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AT&T Welcomes Programmers for All Phones Except the iPhone
An anonymous reader writes "Apple's reasoning for keeping the iPhone a closed platform is that they don't want to 'potentially gum up the provider's network'. An article in the New York Times, though, points out that there are hundreds of phones out there working on open platforms that don't seem to be causing network interference. AT&T and Palm, in fact, welcome experimentation on their platforms. In AT&T's case ... on every phone but the iPhone. 'Hackers who have explored the workings of the phone say it uses the frameworks and structures that Apple uses on its other platforms to enable development; it just hasn't been documented. So if Apple is going to allow applications later, is there any reason -- other than vindictiveness or obsessive interest in control -- that it would want to cut off those developed by the pioneers who figured things out ahead of the official launch?'"
Control I buy into, but vindictive?
My guess is that the short answer is "Yes", and the long answer is "Yes, AT&T cut them a big fat check to do exactly that."
I've said from the beginning that the reason Apple's iPhone was closed to outside development was due to Apple, and not to AT&T. Apple is obsessive about controlling the end-user experience, so they don't want any third-party development on the iPhone. And what happened? I got accused of starting flamewars by rabid, foaming-at-the-mouth Mac fanbois.
There's nothing wrong with Apple intent on the iPhone. It's their product and they can market and sell it how they see fit. If you don't like it, don't buy an iPhone.
My blog
errr....
never mind.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
I remember back when Apple was going after people selling mac roms for Amiga emulators.
Apple has always been proprietary and exercised iron-fisted control over what THEY want done with the hardware they sell for a profit. Why are the iPhone actions such a surprise?
If they don't want people messing with their precious phone, then don't buy one. I know that won't play well in the Reality Distortion Field, but their stubborness should not be rewarded.
Now, if it were actually the case that the service providers in the States actually wanted developers to do nifty stuff, then I think the pace of innovation on mobile phones would be quite different. Most of the wireless network providers don't want you to do neat things because that's money out of their pocket.
If there's a benevolent provider, please speak up.
http://www.maxineudall.com/2010/02/should-economists-be-sued-for-malpractice.html
AT&T is innocent, Apple wants to opt for the console model on the iphone, a closed platform , for which they are going to play middle man who cashes in via the itunes shop.
Give us insane amounts of money.
No, you can't THAT with an iPhone.
We are going to bill you so hard you'll wish you were never born.
No, you can't do THAT with an iPhone either
We'll drop the price right away just to rub in what a stupid amount of money first adopters forked over
No, no NO! stop trying to use your iPhone in any way we haven't sanctioned
Doctor:
Notice how the subject keeps coming back for more and thanking us for it? The next update will cause the phone to shock the user at random times. We will see how THAT gets spun into an innovative feature that the users thank us for.
[insert evil laugh here]
The most obvious reason for me would seem to be simply avoid responsibility for the API until it is fully matured? Surely, if they were to release their API for the entire multi-touch aspect of the iPhone and iPod Touch at this point, they would be in a position where they have a lot of responsibilities:
* extensively documenting the API for a broad base instead of only for internal usage
* testing for possible bugs for usecases which are not relevant in Apple's internal usage
* making it feature complete
* making it secure
* when upgrading the API, supporting older applications built on that API (in other words, keeping full backwards compatibility)
All in all, this can be summed up as the basic fact that officially releasing the "mini OS X" that Apple uses on its portable devices as a development platform requires a whole different approach then simply using it themselves and not publishing it. All these responsibilities are easily avoided by simply not publishing the API and is a no-brainer if the company is on a tight deadline. Given the iPhone's short development lead time, i can fully understand that there was no time to get all of the above in order, so avoiding responsibility of the API for the time being seems like a logical thing to me.
That said, the above reason would steer them towards a tolerance stance regarding 'hackers', while Apple seems to be leaning more towards an 'active prosecution' stance, which i considere pretty much unjustified, together with the rest of the world.
"obsessive control" is Apple standard operating procedure for all of their machines, not just the iPhone. Want to use something other than iTunes for the iPod (I don't, but beside the point), you have to hack it. Run Mac OS on non-Mac hardware? Never happen. Include a real keyboard and a mouse with right click in the box? Same answer.
(I've gotten a chance to play with the new iMac keyboard, it sucks ass.)
"Apple's reasoning for keeping the iPhone a closed platform is that they don't want to 'potentially gum up the provider's network'."
Yes, and I'm sure that's why they're keeping the iPod a closed platform, too.
Gifts for Geeks - Stuff that really matters!
So lets give Apple the benefit, say they want to control the development, pretty much like with all iPod devices they want their kick back from other companies providing services/applications on their iPhone. Having said that they want to control when that happens, when they have the money lines up and running, I mean Apple is a business after all, they loves their money and keeps what they extort(find).
So when Apple will be ready is the time the developers will look at them and go "EH" tried that then you f-ed it all up I had to give refunds to people, now no one will trust me or buy for the iPhone cuz you might wave your magic firmware (too funny) and poof it's all starting over again.
No one in their right mind could say that AT&T wanted to keep the iPhone in check, cuz wouldn't they have written that in their contract with their end users and spelled it out.
I have an iPhone and I love it, don't care about the locking/unlocking stuff since I had AT&T to begin with and I actually like their service. Not hurt by EDGE network speeds cuz the phone lasts longer then it would otherwise. But comeone, this is a control freak trying to freakishly control something through software, just like the DRM, you'll see the it's ok flag when Jobs releases a blog entry about how he "wishes" AT&T would allow them to relenquish control for the iPhone. Then 10 days later it'll unlock and poof once again Steve Jobs will pull the wool over the eyes of people, thinking he's a pioneer when in reality he's come to grips with the fact that he can't control people this way.
I had a lot of the open source stuff on my iPhone. It made the experience much better. If Apple wants to be a little whiner they should provide alternatives or sub-contract to these developers to create standardized apps that Apple then can get a piece of.
NOT a useless piece of garbage like the N-Gage was with all it's games and programs...
SO if Apple decides to keep your junk software off their hardware I love the iPhone even more!
