Von Anfang an war ich begeistert und mit jedem weiteren Beta-Release wurde alles noch runder, besser und schöner. Ich bin so begeistert, dass ich nicht einmal auch nur einen Gedanken oder Wunsch hatte auf das “alte” Vierer zurückzugehen. Auch selbst programmierte Apps liefen sofort ohne Anpassungen weiter.

Apple hat scheinbar den Termin zur Veröffentlichung schon wesentlich länger gekannt, denn das sollte mein Screenshot zur letzten iTunes 10.5 beta zeigen:

Von daher wünsche ich allen, die iOS5 noch nicht selbst auf ihrem eigenen Gerät haben, viel Spass damit! Es lohnt sich.

Trauer trifft mich um diesen großartigen Mann, den ich nicht einmal persönlich kannte. Seine Ausstrahlung und Hartnäckigkeit hatte immer eine faszinierende Wirkung auf mich – und auf viele andere auch. Mit seinen Ideen und Produkten hat er auch mein Leben beeinflusst und auf seine Keynotes habe ich mich jedesmal wie ein kleines Kind gefreut.

Daher will ich nur sagen “Danke, Steve und ruhe in Frieden!” und wünsche selbstverständlich allen Angehörigen und engen Freunden mein Beileid.

Jailbreak

Der Jailbreak ermöglicht das Installieren von Software auch ohne Apples AppStore.

Man kann also Software entwickeln und weitergeben, ohne dass sie über Apple’s Tisch läuft. Somit gibt es keine Qualitätsprüfung, die einige Tage oder Wochen dauern kann. Außerdem ist man auch nicht der Gefahr ausgesetzt, dass die App abgelehnt wird.

Zusätzlich können Funktionen aktiviert werden, die für ältere Modelle deaktiviert wurden – beispielsweise Fast-App-Switching.

Unlock

Der Unlock erlaubt es andere SIM-Karten als beim Kauf mit Vertrag zu verwenden. Das macht Sinn, wenn man einen günstigeren Mobilfunkanbieter findet oder sich z.B. im Ausland befindet und lieber eine dort gültige Prepaid-Karte verwenden möchte.

Unlock nur mit Jailbreak?

Immer wieder liest man in sämtlichen Foren, dass ein Unlock des iPhones nur mit einem Jailbreak möglich ist. Es gibt die Software Blackra1n, mit der es sehr einfach auch ohne Jailbreak funktioniert.

Allerdings hat das den großen Nachteil, dass nach jedem Firmware Update des iOS auch der Unlock wieder weg ist – und zwar so lange bis eine Möglichkeit gefunden wird das zu umgehen.

Wer immer sein iPhone also mit Unlock auf dem neuesten Stand halten will, hat das Pech immer warten zu müssen, bis es den entsprechenden Patch gibt und das kann auch schon mal einige Tage dauern.

Dauerhaft unlocken?

Ja, es gibt die Möglichkeit sein iPhone und jedes andere Telefon auch SIM-Lock-frei zu bekommen. Beim Provider anrufen und genau das verlangen! Benötigt wird noch die IMEI-Nummer, die dann an Apple zum Freigeben weitergeleitet wird. Etwa drei Tage später ist das iPhone frei wie ein Vogel.

Gerüchteküche

Das Unlocken soll erst nach einem Jahr Vertragslaufzeit möglich sein und es könnte kostenpflichtig sein.

In meinem Fall war das iPhone nun zwei Jahre alt und ich habe den Vertrag nicht verlängert. Eure eigenen Erfahrungen könnte ihr gerne in die Kommentare schreiben.

iOS 4 macht alles schön?

Seitdem es die iBooks mit iOS4 gibt wollte ich unbedingt Bücher auf dem iPhone lesen. Bei mir hat es einfach nicht funktioniert, weil immer wieder die Meldung kam, dass mein iTunes-Kennwort nicht korrekt sein soll – ist es aber hundertprozentig – sonst hätte ich erst gar keine (kostenlosen) Bücher erwerben können.

Der Donnerbalken

Bei den Büchern, bei denen diese Meldung nicht erschien, ist der Download-Balken einfach nicht verschwunden. Das muss ein ziemlich bekanntes Problem (gewesen) sein, weil genau das in den Kommentaren im iTunes Store zuhauf zu lesen war.

Und es geht doch!

Jetzt habe ich es aus Neugier doch noch einmal ausprobiert. Ein erster Erfolg hat sich gezeigt, als ich das Buch über einen orangefarbigen Honigdieb tatsächlich problemlos öffnen und durchblättern konnte.

