The inimitable Steven Sande and extraordinary Erica Sadun of TUAW fame have put together an Amazon Kindle book designed to help us help Siri help us.

This short, focused book teaches you how to use Siri from the ground up. You'll learn how to achieve the the highest recognition rate as you talk. You'll discover which categories Siri responds to and find out how to make the most of each category in your conversations. You'll discover practical how-to mixed with many examples to inspire as well as instruct.

Talking to Siri: Learning the Language of Apple's Intelligent Assistant is a available now for less than the price of a fancy mixed coffee beverage. Go grab it. Then ask Siri where to find a good fancy mixed coffee beverage that you can enjoy while reading it.

Source: Amazon.com

TUAW's Erica Sadun, if ever a wiz there was, has once again hacked away at Apple's iOS 4.2 AirPlay feature and created an app called AirPlayer that gets it to stream video from iPhone or iPad to the Mac.

What AirPlayer does is create and advertise a custom Bonjour AirPlay service that pretends to be an Apple TV. Bonjour is Apple's zero configuration networking solution for allowing devices and applications to communicate with each other over local area networks. When Apple created AirPlay, it basically set up a new way for Apple TV to interact with iOS using Bonjour communications.

She's not a Windows dev but says in theory the same thing should be possible on that platform and perhaps Linux as well.

You don't need to Jailbreak to try this out (the app runs on your Mac, not your iPhone or iPad) but if you're not Jailbroken and running AirVideoEnabler you'll be limited to YouTube and iPod/Videos for your streaming (AirVideoEnabler lets 3rd party apps stream AirPlay video as well).

If you want to try it out, you can get AirPlayer from Erica's website, below. Video after the break!

[AirPlayer, TUAW]

iOS developer extraordinaire and TUAW blogger Erica Sadun decided to take a look into iOS 4.2's AirPlay feature (and see if she could figure out why it was restricted to audio-only outside Apple's YouTube and iPod/Video apps (i.e. there are only audio AirPlay API currently available to 3rd party App Store developers). Here's what she's found so far:

Having gotten this proof of concept working, there's still a lot left to get done to transform this into a stable solution that works with general applications. Keep in mind that you'll be working with unpublished APIs, so the above classes and code are not App Store Safe. That's why we have a jailbreak world, after all.

The bad news is it looks like it will take an "Act of Apple" to get proper, video-supporting AirPlay API into developers hands and into App Store apps. (So developers, get thee to the bug report system and ask for this to be fixed and surfaced asap). The good news, at least for now, is that Steven Troughton-Smith has reduced the process to a single line of code, eliminating the YouTube work-around.

Yes, it still won't be App Store safe, but it's jailbreak friendly, works flawlessly, and suggests only a single item that Apple could move to a public API to open up this functionality to developers. What's more, with a little screen scraping or off-screen layer manipulation and a clever use of AVFoundation, you can probably have games working out to Apple TV almost immediately.

Indeed...! Check out her full post via the link below for details on how it all works.

[TUAW]

iPhone developer extraordinaire Erica Sadun has been running a great series of "iPhone Dev Sugar" posts over on TUAW:

• Should you be building universal apps for App Store?
• Create shiny buttons easily
• Simulating device events with iSimulate
• Re-signing applications - Installing the 3.2 SDK alongside the 3.1.1 SDK
• Three lessons from the iPhone (big fingers, attention spans, fast launches)
• Letting go of iPhone visual design patterns
• Simple table badges
• Improved Network Reachability routines
• SwapKit

For anyone interested in the nuts and bolts -- and subtleties -- of iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch development, they're definitely worth a look. Check them out, and if you have any ninja-level tips of your own to share, don't be shy!

Draw [$2.99 - iTunes link] lets you doodle on your iPhone or iPod touch to pass the time or whip up whiteboard-style diagrams to illustrate your point, share via Twitter or email, and even challenge friend's to tic-tac-toe or homespun games via P2P.

Draw comes by way of Erica Sadun of Jailbreak, iPhone dev, and TUAW fame, and she not only knows how to make great apps, but beautifully stylized ones as well. If you want a good mix of casual productivity and just plain old-world fun on a decidedly new-world device, give Draw a go and let us know what you think.

More screenshots after the break!

Speaking of tiny, incremental improvements, Erica Sadun over at TUAW highlight a new addition some developers are seeing when entering iTunes Connect -- a submission history:

Appearing near recently reviewed items, this option opens a detail table showing how your application has worked its way through the App Store review process, and on to the shelf. Stormont details this update on his site.

