Apple announces Apple TV and iPhone

[Viin]

I never use the keyboard on my Tilt, I almost always use the touch screen keyboard (with stylus). So the super thickness of the Tilt is wasted. Thus I will be either switching to an iPhone (damn it peer pressure!) or hold out for the Blackberry Bold, which is still big with a keyboard but not so damn thick.

[Ingmar]

I never use the keyboard on my Tilt, I almost always use the touch screen keyboard (with stylus). So the super thickness of the Tilt is wasted. Thus I will be either switching to an iPhone (damn it peer pressure!) or hold out for the Blackberry Bold, which is still big with a keyboard but not so damn thick.

I can write about 10,000 times faster (scientifically measured) with the keyboard than I can with the stylus.

[Viin]

I don't doubt it, I just don't do much texting on my phone. I read a lot, but not much typing.

[Ingmar]

I don't doubt it, I just don't do much texting on my phone. I read a lot, but not much typing.

Ah, I primarily use mine as an email device. The size/weight has never bothered me much but we have plenty of users who have rejected it for those reasons.

[Kitsune]

Yeah, I'm faster with a physical keyboard than touchscreen tricks.  Apple's touchscreen keyboard's better than any others I've seen, but it's still slower for me than the keyboard on my old Treo, which is itself far far slower than a real keyboard.  Given that I'm used to pulling over 80 WPM on a keyboard, any handheld device is akin to watching paint dry in comparison.  I try to avoid typing on them as a result, or keep things brief.

Meanwhile, the trials with the itunes store continue.  The applications encompass  a wide variety of crap, and there's not much of a way to filter the crap out, or at least I have yet to find a way to sort by an app's overall rating.  You'll find utterly sweet programs, like the 99-cent die roller mentioned on the last page, and you'll find programs that cost several times more while offering less, and the only way to find the gems is to spend a minute or so reading feature lists and reviews for each and every product.

Once you find something you like, though, it's dangerously easy to get it.  You just pull up the list from the ipod, hit the buy button, put in your itunes password, and it automatically charges you and downloads the application.  I really appreciated the smoothness, but compulsive buyers could rack up a whooooole lot of expense that way.

[Prospero]

Gizmodo has an "apps of the week" post on Fridays. I've picked up some pretty good apps on their recommendation. My current list of worthwhile apps is:

Simplify Media
Pandora
OmniTuner
NowPlaying
Urbanspoon
ToyBot Diaries

[Viin]

I really appreciated the smoothness, but compulsive buyers could rack up a whooooole lot of expense that way.

Isn't that the point? 

Thanks for the recommended apps list - I broke down and got a 8gb iPhone today. Been going over the app store (at least the free ones) and haven't really seen anything all that interesting.

[Oban]

I now use the iPhone's Safari browser to access about 95% of what the applications provide.

Sad.

[Kitsune]

Thanks for the recommended apps list - I broke down and got a 8gb iPhone today.

If you have any designs on using the thing in an ipoddy capacity, take that right back and get the 16 gigger.  Thanks to Apple's 'a gigabyte is 1,000,000,000 bytes' bullshit, the actual capacity's 7.45 gigs, and any apps, emails, files, cached browser content, music, videos, etc. are gonna have to fit in that for the life of your phone, with no external storage slots.  If you're just gonna use it as a phone, then disregard the above.

Been going over the app store (at least the free ones) and haven't really seen anything all that interesting.

There's a free file transfer app that Gizmodo mentioned today, Air Sharing.  It lets you transfer files over wifi to and from the normally-inaccessible storage in the iphones/ipods.  It's free as a promotion until the 22nd, apparently.
\

I now use the iPhone's Safari browser to access about 95% of what the applications provide.

Sad.

?  Explain, please?

[naum]

I now use the iPhone's Safari browser to access about 95% of what the applications provide.

Sad.

?  Explain, please?

