Yahoo OneConnect Brings Free SMS to Your iPhone

iPhone/iPod touch only: Yahoo OneConnect is a free application that brings a handful of communication and social networking tools to your iPhone or iPod touch. Off the bat, the most notable thing about OneConnect is that it supports sending SMS messages to contacts in your Yahoo Address Book (provided you have a phone number in their contact card). That means you can text all day long from your iPhone (or iPod touch, if you have a Wi-Fi connection) without taking any texts away from your meager AT&T SMS plan.

The app's Pulse feature also supports a ton of social networking sites, from Facebook and Flickr to MySpace and Twitter. (Oh yeah, it works with Yahoo Messenger contacts, too.) It connects to and retrieves contacts from every single service, and you can update your status on all supported services from one box. Aside from all the functionality, it's also one of the more slick apps we've seen. OneConnect is a free download from the iTunes App Store, requires a Yahoo account to use.

iPhone/iPod touch only: Free iPhone app Wikipanion searches Wikipedia through a fast, native interface. Complete with autosuggest, landscape mode, and large, readable text, Wikipanion offers a fantastic way to browse Wikipedia on-the-go. The application's bottom row of buttons provide simple navigation (back and forward), links to sections for quick navigation of large articles, and access to every link on the page, including Wikipedia category links or external links. The free Wikipanion is simple, but does exactly what it promises.

http://tinyurl.com/5mbu99

Reader Rom is angry with AT&T because they won't sell him an iPhone 3G for the price listed in their press release. AT&T says the promotional pricing ($199 for an 8GB, $299 for a 16GB) is only available to, among others, existing iPhone customers. Rom is an existing iPhone customer.

The relevant press release reads, in part:

iPhone 3G will be available for $199 for the 8GB model and $299 for the 16GB model. These prices require two-year contracts and are available to the following customers:
* iPhone customers who purchased before July 11
* Customers activating a new line with AT&T
* Current AT&T customers who are eligible, at the time of purchase, for an upgrade discount

Rom writes that he purchased an iPhone earlier in the year, and that he also purchased a BlackBerry from AT&T. After speaking with someone in the president's office, he says that the point of contention is that AT&T is interpreting "iPhone customers who purchased before July 11" as "iPhone customers who purchased before July 11 and haven't bought another device from AT&T since." Although Rom concedes that the purchase of the BlackBerry eliminated his upgrade eligibility, he still is an iPhone customer, and should be entitled to the promotional price.

(Photo: jetsetpress)

credit - http://consumerist.com/5038610/att-wont-honor-iphone-price-announced-in-its-own-press-release

http://www.tuaw.com/2008/08/18/first-look-handibible-for-iphone/

Posted Aug 18th 2008 1:00PM by Steven Sande
Filed under: Software, iPhone, App Store

As TUAW's own Robert Palmer noted a few weeks ago, there are over 20 Bible applications available for iPhone. Some require an Internet connection to query an online Bible database, while others store the text on the device.

HANDiBIBLE (formerly Pocket Bible) is one of the latter apps, and is now available in the App Store (iTunes link). The developer, Jerry Beers, made an easily accessible (US$4.99) and usable Bible application and realizes that version 1.0 is just the start -- he welcomes feature requests.

At the present time, HANDiBIBLE provides an easy-to-use interface to a King James Version of both the Old and New Testaments. Readers pick which Testament they wish to read and a list of all of the books appears. Pick the book by tapping on it, and a set of scroll wheels appears which are used to set the Chapter and Verse. Tap go, and you're reading.

Since the developer has asked for feature requests, I'd suggest a word search mechanism and a New King James Version translation for readability. Despite these suggestions, HANDiBIBLE is a well-done and affordable Bible application for iPhone.

credit - http://www.tuaw.com/2008/08/18/first-look-handibible-for-iphone/

SoundMeter for iPhone

Posted Aug 13th 2008 10:00AM by Steven Sande
Filed under: Multimedia, Software, Odds and ends, iPhone, App Store

iPhone 2.0 Jailbreak Apps You Can't Find in the iTunes Store

The iTunes' App Store offers iPhone and iPod touch users hundreds of applications to install on their devices, but power users who want functionality above and beyond what Apple's SDK allows still want to jailbreak their device. Now that jailbreak developers have had a full month to work on applications for jailbroken iPhone 2.0 users, there's a bigger selection than ever of jailbreak 2.0 software that lets you do things App Store offerings don't. Let's look at a few of the good ones.

Note: Most of the iPhone 2.0 jailbreak offerings are geared toward the developer and power user. If you're not sure whether or not you want to take the plunge and jailbreak, hopefully this post will give you an idea of whether or not it's worth it for you.

