iPhone users get free wifi

iPhone users finally get free wifi from AT&T. Basically, you connect to the access point and enter your phone number. AT&T then sends you an SMS message with a 24-hour access key. I haven't tries it yet...

truphone: Killer iPhone app for international travel

Two days after the iPhone 2.0 software and the iTunes app store were released, I went on a family trip to Europe. So of course, in the days prior to my trip, I frantically installed, then reinstalled, the 2.0 software. This would make my phone much more useful during my trip, I reasoned. Well, it turns out I was right, and the main reason for that was the truphone application.

Truphone is a VOIP application, with one version running on Nokia phones and one iPhone version. The iPhone version appears as a separate application on the iPhone, providing buttons at the bottom of the display that provide access to your contacts, a keypad, a truphone web page for buying account credit, a list of recent calls, and a list of favorites (which, unfortunately, are specific to truphone and not copied from the Phone app). The application is exceedingly simple in operation:

1. Sign up for an account and buy credit (when I signed up, they gave $8 credit for free; now they give $1 credit).
2. Be someplace that has wifi that you can access.
3. Make a call to one of your contacts, or dial on the keypad. These are calls to regular phones (landlines or mobiles), not to other other iPhones running truphone -- it's like SkypeOut.
4. Pay $0.06/minute (now they've got packages that provide $0.015/minute to the US and Canada).

Perhaps paradoxically, this simplicity has caused some confusion among the commenters on the iTunes store. Part of this is truphone's fault, as they don't distinguish well in their online documentation between the Nokia and iPhone features. The Nokia app includes free truphone-to-truphone calling, SMS, etc. -- much more like a full Skype implementation. It also appears to integrate into the Nokia calling software, so that the phone automatically switches from regular cell to VOIP, depending on circumstances. The iPhone application is simpler, only including calls to regular phones and requiring you to consciously select wifi calling (by running the truphone app, rather than the Phone app).

I actually prefer the iPhone implementation. At this point, truphone doesn't have much market penetration, and besides I don't know that many people I might call who have iPhones or Nokia N95s. So being able to call other truphone users wouldn't have been useful during my trip (with one small exception: you know who you are). More importantly, I wanted to be 100% certain that I was making a VOIP call, and not a $2 or more per minute cell call. I didn't want my phone switching to regular cell calling because of a software glitch or because of some problem connecting to a hotel's wifi network. The fact that I was running the truphone application, not the Phone application, and that truphone only works with wifi, was very reassuring.

I spent at least a couple hours calling various phones here in the Seattle area, Philadelphia, south Florida, and China, from hotels in Prague, Venice, and Rome. Generally, call quality was quite good, equal to the best we've experienced using Skype, with the only issues being a weak signal in one hotel that required me to sit in a particular chair in the lobby that happened to be in a good spot. Also, I tried at one point to add credit to my account using my MacBook, but the truphone web site was abysmally slow; I connected to the mobile version of their add credit page and the transaction went off without a hitch. And it was great to be able to call relatives to let them know we arrived safely and keep them updated on our wanderings without having to deal with phone cards or similar unfamiliar contact methods.

So, is truphone useful for calls within the US? Probably not, unless you've somehow gotten yourself a plan with very few minutes and very high costs for additional minute usage. But, if you need to travel internationally, then calls using truphone are approximately 1/30 the cost of AT&T calls. You could easily pay for the purchase cost of an iPhone 3G with the savings from one international trip.

Getting the right iPhone 2.0 software

For those of you (like me) who followed the information I reference in a previous blog post, note that that unofficial iPhone 2.0 software was for the new iPhone hardware. If you (like me) have the original iPhone hardware, you need to follow the directions at MacRumors linked from the title to get the correct software for your hardware.