Sadun also states that the amber status bubbles are slightly more verbose now, adding "waiting for review" for the freshest uploads.

If you're a developer and you're seeing these, or any other changes in iTunes Connect, let us know, and let us know what you think about them, and what else you'd like to see.

Apple has gone out of their way to point out the cons of multi-tasking background applications -- a claimed 80% reduction in battery life while on standby with a single 3rd party IM client enabled. Push Notification, likewise, has been promoted by Apple as providing a single point of coordination for 3rd party alerts routed through servers on Apple's end.

But unlike the code-once, release-done model of background processing for a single app, Push Notification requires developers to create a server system on their end as well, one that's constantly and reliably available to send alerts to Apple, and scales to an iPhone and iPod touch user base already exceeding 30 million units.

Ars Technica's Erica Sadun goes into detail on the process and problems:

Consider an application with just 10,000 users. It might service a million uses per day, assuming update checks every 15 minutes. More time-critical uses might demand checks every few minutes or even several times a minute. As the computational burden builds, so do the hosting costs. While cloud computing provides an excellent match to these kinds of needs, that kind of solution comes with a real price in development, maintenance, and day-to-day operations.

For more on additional issues, like security, and whether or not small developers will even be able to afford to implement Push Notification, check out the rest of the article.

Any developers out there avoiding Push Notification for just those reasons? What could Apple do to help you out? Offer a hosting system for small developers on Apple's end?

Ars Technica's iPhone wonder woman, Erica Sadun, has put together what must be the first expert level how-to: Pushing tweets to your iPhone with Apple Push notifications

Ars shows you how to create a Push-based Twitter update notification system for the iPhone without actually showing you any of the details due to the ongoing NDA. (But don't worry, we tell you exactly where to find the instructions.)

Nin. Ja.

Now if you need help getting your code on, it just so happens that the Stanford iPhone Application Development course (the one being offered via iTunes U) looks like it has "make your own Twitter client" on the agenda.

Ready? Set? Push Tweet!

With the iPhone OS 3.0 Preview coming this Tuesday, March 17, the question will inevitably become: when's it shipping?!

However, Erica Sadun over at Ars Technica, in an article designed to help developers better target their firmware requirements, shows some interesting data on what firmware releases iPhone owners are actually using... and it isn't always the latest.

iPhone users likely keep up to date more than almost any other smartphone platform on the planet simply because Apple and iTunes make it so drop dead simple to find out about, and install the OS updates. But even so, Sadun's article shows not everyone is doing it:

The data, covering one week and provided by Headlight Software, showed no one on 1.x (thank Jobs for that!), less than 2% total on 2.0.x, less than 7% on 2.1.x, 26.61% on 2.2, and a whopping 65.49% on the current firmware, 2.2.1 released January 27.

So two-thirds on the latest/greatest firmware, just over a quarter on the previous release (yellowsn0w unlockers accounting for some of that, we suspect), and few stragglers back in the stone ages of 2.0.

As important as this information is for developers trying to figure out how to target their requirements, we're also just plain curious. We figure TiPb readers are some of the smartest iPhone folks on the planet. So let us know, are you on the most recent iPhone OS 2.2.1 version, or are you deliberately staying on 2.2 for now? Anyone just not care about firmware and sticking with an older version that "just works" for you?

And how many would upgrade to 3.0 in a heartbeat the instant Apple dropped it?

The Situation: Developers who signed up for Apple's iPhone SDK Beta and iTunes Connect program last year are coming up on their 1 year renewal deadline.

The Problem: Apple has no mechanism in place to handle such renewals.

The solution: Er... there is none -- yet. But in the meantime, Ars Technica's Erica Sadun reports:

Apple has now e-mailed iPhone developers to extend their memberships until July 11, 2009. A short-term solution to the problem is good, but it shows that Apple is still working out the longer-term details.

Here's hoping them details get worked out soon rather than later.

Almost a year ago, Apple held their iPhone SDK Roadmap Event and unleashed the App Store concept on the world. Developers signed up for iTunes Connect contracts, and now their first year is almost up and they need to renew.

One problem: Apple doesn't yet have a renewal process in place.

Wha-wha-wha-what? Erica Sadun over at Ars Technica (following an article in Apple Insider) looked into it and found the right side of the Apple didn't seem to know from the left:

When we explained that we were looking both to renew ADC memberships and to update iTunes Connect contracts, the representative instructed us to send a query to devcontracts@apple.com. [...] We did in fact contact the iTunes Connect e-mail address, who wrote back to us saying, "Please refer to the Contact Us links at the bottom of iTunes Connect. devprograms should be able to assist you." Apparently 1 Infinite Loop does not just refer to a corporate street address.

