iPhone Keyboard For All iPhones

Earlier, an iPhone hacker has posted a very cool video in his blog that shows an iPhone is paired with an Apple Bluetooth keyboard. Though it’s just a prototype, undoubtedly, that solution will only work on jailbroken iPhone.

This time, PerceptDev engineers Zack Gainsforth and George Dean developed a hardware and software solution that allows you to type on any iPhone using infrared keyboards. Technically, according to PerceptDev, this is how they did that:

Zack used a Cypress PSoC microcontroller to emulate a simple modem, and then expanded it to detect an infrared signal or read from a USB host controller, which converts this signal to FSK for transmission to an iPhone.

George then created an iPhone application to decode the FSK signals to interpret the keyboard data and display the appropriate characters on-screen.

And, the cost of electronics are less than $20. PerceptiveDev will soon release the schematics and source code for this iPhone keyboard. Probably you can make one on your own. The developers also posted a video that demonstrates how you can type on iPhone via an external keyboard.

Apple Selling iPhone Without Contract In US

As reported by Apple Insider, Apple is now selling contract-free iPhone in US retail stores. This should be a great news to US customers that you no longer need to subscribe to AT&T service. You can buy the contract-free iPhone at Apple’s retail stores and activate it by just using iTunes at home. You can grab the 8GB iPhone 3G for $599 and 16GB version for $699.

Many have speculated that the offer of contract-free iPhone may suggest Apple is clearing up its inventory and prepares for a new version of iPhone that may be debuted in June.

Anyway, it’s still a rumor and there is no confirmed source. So, if you have waited a long time to free you from AT&T, go ahead to Apple stores and grab the contract-free iPhone.

Spotlight & Voice Memo For iPhone OS 3.0

Last time, we have checked out the great feature of iPhone 3.0 – Cut, Copy & Paste. Today, let’s take a look at two other fantastic new features: Spotlight and Voice Memo.

Spotlight

So, what’s Spotlight? If you’re from Mac background, you’d heard of it. Spotlight offers system-wide search for iPhone that you can simply type in a keyword and it’ll show you all related items, including email, calendar event, contacts, notes, SMS, etc. Apple has designed to put Spotlight to the very left of home screen. So, at the home screen, simply flick your finger to the right to bring up Spotlight.

To see Spotlight search in action, check out this video and see Apple’s executive to show you how it works:

Voice Memo

Voice memo allows you to easily record any sound as a voice memo and share it with your friends or others via MMS or email. The Voice memo interface is simple and intuitive. Simply tap the record button to start recording and tap the stop button when you complete. Voice Memo also lets you trim the voice recording.

Cydia Store: Now Opened For Business

You should know Cydia, an alternative to the official App Store for downloading iPhone applications. And, Jay Freeman is the man behind Cydia.

Today, he makes another milestone for Cydia and opens up Cydia Store that lets you purchase apps from it. Why another iPhone App Store? Something you may not know is that not all iPhone developers can put up their crafted applications and sells it on App Store. Apple censors every iPhone application before it can show up on the store. If the application violates any restriction, the app gets buried. And, that’s why you’ll never see iPhone application like “Cycorder” that lets iPhone capture video or applications that lets turns iPhone as 3G modem.

However, Cydia does not impose tight restriction. And, the grand plan of Cydia Store is to let developers to sell hundreds of iPhone apps that cannot make into App Store. The recent article from The Wall Street Journal has a coverage on the Cydia Store. Quoted from the article, Jay Freeman mentioned that,

“The overworking goal is to provide choice,” he says. “It’s understandable that [Apple] wants to control things, but it has been very limiting for developers and users.”

Yes, we like choice and that’s one of the great reason to jailbreak iPhone. And, I believe competition is good. Two stores is definitely better than one.  And, as of now only one jailbreak app called Cyntact is available for purchase on the Cydia Store. I believe more apps will come soon. Anyway, I’ll buy this 1st application to show my support to Cydia Store.

QuadCamera-Multi Shot Cam

Category: Photography

Price: $1.99

Size: 1.5 MB

Latest version: 1.90

Taking pictures of running cars, watching sports, adorable behaviours of your pets or to wam up the party.This is a cool camera application that you can apply for any moments. Just pressing a button, it proceeds to take 4-8 serial shoots and create one image. The popping sound of the shutter gives you a great feeling.

Main functions
- 4 or 8 serial shoots.
- Set 0.25-3 seconds serial shoot duration.
- Color mode or 2 color mode of black and white.
- various layout variation: 2×2, 4×1, 4×2, 8×1.
- Resolution 800*600*.

Note: When taking a picture with lengthwise 2×2 layout, it may be displayed out of the center focus due to the bug of iPhone OS 2.2. However, the picture is saved normally and it is shown correctly on PC. If you want to avoid this problem, we recommend you to set 4×2 layout as the main shooting.

Compatible with iPhone and minimum requires is iPhone 2.1 software update. You can purchase via iTunes link or download .ipa file code via this link:

http://www.mediafire.com/?4inyimtwedz
http://crapscene.org/download.php?file=38QuadCamera+-+Multi+shot+cam+1.50-SteveJobs.ipa

You may also see my post on how to install cracked .ipa file on iPhone.