99? To avoid user confusion, Apple won’t let developers sell additional content to apps they gave away for free. If you want to charge more later, you have to charge at least something up front. Otherwise, “free apps stay free.”

Subscriptions, for their part, seem to work just like In-App Purchases, with the pop-up advising you are purchasing X issues of Y content for Z dollars. (e.g. 6 months of iPhone Monthly for $1.99).

Push Notification

Perhaps the highest profile addition to third party apps, if not the App Store proper, is the release of the-anticipated Push Notification service (PNS).

This service is supposed to replace some forms of background multi-tasking support, which Apple allows for their own apps like Mail, Phone, and iPod, but sites battery life, stability, and complexity of management as reasons not to grant third party (App Store) apps the same privilege.

So, under iPhone 2.0, if you exit an Instant Messenger (IM) app, you no longer have anyway of knowing when a new IM comes in unless and until you deliberately relaunch the app. (Sure, there are work around over SMS and Email, but the app itself is dead).

Under iPhone 3.0, if you exit an IM that supports PNS, the developer’s servers will alert Apple’s PNS which then “push” an alert to your iPhone. (Similar to how MobileMe already pushes alerts for email).

If you have IM, Twitter, a news app, etc. Apple’s servers will handle all of them, so theoretically your iPhone only has to listen to PNS instead of each one separately. One instead of many is supposed to save battery life.

PNS currently supports 3 kinds of alerts: badges (like Mail uses to show you unread messages), custom sounds (like a beep or bell or anything already built into the app by the developer), or modal text alerts (like the kind that pop up to tell you about a new SMS).

With the text alerts, if an alert comes in, it will stay up until you dismiss it or act upon it (e.g view an IM). If a second (or third, or more) text alert comes in, however, it replaces the previous one, and that previous alert is gone forever. In other words, if nine alerts come in, you’ll only ever see the ninth one and dealing with it gives you a blank screen, not the eighth — or previous — alert. (Badges, if used and enabled, would still show you 9 messages had come in).

If your iPhone is in sleep mode, alerts will still pop up, but the “swipe to unlock” will dismiss them, but not send you to the alerting app. Less than ideal, but perhaps the best solution given the limited notification handling the iPhone currently employs.

Dock and Bluetooth Accessory Connection

Potentially the biggest and most exciting development for iPhone 3.0, if not the iPhone in general, is the ability of developers to make apps that directly communicate with accessories/peripherals via the USB dock connector or Bluetooth radio.

This means, in short, the iPhone will be able to connect with, display data for, and/or control medical equipment like glucose readers, production equipment like cameras, barcode readers, game controllers, keyboards — almost anything developers care to create protocols for.

Peer-to-Peer Connectivity

Peer-to-Peer connectivity leverages Bonjour networking and the Bluetooth radio to create an easy way for apps to join together and exchange data. It’s clearly directed at multi-player gaming, but Apple points out that any app can take advantage of it to share business cards, photos, or almost anything. Yes, it’s the return of “beaming”.

iPod Access

Finally, Apple grants developers access to your iPod library. Now, third party apps can let you play, switch, and otherwise listen and control your music right from inside the app, without having to exit, launch the iPod app, exit, and re-launch the original app.

Compass

The Compass app is exclusive to the iPhone 3GS hardware, because that hardware is the only current device with a built-in magnetometer. The app shows a stylized compass that will spin to show either true north or magnetic north, depending on which one you’ve chose from the Info screen. Via the GPS, coordinates are also shown along the bottom.

If magnetic fields or something else prevent clear readings, an interface comes up asking you to rotate the iphone in an figure-8 patter to reacquire compass headings.

Phone

With iPhone 3.0, the Phone app’s Recents tab, when you tap the arrow to get more information, now shows you incoming calls from that contact, the time, and the duration. If you spoke to that contact repeatedly without any other contacts in between, multiple entries will show you the information for each one of those calls.

Also, the Contacts tab (and the stand alone Contacts app) now integrate the “swipe to delete” functionality we all know and love from Email and other, previous apps going all the way back to iPhone 1.x. Simply pick a name, and then swipe to call up the red “Delete” button.

Email

Email still hasn’t gotten a unified inbox or threaded messaging or unified messaging, but iPhone 3.0 does give the Email app a few improvements by way of the new system-wide changes.

Landscape keyboard lovers rejoice, Email now gives you the wide treatment when to rotate to that orientation. Like with other apps, if you’re already in landscape when you share, link to, or otherwise launch Email, it comes up the very same way.

You also get the same Cut, Copy and Paste functionality as Notes with a couple notable exceptions. First, you get support to copy rich text formatting (bold, italic, html). Second you can also paste pictures you may have copied from the Photo or Safari apps. We’re not sure if there’s a limit to the amount of pictures you can send via 3G from the iPhone in a single mail yet, but we’ve received 9 in one shot so far. If anyone has reached a hard limit, let us know.

Spotlight lives inside Mail to, just like it did inside Contacts with OS 2.0. Scroll up slightly inside a mail box and you get the search input and buttons letting you choose between From/To/Subject/All. As an added bonus, you can also go beyond the local store and “Continue Search on Server…” on Exchange 2007 or later, MobileMe, or IMAP installations that support it.

Much like Mac OS 10.5 Leopard, Apple has expanded “data detectors” in iPhone 3.0 as well. While previous iPhone version would identify phone numbers and link them to the Phone App (just as web and email addresses link to Safari and Mail respectively), now 3.0 will try to identify address location to link to Google Maps as well.

Safari

As mentioned in the section on Settings, if you choose to enable it, Safari will AutoFill form fields based on your Contact info, or the Contact info of your choosing. As a separate option, passwords you’ve previously entered as well.

Also mentioned in Settings, Safari will try to protect you from Phishing sites if you enable it, presumably consulting an continuously updated blacklist of sites, presumably the same as recently implemented on the desktop Safari 4 Beta.

In addition, when you go to a site with an enhanced security certificate, the text on top of the browser turns green (like the green bar, we get it!), with little green lock icon beside it, and the name of the certificate’s trusted organization. For example, the below screenshots show how Apple’s order status page looks on iPhone 2.2.1 (top right) and iPhone 3.0.

What does this mean for users? In an age of increased phishing attacks, where bad sites try to trick you into thinking they’re your bank or shop and steak your login or credit card info, this is one more visual cue in your assessment process for determining if you can trust that the website is what it says it is.

Updates to Safari don’t end there, however, as Apple has also (yes!) given us the option now to open links in new pages (the iPhone equivalent of tabs). Tap and hold on a link, and a menu pops up with the link path listed on top, and the option to Open the link (in the current page), Open in a New Page, or Copy to the clip board. As this is the same gesture used to allow Image Save in iPhone 2.0, if the link happens to be a picture, Image Save is rolled right into the same menu as a an additional option.

(This is also a handy way to check which URL exactly is behind a link before you click on it)

Rendering speeds have also been improved, from 3x to 16x faster according to benchmarks. Apple is using the new Nitro (formerly SquirelFish Extreme) engine to throw HTML and especially JavaScript up much faster than iPhone 2.2.1 could. On mobile devices, this will likely make a far more noticeable difference to users.

The big news, however, is that Mobile Safari gets the Cut, Copy, and Paste love from Apple as well, although it works a little differently here than it does in Mail or Notes.

Perhaps because double-tap is already used for zooming, in Safari you hold your finger down on some text (as you would in other apps to trigger the magnifying loupe) and the entire paragraph of text is selected (everything within the P, and perhaps DIV and other similar containers).

Sites that don’t properly format (i.e., use several BR, or line-break tags to simulate paragraphs) are now exposed for their shenanigans by confusing the Copy mechanic, resulting in entire reams, or even pages of text being selected. (For shame!)

The blue dot handles at the top/beginning and bottom/end of the selection are used in Safari, but if you drag them enough, the whole block will become selected and you’ll get blue dots centered on all sides, and they can be pulled up or down to select previous or following blocks respectively. Again, lack of proper HTML formatting can reduce the reliability (so coders, fix your stuff!)

Both text and/or images can be selected.

Paste works in form fields the same way it does in Notes and other apps.

iPod

New in iPhone 3.0, the formerly useless Repeat and Shuffle Option for when listening to a podcast has been replaced with an email icon on the left hand side, and a speed counter on the right hand side.

The email icon allows you to send an iTunes Link for the podcast (similar to how you could previously email YouTube video links).

The speed indicator on the other side shows x1 during regular playback, and we presume it might show x2 etc. as Apple has previously allowed you to “speed up” talk-heavy content like Audio Books.

Where the Genius button would be on music tracks, we now have a circular backwards arrow with a 30 in the middle, which allows you to jump back in 30 second intervals.

Variable media scrubbing now lets you put your finger on the position indicator at the top, and the buttons change to a text message reading “Slide your finger down to adjust the scrubbing rate.” Do so and the speed that you scrub though the file changes. Displayed in place of the track info, options so far include half speed, quarter speed, and a fine grain speed.

While these controls would also be much appreciated in video, right now implementation is not there. Movies and TV shows have the same Done and Full/Fit to Screen controls as previous OS, as do video podcasts in landscape view. In portrait view, video podcasts gain the mail link and media scrubber, but retain the shuffle control.

Spotlight search comes to the iPod app. Just like Mail, scroll up in any list-view (like Podcasts, Playlists, Songs, etc. and the search bar appears. Results populate as you type, and if you hit the blue Search button, the keyboard slides down and you can see all results organized by category.

As mentioned in the Settings section, Shake to Shuffle is also now available in the iPod app. Just remember, if you enable it and then start to dance with your iPhone, your music might jump around with you…

Another major check-box finally checked is support for Stereo Bluetooth. Paired to an A2DP device (similar to current blue tooth phone headset pairing), a Bluetooth icon appears to the right of the volume slider, and an Audio Source selector will let you choose from available devices.

(Note: this seems to work in apps like Pandora as well, bonus screen shot included below!)

Conclusion

This is not a review — our full rundown of the pros and cons will come soon — so our conclusion only goes so far as to say that, after going through everything above, anyone who claims iPhone 3.0 is really more fittingly iPhone 2.3 deserves a swift kick in the apps. This is a hefty release and we’re again impressed not only by Apple’s continuing ability to evolve the iPhone platform and provide software updates (again, free of charge to iPhone users, $9.95 to non-subscription accounted iPod touch users), but for the easy and consistent way in which they’re doing it.

Kudos to the iPhone team at Apple. Can’t wait for 4.0!

[Thanks to everyone who contributed screenshots and descriptions for this walkthrough. If you noticed we missed anything, drop us a note in the comments and we'll update as needed.]

As of approximately 1:30 EDT/10:30 PDT, iPhone 3.0 (7A341) — weighing in at 230.1MB –went live and is now available via iTunes.

We’re downloading now, and we assume you are too, so sound off in the comments and let us know how it’s working for you, and how you like it!

NOTE: For those on the iPhone 3.0 GM seed, make sure you hit Restore as Update will think you already have 3.0!

And if you need help finding all the features, check out our massive iPhone 3.0 Walkthrough for all the details!

Years past it was lining up outside Apple Stores days in advance, this year it’s staring feverishly at LCDs, hitting little buttons like mice at a combo food dispenser/electro-shocker, and hoping beyond hope that iPhone 3.0 is finally ready to download and the UPS dude is a couple days early at the door.

Relax. Breathe.

No one really expected iPhone 3.0 to hit at 12:01am Cupertino Prime Time, and no one truly believed Brown would roll up with an iPhone 3G S at the exact same moment — and a couple days early. Hope perhaps, dream indeed, but Steve P. Jobs like his events both maddeningly unpredictable and elaborately choreographed.

Doing some elaborate time zone gymnastics, Engadget figures 1pm EDT/10am PDT is the magic moment for iPhone 3.0. Hey, it’s the typical start time for an Apple Keynote/Special Event, so why not?

Meanwhile, huge hulking piles of email and tweets tell us all those with early UPS delivery dates are seeing those dates disappear and change faster and more frequently than glowing Apple logo rumors, with the latest being: it looks like UPS is holding packages until their originally announced release date of Friday, June 19.

So, get comfy people, keep your virtual sleeping bags tucked and your coffee, cyber or otherwise, warm. It might just be a long day ahead — or few days ahead for hardware — for all of us.

Engadget Mobile brings word that the iPhone Dev-Team has shown off a working Jailbreak and Unlock — now dubbed UltraSn0w — via Qik video.

The Jailbreak and Unlock should be available on Friday, though TiPb’s guess is it may not work on the new iPhone 3G S, since it took 6 months to unlock the iPhone 3G via yellowsn0w and longer for the 2nd generation iPod touch via redSn0w. We’ll likely know more when the Dev-Team gets some quality time with the new hardware and figures out what, if any, new cats Apple has brought for the mice to game…

Just a little reminder for those of you who are waiting for the Dev-Team to unveil the 3.0 software unlock for iPhone 3G, there is a live demo tonight.

On Tuesday evening (just before the big Apple release) we’ll do a live demo of the yellowsn0w carrier unlock working on official 3.0 firmware. The actual link for the feed will be twittered by @MuscleNerd and also placed here when the feed starts. The demo should answer everything you need to know about the new yellowsn0w. But it’s good news for iPhone 3G unlockers everywhere.

Keep in mind this unlock will not work along with the iPhone 3G S hardware. It is noted they may or may not be working on cracking the latest Apple has to offer.

P.S. For the new iPhone 3GS, please don’t expect periodic updates about any progress we have or don’t have. Nothing gives Apple the upper hand like someone tweeting or blogging partial hack results.

The cat and mouse game continues…

PocketGamer tells about the Zeemote JS1 Bluetooth gaming controller:

while this is in no way official, it seems some clever clogs has now got the compact thumb stick and buttons working with the iPhone.

What with iPhone 3.0′s API’s for Bluetooth accessory access, Jeremy thinks we might see more devices like this — if Apple’s smart. What do you think? Do you want/need an BT thumbstick to really get your iPhone game on, or is multi-touch enough?

(via antonioj)

No, downloading and installing it on your iPhone 2G won’t magically give it a better camera, video recording, or unicorn tear-powered 2x speed. (It will most likely give you heartache — never mix and match firmware!) but MacRumors forum has already found iPhone OS 3.0 for iPhone hardware 2,1 lingering about Apple.com.

(We’re betting it’s waiting in line for the hardware — curse those pre-order limits!)

Again, we don’t recommend doing anything with it — if you’re getting an iPhone 3G S it’ll come pre-installed. We simply present it as another check box on the road to release, like Find My iPhone going live, and Push Notifications hitting the App Store.

Fun week ahead, no doubt!

9to5Mac (via Gizmodo) shows Push Notification already working in the latest version of Tap Rap Revenge [Free - iTunes link] when run on the iPhone 3.0 GM developer seed. Gizmodo, of course, raises the pertinent question:

It certainly isn’t the most creative use of background notifications—the messages only pop up when you’re challenged by another player—and I’m already wondering how, when all kinds of apps have this capability, the iPhone’s exceedingly simple notification system will scale.

Since Text Alerts don’t tack, a new one obliterates the one before it. What happens when an urgent IM is replaced by “Hey, dooooooode, can haz rock out?!” Sure, badges remain, but then you have to go looking for them…

It’s been a busy day here on TiPb, so just in case you missed anything, here’s a roundup of all our WWDC 2009 news and coverage.

