Hey, if I jump start my car with the iPhone, will that reduce the battery life to 4 hours? And if so, do the iJumpercables have an HDCP authentication chip in them, so I can't also transfer movies to the in-car entertainment system? Hehe, ok, so I'm tired and silly today......
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Background Tasking and Battery
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Some sort of system?
Could Apple not implement some sort of core service that handles "background" processes. In a similar fashion to how some PHP scripts place all MySQL database calls into one call to make database usage more efficient, could Apple not have a service that a program that would need "background" functionality could call and this would, at a user selectable interval (30 sec, 1 min, 5 min, 10 min, etc.) look for every "background" process that needs to be run and run it in a single burst of radio activity. As opposed to one app getting radio activity every minute and another app getting radio activity every 30 seconds creating an upswing in radio usage.
Could Apple not implement some sort of core service that handles "background" processes. In a similar fashion to how some PHP scripts place all MySQL database calls into one call to make database usage more efficient, could Apple not have a service that a program that would need "background" functionality could call and this would, at a user selectable interval (30 sec, 1 min, 5 min, 10 min, etc.) look for every "background" process that needs to be run and run it in a single burst of radio activity. As opposed to one app getting radio activity every minute and another app getting radio activity every 30 seconds creating an upswing in radio usage.
If I am not mistaken ATT and AOL already has a deal in place. This keeps aim constantly alive within a server as well as sent notification when a message has been received. The only problem is that ATT charges for the Instant Messages, which makes it similar to SMS Text. Now if ATT makes this AIM client within the same bounds, then how many people will actually use it and pay monthly for it?
Note: Not all AIM phones are based on this bound, only those who come with AIM pre-installed within the phone.
This sort of lends its self to the whole adobe wanting its own PDF reader on the iPhone before flash support can be incorporated.
Sure flash only kills battery when in use but the PDF reader would have to remain working in the background in-order to make it appear as snappy and quick as the other iPhone apps.
Thusly killing the battery as we all know adobe would sneak in some spyware
Sure flash only kills battery when in use but the PDF reader would have to remain working in the background in-order to make it appear as snappy and quick as the other iPhone apps.
Thusly killing the battery as we all know adobe would sneak in some spyware
No, this sounds VERY accurate to me!
I know, for example, I downloaded the RSS reader software for the iPhone a while back, and configured it to update the list of feeds every 5 minutes. Right after that, I discovered that by the end of the workday, my battery was almost dead. Before that, it would typically still be around 80% or 90% charged, if I didn't talk much on it.
There's probably a "threshold", where you can run a background app that polls the Internet infrequently enough so the wi-fi (or edge) circuitry still gets to go to sleep between polling events. But doing it too often apparently leaves the radio running *all the time*, and drains the battery excessively quickly.
IM clients are probably notoriously bad for leaving the radio in an "always on" state, since unlike email checking, they're going to be polling more often than once every 15 minutes or so.
I think I like the guy's idea who mentioned SMS. How about an IM client that runs in the foreground like normal, but when you exit the program, it sends info to that effect to a "middle man" server. If you exit, telling it you wish to appear "online" to people still, it tells the server in the middle to keep up that appearance and to cache new incoming messages for you until you return. When new ones DO come in, it could use a single SMS message to notify you that you have new IMs to pick up.
I know, for example, I downloaded the RSS reader software for the iPhone a while back, and configured it to update the list of feeds every 5 minutes. Right after that, I discovered that by the end of the workday, my battery was almost dead. Before that, it would typically still be around 80% or 90% charged, if I didn't talk much on it.
There's probably a "threshold", where you can run a background app that polls the Internet infrequently enough so the wi-fi (or edge) circuitry still gets to go to sleep between polling events. But doing it too often apparently leaves the radio running *all the time*, and drains the battery excessively quickly.
IM clients are probably notoriously bad for leaving the radio in an "always on" state, since unlike email checking, they're going to be polling more often than once every 15 minutes or so.
I think I like the guy's idea who mentioned SMS. How about an IM client that runs in the foreground like normal, but when you exit the program, it sends info to that effect to a "middle man" server. If you exit, telling it you wish to appear "online" to people still, it tells the server in the middle to keep up that appearance and to cache new incoming messages for you until you return. When new ones DO come in, it could use a single SMS message to notify you that you have new IMs to pick up.
Agile Messenger on my Treo 700wx was left active all day. The only time the battery goes faster is when I was messaging a lot.
Batterie perspective woudn't be the only one issue. As mentionned in this article http://boursomac.com/article/819 whenever twitterific should use the radio, your incoming call will be missed 
Who is he trying to fool. People make all types of compromises based off their wants/needs. The iPhone is a mobile messaging platform capable of delivering a very rich interactive user experience for users on the go. You might as well make the argument that because playing movies on the device drains so much battery that should be disabled as well or because web browsing could prevent you from receiving a phone call edge should be disabled as well. The reality is as a user I can budget and make the kinds of compromises that fit in with my own needs or objectives better than anyone else can.
The post just doesn't seem very well thought out, seems more like a string of excuses as to why Apple was doing us a favor.
The post just doesn't seem very well thought out, seems more like a string of excuses as to why Apple was doing us a favor.