Telia also trying to bring MMS to the iPhone

For over a year now the iPhone has torn apart because it lacks the basic MMS functionality that has become and industry standard. There have been a few work around that have worked for some but not others such as Swirly MMS, but they all require you to first jailbreak ...

Google voice search hits the iPhone allowing anyone to search

The Google voice search application that we reported on a few times has finally reached iPhones everywhere, making the already popular search application all the more useful. Now users can search for locations while driving, product info while shopping or even search for images without ever typing a thing. Not sure ...

Tell if someone is lying with Lie Detector

The iPhone has had a lot of odd applications in the past, but apparently we haven’t seen them all. The newest one to fall into our lap is the Lie Detector application by John Freeman. Now you can get answers on the fly with little notice. The Lie Detector claims that ...

Mobiles.co.uk gets the iPhone 3G

It seems like everyday a new retailer is getting their hands on an Apple product. Today, it was announced Mobiles.co.uk now will be selling the iPhone 3G in the UK. This is actually the first time the phone has been sold in the UK by any other retailer than Apple, ...

Google acknowledges skirting App Store rules

It seems Google has confirmed the notion that Google Mobile uses APIs that are undocumented, opening up the ability to use the built-in proximity sensor in the iPhone for verbal searches. This goes against the iPhone SDK, which states developers can only use APIs that Apple published within the kit. Google ...

iPhone firmware 2.2 not without bugs

With every new firmware version there are bound to be a few bugs here and there. No one was prepared for the issues that users are currently reporting in the iPhone firmware 2.2 update. Some of the more serious issues include the loss of the ability to sync with iTunes, ...

iPhone 2.2 SDK offers up TV out functions

Looks like the latest iPhone 2.2 SDK has a few surprises built-in. For one, the updated MediaPlayer framework can make it possible to export live video to your TV. I know it sounds crazy, but it is totally possible, and we've posted a video to prove it. MPTVOutWindow class makes it ...

Forum Review: Typing Genius for iPhone

Typing Genius Forum Review by cjvitek For more Forum Reviews, see the TiPb iPhone App Store Forum!

Okay, how many people have taken a while to get used to the soft keyboard on the iPhone? Show of hands? Okay, now put your hands down, you all look silly.

I admit, it has taken (and still is taking) me some time to get used to the soft keyboard. I came over to the iPhone from a Treo 680 (which was my first phone keypad) and I still find myself missing the hard keys with the tactile response. But they soft keypad isn’t horrible, it just takes some time to get used to.

Enter the application Typing Genius. As you might guess, typing genius is a typing tutorial program. It is based on the same idea as “normal” typing tutor programs (for use with a normal keypad) - just converted to iPhone use.

When you start the program, you are taken to a screen where you can choose from excercises, statistics, frien challenge, and tips. I will take you through these options one at a time.

Excercises are simply the standard typing excercises to get used to the keypad. You can practice one hand at a time, both hands togethers, numbers, capital letters, punctuation, symbols, and even practice with words, all characters combined, sentences…well, you get the idea. When you choose one of the excercises, you can then choose to have the portrait mode, landscape mode, or turn autocorrection off (more on this later). You select your mode, then start the excercise. The goal is simple - simply type the letters (and spaces) that appear on the screen above the keyboard. When you make a mistake, you will see the error highlighted in red. I do not recommend going back and correcting mistakes - it will improve your accuracy, but really slow down your speed. Once you finish, you get a summary of how well you did - words per minute, accuracy, etc.

The statistics option lets you view your various statistical measures for each of the excercises. Unfortunately, there is no overall “average” statistics,, but for each of the excercises (and for each of the modes - portrait, landscape, etc) you can view your most recent test, your best results, and your average results.

The friend challenge presumably lets you compete against a friend in the same excercise. However, when I tried it, it really only let me do each excercise - there was never and option “now let your friend try”. Since there is not a complete help screen, I was not able to figure out how to use the friend mode. I think they way it works is your friend tries to type, and his stats are recorded. You can then compare them to your own stats for the same excercise. I would have preferred to see a head to head challenge with the same words/excercises, but it would work okay as designed.

The tips screen gives you some hints and tips about typing on the iPhone. For example, did you know that when you are typing a word, the responsiveness for each key will vary depending on the word. If you are typing “iPhone” for example, when you type “iPhon” and are about to hit the “e” button, the area that will respond for the “e” is larger - giving you more “wiggle room” when typing. I didn’t know that.

