Development

The iPhone is a fantastic product out of the gate. But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be improved. The fine folks at Macenstein have started up a list of the ultimate iPhone feature requests and are asking for contributions. Here is what they have so far:

- Add Copy and Paste
- Display should have an auto-dim/off function to conserve battery life
- Safari Password Storing
- Widescreen keyboard should be an option for EVERY app that handles text, not just Safari. It’s just easier to type on a larger keyboard.
- EVERY app should rotate when the iPod rotates.
- Add a master “Address Book/Contacts” button to the main interface
- Add “Disk Mode” like standard iPods
- Ability to assign more than one signature in Mail
- Add “Games”
- Ringer should have a setting for “Ringer, Headset, or Both”.
- User defined custom ringtones
- Let us browse the device via Bluetooth
- Time stamping on SMS messages. Add a “period” key to the main keyboard.
- Directory access, or at very least, access to the photos… more...

If you need help in designing Web 2.0 Applications for the iPhone, creating optimized sites and making an enjoyable user experience Apple can help with that. According to Mac Rumors Apple has posted guidelines for developers to take advantage of the iPhone although they are brief.

The overall Web Experience of the iPhone is an integral part of its success in the mobile market and Apple should emphasize Web Development even more as its the only means of third party Applications for the device. In addition, if you are a Blogger I highly recommend taking a look at the guidelines to better optimize your Blog for iPhone users.

The guidelines cover the basics such as knowing what Safari is, realizing the browsing experience is significantly different than its desktop counterpart and learning what exactly Safari supports. While we’re on the topic of iPhone Web Apps, we’ll be reviewing a few here on the Blog and if you’d like us to take a look just drop us a line.

Designing Content
Web Development for iPhone

Via: MacRumors

500 to 600 dollars plus tax may have been too much of a burden on your wallet but Arstechnica reports that Apple’s profits margins may be as much as 400 dollars per phone. But should we forget the fact that R&D must be factored in along with shipping and manufacturing?

If you look at it, 220 dollars to create an iPhone suddenly paints the device as a cheap phone that could’ve been offered at half it’s retail price. But here is the thing, this a first generation product that Apple will want to limit greatly in order to fine tune the device. Not only that but it’s very rare to get anything close to an iPhone as a consumer marketed product. Sure there is the Microsoft Surface but that isn’t readily available to consumers while the iPhone is. It’s a great piece of technology that needs some time to blossom.

In short you’re paying not only a lot for R&D but I believe Apple intentionally wanted this to be a high end phone for two reasons: to limit consumption as a sort of public testing and to really make… more...

We’ve received another tip, this time focusing on the Apple Bluetooth Headset.

Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) qualified in the early hours of the morning the iPhone and it’s bluetooth software and hardware. It looks as though the hardware is provided by CSR with its Bluecore 4 chip and the software is provided by Open Interface North America, Inc. with its BLUEmagic 3.0.

[Thanks to William for the tip]

I didn’t see this coming, the website http://reader.mac.com appears to be iPhone only, as it refuses to load in Safari and Firefox (I’ve not tried any other browsers).

As it’s hanging off mac.com, can we assume this is an Apple website or one created by an iPhone developer? Also, the site states “This Application is viewable only on iPhone” - perhaps with ‘reader.mac.com’ as a name, can we assume this is an RSS reader? Only one more day to find out!

With a little over two weeks to go now until the iPhone debuts in America, there’s a strong feeling that there could be a shortage in supply for at least two months post-launch.

Dr. Simon Croom, of the Supply Chain Management Institute, has spoken with ZDnet about the likely hood of supply shortages in the States, and this comes down mainly to the components being used to build the iPhone not arriving as fast as Apple would have hoped from manufacturers in Japan, Korea and Taiwan.

“Undoubtedly there will be shortages, service issues and challenges for call centers,” Croom says. “Pressure will also be felt for AT&T in terms of sales support - in particular trade ins, impact on the sales of other phones and customer’s expectations from a ‘revolutionary’ new product.”

Further problems may arise, of course, if Apple and AT&T find themselves with problems and even returns of the iPhone, causing replacements to be issued and delaying iPhone roll-out to newer customers.

[Via Electronista]

In a widely anticipated and requested move Apple has made the iPhone available to 3rd parties but in a curious and questionable way. Apple’s answer to 3rd parties is to allow developers to write essentially websites that can be rendered in Safari. Apple will make available the ability for developers to call iPhone functions like call, email, etc but it isn’t clear to what extent.

It also isn’t clear how these applications will be accessed. We asked a VP at Apple how applications would be accessed and all he had to say was that they would be bookmarked like webpages. Doesn’t make too much sense. What do you think?