Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

iPhone's Development Limitations Could Hurt It In the Long Run

Posted by Soulskill on from the my-way-or-the-iway dept.

ZDOne writes "Apple might have finally come around to allowing third party developers to create applications for the iPhone, but only up to a point. ZDNet UK claims Apple is leaving itself vulnerable to the competition and to a loss of lustre by blocking background tasks on the device. The author notes, 'Perhaps it doesn't trust application designers or users very much. Perhaps it wants the best software for itself, where it can limit what it can do in order not to upset its telco friends. Whatever the reason, it reflects badly on Apple. The iPhone is not an iPod; it's a smartphone connecting to a universe of fast-changing data on behalf of innovation-hungry users. The sooner it stops pretending to be a 1981 IBM PC, the better it will be for everyone.'"

3 of 452 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Where is the competition? by nguy · · Score: 5, Informative

    Among the mobile phone makers, who hands out SDKs for creating applications on the phones?

    Almost every manufacturer, actually: there are SDKs for Symbian (Nokia, Motorola, Samsung), Windows Mobile (Motorola, Samsung, HTC, ...), Palm OS (Palm), etc. Symbian is a multitasking OS with Linux-like APIs. And almost all modern phones other than the iPhone can be programmed in MIDP.

    I wouldn't even know where to start if I wanted to develop an application for my Sony Ericsson W910,

    The W910 runs J2ME and MIPD, just like most phones these days. There are thousands of applications for that and it's easy to develop for.

    call me clueless but I don't see anything comparable to the iPhone SDK for any other phone.

    Yup, you're clueless. In terms of SDK, the iPhone is about the worst there is among modern phone platforms.

  2. Not without their reasons by countach · · Score: 5, Informative

    Background tasks, especially networking ones (which frankly, are the most useful type), would flatten the battery really quickly. Even more so with several of them waking up at different times and connecting the network.

    On the other hand, making the rule hard and fast is a bit tough. And Apple could provide some means of minimizing drain (waking every task up every few hours for example), but don't damn Apple totally on this one.

  3. Re:Even funnier by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    1)- the iphone sdk DOES NOT ban background processes. it disables them by default, but people have been compiling iphone apps that run in the background for months. it's actually ridiculously easy; this is how im apps let you stay signed on while your iphone is off (or you're talking on it).
    2)- the official iphone os may ban uncertified code, but people have been running uncertified code on iphones for months. since the number of "hacked" iphones is almost as great as the number of "boring" iphones, this is rather significant.

    i'm not a fanboy- personally, i don't like iphones, or people who like iphones. i just don't like misinformation.