This weekend I re-jailbroke my iPhone running the 2.0.1 software using PwnageTool. Here's how to jailbreak iPhone 2.0 with PwnageTool for Mac; Windows users, you can use WinPwn to jailbreak iPhone 2.0. PwnageTool added both Cydia and Installer.app to my device (pictured right). Cydia and Installer.app are the two gateways to software repositories for jailbroken devices. Next to each app below, I'll list the source (Cydia or Installer.app) and the app itself so you know where to find it.

MxTube Downloads YouTube Clips to Your Device (Cydia)

When you've got a favorite YouTube clip you want to show all your friends—but don't want to wait for it to download over the air—MxTube comes to the rescue. MxTube can download and save YouTube clips to your jailbroken device for watching when you're offline, out of Wi-Fi range, or just using the slow Edge network. Great especially for iPod touch users without a data connection. (Original post.)

Click to view MxTube's search interface, with options to stream the clip as usual, or download to your device.

BiteSMS Offers Cheaper Text Messaging (Cydia)

BiteSMS is a text messaging service that offers an alternative to AT&T or your iPhone's SMS carrier. Buy text messaging credits at BiteSMS.com (currently 10 cents per message, less if you buy more) and install the BiteSMS app via Cydia on your jailbroken device. Then, to send messages using BiteSMS instead of your plan, choose it near the Send button, as shown. (Click the image to see a full-sized version of what sending a text message with BiteSMS looks like.) The BiteSMS app keeps track of how many messages you send via your default carrier, and how many BiteSMS credits you have left, so you can decide which is the most economical way to send a message.

Here are detailed instructions for installing BiteSMS via Cydia; you'll have to purchase credits at BiteSMS.com to start using it as an alternative to your SMS carrier.

BossPrefs Removes Icons You Don't Want (Cydia)

While you can remove bookmarks and other app icons from your device by just tapping and holding, then hitting the X icon on them, some icons are absolutely fixed on your iPhone or iPod touch—whether or not you use them. Install BossPrefs via Cydia to get extra options for configuring your device, including "Poof!" a section where you can disable icons—even fixed ones like iTunes or Stocks.

Click on the image to see a full-size view of Poof, inside BossPrefs.

WebSearch Customizable, One-Tap Search Launcher (Cydia)

This is the app that got me to jailbreak my iPhone pre-2.0: a quick tap way to search common engines beyond Google, like Wikipedia, IMDB, and even Lifehacker. Adam named this an app worth jailbreaking for pre-iPhone 2.0, and it still ranks right there even now. (Not sure why this app isn't available via the App Store; let us know in the comments if you've found an equivalent there.)

Click on the image to see a WebSearch quickly query Wikipedia search in action full-size.

gTxtEdit is an Actual Text Editor (Installer.app)

If you want to store your notes in actual plain text files—instead of the BS built-in Notes application—you want gTxtEdit. Granted, gTxtEdit doesn't offer a file browser for easy loading and saving of files, and to get your .txt files off the phone you need to SCP in (with OpenSSH, see more below), so it's not the most user-friendly of apps. But plain text lovers not afraid of the command line will dig it. (Also, the developer promises that an actual file browser is forthcoming.) Click on the image to see a text file in gTxtEdit.

Customize App Skins Your Device (Cydia)

Users who really want to trick out their device want to put a good-looking skin on it. Using the Customize app, you can browse, preview, and download custom skins, and apply the whole skin to your device or just parts of it. Here are a few skins you can find there.

Click each image below to see it full-size.

From left to right the skins shown above are: AlienwareTheme, Leopard, SketchedOut, and Stickers. (Be warned: I had some trouble applying some skins I tried out, like Alienware. To activate a skin, on the skin page, after you choose "Apply Theme to Device," head back to the Customize main menu and choose "Exit & Restart Springboard.")

quake4iphone (Cydia)

This one's pretty self-explanatory. It's Quake! On the iPhone!

OpenSSH Gives You Full Root Access to Your Device

We've been over this a million times already, but an article like this can't go without saying: Getting SFTP (or SCP) access to your device means you can move files back and forth from it. This lets you copy voicemail or music files from the device to your computer, transfer NES emulator ROMs to play on your device, access the text files you're editing with gTxtEdit, and get your computer online using your iPhone's data connection. You can even do nutty stuff like transfer your Notes and SMS messages back to your computer for saving and archiving with OpenSSH installed.

