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What Features Should Be Included With iPhone 3.0?
With the announcement coming tomorrow, Macworld has posted their top list of 15 features they would like to see in an iPhone 3.0 update. The list includes some things that people have been asking for since launch (like cut and paste) and things that were once there but have since been silently removed (like push notifications/background apps). With almost 2 years of time to grow and learn, what other things are woefully inadequate on Apple's popular handheld?
... a keyboard?
Should be top of the list.
"So is the BSD licence even more 'free' (than GPLv2)? Yes. Unquestionably." --Linus Torvalds (TinyURL.com/2vugzl)
The Apple music store is DRM free now.
Are you proposing they remove the DRM support in hardware, so people who bought DRM'd media can't play those files?
Or are you just bitching about something that's sure to get a bunch of other putzes to agree with you?
-Ability to use as a modem (via bluetooth and USB or even ad-hoc WiFi).
How about the next version include less smugness?
Sent from my iPhone
This one drives me nuts. My life is conf calls yet when a call number in included in a meeting invite, IT'S NOT LINKED like phone number are EVERYWHERE else in the phone apps.
-Tethering
Well shoot, you can just put your own tether onto it, be it lanyard you made at summer camp, a dog leash, one of them there chains that keep people from stealing your wallet, or something else. Or you could just hold onto it better.
-Multitasking
Here again, no need for updates from apple. I mean, I talk on my phone all the time while doing other things. Not driving though, they just outlawed that. And if you buy TWO iphones, you can use two apps at the same time. Imagine being able to use the lightsaber app while using the zippo app!
-Video recording
Tape a video camera to the iphone.
-USB mass storage support
While you're taping a video camera to the phone, go ahead and throw a USB thumb drive in there.
skipping tracks is as simple as clicking the inline button on the earbuds. pause is a double click. The buds also double as your headset so that phone calls automatically pause the music and give you a chance to answer with another simple squeeze of the button. Hanging up is just one more squeeze again and then back to the music. It's not advanced, but it's perfectly sufficient...
The iphone is awesome and I want one but it's still a walled garden so I'm avoiding it. Here's a perfect example:
http://appstorehell.chocoflop.com/wiki/Main_Page
What the hell is wrong with my iPhone / iPod application and why do I not get any answers after months of waiting ?
So you got an iPhone and thought it was a great device and you decided to write software for it:
* You learned objective-C and Cocoa programming
* You paid 99$ to register as an official developer
* You wrote a nice application
* You submitted your application.
* and then...
Image:mail.png It doesn't get rejected, but you get a message that says...
Your application YourApp is requiring unexpected additional time for review. We apologize for the delay, and will update you with further status as soon as we are able. Thank you for your patience.
Looks like nothing to worry about. So...
* You wait for a week, then two, then three, four, five, six...
* You write e-mails to devprograms
* You make phone calls to developer support
But you never get any answer ? After a pair of months you get used to the idea that your app will never be accepted nor rejected.
Image:question.png So what is happening really ?
Knowningly or not you most likely hit on one of the "secretly forbidden" features that Apple doesn't want on the AppStore. Those are issues that are not specifically mentionned in the agreement and that they are not willing to defend. Their solution, which is unofficial but which has proven to be systematic is to let developers linger in silence for ever.
It's a cool technology but Apple's engaging in superdickery here, same as the American cell carriers. Apple had to use their clout to get unmetered broadband from ATT but cheering them on for that feels kind of like WWIII Ukrainians cheering on the nazis for pushing out the communists.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
We've got an entire company of these things, and no one seems to complain about exchange support.
I personally have one as well, and I have yet to have a problem with it.
-ted
In the dark, dank economic times ahead, we need weapons in the iPhone because its cheery and inviting glow will attract the unemployed proletariat riff-raff out on the streets.
I suggest a titanium telescoping katana that rotates into a Calabi Yau hyperspace manifold when not in use, or an iPhone app that opens a wormhole to a universe full of angry bees.