You left one out: The ability to sell an iPhone 2 to the early adopters. How many of the folks who waited in line for hours/days to get an iPhone will hesitate to to drop another $500 once the open iPhone 2 comes out? There is no way Apple can keep this closed forever. When there are dozens of open smart phones to choose from Apple will have no choice but to compete. History will be the judge if early being to market was worth the pissed off customers who have a $500 POS in a year.
And, why would anyone be surprised by this? It's very much in keeping with the way Apple has done business for years and years.
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
They are selling an iphone, a way of thinking, an idea. The problem is, the cellphone market really doesn't give a shit. Apple hasn't learned that. The question becomes, who budges first? Apple or the cell phone market?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Remember the bad old IBM that was incompatible with everyone else (remember EBCDIC), which you had to go through a select priesthood in order to do your job, and you had to wait three months for a trivial change to your report?
Apple is just like that: it's a platform so complicated that you cannot develop yourself software easily, you have to put yourself at the mercy of the high priests for software that does what you want, and worse than the original bad old IBM, it brainwashes it's followers into believing that all is well...
From the article:
What is especially odd is a NYT reporter creating a conspiracy story... wait I'm sorry that is normal operations at the times lately.
But seriously, maybe the real reason that Apple is not opening the iPhone right away is something more mundane. I base this on some of the minor clues given in the above quote.
1. The firmware API is not yet set in stone. Apple may be planning some "tweaks" to smooth over any rough edges in the firmware after releasing the phone into the wild and before publishing the currently undocumented API.
2. They haven't formulated a plan to keep the phone secure, and allow third-party programs (Sandbox anyone?).
3. The one thing that this article failed to mention that the other AT&T phones are handsets with limited OS installed and low data rate capabilities, and this is a smartphone with a reduced feature version of OS X installed and alledged high data rate capabilities. The point being that the iPhone is a little more complicated than a free Nokia or Motorolla phone.
Just wanted to point out some obvious scenarios, before the mac, windows, and linux fan-bois start the flamefest.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
Steve Jobs can't come right out and say this, as it can be seen as tantamount to saying that users are stupid. Security. Not on the cell network, but the iPhone as a new platform. User's can't be trusted to install their own apps!
The big reason that Windows machines are riddled with Trojans, is that every user's process runs with the same permissions as the user, and that current systems do not allow finer-grained control over these permissions. (I removed 18 Trojans from my girlfriend's mom's computer the other day!) Stuff like this is one of the big reasons why the user experience on Windows can SUCK. (And yes, it's terrible that all iPhones have the same root password and that's already been cracked.)
The OLPC folks are addressing this by running apps in a sandbox. There are many others thinking along these lines -- that the security model we've been using is not the right one. The current Access Control List security model was designed to keep individual users on a mainframe from interfering with each other while under the supervision of a benevolent and all-powerful root Super-User. Now, in the 21st century, essentially everyone, their mom, their grandparents, and anyone else who runs Windows as Administrator and installs programs is root.
Think about it. There's something seriously wrong here, folks.
Now that we are entering the era of dual and quad core computers becoming mainstream, there is no reason why we can't have more secure models like capabilities. (Especially on quad core machines, where a micro-kernel can lock itself to one processor to prevent context-switch overhead without undue loss of performance.) In order to ensure security on the iPhone, and thus retain total control of the user experience despite malicious hackers, something like sandboxes with a capability model is needed. (Capabilities without context switch overhead could also be enabled by using a VM platform like Java.)
See Rik Farrow's Google Tech Talk on this subject. It's over an hour, so download it and watch it while working out. It's a *fact* that we've been barking up the wrong tree security-wise.
... and left a message: "All these phones are yours except the iPhone."
(my Apologies to Arthur C. Clarke)
Perhaps it's also worth mentioning that the initial programs written for the iPhone exploited security holes in the software? It's possible that the death of the Installer.app applications was just a side effect of a security tightening.
Then again, that doesn't explain the ringtones, does it?
Does Slashdot have an open API? If so, I'd like to write an applet that silently filters any article containing text that matches "\".
Applicant: I'd like to program for your phones.
Hiring Manager: Okay, what can you program on?
Applicant: The iPhone.
Hiring Manager: And what else?
Applicant: Nothing, just that.
Hiring Manager: Well, we're only hiring for non-iPhone programmers.
Applicant: Yes, but I currently have a job.
Hiring Manager: Uh huh...
Applicant: And I've got a offer waiting for me at Verizon...
Hiring Manager:WAIT! WHAT DO YOU WANT? WHEN CAN YOU START?
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
"Hackers who have explored the workings of the phone say it uses the frameworks and structures that Apple uses on its other platforms to enable development; it just hasn't been documented." Maybe these "Hackers" can tell us more of the inner workings of the iPhone, so as to help us understand more. As for gumming up the AT&T works, maybe Apple's PR department should start random drug testing?
"There is one born every minute." - P.T.Barnum
Are people just heart broken that Apple locked down the phone so much or what? If you want to support open platforms don't give Apple your money. I don't think it was a secret before the iPhone began sales that it was going to be a closed platform. Just like anything, support what meets your needs/wants.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
I was talking about APPS.
My current working theory is that there is a simple reason, a reason of omission.
Either they plan a new real iNewton in the future with total OSX-oid support, and don't want to undercut that thunder, or they plan a de facto newton-like level of customization on the iPhone/iPod Touch line of products, but are not yet ready to deal with the developer support.
[
The reasons were discussed before the iBricking event, but in summary:
1. Stability. Whenever third party apps are on your device, instability develops. Of course, sometimes the OS is unstable with no third-party apps running at all. Before the 1.1.1 firmware, Safari used to crash all the time. There haven't been a lot of reports about third party iApps being any worse behaved than the built-ins.
2. Support. Support issues are a perennial nightmare for any platform. It was speculated that lots of Apple and AT&T's support time was for applications that weren't native. Anyone have any numbers for this?
3. Development. It could be that the APIs are still in motion. The iBricking may be due to some bad updating; Mac OS X does have problem occasionally.
4. Developer support. Let's face it, lots of apps on other mobile platforms are ugly as all get-out. Apple's only now released human interface guidelines for the iPhone. If it's been this long for the HIG, the real developer docs'll take even more time.