Of course, the previously mentioned Mobile Terminal and the NES emulator are also top picks for jailbroken iPhone 2.0 apps. The very promising SynchStep—an app that purports to switch the song playing on your iPod to your pace using the device's motion detection—didn't do as well as we hoped in tests. (But the concept is super-cool, and we hope the developer will work out the screen lock kink soon.)

What are your favorite jailbreak 2.0 apps, skins, add-ons, and tweaks? Let us know in the comments.

credit - http://lifehacker.com/400148/iphone-20-jailbreak-apps-you-cant-find-in-the-itunes-store

Pwnage Tool 2.0.2 Jailbreaks iPhone 2.0.1 Software

Mac only: The iPhone 2.0 jailbreak utility for Mac, PwnageTool, has just been updated to accommodate the latest iPhone software update from Apple. Re-jailbreak your iPhone 3G, first gen iPhone, or iPod touch running the 2.0.1 software with PwnageTool 2.0.2. PwnageTool creates an alternate firmware bundle to install on your device, that includes an app called Cydia—and new to this version of PwnageTool—a new beta of Installer.app. Those two apps serve as gateways to software repositories you're not going to see in iTunes' App Store. Here's a screenshot of just a few apps I installed via Cydia and the Installer.app post-jailbreak.

On the top left you see Installer and Cydia, then gTxtEdit (a better text editor than Notes), ModPlayer (plays more file formats than your iPod), SynchStep (plays songs with beats that synch to how fast you're walking—seriously), MxTube (a YouTube clip downloader), and the NES emulator.

If you install OpenSSH from Cydia, you can also copy media and voicemail from it to your computer and tether your iPhone to your Mac to get online anywhere.

Here's the step-by-step for jailbreaking your device with PwnageTool; developers recommend upgrading via the original PwnageTool's built-in update system. PwnageTool 2.0.2 is a free download for Mac only.

GrandDialer Brings GrandCentral to Your iPhone

iPhone/iPod touch only: Free application GrandDialer integrates with previously mentioned GrandCentral—Google's phone-consolidation service—so you can seamlessly call contacts from your iPhone using your GrandCentral number. The beauty of GrandDialer is that the call you place will display your GrandCentral number instead of your AT&T number, so contacts will call back on the right number (assuming you use your GrandCentral account as your main number). The app integrates with your contacts, so dialing is just as easy as dialing with the default phone application. If you're an iPod touch user, you can still use GrandDialer to place calls as long as you've got a Wi-Fi connection—you'd just set it to call a phone you have nearby. GrandDialer is freeware, iPhone and iPod touch only, requires iPhone 2.0 software.

Steve Jobs on MobileMe: the full e-mail

By Jacqui Cheng | Published: August 05, 2008 - 01:52PM CT

With MobileMe, Apple Bites Off More Than It Can Chew

Mark Hendrickson

17 comments »

When Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior VP of Worldwide Product Marketing, introduced MobileMe onstage at the WWDC keynote in June, the audience was wowed into believing that the most stylish hardware and software company had transformed itself into a formidable Internet service provider right before its eyes.

MobileMe not only promised to be exceedingly functional - an “Exchange for the rest of us” that would synchronize our emails, contacts, calendar appointments and photos across devices using push technology - it was also exceedingly beautiful. By applying its legendary design expertise to the SproutCore JavaScript framework, Apple had created a browser-based hub that not only empowered consumers with device flexibility; it also raised the notion that Apple would become a major player in cloud computing, even if MobileMe was technically only an upgrade to the six-year-old .Mac service.

But alas, the transformation has proven itself to be more of a slog than Apple had hoped. After a false start, persistent outages, and all-around bugginess, Steve Jobs has admitted to employees in an internal email that “it was a mistake to launch MobileMe at the same time as iPhone 3G, iPhone 2.0 software and the App Store,” and “the MobileMe launch clearly demonstrates that we have more to learn about Internet services”. This is an atypical admission by a company known for its well-maintained image of impeccability. It also raises the question of whether Apple will be able to metamorphize as services and software move online around it.

Apple is certainly not without its previous Internet successes, namely the iTunes Store with its paid music and movie downloads. The store’s success appears to be why Eddy Cue, Apple’s VP of iTunes, has been put in charge of all Apple Internet services following the MobileMe mess. But it has yet to be seen whether Cue can translate his experience deploying an Web-connected desktop app within a proprietary framework (iTunes) into a more distributed, browser-based platform that competes with the likes of Live Mesh and SugarSync. And then there is the question of whether Google will ever add desktop syncing to its webtop services, competing even more directly with the MobileMe offering.

credit - http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/08/05/with-mobileme-apple-bites-off-more-than-it-can-chew/