‘Tis soon the season. No, not fall, but new firmware season as Apple has released the first beta for firmware 2.2. Following on the 8 betas for 2.0 (released July 11, which turned out a little on the undercooked side…), and 4 for 2.1 (released September 12, which changed from feature bump to stability patch), 2.2 will hopefully bring us a little Notification Server love, and who knows what else? (Not going to say cut and paste — a blogger can only get their heart broken so often!). Says Macrumors:
The new version is labeled iPhone OS 2.2 beta 1 and is accompanied by a new beta of the iPhone SDK (build 9M2611). Beyond “compatibility testing”, there are no other differences noted by Apple.
Doubtless, the one NDA to [redact] them all is in full effect, but hopefully some deep-delving coders will discover (and leak!) a few goodies for us anyway.
Last night Apple began seeding iPhone firmware 2.1 and SDK Beta 1 to registered developer program members (those who paid the $99 fee and were accepted, and have App Store uploading privileged’s). Word came in early about new features in CoreLocation and Notification Server APIs. Now Engadget is adding the nigh-mythical holy grail of basic smartphone functionality to the list of maybes: Cut, Copy, and Paste!
Another bit which may or may not make it into 2.1 is copy/paste. We’re still both hopeful and skeptical, but supposedly in the new version of the WebKit framework exists commands for “plugins,” “copy,” “paste,” “cut,” and some others. We can’t confirm if these really exist (and if they do, we don’t know how they’ve actually been there, or if they’re simply holdovers from the desktop WebKit frameworks), so don’t hold your breath.
Greg “Joz” Joswiak, Apple’s head of iPod and iPhone marketing has previously stated that cut, copy, and paste is on the future feature list, but with limited time and resources, Apple didn’t get to it for 2.0. Will 2.1 be different?
What do you think? Any breath holding on your end?
Apple has reportedly seeded an early beta of firmware 2.1 (5f90) and a new and improved SDK to developers. Among the changes, CoreLocation (which covers GPS and other location-aware services) gains direction and speed tracking abilities (leading to a fresh round of turn-by-turn speculation, ‘natch), and API’s for the Notification Server that, come September, will be used in-lieu of background multitasking to push alert badges and sounds to Apps (like Instant Messages, Tweets, etc.). Given how MobileMe is doing with Push, that one may prove interesting…
On the negative side, 2.1 is one way street. Developers using 2.1 can not create binaries compatible with the current 2.0-centric App Store, so they either have to maintain two independant development environments (Update: possibly 3 environments and up to 6 devices, 2.0 and 2.1 for iPhone 3G (with mandatory carrier plans), iPhone 2G, and iPod Touch — expensive much?), or wait for App Store 2.1 to launch (in September along with Notification Server?)
Of course, before 2.1 we’ll likely see the already being tested 2.0.1, which will hopefully fix many of the bugs plaguing upgraders and new adopters both. Like, really soon, right Apple?
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