

Well argued iPhone SDK critique (no whining) - bdfh42
http://whydoeseverythingsuck.com/2008/03/apples-iphone-sdk-prohibits-real-mobile.html

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sanj
What undermines this argument is that Palm acheived such domniance in handheld
and smartphone with no background threads.

That's not exactly true. There was a single background thread which handled
(surprise!) comms.

Both the Palm and the Newton also had a sophisticated notification frameworks
to deal with asynchonous messages.

It isn't as convenient, but it can be done. Heck, I've done it! And it retains
some control by the platform, which is the point.

And while I love the premise of Android, I think that developing for 10 000
000 iPhones rather than 0 gPhones may be a prudent business move.

~~~
bilbo0s
Of course, MOST of us are going to have a difficult time trying to develop for
the 10 000 000 iPhones. You see, you can download the SDK and do all of the
testing you want . . . good luck running your code on an actual iPhone though.
A lot of developers read the fine print, and skipped over the finer print. To
try out your newly developed games, or virtual worlds, against the actual
iPhone accelerometer you have to be accepted into the OFFICIAL iPhone
Developer's Program. Guess how many of the 100000 developers who downloaded
the SDK were accepted into the program . . . Oh . . . So then you read the
article already . . .

[http://apple20.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/03/15/apple-
to-100...](http://apple20.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/03/15/apple-
to-100000-iphone-developers-dont-call-us-well-call-you/)

The short version is that Apple is giving its strategic partners a head start,
EA, Salesforce, AOL, Epocrates, Sega . . . and Apple quoted a quite a few more
the press release Intuit, Namco, Netsuite, PopCap . . . you get the idea. Good
for Apple, its partners, and probably the iPhone . . . Bad for startups who
happen to compete with something one of the partners wants to do. Guess which
app will get the splash page billing on the iTunes App store, the startup's or
the partner's?

There is SOME good news though, if someone is willing to search past the first
page of the iTunes app store to look for your app, they will probably be able
to find and install it without much trouble. Of course that is ASSUMING that
you are allowed into the OFFICIAL developer's program, which there is no
guarantee of either if you are making an app that competes with a strategic
partner.

Cheers!

~~~
vikram
I think there will be other ways to distribute the app than the itunes app
store. You have access to the users contacts, so with permission you can send
the others an email/sms containing a request for the app. Similar to facebook,
myspace or twitter. You don't really need iTunes except for hosting the app
for download.

~~~
allenbrunson
ahem. there's NO WAY apple will allow that.

they've said over and over again that iphone apps must be purchased through
their app store. do you think they're suddenly going to say "oh yeah, and
there's a loophole you can exploit, where you can email an app to somebody
else. sorry for not mentioning that earlier."

as if.

------
rcoder
I've said as much in the comment thread on the basic article, but basically
all of the limitations baked into the SDK boil down to one primary lesson:
Apple thinks that they, and only they, can and should decide what software
will run on the iPhone.

If I were an independent developer on the Mac platform, I would personally see
this as a slap in the face. Indies spent years keeping the Mac alive as a
viable platform while the big vendors ignored it. Now, Apple has chosen to
give preferential treatment to the same enterprise and entertainment concerns
that once shunned them.

The losers will be the indies, hobbyists, open source developers, and everyone
else whose labor kept the platform alive through the dark years.

I've been buying Macs for almost 15 years, but my current system will sadly be
my last, unless Apple stops showing such contempt for the intelligence of
their own long-time supporters.

~~~
derefr
Are you sure? Could it be that _AT &T_ thinks that AT&T->Apple, and only
AT&T->Apple, can and should decide what software will run on "their" phones?

If you compare the attitudes of cellphone manufacturers with cellular network
carriers over the last decade, the manufacturers have almost always wanted
open solutions, while the carriers have almost always tried to keep things
closed. Apple is, in this case, acting much more like a carrier than a
manufacturer, and I think that this might say less about them, and more about
their relationship with Cingular/AT&T.

------
jws
I think I'll have to make a prediction: By June the iPhone developers will
have a mechanism for running a lightweight background process. Only one
application runs, but you will be able to have a sentinel of some kind. It
probably exists now but hasn't been finalized and documented.

------
wave
Restricting the iPhone’s platform might work for Apple as long as they stay on
top of innovation. When Android is released with hardware and start seeing
innovative products and services from other companies, iPhone can easily
become irrelevant.

~~~
ichverstehe
I have, quite often, been very close to buying an iPhone. But, I will wait for
the Android phones, and if any of them are just somewhat as sleek as the
iPhone, that will definitely be my choice over the iPhone.

Looking forward..

------
tlrobinson
"There are many ways to address this through task prioritization, and
sandboxing background tasks or even _limiting their size_."

Huh? Limiting the _size_ of an application? Alright...

    
    
        while(1) malloc(1);
    

Sandboxing doesn't really address that either.

~~~
ashu
Sure it does. Try 'man ulimit' on any unix machine.

Given how advanced the iPhone OS is, I doubt that managing and controlling
background tasks is that hard to do. Most probably, they have just pushed it
back on their priority lists to get it exactly right, that is all.

------
tocomment
Kind of speaking of background processing. If I open multiple pages in Safari
on the iPhone, will they load simultaneously, and lead to time saving for me,
or do the pages wait to load until you're on them?

------
wallflower
Even with all the perceived shortcomings of the iPhone SDK, there is a
cracked-open-window of opportunity for a few, best-of-class new applications
from new developers.

