Now with 3.0 goodness
Writes for Macworld, Macworld Indonesia, and Jakarta Globe. Tweets a lot.
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This little blog of mine hosts my personal thoughts and opinions about the technology and communications industry. In no way it reflects anything of my employers' or anyone else's unless with attribution.
Contents © 2008-2009 Aulia Masna unless otherwise noted
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Filed under
iphone
AppStore claims another developer
Joe Hewitt, developer of Facebook application for iPhone announced via Twitter that he's handed off the development of the app because he was frustrated with how the App Store review process works (or doesn't work, depends how you see it). Hewitt has sworn off iPhone apps.
Yes, Apple has 200 thousand iPhone developers and 100 thousand apps on the App Store and counting, but there's been a steady stream of news of developers quitting app development for iPhone OS and going back to Mac work or switching away to other mobile platforms because they see them as having a more open process.
Mike Rose of TUAW has some sound suggestions regarding the App Store approvals:
Once a developer has had an app pass the traditional review, any further releases by the same developer would be pushed but not made public until a proper review is completed. People would still be able to search and find the updated versions but it won't make it on to the lists or the front page of the App Store. Said app will also carry a warning on its App Store page that it's not completely approved yet, so buyer beware.
This does however mean that people are expected to not irrationally complain if the app goes awry, because they knowingly download an untested app.
via TUAW
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App Store Expense Monitor
Evan alerted me to this nifty app earlier which I should have noticed even earlier since Macworld US wrote about it a couple of weeks ago. It's a menu item called App Store Expense Monitor. What it does is it gives you a list of all the iPhone apps you've ever purchased based on the iTunes Media folder in your computer and it also tells you how much you've spent.
If you have purchased apps using different iTunes Store accounts, it will display them separately although it can only display in one currency. It uses the currency setting inside the System Preferences under Language & Text in Mac OS X Snow Leopard or under International in Leopard. This means if you use accounts with multiple countries that use different currency symbols, it will only show your primary currency.
It's handy because it lets you keep track of what you've bought and how much you've spent. You can also export the list into one text file that can be imported into a spreadsheet.
It's not without several issues though:
1. It looks up current app prices on the App Store to determine how much you've spent.
It doesn't help if you got the apps at different prices or even for free during promo periods. If you did, you'll have to manually enter the actual price you paid. If you've spent money by purchasing for items directly from inside an application, this app won't know anything about it.
2. It's a menu item app
It could have been a proper application that sits on the Dock but the developer decided to make it a menu item. I can see why it's useful up there but it should have been an option like with Skitch. There is precious little real estate on the menu bar when you're not using a 2000 pixel wide monitor.
3. The app stays on top
Even dialog boxes would step back when you switch to a different app. This thing stays on top even when it's not the active window, obscuring whatever windows you have open underneath.
4. No secondary click option
It would have been more useful had it had a contextual menu when you control+click on each of the app listed
Regardless of those shortcomings, this app is undoubtedly useful. Arguably, buying apps using iTunes Gift Cards would be a better way to control your spending if that option available in your country. At the moment, there is no iTunes Cards for the App Stores in South East Asia.
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Telkomsel's current tethering option with iPhone 3G
There was no public announcement but Telkomsel sent out a text message to its iPhone 3G customers several weeks ago telling them that the tethering option has changed. Tethering is a way to use your phone as a modem by connecting it to your computer either wirelessly or via a cable.
Yes, the company that couldn't decide how to package the iPhone 3G since it launched the phone back in March this year changed its policy yet again and apparently many new customers aren't aware of it. Then again not many are aware of the tethering option in the first place.
The new policy came with the latest promo package which began sometime before Ramadhan to coincide with the price drop on the 16GB model from 9.5 million to 7.5 million. With the new package, tethering is still optional via sms to 1377 but if you had to pay Rp 87,500 per month before, which gives you an additional 1GB quota for tethering, this offer is no longer available.
Tethering is now available for free and data usage is taken from the 500MB quota you get as the standard package, which if you notice, is the only package available now. There seems to be no more Turbo Plus or Turbo Premium.
Another catch is that the tethering menu in the Settings app may disappear if you upgrade to OS 3.1 or 3.1.2 and decide to use another operator. Your iPhone 3G is unlocked when you restore it to OS 3.0 so you're free to use it with SIM cards from other GSM operators. What they didn't tell you though, is that the tethering menu in Settings app disappears if you use a non-T-sel SIM card. I currently have no information on how to get it back. I'll update this entry once I do.
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Tweetie 2.0 coming very soon
via news.atebits.com
The excellent Tweetie apps on both iPhone and Mac will have version 2.0 coming real soon. Loren Brichter, the developer, will submit the app to Ap Store this week and the Mac version will follow soon after.
It looks like a heck of a lot of work was put into making this one as it now looks like a completely brand new app (well, Brichter did say it's a new app). There is an insane amount of changes and new implementations in the iPhone version of Tweetie 2.0, which will be available for $2.99, and unfortunately owners of Tweetie 1.x will have to buy it again but it's going to be worth it.
Tweetie 2.0 for iPhone will require OS 3.0 and best used on iPhone 3GS but older iPhones are good for it too, they just won't be able to take advantage of some of its more advanced features.
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Buzz Anderson on quality vs first to market
"Shipping quality is a longer, tougher road than just shipping whatever to be first to market, and its benefits tend to be realized more slowly, but if you want users to love your software as a brand, and not merely use it as a commodity, it’s the only way"
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Blackberry vs iPhone 3.0
"I was shocked to discover how bad an e-mail client the BlackBerry is compared to the iPhone. And the BlackBerry is terrible at the rest of what the iPhone excels at: being a phone, a Web browser, an applications platform, and a media presenter. With its Windows 3-like UI, tiny screen, patched-together information structure, and two-handed operation, the BlackBerry is a Pinto in an era of Priuses."
via Macworld
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Why Palm Pre is not on Verizon
Interesting view from Marco Arment who thinks Apple may have done a deal with Verizon to keep Palm away from the US' largest CDMA network and keep them from fully competing with the iPhone. A CDMA iPhone may be the carrot that Apple is dangling in front of Verizon's face for 2010, not another device, says he. Didn't Apple hire CDMA engineers a while back? Sent from my iPhone
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New Glyphboard arrangement
Looks like Neven Mrgan updated Glyphboard, the character palette offline web app for iPhone OS. As you can see from the pics, the degree symbol º has been replaced by the en-dash as per this blog entry and the circle with a dot in it on the bottom left corner is also gone, replaced by the envelope icon. Unfortunately he seemed to have forgotten to refine the yin yang symbol to fit in the corner so for now it doesn't look as nice.
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MacBooks and batteries
You know what I love about Apple, they work on getting morons to stop abusing their Macs.
In Leopard, they stopped you from being able to change the name of your home folder. In the MacBook Air and new MacBook Pros, as well as all iPods and iPhones, you can't even remove the batteries without taking the gadget apart and they're not user replaceable.
What is this saying to you? It's saying Apple doesn't want you to use their notebooks without the battery, so use the battery at ALL TIMES.
AT. ALL. TIMES. unless you're changing the battery in which case the power is cut anyway.
Do you know what "at all times mean"? No? Look it up in the Dictionary app. It's in your Mac. You don't know there's a Dictionary app in your Mac? You're using Mac OS 9? Get away from my face.
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