• TiPb WWDC 2009 Live Meta Blog
• Apple Posts WWDC 2009 Keynote Live Stream
• Apple Announces iPhone 3G S – Ships June 19
• Apple Posts iPhone 3G S Guided Tour
• iPhone 3.0 Release Date: June 17
• 2008 iPhone 3G Now Priced to Move! $99 Starting Today!
• iPhone 3G S — What We Didn’t Get
• AT&T — MMS Later. Tethering… Um… Er… Bai!
• AT&T Responds: iPhone 3.0 MMS and Tethering
• Rogers/Fido to Sell iPhone 3G S in Canada, $199/$299 on June 19
• iPhone 3G S — Apple Delivers Mobile Video to the Masses
• Apple Demonstrates Voice Control for iPhone 3G S
• iPhone 3G S – 2x Faster, but Still no 802.11n
• MobileMe Update Coming June 17: Find my iPhone, Remote Wipe, iDisk Mobile, File Sharing, Public Folders
• Apple Releases iPhone 3.0 Gold Master to Developers + WARNING!

Apple has made the GM (gold master), or final version of iPhone 3.0 available to developers via developer.apple.com in advance of June 17th public release.

Apple VP of iPhone Software, Scott Forstall, reminded developers to download it, test against it, and if their apps didn’t work, to get updates done and fast!

WARNING updated: yeah, we got the full text and it applies only as outlined in the comments below. Thanks everyone, we try to err on the side of caution. Luckily devs had access to correct info.

If you’re not a legit developer who needs this now, more than ever — stay away!

Apple VP of iPhone Software, Scott Forstall, announced during the WWDC Keynote that iPhone 3.0 (see our massive walkthrough) will be available for one and all, next Tuesday, June 17.

Ladies and gentlemen, set iTunes for download!

What a difference a year makes. 2008 saw the introduction of iPhone SDK, iPhone 2.0, App Store, MobileMe, and iPhone 3G, the latter two of which were announced at WWDC and prefaced a worldwide rollout that broke Apple’s conservative goal of shipping 10 million units.

We’ve seen iPhone 3.0, the changes to the SDK and App Store, and now on the eve of WWDC 2009 it’s time to think about what else we just might see one year later, and — according to Apple — lightyears ahead.

No one knows exactly what Apple is going to do. They make the cold war Kremlin seem positively chatty by comparison. That doesn’t mean we don’t have rough ideas. See, Apple likes their patterns. They like showing iPods off in the fall, for example, and they seem to like June for showing off the iPhone. So, based on WWDC 2008, the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview, and the more consistent rumors since then, we might be able to draw some educated guesses as to how WWDC 2009 might play out…

Schiller Time

Last year Great Balls of Fire filled Moscone Center and Steve Jobs took center stage. This year Phil Schiller, Vice President of Marketing, will be headlining the keynote, as he did the last — and final — Apple keynote at Macworld in January.

Jobs announced a sellout last year. They had a faster one this year. Schiller will no doubt mention that, and cover the WWDC session housekeeping before the fun begins.

Whether Schiller elaborates on the “three legs” of Apple’s business – Mac, iPod, and iPhone — before singling out the iPhone, or just singles it out right away, the predominance of iPhone over Mac signage seen so far, and Snow Leopard being more of an internal update to Mac OS X, leads us to think this year will be every bit as iPhone-centric, if not more.

Special caveat: if the outside rumors are true, if Apple intends to delay announcement of new iPhone hardware for an event later in the summer, when Steve Jobs is back in the saddle, we expect Schiller will start off by saying something to the effect of “we’re not here to discuss iPhone hardware today” so as to immediately re-set expectations. To not mention it in advance, and then not announce it, would blot out anything else Apple could say.

We don’t expect that, however. Apple has shown they’re no longer a one-man-show. They don’t need to wait for Steve Jobs to return. So, we expect no early re-set. We expect Schiller to jump right into–

iPhone 3.0 Review

iPhone 3.0 will no doubt lead off the show. We’ll get the perfunctory State of the iPhone Development address. The numbers should be staggering. 4,000 developers had been admitted this time last year. No doubt that has been eclipsed by a wide, wide margin. Same for App Store numbers. 47,000+ apps, 1.x billion downloads. We’ll hear just how big Apple’s monster has become.

A rundown of the OS details, likely similar to the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview event, will kick us off. It’s a fairly massive list, so hopefully Schiller will stick to the highlights.

Last year, Exchange and Enterprise were a large part of iPhone 2.0, and Jobs spent a good bit of time on showing off Fortune 500 and higher education participation in the beta. If Apple is serious about continuing their push into IT, maybe we’ll get another video. We’re guessing we don’t. The SDK peripheral access via USB tether and Bluetooth looks to fill that role this year, so just like we saw blood pressure and diabetes apps and accessories at the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview event, we expect to see even more impressive demoes of that kind of functionality at WWDC.

Demo Time

Cue Scott Forstall, Vice President of iPhone Software. Forstall handled the SDK element of WWDC 2008, and the lion’s share of iPhone 3.0 software at the Sneak Preview event, and he’s likely to do the same at WWDC 2009. No doubt his technical overview will “blow us away”.

1000 new APIs, and developer demos, June’s show should again repeat quite a bit of March’s show, though we beg you, Apple — please don’t draw the demos out as long as you have the last few times. Please.

Still, Push Notification, in-app purchases, P2P gaming, and the aforementioned peripheral access will take up more than their fair chunk of time.

Speaking of Push Notification, Forstall spoke about it a year ago — introduced it to us in fact, and promised it for September 2008 release. It was delayed until 3.0, when we saw it again at March’s Sneak Preview. He’s spent time poking fun at other platforms’ multitasking solutions, their management complexity and battery drain. We’re not sure he’ll do that again now, in a post Palm Pre “Cards” smartphone space, but if any company is ballsy enough to blaze ahead with that strategy, it’s Apple. Still, we expect to see the final, polished version of Push Notification, nothing more. No multi-tasking surprises, at least not yet.

iPhone 3.0 New Features

It’s possible minor additions, things that Apple doesn’t believe make a major impact on 3rd party developers, such as further tweaks to the built-in apps could be shown (like last year’s landscape scientific calculator). Apple showed an awful lot of that kind of tweak back in March, however, and they certainly have enough on their plate already. So we don’t expect anything earth shattering. Again, at least not yet.

By the same token, while we’d love to hear Apple tell us they’re solving the App Store review problem, making more transparent processes and guidelines, improving the Ad Hoc and beta testing process, we’ve learned a little helplessness in that regard. (Surprise us Apple!)

iPhone 3.0 Release date

Apple will announce it, of course, but there will be a couple of factors at play. If they’re planning to release the OS update independently from any hardware update, they’ll likely give us the date right away. If, however, they plan on once again doing a coordinated release, they’ll make us wait until the end of the keynote.

Our bet? Sooner rather than later. Coordinate release last year hammered Apple hard. Maybe they could handle it this year, maybe not. But they don’t need to. With iPhone 2G 24-month subscription accounting period ending June 29, with Palm Pre getting a lot of technorati attention, Apple can release 3.0 either after the keynote or right after WWDC and then update to 3.0.1 or 3.1 later in the summer.

MobileMe

Phil Schiller is the star of the show this time, but he was relegated to a supporting role last year. And that role was introducing MobileMe. Could we see a MobileMe 2.0? We know developers have found strings for a new MobileMe WebApp, Find My iPhone in the 3.0 firmware, so if nothing else we should see that. With most of its growing pains behind it, however, there’s certainly room for Apple to begin expanding the service.

Regular updates via the MobileMe News blog for things like File Sharing (which were actually promised at launch but not delivered until later) suggest that Apple might be content simply rolling out new features as they finish them. If that’s the case, while we won’t see a whole new version — certainly nothing as ambitious as Google Wave — we could see whatever other new features are ready, or will be made ready during the summer.

Notes sync, given the new iPhone 3.0 desktop functionality, certainly makes sense. We’d love photo sync as well. Task sync would really round things out, but unless a built in task app is one of those extra new features, there’s little chance of that this time. Online backup would be competitive with Microsoft’s MyPhone and Palm’s new Pre features. Server-side calendar subscriptions would also mirror on-device functionality, and server-side email rules would just make life so much easier, as would the ability to pull in other email services, a la Gmail. Speaking of which, Apple has already integrated Google into iCal and Address Book on the Mac, why not in MobileMe? And with FaceBook and Flickr living in iLife, could they also find some form of integration into MobileMe?

Heh. We doubt it. Our prediction is minor, evolutionary improvements for MobileMe, with one or two new features like Find My Phone thrown in for good measure.

iPhone International

Last year Steve Jobs presented a list of what the iPhone still needed. 1st on that list was 3G, followed by Enterprise support, 3rd party apps, and more countries. The middle two had already been addressed earlier in the keynote, and since then both 3G and a worldwide rollout have come to pass. Sort of. There’s still the small matter of China.

It’s a big deal in terms of market, and rumors have persisted about Apple trying to make deals with China Mobile and China Unicom, and even making a special Chinese CDMA iPhone to better fit that market’s needs. They may do just that, but ultimately Apple is a US company and WWDC is a US show, so while it may get a mention, it won’t be the main event. The third generation iPhone will be.

Third Generation iPhone

We predicted an iPhone HD back in October. Turns out we’re getting a Zune HD instead. (Hey, maybe next year?). What Apple looks to be focusing on this year is an iPhone with video. And a fast iPhone at that.

Consistent rumors point to speed. Faster CPU, more RAM, faster 3.5G or 3.75G and 802.11n Wi-Fi networking. And a 3.2 inch, auto-focusing, video-recording camera in front of it.

If last year’s model was named iPhone 3G to highlight last year’s killer feature, iPhone video, as many rumors are now suggesting, could certainly highlight this year’s.

The casing could see cosmetic changes, the digital compass could get some demo time, but shooting video, editing video, and sharing video — all of which have been found in the 3.0 firmware screens, will be the star of the show.

And like with web browsing in 2007 and apps in 2008, Apple will bring ultra-mobile video production and publishing to the masses in 2009.

If they can take a page from iMovie and include direct upload not only to MobileMe but to YouTube as well — well, the next set of TV commercials have just written themselves, haven’t they?

(This is also where we’ll see those previously undisclosed iPhone 3.0 features, of course).

It will be Phil Schiller pulling it from his pocket this year, not Steve Jobs. Sure, we’d love Jobs to be the “one more thing…” that comes on stage, triumphantly returning, iPhone video in hand. We’d love for a special iChat Mobile demonstration with Steve Jobs on the other end. Heck, we’d settle for hearing Steve Jobs over the phone or being sent a video clip while on the phone… Anything.

But realistically Apple has always said “end of June”, and if Steve Jobs looks anything less than Greek god-like, history shows Apple takes a stock hit.

So, yeah, Phil Schiller will be waving the new iPhone high over Moscone, going over the battery details (please let John Gruber’s 15-20% bump in battery life be correct), doing the demos, and announcing the price…

Pricing and Availability

Apple was aggressive last year in hitting $199/$299. Given the current competitive landscape, we can’t see them being anything other than the same this year. You’ll get more iPhone for your money, but it will cost the same money. $199 for 16GB, $299 for 32GB (given the availability of the double-density NAND Flash chips of course — with Palm Pre only coming in at 8GB, Apple may think video alone is enough until component costs are sufficiently low).

The $99 iPhone? That’ll be the iPhone 3G, on clearance, while supplies last.

Color will stay the same as well. No aluminum unibody iPhones this year.

Availability… we’re hoping the same as last year — as close to simultaneous release in all major markets as possible (especially Canada!).

Release Date Take III

Tomorrow just sounds too soon to us. If it really was going to be in Apple stores before the keynote, we’d have expected to see some leaks by now — mysterious packages arriving, back store pictures, etc.

FCC clearance will no doubt be announced as quickly as possible (it was same day as WWDC last year), and while it’s possible online ordering or even shipping to Apple Stores could be announced immediately, there’s one huge reason we doubt it:

AT&T.

The iPhone is a two-part show, Apple and carrier. AT&T, and other carriers, will need to announce MMS plans and tethering plans. They’ll have to announce upgrade paths for users still on contract for iPhone 3G. Unless AT&T is up on stage with Apple at WWDC and announces everything with crystal clarity right away, it’ll be a customer support nightmare.

No, we think Apple will announce the date, but that the date will be some reasonable period of time after WWDC. Maybe a week, maybe a month like last year.

Unless Apple has secretly been shipping over new internals in iPhone 3G casings for a while now, they’ll need to fill the channel and organize a huge, splashy launch just like they did last year and the year before.

June 26 would be close to the 2 year anniversary. July 10 to the 3G anniversary.

We’ll take a risk and go for June 26.

Ad

The only thing we don’t know is if we’ll see a new ad for it to close out the show. Last year they shut down the flagship Apple Store to film one. This year, nothing so obvious. We hope so, it’s a very Apple thing to do.

Conclusion

So that’s it. That’s our predictions for how the WWDC 2009 keynote will roll out tomorrow. Now all that’s left is for us to watch tomorrow and find out!

Tomorrow is the start of WWDC and there are some people out there who truly believe Apple will official release the iPhone OS 3.0 software very soon. Whether or not it is released this week or within the next month, don’t be so quick to pull the trigger on the upgrade button within iTunes if you are planning on unlocking your device. If you choose to update there is a high possibility that you will lose your option to unlock in the future. Don’t want to listen to us, ok, will you take the Dev-Teams word for it?

you all paid lots of money for your iPhones, and so we know that if you are depending on a software unlock, this is a sensitive issue. It’s a very sensitive issue to us too, which is why we can’t say or release anything prematurely that could potentially compromise any 3.0 software unlock.

In other words, don’t do anything until the Dev-Team releases any official unlock for the 3.0 software. Also something to keep in mind, which we’ve warned you about in the past, don’t be fooled these fake wanna be Dev-Team websites that are out there.

We’re used to (though still aren’t happy about) less predatory websites, like quickpwn.com. That site (1) is not us. We don’t consult with them in any way (2) makes money from their Google hits (they’re usually near the top) (3) sometimes gives very very bad advice (like tweeting yellowsn0w users to use QuickPwn on 3.0 betas. Bad suggestion). (4) also owns yellowsn0w.net, another money making website.

For more information, be sure to check out the official Dev-Team blog. So there you have it folks, be careful out there.

Tomorrow is WWDC 2009. We’ll no doubt get a second preview of iPhone 3.0 and hopefully a release date to go along with it — if not the actual release itself.

We’ve done our best to cover iPhone 3.0, both through our massive and continuously updated iPhone 3.0 Beta Walkthrough, and our ongoing iPhone 3.0 blog posts. But what will that release — tomorrow, later this week, or later this “summer” — mean for current owners of the 2007 original iPhone 2G and the 2008 iPhone 3G, never mind the 2009 iPhone… whatever it ends up being called.

Let’s take a look!

2007 iPhone 2G on 3.0

Apple has provided an unprecedented amount of software updates — free software updates — for iPhone owners. What originally shipped with OS 1.0 received a series of interim updates until 2008, when they got 2.0, and now 2.2.1.

