Mike on Software on iPhone

Although I’ll reserve my judgement on the iPhone until a later article, I have to say that this screenshot sent in from a reader shows how great this blog looks on the iPhone:

This clever web page rendering is thanks to the Wordpress plugin, "wp-pda" which you can obtain here: http://imthi.com/wp-pda; it’s a brilliant little piece of code.

If you’re using Windows Mobile’s Pocket Internet Explorer you’ll get a similar layout with post previews. It looks a little like opening an RSS feed in Internet Explorer on the desktop. Of course if you’re using the latest Mobile Opera beta, this website will look just like the desktop. The iPhone doesn’t render the full "desktop" site as the plugin detects the browser identification "agent" and delivers a cut-down site especially formatted for the iPhone.

What a day! Super-car driving and Super-phone integration.

It’s been a busy day today. Today, I was at the iT Showcase Live event at Mercedes-Benz World, Brooklands. It was fairly quiet for an exhibition, although the exhibitors didn’t give much away, Mercedes did - running rides of their AMG performance vehicles all day long. I managed to get a free pass and a spine-tingling face-breaking trip in a lovely new supercharged 500bhp CLS 63 AMG. When I finally got home, news was breaking that Apple had licensed the Activesync technology from Microsoft for use in their iPhone. This means a great deal for the IT industry, and I shall explain later. First however, the car.. Read more

Apple release an iPhone; without the Phone…

Apple have announced today the first major redesign of the iPod. Introducing, the iPhone-without-the-phone-pod:

 

This device, in an iPhone-style form factor, will replace the outgoing jog-wheel iPod models. In fact, it makes the current iPods look 30 years old - the new one is stunningly beautiful.

If you want one of these, you’ll need to start saving now. They are due for retail at $299 and $399 for the 8GB and for the 16GB version respectively. The new iPod also sports some of the features from it’s bigger brother, the iPhone: Multi-touch (use more than one finger on the display at a time) and Wi-Fi, as well as support for YouTube videos.

However, you can’t make or receive phone calls, or watch live internet-enabled content (WebTV, YouTube, etc), you’ll need an iPhone for that. But more great news - Apple have slashed the prices for the iPhone models too!

Just hours before the Apple announcement, in an attempt to maintain competitiveness, Microsoft slashed the recommended retail price of it’s latest Zune by $50.00.

There is no official word yet on an SDK (tools to create third party software) for either the iPhone or the iPod. Microsoft have historically held the lead in providing developer tools and basic hardware for the community to create the innovation. I’m keeping my eyes open for this one, and hoping to persuade my better half that a new not-quite-an-iPhone would be a good present for not-quite-Christmas

What are you thoughts on the new iPod? Will the lower price of the iPhone tempt you to abandon your decrepit old phone?