Many of those who know me know that I am an iPhone fanatic. I love all the features and capabilities the phone provides and believe it's a step towards having all the capabilities of having all the power of the internet in your pocket. A lot of people ask me how I do some of the things I do on my iPhone and I decided I will publish this on my website. This page will serve as my work in progress for all things I know about the iPhone to share with all of you! Enjoy.
App Store Applications
One of the first things you do when you get the iPhone is to start adding applications! It's one of the most innovative features that the iPhone has over its competitors. Many developers out there are working hard to provide great value and experience to the iPhone. Here are some of the applications that I found very useful since I started using the iPhone. All links lead to the Apple iTunes store for your review.
Social
- Beejive - as of right now, I believe this is the best Instant Messaging app out there, couple this up with Backgrounder (jailbreak iphones only) and Push enabled (under settings-> Fetch New Data) and you'll have instant notification on new IMs
- Fring - also a good Instant Messaging program but what's even better is that they allow you to access Skype to save those precious talk minutes while you're in wifi locations
- Facebook - great app for a great social networking site!
- MySpace - okay app for a good social networking site
- Whrrl - great social location service app that can allow you to leave comments and rate places that you like and view what others in your social network are saying and doing
- Brightkite - interesting social location service app that allows you to check into locations and enter comments and view what's going on at that location like a blog
- Free Translator - easy translation of foreign texts to local languages
- WordPress - great for blog owners to post on the fly
- Tumble - very simple app for a simple blogging platform
- FakeCalls - handy application for getting out of awkward situations, meetings, and boring conversations
Document Retrieval
- Evernote - use the camera on your iphone to save pictures that you can later search with tags or even texts in the picture in your evernote whether on your phone, computer, or anywhere with a web browser
- Jott - record your voice through your phone and then jott will turn it into text for you for FREE!
- Instapaper - save webpages from Safari on your iPhone to read later
- MiGhtyDocs - save your Google Docs on your iPhone for quick retrieval
- AirSharing - turn your iPhone into a wireless backup hard drive
Games
- Enigmo - get the water dripping to bounce, shoot, soak, or roll any way you can into the receptors puzzle game
- Warfare Incorporated- if you loved red alert, starcraft, and warcraft 3, you're going to love this game on the iPhone
- iPhysics Lite - unique game that plays with the laws of physics and includes a pinball game!
- FS5 Touch Hockey - great wifi multiplayer game based on air hockey
- PhotoHunter - the best bar game brought to your iPhone
- Aurora Feint - matching box game with a fantasy twist
- Fieldrunners - build up your defenses from the never ending armies crossing the field on your iPhone
- Labyrinth - work out your balancing skills to get the marble through the labyrinth
- TanZen - fit the triangular and square pieces into intricate puzzles
- Subway Shuffle - get your subway cart through a maze of subway lines
- Brain Toot - test your vision, thinking, memory, and computational skills in this simple little game
- Brain Tuner - test your mathmatical skills through addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division problems
- Trace - has a very super mario 1 style to get from one end of the stage to the other through tracing lines
- iChoose - one click to a serendipitous result
Media
- PanoLab - this applications allows you to take multiple photos of a location and then match them into a panorama
- CameraBag - fun photoshopesque effects for your photos
- Shazam - let your phone listen to a song and it will return with all the information and save that information for later or buy the songs straight from iTunes on the spot! (note: this program does not work with remixes)
- Midomi - will listen to you sing a song and tell you what you are singing, daaammmnnnnn
- AOL Radio - great stations including local stations in your neighborhood streamed into your iPhone
- Last.fm - playlist creation and new music recommender based on your tastes
- FlyCast - internet radio station streaming to your iPhone
- Google Earth - fly around the world with your iPhone!
- Ocarina - the first unique musical instrument on the iPhone
- ICanHasCheezBurger - the funniest pictures from the internet streaming on your iPhone
On The Go
- Trapster - the social networking app locating popular speed traps that cops set up
- Snow Reports - a snowboarder's dream of flipping through all the mountain reports at all your favorite ski resorts in a flash
- The Weather Channel Mobile - best weather tracking application for the iPhone
- Now Playing - location aware application that tells you what movies are playing in your area, ratings from Rotten Tomatoes.com, and movie release information
- Yelp - from one of the best social networking sites for restaurant reviews
- AroundMe - find all types of points of interest near your location
- Open Table - check for availability and make quick reservations through your phone quickly
- UrbanSpoon - this is the famous app for shaking the slot machine and giving you restaurant locations near you
- Save Benjis - enter in the bar code of an item your interested in buying and get quick online price comparisons
- SnapTell - take a picture of any book, DVD, CD, or video game and get reviews, information, and price comparisons
Other
- WordBook - the best dictionary I have found so far
- Vlingo - tap and immediately map, search, call, or update your social network statuses with the power of your voice!
