iPhone Evolution Infograph

How many iPhone have you had?? Well if you haven't known its characteristics, it is a good time reveal that hidden secret, realize why iPhone 4 blows away the quite old original iPhone.

All is explained within this infograph from Into Mobile

FastPost: Apple Airplay

I watched this video and I realized of the capabilities of Airplay technology coming for the iOS 5, simple amazing.

I totally suggest to keep watching it until the end, I know that 10 minutes is a long time, but it worth it.

iOS 5 for Developers

Many news came with the official announcement of the fifth iteration of one of the most advanced mobile operative systems: iOS (previously called iPhoneOS don't forget). Things like messaging, offline reading, cloud synchronization and notifications will be bundle along the september update, meanwhile, we, as developers must learn and relearn the APIs released, which Apple says are more than 1,500.

Of course, we will learn them by the time goes on, however, there is a list of the most noticeable to take note of:

Sphero or trading control ways

iOS SDK allows programmers explode their imagination with many technologies and tools that are provided just out of the box. Now, I want to show you a simple toy called Sphero.

Also, with smarphones, the gameplay possibilities are endless, especially when you add another physical object such as a helicopter or a remote controlled car. Let me add one more to the list, a ball that we can control from the iOS device, be it the iPad or iPhone. Check this out:

Noise cancellation

Have you ever wondered how the noise cancellation works?? Smart Phones like Google Nexus One, iPhone 4, among many includes the hardware necessary to implement such technology improving considerably the signal transfered to our receiver, unfortunately not always works the other way around.

Anyway, people from Chipworks discovered the function of a small chip along the A4 processor inside the iPhone 4, this one:

iOS 4.3 with multitouch gestures

Apple continues with the development of iOS, as well as the improving of the User Interface with interactions that changes the way of managing all the resources inside the device. iOS 4.3 can come up with many innovations, especially given the features that were released a few days ago, specifically something is calling enough attention, that is multitouch gestures.

Of course, this 4.3 has not been public released, nonetheless developers can take hands on with private releases so that Apple can have feedback about the intention to publish those new features. The multitouch gestures are activated using four or five fingers down to return to the main screen, left or right to switch between applications and a move up to show open applications. These gestures have been in the beta of 4.3 for iPad iOS, so the question was whether the iPhone would have this capability.

Here is a video of those running on the iPad:

Suertudo: Lucky iPhone/iPod App released!!

Today, I received the notification from iTunes that Suertudo has been published. Let me remind some features that are included with this release (v1.0):

- Determine your luck at any point of time: pressing the red button or shaking the device.

Let's geek just a bit

Quite fun image that I found at C-Section-Comic, first how the Smart Phone users see the 2G ones:

Objective C Valuable Links

Right now that I have been developing Suertudo for the iPhone/iPod, many doubts and circumstances have been solved with just little search over the greatest Google, however others have not, anyway I found many useful links that could help many others programmers:

How Popular Is The iPhone

Someone has asked this? well Bill Shrink did and also they made an image illustrating few funny facts:

PayWave on iPhone

Visa has a system called PayWave that allows "contactless payments" using a special card that "wave" on a reader device that accepts payment, without touching or insert on it. Now the same technology is being tested using iPhones in New York, specifically, in the subways of New York.

Well, like other wireless systems, is based on RFID technology using an special microSD memory card, enabling the use of other phones, not just iPhones. People who receive these payments from Visa are also on the subway, on the bus, and thousands of taxis in New York.

As the video shows, it will be necessary unlock the iPhone, open the application, pepare the pay and then move close to the "reader", here is an example:

App Store Functionality Rules

Few weeks ago, Apple released a guide to what we must or must not to do in order to ensure that any application submitted for the App Store become approved. This guide, simple and very close in wording, sets those parameters to be taken into account, and also to be aware of the latest changes in policies and restrictions that have happened in the App Store since the beginning of September.

Mittratter - Source Code

Ok, the Compilated App has been released here: Mittratter and its post related: http://mittrasw.blogspot.com/2010/09/mittratter-twitter-client-for-osx.html. What would help to other programmers trying to implement oAuth into their developments will be the source code used by Mittratter to sign into Twitter's Servers. Also I will give a brief explanation of how does this thing work.

As I explained here and here, now Twitter uses the oAuth Procedure, well the code behind is quite tricky and might confuse at first sight. Mittratter is an application developed in Objective-C, so the code is going to display here helps to implement those functions into iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad developments as well. Don't forget to do a quick review of the Twitter API where few libraries and implementations could be found. Well, let's get started.

Prog: Accelerometer on iPhone/iPod Touch

In this post, I am going to talk about the accelerometer on the iPhone/iPod Touch and how to use it via SDK. The Wikipedia says that

An accelerometer is a device that measures proper acceleration, the acceleration experienced relative to freefall.

Well the accelerometer inside the device help us to detect the relative position in relation with the gravity, measuring the answer of the 3 movement axis: x, y and z, so this allow the device to detect its orientation (portrait, landscape, face up or down), a shake or the relative values in specific moment in time.

And accelerometer sensor is not only used on Phone devices, also many high end cameras uses for the image stabilization; the cars to detect the vehicle acceleration; watches for runners that include footpods; the Nintendo Wii with the accessory Wii Motion Plus or the six axis control of the PS3 includes one. Well let's talk about how to get the values of this sensor in side the iPhone/iPod.

iPod Touch 4G

Yesterdar, Apple had an event in San Francisco where were shown the updates prepared for their full line of iPods: Shuffle, Nano and Touch.

The images below shows the redesign of the Shuffle (once again with buttons) and Nano (now a really nano) without the the old fashion Click Wheel, which next in the list to disappear would be the iPod Classic for sure.

After a little review, we are going to review the iPhone without Phone: iPod Touch 4G:

iOS App Store(s)

Every one can develop native or Web iOS applications just using Mac OS and SDK provided by Apple. For the native applications developed with Objective C the main exit is the iPhone/iPad application store, although there are other ways of distribution (ex. Cydia). 

About the App Store, certain rules apply, wich must complain with the rules of design published by Apple, such no duplication of iPhone/iPod/iPad functions embebed (ex. iPod app).