Yikes! Hopefully -- for the sake of developers and those of us who want to continue seeing apps in the App Store -- Apple will sort this right quick.

Any developers manage to get a better answer from Apple?

There are no demos available in the App Store, we know this. No try before you buy, no download now, pay later. According to Erica Sadun at Ars Technica, even mentioning demo in your verbiage, like beta, will get you a swift kick in the rejection button. Free "Lite" versions are the only way to go.

Zach Epstein over on the Boy Genius Report wonders out loud why Apple, in its infinite usability, can't create a mechanism where Apps get downloaded free, and then expire after a short period of time unless you decide to buy and keep them.

So, does Apple really not know how to handle App Store demos yet? Or do they suspect, as TiPb does, f that demos would kill the $0.99 novelty App (and CrApp) impulse-buy business dead? After all, how many would really not tire of the gags before the demo period expired?

I'll fess up that the Lil John "YEAH!" "OKAY!" "WHAT!" travesty App would never have eaten my $0.99 had there been a demo! What percentage of Apps you've bought, do you think having had a demo period wouldn't have made sure you didn't buy instead?

As revealed by Craig Hockenberry on Twitter shortly after today's iPhone OS 2.2.1 update: developers hadn't heard a whisper of this release, no beta, not even a warning, and it wasn't compatible with the previous SDK. Nice, Apple!

It should come as some relief, then, that the iPhone SDK has now also been bumped to 2.2.1. Says Ars Technica's Erica Sadun:

In all likelihood, the 2.2.1 SDK is, as suggested, a simple bug update without any significant API changes.

So not much different from the iPhone OS 2.2.1 then?

Of course, with such a minor point release we can't really expect anything revolutionary (we'll likely need 3.0 for that). But Apple has been known to sneak some early clues into frameworks, so hopefully we'll find something to look forward to once the deep code divers get through tearing this one apart.

Not only has the iPhone 3G finally been unlocked, it's now also been hacked to work with a Blue Tooth keyboard. Sure, it's not the elegant, Apple, "it just works" solution the world at large has been waiting for, but a "it's hard work" solution for those desperate and ingenious enough to tackle it. Ars Technica's Erica Sadun breaks down the solution:

For the external approach, Ackermann modified a Robotech Bluetooth module, which he placed in an iPhone battery sleeve and connected to the iPhone (serial) connector port at the bottom of the unit. This allowed the the phone to communicate directly with the the module using the Bluetooth serial port profile.

And you can find out more at Ackermann's blog, if you want to try it yourself. Do you? Or are you waiting (and waiting...) on Apple?

A week or so ago we linked to Erica Sadun's demo of the iPhone SDK's undocumented video out feature. Well, she's been busy since then talking with Freeverse, the developers behind the hit Moto Chaser game for the iPhone. The result? The tech demo featured above.

Good news is that the possibilities are mind-boggling. Bad news is that we're not there yet:

On the 2G touch, Moto Chaser can reach approximately 20 frames per second. This makes the game, in the words of Freeverse Producer Bruce Morrison, "nearly playable." Morrison manages the Freeverse product teams and was heavily involved in developing Moto Chaser; he designed all the levels in the game. The norm for commercial games is 30fps, a point at which motion becomes as smooth and watchable as normal TV video. For reference, the current iPhone release of Moto Chaser runs at 26fps and includes many optimizations to achieve even that on the iPhone's relatively slow processor and limited RAM memory.

Check out the rest of the article for look into how they did it, how long it took, and where they might go from here...

Apple has now hit the milestone 10,000th app in the iTunes App Store, and to celebrate, TapTapTap created the awesome icon tile artwork above (via TUAW), and what's more, CNBC (via iLounge) noted that Apple has snuck in some new ad copy claiming iPhone users have "downloaded over 300 million" apps.

Those numbers are simply staggering. As Steve Jobs recently, the adoption rate is beyond anything seen before in the industry. That the App Store is as unified, integrated, and easy as the iPhone platform itself is no doubt the driving factor.

But the question increasingly becomes, amid 10,000 apps, how do developers get more of those 300 million downloads for their apps?

