Archive for July, 2007
July 23, 2007
There’s been much ado about battery replacements for the iPhone. We know that after 400 full charges, the iPhone’s battery will drop to around 80% capacity; hardly unusable, but we don’t know how the curve goes from there: do another 50 charges drop it to 70% capacity? 50% capacity? We don’t know yet, and it’s likely to be a while before we do.
We do know that Apple’s got a FAQ up on battery service for the iPhone, which states that it’ll cost $79 plus shipping and handling to have your iPhone’s battery replaced, that the process will erase all the data on your phone, and that it will take about three business days (if they’re smart, they’ll come up with a way of doing it in the Apple Store, or give you a loaner phone—nobody wants to be without a cell phone for three days).
But now, courtesy of PC Magazine, we can pinpoint the precise instant* your battery will die, just by typing in what day you bought your iPhone. Now you can plan ahead, and take preemptive measures to ensure that your iPhone is kept in good working fashion. I recommend bookmarking the page on your iPhone, just so you can keep an eye on the ticking countdown clock. It’s even better than watching the ball drop on New Year’s Eve.
* By precise, we mean “totally, ridiculously estimated.”
July 23, 2007
The popularity of the iPhone ensures that it’s going to be a target of unwelcome attentions, so the announcement this morning that a team of security researchers had allegedly discovered a vulnerability should not be shocking.
Independent Security Evaluators, the firm that did the investigation, claim to have found the hole in the iPhone’s version of Safari. It would allow for the execution of arbitrary code, run with administrative privileges. Such code can in theory do anything the iPhone can do, including sending text messages, stealing email passwords, or recording audio. The demo that ISE has concocted reads the SMS text log, the address book, the call history, and the voicemail data.
While this exploit should not be taken lightly, it’s important to note that it’s not in the wild: ISE has released a preliminary paper, with a full paper and presentation to be given at the BlackHat conference on August 2nd. They’ve notified Apple of the exploit along with a proposed fix. Also important to note is the potential attack vectors: since the vulnerability is in Safari, the user needs to click on a link or otherwise be directed to a malicious website, so it’s important to practice safe computing.
July 21, 2007
It took a week of false accusations from Duke University, but the truth finally came out. The iPhone was not at fault for the wireless networking problems the university has been experiencing.
Duke admitted late yesterday that a Cisco wireless access point was the cause of the problems that Kevin Miller, assistant director, communications infrastructure, with Duke’s Office of Information Technology, had blamed the iPhone for causing.
Duke posted a statement to its Web site saying the iPhone was not to blame. I talked to Cisco last night and they said a fix was in place and Duke hasn’t experienced the problem since.
July 20, 2007
Own an iPhone and a BMW? And what kind of security do you have? I’m just…asking. Anyway, if you’re interested in using your iPhone while in your car, BMW has confirmed that the handsfree system found in models made after October 2004 will be compatible with the iPhone.
Not only will you be able to use the BMW’s built-in speakers for talking on the phone, but you can use the BMW’s dash buttons to access the iPhone’s address book. And the iPod connect features should work as well, meaning you can control your iPhone’s music playback with the built-in controls as well.
My ten year old Honda Accord sadly has none of these bells and whistles, but my dad’s got an Acura TL with the handsfree system: it worked great with my old phone, but I haven’t had a chance to try it with the iPhone yet. Next time I’m over there, I’ll have to give it a shot.
July 20, 2007
Own an iPhone and a BMW? And what kind of security do you have? I’m just…asking. Anyway, if you’re interested in using your iPhone while in your car, BMW has confirmed that the handsfree system found in models made after October 2004 will be compatible with the iPhone.
Not only will you be able to use the BMW’s built-in speakers for talking on the phone, but you can use the BMW’s dash buttons to access the iPhone’s address book. And the iPod connect features should work as well, meaning you can control your iPhone’s music playback with the built-in controls as well.
My ten year old Honda Accord sadly has none of these bells and whistles, but my dad’s got an Acura TL with the handsfree system: it worked great with my old phone, but I haven’t had a chance to try it with the iPhone yet. Next time I’m over there, I’ll have to give it a shot.
July 20, 2007
Three weeks in, and the iPhone buzz is still going hot. In fact, according to Carl Howe over at Blackfriars Marketing, it’s hotter than Harry Potter (hey, that rhymed!). Maybe it’s just my excitement over The Deathly Hallows talking, but I’m not so sure about that (be on the look out for Macworld’s new “Harry Potter Central” blog any day now).
The good news is, if you’re looking to pick up an iPhone, there’s plenty of places where you can do that. Howe has also put up a Google Map that shows you which stores around the country have iPhones in stock and which don’t, pulled from Apple’s own retail status page. Most of the little pins seem to be green at this point, meaning that there are plenty of iPhones available. No doubt, the more negative will spin this to mean that supply is outstripping demand: that’s okay, we prefer being able to get our hands on the next big thing, instead of just staring forlornly at pictures on the Internet.
July 20, 2007
Apple To Host iPhone Tech Talks (news/software/apple-to-host-iphone-tech-talks-20070720281)
July 20, 2007
Apple is hosting iPhone Tech Talks (http://developer.apple.com/events/iphone/techtalks) in a few major cities starting August 2nd in Los Angeles, CA. iPhone experts will be on hand to speak to developers and offer insight on how to optimize Web 2.0 applications and content.
July 20, 2007
Colorware Offering Custom iPhone Colors (news/iphone-accessories/colorware-offering-custom-iphone-colors-20070719280)
July 19, 2007
Colorware, a company that specializes in altering the color of technology products, is now offering customized colors for the iPhone.
July 20, 2007
From the “I didn’t know that” department: if you wake your iPhone from sleep when it’s playing music, it will display the currently playing album’s art instead of your wallpaper as well as put the name of the track that you’re playing underneath the clock. That way you don’t have to unlock the phone if you can’t remember what song you’re listening to. Nice touch.
July 19, 2007
According to Apple, you can sync your iPhone with your contact information and calendars from Entourage. While that’s technically true, a recently published Apple knowledge base document shows that what APple really means by this is that you should sync your contacts and calendars from Entourage with Address Book and iCal, and then sync those with your iPhone.
You’ll need to have Office updated to version 11.3.5 for this to work, then visit the Sync Services section of Entourage’s preferences and enable syncing for iCal and Address Book. Entourage will give you an option to replace Entourage’s information with Address Book, vice versa, or merge the two.
I don’t find it terribly surprising that this is Apple’s solution for syncing with Entourage, but hopefully it’ll be acceptable for those of you who need it.
