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iPhone Jailbreaking Still Going Strong
snydeq writes "Despite the productivity promises of Apple's forthcoming 3.0 firmware update, jailbreaking should continue to push the iPhone's productivity envelope, as users increasingly demand the Holy Grail of smartphone power use: applications that run in the background, InfoWorld reports. Copy and paste, video recording and streaming, Internet tethering, and content search are just a few of the features over which iPhone users have sought to jailbreak their devices — a practice Apple itself has done little to crack down on. Jailbreak apps circumvent hardware and software restrictions that Apple says ensure a consistent, responsive user interface and optimal battery endurance. In particular, jailbroken phones can run apps in the background, a capability Apple reserves for its own apps but prohibits in third-party programs. Jay Freeman, creator of the Cydia iPhone installer and Cydia Store, however, believes a free-market approach is the best way to satisfy power users' demands for features without compromising the performance of their iPhones. And given Apple's App Store overcrowding, it seems likely that jailbroken phones and app venues like Cydia Store will continue to be popular with iPhone customers and developers, even after the 3.0 firmware ships."
Google still a good option for search.
Vista sales not picking up much.
ipod is a popular choice of mp3 player.
In surprise development, dog doesn't bite man.
Yes, and why should it not? It is similar to the how users run Mac OS on non-apple computers. If users want to do something, they should be allowed too! Consistency of user interface is no excuse, because it wouldn't even affect users with non-jailbroke phones. Apple just likes to control what users see and do, and jailbreaking is just evidence that some people don't like being told what to do!
...and here's why: Some company makes this, but you can't listen to music while using it. What a shame, what a waste. But they figured that if somebody is dumb enough to buy an iPhone then they're dumb enough to spend the dough on a fancy accessory that they believe they need to workout.
You have to first jailbreak the phone if you want to unlock it. But I recently switched to Google Android so I don't have to deal with this. It's a less nice experience, but I imagine a lot of people who are willing to go through the trouble of jailbreaking a phone are also willing to put up with the less polished UI.
Seriously? The two items that comprise the Holy Grail of smartphone power use are background apps and Infoworld reports?
Just look at the source of the TFA -- it's Infoworld themselves! Methinks they have a slightly overdeveloped sense of self-worth.
Also, I'm not sure why I would need to jailbreak my iPhone to access Infoworld, they must have some serious issues in their web design department.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
My wife once took a position at Apple. It was...interesting. The boss was one of three brothers (all tow-headed and just as gay as can be), and he'd been chosen to do the accounting and such, despite not actually wanting to do it, so he paid little attention. He kept the computer and software manuals in his office, which was frequently locked.
The person who set the system up was a nice guy, technically competent, but lacking real-world experience. His name was Rob Malda. He set the system up with as much high-tech stuff as he could (including a main system with an Intel 80186 - this was some time ago), and left to go to school somewhere a thousand miles away or more, with no way of contacting him except Ouija board running at a blistering 4Mhz.
This included setting up the big 40M disk on the main computer. Now, in those days, MS-DOS couldn't handle a disk larger than 32M, so he partitioned it into two, using software he had available, and didn't include as part of the package he left behind.
Therefore, when the disk drive caught fire, with flames coming out of it (probably from filings or metallic dust from the skate-sharpening machine in the next room), nobody knew how to restore the system.
They floundered around for a bit, but my wife wound up leaving, so I never did find out what they did to get going again. I forget how the story ends...but at least now her iPhone is unlocked. Assholes.
I predict the next great STD will come out of the rampant homosexuality associated with Apple products.
God hates the faggot computer.
They know not what they do, tinkering with the perfection of Jobs' vision. Apple will have to work even harder to cryptographically protect them from evil...