Icon Factory co-founder and Frenzic designer Gedeon Maheux, on his gedblog, suggests that the app icon is an important place to start:

All too often icons are treated as second-class citizens, especially in the App Store. Lately, developers have taken to plastering “SALE” or “60% OFF!” within their icons. They’ve become lazy and let the iPhone software mar their design with glossy highlights which obscure efforts to brand their software. They use dull colors or pile on heaps of detail that just adds unwanted noise to an already cluttered array of choices. After the flashy ad pitches have faded, the icon still has to live on the user’s device and is often the first line of interaction with the product.

Another tool that may help is the new promo code system Apple has enabled for the (US-only so far) App Store. Erica Sadun provides a great iPhone promo code walk through over on Ars, explaining how to both give and receive, as well as some helpful hints for developers:

You can preview your Application. Once your App has been given a green light by Apple, the codes can be used—even before the release date you set in iTunes connect. Whenever your app is "Ready for Sale", Apple says you can offer free downloads. Setting a future date and releasing previews allows you to build your buzz before you go live in the App Store.

The scariest thing of all? It hasn't even been 6 months since the App Store launched (Dec. 17 will mark that anniversary). What will things look like in another 6?

While many sites are reporting that the iPhone App Store has hit 10,000, MacRumors says it's not quite there yet, but will be soon:

While several sites have reported that 10,000 iPhone Apps have been released into the App Store, the actual number of active iPhone apps that can be downloaded is about 9,676 as of today's count. The discrepancy comes from the fact that many apps have been removed from the App Store for various reasons (trademark infringement, discontinued apps, pulled and released).

With approximately a quarter of those being games, and a tenth each for entertainment and utilities.

Want to get your App up as part of the next 10,000? Erica Sadun has some tips for you. What are they in brief?

Keep your icon consistent throughout the various sizes, don't link to web sites you haven't deployed yet, don't ever include any mention of "beta", and do not reference forbidden accessories (like a mic for the iPod Touch).

Check out the full article on App Store Lessons for much more by way of explanation and example.

A few days ago we mentioned Ars' iPhone expert, Erica Sadun was taking the lifting of iPhone OS 2.2's NDA as an opportunity to dump code and sift for gold. Turns out she's not only found some in the way of "hidden" TV-out features in iPhone 2.2, she's sacrificed her well earned turkey day to experiment with them. From her previous post, here's what's at work:

The MPTVOutWindow class allows your iPhone to send its video to a connected TV rather than to the built-in screen. Intended to be used with movies, the unpublished class creates a live video feed that is sent out through the iPhone's connector port. End-users will need to buy a video adapter or cable to use this functionality.

Early days still, but fairly awesome stuff. Can't wait to see what she and other developers -- not to mention Apple eventually -- come up with!

First up, with the previous rejection of Gmail client MailWrangler, Engadget says another app which also dares to "duplicate features" found in a Dock App (Apple's own MobileMail) has actually been accepted into the App Store. Did BdEmailer slip through the cracks? Or is this a sign of inconsistency on Apple's part? Hot on the heels of the controversy surrounding Google's Advance Voice Search using non-public API's, developer confidence in the approval process might drop even further...

...Though Ars' own Erica Sadun reveals the story of one developer who, after initially having their App rejected by Apple, tried and tried again, and without making a single change to the app, had it approved the second time around. Embarrassing for Apple, if the policies really are that inconsistent.

Speaking of embarrassing, Wired reveals that one developer actually got Amazon's mechanical turk involved in paying for reviews. Users who get $4 -- $2 to "buy" the app, and $2 in bonus for leaving a 5-star review.

Lastly, Erica Sadun is back to remind us that, with the release of iPhone OS 2.2, the NDA is now lifted regarding that firmware, and the public dumping can begin! Any guesses as to what goodies will be found?

UPDATE: iPhone dev extraordinaire Erica Sadun investigated over at Ars and found the following: Google is both linking to Private Frameworks and using unpublished APIs. While the latter is likened to jaywalking, the former is apparently a ban-worthy offense. Yikes. Check out her complete investigation for more. And now that it's public, the question shifts to what if anything Apple will do about it? Cave to Google over a killer feature and betray the confidence of other developers, or yank Google's app, alienating a huge (if guilty) partner and likely creating another furor among users?

Original post:

Is Google using private (i.e., not publicly available via the official iPhone SDK) APIs to create the silky-smooth "raise the phone and talk" activation for their new Advanced Voice Search feature in the update Google Mobile App? That's the latest question Daring Fireball's been looking into, and here's what they've found so far:

If you use something like the command-line strings utility to examine the UIKit framework, you can see that there’s an undocumented (and therefore private to Apple) method named proximityStateChanged. And if one were to strip the FairPlay DRM from the current Google Mobile application binary — which, of course, you wouldn’t do, because you’re not supposed to strip FairPlay DRM, but I’m just saying if one were to do this — a class dump of the application binary would show that Google Mobile does in fact implement proximityStateChanged.

