I think it's the best that Apple can do at the moment for a phone.
I suspect that the GSM and other phone carriers stacks are relying highly on security by obscurity and it's part of the deal that Apple just doesn't allow third parties to take a snoop.
Wezz6400
· 2 years ago
Wow, finally someone being a bit critical as far as Ajax goes instead of the normal hallelujah stories all over the place. I think you're absolutely right, Ajax is nice but desktop apps kick it's but with two fingers in the nose. ;) Personally I think using Ajax is a good thing where portability is nice (e.g.: accessing your e-mail everywhere through GMail is nice) but if it doesn't a standard desktop app is just the better way to go. :)
Zef Hemel
· 2 years ago
Bas, what do you mean by "are relying highly on security by obscurity"? For what, third-party application development? Java just uses a sandbox model so that's just secure by itself.
Bas Westerbaan
· 2 years ago
I suspect the GSM et al procotols are not very safe and implementations need to be kept hidden. (That's why the opensource phone of Trolltech has got two full cpu stacks, one open and one closed)
Java and other languages for that matter would indeed be effective in sandboxing, but it comes at a cost. It does take quite some space on the device to implement script and, I think even more important, it takes quite some effort to maintain an implementation.
Maybe the iPhone applications will be local websites, as the widgets on mac os x are written with html/css/js too or as in the same way as the who UI of firefox is too (actually, that's not completely true). They must have a browser with js support anyway (otherwise they wouldn't be able to support google maps) so it's all win for them.
Zef Hemel
· 2 years ago
GSM is not all that safe, that's true. About Java taking some space and effort. Sure. But this is the iPhone, it comes with either 4GB or 8GB of storage. It runs OS X, I would say that in theory it could even run the full J2SE if it wanted. So I don't buy that that really is the reason.
As it was demonstrated the iPhone applications, at least for now, will not be local websites, they are just pulled from the server every time. The browser in the iPhone is Safari, so that's indeed a full-blown browser with Javascript support. And Google maps does not run within the browser on the iPhone, they built their own client to Google's map data.
On GigaOm I read that it may actually be AT&T; who forced Apple not to open up the iPhone. AT&T; and every other mobile provider in the world probably is scared to death of VoIP. My Nokia N95 can make Skype calls, which are a lot cheaper than making calls on the normal cellular network. I think that's why they don't open up the iPhone, to prevent people from making VoIP applications.
Bas Westerbaan
· 2 years ago
I completely overlooked that! That makes a way more plausible explanation. It's strange though that Apple didn't try to find a provider that doesn't try to lock in for the inevadable. Looking at the current trends it seems that internet via the mobile network is getting cheaper and cheaper.
Lets see what happens after the initial 4 year (?) contract with AT&T.
Chui
· 2 years ago
The desktop apps do have something to learn from the browser.
1. Bookmarkable applications. I can send you the URL of a particular screen, or a particular record.
2. This opens up applications to easily implement Most Recently Used Feature, or Most Recently Accessed Data
3. It makes it easy to add annotation-like features to an app (through mashups).
4. You can create mashups easily, e.g. treat an application as a component for free
5. Back button (MSMoney-style UI), although the caching of application screens on browser make this somewhat broken, but desktop apps will be able to address this.
All Comments
I suspect that the GSM and other phone carriers stacks are relying highly on security by obscurity and it's part of the deal that Apple just doesn't allow third parties to take a snoop.
Personally I think using Ajax is a good thing where portability is nice (e.g.: accessing your e-mail everywhere through GMail is nice) but if it doesn't a standard desktop app is just the better way to go. :)
Java and other languages for that matter would indeed be effective in sandboxing, but it comes at a cost. It does take quite some space on the device to implement script and, I think even more important, it takes quite some effort to maintain an implementation.
Maybe the iPhone applications will be local websites, as the widgets on mac os x are written with html/css/js too or as in the same way as the who UI of firefox is too (actually, that's not completely true). They must have a browser with js support anyway (otherwise they wouldn't be able to support google maps) so it's all win for them.
As it was demonstrated the iPhone applications, at least for now, will not be local websites, they are just pulled from the server every time. The browser in the iPhone is Safari, so that's indeed a full-blown browser with Javascript support. And Google maps does not run within the browser on the iPhone, they built their own client to Google's map data.
On GigaOm I read that it may actually be AT&T; who forced Apple not to open up the iPhone. AT&T; and every other mobile provider in the world probably is scared to death of VoIP. My Nokia N95 can make Skype calls, which are a lot cheaper than making calls on the normal cellular network. I think that's why they don't open up the iPhone, to prevent people from making VoIP applications.
Lets see what happens after the initial 4 year (?) contract with AT&T.
1. Bookmarkable applications. I can send you the URL of a particular screen, or a particular record.
2. This opens up applications to easily implement Most Recently Used Feature, or Most Recently Accessed Data
3. It makes it easy to add annotation-like features to an app (through mashups).
4. You can create mashups easily, e.g. treat an application as a component for free
5. Back button (MSMoney-style UI), although the caching of application screens on browser make this somewhat broken, but desktop apps will be able to address this.