So...there are lots of possible reasons for Apple's stance...before getting to the negatively-tinged personification excuses (control, vindictiveness, etc).
I never realized this but the Mighty Mouse that ships with the desktops does have a left and right click point. In the Mouse preference pane there is a choice to assign what the right side does and you can set it to right-click. :)
Q: I am short, useless and provide no value. What am I? A: a sig
"Net Neutrality"
Not that I EVER cut Apple any slack (they are just as eee-vil as Sony, they just do it with more style), but AT&T are still into the "closed network" thing.
I have read in several places on the web, including in the comments here at /., that the reason the iPhone is closed is to prevent the development and widespread use of a VoiP app.
In light of this article, here is my questions: do VoiP apps exist for these other phones? If so, are such apps widely used? If not, why not?
Has a VoiP app been written for hacked iphones? If not, why not?
I have no experience with either the iphone or unlocked gsm phones that allow third-party development because I'm on Verizon. (They are the only network provider with decent coverage over the vast swathes of non-urban areas that make up the majority of where I need a mobile phone in the US.)
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
I really don't get it.
... you don't have to install 1.1.1. If you don't want Apple support (Which is what the upgrade is - support), you don't have to use it. If you want to use the device in the state Apple sold it to you, you are well within your rights to do so. It does everything they advertised it doing when you purchased it.
I have an iPhone. I love it. and you know what? It does exactly what they said it would do when I bought it . Imagine that?
It's like there's a bunch of little kids that figured out that their new toy could do something it wasn't supposed to be able to do, then got upset when Mommy took it away / made it so they couldn't use it that way.
It would be one thing if Apple hadn't said from the start that there wouldn't be 3rd party apps or an SDK. They also said 1.1.1 would do exactly what it does.
And also
Comparing it to other phones or other products is moot - this phone wasn't advertised or sold as having or supporting a development platform for 3rd party apps. If you bought the phone wanting that as a feature, you made a mistake. You bought the wrong product.
This is also ignoring the fact that with Safari on the iPhone supporting AJAX, you can do some pretty slick apps via the web.
- Roach
The current situation is a case of collateral damage. They have to lock down the development environment to prevent SIM unlocking. Letting users have a few extra applications is not a concern to Apple -- losing monthly subsidies from AT&T, on the other hand, means lost revenue.
I suspect that there will eventually be a SDK and an Apple approved mechanism to get apps onto the phone (keep users happy and lessens the incentive to jailbreak and unlock.) Probably something like how podcasts are handled in iTunes.
-ch
More likely, the agreement with Apple, for AT&T to promote & sell the iphone probably says that they may promote & sell, but they CANNOT alter or modify anything on the phone, unless approved by Apple.
To anyone my age, the bogeyman of "network interference" instantly calls to mind Ma Bell and all the reasons she gave why nobody but AT&T could be trusted with an RJ-11 jack.
Actually, it predated the RJ-11 jack.
Here we go:
The New York Times, February 17, 1951, p. 30: Phone Company Upheld In Ban on Hush-a-Phone
The Hush-A-Phone was a simple cup-like acoustic isolation device that snapped onto a telephone handset and provided a measure of privacy and quiet. No wires, no electrical connection. The phone company banned it as a "foreign attachment." In the Times story, the FCC agreed such devices were subject to A. T. & T. control. The punch line:
"Unrestricted use of the device could, in the commission's opinion, result in a general deterioration of the quality of telephone service."
Yes, seriously.
Later, the phone company was to claim that wired connections to third-party devices (answering machines and, later, modems) could not only bring down the network but put their linemen at risk of electrocution. Anyone who wanted to connect a computer had two choices: buy a very pricey "Dataphone"--never sold, of course, but leased by the month--or buy a third-party modem anduse a pricey phone-company-supplied "Data Access Arrangement" device, which was never sold but only leased by the month.
It took decades to get the FCC to agree that it had the regulatory authority to set specifications for third-party interconnects, and to allow them.
I recall an amusing Racal-Vadic advertisement showing "Ma Bell" depicted as a grandmotherly figure, staring out of her window in horror at a huge dump truck pouring hundreds of DAA boxes onto her lawn, now that Racal-Vadic modems no longer needed them.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
Id rather hook up with microsoft in a shady side-alley
Read radical news here
from under all these youngsters who, by default, frame every relationship as a parent-child one. No, son, Apple is not your daddy and is not abusing you. There, just saved you all a ton in therapy bills.
damaged by dogma
near you.
Why doesn't apple want 3rd party apps? Because if john doe can write one in a few weeks then so can their dev teams - and then they can sell it.
Hasn't anyone here realized that people pay more for ringtones than MP3s? For phone backgrounds than some actual computer programs?
So yeah, you can bet apple will be selling apps real soon. Probably for jacked up "omg" prices. Then everyone else will follow suit. Well, except me. I'm not buying an iphone, apple, or any of their other junk. I'll keep my compatibility with the world at large TYVM.
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
Yes, it's really a pity how if Apple allowed 3rd party software, everyone would have to put it on their phone.
Oh, you wouldn't? Then what's your point again?
I wouldn't mind even a highly sandboxed environment, s long as there was some kind of local storage and "offline" functionality.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
It would seem that since Apple generally seems to go out of their way to think differently, they also seem to apply their different-ness to everything they branch out into. So it doesn't matter if the way mobile phones have always been this that or the other.... that unlocking phones has always been a consumer right and has never been a problem when it came to updates, upgrades or support for third-party-anything.
Their different-thought will continue to cause problems and waves until they either exit the market, which I think they should, or adapt their stuff to work the way other people do it and to meet consumer expectations.
[Why are people incapable of making the easiest of comparisons? Are they stupid, or just dumb? Apple is going for the console model, you frickin retards. If you don't like it, by a WinCe shitbrick.]
Not to worry. I laugh just as hard at the sheeple who worship the xBox as the sheeple who worship the iPhone. (Ooo ooo Innovate me! Innovate me harder!)
"From any tree of the garden you may eat freely"
"All these worlds are yours, except Europa."