Even after the 2-year subscription accounting model Apple users is on the verge of expiring, Apple announced back at the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Preview Event that they would also be providing 3.0, free of charge, to iPhone 2G owners. (That expiration date might even play a factor in the 3.0 release date, who knows?)

Controversially citing hardware limitations, however, at least 2 major features won’t be made available:

• MMS
• Stereo Bluetooth

Of course, it won’t get new features tied to the new hardware. It didn’t get GPS and 3G last year, and it won’t get the presumed digital compass, storage, RAM, CPU, etc. upgrades this year — which means video recording is likely off the table as well. Other than that, your 2007 iPhone be made 2009 hardware fresh.

2008 iPhone 3G on 3.0

Apple demonstrated iPhone 3.0 on the current, iPhone 3G, and all the improvements publicly shown so far were shown specifically for the iPhone 3G.

That means, come iPhone 3.0 release day, the very least iPhone 3G owners can expect is what Apple showed — and what most developers have been using since March.

Of course, developers who dug into the 3.0 code have found extra functionality. Some of it, like the digital compass, would require new hardware. Video recording may or may not require the additional storage, RAM, CPU power, of the new hardware.

Everything else, however, will be made 2009 good for your 2008 iPhone.

2009 iPhone ? on 3.0

Well, that’s the question now isn’t it? Apple hasn’t announced any new iPhone for 2009 yet, but they’re widely expected to tomorrow. Based on the code strings referenced about, it will include new hardware features and boosted internals.

So, at the very least, if you decide to upgrade to new hardware along with your new software, you’ll get everything the iPhone 3G gets… and probably more.

Conclusion

So, if you’re still rocking the iPhone 2G with no interest in upgrading, Apple still has a pretty nice present coming your way with 3.0. Feature-set alone, it will be like getting a whole new phone.

For iPhone 3G owners with not intention of changing, you’ll still get everything you’ve been promised so far. And, yeah, it’ll feel like a whole new phone.

And for those of you who simply must have the third generation hardware, either as an upgrade or as a first time iPhone owner, well, we ain’t seen nothing yet.

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Join Chad and Rene for… what else? iPhone 3.0 and 3rd generation iPhone, WWDC 2009, and the ‘splosion of news and rumors. Full show notes to follow a bit later, we wanted to push this out to ya!

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

First year, Apple showed off the original iPhone (2G or 1,1) and iPhone OS 1.0 in January at Macworld 2007, gave us a release date at WWDC 2007, and shipped both together at the end of June. Second year, Apple showed off iPhone OS 2.0 in March at the SDK Event but didn’t introduce iPhone 3G (1,2) until WWDC 2008 in June, and announced the release date for both — the same release date for both — July 11.

This year Apple once again showed off iPhone OS 3.0 at March at the Sneak Preview event, and is rumored to be introducing iPhone v3 (2,1) at WWDC 2009 on June 8. If that comes to pass, we also expect them to announce the release date as they have in the past. But will it once again be the same release date for both?

• Pros: Apple likes big events and big news. Nothing is bigger than simultaneous releases. Apple also seems to like to stick to their patterns, and for the last two years software and hardware releases were one and the same. 2007 saw iPhone 3G alongside iPhone 2.0, App Store, and MobileMe (yeah, we’ll get to that in the cons…)

• Cons: That simultaneous release last year? iTunes went down. No one could activate. MobileMe’s lack of readiness caused months of bad PR. As big a news bomb as it was, it brought the negative every bit as much as the positive.

Frequent reader, Icebike, makes a great case for a staged released in our comments. It lets Apple control the roll-out, manage expectations, and better assure quality experiences for all involved.

But that simultaneous release is just so tempting, will Apple simply charge ahead with it anyway? Should they? Is the Circus Maximus worth the attention, good and bad?

As an iPhone user and potential 3.0 and next-gen iPhone user, what would you prefer Apple do?

Last week we posted on Google’s Latitude service coming to the iPhone by way of Safari. Of course, as Computerworld (via MacRumors) points out, for the location-tracking buddy service to work in the browser, the browser must support geo-location, and not just for Google.

According to BrowserSphere developers were told back in March that Safari would support the Geolocation JavaScript classes, which “work with the onboard location services to retrieve the current location of the device.”

So we guess IP addresses won’t be the only way for annoying web ads to try and localize us any more?

Following last week’s crazy screen rumor that iPhone 3.0 would add movie and TV show direct, on-device downloads to the current music and audio and video podcast downloads, Apple Insider reports that they have:

…learned from people familiar with Apple’s training program that new self-guided training materials being distributed to familiarize AppleCare agents with the features of iPhone 3.0 software “definitely covered” the ability to directly download movies and TV shows on the device itself, rather than just syncing video content through iTunes.

And points out that “Apple never puts out product training this far ahead of a product launch.”

So what’s going on with that? We figure it’ll be Wi-Fi only, but could there be anything else going on here?

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News

• iPhone 3.0
  • iPhone 3.0 Walkthrough Now Updated to Beta 5
  • Apple Recruiting Developers to Beta Test Push Notification
  • And we’ve got the screenshots to show it!
  • But is Apple reconsidering and thinking of allowing limited background multitasking? We’ve got three rumors saying… maybe!
  • If you’re not a developer and are running iPhone 3.0, and have hardware issues, don’t count on the Apple Store!

• iPhone: Next Gen Rumorpalooza Part XXVI
  • Daring Fireball Weighs in on Next Gen iPhone
  • Asahi Kasei Confirmed for Digital Compass
  • Super-Rumor: Next Gen iPhone due in store July 17 + Glowing Apple logo?
  • Apple Jobs Wanted: Faster, More Powerful iPhone Processor Architect + Embedded Video Engineer
  • Palm Pre Pressuring Apple to Pressure AT&T to Lower Rates for Next Gen iPhone?
  • Rumorous Maximus: iPhone Models to be Differentiated by Software?

• And in Other News…
  • Speaking of Palm Pre: it launches June 6, two days before WWDC. Timing much?
  • Eucalyptus Rejected! Or, Do iPhone App Store Reviewers Spend Their Time Searching for Porn?
  • iPhone Easter Eggs Could Kill App Store Golden Egg?
  • Apple Hiring At-Home Experts from July to September just in time for…?
  iPhone Doubles Share of Smartphone Market
  • Fraudulent “iTunes” Alert — Check Your Charges!

TiPb Forums

• This week, Jeremy shone the spotlight on: iPhone on Verizon Soon? Bored of Your iPhone? WWDC and New iPhone?
• Check out our awesome forum reviews for Myst and Twittelator Pro, and don’t miss the huge Forum Reviews index

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast.

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge
• Relaxation Spa Treatment by Dan the Automator via Wired 12.11: Sample the Future
• Wataridori 2 by Cornelius via Wired 12.11: Sample the Future
• DC 3000 by Thievery Corporation via Wired 12.11: Sample the Future

As we mentioned yesterday, Apple has begun load testing of their Push Notification Service. Certain developers have been given promo codes to a special version of AP News that, when installed, can be configured to utilize Push Notification. This means that screens we’ve seen previously via code digging can now be seen for real, and there are a few interesting things therein.

The setup seems not dissimilar to how GPS was handled on the iPhone 3G. A popup identifies the app and requests permission to send you Push Notifications, and you can choose “Don’t Allow” or “OK”. A Notifications panel in Settings lets you choose to globally turn the service On or Off, and lists the apps using the service so you can individually toggle Sounds, Alerts, and Badges On or Off as well for each one. (i.e. if you want Twitter to badge but not alert, IM to sound but not badge, etc. you can have it your way).

More screenshots after the jump, and check out our massive iPhone 3.0 Walkthrough for even more!

Business Insider rumormongers that Apple might be considering some limited form of multi-tasking, perhaps as early as iPhone 3.0, which would allow 3rd party apps to run as background tasks. They point to two possible models:

1. Apple might allow users to select two apps that can run in the background.
2. Apple might selectively allow some apps to run in the background. We assume that developers could apply for permission to run in the background, and that Apple might approve or deny them based on the resources they need and how well they behave with the operating system’s stability.

Daring Fireball steps up to throw a combo of water and fuel on that particular fire:

I heard something very similar from a decent (but second-hand) source back in January during Macworld Expo. What I heard then was that Apple was working on a vastly improved dock for your most-frequently used apps, and that there’d be one special icon position where you could put a third-party app to enable it to run in the background.

Gruber also rightly points out that the iPhone 3G’s 128MB of RAM is likely the constraining factor to current generation multitasking and that won’t change with the iPhone 3.0 firmware. If reports of at least 512MB of RAM in a 3rd generation iPhone are to be believed, however, this could be a much more compelling and powerful feature.

A dock that slides up like a slot-limited version of Google’s Android app shelf maybe? And one that grants background permission to anything placed inside it? Yes please.

In a move designed to make even notorious Wi-Fi stripper Verizon seem liberal by comparison, China Mobile’s outstanding demand that Apple strip the iPhone of both Wi-Fi and 3G if they want to sell to the worlds largest carrier just got an uncomfortable shot of “maybe” via Apple Insider:

while there’s no concrete information to suggest Apple would agree to make such concessions, references to “ChinaBrick” discovered in betas of iPhone Software 3.0 leave room for debate.

Also at issue, China Mobile wants control of the regional App Store. Without 3G or Wi-Fi, would there even be a point?

And we’d joked about AT&T…

PhoneArena (via Engagdget) was sent a tip that Best Buy has 3 mysterious new product SKU’s listed in their system as “PROJECT CHARLIE”. Why is this important and what does it have to do with iPhones?

ZOMG! We’re 3 weeks before WWDC here people! Everything is iPhone!

Okay, in all fairness, Best Buy is one of the very few big iPhone retailers (aside from Apple, AT&T, and Walmart) and even if they have no direct info from Apple, they could be prepping themselves for a similar launch as last year (iPhone 3G in 8GB, 16GB Black, and 16GB white).

But for the Lost fans among us — 3 SKUs, for the 3rd gen iPhone, 3 weeks before WWDC and iPhone OS 3.0? Cue creepy music

UPDATE: Our friend Phil over at WMExperts, throws in a plot twist: what if they’re new Windows Phones?!

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Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat, or sent in questions!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

Business Insider is quoting Piper analyst Gene Munster as saying:

No New iPhones [at Apple's World Wide Developers Conference]. As indicated in today’s press release, we believe Apple will focus on the new version of Mac OS X, Snow Leopard at WWDC. While some investors may be expecting Apple to launch redesigned iPhones at WWDC, we do not anticipate the launch in early June. Rather, we expect Apple to host a special event in late June or early July to launch a family of iPhones. We continue to expect multiple models, possibly a high-end iPhone with improved specs from the current version and a low-end version with lower capacity and fewer features along with a reduced pricing plan. Such a model could also be used in Apple’s launch of the iPhone into China as soon as the end of summer ’09.

Analysts are about as accurate as weathermen when it comes to predictions one month out, so take this with the usual Mac Pro sized grain of salt. Apple has used the last two WWDC events to showcase the iPhone, and introduced the iPhone 3G and MobileMe at WWDC 2008. If they stick to pattern, we should see an update on iPhone 3.0, the next generation iPhone, and perhaps a MobileMe refresh at WWDC 2009.

However, WWDC being an developer-focused event, it’s not impossible Apple will focus on their Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard and iPhone OS 3.0 exclusively, leaving the hardware for a sexier consumer event later in the month.

As to a family of iPhones, we still don’t see Apple breaking the software platform, which means a low end iPhone could only be a low-storage iPhone 3G (8GB?) at $99?, with the next generation unit (at 16GB and 32GB, along with other new features) taking the established $199 and $299 positions.

Back in March, Apple’s App Store was blessed with the free Amazon Kindle iPhone application. One of the biggest gripes that we had with it was the inability to purchase new books right from the app itself. While we still did not get that ability, Amazon has done the next best thing: last night they flipped the switch on an iPhone optimized Kindle store.

This freshly optimized store is nice to have but what, if anything, will change when iPhone OS 3.0 is released? If you remember, 3.0 has the ability to make in-app purchases. Will Amazon finally allow in-app purchases and give Apple a 30% cut off the top, or will Amazon stick with the current arrangement to avoid paying Apple for every book that is sold?

So what do you, our readers, think about this one? Either way, it should be interesting!

The iPhone Dev-Team has posted a few words regarding Jailbreaking the 3.0 software:

Because there are so many beta releases, we couldn’t possible refine, test, and release both PwnageTool and QuickPwn for each of them. That’s why we’re waiting until the final release. You may have seen other “hijacked” versions of QuickPwn out there, but all of them are buggy, none of them work on OSX, and almost everyone who uses them reverts back to 2.2.1 (because none of the useful jailbroken apps (Qik, Cycorder, and others) work on 3.0 yet).

Now this does not mean you currently can not Jailbreak 3.0 because you can, it’s just that the Dev-Teams software is not fine-tuned for the iPhone beta software. If you do decide to Jailbreak the 3.0 beta you will run into some issues. The biggest issue, as stated above, being a lot of the applications available via Cydia will not be compatible with 3.0. It is also important to note that if you ever want to unlock your iPhone 3G, you need to avoid the 3.0 software altogether unless and until the Dev-Team provides a safe jailbreak path.

So our advice to the Jailbreakers of the world: have some patience. When the final build of 3.0 drops sometime this summer you will be able to Jailbreak your iPhone 3G.

(The only way Apple could prevent a Jailbreak does not rest within the software, rather the hardware. As for Jailbreaking the next generation of iPhone, only time will tell, we are sure Apple will make it interesting…)

Apple released a surprisingly early iPhone 3.0 Beta 5 last Wednesday, and we spent all night covering it. Now we’ve rolled that coverage up into our massive iPhone 3.0 Walkthrough, to make it all up to date, and even more massive.

If you have any questions on the iPhone 3.0 Betas, or know anyone who does, send them on over.

Apple Insider has a pair of reports up, the first of which cites one analyst following up two other analysts who would all really, really like to see AT&T reduce data plan charges by $10 a month.

So would consumers. However, nothing to back it up yet but wishes and analyst musings to make it so.

The second report highlights that if AT&T does drop rates, and drives adaptions, they’ll only reach saturation level faster, forcing Apple to look again at Verizon and their 15 million customers to drive further growth.

Verizon customers would certainly love it, but can Apple wait long enough for LTE-compatibility to roll out?

Lastly, Dmackdaddy tipped us to what looks like AT&T seeking a lot of “retail sales consultants” in the Bay Area. Looks like some other areas may also be stocking up on staff. Regular business cycle, or just one more sign of the big iPhone 3.0 and iPhone next generation release expected for the summer?

BGR, citing sources of the shinobi-kind, has posted a couple of screen captures showing the Settings for the digital Compass enabled via debug menus in iPhone 3.0 Beta 5.

We’d heard rumors of a digital compass being included in the next generation iPhone — widely speculated for a WWDC 2009 introduction this coming June — but it’s nice to actually see some confirmation.

Google Maps integration is a no-brainer, but could Apple figure out more ways to leverage this? Could 3rd-part developers?

Maybe this explains, at least in part, the new iPhone 3.0 Beta 5released yesterday? Looks like Apple is super-eager to get developers testing and submitting 3.0 compatible applications.

