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Filed under: Developer, Features, Apple, Mobile Minute, iPhone

Mobile Minute: iPhone APIs are like life - they're full of compromises

Two weeks ago we saw the first wave of third party applications for the iPhone. But because Apple has yet to open up the device and provides an API (Application Programming Interface) for software developers, making third party applications right now is not for the faint hearted or even regular developers. A couple of weeks ago in MacBreak Weekly, Leo Laporte called for Apple to open up the iPhone immediately and he could not see any reasons preventing that happening. What Mr. Laporte, and most pundits, seems to imply is that providing an API is a straightforward process. Publish the API online and let the developers use it, right? If only it were that simple.

An API is a contract between the provider (Apple) and the consumer, who in this case is the software developers. As with any contract, once it is published, a level of trust is established between the provider and the consumer. This means the provider describes the functionality accessible by outsiders in the API, and that functionality will work as advertised. The consumer has to depend on the provider to keep their word so the consumer can develop applications base on that functionality.

But establishing an API also means restricting internal development freedom for the device. It is no longer simple to rework a particular function to provide better capability or performance without substantial testings to ensure the existing APIs are not broken. There are a few ways to deal with this situation.

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Filed under: Internet, Utilities, Features, Productivity, Web services, Browser Tips, Mobile Minute, iPhone, web 2.0

Mobile Minute: Get some use out of web apps for the iPhone



Apple's decision to keep 3rd party apps locked out of the iPhone (for now) is still disappointing both users and developers alike, but that doesn't mean we can't get some actual functionality out of some truly unique web apps. For this week's brief Mobile Minute, I'm going to highlight some web apps, utilities and bookmarklets designed specifically for the iPhone that are rising above the rest.


1. 17 iPhone Bookmarklets

Chanpory Rith at LifeClever has published a list of 17 powerful bookmarklets for your iPhone, containing some truly useful stuff beyond the typical web app launchers that are quickly becoming a dime a dozen. At the top of my list are 'marklets like movie times and Wikipedia, which offer one-click popup access to search for local movie times or articles on Wikipedia (respectively). Other really useful ones are 'Find in this page' which is pretty straightforward, as well as 'Open links in new window,' which will reload the current page you're viewing on your iPhone and edit all the links on the page to, well, open in a new window. This is particularly useful since the iPhone doesn't seem to cache pages well (or it possibly uses a caching system that most sites simply haven't accounted for yet), but MobileSafari (the new name many are using for the iPhone's Safari browser) does tabbed browsing like a champ. In fact, it even remembers opened tabs after you power down and restart the phone, making a bookmarklet like this very handy to those like to truly explore the 6 degrees of the world wide web on their iPhone.

To get set up with these bookmarks, visit the LifeClever site in either Safari or Internet Explorer and add them to a folder of bookmarks you're synching with the iPhone. Perform a sync and you're ready to go.

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Filed under: Internet, Productivity, Web services, Apple

iPhone-only RSS reader coming to .Mac



It seems that Apple is taking the first sip from the web 2.0-only-iPhone-apps kool-aid while simultaneously injecting their stagnating .Mac service with a little pep by introducing what looks like an RSS reader just for the iPhone. Going to reader.mac.com should present the dialog you see capped in this post, which means that the app is likely tied to Apple's suite of .Mac services, but is surprisingly not even available to users on, how shall we say, more 'traditional' computers.

This is an interesting move, especially since Jobs is on record saying that .Mac needs a bit of a kick in the pants. Fortunately, with the iPhone-optimized rate plans Apple and AT&T announced earlier this week, users won't have to worry about pulling down too much data while surfing RSS all day (though we should note that iPhone customers can use an iPhone on any voice plan they already have with AT&T). We'll take a look at this app as soon as we can get our hands on an iPhone.

[via Daring Fireball]

Filed under: Macintosh, E-mail, Web services, Apple, Commercial

Apple upgrades .Mac webmail

.Mac webmail
Apple finally realized that .Mac users were bailing in droves because of the service's lack of recent updates updates and the march of progress to distant locales like Gmail, Yahoo! Mail, and Windows Live Mail. In response, it has unveiled a new version of its .Mac webmail offering. The service takes a lot of cues from the new batch of Ajaxy webmail clients, but also from Apple's own Mail.app. In fact, the app looks quite a lot like a desktop app with an interface that fits very well alongside OS 10.4 Tiger. It features IMAP syncing, organization by drag-and-drop, a new message pane just like Mail.app and Outlook's, a Quick Reply feature that lets you "Dash off a response without leaving your Inbox," address book integration, keyboard shortcuts, and Gmail-esque "message previews." Overall, it looks like it will fit in reasonably well with the current crop of webmail offerings, but keep in mind that .Mac still costs $99 per year, which gets 1GB of storage, including what you might use for iDisk backups.

So I want to hear from .Mac users: Is the new .Mac webmail really awesome? How does it compare to Gmail or Yahoo! Mail? Is it worth $99 per year when free webmail (Gmail, 2.8GB) and online storage services (Xdrive, 5GB) are out there? It's not rhetorical--I haven't used .Mac and I really want to know, is it really worth it, and if so, why?

Update: TUAW's David Chartier has penned a nice long review of the new .Mac webmail entitled New .Mac webmail delivers, mostly. He concludes, "Let's face it: no one can please everyone, but this new webmail is pretty hot, considering everything .Mac is up against, like a segmented demographic and high expectations from the nerdier half of it."

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