...is there a more stupid faux-tech-neo-nerd-speak expression than "Jailbroken?"
i swear there was a story last month how Apple had it in the newest SDK EULA that you can't make jailbroken apps with it. Apple gave up a technical solution and just told people that if you want to write jailbroken apps then do it from scratch and don't use their code
Apple's prohibition on 3rd party software running in background is probably the best line of defense against spyware infecting the average idiot/user's phone. Once you let un-vetted apps run in the background, you create the opportunity for keyloggers, spam software and all the other fun stuff that runs on PCs to infect the iPhone without the user even being aware. Plus you end up going down the path of requiring anti-virus and security software to run on the phone all the time, reducing the battery life. What's basically going on is that no one is willing to pay the costs that would be required to develop a "trusted application" framework where Apple could test and approve 3rd party apps. Plus, there's always the paranoia factor that someone's great idea would get stolen as part of the approval process.
But given the state of windoze computing these days, I'd say Apple's approach has to be viewed more as a security feature than an anti-competitive fair trade violation.
We are the 198 proof..
I have one. I'll stick with OS 2.1.2 until 3.x is jailbroken. Between netatalk, the ssh server/client, mobile terminal, and functional teathering, there's absolutely no way I'd go back to a closed and locked OS on that phone. If AT&T and Apple don't like it, cancel my account.
I'm of the opinion now that these companies have got too uppity. I've canceled cable television and Internet service, then put an antenna on my roof. I've canceled my land line. If AT&T wants my iPhone - they can have it.
Live without and you'll live better. Or, at least you'll live without a corporate cock pumping your unlubricated ass.
Hmm, I sit here and I wonder...did the submitter for this article have a beard? We'll probably never know.
I often wonder about stuff like that. What about you? Does your soul still wonder about beards?
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
The reason i have a jailbroken iPhone (legally unlocked, bought it in Italy) is the way the App Store apps are crippled. The apps from cydia have much better functions in many cases, as a simple example the flashlight app, the one from cydia can override the screen brightness settings, which makes it actually work, whereas the official doesn't. Also apps like intelliscreen and others like it make it clear that I will still jailbreak my phone at 3.0.
Only recently was all of this "this being the chance to work at Apple" laid to rest, ending several months of talks and bringing a close to the toughest challenge, by far, of my career to date. Following is an account of how it started, and yes, how it ended.
For years I've literally dreamed of working at Apple. Grinding my life away like a digital serf. Who hasn't? For a designer, its the holy grail of aesthetic accolade. Through a series of related events, a recruiter at Apple contacted a certain high-level person *cough* Woz *cough* in the industry. This person then asked me if I wanted my name in the collective applicant hat, which eventually produced a call from Woz himself. The timing couldn't have been better given the position they were looking to fill.
And what was the position for, you ask? Well, to protect Apples and Oranges right to secrecy, I wont disclose too many details. But suffice it say I would have been managing the design of a certain place within their site where they showcase a lot of product for newer stuff where the make widgets and then showcase product.
The Interviews
Officious little prick. On the heels of a few successful phone conversations, I was flown out on a cold November evening. Interviews with several members of the team were to be held the next morning. And yet here I was in a lush hotel room, almost pinching myself to be certain this was really happening. Am I really here in Cupertino? With my gay lover Rob Malda? Am I really about to interview with Apple tomorrow? No way. Yes way. No way.
The following morning I endured 6.5 hours " yes, I said 6.5 hours " of interviews. Straight through. Even lunch was an interview. The only breaks I enjoyed were spent in the mens room with my lover CmdTaco enjoying a commode taco.
Interviewing with several members on a team isn't unusual these days, especially at the likes of Google, Yahoo, and a host of other tech companies. Needless to say, however, fielding questions and selling yourself for nearly a full day is quite exhausting. But I thoroughly enjoyed it, and the team members were both fascinating and brilliant. Two of the designers I would have been working closely with were particularly savvy.
The interviews concluded, I returned home, and in the ensuing weeks Suzanne and I discussed it at length. And I mean at length. The pros. The cons. The once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The sacrifices.