This program can really help you get up to speed with your typing skills on the iPhone. However, there were two main drawbacks when using this program. While the excercises are nice, there is no real tutorial process. I remember when learning to type, there were tutorials about how to place your fingers, which fingers you use for which keys, etc. Some quick tutorial like that (even if it is just a suggestion) would be beneficial - expecially for people that are self taught typers.

The biggest problem was with the autocorrect, though. If you choose any mode other than no autocorrect (and at times, you don’t have a “no autocorrection” option) they typing tutor is almost worthless. As you are working on your excercises, the words are being correct as you type - which means that if you are practicing just typing letters or random gibberish, you are actually increasing your error rate as the gibberish is converted to a word. In addition, even if you choose no autocorrection for the excercise, you can’t practice in the landscape mode (rotating the phone doesn’t change it to landscape mode by itself). It seems to me that a better option would be to either have an overall toggle for autocorrect (on or off) or allow landscape mode to the entered simply by rotating the iPhone. Either way it would allow someone to practice in landscape mode without autocorrect, which is impossible right now. Given that autocorrect makes many of the various excercises useless, this is a major flaw in my opinion.

Pros:

• Nicely designed typing tutorial,
• good interface

Cons:

• Major flaw when trying to use landscape with no autocorrection,
• some actuall instructions or tutorials would be nice

Conclusion

All in all, this is a good program is you want to practice your typing, but only if you don’t want to practice in landscape mode with no autocorrection. Using this program, you can improve your iPhone typing skills - both for speed and accuracy. At $1.99, the price isn’t bad, and if you text or type alot this program can be very beneficial. However, given the major design major flaw I can’t give the program five stars. Four out of five stars.

Forum Rating

[Typing Genius is available from the iTunes App Store]

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Forum Review: Typing Genius for iPhone

Apple Creates App Store Promo Codes! (US Only!)

Toby Vincent of SmudgeApps wrote in to let us know that along with general App Store distribution and the 100-device Ad Hoc method universities and beta testers have been using, Apple has just opened the door to a new system:

Apple has finally started allowing us to issue free promotional copies of their iPhone applications. Devs can issue 50 promotional codes for their application. The codes allow the recipient to download a full copy of the application for free. Codes can only be presently used in the U.S. iTunes Stores by using the “Redeem” link in the App Store.

This would allow developers to, among other things, get their apps more easily into the hands of reviewers, or give them away as part of a promotional/marketing initiative.

Vincent was kind enough to send along a promo code for their flagship App, Jam! Unfortunately, as a — I guess undeserving? — Canadian, I was barred from downloading it. Ah well, my loss will be the gain of one of our US based writers for now…

So, while this still keeps apps for the most part still locked into the App Store, does it give developers a little more wiggle room in their iTunes straight jackets? What else does Apple need to do to really help expose the now 10,000 strong catalog to end users?

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple Creates App Store Promo Codes! (US Only!)

Apple gives developers the ability to use promo codes

Filed under: Developer, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

Apple has now given developers the ability to use promo codes to give away copies of their applications on the App Store. Previously, developers had to build a special version of their application (i.e. Ad-hoc copy) that included a mobile provisioning file and the actual application. These two files were then dragged onto iTunes to install them.

With the Ad-hoc model, developers were limited to giving away 100 copies of their applications. Plus, users needed to find & supply the UDID information for their iPhone/iPod touch. With this change, developers can give away a special code that, when typed into the iTunes Store under the "Redeem" section, will give the user a free (or promotional) copy of the application. However, there are some caveats to using the promotional codes:

• The developer can only give away up to 50 promotional codes per application version
  
• Currently the promo codes can only be used in the US iTunes Store

We're sure that this will fill the gap between developers looking to get reviews and users eager to do the reviewing. Nice work, Apple!


[via MacRumors]

Apple gives developers the ability to use promo codes originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Apple gives developers the ability to use promo codes originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Tue, 02 Dec 2008 19:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Developers Can Now Issue Free “Promotional” Copies of iPhone Apps

Apple has finally started allowing developers to issue free promotional copies of their iPhone applications. Once an application has been accepted to the App Store by Apple, developers can issue up to 50 promotional codes. The codes allow the reci...

