New iPhone Software Release 2.1

Slated for release in September, here's just a few predictions I'll throw out:

Bug Fixes - Expect to see the new software release be a lot more stable than the original 2.0 release, building on the stability introduced from 2.0.1 onwards

Tethering - Lot's of talk about this being introduced. This is where you can link your iPhone to your laptop and allow the iPhone to act as a proxy connection to the Internet for your laptop using the high speed 3G data network. Would love to see it but I'm doubtful on this one for two reasons:

• The increased load that would be inflicted on the already stretched 3G network
• but mainly due to the cannibalisation of the existing mobile connectivity offerings already provide by the carriers
  

can't see them agreeing to it myself!

GPS - Pure speculation but it wouldn't surprise me if Apple introduced a turn by turn GPS application either developed in house in association with Google or provided by a third party such as Tom Tom. I'm sure that turn by turn GPs is completely possible on the current 3G iPhone and 2.1 might just be the release where Apple spring it on us. Just in time to boost sales of the 3G iPhone for the holidays (as if they need it)

Any others?

Comments

[Paul Shadwell]

Turn by turn is completely possible after all it's in most other phones that have GPS installed, whether we see it anytime soon is debatable.

Cut & aste would be the killer app for most of us since I have so many times wanted to cut and past info from Safari and paste into the Typepad app.

Fowarding SMS. Not available in the current version and it would seem that because the US are not big SMS users we get a sub-par app in the iPhone. Mind you they did add multiple recipients, so not all is lost.

3G coverage in Switzerland is excellent and has been for some time but I'm still getting issues with dropout on the iPhone, switching 3G off usually solves the problem so I hope the bug fixes will solve this.

I've also had the interface freeze when I get an incoming call so I can't answer it, öuckily this hasn't happened too often and not on important calls but there's still time, roll on the update.

Paul

[DonMc]

Ah yes, Cut & paste - I’d forgotten about that!

That’s the one thing that has me scrabbling for my laptop if I need to do any serious work on the Internet. The iPhone browsing experience is great but they must surely listen to their users and bring out cut & paste at the next release

[x5315]

i tried the GPS while driving and it didn't seem accurate enough while i was driving along. It doesn't seem to handle parallel roads very well.

Cut and paste would be an addition, but i still don't understand all the hype about it.

Forwarding SMS messages would be very welcome.

i'm hoping for a lot more stability. i haven't had that many problems now, but even more stability is always welcome. One thing i keep telling people, even if they don't listen, is that the little bug fix updates that we keep getting may not fix your exact problem, but eventually they'll build up until all the bugs are taken out.

Paul needs to read the article about the iPhone 3g issues. It's related to a problem in the 2.0.1 firmware that calculated the power required from the tower incorrectly, therefore asking for more. The cell tower would then start to fail as more iPhones asked for more power.
This has been fixed in 2.0.2.

As for tethering. It's a possibility, there have been many rumours about AT&T and Apple working on a solution. I haven't heard much from O2, which is more interesting for us UK users. I have NetShare on my iPhone, and have found this to work well, even if it does consume battery like Vista uses RAM.

Penultimately, i'd really like is if the iPod application would be more like the Remote app that apply sell. I think that the Remote app is much better to use than the iPod app.

Finally, one other welcome idea (that i heard somewhere) would be allowing for downloading of Podcasts over Wi-Fi. So when i'm at work, my iPhone could automatically download updated podcasts.

[Steve Bye]

1. An Inbox that consolidates numerous email accounts. I accomplish this by forwarding all email accounts to my me.com account, but that won't work for everyone.

2. The ability to see calendars that I subscribe too. I can see my calendar but I cannot see my wife's calendar. Sometimes I need to see her calendar before making commitments.