Windows Live Messenger now on iPhone, Aus soon :(
Posted Monday, June 21, 2010 at 5:10 pm by Jason CartwrightFor years fans of Windows Live Messenger had to resort to 3rd party iPhone applications to chat with friends, sometimes at a reasonable cost. Applications like Beejive IM, IM+ and Meebo allow you to chat with friends on Windows Live, as well as variety of other services, but if your after a solid, official Windows Live Messenger app, it has finally arrived.
From the screens above you can see the Windows Live Messenger iPhone app reflects the new Wave 4 UI available on http://home.live.com and will soon come to Windows Live Essentials desktop applications.
Functionality wise, the iPhone app allows you to see your social updates from your friends, from various different social networks all in a single stream. In-line commenting is supported. You can also upload photos directly from your iPhone to Windows Live, as well as accessing your hotmail email without exiting the app. The app also supports push notifications, so you can leave the app and still receive notifications when chat replies arrive.
Another important feature is the ability to sign into the iPhone app while still signed into your desktop messenger client. This is handy if your back and fwd to your desk a lot and handy inclusion.
The Photos section gives you access to your photos uploaded to http://photos.live.com and actually supports pinch and zoom gestures to resize the thumbnails, as well as a slideshow option.
Unfortunately Australian’s can’t currently download the app, hopefully this is fixed quickly, as Microsoft has spent a great deal of effort promoting just how many Australian’s use their services.
More @ iTunes Preview via My Microsoft Life
Apple iPhone 4, WWDC 10 wrapup
Posted Tuesday, June 8, 2010 at 3:00 am by Jason Cartwright
Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference has just begun (3am AEST). I’ll be posting the main announcements as they happen, right here so stay tuned. As more details emerge this post will be updated. It’s expected that Steve Jobs will announce the 4th generation iPhone which is said to be called the iPhone HD. Given the developer focus of the conference and the recent launch of the iPad expect Apple to be giving lots of incentives for developers to create dedicated iPad applications. We may even see iPhone OS 4.0 software for the iPad released, stay tuned.
Update
Apple have just gone live with their official iPhone 4 site featuring a new gallery and video.
Event details:
- Over 5,200 attendees
- 57 countries
- Sold out in 8 days!
iPad details:
- 2 Million sold (One every 3 seconds)
- iPad specific apps are up to 8,500.
- 35 Million iPad apps downloaded (17 apps per iPad)
- 5 Million iBooks downloaded (2.5 books per iPad)
Apps:
- iBooks will now support PDF, coming to the iPhone (with wireless sync)
- Netflix for iPhone (US only)
- Farmville coming to the iPhone
- Guitar Hero for the iPhone
- Apple have paid One Billion Dollars to developers (and taken 30%)
Image source: GDGT
iPhone 4 announced
- New industrial design – ‘Really gorgeous, really thin’
- 9.3mm thick – ‘thinnest smartphone on the plannet’
- Front facing camera with LED flash
- 326 ppi resolution display, 960 x 640 resolution, 800:1 contrast ratio (4x the res of the iPhone 3G/3GS)
- Same A4 processor as the iPad
- Up to 32GB of storage
- Moving to the Micro SIM
- Improved Battery life – 3G talk (7hrs), Browsing on WiFi (10hrs), Video (10hrs), Music (40hrs), Standby (300hrs)
- Includes Gyroscope
- 5 Megapixel camera with a back side illuminated sensor [samples]
- Records HD video (1280×720 @ 30fps)
- iMovie for iPhone announced (US$4.99), export in 360p, 540p 720p.
iPhone OS renamed to iOS4
- 1500 new features including multitasking
- Bing added as a search option
- iOS4 Gold Master coming to developers today
Image source: Engadget
FaceTime
- Ridiculous name
- Video calling using the front facing camera
- Wi-Fi only in 2010, Apple working with carriers.