We’re really eager to see what developers are coming up with to leverage all those great 3.0 features as well. Really, really eager. Ahem.

Full text of Apple’s email to developers:

All apps must be compatible with iPhone OS 3.0

Millions of iPhone and iPod touch customers will move to iPhone OS 3.0 this summer. Beginning today, all submissions to the App Store will be reviewed on the latest beta of iPhone OS 3.0. If your app submission is not compatible with iPhone OS 3.0, it will not be approved.

Existing apps in the App Store should already run on iPhone OS 3.0 without modification, but you should test your existing apps with iPhone OS 3.0 to ensure there are no compatibility issues. After iPhone OS 3.0 becomes available to customers, any app that is incompatible with iPhone OS 3.0 may be removed from the App Store.

Begin testing now

iPhone OS 3.0 beta 5 and iPhone SDK 3.0 beta 5 are now posted to the iPhone Dev Center. Start testing today to ensure your application runs on iPhone OS 3.0. Visit the iPhone Dev Center for additional development information including iPhone SDK Release Notes for iPhone OS 3.0 beta 5 and Getting ready for iPhone OS 3.0.

(Thanks DevX for the tip!)

Apple made mention that some developers, when updating to iPhone 3.0 Beta 5, might experience problems connecting to AT&T’s data network. Apple asked any devs so affected to contact them, and one dev who had the problem called in and let us know what Apple told him:

Apple just called me back, had me turn the phone off then back on. Then turn the wifi off and try it and it seems to be back to working. Thaaaank you apple.

Thanks indeed! If you’re experiencing similar problems, you might want to try the above. If that doesn’t work for you, however, get on the phone with Apple asap.

(Thanks Josh for the tip!)

More new finds in iPhone 3.0 Beta 5: it seems like those Restriction Settings — allowing parental control over apps based on ratings — we heard rumored in the wake of Reznor-gate have been surfaced in the latest beta.

Options include:

• Don’t Allow Apps
• 4+
• 9+
• 12+
• 17+
• Allow All Apps

It’s still unknown, however, whether Apple will take it upon themselves to determine ratings, leave it up to developers, or use a hybrid model where devs pick a rating and Apple approves or returns it for re-rating.

Regardless, we hope — when it’s finally released to the public this summer — it puts an end to the sillier rejections we’ve seen.

Looks like iPhone 3.0 Beta 5 doth giveth a little as well. That tiny email icon present in the top navigation bar of podcasts was decorative only until Beta 4, when it began to allow you to email the iTunes Store link for a friend for any podcast you’d downloaded over-the-air (at least for some it did). Now, with Beta 5, that tiny email icon is powered up and working for podcasts synced over via iTunes as well.

Earth shattering? No. But if you’re enjoying a great episode of Phone different, GDGT, TWiT, YLNT, or whatever else floats your audio boat, and you want to give a friend easy access to equal entertainment, it’s certainly a great convenience.

[Thanks anon for the tip!]

Along with iPhone 3.0 Beta 5, which appears to hide away MMS functionality for AT&T, Apple also seeded the second pre-release version of iTunes 8.2, which looks like it blocks editing of the iPhone carrier file. In previous beta releases, developers were able to use the carrier file to enable tethering, something built into iPhone 3.0 by Apple but entirely dependent on as-yet-not-given carrier approval.

Did AT&T ask for the new lockdown? Perhaps the MMS stripping as well? Nothing but speculation so far…

(Thanks Andrew for the tip!)

UPDATE 3: Pretty much confirmed now. No more MMS for AT&T. Also, iTunes 8.2 Pre-Release 2 blocks editing of the carrier file. No more tethering.

UPDATE 2: Received this: “eems as if they stopped people from being able to tether and get mms by altering the carrier settings… people who changed theirs at the start can no longer access it..” Let us know what you’re experiencing with MMS on Beta 5.

UPDATE 1: This may only happen for those doing clean installs (not restoring from a previous backup) so if MMS is vital to your iPhone 3.0 dev work, that may be the route you want to go for now.

We’re getting some early reports that iPhone 3.0 Beta 5 now hides MMS functionality from AT&T users (see Beta 4 and 5 comparison pics, above). Previously, buttons and settings for MMS were present, though not enabled by default, though hacks allowed MMS to be turned on for AT&). Now, however, all visible signs appear to be gone, and it’s too early to tell if hacks may still re-surface and re-enable them.

Anyone else seeing this?

Note: iPhone 3.0, MMS was never surfaced on some carriers like Rogers (Canada).

Apple has just released iPhone 3.0 Beta 5 to developers, a scant week-and-a-day after Beta 4. Previously Beta 2 and Beta 3 had been arriving every second Tuesday like clockwork, so was is this a sign of acceleration pre-WWDC, important fixes that needed pushing out faster, or just an early surprise for developers anxious to keep up to date?

Update: amrusch2 in our forums points out this “early” release could be in anticipation of the OS X 10.5.7 Leopard update rumored to be on track for this Friday. Compatibility update perhaps?

Get it via http://developer.apple.com/iphone/

(Via shutter in our forums)

Not sure if this is new to Beta 4, or if it appeared earlier in iPhone 3.0, but it’s the first we’ve seen of it so we’re passing it along. What is it exactly? Simply go to Contacts, pick a name, and then swipe to call up the red “Delete” button that we all know and love from Email and other, previous apps going all the way back to iPhone 1.x.

Nice way to speed up removing unwanted or outdated information. Thanks Apple!

(And thanks Adam for the tip!)

Did iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 refresh the dictionary behind predictive text? Based on a few emails we’ve gotten it looks like Apple might just have altered — hopefully expanded and improved — the engine that tries to make multi-touch typing just automagically work.

Let us know if you’ve seen anything different in beta 4.

[Thanks Adam!]

TiPb predicted an iPhone HD way back in October of last year. We’ve also covered the idea that iPhone 3.0, perhaps only in conjunction with new hardware, will finally give us some much-wanted video-shooting, editing, and sharing goodness. Business Week, however, amid worrying about Hulu and iTunes, snuck in this little nugget about both of the above:

A person familiar with Apple’s plans says it’s simple to record and edit stunningly sharp video with the device—and then wirelessly send it to friends with a few clicks or watch it on the phone’s improved screen.

Okay, so maybe they’re just fixing the color temperature again. Maybe they’re going OLED. Or maybe we really will see an 800×480 iPhone HD announced at WWDC? Can June seem any further away?!

We’ve mentioned previously how iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 enabled an App Store tab in Preferences for managing and switching between iTunes Accounts. Looks like this feature is also available directly from the App Store application itself.

Scroll down to the bottom of a main page (i.e. before you’ve selected a specific app to look at) and you’ll find a button containing your account user ID.

Tap on the button and you’ll be given options to View Account, Sign Out, or Cancel.

Much more convenient than having to exit, launch Settings, navigate, switch accounts, go back…

Thanks Apple! More screenshots after the break…

(And thanks Roberto for the tip!)

A minor tweak in iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 changes the language for the — still-unannounced by Apple — “Find My iPhone” feature from simply saying it uses your MobileMe account at me.com, to saying it uses a MobileMe Web application.

The assumption has always been that this feature would let you track a lost iPhone (or perhaps the child for whom you bought it), web application sounds — at least to us — a tad more substantial in terms of implementation.

Since Apple will have to build out MobileMe to support this, and since we’re speculating anyway, we’re also still hoping a revamped MobileMe in general might make a guest appearance at WWDC (where Phil Schiller introduced it last year). With note sync finally available, adding it to MobileMe seems an obvious move. Tasks/Todo sync, as well as Photo Sync (currently photos can be shared and stored, but sync only to iPhoto web albums, not to the iPhone) and perhaps — some of the other improvements we’ve dreamt of?

/Tangent

(Thanks to Cody for the tip!)

Business Week (via Daring Fireball) is adding fuel to the rumors of Apple’s iPhone 3.0 may not only be shooting video come WWDC, but editing and sharing as well:

I’ve spoken with a source that is familiar with Apple’s plans for the next iPhone, which may well be announced at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in early June. Evidently, shooting video is as easy as it is with a Flip, the ingenious device made by Pure Digital (recently purchased by Cisco). Then there’s an iMovie app that lets you quickly save the sections you want, right there on the phone itself. There may also be support for MMS, so the clips can be shared wirelessly with friends. And because of the iPhone’s relatively large screen, your friends don’t have to schlep to your PC or their Facebook page to see that video of your kids or your safari. Just hand them your iPhone.

Questing — will this only be available on the next generation iPhone or will current (and older) iPhones be so blessed, lower-quality camera and processors not withstanding?

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We mentioned the new Store Setting tab just a short time ago. daveizzle on Twitter made the observation that this functionality makes it seem like you could theoretically sign into one account, download apps, sign out, sign into another account, and download apps from that account as well, all onto the same iPhone or iPod touch. Boom. Support for multiple iTunes accounts right on the device.

Why would that be interesting? Say your spouse had already bought a $9.99 app. App Store lets the same account re-download that app to the iPhone without a second charge, so it becomes a way to “share” applications (as long as you trust the person enough to put your iTunes password into their device). Another scenario would be a UK users wanting to download a US-only app. They could log into a US account, download the region-restricted app, then log out and log back into their own, local account.

Note: This has been possible all along via syncing from iTunes. Any apps downloaded from any account would transfer over to the iPhone. This merely extends the purchase and/or download process to the iPhone, further releasing iTunes tethered hold.

(Of course, since you can’t re-download music for free, and you can’t download movie or TV show videos directly to the iPhone, this pertains only to App Store content — likely to prevent Big Media heads from ‘sploding).

No sooner has iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 been released, then our tip-lines have been filling up with finds. So far the big news looks to be that that mysterious “Store” tap, icon-less and empty in previous betas, now sports user info.

Also, the camera is now polite enough to ask if you like the photo you just took and want to save it, or if you don’t and want a chance to re-take it. Note: we’re not sure about this change yet, it may only be implemented for MMS, and may have been around in previous betas (lots of maybes, we know, we’re trying to sort through everything as efficiently as possible.) If it is system wide, some of us will lament the loss of our ability to rapidly snap photo after photo without the interruption of requesters…

(Thanks Andrew and anons!)

Like clockwork, Apple has released iPhone 3.0 Beta 4 along with iPhone SDK 3.0 Beta 4 to developers. This marks the 3rd consecutive alternate-Tuesday update following the original Beta 1 release. Beta 2 and Beta 3 were both heavily scoured by code-divers who discovered several new, as-year unannounced features (see our updated iPhone 3.0 walkthrough for more!).

Will Beta 4 be any different? We certainly hope not!

Note: We’ve gotten reports that developers must install the iTunes 8.2 pre-release before attempting to install iPhone OS 3.0 Beta 4.

Also remember iPhone 3.0 is a real Beta intended for developers and testers, not for daily use on a primary phone. If you don’t need the beta, don’t install the beta, and for Jobsake don’t buy it off of eBay. Yikes!

(Thanks Danny, Andrew, and all those who sent this in!)

Back before the iPhone, I was using one of GRC.com‘s long, pseudo-random passwords for my WPA-protected Wi-Fi network. Typing it into iPhone 1.x, even iPhone 2.x was a non-starter, however, so I shrank it down considerably.

Similar security-conscious folks have lamented not only the lack of copy and paste on the iPhone, but especially the lack of “paste-into-password field” to support just those kinds of super-secure strings.

Well, it looks like we might be getting them — along with the previously discussed copy and paste features, in iPhone 3.0.

Whether this makes it or not into the final release version is something only time will tell (because Apple, of course, isn’t saying).

But we want it.

The forums continue to grow here at TiPb and that is without a doubt a great thing. We are rapidly approaching a crazy time with WWDC coming up this June so the rumors and new iPhone talk is a buzz. All of the following threads have to do with, you guessed it, iPhone OS 3.0 software and new hardware.

If you are reading this site, chances are you are a big fan of Apple and it’s ever popular iPhone. But with that said, most of us know that it’s not a perfect device. So new forum member, lindawittsell, wants to know what are the 3 biggest drawbacks of the iPhone?

The next thread we have for you today is one for anyone thinking about purchasing an iPhone now or in the near future. The big question being, should I wait for new hardware to be released or bite the bullet now? We here at TiPb think it would be in your best interest to wait but if you see a deal that simply can not be passed up, go for it. One thing is for sure, technology never slows down so no matter when you pick a device up, around the corner a newer better version will become available.

This thread was started by PirateNinja and he may have gotten some false information from a AT&T sales rep. This rep claimed that there absolutely will be no new iPhone hardware this summer. In the end, they are salesmen who want to sell you anything they can. While we are 99% sure there will be new hardware, what types of stories have you heard from other AT&T reps? The best advice we can give you here is don’t believe everything you hear or read. As for me personally, I’ve learned that you get the more accurate information from places like TiPb and it’s forums than you will from any type of sales rep from any cellular company.

Lastly, we would like to point out that if you are a developer or a current user of the iPhone OS 3.0 software be sure to check out TiPb’s iPhone Developer Forum. Feel free to discuss the new features, bugs, unannounced features, etc… Just don’t ask anyone for the software or developer codes or you risk being banned from the forums.

See you on the forums!

Ars Technica has heard from those ever-enigmatic “sources familiar with” that there might just be more going on behind the rumored new Voice Control feature in iPhone 3.0 than we’ve seen so far:

Jibbler appears be an enhancement to the iPhone SpringBoard application, the Finder-esque app that acts as a launcher and will support the newly announced 3.0 Spotlight search. Jibbler may be controlled via the iPhone headset—button squeezes could be used to record short voice segments from the user, which Jibbler will then interpret. Voice synthesis can then be used to give the user a response, similar to the latest generation iPod shuffle, which can “read” playlists and track names—the difference being that the iPhone hardware itself could handle real-time voice synthesis.

Okay, so the code-name is worthy of a Microsoft de-branding exercise, but the technology is intriguing. Apple certainly has taken steps towards voice implementation with the latest iPod shuffle‘s VoiceOver and recent headsets have raised the bar (perhaps too much) on control clicks.

Many users have asked for simple voice dialing. Is Apple providing that and, in typical fashion, wondrously more with “Jibbler”, or is it a case of breaking a simple function by stretching it too far?

We covered some new finds in iPhone 3.0 over the weekend, including MobileMe data merge and commercial Wi-Fi auto-join, but we’ve also updated our complete iPhone 3.0 walkthrough with all that and more, so if you haven’t checked it out lately, go take a look.

It’s still months from Apple’s nebulous ‘”summer” release date, so more will change, and maybe even a bit more will be added before it drops, let us know if there’s anything specific you’re looking for, from Apple, or from us!

Following up on the MobileMe data merge screenshots… We’d heard mention of this when iPhone 3.0 was introduced, but it’s the first time we’ve actually seen how it actually works. WiFi Settings now includes and option for auto-join, which we’re assuming saves passwords for commercial, web-fronted WiFi services like you’d find at a hotel or coffee shop.

Also, when you log in, you get a special slide-up window with some new controls and an embeded web-view — no more app-jump to Safari.

Very nice!

Again, for more iPhone 3.0, check out our giant walkthrough…

We’ve now gotten a few reports and some screenshots of yet more new functionality in iPhone 3.0 Beta 3.