Let it be said that the chance to work at Apple, the prestige that comes from doing so, and the challenge of working with a highly talented team was undeniably attractive. But regrettably, it was the other parts of the equation that werent, well, quite as attractive.
Weighing Pros and Cons
Amidst a veritable sea of pros and cons, two factors weighed heavily on the decision we'd end up making: cost of living and flexibility of schedule. And my gay lover, Rob Malda's future living with us as a eunuch slave.
Having grown up in the Bay Area and still in touch with family and friends, it came as no surprise that housing is quite affordable. One can talk all day about the economics of supply and demand and how the market is merely working towards equilibrium, but when the same humble home I have now in Utah is priced at 1/5th that of the cost in Cupertino " nearly a million dollar home " I'm left only to wonder where the buck will stop. Or in this case, where it doesn't.
Further, housing in the area isn't kind to a 60-member family. Being a sole provider of income for that same 6-member family isn't a kind proposal either. On top of all this, we were considering scenarios which reduced commute time, limiting ourselves to homes closer to Apple headquarters, and therefore driving the overall cost of living even higher.
But enough about money. How about the intangible pros and cons? Flexibility of schedule? Time with family? Freedom to speak at conferences, author articles, and the like on the clock instead of off?
Knowing Id have to dedicate myself 100% at
iPhone is great, but a jailbroken iPhone is AWESOME! Oldschool emulators (Genesis, Nintendo), bash terminal, custom text ringtones, scp/ssh ... it's a fantastic device by itself, but without restrictions it's unbelievably good.
Breaking news, people will keep jail-breaking iPhones despite improvements!
In other breaking news, extensive research has determined that water is a liquid.
How is background execution the Holy Grail? Other smart phones have always had this feature. Holy Grail implies that all phones are working towards this feature. But as usual, other more capable phones get glossed over, and the world view of TFA is restricted to the shiniest turd on the block.
Apple sucks, and their IPhone will be hacked. Fuck it, Apple. You suck big asses.
Apple are doing everything but condone jailbreaking because they know it's a nice feature and they are selling iPhones because of it.
After logging in slashdot still does not take you back to the page you were on. It's been that way for 20 years.
Anything that justifies itself on the basis of "the user's experience" should be viewed appropriately - as a load of BS.
Apple contends that they want us to have a smooth, consistent user "experience".
Isn't that MY DECISION? If I choose to want concurrent apps (which I don't, the device doesn't have enough power to make it useful), who is the vendor to dictate my "experience"?
The reality is that they want their massive cut of the app store revenue, and alternate app stores cut their revenue stream out of the mix. Not to mention the possibility of messing with their carrier contracts. Any pathetic excuse like "experience" is obviously a sham. If they cared about my "experience" they would have delivered cut and paste two revs ago. If they cared about my "experience" iTunes would be trained to watch folders and automatically import music that is added to the folder without intervention. If they cared about my "experience" they would let me download TV shows that I have paid for via iTunes when connected to the internet via WI-FI.
And I say that as a member of my Fortune 100 company's "User Experience Executive Steering Group", which is a thinly disguised attempt to procure resources for pet projects...
The lockin forces the app-store, which forces the dev eula which forces the non-competition, which perpetuates apples distribution monopoly, which keeps the dump trucks full of cash coming in. Artist 'reward' as a justification for repression, etc. They don't care too much about jailbreaking because the avg buyer is not going to bother... and most people will continue to fork over cash, instead of stripping the nasty, avoiding the cash grab and using it as the more flexible and useful device it could be.
Windows Mobile devices have had applications running in the background for ages and there have not been outbreaks of infections preventing people from dialing 911.
So what you are saying here is, that computer makers should not be concerned about security until there is a problem.
GIven the nascent field that is mobile computing, of course there are not going to be many attacks yet. But that does not mean there will not be, and that they will have to be addressed. It's better to consider what that means ahead of time rather than when the storm hits.