Hack all phones, except the iPhone.
iPhone is a big experiment for Apple. Clearly, there is a lot of potential for iPhone software and services beyond what you get with it right now.
I expect Apple prefers to keep it closed while it settles down and they see how it all pans out, to have time to see where best to take it next, and to develop and sell the new services themselves without losing out to some fleeter third-party developer.
Consumers may have a lot to gain from an open iPhone, but I don't see that Apple does right now.
That's just one reason though. If it were fully open and documented, the first thing people would do is throw VOIP & IM onto it, which would piss off AT&T.
Best mini-bio I've read yet on Steve. Goes right back to the days of the original, sealed, Macintosh box.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
I don't like it one bit, but with not much tweaking, it would seem to me an iPod touch could be rigged to run a service like skype. WiFi or not, it would still be an incredible thing to have, essentially it would be a WiFi iPhone.. or. WiFiPhone. That said i don't think the touch has a mic, but i heard a rumor it had hidden bluetooth capability. In any case.. i can understand why they might want to discourage too much innovation on a device that has so much potential.
Aside from the extremely high potential that people will use services other than the ones apple might have contractually agreed to enforce exclusivity on, if too much is done by Joe Hacker then they wont have much to tout for the iPhone 2.
Here's a hint: the N-Gage sucked without the games or programs added. A bad UI will still be a bad UI no matter what you add on top of it.
A handheld device should be, first and foremost, a good device without anything added. Then, when people add things, it will, by definition, remain a good device. You don't want ten tons of features that only three people use initially, of course; every feature makes the phone harder to use, even if only slightly so. That said, if a person wants that feature and chooses to add it, that's the customer's choice to do so; the customer is saying that for him or her, having that feature is more important than the simplicity they lose as a result of having it. That should be the customer's choice, not the manufacturer's, not the telco's.
I don't buy for a minute that this is anything other than AT&T seeing if they can get away with it and not wanting a device on their network where you don't have to pay AT&T for the right to run games and other software on your own phone. Ditto for the ringtones situation. AT&T wants their cut. I have no reason to believe that Steve was outright lying to everyone when he said that Apple had to protect AT&T's fragile network, either. The difficulties adding software to the iPod touch can be easily explained by Apple simply wanting to maintain only one embedded port of the OS. Until I have reason to believe otherwise, I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt because Apple doesn't have a history of being dirty, lying scumbags with delusions of grandeur and a desire to control everything, while AT&T does. I hope my loyalty to Apple is not misplaced....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Once they sell it to someone, it becomes that person's product to do with as they like.
What isn't the iPhone compatible with?
Why do you think open and compatible are the same thing?
People pay more for ringtones because it has more value to them. Value is not measured by the length of a piece of music.
Your selling apps theory really doesn't hold much water based on their history. You may be right, but your point was convoluted and your whole post came off as a reason to puff you chest at 'those people'.
and the 'TYVM' makes you look like an ass.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I think more than any other mobile platform out there the potential for a well-written VOIP app on the iPhone to obsolete the use of its cell function is what makes AT&T terrified. I'm pretty sure Apple is bowing to pressure for AT&T on this one.
Imagine people buying a device that doesn't need a restrictive lock-in cell plan from the provider to make and receive calls. This is the same reason why the big telecomms don't want open access on the 700MHz band, it would kill their sacred profit cow.
-- I'm not a pessimist, I'm a realist. It's not my fault that life sucks so much. --
"THIS IS APPPPLE!!!" Apple's decision to lock out the platform is equally as intelligent as that movie. They are fanatic about the iPhone only being used as a phone, iPod, internet device (only what Apple decides and nothing more). The Book of Jobs forbids anyone to use it to log into a Cisco VPN, authenticate with Active Directory, log their credit card purchases, play a game or any other nonsense. This is the most efficient route to take a novel product and run it into the ground. Third party apps can only add value to the device thus helping Apple to meet its goal. Oh, well. I guess they have a special place for it in the Apple museum right next to the G4 Cube. If they try this on their computer line, I will have to change my sig.
You don't have to be smart to use a Mac, you just have to be smart enough to buy one
Yeesh, I see why you post anonymously. The next time I want to state my beliefs on slashdot, I'll be sure to do it AC.
Slashdot: censored by nerds, stuff that's moderated poorly.
I don't have an iPhone (yet), but I have had many PDA phones and I think Apple have made the right call here for iPhone v1.0 but they will have to change if they want iPhone v2.0 to be a success.
The big problem with most PDA phones is that they are worthless pieces of S**T. My Palm dies constantly, the browser is dreadful and third party apps make it unstable. My iPaq was worse, the bluetooth and WiFi were abysmal and the phone quality rubbish.
The problem with most computer phones is that they have puny processors and the operating system (such as it is) is 1980s style with no protected memory. Put a misbehaving application on the device and it becomes unstable.
Given the time that Apple had to put the iPhone together, I think they made the right call. It is far more important for the iPhone to work well as a phone than be an infinitely extensible computing platform.
This is not going to be the case for iPhone 2.0. Unlike the iPod competitors, Motorola, Nokia &ct. have the same commitment to usability, style etc. that Apple does. Google is also likely to enter the market. They are not going to respond with a Zune. If the iPhone is going to continue to be a success it is going to have to be available unlocked.
The iPhone exclusive deal looks to me like it is the last hurrah for a business model that has had its day. Carriers don't want to be in the business of selling phones, they have to give discounts on them in any case. The business of locking phones evolved because the carriers have to ease the customer into the deal by making the phone effectively free.
Free phones made a lot of sense when they became obsolete in a year, as they did a few years ago. The difference between the RAZR and predecessors was significant. The difference between modern phones is much less important. The iPhone marks the end of the 'disposable phone' era. People will abandon the 1st generation iPhone for the GPS and 3G capabilities in the second. But the idea of replacing a phone every year as a matter of course will go.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
AT&T has actively discouraged third-party developers for all phones since way back in the old Cingular days. Have you ever seen how locked-down the J2ME model is on Cingular/AT&T phones? One cannot connect to bluetooth (at all) unless the app is signed by a Cingular Preferred certificate. Guess how many third-party developers have a pre-existing relationship and/or can get one, to get their app signed? If you guessed that even Google doesn't sign their apps and pays the price in user functionality, you guessed correctly.
