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Google Gets Its iPhone Voice
snydeq writes "Google has found a way to let iPhone owners use Google Voice, launching a Google Voice Web app that runs on iPhone 3.0 OS devices, as well as on Palm WebOS devices. The Google Voice application leverages HTML 5's functionality for running sophisticated Web applications on a browser at speeds matching those of native applications, Google said. The Google Voice-iPhone conflict is one of several issues putting the companies on a collision course, the latest of which involves Apple potentially courting Microsoft to tap Bing as the iPhone's default search."
You're just shooting yourself in the foot otherwise.
I switched to Mac so I wouldn't have to use a Microsoft product ever again.
I'll keep using Google as my search engine, even if it means I have to use a bookmark instead of the search field!
If I run out of minutes I can use my data package?
If I had an Iphone, which I don't...
It's just you. If Google wants Google Voice to succeed in the market space they have positioned it for, users must be able to use it on the Iphone.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Is it just me or does Google have this disgusting sense of righteousness that makes them think they are always right and can do whatever they want.
Apple told you No, stop trying to circumvent it.
Hi Steve,
I think Google is trying to increase the visibility, for the average user, of Apple's strong handed walled garden approach. Most people outside of Slashdot don't know how ridiculous Apple's policies are with the iPhone, so Google is helping Apple make an ass of themselves in a way Google can publicize.
Hmm.. first complex HTML5 app maybe?
I'm probably not the first person to say it, but thank GOODNESS somebody is pushing HTML and web markup tech forward again. Even though some folks don't like some of the new elements present in HTML5, at least it's progressing again. Let's hope this continues!
-6d
Anyone have some first-hand experience with Google Voice willing to share their thoughts? I find it very intriguing but am very hesitant to use it without knowing more...
I don't think there is a way to get access to the microphone from a web page. On iPhone, Safari doesn't allow any plug-ins to load. From the description, it sounds like this just tells the phone to make a local call over the cell network to a special number that then forwards your call to the desired destination.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
"Google has found a way to let iPhone owners use Google Voice."
Really? There's a patch for that.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Use GV Mobile, available through Cydia. Much much better. An actual app for starters. :-)
Not really.. I run Google Voice with a landline, a blackberry, and a dumb cell phone (crappy Motorola Flip phone) All you really need internet for is to setup the call routing or change it. I have it send SMS to my mobile phone (free incoming texts) with transcripts of my voicemails, as well as emailed to my gmail account. I could, just as easily call in and listen to them too.
The iphone app is just a handy way to manage it all, to use all the screen real estate. I guess there could be some functionality with SMS, or when calling someone from GV, it just puts your phone in "talk" mode, instead of calling it.. but the power of Google Voice is the simplicity of management, and the backend stuff. I almost never deal with the website.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
Anyone can develop and publish apps to run on OS X, but it hasn't harmed Apple's reputation. Same thing can be said of *nix and even Windows. The reason the iPhone is treated as a special case almost certainly has more to do with potential liability issues regarding AT&T's network. But of course it still sucks.
Caveat Utilitor
That's because Google Voice is not a VoIP app, but a call redirection service. On a touch, the ONLY features it has are managing voice mail and contacts, it can NOT place calls.
On an iPhone, from the web app, if you select a contact to call here's what happens:
1) Google generates a "one time" number in your local area if possible.
2) Google programs this number such that an incoming call from your selected phone to that number is routed to your selected contact's phone number
3) it presents you a UI button to press to have the iPhone call the Google one-time number.
4) when you click the button, you iPhone calls Google's selected one-time number (not your contact). This call will appear on your bill as a call from your cell phone to Google and uses airtime (which depending on your plan and time of day might be free).
5) Google routes the call and rings your contacts number, presenting your Google voice number on their caller ID screen.
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
Is it just me or did this post seem like sarcasm?
I really hope so.
If you stopped reading, how did you get here?
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
It's not really "getting around": Prior to the SDK/XCode release, Apple's preferred approach was that devs should write webapps. With HTML5 this is even more tempting than before, and there is no vetting process at all.
There is an explicit reason this is so. Google currently operates solely as a call forwarding service. They also offer Gizmo services on that number, but only to other gizmo subscribers as PC to PC communication. Should Google offer to connect a traditional Voip Provider, as a voIP extention accessing a google numebr that could call terrestrial lines, then google would become a telephone proivider, not a routing service provider, and then they'de be responsible for 911, e911, and special rates they don't want to pay (that AT&T is fighting to make them pay).
By remaining a simple central routing point for other numbers and services, Google provides a good service for free. Stepping across certain lines opens them up to regulation, requires them to collect certain taxes, and incurs fees to you.