Dickes Kompliment an Apple, damit kann tatsächlich gut lesen. Die Einstellungen sind gut und schnell erreichbar. Auch die kleinen Spielereien an Effekten machen Spaß.

Oder doch nicht?

Freudig und voller Ungeduld machte ich mich daran, die anderen noch ungelesenen Werke in mein virtuelles Bücherregal legen zu wollen. Doch die Freude wurde schnell mit einer Fehlermeldung gebremst.

Ein unbekannter Fehler ist aufgetreten.

Doch, es geht!

Glücklicherweise gibt es eine ganz simple Lösung. Einfach das Buch noch einmal kaufen. Die Anwendung bemerkt, dass das Buch bereits schon einmal gekauft wurde und gibt einen entsprechenden Hinweis aus, der jedoch getrost ignoriert werden kann. Anschliessend funktioniert der Download einwandfrei und das Buch kann gelesen werden.

LAN, WAN, mobile data

You can use wireless LAN if available for fast data transfer, but when no wireless internet is available, the iPhone takes it way through the mobile SIM card. Ok, that is cool, but what if you do not want to use your iPhone that mobile data transfer? It could be very very expensive if you have no data flat in your contract.

Stop mobile traffic

Since iOS4 you have the possibility to complete deactivate mobile data transfer!

That is really great, because normally you are forced to use one of the big players (AT&T or T-Mobile). More and more providers are offering better and more fair tariffs. This lets you decide to have a contract or just a prepaid card with or without data options.

Freedom

With that tiny new slider you have the freedom to save some costs and dominate about your own data usage.

Lock your iPhone

Like on all other mobile cell phones you can set a lock code. Once it is locked  or fallen asleep by pressing the power button, you need to enter a code to unlock, and make it ready for use, again. To activate this option go to Settings -> General -> Passcode lock. Put in a PIN code. In the same settings, you can set how long it takes until it will be auto-locked either iPhone is unused or after what time it is sent to sleep.

Unlocking

Only with that previously determined code, your iPhone can be made useable after a lock.

Mistake, mistake?!

You have six tries to unlock your iPhone. If you mistake them all, it will be locked for one minute. No, problem! Just try again. Yet another mistake? The time to wait will increase to five minutes, then 15 minutes, followed by one hour! A clever idea would be just to reboot the iPhone, but Apple was clever, too, so this will not help you out. You need to wait until the time is expired!

To learn and improve my English, I need to look quite often into a dictionary. There are many free dictionaries available on the web like Leo or Dict.cc.

My favorite is Dict.cc, because it is a very slim page. The results come as speedy as gunshot and look like I expect them. There are a lot of other word suggestions and common phrases which totally differ from language to language.

For using Twitter, or when on the road, sometimes I just need to find the right word. And of course, “there is a app for it”. Get the free German to English and vice versa dict.cc application in the AppStore for the iPhone. It is really well done, with a quick and easy interface. My most liked feature is the live-type-suggestion.

First of all I thought it was corrupted, because even on plugging it out and in again did not change anything in that misbehavior. To be sure it is not my fault, before claiming the Apple support, I restarted my iPhone.

Still not working and I even made a complete reset and restore. The solution is somewhat strange!

In microphone jack was some dust – just such a little that I could not even detect it on blowing into the socket or plugging the headset connector in with a smart pressure. With a wooden toothpic I managed to get it out. It was just a very little tiny fluff.

After cleaning everything went fine, again. So keep it clean and easy going!

Windows95 and even WindowsXP can be running on a iPhone!

As owner of an Apple device I have of course no real intention in using it, but “yes, we can“! If you are interested in, you even can get the source code.

Sources: Image

How much time is remaining when the tiny battery icon has about 35% battery left?

The free application iBattery is the perfect solution for that by displaying the time is left for usage in hours and minutes.

You will stay tuned on how long your standby will be, how long you can talk, listen to audio or even watch video.

When I was playing around a little bit with it, after the upgrade to the 3.0 firmware and quit Skype, then it somewhat crashed. I saw the the dialog as the picture shows at the right hand side, but then, after relaunching the spingboard, everything worked fine.

For sure, I did I a reboot after that and noticed by the way, that one of the new 3.0 firmware improvements is the SIM-card-unlocking. It is so much faster, that I can not feel any delay, anymore.

As you already know, I am a big fan of twitter. On the iPhone I was taking the Twinkle client mostly, because it can show me twitterers next to me in a range of kilometres.