Availability
iPhone 4 will be available in 2 colors, black and white. Price is $199 in the US for the 16GB model, and US$299 for the 32GB model. 3G discontinued, 3GS will drop in price.
Pre-orders (may be US-only) start June 15th.
The release of iPhone 4 will be in 5 countries initially on June 24th 2010 – US, France, Germany, UK, Japan. In July 2010, they release in 24 more countries including Australia.
iOS4 arrives June 21st, available for free to iPhone and iPod touch owners. Some features (multitasking) won’t be supported on older versions.
More @ Apple
iPhone 4.0 beta 4 released to developers
Posted Wednesday, May 19, 2010 at 1:46 pm by Jason Cartwright
Ahead of WWDC on the 7-11 of June, Apple is nearing the competition of the latest iPhone firmware. In this 4th beta we see a more refined, faster OS which is in line with expectations at this stage of development. Beta 4 brings a number of changes from what we seen in beta 3. More info soon.
Official Digg iPhone App now available in App Store
Posted Thursday, March 25, 2010 at 5:02 pm by Jason CartwrightWhilst many have tried, almost all have failed at creating that killer iPhone app for Digg.com. The biggest stumbling block for other developers is that Digg has prevented Digging from within the app. Some opted to workaround this by using a Web View, but it just hasn’t been a great experience.
The Official Digg iPhone application offers a slick interface into stories on Digg.com. Whilst the app does a good job at delivering stories and social sharing, it fails to give any control over management of friends or your Digg Profile. This is a 1.0 product, so user feedback is sure to drive development of the app.
Not sure why it took so long to arrive, but I’m glad it’s here. Expect interactions on Digg to increase as a result of launching the application. You can easily Digg stories and comments up or down, as well as add stories to your list of favourites.
Download the free Digg app from the App Store.
Opera shows up Safari on video, really not getting approved now
Posted Wednesday, March 24, 2010 at 4:08 pm by Jason Cartwright
Opera’s been making a lot of noise recently about their new browser application for the iPhone. In what’s probably the worst idea, they’ve created a video showing 2 iPhone 3GS’s side-by-side. One running Opera Mini 5 browser and the other running Mobile Safari that comes with the iPhone.
In the demonstration, the New York Times website is loaded using the same 2G network. The Opera browser is significantly faster, achieved by Opera’s special sauce compression technology. Wether the results are as significant on 3G remains to be seen, but one things for sure they haven’t done their chance of getting approved to the App Store any favours.
It’s one thing to say it’s fast, another entirely to show how crappy Apple’s own browser is in comparison. Also speed isn’t the only thing Opera Mini’s got going for it, the way it handles multiple browser windows also looks polished.
Opera don’t hold your breath.
Tech furniture finally here, iPod couch
Posted Saturday, March 20, 2010 at 7:39 am by Jason Cartwright
Gadgets are part of everyday life, from mobile phones, to portable gaming to netbooks and laptops, they’re everywhere. One common place we use our technology is in the lounge room, so it makes sense the other elements of a lounge evolve to support modern-day tech.
Luxury furniture provider Danish Inspirations is selling a couch titled Surround by Natuzzi. The couch features an iPod / iPhone doc not only charges your device, but can also play tunes view an in-built speaker in the couch.
Whilst we make all the effort in the world to hide the mass of cables that make up a home entertainment setup, inevitably the couch ends up being littered with charging and USB cables. This couch offers a neat solution to the problem, but this is potentially just the start. Imagine if your couch was wired so you could simply insert a USB thumbdrive or SD card and watch that content on your TV. Even better, would be a way to (safely) hide your laptop charger in your couch, with a retractable cable.
Keep in mind upcoming iPad / Slate war, these devices are perfectly suited to be used on the couch, so why not have your couch support it. What about a pocket in the side of the couch for the iPad or Slate, or maybe that wireless keyboard for your gaming console or set-top box.
Could furniture become a new tech category ? I sure hope so.
More @ DanishInspirations via CrunchGear