It IS possible to have Google voice forward to a Skype-in number, and it;s also possible to dial through google voice with Skype, however, that's not going to work through an iPod touch as the google web app is trying to contact the iPhone dialer API which does not exist there, and web programs can't access app launch protocols so the google web app can't talk to the skype app at all (for very good security reasons!)
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
Anyone can develop and publish apps to run on OS X, but it hasn't harmed Apple's reputation. Same thing can be said of *nix and even Windows
Well, except for all those lousy Windows drivers, and the viruses, and tons of crapware. Come to think of it, at least some of Microsoft's bad reputation can be tracked to horrible implementations done by other people.
"I see undead people" Warcraft III - Necromancer
Anyone can develop and publish apps to run on OS X, but it hasn't harmed Apple's reputation.
Sure it has. As OS X grows in popularity, a LOT more spyware and crapware has been popping up, so much so that there now exist anti-spyware and virus scanners for OS X, something unheard of only a few years ago. All of this crap could easily be prevented by having Apple be the arbiter of quality for all applications before they are authorized for use on OS X. They already do this on the iPhone and (hopefully) the iTablet, so why not extend the metaphor to the desktop? The only thing holding them back, in my opinion, is some kind of false sense of duty to failed ideas like shareware and open source. As I have pointed out in the past, these niche development models are a key vector whereby spyware and security holes are added to the Apple ecosystem, so eliminating them (or at least bringing them under much tighter control) would be a key step towards making computers "just work", something Apple has traditionally been very good at and has proven to be extremely effective with the iPhone.
But of course it still sucks.
It only "sucks" if you are a greedy or incompetent developer looking to cash in on Apple's hard work. Apple has proven that for an end user experience to be seamless (and thus popular), it has to have much tighter control over what developers can and cannot do and as an investor I hope Apple closes these loopholes that have allowed developers to put out terrible quality software for too long.
That's not what Google did.
Apple refused Google Voice in the app store. So Google's not dealing with the app store.
So they just rewrite it for the web: Javascript, HTML, and CSS. This happens to work on the iPhone, and if they add some enhancements for iPhone users who want this program, how's that anything bad? This also runs on Palm's WebOS, and perhaps other smart phones with modern browers. This is a good thing... many people want this, and if Google had to write a phone-specific version for every phone, some people might be left behind. And in fact, this is the future... many apps will be written this way. WebOS, in fact, is largely based on using Javascript, HTML, and CSS to deliver applications. With Palm and Apple and various others fighting to get better Javascript benchmarks, this was only a matter of time.
They have a nice and very functional Google Voice app for Android, which will work just dandy, and better than an iPhone app would anyway, since it can run background servers. If you can run the program you want on your iPhone, aren't you better served? Why should you have to put up with Apple's plans.
It's kind of amazing... Microsoft, for years, did stupid little things to ensure their future dominance. They were usually keel-hauled for it, in forums like this. Didn't change anything .. they still did it. Well, up though Vista, which is where this "we're building an OS for us, but charging you for it" really caused them problems. So they backed off a bit.
Apple, on the other hand, is taking a hard-line approach, with draconic censoring of applications. So you can't run a Commodore 64 emulator on your iPhone, because its ability to run "programs Apple doesn't get paid for" is a major threat to Apple's future. And you can't run Java programs, for the same reason. And you'll never get Flash or Shockwave, for the same reason... it doesn't even matter that this makes iPhone a second-class web browsing engine.. Apple cares more about a few more pennies from users than it does about you getting what you think you paid for (eg, the often touted best pocket web browsing experience... which it's not anymore, not by a long shot).
Javascript was the only loophole... the only method of code execution that Apple didn't cut out of your typical web browser experience. And they made it fast... last year, they were faster than Android and twice as fast as WebOS, even though most WebOS needed the speed (this changed in WebOS 1.3 and, more still, in WebOS 1.4). Palm has pretty much shown the way... while there won't be a serious level of video games done this way, for many pocket-sized applications, web-based apps work fine. They're going to run on Palm, on Android, on Nokia, and, unless Apple further works to break their support of the Web's official and de-facto standards, on iPhone.
And the funny thing... Apple is pushing developers toward this kind of development, through their approval policies.
-Dave Haynie
Congratulations on buying into media hype and FUD. Only pople who don't actually have any experience with OS X believe it. In reality the only malware any Mac user needs to be concerned with is trojans, which of course are also very easy to avoid.
Not much of a thinker, are you?
Also, you can blacklist phone numbers (known telemarketers, etc) from calling your google voice number, which for some reason the phone companies will never let you do with a regular number.
Hands in my pocket