I fully agree that the primary reason for Apple maintaining this restriction is business interests. But I fully disagree on what the interests may be, to my mind they are focused on device performance and this restriction is all about battery life rather than even security.
I think Apple can be cautious in opening features for devices and that can be frustrating, but history has shown us that caution may be advised in areas where you have large masses of networked devices and so I do not fault them for it.
In the end I don't see this as a big deal, if you truly care you can simply jailbreak the phone. The restriction as I see it is really only for the users that don't really need it anyway...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
You have to first jailbreak the phone if you want to unlock it. But I recently switched to Google Android so I don't have to deal with this. It's a less nice experience, but I imagine a lot of people who are willing to go through the trouble of jailbreaking a phone are also willing to put up with the less polished UI.
Given that Jailbreaking is essentially an O(1) operation over the life of the device, and day to day use is O(n), I'll take the better UI thanks!!
On Android you also still have to deal with hunting down apps not approved for the store, just like looking at Cydia apps on the iPhone...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The iPhone lacks background Applications - however, a percentage of the cases for making use of background processing are addressed by the notification service (which is finally going in with 3.0).
Once you eliminate the entire class of polling apps, are the remaining set truly the "holy grail" of iPhone use? I don't think so.
That said, Jailbreaking will thrive because there will always be stuff you can do with Jailbreaking you cannot otherwise, if nothing else just the opportunity for raw experimentation.... I seem to recall there has been some proof that Apple looks over these jailbroken apps, I'm sure they draw ideas from them and can even use them as a measure of just what areas people most want to see a deeper API exposed. So I don't think Apple will ever get serious about stopping this, not to mention they have been intelligent enough to know to spend only the most minimal time developing protection mechanisms that will be hacked anyway (which is all of them).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
So, in order to use this product, I have to partially break it?
There is only one product that I have to partially break to use that I am OK with.
It isn't a phone.
www.eFax.com are spammers
2. Ad Block. Either by the shareware Adblock or a hosts file.
3. Emulators. The GBA emulator has gotten quite good.
The trouble is that as soon as you have arbitrary apps deciding to run in the background, you have to look *very* closely what they do. Because if you don't, these apps will suck at your battery until it is empty.
And most normal users most certainly don't want to have to do that. At least with the appstore apps you can rely on them to stop doing anything as soon as you return to the home screen or click the phone "off". And Apple has done a really good job when it comes to power management. You may easily overlook this fact on an iPhone, but if you look at the iPod touch this thing runs (sleeps) for weeks if you press the off button. Having apps running in the background and then return to an empty battery two hours (or one day) later surely is *not* in the interest of the users. Constantly having to check for (and kill) running apps in some task-manager is no solution either.
Say what you will about Apple, but power management is one thing they are very serious about, not only with the iPhone. The new MacBook is able to even put most netbooks to shame when it comes to minimum power draw and this is not due to magic but just to lots of hard work and smart hard- and software. I've seen my MacBook drawing about 6 watts from the battery with WiFi on, display on 50% and writing things. This is outright impressive, they must have some really clever people working on that while most other hardware vendors just don't care and either stuff fat batteries into their machines or give you two hours of battery life. Limitations like "no background apps on the iPhone" are there for a good reason, so be careful what you wish for.
I notice this is moderated -1, Flamebait.
I'd like to suggest a different mod: +3, Troll. It was both subtle and brilliant.
Just another "DOJ fascist authoritarian totalitarian bootlicker" -- Zeio
I do not fault them for it.
Have you ever actually faulted Apple for anything?
Da Blog
Since this was taken almost word-for-word from a post about bad working conditions on Stack Overflow (note the second-to-last paragraph; I don't think Apple has skate-sharpening machines all over the place), it should be either under the bad working conditions article or at least a copyright thread. (It is clearly a copyright violation, and doesn't attribute itself properly.)
I suggest modding to 0 with Off-Topic, since it doesn't belong here.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
1) Memory management in objective-c sucks.
2) The runtime environment of the iPhone doesn't provide garbage collection.