The best and lightweight client in my humble option is TwitterFon, but I was missing the nearby-functionality. Thanks to Tim pointing me to a solution having the same functionality in TwitterFon.

Just go to the search and leave the keywords empty. Then click left to the search and specify the distance. Now I found some interesting new twitterers.

On the release time of the free application Skype for iPhone, I could not let it be to install it. Because I am lazy at typing I initially tested it with just a small chat, only.

But, today I had a situation that I needed to do a Skype call to ask something. The voice quality is amazing good! The person I called just used his MacBook with the integrated Microphone.

A very big plus for Skype is, that when I turned my Mac on, the iPhone’s history was inserted immediately to my Mac’s Skype!

Very great to keep the conversions complete.

The iPhone checks frequently for new mails and you will be up to date of what has been sent to you. Every mail is marked as unread and until now I do not a see a built in function in the iPhone to mark them all as unread.

This is really nerving me, especially if I do not use the iPhone for some hours. I do not want to click every single mail to get it marked as read. Here is my workaround:

1. Login to GoogleMail and go to the “inbox”
2. Select “all”
3. In the first line, you can select really all mails of your inbox and not only those which are listed on the first page.
4. “Archive”
5. On the iPhone, start Mail
6. Leave the inbox
7. Go back to the inbox

Now, all mails are even in the archive on the iPhone and nothing is unread anymore, besides you receive new ones meanwhile.

Blackberry HS-655+ headset

The Bluetooth headset branded with HS-655+ or just Blackberry 655+ is a great and tiny thing. It supports Bluetooth 2.0 technology and has a good sound quality and distance range. There are lot of testing reports in the web, but no useful reference manual or user guide. The delivered one is one of the worst I have ever seen. So I will give a neat summary below.

I bought that headset in combination of my Blackberry 8110 which is now replaced with my iPhone 3G – the best(est) PDA / iPod / phone available on the planet. I suggest you getting it, because the price cheapened from about $100 down to approximately $60 and you also can use it on every Mac.

The original vendor is Plantronics with the model number ASY-12747-002, but there is not valuable manual out, either.

Here we go for the short, but explainary summary. I really can not image what inherited them for writing just these few words:

Charging:
Plug a USB cable into the cradle. Put the headset into the cradle. When it vibrates once it signals, that power is available. When it is blinking red in 3 second steps, it is charging. When the light is off, the battery is full.

Power on:
Hold down the button for 3 seconds. When it is on, then it blinks blue every 5 seconds.

Power off:
You need to disconnect bluetooth from the other device, first. Else the headset will not react on power off. When disconnected, hold down the button for 4 seconds. When the light it is off, the headset is totally powered off, too.

Pairing:
Power it on (see above). Release the button and hold it down for 10 seconds. Then the button blinks alternating red and blue. Find the headset with your phone or Mac. When you are asked for the passkey, enter 0000 (for times zero). When paired it blinks every 5 seconds blue as described on power on.

Note on Pairing: When powered on and your device is findable, it could happen that is asked for the passkey without holding the button for 10 seconds down.

Now, go and get it! Maybe, we will see/hear us in a Skype call.

Skype

Yes, I do have an account on almost every important protocol and I was managing them with the Adium client. That is really a great and superb tool with an awesome tight interface. But, I have made a hard and ultimate decision.

I decided to take just only one messenger and one protocol, since now: Skype.

Why Skype?

• It runs on important platforms: Linux, Mac, Windows, Mobile phones.
• The interface is free available and really easy. All functions an instant messenger needs to have are there. My favourite is to sort out old and unused contacts.
• Encryption is enabled by default. Other instant messenger do not even encrypt at all or plugins are not easy to install.
• Can run even through firewalls.
• Chat, audio/video possible. Even conferences with multiple users.
• Standing out audio/video quality and reliable.
• Working and fast file transfers, also encrypted.
• Less network traffic by using just only one protocol.
• Available web graphics to show current online status.
• Great directory with search. You can specify by yourself what is visible by anybody and what to your personal contacts.

If you need, you can charge services at fair prices:

• Call from internet to local lines and mobile phones.
• Send SMS to mobile phones.

That list is incomplete, but that points are facing exactly what modern instant messaging in those days should be able to do. There are even LAN/WiFi phones available having Skype implemented. Also, having just one account makes it easier to configure and to handle.

If you have Skype installed and want to get in direct contact with me, click the Skype icon (blue cloud with a “S” inside) on the top right social profile bar to add me to your contact listing.

