Columns

Remarkably for a company which seems to attract as much criticism as it does praise these days, Apple seems to have pleased almost everyone with its announcement of iPhone 2.0. Much of the attention prior to the live event in Cupertino, at which Apple demonstrated the new software development kit (SDK), was focused on what would be missing and what kind of restrictions it would impose on would-be iPhone developers. As it turned out, the SDK is far more comprehensive than had been expected, and the restrictions far fewer.

Rather like Treasury Budget statements, however, Steve Jobs' announcements take several days of digestion before the details start to reveal themselves. Now that time has passed, however, and the general feeling is much the same - that Apple has done as much as it could have been expected to, and more than most thought it would, albeit a year late.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the announcement was the way Apple has chosen to implement support for enterprise services such as push email, and push calendaring. Unlike Rim, maker of the ubiquitous BlackBerry, a device which has done more than any other to popularise push email, Apple has licensed Microsoft's ActiveSync protocol in order to build support for Microsoft Exchange into the iPhone. Technologically that's a wise move. It allows Apple to integrate applications it already runs on the iPhone, like Mail and iCal, with Exchange and offer users the best of both worlds as well as

ADVERTISEMENT

extra features like remote wipe - where a lost or stolen iPhone can have its data wiped over the air.

Politically it's hugely significant. In recent years, Apple has been doing everything it can to distance itself from and reduce its reliance on Microsoft, from developing its own browser and office applications, to refusing to support Windows Media formats on the iPod. Now it's acknowledged that in order to realise the potential of the iPhone as a smartphone for business users, it must not only support a Microsoft platform, but license tools from Microsoft in order to do it.

While users and potential users were delighted by the news of Exchange support, however, third-party developers were much more interested in what Apple had in store for them in the SDK. The news was, mostly, good. The SDK is free to download, though developers will need to pay Apple a one-time fee of $99 in order to develop applications for it. The tools and APIs themselves are, according to Apple, identical to those Apple itself uses to develop iPhone apps. And three of the four layers of the iPhone OS are the same as those on Mac OS X; Core OS, Core Services, and Media. The fourth layer, which replaces Cocoa, is Cocoa Touch, the user-interface application framework which supports elements of the iPhone, such as Multi-touch and the accelorometer, which differ from the Mac.

Some developers were less keen on the news that all applications, whether sold or given away free, would have to be signed using a certificate supplied by Apple, and approved by the Cupertino company. It will distribute applications exclusively through the iTunes Store and take 30% of the revenue of those that are sold. The 30% charge seems reasonable, given that Apple will pay the cost of credit card processing, order processing, and marketing, as well as host the applications on its servers. And even the implementation of code signing is not necessarily negative. Support for code signing already exists in Leopard and is necessary for features like Leopard's Firewall and Parental Controls.