Trying to figure out just exactly how to find your Mac UDID so you can get in on an ad-hoc Mac App Store beta? Just like with iPhone and iPad, your Mac has a UDID (technically a Hardware UUID) that developers can use to send you app builds before they become publicly available. Luckily, it’s easy to locate once you know where to look.

1. Click on the Apple logo at the top left of your Mac menu bar
2. Click on About This Mac
3. Click on More Info…
4. Click on System Report
5. Make sure Hardware is selected at the top left
6. The very last entry in the list on the right will be your Hardware UUID

Copy and paste it and mail it off to the developer, then wait for your ad-hoc app to arrive and start beta testing!

Of course, since the Mac App Store isn’t the only way to distribute software on the Mac, developers can also choose to simply send you a non Mac App Store — i.e. regular-style apps. If they’re developing specifically and only for the Mac App Store, however, this might be the way they choose to go. If it is, you’re all set!

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Via: @lucvandal

The guys from Applidium claim to have cracked Siri’s security protocol and it could open the floodgates to third party developers and of course other hardware too. There is a downside, in order to use Siri on one of these other devices; you still need to have a UDID of an iPhone 4S device. A UDID is a Unique Device Identifier and is a 40 character unique number assigned to every iPhone.

The iPhone 4S sends identifiers everywhere. So if you want to use Siri on another device, you still need the identfier of at least one iPhone 4S. Of course we’re not publishing ours, but it’s very easy to retrieve one using the tools we’ve written. Of course Apple could blacklist an identifier, but as long as you’re keeping it for personal use, that should be allright!

Source: Applidium

Time was a developer could call the UDID (unique device identifier) for your iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch and do with it what they would, from beneficial things like keeping your data allocated to you, to evil things like tracking you and your behavior for advertising and giggles. Now with iOS 5 beta 6 Apple aims to make it no longer so.

Deprecated in iOS 5.0

uniqueIdentifier

An alphanumeric string unique to each device based on various hardware details. (read-only) (Deprecated in iOS 5.0. Instead, create a unique identifier specific to your app.)

While deprecation doesn’t mean removal now, it does mean removal in the future. Which means devs will ultimately have to find a way around it, though according to TechCrunch some reckon Apple might not cotton to their own rules when it comes to first party services like Game Center and iAd:

“I guarantee Apple will not stop using UDID,” predicts one mobile industry CEO. If Apple does continue to use UDID for itself but denies it to developers that would be an “extremely lopsided change.”

For those concerned about end user privacy, this change will no doubt be welcome. For those who care more about convenience, it could cause some frustration. If the language makes it into the final release, that is.

[TechChrunch]

Trying to figure out where to find the UDID or serial number of your iPad, iPod touch, or iPhone? There are many reasons you may need to look up your UDID, IMEI, or serial number of your iOS device. While earlier generations had the serial printed on the back casing of the device, many newer models don’t. There are still several ways you can obtain this information both natively on your device or via iTunes.

Follow along to find out how.

As a side note, a lot of information is taken out for privacy reasons. Obviously your fields will not be empty.

Serial Numbers

There are a few ways to obtain serial numbers. The most common in under Settings.

1. Tap Settings and go into General.
2. Now click About.
3. When you scroll down you’ll see quite a bit of device information including your serial number. (As a side note, users on 4.x will not see the UDID/ICCID number on your device like in the picture above. I believe this is a new feature in iOS 5.

If your iOS device will not boot and it has a SIM tray, you can also pull out the SIM tray and view the serial printed on it. As long as your SIM tray has not been mixed up with anyone else’s, it should be the correct serial number.

UDID numbers

To view your UDID number in iTunes, use the following steps –

1. Open iTunes with your device plugged in and you will see your device name and information. Tap where your phone number is a couple times and it will eventually show your UDID number (also known as ICCID). This is the number you have to have on file to test developer builds of iOS.

2. If you need to paste this number somewhere, simply go to the top of iTunes and click Edit and then Copy. This will paste your UDID number to the clipboard. From there you can easily copy it into an e-mail or text document.

To view your UDID number from on your device, use the following steps –

1. Download a UDID app from the App Store. There are several available and most are free. I use UDID by Sean White (Free – iTunes Link)
2. Simply open the program and it will give you all of your device information.

3. You can then copy it into an e-mail or just view it.

Viewing device information from programs like UDID are especially convenient if you aren’t home to plug into iTunes and need to access the information quickly.

But what if your device is stuck in restore mode and you can’t load this information in iTunes or on the device?