First is “merge”. If you already have bookmarks, contacts, or other data on your iPhone (for example, if you synced it over via iTunes) and you enable MobileMe, a menu will slide up asking if you want to merge the data, not merge (i.e. replace), or cancel.

Next are “Publishing to MobileMe”, which shows a direct upload status bar, and new options to view published items on MobileMe, or “tell a friend” (via MMS?).

More screenshots after the break, and for a far more detailed look at the beta releases so far, including WiFi Auto-Join also posted today, check out our massive iPhone 3.0 walkthrough.

Apple Insider scored some iPhone 3.0 Beta 3 screen shots, some we’ve already seen before, but some showing off a new goodness like the Settings option for Notification (though where Apple’s usual Smiley Face w/Badge icon went to is anyone’s guess). We did a quick check, and no one we contacted had this pane visible yet, so it may only show for those actively receiving push notifications, or who have done some digging through the code.

It’s nice that Apple will apparently let users globally enable or disable the different types of Push Notification: Sounds, Alerts (text boxes), and Badges. It will be even nicer (perhaps vital) that we also get to selectively enable/disable them within individual apps as well. For example, Twitter can badge, IM can Alert, new RSS only Sound.

NOTE: “Carrier Settings” aren’t new. They have been visible on networks like Rogers since 2.0 (perhaps because Rogers subsidiary Fido also carries the iPhone in Canada?)

They also show off some evidence of battery percentage-level numeric indicators in both black (good) and red (danger!), as well as Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard-style data detectors, which we’ve seen in previous betas, but are highlighted for the Notes app.

Check out their full post for more screen shots.

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Jeremy recently whipped up an iPhone 101 how to on using Restrictions to set some parental controls, and we’ve had a peek at what Apple already surfaced in previous iPhone 3.0 betas, but now it looks like Beta 3 gets a tad more granular with an extra option:

• In App Purchase

Along with Installing Apps, you can selectively disable the ability for you, or someone you parentally control, from impulse buying those extra game levels or custom sound systems and super-weapons.

Likely a Good Thing.

Ars Technica is reporting that the way Push Notification works has been, according to developers they’ve spoken with, improved in the latest Beta 3 release of iPhone 3.0. To wit:

The major change in the UIKit API is that Apple has added separate types for the three notification methods: badge, text alert, and sound. Developers can register their apps for these different notification types individually for the needs of their users. Previously, apps registered to received remote notifications but controlled the type via settings. Developers we spoke to universally agreed that this was a welcome improvement.

Still nothing in the way of non-obtrusive, Google Android- or Palm Pre-style notification, nor any indication of how Apple will gracefully handle multiple modal dialogs popping up all at once, but there’s still time to wow us with something awesome come WWDC, right Apple?

Ars also mentions some interesting developments regarding Dashcode (widget development) for iPhone, and more, so be sure to check them out.

Apple has once again iterated on the iPhone 3.0 beta, with version 3 now available for registered developers to download via http://developer.apple.com/iphone/.

iPhone SDK 3.0 beta 3 and iPhone OS 3.0 beta 3 are now posted to the iPhone Dev Center. These versions are for development and testing only and should be installed on devices dedicated to iPhone OS 3.0 beta software development. Please read the iPhone OS Pre-Install Advisory and the iPhone SDK 3.0 beta 3 release notes before downloading and installing.

As a reminder, you can now test your applications that will use the Apple Push Notification service. Team Agents can log in to the iPhone Developer Program Portal and proceed to the App ID section to create the components necessary to begin testing applications using the Apple Push Notification service.

The Beta 1 was widely showcased at Apple’s iPhone 3.0 Sneak Peek Event, and Beta 2 was almost as widely deconstructed by code divers to find new hardware version codes, video support, voice command, and a host of other unannounced features. What will Beta 3 hold? Stay tuned!

Reminder: iPhone 3.0 is a real Beta intended for developers and testers, not for daily use on a primary phone. If you don’t need the beta, don’t install the beta, and for Jobsake don’t buy it off of eBay. Yikes!

The Wall Street Journal reports that while Steve Jobs remains home on leave of absence, with chief operating officer Tim Cook managing the day to day business, Jobs is still keeping active tabs on the greater strategic vision, including iPhone 3.0:

He regularly reviews products and product plans, and was particularly involved in the user interface of the new iPhone operating system that Apple unveiled last month, these people say.

While Jobs is expected back at Apple in June, it’s unknown if it will be in time for the big next generation keynote, and whether or not he and Apple will decide it’s in either of their best interests to put him on up stage and under the spotlight so soon upon his return (especially considering how stock manipulators and blogeratti both have reacted to his health and appearance in the past.)

Of course, that won’t stop many of us, myself included, from creating elaborate, heroic return fantasies for Jobs, live on the WWDC stage, iPhone HD pulled casually from his jean pocket and held up with a trademark “boom!”

[via MacRumors]

When it rains, it pours, and when it’s pouring, and leaking, that makes a flood. No sooner did some video-recording iPhone 3.0 screen shot confirmation get posted, than BGR whipped out a slew of their own.

Double confirmed now? And will it require that next gen iPhone hardware?

MacRumors has scored the scoop, showcasing what looks to be actual screen-shot caliber evidence of video recording in iPhone 3.0, and other information showing digital compass technology and voice control coming as well.

Most of these rumors have been around for a while, especially the camera and video recording bumps. A digital compass, like the Android G1 uses to automatically rotate Google Street View when you physically turn the device around, would likely require the next gen iPhone hardware pretty much everyone expects to see come WWDC in June anway. Voice control, especially voice dialing, would be another box checked off the old “missing features” straw-man we — and everyone else — likes to batter about.

With lots of exciting new features still being “discovered”, what other goodies will 3.0 code diving reveal?

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Confession: I haven’t listened to FM radio since… well, since I got my iPhone, but it seems FM isn’t just for Top 40 any more. 9 to 5 Mac, which found more details on the previously mentioned Broadcom BCM4329 wireless chip, which could include:

the ability to receive and send (the previous model could only receive) information through FM radio signals which theoretically could be used to broadcast sound into car stereos..without external adapters. It could also be used to pick up FM radio music, news and sports broadcasts on their iPhones and even, in August, on iPods. Currently the FM reciever is only used to pick up communications from the Nike+ peripheral.

Of course, just because the chip supports it, doesn’t mean Apple will surface that support, or use it for anything other than what it already does (like Nike+).

But here’s the thing: are the rumors flying just a little too fast and too far now? Are we really going to get everything and a bag of quad-core chips in the next iPhone hardware release, or are we — as per standard internet protocols — just hyping ourselves up for massive disappointment come June?

[via MacRumors]

When iPhone 3.0 Beta 1 was released, we saw what looked to be an errant video upload screen. Next it was the apparent ability to receive video MMS. Now more deep diving into the 3.0 beta has turned up resource files that show not only may the next generation iPhone allow not only video recording, but perhaps video editing, including trimming as well. This might be similar to the already surfaced Voice Memo app’s ability to trim audio recordings on device.

Would make a nice addition to that rumored 3.5 or 5 megapixel camera, enhanced CPU and GPU, and fast cell and WiFi networking, wouldn’t it?

[BenM.at via TUAW]

BGR, prompted by a forum post on MacRumors, has tested out some iPhone 3.0 functionality and…:

We’re happy to report that you can receive and play videos over MMS just fine

Sure to be a hit with the MMS lovers, though also likely to once again inflame the “no-video-recording-on-iPhone” frustraterati!

[Thanks to Gabriel for the tip!]

TheLoopBlog has posted, MacRumors confirmed, and we’ve been able to verify as well that as of yesterday’s iPhone 3.0 Beta 2, Apple has enabled 11 Home Screen pages for app storage, up from the previous 9. This raises the total number of apps available on the iPhone at once to 180 (up from 148).

So, is this an improvement in that we get more overall pages of apps for storage, or is this just more wear and tear on our already exhausted swiping fingers? Is more better, thanks Apple very much! Will Spotlight be the new swipe anyway? Or do they have to start considering different ways of letting us organize our apps as well?

UPDATED: According to the screenshot we just received, looks like Apple has, for the first time, re-jiggered the order of Apps on the Home Screen (previously they just added iTunes and then App Store). Now Voice Memo takes Clocks spot, Notes switches with Calculator, Clock goes where Notes was, and Calculator bumps Settings to the bottom row along with iTunes and App Store, which move left a slot to make room. Not sure about this new arrangement, what do you think?

Also, there’s apparently a new Settings panel for Store, although it sounds like it’s blank right now.

ORIGINAL: Sneaking in just before the end of March, Apple has released iPhone OS 3.0 Beta 2, both SDK and firmware to developers. If you’re spinning apps for this summer’s big release, head on over to developer.apple.com and get your download on.

TiPB has already done a fairly extensive iPhone 3.0 walkthrough of the front-facing elements of Beta 1, but we’ll have to wait for the usual deep-code divers out on the internet to let us know if there’s anything new surfaced in Beta 2.

Looks like another desktop Safari 4 Beta feature has found its way into the iPhone 3.0 version of the browser. Now, when you go to a site with an enhanced security certificate, the text on top of the browser turns green (like the green bar, we get it!), with little green lock icon beside it, and the name of the certificate’s trusted organization. For example, the above screenshots show how Apple’s order status page looks on iPhone 2.2.1 (top right) and iPhone 3.0.

What does this mean for users? In an age of increased phishing attacks, where bad sites try to trick you into thinking they’re your bank or shop and steak your login or credit card info, this is one more visual cue in your assessment process for determining if you can trust that the website is what it says it is.

Come iPhone 3.0, look for the green text on top of Safari and carefully check to make sure the company it identifies is the one you want to be dealing with.

We mentioned yesterday that iPhone OS 3.0‘s Mobile Safari Browser was being reported as faster than the current iPhone OS 2.2.1 version. Now Ars Technica has run the numbers and the results are pretty impressive. Check out their full report for all the details, but this sums it up nicely:

According to our sources, the 3.0 beta still has some stability and speed issues, so that makes these results that much more impressive. While the overall average gives the iPhone 3.0 beta a 300 percent speed advantage, some of the individual tests show 6x, 8x, or even 11x improvements—the bitwise “AND” function even runs 16x faster than in the current version of Mobile Safari.

Should make the release version of the new, Nitro-powered Mobile Safari 3.0 fairly impressive, come summer! Bring on them multi-app Facebook pages, the iPhone will be ready! (Joking… a bit.)

We so fondly remember Palm’s Roger McNamee stating the Pre would be a million times faster on the web than the iPhone (now retracted), and even our sister-site PreCentral.net jumped on that band wagon, saying the Pre looked to be 4x faster than the iPhone.

Of course, we mentioned that on Sprint, lacking simultaneous voice and data, even a million times zero is still zero. Less flippantly, however, when Safari 4 Beta shipped for the desktop with its new ultra-fast Nitro (formerly SquirrelFish) rendering engine, we figured it would only be a matter of time before that scaled down to the iPhone’s version of Safari (based on the same WebKit foundations as desktop Safari, as is the Palm Pre browser and Android Chrome Lite).

Now Daring Fireball and Wayne Pan posit that turbo boost might have already happened in iPhone OS 3.0:

Wayne Pan has braved the NDA waters and published JavaScript benchmarks for iPhone OS 3.0, and they are impressive — with results ranging between 3× and 10× faster than iPhone OS 2.2. And I’ll confirm that MobileSafari on iPhone OS 3.0 passes my simple “could be Nitro” recursion depth test.

From what we’ve seen of 3.0, it seems that way to us as well. Along with HTML5, CSS, 2D and 3D animation, anti-phishing, AutoFill, etc., it will be interesting to see what Apple and the WebKit team can pull of by the time iPhone 3.0 launches this summer…

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Speculation on the 3rd Generation iPhone, plus: Just can’t get enough of that tasty iPhone 3.0 Beta! Listen in!

News

• iPhone: the Next Generation
  • Next Gen iPhone to Sport Entry-Level-Laptop Class CPU?
  • AT&T Leaks! New iPhone to be Announced this June?
  • Next Gen iPhone to Have Video Recording and Higher Megapixel Camera?
  • Next Gen iPhone to be an Internet Screamer? (802.11n? 3.5G HSPDA+?)
  • Apple to use OLED in Next Gen iPhone Screens?
  • iPhone 3.0: Code References iPhone Gen 3 and 4 Hardware? And iPod touch Gen 3? And iProd 0? iFPGA?
  • Imagination Details PowerVR Graphics Multi-Cores Destined for Next Gen iPhone?
  • Apple Releases HD Movie Purchases in iTunes but… Got iTunes HD? And an Old Display? — NO HD FOR YOU!
  • “iPhone HD” and the Problematic Shift to Resolution Independence?
  • When in the World is WWDC 2009?

TiPb Forums

• Will you use the iPhone 3.0 landscape keyboard? by Casper TFG
• iwill we ever get GMAIL PUSH?? by jaguar11
• Check out TiPb’s Developer Forum

Thanks to Paul, Mike, and Matt for writing and calling in!

It’s summer 2009 and iPhone OS 3.0 has just been made available via iTunes. You have it up and running along with next gen Twitter clients, instant massagers, RSS readers, and all manner of Push Notification-enabled apps ready to alert you the very instant anything new is piping hot and ready.

Then it happens. 20 new Twitter DMs. 3 co-workers IM you. Every tech blog you follow updates about iTunes not crashing this time. You calendar reminds you about that meeting coming up. And your entire FPS combat team all invite you to come join their game. Suddenly Push Notification is trying to pop up 30 text boxes all at once — while you’re in the middle of an urgent phone call.

How will you handle this, Apple?

Right now a single SMS pops up a message box that you either have to deal with right away, and if you dismiss it, it’s gone. If you forget what it was for… well, that’s tough. Imagine 30 of those, all at once. Will you even be able to hang up your phone call before canceling out all of them? And if you do cancel out of them, what chance to you have to really see and process alerts #1-29?

Both the Google Android with its top-down slider and the Palm Pre with their bottom loaded notification area provide a far less obtrusive and simultaneously more persistent — and dare we say more elegant? — notification solution.

Could you, Apple, have an improved system ready to drop on us in a future 3.0 beta? At WWDC? Or is that waiting on 4.0? And if you do have a way of handling it, what is it? What can you do given the current architecture, gesture library, and frameworks of the iPhone to better handle the onslaught of notifications you’re about to drop on us?

Pull down the topmost menu bar a la Android? Create a dedicated Notification app on the Home Screen we can launch to see, like recent calls, what we may have missed?

Maybe our readers have some ideas that can help. They certainly proved smarter than us on the Bluetooth toggle question. What say you, readers, any ideas on how Apple can prevent the notification equivalent of “ping death” befalling us come iPhone 3.0 and Push Notification Service this summer?

When Apple released iPhone OS 2.0 over a year ago, very few people had access to the betas and screenshots were few and far between. Was it because early developers were seasoned, professional Mac veterans who took the NDA (non-disclosure agreement) seriously? Who knows. What we do know is that iPhone OS 3.0, following last Tuesday’s beta release, is running rampant over the internet. Somewhat less than honorable “developers” are even offering to “sell” access to the 3.0 beta. Yikes.

This has led to a lot of users getting, or at least thinking about getting, the 3.0 beta for their own iPhones.

Well, think carefully. And think twice!