DF posits three possible explinations: 1) No one at Apple noticed the private API usage, 2) Apple noticed but turned a blind-eye, or 3) Apple approved the use of a private API. Citing sources, DF claims #3 to not be the case, and perhaps that's why Google promoted the feature so heavily, and stirred up interest so high Apple would feel pressure to approve it (though we wonder if Steve Jobs' Apple ever feels that type of pressure?)

By contrast, DF states #1 is not without precedence, while #2 would be grossly unfair to other developers, and either way, users may suffer if Apple makes changes to their private APIs (which is one of the reasons to keep them private after all).

So what do you think? Which scenario is most likely? And what would you rather, that developers (Google or not) use officially unsupported features if it means better apps but also apps that might just break when the next firmware drops?

iPhone developer extraordinaire Erica Sadun over at Ars reveals that Apple has expanded on the iPhone SDK samples, and with some pretty nifty new stuff.

While I can't claim to understand it, included in the update is aurioTouch and oalTouch for scilloscope and positional audio, Accessory and TouchCells which (apparently!) give greater options in tables and cells, and URLCache and Reflection which focus on Web-based data and image reflections respectively.

Says Sadun:

The iPhone Reference Library is an amazing resource for developers. It offers access to sample code, guides, and release notes. The new items I listed here augment Apple's already rich iPhone sample code suite. Make a habit of stopping by the library page; Apple will often add new items there without announcement.

Check it out!

No sooner did Apple drop the iPhone SDK Non-Disclosure Agreement (fondly referred to as the [Redacted] NDA among aficionados, as it forbade developers discussing the topic even among themselves), then the floodgates of knowledge burst open. Cases in point:

According to TUAW, iPhone coder extraordinaire Erica Sadun's The iPhone Developer's Cookbook is already available in PDF form from informIT (along with code samples!):

If you’re getting started with iPhone programming, this book brings together tested, ready-to-use code for hundreds of the challenges you’re most likely to encounter. Use this fully documented, easy-to-customize code to get productive fast—and focus your time on the specifics of your application, not boilerplate tasks.

Meanwhile, Mike Clark writes in to let us know that Pragmatic Programmers is now offering a set of screencasts targeted specifically at iPhone developers:

There's also a free (no account required) 20-minute "Getting Started with Xcode and Interface Builder" screencast [where Bill Dudney] shows you how to build the simplest of iPhone apps (a Hello World app). More important, he shows you how it works---from the main functions triggering Nib files being loaded, to wiring up interface controls, and all the way through a button push running code that you write.

Of course, Apple itself is going on a World Tour and is revving up the iPhone Developer University Program.

Seriously. Has there ever been a better time to develop for the iPhone?

For the last week or so I've been beta testing a well known iPhone application. Beta testing involves using the 100 iPhone "Ad Hoc" distribution method first outlined at WWDC 2008. I was planning on writing up the process, and my experiences being involved in it (all straightforward, all great -- all definitely far more work for developers than testers) when, thankfully for all involved, one of the foremost iPhone devs, Craig Hockenberry of Twitteriffic fame, went and did it the way it should be done.

Interested in Ad Hoc distribution and how iPhone beta testing works? Get you to reading over at his site, Furbo.org.

Meanwhile, Erica Sadun over at TUAW presents a very well though out essay on how Apple could (and should?) improve the App review process with more objectivity, consistency, and transparency.

In [redacted] NDA land, John Gruber over at Daring Fireball offers an interesting theory, via a reader: what if it's all about patent protection? Seems Apple might start the clock ticking when the NDA is lifted, and the technology gets published, and their lawyers may not have all the dots and crosses in place yet.

Finally, is it time to put BoxOffice on a milk carton yet?

No, not the 2.1 firmware beta, that one's for realz. We're talking here about the Washington Post, which ran a Techcrunch story breaking the news that:

Now we're hearing from an app developer that Appleis finally going to start rolling out a new beta program in the next few days has released an Ad-Hoc program. Details are slim, but it seems like Apple is capping the total number of beta participants at 100 per app. In order to download a beta app, users will need to submit their iPhone's UDIDs number to the developer,who will then need to flag its eligibility in the store itself. All betas will still be distributed through the App Store - you won't be able to download one on an external site.The apps will be directly distributed by the developer.

