Wireless Archive

iTunes 9 was released today, and the big question on everyone's mind (ahum) was: will it break webOS sync once again? Well, yes, it does. In other words, webOS devices can no longer sync with iTunes. Luckily, the webOS 1.2 update is right around the corner, so big chance it'll be fixed quickly.

In a move reminiscent of the Pre launch, Palm has unveiled its second webOS mobile phone today, ahead of Apple's music/iPod event. The Palm Pixi is a candybar incarnation of the Pre, but is clearly positioned below its big brother; smaller screen, and more worryingly, no wifi.

"It's turning out to be a busy week for Nokia. Days in advance of NokiaWorld in Stuttgart, and a couple of days after lifting the curtain on its first netbook, Nokia has announced the Nokia N900, the successor to its almost four-year-old lineup of Internet Tablets. The N900 follows in the footsteps of the N810 with its slide out keyboard, but adds for the first time built-in 3G (Nokia calls it 3.5G) functionality, making the N900 the first Nokia tablet with the ability to go online without a WiFi connection or cellphone pairing. It's also the first Nokia device to run Maemo 5, Nokia's homegrown Linux distro."

Like any true geek who's addicted to online presence, a VoIP SIP, Twitter, and a multi-protocol IM application are the first kinds of apps I am trying to locate when jumping smartphone platforms. The iPhone is currently my platform of choice, and the AppStore has its share of such communication applications. So I decided to give a whirl to Acrobits' Softphone, set it up with Gizmo5 and Google Voice, and use it to call my family in Greece or more rarely, my husband at work. Update: New version is out, fixing most of the things mentioned in the review below, and implementing PUSH.

Apple and AT&T Friday are expected to tell the Federal Communications Commission why Google's free voice application, called Google Voice, is banned from the Apple iPhone. Google is also filing comments. But Google may soon find itself on the hot seat as well, telecom and public policy analysts say. Why: Consumers who use Android, the Google-developed operating system for wireless devices, can't use Skype, a leading Voice over Internet Protocol service. A pioneer in free Internet calling, Skype allows you to talk as long as you want without draining cellphone minutes. Android users get Skype Lite, a watered-down version of the original that routes calls over traditional phone networks — not the Internet. As a result, long-distance calls are still cheap or free, but cellphone minutes are gobbled up every time a Skype Lite call is made.

Apple's iPhone has completely destroyed the status quo that existed in the mobile operating system world before the iPhone arrived on the scene. The iPhone made it easier for people to get on the web while on the go, and despite ridicule before it was even released, it has revolutionised the industry, forcing other manufacturers to get a move on.

Rumors had been circulating for months about the mysterious Dell smartphone, and it seems that they've finally been realized-- at least for China. Little details about the smartphone have been released, but we do know that it'll be a 2G smartphone running Android, it's called the "Mini3i," and it "will offer a full complement of music, games and other downloadable content." The release date is still in the dark as is whether or not Dell will eventually spread its smartphone market outside of China. About Dell's Mini3i, an analyst said, "It makes sense for a company like Dell to enter the smartphone market, but what they need to do is find something that sets themselves apart." This is all too true as too many smartphones (and many other devices, for that matter) have the "Me Too" syndrome.

Microsoft has now more or less given out every possible detail of its next-generation portable media player, the Zune HD. The really interesting part of this device is not the software or its competitiveness with the iPod Touch - no, it's the hardware inside it. This is the first mass-market NVIDIA Tegra-based device.

Peter Wayner of InfoWorld has put Palm's still brand new webOS Mojo SDK through its paces, and came away impressed. Still, there are a number of issues that need to be addressed, but all in all the big advantage he sees is that over the course of the past few weeks, a very active and fertile community of developers has organically created its own development community, creating open source applications everybody is free to install - contrary to the iPhone.

"Well-informed individuals have known about the upcoming death of the S60 platform some time – unfortunately, some (influential) individuals had Yucca leaves in their ears during the announcement and continue to peddle dangerous and wrong information. The TamsS60 team sat down with its long-time friend and benefactor, David Wood. He talked openly about the next binary break."

We've talked about Creative's brand-new Stemcell computing platform before. They developed a new processor, the ZMS-05, which consists of two ARM-926 cores, and 48 programmable 'processing elements' which can develop in real-time into performing any of the specialised acceleration functions needed by modern computing. In addition, the system-on-chips, called Zii, could be linked together freely, achieving teraflop speeds on a sheet of A4 paper. Back then, they claimed that a Zii could easily playback HD content (even on HDTVs). They put the Zii in a iPod Touch-like device, and their promises turned out to be true.

Following the Cupcake branch, the Android team is baking something new and deliciously named. The Donut branch will be developing many new features in order to compete with rival phones and OSs like the iPhone, BlackBerry, Symbian, and webOS. Despite what many others have said, Donut is not going to be Android 2.0, but much of the development going on in that branch will end up being rolled out in the next firmware update. The development from Donut will bring Android a slew of new features, among which are CMDA network compatibility (for Sprint Nextel and Verizon Wireless networks, purportedly), integrated universal search similar to that of iPhone 3.0's Spotlight, more text-to-speech, "automatic backup, and a home-screen widget to let users easily toggle functions like Wi-Fi and Bluetooth." Following the pastry theme, we may expect to see the next two Android branches to be named "Eclair" and "Flan." The only thing I'm wondering is if Android will evolve to a point beyond personal pastries where we'll begin to see "Lasagna," "Orange Chicken," and "Carl's Junior's Famous Star." I'll buy an Android phone just to get those updates that will remind me just how beautiful the world is.

For a while now, the Palm Pre and its webOS have been out and about, but the accompanying App Catalog remained remarkably empty, because Palm had not yet opened its software development kit for everyone. The SKD was leaked not too long ago, and today Palm has announced the official release of the Mojo SDK for everyone who wants to get their hands on it. It includes a webOS emulator.

Earlier this year, it became known that the Palm Pre, engineered by a number of ex-Apple engineers, could interface with Apple's iTunes as if it was an iPod. Everybody more or less expected Apple to block the Pre from syncing with iTunes, but I don't think any of us had anticipated just how forthright Apple would be about it.