First iPhone 3rd Party GUI App Compiles

CmputrAce writes "Well, it's here now. The #iphone-dev team has compiled the first third-party application for the iPhone. Of course, it is the standard "Hello, world." application, but it's native to the iPhone and uses the iPhone's GUI. This opens up the iPhone for development by anyone who can forge through the process of cracking the iPhone, installing the iPhone "Toolchain", writing an application, compiling, translating, and finally installing the application to the iPhone. With the pace of development at present, expect to see commercial "jailbreak" (mod-enabling) applications soon as well. You can already get high-quality applications (Mac) to theme the iPhone and add your own ring tones (Win) for the phone."

Re:Battery Life

[Anonymous Coward]

So has anyone compiled an application to make the battery last longer than 3/4 year and not cost $100 to replace?

So I take it your iPhone battery ran out after only 9 months of use?

Change ringtones?

[AngryJim]

I've been considering an iPhone purchase myself. I never buy a product without hands on experience and I don't really know anyone who has taken the dive just yet. But, you can't even change the damn ringtone? $600, claims of being the most advanced phone in the world, and you can't chnage the ringtone, is this true? if it's true, Fuck. That.

Re:Nintendo DS emulator here we come

[gEvil (beta)]

Yes it has the touchscreen for it. Too bad it doesn't have the other 12 buttons that a DS needs...

Re:Strategic Blunder, Missed Opportunity

[Iphtashu Fitz]

If they had made a multi-band phone and sold it SIM-less, they could well have cracked the carrier market wide open.

From what I understand the carrier (AT&T) had to do a lot of work on their end to support the phone. The visual voicemail system alone required AT&T to update how their voicemail system works. By picking an exclusive partner Apple ensured that all these changes would work properly with the iPhone. If they simply dumped an unlocked phone on the market then a lot of the fancy gimmicks they've been touting wouldn't work for the vast majority of people, and you'd end up with a lot of people griping about how the phone doesn't work the way it was advertised.

Tying the iPhone to a single carrier is only to be expected considering Apple's history. They've always held tight control over their hardware and peripherals, and they're basically doing the same thing here.

Re:Strategic Blunder, Missed Opportunity

[suv4x4]

The visual voicemail system alone required AT&T to update how their voicemail system works. By picking an exclusive partner Apple ensured that all these changes would work properly with the iPhone. If they simply dumped an unlocked phone on the market then a lot of the fancy gimmicks they've been touting wouldn't work for the vast majority of people

"All the fancy gimmicks" - it's the voice mail only. That's only fancy gimmick that requires carrier coop. Not a lot to lose I think.

Big enough, and ignores future potential

[SuperKendall]

"All the fancy gimmicks" - it's the voice mail only. That's only fancy gimmick that requires carrier coop. Not a lot to lose I think.

Random-access voice mail, that you can access on a plane away from cell signals, is in fact very handy.

But what you are really ignoring is the potentital for Apple to add other features like Visual Voicemail that require carrier support. Apple gets to mold a carrier API for FIVE YEARS to end up with a featureset they like in carrier support, and then force other carriers to offer said advanced features if at that time they also want people using the phone to be able to switch to thier networks. That is a pretty huge advantage and switch away from the traditional model of power, where carriers dictacte what is or is not possible on the the network. Shouldn't we all be jumping up and down with joy that Apple is forcing feature upgrades on carriers that we'll all benefit from with other phones eventually?

Re:Not dupe Re:Dupe

[Anonymous Coward]

"When somebody successfully installs an application, then it's been hacked."

A journey of a thousand applications first begins with Hello World.

My Hope

[rgraham]

My hope is that we'll see a replay of what happened when Apple first released Intel based Macs and a contest was established to see who could be the first to boot XP on the machines (and collect ~$14K in prize money). As soon as a winner was announced [slashdot.org] it wasn't long before Apple released BootCamp. Hopefully with this announcement we'll see Apple release their SDK for the iPhone.

