Filed under: iPhone

Sahil Lavingia has decided to do something a little different as he creates his next iPhone app: he's going to do it in public, and blog the process as he goes. He's also going to do it in a one-week marathon stretch, and has aptly named the project One Week App. This is both an interesting way for non-developers to gain a bit of an understanding about what goes into the app creation process, and a great way to get some relatively inexpensive PR for the new app.

The app Lavingia is creating is going to be called Dayta, which is a combination of the words "day" and "data". Although the functionality of Dayta hasn't yet been completely revealed, it's looking like a logger that lets you collect numbers based on the things you do in your daily life.

You can subscribe to the One Week App project via RSS or by following the @oneweekapp Twitter account. Here's hoping that One Week App doesn't turn out to be one weak app.

Liquid Scale is an iPhone / iPod Touch app that allows you to resize images by removing unimportant elements in the photo, leaving the important ones untouched. It's a technique called seam carving that we've previously mentioned, but what's interesting here is that it's now available to be used on the iPhone.

For those that are unfamiliar with it, the seam carving technique analyzes images to determine the most and least important elements, and when you use it to decrease the size of an image it removes the least important parts first, in tiny 1 pixel wide slices. It can be a slow process, particularly on larger images, but the result is often much more compelling than what can be done with a simple crop. Of course, if you're not careful to use the effect sparingly, the results can go from impressive to flat-out weird pretty quickly.

Liquid Scale is available for $2US in the App Store.

[via Daring Fireball]

Touch Mouse [iTunes link] is a free iPhone / iPod Touch application from Logitech that turns your iDevice into a wireless keyboard and trackpad for your Windows or Macintosh computer. It's not a remote control application, so you don't get a view of the computer's screen; you simply get an alternative way to control the mouse pointer and keyboard. Touch Mouse works by relying on a small server software component that you install on your desktop computer that listens for connections from the iPhone app.

This is very useful when you have a computer set up as a PVR. Most of the time, you can do what you need to do with a remote control, but occasionally you'll need to navigate the file system or close a pesky dialog box (no, I don't want to upgrade my antivirus, thanks), and for that Touch Mouse can be very useful.

My one small concern about Touch Mouse is that there is no authentication going on; it appears that any computer that is running the Touch Mouse server software on the same wireless network shows up in the Touch Mouse app. That won't be a problem for me since I'm using it at home on my home network, but it could be a problem in other environments.

[via TUAW]

Sometimes, Apple's decisions about content in the App Store can be petty and anti-competitive -- like asking developers to remove any mention of Android. But sometimes, they make a call that seems to put users first. This time, it's a request that developers use your location to provide useful information, rather than just serving you location-based ads. Here's the text of the warning to developers, posted in Apple's developer forum:

If you build your application with features based on a user's location, make sure these features provide beneficial information. If your app uses location-based information primarily to enable mobile advertisers to deliver targeted ads based on a user's location, your app will be returned to you by the App Store Review Team for modification before it can be posted to the App Store.'

Developers might balk at the removal of a possible cheap and easy revenue stream, but I think Apple is doing the right thing, here. Apps like Foursquare and Gowalla, which allow business to advertise specials, should be unaffected, because they also your location for checking in, finding your friends, and other important game elements. The kind of app being targeted here has no reason to know where you are except to show you ads, and I can get behind Apple trying to block that use of the feature.

Marshall Kirkpatrick at ReadWriteWeb actually seems pretty angry about the situation. His point is that if an app is going to show you ads, whether it has location-based features or not, it should be allowed to show you local ads. Marshall seems to balk more at the idea that Apple wants to decide what constitutes "beneficial information." I agree that Apple may have worded that part of the warning artlessly, but I think what they mean is "non-advertising information."

What do you think, Download Squad readers? I'd especially love to get an iPhone developer's perspective on the situation.

Last week Apple changed began allowing third party applications to make VoIP calls over 3G. What that means is that you can make a telephone call over the internet using a wireless broadband connection. The upshot is that you could theoretically use an application like Skype to make free or cheap phone calls while eating up your data minutes instead of your voice minutes. You can also make international calls over a VoIP application for much less money than your cellphone company would typically charge.

Right now there's only one problem: Skype's iPhone application doesn't support making calls over 3G. And it won't for a little while, because while the Skype team plans to start work on a 3G enabled version, the goal is to improve the audio quality first.