Six score characters.
Brevity being wit's soul
I have enough space.
and welcome to the 1980's.
Now you can start reading that wonderful 1983 publication "The Orange Book" (URL:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_Computer_System_Evaluation_Criteria/) and learn about Division B.
Having an untrusted system administrator is not due to the advent of the 21st century or unknown to the mainframe world.
Unfortunately, what you will discover when you've finished reading that massive, snooze-inducing, orange-covered book is that everything needed to safely allow system administration by untrusted users is also everything needed to enforce kick-a** DRM.
Doh!
See now, I was about to consider this an intelligent comment and reply in turn but then you went calling names. Unlucky for me i'm bored enough at work to reply anyway...
The iPhone is not compatible with any 3rd party apps that i'm aware of, not compatible with BES, not compatible with any wireless contacts/calendar sync. Yes, it's "compatible" with windows and Mac. Linux? Not sure.
To dig into your point, technically everything is compatible...with the specific designated things it was built around. I'm talking about compatibility with...anything other than what's on the phone when you buy it.
As for paying more for ring tones: Yes, obviously people find value in it. The valued service is nothing more than chopping apart a song. Something that can be done with freeware fairly easily. Heck, if the iphone was "open" someone could write an app to do that for you and avoid the per-song fee. Oops! Personally I refuse to pay for ringtones, i've got tons of MP3s (heck, even legal!) that i will.
My theory on selling apps mightnot hold water based on history, but historically apple has never sold a phone. I'm not puffing anything, i'm pointing out that apple/att are quite happily keeping the iphone ibricked so they can sell more.
I'll stick with my blackberry TYVM. Go ahead and call me an ass, i paid 1/2-1/3 for equivilant functionality.
You can get rich if you own a politician, but you have to be rich to buy one in the first place.
But the Iphone uses a modified OSX kernel. Which has protected memory. I seriously doubt they will ever open up the development for 3rd party apps. I think its exactly because Apple locked down the Iphone that others ( Nokia, Motoroloa, Google) will take the same approach to protect revenue schemes, plus the stability that you mentioned.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
It'd be trivial as hell for Apple to allow java apps that run in a sandbox. It's obviously not security that Apple's worried about.
As with most of their products, Apple tends to dictate the user experience to an unusually high degree.
For whatever reason.
NOT a useless piece of garbage like Firefox is with all it's add-ons and skins...
SO if Microsoft decides to keep your junk software off their own I love Internet Explorer even more!
--
But yeah, if you don't want 3rd party apps, don't install them. The N-Gage didn't die because it got flooded with 2nd and 3rd party apps. In fact, the Nintendo DS is more popular then some of its rivals because of how much easier it is to add 3rd party apps to it (such as browsers, etc...) and how it doesn't use a restrictive formatting. By your logic, you'd prefer your DVDs to not have foreign languages, subtitles, creator commentaries, trailers, fansites, forums on said fansites, IMDB entries or wiki articles.
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
I don't own an iPhone and wouldn't really want one, but I wouldn't be surprised if Apple wouldn't be planning one of its coups by waiting until next year and then releasing, along with the rumoured Netwon II an official SDK for all three touchscreen devices.
Several things that have gone down in the general outcry about the iPhone being closed to development (escorted by a truly monumental amount of FUD, such as the claim, last night that Apple still had not released the Intel kernel sources, even though its been a year or so since they did) point to this, such as:
1.Apple almost never comments in public about controversies over its devices. They won't start now. Apple's biggest trump card is its ability to avoid the bleeding wound scenario that plagues companies when there is some new device in the works or some controversy where it would simply be better to weather it out than make a public fool of oneself.
2.The iPhone uses some elements of the OSX 10.5 SDK, which are not yet out in Public. If Apple ever do open the iPhone to development, they'll do it after that, not before.
3.The rumoured Newton II (aka iPad or whatever), will be an open platform, running a version of OSX, very similar to the one in the iPhone and iPod touch.
4.Apple has quietly been hiring gaming developers.
Apple might be at a point where they will also start to compete with mobile gaming devices. It would add another sales point to the line of touchpad devices.
And the original MAC used a 68000 with a memory manager that was completely capable of supporting protected memory but Apple never used it.
The fact that the platform may have some protected memory capability built in does not mean that the O/S is configured to take advantage of it. Windows XP has protected memory but its still virus prone because few people use the accounts feature.
Lock in is a first mover strategy. If you are the second or the third the advantage of lock in is much less. So pretty much every scheme that starts off with a walled garden approach is challenged in time by an open one.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
To get access to the network stack (sockets, SMS, etc.), the contact list or the file system, on most cell phones you need your application signed by the operator (e.g. AT&T) or the OEM (e.g. Motorola). Needless to say, John Doe is not going to get his application signed by the operator or the OEM. Even if you are a serious developers, there will be talk about the distribution model and what their cut is. It might be different for smart phones (or unlocked phones), but for north america operator sold cell phones that's how it works.
The other aspect is security, if any application could send SMS or do network traffic, you could have an malicious or poorly written application create insane bills.
It seems the iPhone OS X doesn't have a signing model to control who has access to what and that would explain why it's closed to random developers.
I want it both ways - I want continued updates and improvements to my new mobile computer from Apple, and I want to be able to do other interesting things with my new mobile computer that fill a niche that Apple understandably wouldn't be writing software for.
Is it unreasonable for me, an Apple customer and shareholder, to want this?
When I'm buying a technology product, there are several factors that weigh into the decision. One is the quality of the technology. Just as important is the future outlook. Is there a good chance that missing features I want can be easily added later? Are there a lot of people, either in a company or on their own, working to improve it? Will I be able to adapt it to some niche problem that I'm working on that may not be important to most people, but is important to me?
Apple has a great technology, but lacking those other ingredients I just can't get too excited about the whole package. In a year's time, there will be other very similar phones on the market:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/29/nokias-iphone-no-seriously/
And some of those will likely be infinitely customizable. Nokia is already running with this Apple blunder:
http://www.nseries.com/index.html?l=campaigns,open
So Apple, am I going to feel like an idiot for buying into a closed platform when similar but open models come out from other companies?
