It's all so very exciting

I am currently not waiting inline outside any Apple store. I did consider (alas, too late) going to camp outside the one in Regent Street just so I could send a random "What queue?" post to Gizmodo or somewhere. Damn, I really wish I had. Not only would it have been deeply hilarious (you'll have to just trust me on this) but, hell, I feel really left out at the moment.

Congratulations!

A quick, slightly belated but nevertheless heartfelt "congratulations!" to my friends Behsad and Iris who had their first child, Bibi, last Sunday.

The iPhone: do I care?

Maybe that's a little harsh, but it's a question that's been floating around the back of my mind for a while now. A UK launch date has still to be announced, but the question remains. On one level, sure I'd like one. It looks a hell of a lot slicker than my current phone (a Sony-Ericsson K750i), and having both a browser and e-mail with me all the time would be great. The reason I hesitate is because of its lack of productivity apps. Maybe its because of my computer-centric way of working. I don't own an iPod, and although I occasionally think about getting one in the end I can never convince myself of the need. I guess what I really want is a small computer -- one of the UMPCs from the marketing movies, rather than any of the currently available models -- and a super mobile phone, no matter how good it's going to be, simply doesn't fulfil the same set of needs.

(Yes, this was another "Please, Apple, produce a small-form-factor tablet PC" post.)

Safari vs. Firefox

That slide from last week's keynote -- the one where the Safari piece of the web browser pie expands to swallow Firefox's slice -- has caused a bit of fuss. Here's my interpretation. There are two types of browser users, those who have a clue and decide to use something other than Internet Explorer, and those who don't. Let's consider this second group as a lost cause. Apple are gunning for the first.

And, yes, I'm sure it was meant to be provocative.

Mac OS on a UMPC

My previous -- now abandoned -- blog MacPad was dedicated to the idea that Mac OS X would make the perfect operating system for a UMPC-style device. It seems that I'm not alone, even if Apple doesn't see it that way. Sev7en ("This is not going to have a happy ending"?) has provided detailed, step-by-step instructions for installing 10.4.8 on a Sony UX.

So how did it work out? I'd give it a rating of "so-so". The touch screen works, which should mean you get the full Ink handwriting experience. However, the Sony's internal WiFi isn't supported. This is the deal-breaker for me. If that had worked I would be looking around for a UX of my own right now. They say that external USB sticks work but that really isn't the elegant solution I'm looking for. As soon as they find a driver set that works I think I'm going to be trying it myself.

Touching

I've noticed something odd happening to me of late: I keep getting the urge to touch my MacBook Pro's screen. It's most compelling when I get a call on Skype. There's just something about the way the Answer/Reject buttons appear layered over the display that makes me want to give them a quick tap. I should really look into touch-sensetive screen solutions. Or just get some help.

Did Apple just jump the shark?

So third party iPhone application development is going to be via web applications. Sigh. Here are some random, ill-informed thoughts provided solely for the purpose of (with any luck) being proven wrong:

Access to iPhone features: Someone (sorry, forget who) has already suggested that special URL handlers (eg. a "dial:1234" link to phone a number) may be made available. This means iPhone-only versions of web applications. I hope the client id string in its version of Safari is easily recognisable.

Look and feel: Okay, so the OS X H.I.G. seems to have gone out the window a while ago (although it looked like Leopard may go some way to remedying this), but on the web there are roughly as many different user interfaces as there are sites. Access to common style sheets and AJAX and server-side libraries could fix this, but so far there's been no mention of them.

Data: The thing with the iPhone is that most of the data you may want to manipulate is on the phone, not on the server. Best case allows apps to automatically access your address book and other data, but means lots of round-tripping (that noise you here are AT&T execs rubbing their hands together in glee, thinking of all that extra data traffic). Worse case is a duplicate, un-syncronised sets of names for each web app. Smart use of .Mac could sort this -- but what's the betting it won't.

Money: As Mac OS Ken observed, how are people going to get paid for this? Sure, the guys at 37 Signals are happy enough, but what about ("proper") Mac developers. It's not just a case of new APIs and different languages, selling web apps is a whole different business model. And I guess you can forget about those neat little free apps which make life on the Mac so much easier: add the cost of hosting and the time and effort to maintain a server on top of the time needed to develop the app and the talented hobbyist is unlikely to bother.

Finding these apps: Nothing along these lines has been announced yet. Some kind of page on apple.com -- quickly linked to with just a single click from Safari on the iPhone -- listing "certified" iPhone web apps would be nice. I've complained in the past about how tricky it can be finding indie Mac apps, but I can only imagine that, without some heavy help from Apple, it's going to be twice as hard for these guys to be found.

This is less than a third-rate solution, but the really unbelievable thing is the way Apple is playing it. Their "sweet" solution is, frankly, terrible, but their decision to sell it like this is worse.