Initial iPhone 2.0 app impressions

Here are some of my initial observations about the iPhone 2.0 software:

Settings: Has a "Fetch New Data" item that lets you turn push updates on or off, set data fetch interval (includes the email check intervals for non-push email). Has a new "Mail, Contacts, Calendars" item, which consolidates various items (I think, I don't remember the details of this from the old OS) and includes under calendar "New Invitation Alerts", "Time Zone Support", and "Default Calendar" settings. The latter corresponds to the Calendar app UI now showing the multiple calendars synced from iCal. Played with simplified Chinese international keyboard a bit; neat to be able to draw characters by hand.

Contacts: The iPhone 2.0 software adds a "Contacts" app, which appears to just be a shortcut to the "Contacts" tab in the "Phone" app. We now have search, but it appears to be strangely limited, in that it doesn't search all fields. From playing with it a bit, it appears to search names and company, but not address or notes, for example. At least, this is my tentative conclusion. The on-screen keyboard has a "Search" button, but results update as you type; the "Search" button doesn't seem to do anything.

Calendar: Updated UI includes multiple-calendar awareness.

Maps: UI spiffed up. Circular cross-hairs vibrate as it progressively refines your location.

App Store: It works; looks just like the "iTunes" app.

And some third party apps: BA Flights: Mostly, thought perhaps not entirely, lame. Only lets you search for departures/arrivals within the current month. About what you'd expect: a three-button web app front end.

Talking Italian Phrasebook: Not sure that all of the phrases are correct, but pretty good for free.

Currency: Nothing fancy, just like the Stock app. A nice, simple app.

Exposure: Interface like iPod app. No Flickr upload capability. Not sure I'd pay $3 for Mobile Flickr. Need to compare this to MoPhoTo (which also doesn't seem to support upload).

NearPics: Very slow, and I'm testing via wifi.

Twitterific: Seems fine. Allows "attaching" photos to twitter updates, but I'm not sure this is something I'd like to do often; I think I'd be more likely to photoblog here on Blogger.

So, what do I want?

• Skype! There is an app/service called TruPhone that seems Skype-like. Seems to include the equivalent of SkypeIn for no extra charge. It's in beta, but maybe I'll try it (if it won't insist on calling pay via wifi within the US, given that I have thousands of rollover minutes). I'll report after/during my upcoming trip on my experiences.
• A good photoblogging interface that doesn't force me to switch to another blog platform. In other words, Blogger app.

Neat looking apps that I don't have an immediate need for:

• SignalScope, a spectrum analyzer.
• StageHand, a presentation remote that also displays your talk notes, allows you to highlight/point parts of your slides, etc.
• OmniTuner, which seems, despite the emphasis on guitar, to be a chromatic tuner app. Orfeo is definitely a chromatic tuner, though with less impressive graphics and at twice the price.

And, finally, exactly how many payware tip calculators does the iPhone need? Do people really have trouble calculating tips using a regular calculator (such as the one built into to OS distribution)? Or just ballparking tips in their heads (how difficult it it to figure 10%, then either add in half of that again or double that)?

iPhone 2.0 report

Since I'm in the process of writing my part of a grant proposal before heading off on a trip, I figured, "Hey, why don't I update my iPhone to the 2.0 software?" The software is unofficially available; see this iLounge article for a good summary of how to get it. Here's how things went:

11:55AM: Option-clicked "Check for Update", selected .ipsw file, iTunes extracted update.
11:56AM: iTunes started "Preparing iPhone for software update..."
12:02PM: iTunes started "Updating iPhone software..."
12:04PM: iTunes started "Verifying updated software..."
12:06PM: iTunes started "Updating iPhone firmware..."
12:09PM: iPhone restarting, iTunes sees it, offers to set it up anew or restore from backup. I restored from backup.
12:11PM: iPhone restarting
12:12PM: iPhone reappears in iTunes list. Arrangement of icons same as it was before update. Only immediately apparent differences are "Contacts" and "App Store" icons. Set up synchronization in iTunes to sync all applications. Synced iPhone. 12:30PM: All done, now to see if it works...