- MindFreek - use binaural tones to manipulate the mind while falling asleep for lucid dreaming
- MindWave - use binaural tones to help improve mental functions throughout the day
As far as web browsing goes, the iPhone Safari is great but is sometimes limiting compared to what you can do in a normal web browser on a computer. There are some developers out there writing javascript codes that you can sync or install into your Safari browser to give it more functions. Here is the list of the ones that I use.
- Tabulate - allows you to get options to open a link in a new window, the current window, or save for later
To install: (1) click this link in your iPhone Safari browser, (2) Press stop button [the X] immediately, (3) bookmark the link, (4) edit the link and erase everything before the word "javascript" at the beginning of the link (this includes the "?")
- Find In Text - allows you to search for a certain word on the page
To install: (1) click this link in Safari and (2) follow the same instructions as above
One of the best things you can do to unlock the potential of the iPhone is to "jailbreak" it. This means to alter the software that comes with the stock iPhone. This allows you to access the underground market of applications that Apple has denied due to their strict rules. Inherently, if you jailbreak your phone, you will be taking on more risky chances of messing up your phone. As a disclosure, any advice you take from my site is at your own risk. I do not take any responsibilities on the decisions you make on your own. I am only providing information for educational and entertainment purposes.
Aside from that disclaimer, if you do run into any problems with an iphone jailbreak, you can restore the phone to the last full sync you have completed in the past. There are two ways to restore: through iTunes or through holding the buttons on the iPhone. The act of jailbreaking an iPhone is relatively safe because if you do mess up, you can always go back to the last restore you had on your phone.
Jailbreaking the iPhone
Now onto the actual Jailbreak. Theiphoneblog.com has great illustrations on how to jailbreak your iPhone. However, the first thing you have to consider is what version of the iPhone Operating System (OS) do you have and whether or not you want to unlock the phone in the future. If you're not familiar with the difference between jailbreaking and unlocking, jailbreaking is to change the software so you can install underground applications and unlocking is to take out the restrictions in the phone for a certain carrier such as AT&T and allow the iPhone to operate on any cellular phone provider. If you have OS 2.1 and want any chance of unlocking the phone in the near future, DO NOT UPDATE THE PHONE TO OS 2.2. While an unlock will eventually come out for 2.2, it won't be for a long time. If you have 2.2 and would just like to jailbreak the phone, just follow the link below.
- Jailbreak OS 2.2 (Mac version) - this is to jailbreak and allow unlock in the future for iPhone on a Mac using Pwnage 2.2
- Jailbreak OS 2.2 (PC version) - this is to jailbreak the iPhone on a PC using WinPwn 2.2 (no unlock)
- Jailbreak OS 2.1 (Mac version) - this is to jailbreak the iPhone on a Mac using QuickPwn 2.1
- Jailbreak OS 2.1 (PC version) - this is jailbreak the iPhone on a PC using QuickPwn 2.1
Cydia Applications
After you jailbreak your iPhone, now you will have access to unlimited range to all applications that are on the market for the iPhone. The equivalent to the App Store is the brown program icon for Cydia. From Cydia, you can search and download applications that improve the functionality of the iPhone. Here is a listing of Cydia apps that I have found useful.
- SBsettings - quickly turn on or off 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Airport Mode, and Brightness even if you're inside another program and also can toggle numerical percentage instead of green battery icon and make any icons dissappear
- Categories - put all your apps into folders that you can name and design icons for
- Cycorder - record video through the iPhone camera!
- Five Icon Dock - get 5 icons in your deck on the bottom of the home screen
- dTunes - download any song at any time you want for free
- Backgrounder - run any program you want in the background even if you quit the application, meaning you can load webpages while checking your mail or responding back to a text, or running your favorite Instant Messaging program while you read webpages online. (note: kills battery faster)
- OpenSSH - hook your iPhone up to your computer wirelessly
- Snapture - a replacement application for the stock iPhone camera, you can click anywhere on the screen to take a photo and adjust contrast/brightness, and multiple exposures
Looking Under the Hood
For more advanced users, you may want to check out the inner workings of the phone and manipulate files within the operating system. This is accomplished by using the OpenSSH app on a jailbreak iPhone and WinSCP on the PC. This will allow you to log into your iPhone through your computer on a shared wifi connection. Through this method, you can decide to install NES, Sega and Playstation ROM files and also get IPA files onto your phone. Here are two instructional links that will help you accomplish this.
- How to Add IPA Files To Your Phone
- Video Instructions on Enabling Your Phone to Install IPA files
Application Ideas
- Voice Conference Trivia Games - I had a great idea on 12/13/2008 to create a hands off trivia game for the iPhone. This application would allow users to conference in their friends or join groups through 3G or Wi-Fi to participate in trivia games. Users would all be asked individual and group questions and the first person to give a correct answer would receive a point. With voice recognition technology becoming more and more advanced these days, the accuracy and automation of the program should be done with ease. This would be a great group experience because it will allow all iPhone users to congregate and play a game together in a social setting without averting attention and eyes from each other. Thus, this would build a closer social bond between iPhone users instead of a distracted image of most smart phone users.