Vietnamese Hacker Unlocks iPhone 3G at Hardware Level

Hockenberry on Choices and Designing Twitteriffic

Back before my iPhone was torn from me (sniffle) for the Round Robin, Twitteriffic was (and will be again) my mobile Twitter client of choice. Since TiPb has also been looking into App development and iPhone UI lately, this all added up to make Craig Hockenberry’s post today on furbo.org especially interesting. Hockenberry talks about the importance of making choices in development, about what features to add and what to leave out, and perhaps most importantly to us, in variety of different approaches:

There will always be more than one way to solve a problem: a developer’s personal preferences will inevitably seep into the implementation. Having many choices for a Twitter client means that developers don’t need to create a “one size fits all” solution. In essence, users get to choose a developer whose preferences match their own.

If you’re at all interested in a behind-the-curtains peak into what makes a good app great, be sure to read the whole article.

Also, let us know if you’re currently using Twitterrific, if what he mentions was already obvious to you, or if you’re using another Twitter client, what you’re using and why you prefer it?

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Hockenberry on Choices and Designing Twitteriffic

Apple’s New In-Ear Headphones Now Available to Order

For those of you waiting for Apple’s new headphones, the patience you have displayed for the past 3 months has paid off. The day is finally here and you can now place your order.

Hear every detail of your music every time you tune in with the Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic. They offer pro audio performance and impressive sound isolation, and convenient buttons let you adjust the volume and control music and video playback.

The Apple store is claiming the Apple In-Ear Headphones with Remote and Mic will begin shipping within 7-10 business days and will run you $79. The earphones with remote and mic carry a 3-4 week wait and have a price tag of $29. And with that 3-4 week wait, don’t expect these before the holidays.

Place your order today!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Apple’s New In-Ear Headphones Now Available to Order

Apple Exploring Liquid Notebook Cooling Systems for Cooler Laps

MacNN reports on a newly published Apple patent application which details ongoing research into alternative cooling systems for notebook computers.


Specifically, Apple explores the possibility of a liquid cooling system for th...

Apple might Introduce 32 GB iPhone at Macworld 2009

Psystar Working on Mac Laptop Clone, Apple Files DMCA Charges

ZDNet reveals that Apple has amended its lawsuit against Psystar with charges of violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). The DMCA is a controversial law that criminalizes the act of circumventing copy protection. Apple alleges th...

Today on the Forums: Next Gen iPhone? 2.2 Battery Issues? Free Ring Tones! Jailbreak Central! And Top 10 Jailbroken Apps!

The forums continue to grow and today we have a few interesting threads that you should not miss.

Sturamsden started a thread that asks the question I’m sure a lot of people who do not currently own an iPhone may be asking: should I wait until the next generation iPhone comes out before I make my purchase? To see what type of advice he is getting please head on over to his thread, how close is the next gen iPhone?

Next we have forum member Dizzy, he seemed to be having some battery life issues after the 2.2 firmware update. I know I had some similar issues after the 2.1 update, is anyone else having similar battery drain problems with the 2.2 firmware?

The next thread will help a lot of you out there looking to add ring tones to your iPhones. It was started a while back by cjvitek: Want to make your own ringtones but you don’t want to have to pay for them? Well if the answer is yes, then please check out that thread. All the information you need is contained in the link.

Finally we have a whole sub forum dedicated to jailbreaking and we’d like to point it out to all of you interested. It seems jailbreaking has gone to the next level with the 2.2 firmware and I urge anyone interested to check this sub forum out now! It can easily be found right here in Jailbreak Central. I see a lot of you are asking questions on the front page, if you have not found your answer there you will sure to get the help you need in our forums. For those of you who are jailbroken, we want some feedback from you. What are your top 10 favorite jailbroken apps? Even if it’s your top 5, that will do. Thanks!

To get in on the action all you need to do is register. It won’t cost you anything and it’s a painless process. So what are you waiting for?!

See you on the forums!

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Today on the Forums: Next Gen iPhone? 2.2 Battery Issues? Free Ring Tones! Jailbreak Central! And Top 10 Jailbroken Apps!

Apple In-Ear Headphones Finally Shipping

After a long delay, Apple has started to list ship dates of "7-10 days" on their revised In-Ear headphone which were announced in September.


Apple describes the new In-Ear headphones as being "engineered for superior acoustic a...

Smartphone Experts Round Robin Roundtable!

• Our podcast feed
• Download Directly
• Subscribe via iTunes

Join us for the first of two special Smartphone Round Robin Roundtables! This week, Casey, Kevin, Rene, Jennifer, and Dieter all come together to discuss three of the Smartphone Round Robin devices: The iPhone 3G, the Treo Pro, and the BlackBerry Bold!

Music: Our Slanted Voices by DoKashiteru

This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

Smartphone Experts Round Robin Roundtable!