A Year Later: iPhone Loves and Wants

What do I want most from the iPhone this year? FOR IT TO COME TO CANADA

Album Shuffle

I know it's a little item but the lack of album shuffle on an unhacked iPhone bugs me. Sure, there are bigger issues. Apparently the option exists in the configuration file but there is no way to get to it unless you have a hacked iPhone. My old nano does album shuffle!

(In my searches on the subject, some people seem really confused about what album shuffle means. The nano, and I believe iTunes and other iPods, have an option to play songs within an album in order but to go to a random album when the album completes. Shuffling all your songs at random does work on the iPhone.)

It should be a simple software fix to expose this setting. If this happens or not is a different question.

Beyond just liking it because it "just works", I love this thing simply because it is what I always wanted a phone to be like. A radical new interface that just make mobile things intuitive.

I've had Sony Erriconsons and BLackberrys and to me these things are a different device all together then the iPhone.

After the 1.1.3 stuff, I'd like Coverflow-Quicklook/Spotlight/Disk-Mode/Web-Download to come in hand-in-hand, all at the same time. Being able to use my iPhone as a PDF reader would be huge, whether its reading a manual, a reference guide, or a tutorial.

~ CB

iPhone as a PDF reader

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Me too. So badly I want this. That and todos that sync to the mac are the only dissapointments I have found.

In Feb. I expect those problems to go away.

PDA Functions

I have 2400 names and addresses in my book. I need a search function and I need to be able to search by name, 1st & Last and especially by company.

sellitman said:

I have 2400 names and addresses in my book. I need a search function and I need to be able to search by name, 1st & Last and especially by company.

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Oh yes. The address book. I also wish there were filters for only-addresses-with-phone-numbers or only-addresses-with-street-addresses for the various apps that let you pull up the contacts.

Love to come to Aus at a decent price.

Wants: Software
C&P

Pages/Numbers/Keynote integration

iDisk on my iPhone/touch

Voice calling - for my BT headset (see below)

Offline webpages - so I can download a bunch either via the mac or wifi and it will cache the lot and allow me to look at them when I am "offline"

Delicious Monsters Library on my touch/iphone with synching to my home machine

Copy of all my home macs itunes library searchable by artist/album/year of release so I can have it handy when I go shopping - syncs automatically

Mactracker on my touch/iphone that syncs with my home mac

A shopping webclips/camera program for bigger ticket items and geek toys that works a little like DM Library so I can keep info and pics of items I am shopping around for and ability to add new images right from my iphone camera taken at stores when I see something I want to do some research on or price elsewhere. Keeps item name, model number, colour, quantity available, shop name (with suburb for chains), address, website, google map address, sales person(s) name, rrp, discounted rrp, date of quote, date sale/quote ends, freehand notes, warranty, delivery cost, images of items/shops/even sales people. Allows several items to be made an item of interest so they can be seen together quickly or even on one page, and auto tabulates and highlights best price, highlights deadline dates and outs them in iCal with 2 day or so warning. Allows me to look at suburbs and see what shops I have quotes from there so if I unexpectedly end up somewhere I can see if there is anything I wanted to follow up on. Allows me to indicate I have purchased and the price(s) and extras, then archives so that its available to me if I need that info later - that is all info in case I want to tell others as well as the summary of what I ended up getting. Export function. Possible web integration so that I can contribute to a "Digg" like shopping experience for latest bargains etc maintained for free by whomever writes this badboy.


Wants: Hardware
3G

GPS BT shuffle like clip on so I dont need my phone out all the time and can have a second one mounted in the car. Easy ability to download maps for area not over the air so I can always have the city maps handy etc.

Nice audio recorder with stereo mike and audio input

Turn my iPhone into a 1.3+ MP video camera with 30fps

Stereo BT headphones with controls

Nice cradle that allows touch/phone to slip into it with audio/data connections in portrait mode, and then turns to landscape mode easily so I can watch stuff. Same cradle might be car mountable for GPS. Stand should be nice and stable because I am going to be touching it, not too plasticy or bizzy. Maybe even use the space behind it to hold accessories like the cover/case, earphones etc whilst it is docked. Ability to use whilst ihone/touch still in a slim case would be excellent.

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/3B48b Safari/419.3)

how about the ability to use the iPhone as a remote for iTunes on my home computer over my home network. This should be a simple software fix

I have three, and they seem sooooo simple.

1) Copy and Paste. It's just crazy-making to have useful data, like a phone number, e-mail address, or a reservation number in one part of the phone, and not be able to move it to another. It's the most-limiting aspect of the device, for me. If I want to copy a number from, say, an e-mail to a calendar event, I need to write it down, and re-enter it... copy&paste is one of the fundamental functions of a device, IMHO.

2) I want voice mail to play through my BT headset. It's ridiculous to have to hold the handset to my head to listen to voice mail, when the headset is live.

3) Address Book Search - finding anything in the address book is just frustrating beyond belief. It took me 15 minutes the other day to find someone in my own address book. I tried it on my old Treo when I got home - 2 seconds, including typing in the name... A similar aspect is 'Global Search' - the ability to search for a word anywhere in the iPhone, whether it's an event, note, e-mail, or whatever.