Most of these points have already been made -- sync all your stuff, not just your email. Make everything searchable, not just contacts. Apple, PDAs have done this since before the turn of the century. Get on the stick.
Full bluetooth support. The i-phone should pair seamlessly with car audio systems that support stereo bluetooth. Blackberry already does this. Funky, proprietary cables and scratchy FM transmitters are so two decades ago.
Support for bluetooth peripherals, including (let me be clear on this) a decent keyboard. Blackberry already does this. Apple, you're missing out on a whole new line of stylish white iphone peripherals. Your marketing geeks should be thinking "micro-office".
Not just tethering, but bluetooth tethering. It's just amazing to me that you can tether a Blackberry to a Mac but you can't tether an i-phone to a Mac. How could Apple allow this to happen?
Speaking of proprietary cables, it's time Apple take a clue from the rest of the cell phone industry and switch to a micro-USB connector on the phone. Last time I said that in this forum, someone replied that Apple has been providing USB support for some time, which just goes to show how misunderstood this issue is. All three of our phones, and the company phone when I have to carry it, will charge from the same charger despite being different manufacturers. The ipod touch needs that proprietary stylish white charger with the stylish white proprietary connector. Where the hell has that thing gone now... Apple, please hear this. Proprietary data connectors are so last century.
MMS... geeze... don't get me started...
Apple has got to stop screwing around with locking down memory and calling it a feature. Flash memory is cheap, plentiful and standardized. A phone without a micro-SD slot is just plain not interesting. Why in God's name should you have to buy another phone to get more memory? How green is that? How financially responsible is that? Ipod and Iphone owners -- let me clue you in on a secret that Apples doesn't want you to know about... Memory has been cheap and more importantly, interchangeable for years. To upgrade my Blackberry from 8 Gbytes to 16 Gbytes costs $40.99 (Amazon) and can be done in a few seconds. To do a similar upgrade to an ipod touch is $284.95 (Amazon) minus whatever I could get on the used market for the old ipod. This is incredibly backwards. Flash memory is a commodity item.
I'm sure there are Apple marketing people who will say that locking down memory in iphone and ipod devices is a positive revenue stream for Apple. To them I say, the current arrangement results in a thriving used device market, from which you don't get revenue. Wouldn't you rather be selling stylish white SD cards at Apple's usual markup?
And finally, I won't even consider a phone that doesn't have a user replaceable battery. My phone is, like, my phone, it's what I use for my livelihood. I can't be without it for any longer than it takes to pop off the back and put in another battery. I'm sorry, if you're going to be a serious contender to serious phone/pda users, you're going to have to rethink this.
Again, I expect the next i-phone to be like the current 3G phone except more memory and a few bugfixes. What I hope happens is that Apple steps up to the plate and fields a phone that does everything the current competition does, only better. But -- reality check -- different isn't necessarily better. Example: Email is not a substitute for MMS. Email is Email, and MMS is MMS, and your competition has both.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
The reason you don't get turn-by-turn directions with Google maps is that Google's agreements with map/GIS data providers (all those with copyrights listed in the bottom corner of your map) forbid it.
A license that allows turn-by-turn directions that is controlled by GPS costs money, hence why there aren't any free apps that do this, except for one, AndNav for Android, that uses Open Street Map data instead of commercial map data.
In fact, AndNav started out doing this with Google Maps until running into this problem.
4) Dump iTunes. Seriously, talk about specification creep. When a music player now manages movies, television, that's one thing. But when it's your application manager and synchronization tool as well. Apple really needs to launch a new tool, call iLife or what not. Where iTunes would just be one category. I mean, I really hate having to go under music to find my TV shows and apps and such. LAME!!!
Not to be disrespectful, but are you frikkin' nuts?
Apple's success outside of the computer market over the past few years has been due to their ability to:
iTunes is the key to Apple's strategy. They're not going to dump it, they're going to use it to continue to make boatloads of cold, hard cash. If you want to rename the application to "Apple Online Store", I'm sure they wouldn't mind you doing so on your own computer. But in my mind it's fair to say that iTunes is currently Apple's most important asset.