You can still pull the information if you have a previous backup file as the backups are saved as “UDID – Date”.

Simply navigate to the following location and view your UDID as the name of your backup –

Backup locations in Windows

C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup

Backup locations in Mac OS X

~/Library/Application Support/MobileSync/Backup

Have you used any of these methods or a different one? How’d they work for you?

Tips of the day will range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you’d like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to news@tipb.com. (If it’s especially awesome and previously unknown to us, we’ll even give ya a reward…)

Forget to add your UDID (universal device identifier) to the iOS Developer Portal before loading up iOS 5 beta and wondering how to find it so your iPhone or iPad will activate? It happens. Your iPhone gets swapped out by the Apple Store due to a hardware issue or you get an iPad 2 and forget to add it before you install the new software. iTunes won’t help you until the device is activated. Usually you can just grab it from Xcode but if you don’t have Xcode handy, you can also get it from System Profiler. We’ll show you how, after the break!

To get your UDID:

1. Launch System Profiler (it’s in the Utilities Folder or just hit Spotlight and start typing)
2. Under Hardware in the sidebar, go down to USB
3. In the top right pane, go to USB High Speed Bus. If you have a MacBook or iMac, the first one is usually the iSight/FaceTime camera, so open the second to find your iPhone or iPad
4. Click on your device
5. In the bottom pane, look for the serial number. That’s the UDID.
6. Copy and paste it
7. Head back to developer.apple.com and add it to your authorized device list

That’s it, from crisis to cool in just a few clicks.

If you have any other developer tips, leave them in the comments!

Tips of the day will range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you’d like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to news@tipb.com. (If it’s especially awesome and previously unknown to us, we’ll even give ya a reward…)

Here is a tip for developers on how to install a beta for iOS using XCode or iTunes. One of the coolest things about being an iOS developer is being able to check out new versions of iOS before they’re publicly released. With WWDC 2011 upon us, we should see a beta of iOS 5 soon. If you’re a new developer, or you’re testing for a current developer, you’ll want to make sure you install beta firmware correctly. If you don’t, this can lead to problems when upgrading to official or later versions of iOS.

As a forewarning, betas are only intended for developers and testers. Don’t expect a beta to be flawless, expect the opposite. I also recommend installing betas on a test device when you can in case something goes wrong.

So if you’re new to this process, hit the jump for a walkthrough of how to provision your device and install a beta version of iOS. And obviously, betas are Mac only.

Download the SDK, XCode, iTunes beta, and iOS firmware

1. Log in to your developer account on Apple’s Developer Site.
2. Next you’ll need to go into the dev center for iOS.



3. Under downloads, you’ll see a link for the SDK, iTunes, and beta firmware IPSWs.
4. Download everything you need and then move on to the next step. (Note: If you’re installing via iTunes beta, you don’t “have” to install the SDK if you don’t want to.

Provision your device’s UDID within the the Apple Developer Portal

There’s a couple ways to add your UDID to the provisioning portal. The easiest is with XCode (which is what you should be using anytime you are installing beta firmware).

1. Simply open XCode with your device plugged in. It should bring up your device in the side bar. Right click and choose to add it to the provisioning portal. XCode should ask for your developer login.



2. Alternately, you can also log into the developer portal and add a UDID via the provisioning portal as well. The XCode option is just a lot easier as it does it for you. You can pull your UDID from XCode or from iTunes (simply click your serial number until it changes to the longer 40 digit number, that is your UDID and what you need to enter into the provisioning portal.

Install the beta version of iOS via XCode

If you’re installing via a beta version of iTunes, skip this section and jump down to the iTunes install instructions below.

Once you’ve provisioned your device with the developer portal and downloaded the newest beta of iOS, you’re ready to install it via XCode. It is always a good idea to back up your iPhone and restore it clean before installing a beta as well. Not required but I recommend it. If you are jailbroken, it is especially a good idea to restore stock before attempting this.

1. In XCode, under software version, you’ll need to choose Other version…
2. Then you will need to navigate to the .ipsw file that you earlier downloaded (the beta firmware file). I typically save them on my desktop or somewhere in a folder that I can easily find.
3. Select it and click Restore iPhone
4. A warning will pop up telling you all data will be erased. Agree and your device will be restored to the beta version. You can then restore from a backup in iTunes like normal.

Install using a beta version of iTunes

If you’ve already installed using XCode, no need to go any further, you’re done!

Almost all betas will need to be installed using a beta version of iTunes. In the case of iOS 5, you’ll need iTunes beta 10.5.