In the meantime, you can always use Fring, which already offers VoIP calls over 3G.

iPad fever seems to have gripped the iNation. If looking at your diminutive iPhone or iPod Touch is getting you down, and you wish you could be stroking a beautiful new iPad, maybe the mod described at Redmond Pie will tide you over.

Modifying the iPhone operating system isn't possible unless you jailbreak your device, but once you do a huge number of possible modifications are available. For this particular makeover Redmond Pie suggest installing the following apps from both Cydia (the jailbroken app installer) and Apple's App Store:

• Winterboard app via Cydia
• "Simple iPad Theme" via Cydia
• MakeItMine app via Cydia to Change the Carrier logo to iPad.
• Shrink app via Cydia to reduce the size of all the icons on the springboard.
• ProSwitcher via Cydia for Multitasking.
• NYTimes - The New York Times app for iPhone via App Store
• Classics - The iBooks lookalike app for iPhone via App Store
• Kindle for iPhone via App Store

For more details including a video of what the completed mod looks like, head on over to the post at Redmond Pie.

iPhone owners might not have access to iPhone OS 3.2 yet, but it's already running on the new iPad. Our sister site, Engadget, was able to score some of the details of the new features in 3.2, and it sounds like it's going to be great for both the iPhone and the iPad. The biggest surprise might be the inclusion of some video calling code that even includes multitasking while on a video call. This suggests a couple of things, either one of which would be awesome:

1) The next version of the iPad is getting a camera. This is the least immediately helpful possibility, but it also sounds completely likely. A lot of tech pundits assumed the first-gen iPad would include a camera, so I'd bet on seeing it next time around.

2) Multitasking is coming to the iPhone sooner rather than later. Although a video call and another task at once might be a lot to ask on the small screen - and not that useful, either - we can at least hope that the next software update brings the ability to run third-party apps in the background. The iPad already has wicked multitasking potential, with the introduction of new popover windows that don't take up the entire screen.

Another useful new feature rumored for 3.2 is the ability to download and locally store files using Safari, and open them in other apps. The lack of access to the iPhone's filesystem is one of the biggest reasons that fans of more open mobile operating systems scoff at Apple, and, although this wouldn't totally shut down that line of criticism, it would be a step in the right direction. File uploading is also reportedly included in the update.

Check out the Engadget post for more info, including possible SMS support on the iPad and some slightly more far-fetched rumors about a stylus and a handwriting keyboard.

Adobe has always been pretty miffed over the lack of Flash on the iPhone and iPod Touch. You can understand Apple's point of view though: Flash would remove their control over the user experience. It would also make the App Store irrelevant and the flow of software onto the Apple devices almost impossible to govern.

Couple the lack of iPhone support with the keynote presentation of the iPad, where Steve Jobs proudly displays the lack of Flash, and you can see why Adobe has just launched an anti-iPad smear campaign.

Not ones to tread lightly, or even scale up their assault, they've waded right in and played the porn card. As you can see, they've already removed the offensive part of the screenshot, but not before generating a lot of angry comments and even some commentary from Wired.

Adobe's poster ends with the slogan "Millions of websites use Flash. Get used to the blue legos." Maybe, as Jay said yesterday, Apple's customers don't want Flash. It performs poorly, it steals vital CPU cycles, it flattens your battery faster than an American stocking up at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Hopefully this is the kick in the butt Adobe needs to make Flash a little more efficient and less impotence-inducing. Watching --and feeling! -- my 2.2GHz laptop sit at 100% CPU usage while viewing Flash videos is truly a sad sight to behold.

When Apple unveiled their new iBooks application during the launch of the much-anticipated and unfortunately named iPad tablet computer, many people noticed its similarity to the well-known Classics iPhone app. Classics [iTunes link], if you're not familiar with it, is an iPhone app that gives you access to read over a dozen public-domain books.

There are lots of ebook readers available for the iPhone, but where Classics sets itself apart is with an exquisite user interface that mimics the feeling of going to a bookshelf, getting a hardcover book, and paging through it. It's likely that the bookshelf metaphor in Classics was inspired by Delicious Library, a Mac app for cataloging books, media, and anything else you want to catalog.

Install0us is an app that could be installed on jailbroken iPhones that would allow the user to installed pirated versions of commercial iPhone apps and avoid actually purchasing them. The developer of Install0us, puy0, recently posted in the Install0us forums that he has decided to discontinue work on the app and kill the project for legal reasons. You don't say?