No Blunder Or Missed Chance, Just A Bitter Geek

[NDPTAL85]

I think Steve Jobs knows how to run his business just fine, thank you very much. Apple has very long term plans for the iPhone and you'll be eating crow in about 4 years when millions have shifted from their carriers to AT&T just to get the iPhone. There have been a LOT of good replies to your initial comment, why have you yet to respond?

Apple's goal isn't to open the carrier market for YOUR purposes. You are applying your wishful thinking onto Apple's business plans. First of all why are you saying Apple limited themselves to the US Market? Have you been in a cave that has prevented you from knowing that European and Asian launches are coming in 2008 if not sooner? As for offering the phone SIM-less thats not Apple's style. Apple makes things EASY and SIMPLE to use. If the purchaser of the phone has to figure out what carrier they're going to use and then find a SIM card for it thats just not easy enough. Its too hard. I know you're going to scoff because you are a geek but you aren't Apple's target market. No geek is. Ease of use, ease of use, ease of use. Thats Apple's DNA. Your method introduces uncessary complexity.

When you purchase the iPhone, you take it home, connect it to your computer and iTunes pops up to take you thru the activation process. Its EXTREMELY simple. Now imagine had it been sold SIM less. Each person would have to get the appropriate SIM for the carrier they wanted to go with. Thats just far too messy for Apple's tastes.

Ironically long term Apple will still bring about a healthy carrier market anyway. When the 5 year contract with AT&T is up the other carriers will certainly jump to offer the iPhone just to stop the bleeding of their own subscriber numbers. I wouldn't bet on Google coming to the rescue. They've got a lot of industry inertia and lobbyists to combat against which could take YEARS.

Do you even think before you type?

[NDPTAL85]

First of all the iPhone is one very HIGH quality piece of hardware. Its build quality is excellent and its VERY sturdy.

Second this shows you know next to nothing about the Mac using community. The level of hacking and shareware development on Macs has been HIGH for decades. There were folks tinkering around with source code and resource editors on Macs before Linux was even created. When you move to an open platform you only gain ONE thing, software freedom. When you move to an Apple platform you gain ease of use. I've seen TONS of geeks in #freebsd and #linux channels moving to Mac OS X because they're tired of fighting with their operating system when they just want to get simple common tasks done (like playing DVDs, burning DVDs, getting onto a WPA encrypted wifi networks, good power management, simple software updates, decent office suites, no trouble video codec playback....etc.) When these same folks WANT to get down to something complicated the terminal is always there for them in /Applications/Utilities

So to recap, you are wrong. The contributions of hackers is very much appreciated on the Mac OS X platform and will be the same for the iPhone. What we DON'T want is for Apple itself to be distracted from its core mission of making its products ridiculously easy and joyful to use. Perhaps if your own operating system were more pleasureable to use you (and a good number of other open source users) wouldn't be such miserable, bitter and spiteful people. Here's to hoping.

Visual voicemail is not a gimmick

[kiddailey]

Having actually USED visual voicemail, I can assure you that it is no gimmick.

That is unless of course you enjoy listening to the automated "message received at... press x to listen... press y to delete" crap after being forced to wade through and delete old voicemail before listening to that new one you just received.

Re:why bother?

[pressman]

Man am I ever tired of the use of Apple Cultists. I'm a 23 year Mac user... which means I've been using a Mac longer than many of you have even been alive! The reasons I use Apple hardware and software:

a) I'm not a hacker/programmer/developer

b) I (me personally) find using a Mac to be far easier and more useful to use than any other OS out there

c) Final Cut Pro! (I'm a video editor by trade)

The fact that Apple products tend to look cool is just a bonus these days. I've used all the beige varieties that they manufactured pre 1998 and the coming of the iMac. I'm loyal to Apple because they have consistently created tools that I can use efficiently and effectively for the tasks I need to accomplish. (Granted the early generations of PPC Mac's was a bit of a blemish on their track record.) Brand loyalty is not cultish in and of itself. Just because Apple's products do not appeal to you or meet the needs of the tasks you need to accomplish, doesn't mean that everyone who does enjoy Apple products is a fanboy or cultist.

Be careful with your rhetoric... you yourself come off as a zealot by pointing out other zealots.