MacWorld Revealed iPhone Updates

Amidst much whooping, cheering and standing on seats Steve Jobs, sporting his familiar “casual turtleneck look”, gave his annually anticipated MacWorld Expo speech yesterday. Among the announcements, which included an ultra-slim MacBook Air and new iTune download features, were the new January 2008 (1.1.3) updates for the iPhone.

There was nothing in the way of revolutionary new features, but a few nice additions to the device were revealed, including the ability to create web clips and customise homescreens. Not quite a technological feat, more of a texting must-have – it’s now also possible to send SMS messages to multiple people.

Film buffs should be happy (well, US film buffs at least) as iTunes movie rentals and downloads can now also be viewed on the iPhone to satisfy film urges on the move. The interface for controlling this new feature looked particularly impressive with clear expiration dates showing you when your rented film will run out and chapter navigation making it easy to jump through scenes. This new feature launched today in the US, but [dramatic pause] it won’t be available internationally until later this year!

New map functions dominated the update and there are new features in place to find your location automatically using WiFi base stations and mobile masts. It’s now also possible to view live traffic information and display a hybrid view, which overlaps both map and satellite views.

Whilst this is another big selling point for the device, UK users could be at a distinct disadvantage once again. It doesn’t work using GPS, as you might think. Instead, the maps are displayed using a service called Skyhook wireless which currently has mapped hotspots throughout the US and Canada. This means it’s unlikely to pick up any location information in the UK.

Although a SDK (software development kit) was expected, this has now been confirmed as being scheduled for February. Jobs commented that he wanted to give iPhone users new functionality now. Sceptics could say that Apple was struggling to dig out enough new features to keep the huddled media impressed.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, there’s still no 3G.

source: http://www.mobileexpress.co.uk