Amazingly, puy0 states that he thought what he was doing was somehow legally defensible until he spoke to a lawyer and got a reality check. It turns out that helping people take things that cost money without paying for them is kinda sorta illegal.

The forum post is worth a read, just to see how ignorant puy0 actually was about the legality of stealing, or at least how ridiculous he's willing to look when groping for a way to explain his actions.

I, for one, am happy to see yet another pirate tool die off. Developers work hard for their 70% of the $1 to $3 they're able to charge for iPhone apps; they should be compensated. In the words of Wil Wheaton, don't be a jerk.

[via Cult of Mac]

AT&T made the changes that would allow iPhone VoIP on its 3G network back in October, so the holdup has presumably been on Apple's end since then. Now that Apple has lifted its restrictions, though, does this mean the iPad with 3G service will be able to pull off VoIP calls? I sure hope so. It would be nice to have just an iPad, instead of carting around an iPhone, too.

If you're impatient for a Skype update, you can test out 3G VoIP with iCall, an alternative app whose developers have been using the news of the new SDK to draw attention to it as the first app to actually enable cellular VoIP call via iPhone. iCall is free, although somewhat crashy and unreliable, and it can fill the void until Skype swoops back in.

[via Gizmodo]

You've probably noticed a complete lack of iPad/iTablet/iSlate news around these parts. That's because we don't cover gadgets, nor do we cover hyperbolic crotch-grabbing fanboy speculation. But now that it's finally been announced (forever will it go down in history that we watched Steve Jobs sit in a leather chair and surf on his iPad), we can finally get down to business.

The iPad, whether you like it or not, has implications for everyone. The early-adopter, the developer, and even the conscientious surfer and app downloader -- whichever one you are, the iPad's going to make an impact on your life. Apple has successfully controlled technological fads for almost a decade -- you can be damn sure that the iPad won't be any different.

So here's the news that affects you. Not your friends, nor the hot girls you try to woo with your tablet -- not even your jealous co-workers -- just you.

I'm extraordinarily, off-the-scales nostalgic about the early installments of Square Enix's classic RPG series, Final Fantasy. If you're a big RPG nerd, too, you'll be glad to hear that Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy II are due to hit the iPhone soon. There aren't too many great role-playing games currently on the platform, so Square Enix will be filling a big hole in the market.

I'd happily play these classic, 20-year-old games in their original 8-bit form, but I'm not complaining that the screenshots of the iPhone version look gorgeous, and definitely live up to the kind of visual production Square's fans have come to expect from these remakes. No word on the price or the release date yet, but there are some excellent screenshots up on Square Enix's Facebook page. There's also a Twitter account you can follow to be notified when the games are released.

[via The Next Web]

If you're already using iCal's built-in todo management, or Outlook's tasks on a Windows machine, and you're just looking for an iPhone app that can synchronize with what you're already using, you should check out 2Do.

2Do is a very well-designed and pretty to-do list manager, with the ability to create multiple lists, set priorities and due dates, notes, URLs, and even default actions such as Call, SMS, Email, Browse, Visit, and Google. It's a pleasure to use, with a very intuitive and pleasing interface.

2Do handles 2-way synchronizing with iCal's basic to-do functionality with the help of an additional free Sync application for your Mac, or with Outlook's tasks function with a free Windows Sync application.

I find iCal's built-in to-do management to be clunky and awkward, which isn't 2Do's fault, but does work against it when I'm evaluating what task management app to use. However, if I was on Windows using Outlook, 2Do would be my first choice as a companion task management application for the iPhone.

2Do costs $6.99US [iTunes link], and a free Lite version is available that does not support synchronization and is limited to 3 lists with 25 tasks in each list.

It's not often that you find children writing apps -- as Gizmodo notes, he's not the youngest (that award goes to a 9-year-old from Singapore) -- but it's still pretty damn impressive, considering the excellent quality of the application. iSketch [iTunes link] is by no means as nascent or spotty as its creator: it's actually rather good, as far as drawing apps go.

Better yet, the app only costs 99 cents and a 'substantial portion' of the proceeds are being given to Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA. So if you need an iPhone drawing app, and you have a kind bone in your body, you should grab iSketch!

Delving a little further, the comments on Gizmodo suggest that there are plenty of young software developers, they just don't offer up their proceeds to charity and thus don't get any attention. Can you think of any famous bits of software out there made by kids? Let me know!