Barring a shift in policy of some kind, such as a released api or "binary application approval program", I am thinking it's time to get out of AAPL and think hard before buying more Apple products.
Vidi, Vici, Veni
Yea we had one of those warnings floating from IT. Funny thing the warning came out BEFORE the iPhone did. I think it had more to do with expected demand than actual threat from the phone.
One of them tried to tell me it was because proprietary data could be gathered from the device if it was stolen, and Blackberry has safeguards against this. It was around this time, I realized that we had a contract with a blackberry provider with on-site support and not AT&T or Apple. The other troubling details that dispelled this "security threat" was (1) I would violate regulations by storing confidential information unencrypted on a portable device and (2) I could use any device that supported webmail to check my email.
These comments are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of my employer or colleagues...
Please,
Then we can all give Apple and AT&T the big ol' finger.
Bringing liberty to the masses. - http://freetalklive.com/
You are correct about Macs and 6800's, but different user accounts have nothing to do with protected memory.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
At the very least they need to open up the ringtone controls! I am absolutley embarrassed how end-user unfriendly the iPhone has become - very un-Apple like in my opinion. I would venture to guess that the iPhone is now the most uncustomizable cellphone on the market!! If you are as unimpressed as I am then sign my petition at: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/custom-ringtones-for-the-iphone
Having an iPhone, I can tell you that it's already gummed up. AT&T's edge network sux so hard it should literally be a crime that they continue to charge for it. And the voice network ain't so great sometimes either. I suppose their voice service probably isn't any worse than other providers, but it is laughable to think that somehow iPhone software is going to screw things up. What, would it delay my SMS traffic? My voicemail notifications too? Cause my phone not to ring when people call me? Cause my calls to constantly drop even when stationary? Cross my calls with the calls of other people? Make call quality fluctuate, often to the point where communication is impossible?
Funny, that's already the way it is.
... everybody stop supporting the iPhone. Give them what they want :)
http://www.rense.com/general79/wdx1.htm
Maybe a bad comparison. Firefox *is* a piece of garbage on Mac OS. ;-)
How did you get your spyware on your computer? I mean - you WANTED IT right? Otherwise you wouldn't have downloaded it right?
Windows XP users must love Spyware aLOT. It's fucking everywhere!
I like my closed phone. It resembles your wife's vagina.
1) Apple is not going to come out with an official API, they would have said so.
Simple widgets is all you are going to get.
2) The iphone is very limited in features already compared to other phones and
offers almost no programmablility as well.
3) The iphone does not have as much flexibility in software as does Windows Mobile.
I can take a Windows Mobile device and add the same touch features as the iphone and same interface and there is a browser that works the same as well (Deepfish by Microsoft).
I can even take an IPOD interface with the full on touch features and use that as a music player on Windows Mobile.
Even the programming is so much easier and I don't even need an emulator to develop for Windows Mobile. Run it on my windows machine and Sync it over to my device.
Apple wants you to be locked down to what they provide you. If the PC did not exist, apple would have created a closed platform and you would have to get a license to develop for OS X (see iphone). Thank the PC for the ability to have a more Open platform on OS X.
So it doesn't sound like Apple is opposed to 3rd party development per se. On the other hand, Apple has stated definitively that they will take steps to stop "unlocking" of the iPhone from the AT&T service (which they are probably obligated to do by their contract with AT&T). So it is probably the unlockers who spoiled the party for those who merely wanted to install 3rd party applications. At least one of the unlocking methods worked by exploiting a buffer overflow. Clearly, allowing users to run arbitrary code on the iPhone opens up huge opportunities for supporting such vulnerabilities. So to live up to their contract with AT&T, Apple probably will have to exercise some control over what applications are installed on the iPhone.
This of course leaves open the possibility that Apple might, at some point in the future, provide some mechanism for "approved" 3rd party applications to install on the iPhone. But 3rd party applications are clearly not a big part of Apple's business model for the iPhone, so it's probably not a big priority. Moreover, any such mechanism would have to be consistent with the security requirements of Apple's deal with AT&T, so it won't be a simple matter.
I'm not holding my breath.
There is no valid technical reason for desiring closed platforms. There is a totally valid business concern, and it's not simply forcing customers into certain directions. I agree that this is an opportunity granted by a closed platform, but the real benefit for the business is significant reduction of variables to deal with when moving forward with fixes, new features, and so forth. Because Apple has taken the income over time, they are practically bound to add features. After the first two years or so, don't be surprised if the strict closed platform nature of the iPhone is relaxed significantly.
Also, for those bent on arguing the legality of such things, keep in mind that as a privately held network, AT&T has no requirements to allow devices access to its network if it doesn't want to. Currently, they allow zero devices without a contract or signed agreement of some kind, and in that contract they can easily apply device restrictions even if they seem ludicrous. Until this is actually challenged in a real court case (read: not class action fappery) then there is no reason to believe there are grounds to suggest the actions are unlawful. It's more practical to simply avoid the network entirely. Avoid the iPhone entirely.
Unless you have a significant Apple investment it's not the end-all be-all phone. The next generation of Nokias have as good of a browser (rendering-wise, it's based on the same KHTML engine) and have been open platforms for years. I use an iPhone because I have a strong library of media coming from iTMS, I don't really care about open platforms for my phone at this point. I did for a while, even developing for Symbian myself, but that time has come and gone.
However, if the situation was different, I don't even know why I would look at the iPhone. It's shiny sure, but it's not THAT amazing, the Nokia E90 is a lot cooler of a device imho. The iPhone's touch screen is ok, but hardly groundbreaking. Two touch senses at once... so? The pinching gesture gives me hand cramps, and even with all the smarts I still fat finger things all the time. With a keypad interface that's designed for interface and situation appropriate limits (i.e. single handed use in keypad mode of S60 phones) it's far faster and easier to navigate than a touchscreen. The learning curve is higher, yes, but that's not a problem, especially not for the target audiences.