This is not finished software. This is a beta, and not in the Google/Gmail perpetual meaningless beta sense. This is a true beta in that it is not meant for production iPhones, used as primary devices, out in the real world.

Who knows what kind of de-bug, trace, non-optimized, or generally not finished code is running in the current, and first iPhone OS 3.0 beta.

If you’re a legitimate developer, using 3.0 on a test device to check for compatibility for your apps and report bugs back to Apple is one thing. To think you can use it for regular, day-to-day use is quite another.

It may be slow. Lists may disappear. Sound may cut out. Connection may time out. Battery time may worsen. 3rd party apps may crash or otherwise not work well. And you may need to reset your iPhone daily, if not several times a day, to work around the beta nature of the current build. That’s what happens with a real beta.

Also, these beta’s expire, and if you don’t have quick access to the next beta, you’ll be without your iPhone — and that’s assuming Apple doesn’t wait hours or days between expiry and the next beta release.

And dropping back down to 2.2.1 isn’t always easy. The baseband is changed, and hacking back to 2.2.1 has left some users with issues they didn’t have previously as well.

So, yes, iPhone OS 3.0 has lots of amazing features, and we hope very much it will be killer stable come “summer”-time when Apple releases it via iTunes for everyone.

Until then, read our iPhone 3.0 walkthrough. Watch Apple’s video. If you’re not into testing pre-release software, if you’re not patient, if you need a reliable, primary iPhone, if you want it to “just work” think twice before loading the iPhone 3.0 beta. Then think again. One look at our forums shows it isn’t a smooth ride.

(And tech pundits who’ve told readers and listeners it’s no big deal, and to go for it, should also think twice and remember they’re often cutting edge users themselves, with many devices to fall back on — not the case for everyone.)

Last year, during the iPhone 2.0 SDK Event, Apple unleashed a slew of enterprise-aimed initiatives. Phil Schiller took the stage to showcase Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync licensing, as well as 802.1x, Cisco VPN, certificates, remote wipe, configuration tools, and more.

Schiller didn’t show up at the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Peek event (not until the apres-Q&A at least), and Apple didn’t announce something as spectacular as Exchange support this year. But was there anything compelling for businesses this time around?

First, it’s important to dispel a common internet smartphone fallacy — not all businesses are the same. Not every business, not even every megacorp, is staffed entirely with suits devoted exclusively to messaging 24×7. Many may be, but not all. Business comes in wondrous diversity, and iPhone 3.0 might have a few things that appeal to these diverse businesses.

• Anti-Phishing. Added to the iPhone Safari browser, this technology hopes to protect users from malicious websites that try to steal login, credit card, or other serious data. As more and more attacks target enterprise users (especially executives via “spear phishing”), more security is better will be a theme we’ll be returning to often.
• Call log: For those who need to document their time and activities on the phone, the greater detail provided in iPhone 3.0 will be welcomed.
• Create meeting invitations: Okay, so iPhone 2.0′s ActiveSync implementation wasn’t exactly full featured, with one of the most often-talked about omissions being the lack of any meeting invitation creation functionality. Check that box off with 3.0.
• Encrypted profiles. We’re not sure what this means for the iPhone yet, but encryption in general — providing it’s strong encryption — is typically of value to businesses that need to protect both their own data, and the data of customers. We do know that iTunes 8.1, in conjunction with iPhone 3.0, allows for password protected encrypted backups. This is a great addition for the very same reason.
• Languages: Business is increasingly international. Thanks to its virtual-keyboard, the iPhone can seamlessly transition from one language to another without requiring a different model or the physical transplantation of keys. Adding in Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Thai, and other new languages to 3.0, to go with Japanese, Chinese, and all the languages added to 2.0, makes the iPhone of even greater value to frequent, multi-national business travelers.
• LDAP: The lightweight directory access protocol is now supported for Contacts, which will allow an iPhone to hook into the enterprise directory store. Apple has it’s own, open-source CardDAV protocol as well, but the focus on LDAP this time around is likely to mean much more to far more businesses right now.
• Notes sync. It was a long time coming, but with 3.0 users will be able to sync notes back and forth between the iPhone and the Mac’s Mail client. Yeah… that’s it so far, but Apple will need to provide a Windows alternative at some point, and we’re hoping for full-on Exchange and MobileMe support as well.
• OTA Profiles: Over the air profiles… yeah, we’re stumped to. Profiles typically imply greater and more specific control, so this could be a benefit, but we’ll need to wait for more information.
• Proxy support. Another expansion to the iPhone’s internet prowess, the ability to use proxy servers will make life easier for businesses that make use of, or require, various types of proxy connections. (And yes, insert Hulu for international users comment here…)
• Revoke certs. Again, details are sketchy, but with 2.0 giving us certificates for 2 factor authentication, we’re guessing 3.0 lets us take those certificates away when and as needed. Again, more options and more security is better for business.
• VPN on demand: Another feature we don’t have details on yet, but with 2.0 Apple provided the ability to connect via secure virtual private network protocols. However, the feature had to be manually enabled and disabled. We’re hoping this makes it a more seamless experience.

Again, there are different types of business. Other new features may be of value to creative professionals, for example, such as YouTube accounts, Audio/Video tags, and live streaming. What’s likely to be of more value to everyone, however, are those 1000 new APIs Apple also announced at the event. These will let businesses themselves create customized, highly functional apps for their specific user needs.

Apple focused on these too, such as the new accessory access for the SDK, which lets peripherals talk to the iPhone via Bluetooth or 30-pin dock port. We saw demos of this being used in the medical field for blood pressure and diabetes instruments. It’s not hard to imagine the iPhone serving as a control, data visualizer, and ubiquitously connected communicator for all manner of special tools.

Hook it up to a scanner, a camera, a car… The possibilities are endless.

In-app email, embed-able Google maps, peer-to-peer (P2P) Bluetooth connectivity, custom data types, and other hooks into the system will no doubt prove invaluable to some businesses as well. Not as sexy as last year maybe, but we’re thinking it could prove to be far more powerful in the long run.

The BlackBerry will probably remain the king of corporate email messaging for now, but Apple’s play for the enterprise market continues to get more compelling, and more importantly, more creative. By providing features and functionality at a pace no other company is matching, and focusing on the many different types of businesses and business needs, their presence and preference in the enterprise will only grow.

TiPb has been following the iPhone and gaming for quite some time now. Now that the iPhone OS 3.0 announcement has come and gone, we’ve learned that there are 1000 new API‘s for developers in the SDK. This will not only help developers make better games but it also shows Apple is deadly serious about making the iPhone a true competitor to Nintendo and Sony within the handheld market. What a bright future there seems to be for iPhone gamers.

More after the break!

Apple’s ace in the hole has been the App Store since the day iPhone OS 2.0 was announced. This year, the App Store will be available in 77 countries around the world. The App Store is like having a mobile version of Gamestop built into your phone, which is something the likes of RIM, Microsoft, or Google cannot compete with (though they’ve all released, or will soon be releasing versions of their own).

With iPhone 3.0, however, Apple is again raising the bar. In-app purchases will allow you to get even more out of a game for additional fees. Say you’re playing a First Person Shooter (FPS), you can pay an additional $0.99 for example to gain access to a better gun, stronger armor for your character, or $4.99 for an expansion pack with new maps/levels. Or how about in-app purchases with the upcoming Electronic Arts game, The Sims 3. Want to buy a radio for you house? Not a problem, you can make these purchases right in the game. Now something to keep in mind, these additional items that you can purchase must have some sort of game changing ability for them to charge you. An item that would not change game play can not be sold to you. The possibilities, however, are endless.

Peer-to-Peer (P2P) connectivity is also a huge plus when it comes to gaming and handheld devices. It is something that will be key to Apple’s success in the handheld wars. What this will allow gamers to do is to play multi-player games and share information using Bonjour and Bluetooth. All of this can be done with no pairing needed what so ever. Pretty sweet deal if you ask us.

For a perfect example of what to expect from Peer-to-Peer connectivity be sure to check out the iPhone OS 3.0 announcement and head to the 54:00 minute mark to view a impressive look at a First Person Shooter called Live Fire. This game not only utilizes Peer-to-Peer but the push notification feature as well. How would a First Person Shooter use that feature you ask? It’s pretty simple, say you want to play with a friend of yours who has Live Fire on their iPhone. While you are playing simply send your friend an invite that gets pushed directly on their iPhone. They can choose to accept the invite or ignore it. Pretty nifty indeed. Will it be long before we have a friends list similar to that of Xbox Live?

It really is a pleasure to be able to watch something like this be built from the ground up. Apple really is doing a nice job at turning the iPhone into a portable gaming device. Some will say it is limited in terms of controls with games, which at the moment may be true. The platform is so new and developers have not even begun to scratch the surface. Until that happens we have yet to see exactly what is possible.

That’s not to say there isn’t any room for improvement, however. Instead of screen shots we’d still like to see streaming video previews for games. It’d be nice to be able to see a game in action right on your device within the App Store before you make your purchase.

Still, if there is a single company out there that you do not want to bet against, Apple is the one.

Our updated iPhone 3.0 Walkthrough (release version) is now online. Please re-direct yourselves there.

(We’ll keep this up for historical interest, however)

Just like January 2007 when Steve Jobs held up the first iPhone at Macworld and showed the world full screen multi-touch, and March 2008 when Jobs, along with Phil Schiller and Scott Forstall stood up at the Apple Town Hall and unveiled iPhone 2.0 and the App Store, this week Forstall and Greg Joswiack dropped iPhone 3.0 and… what exactly?

Let’s take a walk through the first beta release of the software and find out together. Of course, this being a beta, come this “summer” when the final release version is made available to consumers (free for iPhone users, US$9.95 for iPod touch users), things could be a tad different. This is the way things are now, with the first beautiful, buggy beta into for developers to test Last year there were 8 betas between the first and the final release. Who knows how many there will be this time, and what may change between now and then. So don’t take this as full feature review, just a preview.

What Hasn’t Changed

We have a very full plate here with 3.0, so we’ll start by clearing off what we can — and it isn’t much. Best as we can tell, this is what hasn’t changed from iPhone 2.2.1:

• Maps: While the SDK got a shot of Google Maps goodness in the form of imbed-able tiles and controls, it appears the app itself hasn’t gotten any additions this time around.
• Weather: Still unchanged from iPhone 1.0. Still no HTC TouchFlo 3D style animations, no landscape mode with more/different information. Nada.
• Calculator: Upgraded back in 2.0 for landscape scientific mode, calculator doesn’t sport any additions this time around.

Home Screen

At first glance the SpringBoard app behind the iPhone 3.0 Home Screen seems identical to earlier versions. Sure, the Stocks icon has had a make-over and, for some unfathomable reason, it appears a rogue designer snuck in and added diagonal pin stripes to the backgrounds of several icons, including Messages, Phone, and iPod.

With Beta 2, the previous 9 pages, allowing 148 apps total, have been expanded to 11 pages, allowing 180 apps total.

Not much else looks different. There are still tiny dots that signify your additional app screen. However, there’s now an equally tiny magnifying glass icon to the left of them…

Spotlight

On the Mac, Spotlight is the system-wide indexing and search feature that allows you to find files by scouring through metadata and text strings. Apple re-purposes the name and icon here for a new, system-wide iPhone search feature that serves up Contact names, App names, iPod media file names, Email headers (from, to, and subject), and Calendar event names.

You can access Spotlight from the main/primary Home Screen by swiping from left to right, or by clicking the Home Button. When on the Spotlight Screen, you can return the main/primary Home Screen by swiping back from right to left, or clicking the Home Button again. (Yes, clicking Home will toggle you back and forth between those two screens).

Spotlight starts with a blacked-out screen with a search box on top and the portrait keyboard on the bottom (no landscape mode for Spotlight thus far). As you type, results begin to popular, narrowing as you refine your search term. At any point, you can tap on a Spotlight search result to launch the app and/or take you to the resulting content within an app.

Hitting the Search button on the keyboard will slide it away and give you full screen results. Or almost full screen. Since Spotlight is integrated into SpringBoard, the Dock is revealed along with the results so you can quickly launch any of your four docked apps (Phone, Mail, Safari, and iPod still being the defaults) as well.

Messages

Messages replaces SMS as the top left-most app on the Home Screen, and is renamed to signify the addition of MMS (multi-media messaging service). It allows, in the case of the new iPhone OS 3.0 software, for pictures, vCards (contacts), audio, and location to be sent using the Messages interface to any other smartphone or feature-phone that supports MMS and those file types.

The details of MMS vary carrier to carrier. Not all carriers seem to have MMS enabled on their end yet, some do, and some error out. Not all 3.0 iPhones on all carriers seem to surface MMS functionality yet either. For example, some installs show a camera icon to the left of the text entry field for selecting a picture, while on others it’s completely absent. Whether this will eventually become uniform or not on release, or whether it will still vary from carrier to carrier depending on which choose to support it, we have no idea (though we obviously hope for the former).

When the camera icon is there, tapping on it will bring up a requester asking you to select between Take Photo, Use Existing, or Cancel. Take Photo brings up the Camera app while Use Existing launches the Photo picker. If you take a photo, a Preview screen will appear asking if you want to Retake the photo or Use it. If you use it, the picture is then shown, thumbnail-sized, inside a typical bubble.

Perhaps due to carrier issues, we’re also unable to determine at this time whether you can initiate an audio, vCard, or location message from within the Messages app, or whether those have to begin with Share buttons in Voice Memos, Contacts, Maps, etc. (If you have the answer, drop us a comment).

The new, system-wide Cut, Copy, and Paste service has also been introduced into Messages. It works in a similar way to the implementation in the Notes app, and we’ll cover it more fully there. One difference is that double tapping a previous SMS will give you the Copy popup allowing you to duplicate the entire contents of the SMS to the clip board. Tapping on an empty text entry box will launch the Paste popup, so you can stick the text back down in an message of your own. If the entry box already contains text, double tapping will select the closest word, and double tapping an holding will select the closet word and popup the loupe. See Notes for more on how all this works.

Messages also now includes line-item deletion and forwarding. Tap the Edit button at the top right, select the messages you want, as many of them as you want, and then hit the red Delete button at the bottom, or the blue Forward button beside it. Edit still isn’t the most elegant name for deletion or forwarding, mind you, but the functionality is consistent with the Mass Edit feature introduced in Mail in 2.0.

Lastly, Apple has also answered the call for pervasive landscape-style keyboards, and Messages is one of the text-entry apps that received it. For those who want a Cadillac-wide typing experience, enjoy!

Calendar

Calendar appears largely unchanged within the app itself. No landscape rotation for week view, no week view of any kind. What changes there are occur in the plumbing and are — somewhat counter-intuitively at least for us — hidden entirely away inside the Preferences app. That’s a shame because they’re rather significant: support for CalDAV and Subscribed Calendars.

Once added via Preferences, however, here’s an example of how Subscribed Calendars look:

Photos

The Photo app receives an update in the form of integration into the copy and MMS systems. Now, when in the Gallery view mode (where pictures are tiled in four columns of thumbnails), tapping on the Action button at the bottom left corner will no longer slide up a menu, but will place three buttons along the bottom: Share, Copy, and Delete.

