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GDC: Firemint wins four Pocket Gamer Awards

touchmyiphone — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 01:09:00 +0000

Firemint was honored with four awards from handheld gaming Website Pocket Gamer at a ceremony held at the annual Game Developers Conference.

Review: Tripod Camera for iPhone

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:05:00 +0000

This app add some nice options to the iPhone's camera -- most notably an anti-tilt feature that keeps your shot level no matter what -- and makes a nice addition to any shutterbug's tool-set.

Opera’s Mini 5 browser comes to Android

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 20:05:00 +0000

Opera has released a beta version of its Mini 5 web browser for Android based smartphones, the company said on Thursday.

More suggestions of multitasking in iPhone OS 4.0

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 19:00:00 +0000

Filed under: OS, Software, Developer, iPhone

Developers have found further evidence of multitasking support for 3rd party iPhone apps in the latest beta (3.2 beta 4) of the iPhone SDK, and suggest that it will become a reality this summer.

9to5 Mac reports on a new line found deep within the latest iPhone SDK. Specifically, SpringBoard.js has a reference to a "multitasking dialog box" that did not appear in version 3.1.3 of the SDK; it seems that it's new to version 3.2. Of course, there's no assurance that this refers to 3rd party support for multitasking, but it is new.

Additionally, Appleinsider's souces with "proven track records" state that Apple has developed "a full-on solution" for 3rd-party multitasking which will be a part of iPhone OS 4.0. No specifics were given on how it will be pulled off or how it will address the two main concerns: battery life and security.

Let's assume that Apple's plan addresses the security issue, but battery life still presents a problem, one that was supposedly addressed by Push Notifications. Apple's remote notification service allows applications to offload polling processes to web servers. By keeping the update algorithms working off the device, the iPhone's battery is spared. Certainly the iPhone itself must take on the task of keeping all of those apps up and running.

It should also be noted that iPhone OS does not use a paged memory model. That means, multi-tasking applications must compete for the same memory space, making it more likely that apps will receive memory warnings and even crash when they use too much memory. That's not an issue in the one-app-at-a-time space, but a real problem with multitasking

Of course, the iPhone OS is already fully capable of multitasking. In order for non-Apple apps to participate, Apple must lift the current restrictions within the OS. That's something the company won't do until the iPhone engineers have devised the best and safest method. As for iPhone OS 4.0, Appleinsider notes that it's got "a ways to go." Hopefully we'll have an answer in July.

More suggestions of multitasking in iPhone OS 4.0 originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Novothink debuts solar charging case for iPhone

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:56:00 +0000

Novothink on Thursday released its Apple-certified hybrid solar charging Surge cases for the iPhone and iPod Touch, along with Solar Planner, an app for estimating charging times.

Review: Tank Raider for iPhone

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 17:37:00 +0000

Tank Raider is a retro tank arcade game by Sunday Solutions that puts you at the controls of an arcade tank pitted against three crafty computer-controlled tanks. Your mission is to capture and hold more gems than the other tanks.

Motorola to put Bing search on Android phones

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:25:00 +0000

Motorola will start loading Microsoft Bing search and map services onto its Android smartphones in China, and possibly elsewhere later.

Review: Knights of Charlemagne card game is simply simple, and we like it like that

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:00:00 +0000

Filed under: iPhone, iPod touch, App Review

The clever 2006 card game Knights of Charlemagne has made it to the iPhone and iPod touch as a simple little number placing app [$1.99, iTunes link]. We don't mean simple in that it's easy to beat or uninteresting. We mean that the game is clearly designed and plays quickly. While the beginner level (the Squire) is really only worth playing through once or twice with the tutorial minstrel on to learn the rules, getting to and beating the AI at Knight, and then the King level (which is supposed to be Charlemagne himself) is a good challenge and provides plenty of game for two bucks.

There's a whole lot of math and bluffing in the game. That is something which is better experienced in person and using real cards, but board games on the iPhone are their own experience. So, when you want some light brain-burning with a medieval theme, look no further than this simple app. Read on to find out more.

Gallery: Knights of Charlemagne game app

Continue reading Review: Knights of Charlemagne card game is simply simple, and we like it like that

Review: Knights of Charlemagne card game is simply simple, and we like it like that originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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GDC 2010: Canabalt postmortem

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:00:00 +0000

Filed under: Gaming, Software, Other Events, iPhone, App Store

"What kinds of games do you like?" Adam "Atomic" Saltsman asked of his panel audience at the Canabalt postmortem during the Game Developer's Conference in San Francisco. "Role-playing" was yelled out, as was "puzzler," and eventually Saltsman picked "platformer" as the genre. Without another word, he quietly went to work on a laptop. Then, his partner at Semi Secret Software, Eric Johnson, took the podium to tell us all about what it was like to make one of the App Store's most popular games.

He started by saying that the game was originally developed in just "five very long days," and was created for the Experimental Gameplay Project and based around simplicity -- it only uses six colors and, obviously, the one button. For a game that's so simple, it actually had a lot of complex influences. It drew from older games, like Another World and Flashback, as well as modern works, like Half-Life 2 and District 9.

Continue reading GDC 2010: Canabalt postmortem

GDC 2010: Canabalt postmortem originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 11 Mar 2010 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MacRumors: More Claims of Multitasking in iPhone OS 4.0

touchmyiphone — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:46:54 +0000

AppleInsider reports that it has received information from sources claiming that iPhone OS 4.0, likely scheduled for release later this year alongside new handset models, will support multitasking by allo...