iPhone Gets Official Third-Party Apps, AIM, and Enterprise Support [Apple]

Category: Science/Tech | Posted by laraib 1537 days ago

If you've been following along with the long-running Hacker vs. iPhone saga that's been dragging out since the iPhone's release late last June, your days of jailbreaking may finally be coming to an end. Today, Steve Jobs and the folks at Apple have announced their official support for third-party applications along with Enterprise support for push email and calendars, Activesync and Exchange support. Hit the jump for more details and what this means for your and your iPhone or iPod touch.Download New Apps with the App Store

If official third-party app support piques your interest most, Apple delivered with some exciting announcements. First, if you've already jailbroken you iPhone or iTouch and experienced what installing apps is like through the excellent Installer.app, Apple's official application management software, called the App Store, works just like Installer.app; it allows you to install, manage, update, or uninstall any application directly from your device, either over EDGE or Wi-Fi. Unlike Installer.app, the official App Store integrates with iTunes so you can also sideload apps through iTunes if you don't feel like installing on-the-go.

Pricing and Availability
One of the biggest concerns surrounding Apple's official support of third-party apps versus what we've seen in the hacker community concerns price—namely, that Apple might charge for all apps similar to how they charge for games through the iTunes store. Luckily, Apple is leaving price in the hands of the developers, meaning that devs can choose whether or not to charge for an app, and free distribution is still an option. Jobs has also said that they won't block VoIP apps (on Wi-Fi, at least), so that's crazy exciting for anyone looking to save a few minutes of talk-time when they're sitting at a hotspot.

The new App Store won't see the light of day on your iPhone or iPod touch until sometime in June, along with the iPhone 2.0 update (though a beta release will be available to developers today). iPod touch users are getting the same update, but it will come with a yet-to-be-determined "nominal" charge.

The question remains, though, whether or not Apple's hand in distributing apps will hinder developers' and users' freedom. If Apple were to start refusing viable apps because it interfered with their or AT&T's business models, for example, the return of iPhone hacks and jailbreaks would be inevitable.

Coming Soon iPhone Apps

So what can we expect to see out of the new SDK? Aside from seeing likely improvements to the best iPhone and iPod touch apps that are already running on jailbroken devices, Apple previewed a few apps already in development using the official software developer's kit. Among them, Apple previewed an official AIM client from AOL and some multi-touch games, including Spore and Monkey Ball. Anyone who's played iPhysics on a hacked iPhone knows how exciting the simple gaming possibilities are on the iPhone, and as such these look very promising.

Enterprise Support

Aside from the official SDK and third-party apps, the other huge announcement that may have a huge influence the iPhone's viability as a full-on corporate device is its new support for enterprise features. That includes everything from push email, calendars, and contacts to Cisco VPN support and Activesync and Exchange support. If an iPhone's stolen or lost, your corporate IT department can even remotely wipe your phone clean of sensitive data (spooky!).

What Else?
Got any questions or comments regarding the new iPhone/iPod touch announcements? Let's hear it all in the comments. Thanks to Gizmodo for their extensive coverage of this Apple event.