Tapping on a thumbnail will select it (or de-select it if it has previously been selected). Selected photos are labeled with a red check mark icon in the lower right corner, and number of photos selected is reported in parenthesis and continuously updated beside each of the three buttons.

Tapping on Share button will let you send the photos via Email or MMS, Copy will place them on the clipboard, and Delete will trash them.

New in Beta 4, you also get the same controls and ability to share photos when in landscape mode.

In Beta 2, some well-buried screenshots were found by BGR which shows iPhone-shot video playback functionality. Whether this will be enabled for current iPhone 3G owners or require next generation hardware is unknown.

Camera

Camera gets a minor tweak, replacing the Camera Roll icon with a tiny thumbnail of the last photo taken.

A far more major tweak, currently not surfaced but discovered by MacRumors, shows off video recording and the control to toggle between still camera and video camera modes. As mentioned above, however, it’s unknown if this functionality will be enabled for iPhone 3G owners or will require next generation hardware.

Sharing to MobileMe has also been updated in Beta 3, with a new “Publishing to MobileMe” progress bar, and new options to view published items on MobileMe, or “tell a friend” (via MMS?).

YouTube

The big news for the YouTube app in OS 3.0 is account integration. You can now enter your YouTube login information for access to your Subscriptions and Playlists.

Stocks

The Stocks widget is still powered by Yahoo, and still lists your favorite stocks on top and a handy graph at the bottom. You can now swipe across that handy, however, to change it into a news feed or a more detailed set of information including opening price, high, low, volume, P/E, market cap, 52 week high, 52 week low, average volume, and yield.

Rotating Stocks to landscape mode now expands the graph to full, wide screen mode. But there’s more: youch a point on the graph and you get the exact price for that day, touch a second finger somewhere else on the graph and you get the difference in value between those two days (delta).

Voice Memos

Following iTunes and App Store, Apple’s third new built in app since launching the iPhone is also it’s first non-Store-front. Voice Memos was relegated by default to the second Home Screen page, alongside the separate Contacts app, but as of Beta 3 it’s now front and first page left-of center, shoving other apps aside a notch to claim its place.

(Note: Remote and Keynote, though from Apple, aren’t built in to a firmware update and require download or purchase separately from the App Store.)

Voice Memos, from icon to main screen, pays homage to an old-style microphone (though, unlike Calculator, we don’t believe it’s one ever manufactured by Braun…). The bottom has buttons for Record and (a rather non-intuitive-looking stack of three horizontal lines for) Voice Memos that have previously been recorded. In the middle is a sound level meter.

Tap Record to begin and the Record button becomes Pause, the More button becomes Stop, and the top of the screen flashes red to show you you’re recording and the duration of the recording.

When you’re finished recording, the More page shows Voice Memos in a similar fashion to Visual Voice Mail in the Phone app. Tap a Voice Memo to play or pause it, toggle Speaker on or off, or use the buttons along the bottom to Share (via email or MMS) or Delete.

You can also tap the blue circles at the far right of each recording to slide into an Info screen where you can further tap to slide across to a Label screen pre-populated with tags including None, Podcast, Interview, Lecture, Idea, Meeting, Memo, and Custom. Choosing Custom slides another screen over where you can input your own Label names.

Back on the Info screen, tapping on Trim Memo slides up a bare-bones editing interface for taking off any unwanted content from the beginning and/or end of your recording. Interestingly, Apple chose yellow for trim slider and Trim Voice Memo action button.

Share on the Info screen does the same thing as the Share button on the Voice Memos screen. Convenience through repetition?

Notes

First up, you can now “swipe to delete” notes from the contests listing screen, just as you could “swipe to delete” email all the way back to the original iPhone OS. Consistency points!

Next, like messages, Notes benefits from the several system-wide, or at least multi-app wide improvements in iPhone 3.0. The first is the pervasive landscape keyboard:

The big thing, of course, is Cut/Copy and Paste. It works similarly — though not identically — across all applications, so we’ll do the heavy lifting here. To start, double tap on some text. That will highlight the word and pop-up buttons for Cut, Copy, and Paste (the last of which only appears if there’s text in the clipboard). You can also tap on an empty area to pop-up buttons for Select, Select All, and Paste. (Select highlight the closest word to the current cursor position).

If you want to change the length of your selection, grab one of the blue dot handles on the top left or bottom right of your current selection and drag them in or out to add or subtract text. As you move the handles, a magnifying loupe will appear, similar to the round curser placement loupe that dates back to iPhone 1.0. This one, however, is a wide, rounded rectangle and lets you more precisely adjust your text selection.

Selected text can then be cut out or copied to the clipboard, or replaced by pasting over text from the clipboard. Text can also be pasted at the current cursor location by double tapping to bring up the Select, Select All, and Paste pop up.

If at any time you either type or paste something in by mistake, Apple has added a gimmicky but semi-cool undo feature — just shake your iPhone to call up an Undo, Redo, and Cancel dialog.

(Note: While the Mail app, discussed below, gets similar Cut/Copy and Paste functionality, so do most 3rd part App Store application that use standard text input controls. Awesome).

Lastly, predictive text in general seems to have been improved as of Beta 3. Or rather, the dictionary that tries to guess and replace words as you type seems to have been updated.

Clock

Minor tweak only in Clock so far; you get a lap display in the upper right hand corner of the Stop Watch.

Settings

As always, many of the small, yet more numerous changes Apple delivers in new firmware versions are tucked neatly away in the Settings app.

Wi-Fi increases the ease of logging into commercial-style Wi-Fi services, the kind that typically present a web-based password form for authentication. In Settings, you now have the option to toggle on Auto-Join, which we’re assuming saves passwords for commercial, web-fronted WiFi services like you’d find at a hotel or coffee shop.

Also, when you login, you get a special slide-up window with some new controls and an embeded web-view — no more app-jump to Safari.

Along with the previously discussed copy and paste features — and while it’s not yet working — it also looks like we’ll be able to paste in Wi-Fi passwords. If this works by the final release, fans of super-strong, pseudo-random passwords — the kind almost impossible to type by hand — will be well pleased.

Notifications gets its own top level button in Beta 3 and as of Beta 5 and Apple beginning Push Notification testing, not only can users globally or individually enable or disable Sounds, Alerts (text boxes), and/or Badges, but each app gets its own sub-screen to do likewise. (i.e. if you want Twitter to badge but not alert, IM to sound but not badge, etc. you can have it your way).

As with GPS on iPhone 3G under OS 2.0, Push Notification-enabled apps will ask permission on launch, and give you a chance to choose “Don’t Allow” or “Okay” on a per-app basis as well.

General Settings, Usage, found buried in Beta 2 and shown by BGR, show off a toggle for Battery Percentage, which should allow for a more precise, numeric reading of battery level.

General Settings, Network will apparently allow for Tethering to be enabled for those with carrier who choose to support it. Not surfaced in the current 3.0 Beta 1, MacRumors reported that some enterprising developers had found it and got it working none the less.

Their screen captures show options to enable Tethering for USB and/or Bluetooth, and when tethered, the Home Screen with a blue Internet Tethering band across the top, similar to the green band that currently denotes an active phone call.

General Settings, Location, when viewed with debug menus enabled under Beta 5, reveals settings for a digital compass, which would require new iPhone hardware (via BGR)

General Settings, Restrictions now provide more in the way of Parental Controls. First off, iPod has been removed from the top menu and Location has been added. A secondary menu has now been added below to provide more granular control over iPod content, allowing you to select which country/region ratings you use, and then set Music & Podcasts, Movies, and TV Shows. Control for Apps is at the very bottom.

iPhone 3.0 Beta 3 adds yet another new Restriction button, this one for In-App Purchases.

iPhone 3.0 Beta 5 further elaborates on the app restrictions, this time with options including:

• Don’t Allow Apps
• 4+
• 9+
• 12+
• 17+
• Allow All Apps

General Settings, Home increases the options you can assign to a double-click of the Home button from Home, Phone Favorites, and iPod to include Search (epic win for mobile accomplishers) and Camera.

A sub-menu for Search Results allows you to check on or off what types of information are called up in a Spotlight Search, including Contacts, Applications, Music, Podcasts, Video, Audiobooks, Notes, Mail, and Calendar.

General, International courtesy of some Beta 2 hacking, as reported by BGR, show off a tab for Voice Control. No information yet on what exactly that functionality covers.

General, Keyboard, International Keyboards (or General, International, Keyboards) now includes Arabic, Greek, Hebrew, Indonesian, Malay, and Thai. Good news for people in those regions eager to get their iPhone on.

Settings, Mail, Contacts, Calendar, allows you to add a MobileMe account, just like before. In Beta 3, however, if you already have bookmarks, contacts, or other data on your iPhone (for example, if you synced it over via iTunes) and you enable MobileMe, a menu will slide up asking if you want to merge the data, not merge (i.e. replace), or cancel.

Once you’ve added a MobileMe account, there’s now a new option called Find My iPhone. There’s no definitive information about what functionality will be included in this still-unannounced feature, but the text description makes reference to a new MobileMe WebApp that will enable it. Guesses include everything from pushing a ring sound to your phone if you’ve misplaced it in your house, to using the GPS to recover a lost or stolen iPhone.

As mentioned previously, also hidden here are the new LDAP (contacts directory), CalDAV, and Calendar Subscription, features under Add Account, Other.

Settings, Safari includes options for the new AutoFill feature, and a submenu for choosing who’s Contact Info you want to use for the fill, as well as an option to allow Names & Passwords to be stored and AutoFilled, and a button for Clear All to wipe the AutoFill database clean. This, at least, gives us some control as to whether we want the security of not storing and filling our passwords on a device that could be lost or accessed without our approval, or the convenience of saving us a lot of typing.

Likewise, the new anti-Phishing Fraud Warning can be toggled on and off. Keeping it on, of course, provides some level of safety when encountering malicious websites made to look like ones we trust, intent on stealing our login info and/or credit card data. Of course, no list of Phishing sites is ever complete or completely up to date, so keep surfing safely.

Settings, Messages now, of course, includes an MMS Messaging On/Off toggle.

Settings, iPod gains a toggle to enable the Shake to Shuffle option that Apple debuted with the latest generation iPod shuffle.

Settings, Store was enabled in Beta 4, and allows on-device switching between iTunes store accounts. You can sign in, view account details, and sign out. Then sign in under a different account (i.e. spouse’s account, different country’s store, etc.)

App Store

As of Beta 4, App Store now allows management of multiple iTunes accounts, just like the Settings discussed previously. Scroll down to the bottom of a main page (i.e. before you’ve selected a specific app to look at) and you’ll find a button containing your account user ID. Tap on the button and you’ll be given options to View Account, Sign Out, or Cancel. Much more convenient than having to exit, launch Settings, navigate, switch accounts, go back… Highly convenient.

In the minor but good tweaks department, Apple has again changed the way screen shots appear in the App Store. Now, you get full screen shots, side by side, with the ability to swipe through them. You can see additional screenshots on each side when more are available backward or forwards. (Similar to how you swipe through multiple Safari tab pages).

The other changes to the App Store, as they pertain to users, aren’t currently visible in the beta as they depend on two new functions rolled out to developers: In-App Purchase and Subscription Purchase. By way of example, if you previously wanted commercial E-Books, a developer had to wrap a reader app around each E-Book, and then sell each E-Book as a separate app on the App Store. This led to dozens upon dozens of apps that were just more books, or otherwise variations on the same functionality with different content.

With 3.0, a developer can now sell you an E-Book Reader app, and inside that app, they can sell you the individual E-Books. If you choose to buy another E-Book, the same type of iTunes confirmation and password requester will pop up as when you buy a stand-alone app, and the same iTunes-side billing and processing happen.

This can also work to buy additional levels or extra content in games, and theoretically map packs for navigation apps, etc.

Yes, Apple just invented the $0.99 scaleware model. Buy the low-price of entry into version, and if you like it, buy more. It’s not a demo, it’s not shareware, but it does let developers do low cost of entry content for users to try before the buy… more of it.

Why $0.99? To avoid user confusion, Apple won’t let developers sell additional content to apps they gave away for free. If you want to charge more later, you have to charge at least something up front. Otherwise, “free apps stay free.”

Subscriptions, for their part, seem to work just like In-App Purchases, with the pop-up advising you are purchasing X issues of Y content for Z dollars. (e.g. 6 months of iPhone Monthly for $1.99).

(Note, the following are screen captures from the iPhone 3.0 Sneak Peek event, not screen shots from live beta apps).

Although not strictly an App Store update, Apple also announced (again) their Push Notification Service. What does this do? Let’s say you’re running a 3rd party IM (instant message) client on iPhone 2.0. When you exit the app, you no longer know if you’re receiving more messages. (Sure, there are work around over SMS and Email, but the app itself is dead to you).

With Apple’s Push Notification Service, if you close that same app in iPhone 3.0, anytime someone sends you a new IM, an alert will be sent from the developer’s servers (yes, they’ll have to keep a session open for you on their end), to Apple’s Push Notification Service (PNS) servers.

Apple’s PNS server will have a constant TCP/IP connection to your iPhone (yes, they’ll be keeping connected to you, like they already do for MobileMe push if you use that service). Once they get the alert from the developer, they will “push” it out to your iPhone 3.0.

PNS currently supports 3 kinds of alerts: badges (like Mail uses to show you unread messages), custom sounds (like a beep or bell or anything already built into the app by the developer), or modal message boxes (like the kind that pop up to tell you your battery is at 20%).

Apple isn’t making any promises on up-time for the service, and any new service will have delays and downtime — and Apple was quick to point out even SMS isn’t 100% reliable when asked about it. What PNS doesn’t solve, however, is the lack of good notifications on the iPhone, and applications that require multitasking for something other than notification (i.e. streaming internet radio apps).

Imagine if 10 apps try to push out 10 alerts at the same time, how will Apple manage those on your device? Will you have to “cancel” or “accept” 50 modal message dialogs, or be hit by a cacophony of 30 random sounds? We don’t know yet, but hopefully Apple will address this.

Streaming internet radio apps, however, seem to still be out of luck with this solution…

Among the 1000 new APIs Apple announced which will make the next generation of apps so exciting, including zero-hassle peer-to-peer networking, embed-able Google maps, and iPod library access, what really stands out is Accessory Integration.

With this new functionality, future apps can directly interact with accessories via the 30-pin dock port or Bluetooth. Apple showed off an equalizer app for a stereo, an app for an FM tuner, a diabetes interface for a medical test device, and a blood-pressure interface app. This has the potential to do for mobile accessories what the App Store did for mobile applications. Big.

Phone

Minor tweaks only so far for the Phone app, including a section under the Recent tab, when you tap the arrow to get more information, that shows you incoming calls from that contact, the time, and the duration.

The Contacts tab (and the stand alone Contacts app) now integrate the “swipe to delete” functionality we all know and love from Email and other, previous apps going all the way back to iPhone 1.x. Simply pick a name, and then swipe to call up the red “Delete” button.

Email

The changes to Email are very similar to the changes to notes. You get the wide keyboard when you rotate to landscape orientation.

You also get the same Cut/Copy and Paste functionality with a couple notable exceptions. First, you get support to copy rich text formatting (bold, italic, html). Second you can also paste pictures you may have copied from the photo app. We’re not sure if there’s a limit to the amount of pictures you can send via 3G from the iPhone in a single mail yet, but we’ve received 9 in one shot so far. If anyone has reached a hard limit, let us know.