So let us recognize the reality, and put your jealous tendencies aside for a moment. Realize that the iPhone, while technically interesting, is an embedded, developer unfriendly, locked down media device. It's not a portable computer, it's not a PDA. It's nothing more than exactly what it's advertised as being and that's what Apple intends. Why should we expect more from it? There are other companies offering what you want. Don't be so Apple obsessed.
I read the script, and I think it would help my character's motivation if he was on fire. -Bender
I know it's an off topic troll just because of the subject matter. I do realize that Microsoft rules the Universe and we should all be kissing Bill Gates ass but what's with the daily bile about Apple? People whine constantly if there's a post blasting Microsoft but it's been pile on Apple for a while now. Look yes they didn't make it open source or open development but it's their product and as the article actually points out there are other options that allow for development if that's important to you. Taking the "how dare they" stance is rediculous. It's a new product and given the fact it's running an OS I'm assuming it'll open up for development down the line. They just launched it people! They didn't include every single feature you wanted? Grab the torches and burn the sinners! Come on grow up. Apple on the whole puts out good reliable products. A clue for those under 16 Apple has never made cheap electronics and they've always cost a premium. Actually Apple products are the cheapest they have ever been based on market standards. If they kept dropping prices for another ten years they'd have to give stuff away. Their large scale monitors have dropped like a rock and their computers are competitive with other name brands and in fact beat regular prices for features and performance. They may be threatening your beloved Microsoft's market share but don't distress Microsoft is still the monopoly you know and love. I'm sure they'll keep shitting out crap OS after crap OS so there's no need to fear they are going away anytime soon. I'm sure they are working on a way to extract a DNA sample before they'll let you boot up the OS and require a retinal scan before it'll let you start an application. The spybots and viruses will still be able to get in but you won't.
I had a couple different Palm smart phones before my iPhone. And, I can tell you, the easiest way to render those phone unstable was to add a third-party application. Even apps from respected developers still caused problems. In the end, I ran these phones "stock" since they had to be dependable phones above all else.
So, I see a good reason for Apple to block 3rd party apps. Given the popularity and visibility of these phones, they don't want non-Apple software products giving the impression that the iPhone is unstable.
And, believe me, they would. People add 3rd party software to their phones with even less discretion than they apply to their desktops/laptops.
Without hardware protected memory, 'different user accounts' is essentially just slightly more elaborate than the 'protection' on a Windows 98 machine. You know, the OS where you hit 'cancel' to skip logging on the system.
Apple never 'got' protected mode. They ended up buying their new multitasking OS from outside developers. Microsoft was just as bad, using the '286, '386, and '486 as essentially a 'really fast 8088 machine' for a long time. I looked at the 'protected mode' features in the '286 and said 'hey, that's cool' but then saw OS vendors seldom doing anything with it. (there were some OS people who took advantage of protected mode, but not many)
Microsoft says legacy (serial/parallel) ports are bad. They don't obfuscate the hardware enough.
They've sold the software with the phone, and it then belongs to the purchaser to do with as they please.
This whole iPhone deal is too weird for me in many ways, some of them design-related, some of them evil business overlord related:
- arguably the most technologically-advanced phone in the world doesn't do video recording, nor does it allow you to replace the battery
- if you open the package, but find out 31 days later that your phone has failed, AT&T will charge you a 10% restocking fee to accept it back for a replacement
- if you have a discounted wireless plan (for example, you work at the post office, which nets you a 25% discount on your entire wireless bill - all phones), and you want to replace the PRIMARY phone on your plan with an iPhone, you lose your discount.
- even though YOU activate your OWN phone via iTunes, AT&T is not giving up that $18 activation fee.
Please note that I personally verified the last three items on this list at a largish nearby AT&T store (Lehigh Valley Mall, Whitehall, PA).
My point in all of this is that I wouldn't put ANYTHING past Apple OR AT&T in regards to the iPhone. They are selling a ton of these phones, and as a result, feel they have carte blanche to treat their customers in any way they desire. If Steve Jobs decides this should be the ONE phone in the world for which you cannot replace your own battery, it shall be so. If AT&T decides you will lose a $25-$50/month (or more) discount on your cell phone bill, in ADDITION to charging you a minimum of $20 more per month for an iPhone data plan, your only recourse is to not get the phone. Frankly, they don't care.
The whole thing is just too weird...
I've read several places that the iPhone would give you a lot of ability to hack the software radio that you can't get from a Pocket PC, Palm, or Java based platform. If that's the case, then that's a pretty obvious reason to keep people out of the iPhone.
So, what's the scoop there?
You don't need a license to use the software. I have the right to enter into a licensing agreement with Apple, but I have no obligation to do so. Unless they have my signature on such a license, it's terms are not enforceable (at least in the free world, YMMV in North Korea or the United States).
Just as I have the right to buy a book, make notes in the margins and then resell it, I have the right to modify the software and then resell my copy. I also have the right to sell as many copies of my patch as I like. Again, YMMV in non social democracies.
Twat are you saying?
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
I don't like it one bit, but with not much tweaking, it would seem to me an iPod touch could be rigged to run a service like skype. WiFi or not, it would still be an incredible thing to have, essentially it would be a WiFi iPhone.. or. WiFiPhone.
My Windows Phone (Sprint Mogul) runs Skype well. At $30/month for unlimited data (plus voice) pushing 1.5 Mbps, the quality is as good as Skype can be (ie, okay but not great). Skype Mobile doesn't do video calls, however, for that I use Microsoft Portrait.
Da Blog
do VoiP apps exist for these other phones?
My Windows Phone (Sprint Mogul/HTC Titan) runs Skype well. At $30/month for unlimited data (plus voice) pushing 1.5 Mbps, the quality is as good as Skype can be (ie, okay but not great). Skype Mobile doesn't do video calls, however, for that I use Microsoft Portrait. Intalling each of these programs simply involved downloading the installers and clicking. That's it. For a "closed" system, the Windows phones sure do have a lot of software and dev kits readily available that extends their functionality.