I believe what is denoted here is that most of the AppStore offerings are nothing but glorified web frontends… …for instance, there are a bunch of Twitter apps but basically they're just native UI that access internet APIs and maybe an extra feature (like location tracking or attaching a photo)...

There are some good apps that don't fit that, and while it's not the majority I'd say it's >5% now… …games, nifty apps that let you setup your iPhone as a WebDav server (letting you use it as a disk volume and put documents, media, etc...)…

[Kitsune]

Ah, yeah.  I'm not opposed to a good interface for a web-based task, if it was for something that I was doing on a regular basis.  But there are a lot of plainly useless apps out there, no denying it.

[Oban]

The only app I have that does not correspond to something I can pull up on Google is iLevel.

Everything else is either a Google App or something the Google search engine can tell me.  (News, currency conversion, weather, sat images, language translations, flight information and expense tracking.)

[Trippy]

USB power adapter that came with 3G iPhone in the US and a few other countries is being recalled:

http://www.apple.com/support/usbadapter/exchangeprogram/

[Oban]

So much easier to just use a laptop to recharge the phone though.  Not even sure where I put the compact charger, but nice to know I can exchange it at an Apple Store at some point.

Found a guy in London selling unlocked 3G iPhones for an obscene amount of money.  8GB for 750 pounds and 16GB for 1100 pounds.  Little bastard had a smile on his face when he told me the prices. I am quite happy with my SIM card kludge for twenty pounds now.

[Ookii]

Apple has determined that under certain conditions the new ultracompact Apple USB power adapter's metal prongs can break off and remain in a power outlet, creating a risk of electric shock.  We have received reports of detached blades involving a very small percentage of the adapters sold, but no injuries have been reported.

Go Apple!

[Viin]

Does anyone know of a way/app to send your (GPS/triangulated) location to another iPhone user?

[Murgos]

Does anyone know of a way/app to send your (GPS/triangulated) location to another iPhone user?

Generally it's referred to as an address...

Sorry for the snark, I couldn't help it.   

[Viin]

An address doesn't help when you are in a mile square park and trying to hook up with your lost buddies. :P

[schild]

The iphone is officially dead to me. It went from option to obsolete. Will deal with my broken but out of contract phone for one more month.

[Murgos]

The iphone is officially dead to me. It went from option to obsolete. Will deal with my broken but out of contract phone for one more month.

I use mine for hours a day.  So easy.  One slim little gadget, slides right into a pocket, does everything I could reasonably need to do when away from home or my office.

[naum]

Yeah but can your phone do this:

[schild]

Hai i have a psp. It can do this:



Without a lame onscreen dpad and a/b button. Also Murgos, note, it has a KEYBOARD and BUTTONS.

[naum]

Hai i have a psp. It can do this:



Without a lame onscreen dpad and a/b button. Also Murgos, note, it has a KEYBOARD and BUTTONS.

How do you use your PSP as a phone?

Do you at least have WiFi on it?

Otherwise, WIN for iPhone - PHONE + CAMERA + WEB_BROWSER + IPOD + GAMING + PANDORA + EMAIL + PDA

In one device without having to tote all sorts of gadgets about like some kind of dork…

[Murgos]

I have a PSP.  It's collecting dust at the bottom of my sock drawer.

http://www.x-plane.com/iPhone

it's just a matter of time.  Why fight it?

[Ookii]

I have a PSP.  It's collecting dust at the bottom of my sock drawer.

http://www.x-plane.com/iPhone

it's just a matter of time.  Why fight it?

Android, no seriously.  With the restrictions and NDAs Apple has with their SDK and AppStore many developers aren't either bothering with creating apps or have given up.  I expected all those open source gurus to start coding like crazy for this thing and it really looks like they haven't yet.  They can't access enough parts of the phone and even if they come up with something interesting (after months and months of coding), Apple could deny it for some stupid reason (like duplicates iTunes functionality). 