More about iPhone apps

Some more-or-less random observations about the available iPhone apps (based purely on their app store descriptions and icons):

• There's a lot of $0.99 apps; I'm not really sure what the rationale is (on the part of the software developer) for not just releasing such apps for free.
• There are many free apps that appear to do the same thing as pay apps. Why would anyone pay for an app that simply produces a white screen to improve the iPhone's ability to act like a weak flashlight?
• Here's my initial list of (free) apps: "BA Flights", "Currency", "Exposure", "Jott for iPhone", "NearPics", "Remote", "Talking Italian Phrasebook". Yes, we're going on a trip.
• Disappointments: no Skype, no official Flickr app (the free version of Exposure is adware).
• A fair number of cute ideas in some of these apps, but I don't think many really take advantage of the synergies available in the full range of iPhone capabilities.

iTunes App Store up and running

Wooo! The iTunes App Store is up! Just use Software Update to download iTunes 7.7, enable "show apps" in iTunes preferences, click on the "Applications" icon, and select "Get More Applications..." (similar interface to podcasts). Can't load the apps yet on the iPhone, since the iPhone 2.0 software hasn't been released, but you can at least browse and make a list (which I will be doing shortly).

Update: You can "purchase" applications and they'll download. This doesn't appear to use the shopping cart, but I've only tried free apps.

Single point of failure?

Do people really rely on a device that can fail, nationwide, if someone screws up a software upgrade at a single location in the country (apparently the reason for the April 2007 Blackberry outage)? A quick perusal of Google indicates two outages last year and one in 2007. And this is supposed to be a device better suited to corporate use than an iPhone?

This is cool

A first-person shooter for the iPhone, written in JavaScript. It doesn't require jailbreaking, as it runs in Safari. I especially like the pencil-and-paper drawings for the opening scenes; they make the game feel personal, like you're reading someone's diary.

Just you wait, Henry Higgins...

Maybe a little dated, but by this point there's plenty of humorous comments to read. Hilton Locke, who works on Microsoft's tablet PCs, states, "I will say that if you are impressed by the "touch features" in the iPhone, you'll be blown away by what's coming in Windows 7." First of all, I think MS is very smart in going back to serial numbers for their OS releases: they are neutral names and nobody can make a fuss about the year they get released or whether their features or performance match their names. And they don't have to worry about running out of cool cat names.

I'll leave it to the comments on Locke's blog to remark on bragging about how a desktop OS not scheduled to be released for three years will exceed a palmtop UI available right now. Consider instead the following quote from the same blog post:

Now if only we could convince more OEMs that Windows Touch Technology is going to drive their sales.

I've got an idea on how to do that: have that technology actually drive their sales. There's no substitute for delivering on promises.

Declaring creativity bankruptcy

I previously wrote about an iPhone copycat product. An unknown company can probably be excused (at least, by those of us who have no intellectual property involved) the desire to make a quick buck off of the latest Apple product. But a large, well-known company? I submit that this is the creativity equivalent of declaring email bankruptcy: Nokia's admitting that they'll never catch up with the rate of innovation of one of their competitors. And this product is vaporware! That's right, they can't even imagine making something that looks significantly different than the iPhone. Sad.

Holy crap

Has anyone every heard of something like this happening? I mean, other than for items purchased at Nordstrom? I had to triple-check the URL to be sure it wasn't a hoax, and even then I was thinking that someone might have hacked Apple's web site (the fact that it was linked from Fake Steve Jobs' blog didn't help). Mr. Jobs, you're a mensch.

ZunePhone

In honor of Apple's newly announced iPod lineup, a very funny fake ad. The blinking "12:00" is a nice touch.

Remote access via iPhone

It's hard to describe how neat it is to see your computer's desktop on your cell phone. Or to browse your files there. I know, there are other ways to accomplish this, and it's not too different than VNC. But, still very cool.