Finally, it's not one of my big wishes, because it doesn't happen much, but the current system for handling MMS messages, which requires me to go to a website, and enter two random-alphanumeric strings to see my message, is equally nutty, and made doubly bad by the lack of copy&paste. I get an MMS about once a quarter, but it absolutely shatters the sense of 'ease-of-use' that the iPhone is supposed to create. Can't imagine what regular MMS'ers feel like.

ccheile said:

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/3B48b Safari/419.3)
how about the ability to use the iPhone as a remote for iTunes on my home computer over my home network. This should be a simple software fix

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But that's already done. That's really the only way it SHOULD be done too (aside from refining the authentication process into something more akin to "pairing"). Apple needs to add "key chain" to the iPhone to simplify auto-login (I've submitted this and they're aware of it), then allowing shortcuts on the homepage (like in 1.1.3) pretty much nails this functionality.

~ CB

I think that the 1.1.3 update will be a big step forward. I would love to have more to do with it. Running and creating apps w.o having to jailbreak it first. I would also like to see a big increases in storage space. I think for that though we will have wait for solid state drives to become cheaper.

I agree with your wants, but "viral development" may be a poor choice of words...

I know this wasn't your intent, but one of the reasons they have the phone locked right now is to protect against the malware (viruses, etc.).

So Apple, please make the SDK free to allow for the abundant development of software to continue, while making sure it's safe enough to prevent any viral development.

how about some basic phone/calender functions

This is a California company and as of july. only hands free cell phone use in the car is allowed.

come on....NO voice dial.(make it over bluetooth) apple wants business people to use this phone, but I have to go to three menus just to dial a contact. and lets face it...in sales e-mail takes you only so far, you got to talk to people.

No week view in the calender??? not custimization of repeating events very weak.


not a huge deal breaker. but no picture messaging? other than the calender my wife got a free phone that does all of that

I'd love to see some functionality and integration of the iPhone to the user's home network. I'm talking about being able to see the computer's shared iTunes library and being able to stream that content from anywhere on that network. For such a capable device and Apple's dedication to seamless integration, I'm actually surprised this functionality doesnt already exist. Especially considering Apple TV's ability to do just that, it seems like the iPhone (and the iTouch for that matter) would be the prime candidate for such functionality.

That's my biggest wish, my more reasonable wishes are for updates that make this rather expensive phone do everything a free phone can do.
- MMS
- Ability to delete individual SMS messages
- More storage space for SMS conversations (8GBs of space yet I have to clear my conversations so often? I owned a BlackJack for months before the iPhone and never had to delete a single SMS message.)
- Flash support in Safari
- Landscape modes for all applications.
- Mass deleting in Mail
- Simple, fun games such as the iPod standards breakout, solitaire, etc.
- Video recording abilities and zoom and brightness function settings for both video and still capturing. Imagine pinching the camera screen for the zoom function and flicking for brightness settings, etc.

All in all, the iPhone is perfect for me, but these are the things I really want to see, and they're all extremely reasonable so I'm looking forward to see what the future holds in the software updates.

Cleverboy said:

But that's already done. That's really the only way it SHOULD be done too (aside from refining the authentication process into something more akin to "pairing"). Apple needs to add "key chain" to the iPhone to simplify auto-login (I've submitted this and they're aware of it), then allowing shortcuts on the homepage (like in 1.1.3) pretty much nails this functionality.

~ CB

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Yeah .Mac synching and keychain is a must for this year.

Two words...

Copy-Paste


Seriously, why is it so hard?

Be Realistic Guys

First, Apple will not make the SDK free. Never has been, never will be. Period.

Most likely the only apps that will go on an iPhone are those that are sanctioned and sold through the iTunes music store. Hey, Apple spend hundreds of millions of dollars to make this thing. If you are going to make a but off the iPhone, Apple is due their small cut. They are learning from Microsoft. They have to in order to save up enough cash to buy Microsoft and rid the world of windows!

My picks for iPhone features:

BT Headphones. The cable is always snagging on something. And make them of a quality worthy of iTunes+ recordings.

Cut and Paste, and Search.

In Safari allow be to go back to a page I just visited w/o loading a new copy of the page that I was just visiting. Cache it Apple!!! Especially on Edge!


Don't get me wrong, all those hard working Apple employees who worked on this elegant device deserve a standing ovation from us users (shareholders). They did a great job! Now take a day off and start planning that early retirement!

Al

Wireless Podcast Sync

Why can't the iPhone sync podcasts (or playlists for that matter, but I most care about podcasts which update daily) wirelessly when I'm connected to my home network?

fyrmedic said:

This is a California company and as of Jan 1st. only hands free cell phone use in the car is allowed.

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Wrong.

The new law, SB1613, will take effect July 1, 2008, giving the Department of Motor Vehicles time to update its manuals and drivers time to get used to the idea.

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I would LOVE to see a Flash/Java plugin so watching videos from YouTube isn't your only option. A PDF reader would be AMAZING and I know that's been said over and over again. A 16GB model would be nice wuold be great too. I can't fit much of my music or videos on 8GB of space. Of course, a SDK allowing third-party applications to be downloaded. Finally, I want to be able to MANUALLY manage my music and videos like on the iPod Touch.

ajhill said:

First, Apple will not make the SDK free. Never has been, never will be. Period.

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Uh, huh. Why so opinionated on this point? We've got anywhere from 30-58 days to wait before we know for sure. It's completely off-topic, but I agree Apple is pushing for something. I just think what they're pushing for, are more Mac savvy developers and ADC members in the mix. At the end of the day, I believe we'll likely see a paid version of XCode "lite" for Windows or something of the sort ($30-$79). --We'll see though, no need to make a stink until then.

~ CB

Three things:

1. Receive MMS messages. Don't care if I can send them or not.
2. OPTIONAL Reminder sounds for missed calls/txt/voice mail
3. Video Recording...

I am excited for what seems to be a real 1.1.3 update, but after that I still want MMS, copy/paste, and flash.