I expect Android to kick the iPhones ass if those open source guys get behind it (couldn't see why not at this point), I just hope, I just hope it doesn't feel like a bunch of separate pieces rather than a whole OS like Linux has been in the past (So you have your kernel and then the distro and then X11 or now Xorg and then the Desktop Window Manager.  Programs can run in the DWM in QT or GTK or godknows whatelse).

Edit: And that said I love my iPhone and use it continually at LEAST 8 hours a day.  I feel paying 96 bucks a month for it is an honor rather than a burden.  For now. 

[naum]

I have a PSP.  It's collecting dust at the bottom of my sock drawer.

http://www.x-plane.com/iPhone

it's just a matter of time.  Why fight it?

Android, no seriously.  With the restrictions and NDAs Apple has with their SDK and AppStore many developers aren't either bothering with creating apps or have given up.  I expected all those open source gurus to start coding like crazy for this thing and it really looks like they haven't yet.  They can't access enough parts of the phone and even if they come up with something interesting (after months and months of coding), Apple could deny it for some stupid reason (like duplicates iTunes functionality). 

I expect Android to kick the iPhones ass if those open source guys get behind it (couldn't see why not at this point), I just hope, I just hope it doesn't feel like a bunch of separate pieces rather than a whole OS like Linux has been in the past (So you have your kernel and then the distro and then X11 or now Xorg and then the Desktop Window Manager.  Programs can run in the DWM in QT or GTK or godknows whatelse).

Edit: And that said I love my iPhone and use it continually at LEAST 8 hours a day.  I feel paying 96 bucks a month for it is an honor rather than a burden.  For now. 

YES, for just any software other than games…

NO, and as an illustrative example, what blockbuster F/OSS games are you currently playing…???

[Ookii]

This might come as a shock, but fuck games.  This thing isn't a PSP, I don't really care about high budget 3D games on my cell phone.  All I have in terms of games now are stupid little fun ones like Cube Runner, Tris, Aurora Feint, Dactyl, and BSkiesLite.

I bought it more for its utility rather than its entertainment value (beyond the normal iPod stuff), I just wish we got our real GPS with turn by turn directions already.

[Murgos]

And, in a couple of years, when Android is on ver 2 or 3 and the iPhone is looking like it can't compete, I'll switch.  And, in the meantime, I will have wrung every bit of utility and value I could out of the iPhone.

[naum]

And, in a couple of years, when Android is on ver 2 or 3 and the iPhone is looking like it can't compete, I'll switch.  And, in the meantime, I will have wrung every bit of utility and value I could out of the iPhone.

YES

I hope Apple loses (for all their proprietary and narrow minded market focus), but right now, it best phone on the market…

[schild]

It won't be on October 22nd.



THAT'S A FUCKING KEYBOARD.

[Surlyboi]

*Giggle.*

[schild]

*Giggle.*

Don't make me redname you.

[Quinton]

I expect Android to kick the iPhones ass if those open source guys get behind it (couldn't see why not at this point), I just hope, I just hope it doesn't feel like a bunch of separate pieces rather than a whole OS like Linux has been in the past (So you have your kernel and then the distro and then X11 or now Xorg and then the Desktop Window Manager.  Programs can run in the DWM in QT or GTK or godknows whatelse).

Android uses the Linux kernel, and makes use of a number of open source components (webkit, libpng, libjpeg, zlib, etc, etc), but it does not run X, GTK, QT, and whatnot.  The Android platform provides its own toolkit, libraries, and UI.  It is going to be released entirely open source when the G1 ships, so I'm sure people will busily port all that wonderful unix desktop crap to it, but the important thing here is that Android is an open source mobile OS built on top of the Linux kernel and other open source pieces, not "UNIX for phones".

I'm pretty proud of it.

If you want UNIX for phones, those openmoko people have a device that does that.

- Q

[Murgos]

So, um, what's the deal with the head-phone jack on the G1?  Whose bright idea was that?

[Quinton]

HTC *really* likes their multipurpose connector.  You can get 1/8" headphone to HTC multipurpose adaptors for $5 or so online, but I certainly agree that just having a regular headphone jack would be nicer.