Sound an awful lot like the Ad-Hoc distribution method Apple announced for educational institutions way back at WWDC to you? Sure did to iPhone developer extraordinaire Erica Sadun, who rumor smashed thusly:

The "Beta Program" will not be released in the "next few days." Ad-hoc distribution is already available and working. Developers can create ad-hoc provisions through the iPhone Developer Program site today.

Sadun also provides a handy-dandy Ad-hoc Helper app for mailing your UDID directly to a developer, should you be part of an Ad-hoc app distribution group.

The App Store went live last week (what day exactly depends on whether you snuck in to iTunes 7.7 and snooped around on your own, or waited for the official links to surface), tying in to the iPhone 3G and 2.0 software launches. How'd it do? According to Steve Jobs:

“The App Store is a grand slam, with a staggering 10 million applications downloaded in just three days. Developers have created some extraordinary applications, and the App Store can wirelessly deliver them to every iPhone and iPod touch user instantly.”

Probably why Apple has finally started putting a dent in its backlog of developer acceptances, eh? But is all happy in App Land? Nope. Find out why after the break...

Never mind the almost spam-like proliferation of ebooks-as-apps (public domain, yet packaged and charged for). There are complaints from both Daring Fireball and TUAW that some developers are engaged in App naming shenanigans, putting spaces or symbols at the beginning to sort higher:

On Twitter, Tim Wood points out that the problem is endemic to alphabetical sorting — if Apple merely disallows spaces and punctuation, the scammers will just switch to “AAAA Solitaire” to get to the top. Dave Dribin points out that Amazon avoids this by not even offering alphabetical sorting as an option. Apple should let you choose between popularity, release date (newest on top), and user ratings.

They suggest negative reviews by way of retaliation. I suggest feedback to Apple.

UPDATE: More gripes today, this one from developer Erica Sadun about how iTunes is imporperly managing App syncing -- backing up entire apps (even graphic and sound chunky games) every time, greatly increasing the length of cycle:

I don't know about you, but those new longer iPhone syncs are just killing me. Once an App has been backed up, I don't see why Apple doesn't just back up the Documents and Library data rather than backing up entire applications every single time the iPhone connects.

Me neither. Backing up changed states would be far more efficient. If backups take too long for a mobile device, people will start skipping them, defeating the purpose. Imagine if it treated +300MB movie files this way?

There have also been widespread reports of App's being buggy and causing crashes, though some developers are pushing back at this, telling TUAW that Apple may have rushed 2.0 out the door before it was as stable as it needed to be:

Anonymous developer sources are reporting that they've been poring over crash logs and discovering that the reported crash has nothing to do with their application. There's a growing consensus that Apple has released a highly unstable "final" version of the 2.0 firmware. So, maybe it's more of a shame that Apple, who laid the groundwork for a multitude of useful and exciting applications, rushed development and failed to build a better foundation.

Some 8 betas since introduction, could the deadlines really have been tight enough on either side to lead to a poor Gold Master?

UPDATE 2: Apple Design Award winner Craig Hockenberry of Twitterrific fame chimes in on just how hard it is to debug iPhone apps, and why, which may explain some of the problems:

The big problem here is that the only way to install software on an iPhone or iPod touch is with the App Store. There are also no provisions for beta testing. Without the ability to sign code, there is no way for a user to get code onto a device: most users fall into this category. The only way to “test” a fix is to release the changes to tens of thousands of users. It’s the developer equivalent of playing Russian roulette.

Arguably the "killer feature" of iPhone 2.0, we've certainly not heard the end of this.

Paul Kafasis, who along with his fellow Rogue Amoeba's raised some early concerns over the iPhone SDK, is back with a post WWDC status report, and his current opinion? Brokended.

After a month of waiting, with no contact from Apple save form letters that went out to all developers, we'd grown quite frustrated. We don't know if we should invest our time in a platform for which we may not even be allowed to release software. Finally on April 8th, one of our developers decided to apply to the program as an individual, to see what would happen. Shockingly, in under 24 hours he had a certificate which enabled him to work on actual hardware.

Kafasis thinks that Apple is handling individual applications separately from -- and for some reason much faster than -- company applications, which he finds confusing given the possible impact of large development houses and the only real (and critical) differentiator of the $99 program acceptance being the ability to tether and test actual hardware (rather than simulators) and, of course, the ability to sell through the App Store. Ultimately, he believes the problem lies in Apple's communications -- not only its lack of clarity, but its complete lacking (almost a trademark of the tight lipped company).

iPhone dev expert extraordinaire Erica Sadun follows up with some analysis of her own:

25000 applied; 4000 admitted. By any stretch of the calculator, thats only about a 16% acceptance rate. It's one that has left many independent OS X developers behind.