3) When applications grab too much run, they are killed by the SO.
Don't need to go too far: Try running Cydia update with openssh, ipod and that afp daemon running. It will die and return to the phone's home screen most of the time.
So pointing out I have a phone that Just Works is Trolling? Right. Sounds like there's an Iphone fan out there who can't acknowledge that other phones exist, that work without requiring hacks.
Having owned both Palm OS (Treo + Palm III/V/Clie/TX) and an iPhone, I can say that while the parent post is well-meaning, it was filled with FUD from someone who clearly has never used an iPhone for any length of time.
you could pick up the phone and call someone in less than the 5 minutes it takes to get iPhone to do ANYTHING.
* Just picked up my iPhone -- from "locked" to "phone ringing at other end" it took 4 presses (one press to turn on screen, one slide to unlock, one press to launch phone, one press to dial contact) -- I timed it multiple times -- it took approximately 4-5 seconds from picking up to ringing.
It took less than a second to start an app
It depends upon the app -- most built-in apps (SMS, YouTube, Mail) take less than one second to launch. Some of the larger App Store add-ons (Orb, Shoutcast, Stanza) can take upwards of 3-4 seconds to launch. Of course, the program sizes for the iPhone are MBs and not KBs...Some of the larger ones (10MB+) such as HoldEm do take nearly 9 seconds to load...that's nine seconds of my life I'm never getting back. Of course I'm usually sitting at an airport killing time so that's a few hours of my life I'm never getting back, but let's get back to the GP post...
when you switched to another app and came back, it was JUST where you left it - what a concept
Let's see -- halfway through typing SMS, leave application, do something else, come back, SMS is still there half typed.
In the middle of playing Bejeweled, if I leave the application (say, the phone rings) -- the iPhone gracefully hands off the focus to the phone, it rings, I finish my conversation, end call and -- right back to Bejeweled.
If I am browsing the web and an SMS comes it, it pops up on the screen, I can reply right then (going into the SMS program) and return to my web page or simply cancel the notification...
Side note: Safari is quite stable. You obviously don't remember the joy of spending hours trying to get Blazer to display pages/not crash...
I was looking forward to Android, but don't want to switch to T-Mobile. Here's to hoping Pre is as good functionally as Treos were and Verizon would for once start carrying a phone designed in this century. (As much as I miss my Treo, I miss having coverage more, AT&T coverage SUCKS)
OK, so you don't want to switch to T-Mobile -- but you say that AT&T coverage sucks and Verizon doesn't carry the phones that you like...?
I'm not really sure what your point was -- other than that you are unhappy -- but suffice to say that the hoards of iPhone fanatics out there didn't just sign an agreement saying that they will take every opportunity to convert the world and force family and friends to drink the Kool-Aid. We really do love our phones *because they work*...
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
An update for an application I bought failed to install through the craptastic itunes, and none of Apple's checklist solutions made it work. So I unpacked the app into the original directory via the docking cable (something Apple won't let official apps do), fixed the perms via ssh (something else Apple doesn't allow), and was on my merry way with my working, paid-for upgrade.
I can see Apple wanting to do something about piracy, but the irony in this case is pretty obvious.
Have you ever actually faulted Apple for anything?
Sure, terrible printer interfacing in OS X, and the mysterious lack of support for many helpful Bluetooth profiles on the iPhone are two.
You see, unlike you I can actually recognize the good and bad in devices from many companies instead of simply faulting a device because it comes from a company I have a blood feud with.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Interesting that your "faults" relate to interfacing with third-party devices. And as for "Blood Feud"? Interesting idea and I wish I had the energy for something like intense, but having used Apple since the 1970s, and having owned and worked on everything from the original compact Mac on, that would be a little difficult to maintain. I've no feud with Apple, just with Apple Polishers.
Da Blog
"Battery Life": I will tell you what I told my VP:
Put a bigger battery in the damn thing. Problem Solved.
-AC