Amen

Sometimes, the simplest things are the most important. Like the "silent mode" switch on an iPhone. The easiest way to silence a RAZR? Turn the volume all the way down. Meanwhile, TVs have had mute buttons since they made infrared remotes.

Whatever happened to originality?

Meizu multi angle
Originally uploaded by stiber

It doesn't seem that anyone's even trying anymore; they just rip off whatever they want. Even if some say that there are signifcant differences with the iPhone.

Then again, just about every portable device that makes sounds has buttons arranged in a circle around a central button, so maybe this isn't really all that new.

iPhone price and profits comparison

The title above links to an interesting article that shows that, like many Apple products, the iPhone's reputation as an expensive device doesn't hold water when you compare total cost of ownership. And you get to experience the satisfaction of using an elegantly designed product for all that time.

Success at last?

We finally received a replacement phone for the old Sony Ericsson T637. Activation went smoothly, and supposedly everything will work out fine, billing-wise. We'll see. Meanwhile, I've learned that while our old plan didn't charge for receiving text messages, the new one does, and only the iPhone has messaging included. Oh well, that wasn't a big criterion.

Topics: iPhone.

Resistance is futile

Well, the new phone for my wife apparently was delayed in shipping long enough that the order was cancelled. Or something like that; the person I spoke to at AT&T didn't really understand why the order would be cancelled. Anyway, she re-placed the order. But, since that would put me well beyond the 14-day time limit for returning the iPhone, I got my iPhone activated on an individual plan, with my wife's phone retained on the old plan, and with the AT&T's representatives' assurances that the billing will all be worked out when we activate everything under the final family plan so that it won't cost any more than the plan would have cost in the first place. I'll let you know how this turns out, so others who are still under old AT&T family plans will know what their options are.

Anyway, I've now been playing with the iPhone for two days, and I have to say that it's like carrying a small work of art in your pocket. When I use it, I get the same feeling I get from looking at a Movado watch. That's not to say that there aren't some improvements that could be made to the software, of course. Meanwhile, here are some interesting web applications I've found:

• The AccuWeather.com iPhone widget is maybe the slickest one out there. Fifteen day forecasts and animated satellite imagery in a quickly loading, nicely formatted web page.
• There are web-based "desktop" applications, like AppMarks and MockDocks that provide web pages that look more or less like the iPhone home screen, except that you can choose which icons appear on it.
• The whole idea of an always-on, full web connection in my pocket is changing my thoughts about small tools. One PIM tool that I've been investigating is Tasks. It has a mobile interface, and would give me access to all of my to-dos everywhere, all from a central repository on one of my web servers.
• Gas.app is a good idea, except that it sometimes doesn't return known cheap gas stations. Still, if you're on the road and you happen to know (or know where to look up) the zip code you're in...

Topics: iPhone.

A little bit slower now

My saga continues. Yesterday, I was optimistic that the new phone would ship from AT&T in a day. Well, a phone conversation later, and I've now learned that the customer care part of AT&T and the folks at AT&T who actually have the phones are two separate parts of the company. Imagine that! And, despite the fact that they'll ship it next day air, shipping itself can take 3-5 business days. Am I the only person who finds that strange? This will bring me right up to the 14-day return deadline for the iPhone.

Anyway, I was also a bit optimistic about the iPhone working without actual phone activation. Despite others' experiences, my iPhone doesn't work via wifi. I swear it did for a little while, but now it just tries to activate EDGE, fails, then gives up. I'll remain optimistic that it will eventually prefer wifi to EDGE when available and that it's just in a different state than a machine that was temporarily activated and then had its AT&T contract cancelled. Another interesting item is its clock, which apparently isn't synchronized when synced with iTunes; it must sync directly over the net. I guess this isn't surprising. In any event, it appears I am truly in limbo, with an iPhone that is really only usable as an expensive, low memory capacity iPod.

Topics: iPhone.