1. Open iTunes and click on your device. (Always back up before installing ANY new firmware, beta or not.)

2. Under the main Summary tab, you’ll see the normal restore button. Simply hold down the alt+option key on your keyboard and click restore.
3. A window will pop up that will let you navigate to the saved beta firmware. Simply select it and click Open.
4. Let iTunes do it’s thing. Once it’s done, it will prompt you to Set up as new iPhone or Restore from a backup. You’ll probably want to restore from your backup. But you can choose which one you’d prefer.
5. Let your stuff sync back over and you’re done!

And again, I can’t say this enough times – beta software is just that, beta. It is meant for developers and testers only. Please do not attempt to install beta firmware without a developer license or permission. And I strongly urge developers to not “sell” UDID spots under their account to people who just want early access to the beta. The purpose is for Apple to get legitimate feedback from developers before a final release. If you do not intend on submitting crash logs and bug reports, please wait for an official release.

Apple is about to add a third device to their iPhone OS family, the iPad, but so far developers are still limited to 100 UDID “slots” for ad-hoc distribution (aka beta testing), leading Craig Hockenberry of the Icon Factory to wonder on his Furbo.org blog if the “crunch” is coming.

Let’s say you (or your company) has a developer account with Apple, two popular iPhone/iPod touch apps, and are about to release an iPad app. That’s three apps total. But all you get are 100 slots total — not per app, not per-user, not 100 for iPhone and 100 for iPad. Total. So if you have 5 developers in-house and each wants to test on all three iPhone OS devices (iPhone, iPod touch, iPad), that’s 15 slots gone already. If you want to maintain compatibility with older devices like the iPhone 2G or the iPod touch G1, you might need slots for those as well. If anyone has replaced a lost or broken device, or had one swapped out under warranty, that means a new UDID and another slot taken. We could be up to 20 slots gone already.

If you have beta testers, the problem scales. Each device each tester has comes with a UDID and takes a slot. If you want to maximize your beta testers, that could be 3 slots each (one for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad) and perhaps more if they have old iPhones or iPod touches, or if they’re replaced a device. That means 15-20 beta testers can consume every slot you have left. Sure you could stretch that out by only having each tester register 1 device but that adds complexity and still only delays hitting the limit.

Further compounding the problem is that Apple only frees up the UDID slots once a year, so any lost devices, developers who have left the company, or beta testers who have dropped out can equate to wasted slots just sitting there for up to a year.

With the iPad launch, it means any developer whose already maxed out and whose slots don’t free up before April 3 is in a tough spot. They can’t register any new UDIDs, which means they can’t register any iPads to test on. That’s not only bad for them, it’s bad for users who expect well-tested, well-polished apps and games.

Hockenberry thinks there’s a better system for Apple to adopt:

A tweet from Mike Piontek crystalized this thought: the limitation for Ad Hoc provisioning should be based around individuals, not the devices that they own. It makes more sense to regulate Apple IDs rather than UDIDs. I want John Gruber to be able to run my apps on whatever devices he currently owns. I want to put my own name on the provisioning list and enable the five iPhone OS devices sitting on my desk. All that Apple cares about is that are only 98 other people besides Gruber and me.

And he points out it’s not just developers but those same Fortune 100 companies Apple often touts who would benefit:

(I suspect that Enterprise IT has similar problems and would welcome a solution based on employees rather than the hardware they own. I can only imagine the headaches of managing thousands of devices.)

If you’re a developer, let us know if the ad-hoc crunch is a concern and what, if anything, you’re doing to handle the oncoming iPad UDID storm.

Apple’s Ad-Hoc iPhone distribution method allows developers to register up to 100 iPhones or iPod touches so they can run their applications on them without having to go through the App Store. This is priceless for beta testing, educational environments, and other non-public environments.

Dragthing‘s James Thomson, however, has posted on a problem that just might bite a few developers right in their beta tests:

Reading between the lines, and discussions on the forums, it sounds like every time I deleted or modified an entry, I was getting one closer to the magic figure of 100 device IDs you have entered since the beginning of time. When you hit the limit, regardless of how many total device IDs you have listed in the portal, your ability to further edit the list is removed completely.

In other words, if you change your beta testers — if you change your own device — you might just end up locked out of your own Ad-Hoc distribution.

Check out the full post for more on this problem and what, if nothing, Apple is currently doing to help developers fix and/or work around it.

Meanwhile, let us know if you have any ideas as well…

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.