Delete Podcast Episode

When I am on the way I mostly consume my favourite podcasts instead of listening to music. When beeing back on my Mac I see which episodes are played in iTunes and then I do mark and delete them. But when I have listened to different podcasts I really hate it to search through my quite long directory and delete them manually one by one.

Today I have detected, that I can delete episodes directly on the iPhone which saves me some time and unconvinient title seeking.

When beeing in the episode list, slide the “unwanted” episode from left to right. The red delete button known from other built in applications will fade in. You can either click it to delete or slide again this entry to remove the button.

Guess what's in firmware 3.0

Apple invited to a iPhone 3.0 firmware presentation. Of course we are all awaiting new features and some things to be optimized. The iPhoneBlog.de invited this evening at 6pm CET to a live chat and a live audio stream.

There are many rumors what could be and would surely will be changed and added. I have created a voting rumor and you are welcome to take part and then let us see what of it will become true.

Speedport’s original firmware has some bad properties. After login it resizes the browsers window, the interface is ugly and some items seem to be misplaced in my opinion. But, all in one it is ok.

Due to I am having T-Home, I am forced to use the Speedport router because of the built in Modem. I just wanted to use my TimeCapsule only, but that did not work, because I do not get any internet connection then.

In former times I already a had FritzBox and was impressed how far it succeeded with useful options. It was even possible in those days to connect a USB capable printer and to print wireless via WLAN. But now, AVM has implemented state of the art features which are really useful for home users or small networks. It provides now USB-support for harddrives and memory sticks and even sharing them with FTP and SMB, VPN tunneling, call answer machine, fax sending/receiving and many more.

Refering to that article mentioned above, I began some research and found some solutions how to get the AVM firmware to the Speedport.

It is not working by just uploading it the normal way! You need to somewhat compile your own thing out of both firmwares. See my steps, and it will work really easy.

Here is my installation guide for Mac users, but with some fantasy you may adapt it for your own purpose:

Disclaimer! YOU ARE DOING ALL THAT AT YOUR OWN RISK! YOUR HARDWARE MAY GET DAMAGED. Read carefully and make sure to understand before doing anything.

First of all, get the Debian businesscard edition (36 MB). The compiling scripts do require some apt libraries which are not available on OS X by default. The stable CD/DVD of Debian 5 crashed during my installation within Parallels Desktop 4.

Begin to create a virtual machine with Parallels by running the assistant. Set the just downloaded Debian 5 ISO file as the CD/DVD drive. Parallels will automatically detect everything what is needed. When the machine starts for the first time and asks you for the installation method, I recommend you to go to the options and select the graphical unattended one. The installation will download everything what is required.

When done, log in as a normal user, because no root access is required. Use the browser icon from the menu bar to download the master script doing all the nasty work for you. For the ease of use, I have created a short URL to type less. You can use the samehttp://kURL.de/opupiin your address bar. If you get a hint, that you have no internet, have a look at the top right corner of your menubar left next to the clock and calendar. There should be a tiny icon and if you click it, you can select a cable network connection. Then reload the script and you should see it’s source text. Store it with menu file, save as. Change the download folder to Desktop!

Open a root terminal window via the menu bar applications, then tools. Go the Desktop directory where the downloaded shell script is located by typingcd DesktopPay attention to the letter case on unix systems! Start the script by typing sh ./download_speed-to-fritz.shThis will do some downloads and may take some time. Now, we change to the new files and run the first script, which will install some needed libraries to continue.cd trunk/speed-to-fritzsh ./install-start

Follow the instructions and read carefully. If everything is done it will start the module configurator which has a nice interface where you can use the cursor keys to change options. Then it downloads the needed firmwares and will re-image them. When you are prompted to reset the router, turn it off! Wait 10 seconds and power it on again. Then the firmware will be installed. Do not interrupt until it is complete!

Then you can access the router over same IP as before or just with http://fritz.boxAll the settings are still kept.

If you made a mistake, you can re-run the last script and restore to the original firmware or just customize other things.

Now I am so happy beeing able to receive faxes and missed calls running on my answering machine by mail to my iPhone!

CSS frames

I am a big fan of creating websites with CSS. You may know, that is possible to have a frame like behaviour without having real frames using the iframe tags.

The secret is to put some divisions at the right place and to give the right properties. It results with only having one section scrollable and the rest of the site will remain and keep a great design. A good inspirating example is given by Stuart A Nicholls.

I have made a design using that technique and was testing it on the iPhone. But anyhow I did not know how to scroll the scrollable content. By accident I took two fingers, and that’s it. You can scroll those areas by using two fingers!