Da Blog
The first thing you should ask someone with an opinion about the iPhone is how they like theirs. Nine times out of 10 they don't have one, but they are steamed about how music and movies were included but not bits and bytes. Get used to it. Most people are not computer nerds. More people listen to music than give a shit about installing software. Most people are drowning in unwanted I-T chores. It is a huge selling feature of the iPhone that Apple acts as your I-T staff.
If you want to add all the iPhone's features to your Windows Mobile, it's cheaper to just buy an iPhone than to purchase all the third-party software you'll need. And once you install third-party software on any phone it starts crashing. Who needs that?
There will likely be an SDK for both iPhone and iPod touch next year at WWDC 2008 and it is likely the apps will have to be approved by Apple and installed by iTunes. Why? Because that's what Apple's customers want: somebody to put a fucking leash on hackers. Right here in this article we see that there are hundreds of phones you can write software for. So go write software for them. When did hackers become so fucking whiny?
I'm an Apple fanboy by admission, but their actions with the iPhone have been pretty sorry -- if somebody wants to add a non-airtime-using app to their phone, who's it hurting? Somehow, it seems to be hurting egos that believe they already KNOW what the perfect phone does. Scroom.
> I wouldn't mind even a highly sandboxed environment, s long as there was some kind of local storage and "offline" functionality.
Your sandboxed apps are already in there, it's got a Web 2.0 browser, which is the best sandbox that Apple could develop in-house. What, you want another sandbox in the phone? No. That is insane. You already have a 3-headed dog named iTunes guarding the front door. Right now you can solve 90% of a user's application needs with a plain Unix Web server and a plain iPhone. Soon enough, with offline Ajax that will go up to 99% of the apps a user needs, and the Internet will just be used for a locally stored app to see if there is a patch update. Ajax is making a Web site of hundreds of pages seem like one page, to cache that page you have to have an Ajax-aware browser cache (e.g. Google Gears). This is obviously what's happening to the bulk of application development. Flash v10 will have ISO MPEG-4 H.264/AAC media and run on the iPhone, making a fool out of Flash Lite on other phones. There is plenty of sandbox in the iPhone already.
The other 1% will be provided by Apple in the OS X software and possibly with optional software you download through iTunes only. But all the native software will come from Apple, that is a basic security and management issue. It's a basic feature of the iPhone that it can die and you can get a replacement and plug it into your iTunes and with one sync you are right back where you were the last time iTunes saw your old phone. There are thousands of personal customizations in every iPhone: every contact, movie, song, photo, setting are all carried from OS version to OS version, from iPhone to iPhone, and with Leopard your Mac will backup iTunes automatically if you so much as show it a second fixed disk. Any optional software has to follow this model or else you'll impose I-T work on the user, they'll have to install or uninstall your apps, which is what makes software so unpopular and PC's in general so unpopular, a shadow of mobiles in number. With the iPhone and iPod, iTunes is the butler. All the other servants report to him.
But the iPhone is newer than Windows Vista and Ubuntu Linux, you have to give Apple a break somewhere. Every feature that's not in the iPhone has a conspiracy theory attached. The truth is that Apple has really high standards, they have been sitting on a tablet Mac for 3 years according to Steve Jobs, because it isn't good enough yet. They can sit on native third-party development as long as they need to because they're the only phone with millions of Web apps and the only phone with so many world-class features built-in.
Apple said that the iPhone UI was protected by tons of patents. Fortunately, the chinese won't care, and will once again show that a free market is superior to artificial monopolies created by patents.
Also, Nokia is working on an iPhone clone.
Unfortunately, given the current state of cell phone UI, I have serious doubts any of the other manufacturers will even come close to Apple's polish and usability.
WHA???
I've owned a ton of phones. Of all the phones I've owned, only Nokia and Palm even seem to care about usability. Motorola, SonyEricsson, LG? Give me a break. The UI on their phones is crap.
And even Palm and Nokia are on the "Okay, I can figure out how this works without making too many mistakes" side, not on the "this is a pleasure to use" side.
I hope this to be the case. It's entirely possible that Apple wants to avoid an early OS X situation, where updates to the OS regularly broke third-party applications because the APIs were in flux, and many public APIs were simply not documented. So maybe Apple will release an API and a way for users to install apps at a later date.
Another possibility is that Apple wants to sell iPhone apps itself, similarly to how they sell iPod games.
A third possibility is that Apple simply doesn't want third-party apps on the iPhone, at all, possibly because they don't have a real sandbox to run them in. Which would explain why they tell devs to target Safari: Safari is in a way a really draconian sandbox, which allows for almost no access to the iPhone (other than calling people or pointing to map locations).
My bet is on option 2. This gives users third-party apps, gives Apple money, gives devs a way to target iPhones, and gives AT&T some security, because Apple would not sell VOIP or SIM unlocking apps.
So... they don't like the iPhone because it is insecure? You mean there is a phone system that is secure? At least phones don't blow up in your face anymore...
;)
Everybody and his mom still uses that 'one ring' trick on landlines like there's no tomorrow
one ring to rule them all..
sigs are hazardous to your health
I haven't heard much about the plans with offline Ajax: all I know is that I'd love to make useful webapps to use on my iPhone but still usethem when I'm on the subway etc; either I haven't done the right research on offline Ajax or it's not there yet.
;-) (in general I think there are some kludgey or under-QA'd aspects to landscape mode, maybe that's why they've been so slow bringing it to other apps that could REALLY use a wider keyboard.)
Also, on my friend's hacked iPhone, I saw stuff that would be useful but probably not too viable via Ajax, like an ssh client. Or DOOM.
Then there's a certain amount of potentially useful stuff that probably can never be safely exposed, stuff that leverages the iPhone-ness, rather than the PDA aspect. (Heh, just like there are "Wii aware" websites, I'd love to be able to read the state of the angle sensors.
And Apples standards are high, but they're not perfect; otherwise I wouldn't see obvious no-brainers like "gee, maybe the magnifying glass content should be onscreen even when the area being mangified is near the top"
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
And Apple is liable for damages if *they* break it.
yeah thats a bunch of bs. Apple should allow you to mod your phone and have the restore just send it back to factory if you screw it up. Use at your own risk. I may go back to 1.0.2 just to get my third party apps back. iTunes Wi-fi doesnt do anything for me.