Was Apple overwhelmed by the sheer volume of applications? Have they botched the program from the get go? And what could they do now to help get developers (and their developments) back on track?

TUAW and iPhone dev extraordinaire Erica Sadun reports that Apple has dropped the svelte-ish 1GB iPhone 2.0 SDK Beta 5 and accompanying firmware:

The fifth beta version of the iPhone SDK is now available. Log in to the iPhone Dev Center and take advantage of all the development resources available to you—a new version of the iPhone SDK, updated documentation, the latest release notes, and more.

No word yet on what secrets deep delving this latest code may reveal, but if past discoveries are any indication, literally anything is possible (except for cut and paste, of course).

Any guesses?

Avast ye scurvy 2.0 firmware -- prepare to be pwned! Erica Sadun of TUAW tells us the cartoon Jobs'ing, Russian slang'ing, custom firmware making, iTunes loading unlock solution has hit version 1.1:

The new tool allows you to add custom packages, logos and fixes EDGE settings under 1.1.4. Either pop over to iPhone-dev.org or choose PwnageTool > Check for Updates (Command-U) directly from the app.

But don't raise the Jolly Roger too soon, rumors are also circulating that Cap'n Jobs is coming about hard, cannon's loaded, and may just be upping the ante soon in the great unloack cat'n'mouse game.

Will Apple be able to hang the rascally pirates from the highest yard arm? Are the pirates too far ahead at this point? And how ironic is it that Jobs and co. once styled themselves as the pirates? What do you think?

After waking up on Tuesday to face the dreaded Blue-- er... Pink-Screen-of-Death (?!) that signaled the expiry of the 2nd beta release for the iPhone SDK, would-be-developers managed not to go to bed angry as Apple kissed and made-up in the form of SDK Beta 3.

Erica Sadun over on TUAW reports that the latest/greatest weighs in at 1.4GB, or just three-quarters the size of the original beta, with the matching firmware at under 200MB according to a commenter.

What new goodies does this release hold? We'll have to wait a bit to find out. But with the continual slow, grinding, excruciating march towards an anticipated June release (WWDC? June 30 at 11:59 pm? Little help?) waiting is something iPhone lovers are used to.

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) is running some screen shots of what may well be our first glimpse of the iPhone's App Store.

Pretty much what you'd expect if you combined the Wi-Fi Music Store with apps, the shots came TUAW's way via a tipster. Seems said tipster claims that, after repeatedly stabbing away at the App Store button (does that mean he was running the SDK beta??) and failing to connect, lo and behold he got through.

UPDATE: iPhone l33t hax0r Erica Sadun went poking around the storeBag.xml from Apple's public iTunes server and found the following:

There appears to be a new service, labeled "p2-panda" [note: p2 might stand for "purple", the iPhone code name] that offers access to the same functionality that Cory reported on last night. Specifically, the panda calls include StoreFront listings, Genres, Top Fifty listings, and Updates. If nothing else, this independently confirms functionality seen from those screen shots.

Be sure to check out her complete post for more geeky goodness!

Erica Sadun has done it again, creating a great app for the iPhone called "findme." What it does is constantly track your iPhone's location and sends it via SMS to Twitter. The idea is that if your iPhone is stolen or you want to enable your stalkers to keep track of you constantly, you can set this up and you'll automatically have a private Twitter page that shows the iPhone's approximate longitude and latitude.

It takes a bit of know-how to get it running (it's command line. If "curl" and "daemon" mean nothing do you, you might want to move along). If nothing else, it shows that I wasn't kidding when I said yesterday that developers will always find a way to do cool stuff with native apps.

findme [via TUAW]

A couple of great iPhone apps (for Jailbroken iPhones) came out in the past couple of days. The first is AppFlow, which lets you browse your applications (but not your Web Links, they're a little different) via the sweet coverflow interface. - ericasadun.com » Introducing AppFlow [via tuaw]

The next one is Touchpad, which turns the iPhone into a trackpad for your computer. It's a neat idea, though the only use I can think of is if you have a laptop with a "nub" mouse that you want to replace from time to time. If nothing else, though, it shows the power of the iPhone:

Cool apps like these are coming out all the time on the sly now, I can't imagine what it will be like once this stuff can be official. There are, what, 7 days left in February? Apple: time to step up and either deliver or tell us it's delayed.

iPhone hacker extraordinaire Erica Sadun was poking around the calendar database on her iPhone and found some encouraging tables:

CREATE TABLE Task (ROWID INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT, summary TEXT, priority INTEGER, duedate INTEGER, completiondate INTEGER, calendar_id INTEGER);. - - (TUAW)

Full support for Tasks/ToDos is a basic feature and one that may be holding back many business users from fully embracing the iPhone. Here's to hoping that we'll see a 1.2 update very soon with full support not only for native apps, but a brand new ToDo app as well. Viva la February!

