Yes! iPhone SDK...
You made it happen people!
Apple just announced they will provide an SDK for the iPhone!!!
Thanks to all the Life Balance fans and others who sent polite email and feedback messages to Apple about the need for a viable SDK for third party developers to create applications on the iPhone, and for not letting that critical issue get brushed aside.
The SDK won't be available to developers until February. And there may be various restrictions, but the security and code signing goals they are talking about we agree with. We have always been willing to play by the rules, as long as there ARE rules. It will be interesting to see how much we can leverage what we've already done for Life Balance, and what the details turn out to be. :-)
I am now officially "joyful" about the iPhone. We plan to run out to get one now that it represents a PLATFORM so that we can start thinking about it. And we are looking forward to the future of cool mobile computing. My hope for sensible things happening there was not misplaced. I'm happy with this news... really happy!
Faith in the future... faith in people.
"The future is certain... give us time to work it out... yeah...."
:-)
Comments
Great, I think that the
Great, I think that the Apple iPhone and Touch will be great units once they can be made to be more like PDAs.
Just don't forget the venerable Palm platform
The grass is always greener
The grass is always greener on the other platform.
;-)
Great! Now if only we had an
Great! Now if only we had an announcement for a new version of LB! And yes for Palm, one of the markets that pays your bills.
DARNIT ALL! I may be the
DARNIT ALL! I may be the only one upset at this news.
I *TRADED* my iPhone and AT&T contract for somebody's Treo 755p and Sprint contract because at that time Apple had no intention of allowing 3rd party development. After 3 months of 'just the basics' with the iPhone, I knew that Life Balance and $200 worth of other Palm would never be ported and I became depressed! (well not really, but heart broken at least)
Upset at Apple in general right now, but I'm glad that they did this. Maybe when my darn Sprint/Palm contract ends in *2009!!! I'll be able to get another iPhone then and have Life Balance on it too!!
LB is the main reason I came back to Palm, so that should say a lot
Life Balance is the main
Life Balance is the main reason I am keeping my Treo650 and have not run out for the iPhone. I'm so glad you've decided to develop Life Balance for the iPhone!! However, one question: why not convert Life Balance to be a web app so I can get to it from my computer and from an iPhone (and of course sync to other offline devices).
Rich, News about an SDK
Rich,
News about an SDK from Apple for the iPhone says nothing about our development on other platforms. And the web is another platform.
We haven't even seen the SDK yet... so how to proceed for Life Balance is certainly not decided yet. An SDK just means different kinds of developer opportunities are opening up for all of us, and that means that there will be more kinds of applications available for mobile customers. That's exciting and worth celebrating!
I'm thrilled with this news.
I'm thrilled with this news. I'm using a Tapwave Zodiac 2, and I love it, but it's showing its age, and I'm tired of waiting for Palm to release something on par with a PDA that has been off the market for almost 3 years! I'd prefer a lot more storage in the touch-based i/Pod/Phone, because the current ones can't hold a decent music library, much less videos, but LB on an i/Pod/Phone would still be a HUGE improvement for me.
Ya know, I was talking to an
Ya know, I was talking to an Apple guy at a Best Buy out here (Georgia) about a month ago. I dunno about elsewhere, but out here, Best Buy is "experimenting" with the concept of having an "Apple section," sort of like CompUSA does - or did. Anyway, apparently the Best Buy guys are either timid or ambivalent about it, because the amount of Mac-stuff they had for this guy (who was an Apple employee, not a Best Buy guy) was so small that he was bored out of his skull - and frustrated, to boot. Which is probably why, when I started to engage him on stuff like the iTunes releases breaking the hacked, 3rd party apps and unlocks that some people had already figured out, he told me something very interesting on the subject of the whole SDK issue. Of course, he framed it as "this is just my guess, I don't know anything" - and who knows, that may even have been true - but it seems as if he was right on the money. What he said was that (as everyone already knew) Tiger was coming to the end of its developmental life. And the upcoming Leopard was supposed to have many bug-fixes and security updates which would allow for the iPhone - which was running on a hybrid of Tiger and Leopard (unannounced) - to be opened up as a platform. "Wait and see if they don't announce an SDK along with or just after the release of Leopard," he said. Looks like he was ALMOST right - they actually announced it slightly BEFORE. Good old Steve - can't keep from sharing a good secret like that. I don't know - maybe it was just a lucky guess and/or a coincidence. But if so, it sure was a good one. Either way, I'm THRILLED!!!
Hooray! I basically trusted
Hooray! I basically trusted Apple to make this move at some point in the not-too-distant future when I bought my iPhone. Life Balance is at the top of my wish list for 3rd party apps. (That & a password keeper!)
Hooray! Looking forward to
Hooray! Looking forward to it! I've been missing my life balance on the go since I had reluctantly get rid of my palm - I tried using Life Balance on the PocketPC with a Palm emulator but without syncing it's pretty much useless! Can't wait to have it on my iPhone, in one form or another! :)
And keep in mind that you
And keep in mind that you already have some iPhone interoperability NOW with the new sync services support in Life Balance v4. While that is not the whole kitten kaboodle or full functionality, it's still a useful start, and may even be "enough" for some folks.
As a tip, you may want either to move old iCal calendar events to a new calendar "for historical reference" or delete them before you start syncing iCal and Life Balance together. Life Balance also maps location to "places" so you may want to get in the habit of putting "where to show up" to an event in the notes instead of the location if you don't want a place created in Life Balance.
Best wishes,
--Catherine--*