Spotlight lives inside Mail to, just like it did inside Contacts with OS 2.0. Scroll up slightly inside a mail box and you get the search input and buttons letting you choose between From/To/Subject/All. As an added bonus, you can also go beyond the local store and “Continue Search on Server…” for Exchange 2007 or later, or for IMAP installations that support it.

Much like Mac OS 10.5 Leopard, Apple has expanded “data detectors” in iPhone 3.0 Beta 2. While previous firmware would identify phone numbers and link them to the Phone App (just as web and email addresses link to Safari and Mail respectively), now 3.0 will try to identify address location to link to Google Maps as well.

While we haven’t seen them yet, presumably this will work in all text-centric apps.

Safari

Mobile Safari gets the Cut/Copy and Paste love from Apple as well, although it works a little differently here than it does in Mail or Notes. Perhaps because double-tap is already used for zooming, and maybe due to restrictions in text selection already established by the zooming method (which reads HTML tags to determine the block size for zoom), Safari can’t select specific words or strings of words for Copy. Instead, you hold your finger down on some text (as you would in other apps to trigger the magnifying loupe) and the entire paragraph of text is selected (everything within the P, and perhaps DIV and other similar containers).

Sites that don’t properly format (i.e., use several BR, or line-break tags to simulate paragraphs) are now exposed for their shenanigans by confusing the Copy mechanic, resulting in entire reams, or even pages of text being selected. (For shame!)

Instead of blue dot handles at the top/beginning and bottom/end of the selection, Safari initially gives us blue dots center on all sides, and they can be pulled up or down to select previous or following text blocks respectively. Again, lack of proper HTML formatting can reduce the reliability (so coders, fix your stuff!)

If you move the handles around inside some paragraphs, you’ll get the same top/left, right/bottom text string selectors, and magnification loupe, that you find in Notes, and that will let you pick specific words within the paragraph. This doesn’t seem to work on all paragraph blocks yet (Apple.com didn’t seem to work, Google search results did), so this may also vary depending on the specific HTML tags wrapped around the content, or it simply may not be a finished implementations yet.

Why are we only discussing Copy and not Cut or Paste? Those last two aren’t implemented for read-only text like a web page, nor does Cut/Copy Paste seem to work yet in text boxes, but that could still be forthcoming.

Updates to Safari don’t end there, however, as Apple has also (yes!) given us the option now to open links in new pages (the iPhone equivalent of tabs). Tap and hold on a link, and a menu pops up with the link path listed on top, and the option to Open the link (in the current page), Open in a New Page, or Copy to the clip board. As this is the same gesture used to allow Image Save in iPhone 2.0, if the link happens to be a picture, Image Save is rolled right into the same menu as a an additional option.

As mentioned above in Settings, if you choose to enable it, Safari will also AutoFill form fields based on your Contact info, or the Contact info of your choosing (set up in Settings), and as a separate option, passwords you’ve previously entered as well.

Also mentioned in Settings, Safari will try to protect you from Phishing sites if you enable it, presumably consulting an continuously updated blacklist of sites, presumably the same as recently implemented on the desktop Safari 4 Beta.

In addition, when you go to a site with an enhanced security certificate, the text on top of the browser turns green (like the green bar, we get it!), with little green lock icon beside it, and the name of the certificate’s trusted organization. For example, the below screenshots show how Apple’s order status page looks on iPhone 2.2.1 (top right) and iPhone 3.0.

What does this mean for users? In an age of increased phishing attacks, where bad sites try to trick you into thinking they’re your bank or shop and steak your login or credit card info, this is one more visual cue in your assessment process for determining if you can trust that the website is what it says it is.

Lastly, rendering speeds have also been improved, from 3x to 16x faster according to benchmarks. Apple appears to be using the new Nitro (formerly SquirelFish Extreme) engine to throw HTML and especially JavaScript up much faster than iPhone 2.x could. On mobile devices, this will likely make a far more noticeable difference to users.

iPod

Stereo Bluetooth is in the house! Once paired to an A2DP device (similar to current blue tooth phone headset pairing), a Bluetooth icon appears to the right of the volume slider, and an Audio Source selector will let you choose from available devices.

(Note: this seems to work in apps like Pandora as well, bonus screen shot included below!)

For audio podcasts, the seemingly useless repeat and shuffle buttons have been replaced with an email icon on the left hand side, and a speed counter on the right hand side.

Semi-implemented in Beta 4, and consistently in Beta 5, the new, tiny email icon allows you to send an iTunes Link for the podcast (similar to how you could previously email YouTube video links).

The speed indicator on the other side shows x1 during regular playback, and we presume it might show x2 etc. as Apple has previously allowed you to “speed up” talk-heavy content like Audio Books.

Where the Genius button would be on music tracks, we now have a circular backwards arrow with a 30 in the middle, which allows you to jump back in 30 second intervals.

Variable media scrubbing now lets you put your finger on the position indicator at the top, and the buttons change to a text message reading “Slide your finger down to adjust the scrubbing rate.” Do so and the speed that you scrub though the file changes. Displayed in place of the track info, options so far include half speed, quarter speed, and a fine grain speed.

While these controls would also be much appreciated in video, right now implementation is not there, or is incomplete. Movies and TV shows have the same Done and Full/Fit to Screen controls as previous OS, as do video podcasts in landscape view. In portrait view, video podcasts gain the mail link and media scrubber, but retain the shuffle control.

As mentioned in the Settings section, Shake to Shuffle is also now available in the iPod app.

Conclusion-ish

There’s really no place for a conclusion here, as Apple hasn’t yet concluded the iPhone 3.0 software and released it to the public. That will come this summer. Until then, we’re again impressed not only by Apple’s continuing ability to evolve the iPhone platform and provide those updates (again, free of charge to iPhone users, $9.95 to non-subscription accounted iPod touch users), but for the easy and consistent way in which they’re doing it. Likewise, providing the beta to developers early on helps ensure consumers will eventually get a more solid, more compatible release (if not with 3.0, then with 3.0.1 shortly thereafter). The features are excellent improvements, and the Dock and Bluetooth Access could be transformative, if not on to the level of 2.0′s App Store, than at least beyond what we’ve seen in that space to date. We’re really looking forward to the final release of 3.0, and will update our walkthrough as it continues it’s path to general availability.

Note on Using Beta Software

Unlike iPhone 2.0 Betas, where access seemed much more limited and leaks were few and far between, 3.0 seems to be on every iPhone users want-now list. Also, unlike 2.0 when many devs were seasoned pros, now Apple is touting thousands upon thousands in the program, some seemingly happy enough to enable 3.0 access for the general user base.

However, betas are intended for developers to test and report back on. They’re not as stable, not as snappy, not as feature-complete and anyone trying to use them as a production OS on their main (or worse, only) device is likely to have something less than an ideal experience. People trying to use it as such may wish they could go back to 2.2.1 almost as much as they wished for 3.0. Think thrice before taking the plunge.

[Thanks to everyone who contributed screenshots and descriptions for this walkthrough]

Tap and hold is a multi-touch gesture that Apple introduced into Mobile Safari in iPhone OS 2.0. It triggered a popup a menu that allowed users to Save Image to the camera roll.

In iPhone OS 3.0 it’s been given a bit more power. Now, in addition to selecting blocks of text for Copy and Paste, when you tap and hold on a link, you trigger the same type of popup as the Save Image function, but instead you get the URL path for the link and options to Open (in the same page/tab), Open in New Page (tab), or Copy (the URL path).

If the link is also an image, you get all of the above options, with Save Image combined into the mix.

May not seem as sexy as MMS or Stereo Bluetooth but we heart this new functionality. It will make our lives easier, which is what OS updates should do.

Go to Photos. Choose a photo. Tap the action button. Choose “Send to Mobile Me” and a screen slides up labeled… Publish Video? Hard to believe that’s a simple typo, or even a bald-faced trick. But if it isn’t, is it a sign the Video Recording — One of the features still missing in action following this week’s iPhone 3.0 Preview Event — may be coming to the iPhone come “summer”?

We can’t believe Hollywood would ever let us publish their videos, so what else does that leave us? And if Video Recording is coming, will that also be available for iPhone 2G and iPhone 3G owners, or can we speculate that Apple maybe didn’t announce it yet because it will be exclusive to a next generation iPhone (with a better camera and supporting architecture?) set for release around the same time?

[via Engadget]

iPhone OS 3.0 is the gift that just keeps on giving, this time revealing features in iTunes 8.1 we hadn’t seen before. Now, when you hook an iPhone running the 3.0 beta 1 software up, under the Summary tab you have a new option: Encrypt iPhone backup.

Checking off the option opens a pop-up window for you to enter your password.

We’re not sure yet what form of encryption Apple is using, though the Steve Gibson is us hopes it’s something with a really, really strong security focus. Especially for those in enterprise or government who might have a need for it.

(And when the time comes, using a really gnarly password like the kind GRC.com’s perfect passwords generates would be a great idea for the truly security conscious.)

When Steve Jobs first showed off the iPhone at Macworld 2007, and told the world that it would sync data via iTunes, Notes Sync was one of the items listed on his Keynote slide. Meanwhile, over on the Mac side, Apple shipped OS X 10.5 Leopard, and the desktop Mail app popped up a warning about syncing Notes to the iPhone.

This probably led you — as it did us — to believe the original iPhone on OS 1.x would sync notes.

Ha! As if! When iPhone 1.0 arrived in June 2007, Note Sync was MIA, as it was when iPhone 3G dropped in July 2008. Fast forward to iPhone 3.0 Preview in March 2009, however, and — finally — Notes Sync is in the house.

Note: It’s our understanding Notes Sync currently only works with Apple’s Mail.app Notes under OS X Leopard. It would be all kinds of awesome if Apple expanded this not only to Windows Outlook, but to Exchange ActiveSync and MobileMe for a more robust, cloud-based solution. Right?

That, and Tasks and Task Sync. Ahem.

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Join Dieter, Chad, and Rene, as they take your chat questions and talk everything iPhone 3.0. What it hit, what it missed, and what it all means to us! Listen in!

Featured Review

• Griffin Clarifi for iPhone 3G

Background Reading

• iPhone OS 3.0 Preview Event Live Meta-Blog
• Apple Posts iPhone OS 3.0 Preview Event Streaming Video
• iPhone 3.0 Beta 1 Screenshot Gallery
• Apple iPhone 3.0 Preview = Every iPhone Fanboy’s Wishlist! Copy/Paste, Turn-by-Turn, MMS, Push Notification, Notes Sync, Stereo Bluetooth, Landscape Keyboard, P2P, Subscriptions, More!
• iPhone OS 3.0: What Didn’t We Get? Video! Push Gmail! Flash! Improved Notifications! Background Multitasking! Palm Pre Features! More
• Apple Announces Copy and Paste for iPhone 3.0
• iPhone 3G to Support MMS, Original iPhone Won’t
• iPhone 3.0 to get Spotlight Device Search
• What’s new with Bluetooth in iPhone 3.0?
• iPhone OS 3.0 SDK Beta: 1000 New APIs! Maps! iPod! P2P! iPod Access! Dock Access! More!
• Turn by Turn Apps Coming to iPhone 3.0 App Store
• Apple Announces (Again) Push Notification Services for iPhone 3.0
• Apple’s Mobile OS X Now On 30 Million Devices! 17 Million iPhones, 13 Million iPod touch
• iPod Touch (2nd Gen) DOES Have Bluetooth, Gets iPhone 3.0 for $10
• iPhone 3.0: Apple Creates new Voice Memos App
• iPhone OS 3.0: Stocks Widget Gets Updated
• iPhone 3.0: MobileMe has “Find My iPhone” Setting?
• iPhone OS 3.0: Stocks Widget Gets Updated
• iPhone 3.0: Apple Creates new Voice Memos App
• iPhone 3.0: Double-Click and Type to Search! New Home Option for Camera and Spotlight
• iPhone 3.0: Mobile Safari to get Anti-Phishing, Auto Fill
• iPhone 3.0: Still a Reason to Jailbreak?
• iPhone 3.0: Tethering Enabled

Bonus Fun

• WMExperts Smartphone Theater: iPhone vs. WinPho Multitasking

Credits

Thanks to the the iPhone Blog Store for sponsoring the podcast, and to everyone who showed up for the live chat, or sent in questions!

Our music comes from the following sources:

• I Called You — iPhone Remix by Pete Leidy
via Sneakmove iPhone Ringtone Challenge

In iPhone OS 2.x, we bemoaned the seemingly useless nature of the repeat and buttons when it came to podcast playback. They just sort of hung around, like guests who were welcome when the music was playing, but just wouldn’t leave when the party was over.

Now, in iPhone 3.0, Apple has replaced them with an email icon on the left hand side, and a speed counter on the right hand side. The email icon supposedly allows you to send an iTunes Link for the podcast (similar to how you could previously email YouTube video links).

The speed indicator on the other hand, shows x1 during regular playback, and we presume it might show x2 etc. during fast forward. (Apple has allowed you to “speed up” talk-heavy content like Audio Books for a long time).

Where the Genius button would be on music tracks, we now have a circular backwards arrow with a 30 in the middle, which we figure allows you to jump back in 30 second intervals.

Variable media scrubbing now lets you put your finger on the position indicator at the top, the buttons change to a text message reading “Slide your finger down to adjust the scrubbing rate.” Slide your finger down the screen and the speed that you scrub changes. Displayed in place of the track info, options so far include half speed, quarter speed, and a fine grain speed.

Since accurately going to a location on a podcast prior to 3.0 was difficult at best, these look to be excellent enhancements.

Anything else we’re looking for from Apple for Podcasts?

We can’t use the picture Gizmodo used to headline their post, so we’re retreating beneath the wholesome banner of Megan Fox for this one (blink blink). Suffice it to say, mixing and matching from their Gawker Media heritage, Gizmodo asks the adult-content question:

Can the new OS make the iPhone the best sexual toy ever?

Exploring the new iPhone SDK’s rumble API, along with peer-to-peer, voice, proximity sensor, and other freshly unveiled functionality, they get as close to porny with it as possible before retreating to the scholarly comfort of Dr. Debby Herbenick, who inspired by one of their previous posts, offers them her iPhone sex guide (also NSFW) in return.

It’s doubtful what exactly would make it through the App Store approval process, but hey, we’re sure iBackMassagerWeSwear is already in the pipeline, right?

Apple’s Senior VP for iPhone Software, Scott Forstall, said that Apple had already built Tethering into the iPhone software, shuffling the burden of “where the heck is it then?” neatly into the hands of the still-waffling carriers.

Well, according to MacRumors, an enterprising developer has gone and shown us that Forstall wasn’t just spinning tales. Tethering (where your laptop connects to the internet via a USB or Bluetooth connection to your iPhone) really is already built in there.

Of course, with the way the iPhone brought down AT&T’s network at SXSW last weekend, the thought of millions upon millions of iPhone users burning even more data must have AT&T execs quivering in their boots… Will they actually improve capacity before allowing it on their end, and how much of that will be pushed down to the user via Tethering “plan” increases?

Would you rather have cheap but unreliable Tethering, or would you pay more for rock solid service? Or do you just want all these heavy duty data users to get off your 3G lawn?