Erica Sadun, iPhone hacker extraordinaire and writer at The Unofficial Apple Weblog, has documented the entire set of Cocoa function calls required to program for the iPhone. These header files are used for programmers to properly create user interfaces, network code, and, well, pretty much everything. And the documentation effort is a massive job, usually not something to be done by just one person. I know that this site can get kind of wonky here and there, so I'll do my best to explain why this is important, but for everybody.

All of the applications available from Installer.app have been written without any formal set of documentation. So, there may be some bugs, since there's no single place to go for programming information. Usually, Apple would provide the documentation for programming on the iPhone. But, as they've recently announced, they're not going to be doing that until February. So, now anyone that is planning or writing a native Cocoa app for the iPhone or iPod touch now has the means to research how to do it.

That includes both the folks that are hacking iPhones to install and write 3rd party apps, and any larger software companies that want to get a leg up on their software development. With this set of header files, it should be perfectly possible for any large development group to prototype their program well in advance of the official Apple release.

Of course, these header files may yet change. There's no guarantee that Apple's set of documentation will stay the same; Apple will definitely be adding to this, and they may not allow some of the function calls documented by Sadun to be accessible for other programmers. No one can tell. But, it's a huge step for programming native applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch

There hasn't been a lot of noteworthy progress on opening up 1.1.1 like there was on version 1.0 of the firmware, and that's to be expected. However, there were some valiant pushes forward last week, by prominent iPhone hacker Erica Sadun who mapped out the filesystem of the 1.1.1 update. This is notable as it pre-empts the requirement to decrypt the filesystem before inspecting files and whatnot.

The other notable incidence is a TIFF image buffer overflow, which essentially means that interesting things could be launched on an iPhone by viewing a malformed image in Safari. It's within the realm of possibility that a custom-crafted TIFF picture could, for example, install a running copy of ssh on an iPhone. Or download and install a ringtone. Or any other payload a creative hacker could stuff in there, really. It's altogether possible that the next wave of users hacking their iPhone's software could be through browsing to a web page and viewing large malformed TIFF files in a particular order.

My guess is that it's safe to say that it will still probably be at least a week or two before it's possible for your average user to hack the new firmware; there's no guarantee that either method will bear fruit. The malformed TIFF will likely require a less-straightforward heap overflow, as the stack on the iPhone is set to no-execute. To rephrase that last sentence in English, it will probably take the hackers a while to get the corrupt TIFF image with code inside to do exactly what they want it to do.

The iPhone Dev Team, the same folks that have set the stage for 3rd party applications and more recently, the free iPhone unlock methods, released a statement via Erica Sadun of TUAW about Apple's positioning on the iPhone unlock and the possible bricking of iPhones. Their statement is to wait to install the patch if you've unlocked your iPhone; if you really need the update, they have a tool in the works that will restore your iPhone to its factory condition. The 'restore-to-factory-condition' tool would be useful for anyone that wanted to sell their iPhone and be assured that there's no personal information on the iPhone. The text of their statement is reproduced below:

9/25 Statement from the iPhone unlockers

Based on download numbers, the iPhone Dev Team believes that, worldwide, several hundred thousand people have unlocked their iPhones. That number continues growing every day. The removal of the lock, a bug, was a major step forward in the iPhone development. It made the iPhone free and useful to anyone, not only to those in certain countries.

Apple now announces that the next firmware update, expected later this week, will possibly break the handset of all of us free users in the World. It speaks of "damage" done to the firmware and "unauthorized access" to our own property, The removal of those firmware problems, which were built in in favor for AT&T, does not cause "damage" as they want to make us believe.

We will provide you with a tool in the next week which will be able to recover your nck counter and seczones and even enables you to restore your phone to a Factory-like state.

In the meantime we advise you not to update your free iPhone with the upcoming firmware. Wait for the next version to be fixed to work properly with your carrier and not break your phone.