iPhone's OS X Less than 500MB, Flash vs Hard Drive

[Doctor Q]

Since Apple stripped Mac OS X down to just what was required to operate the iPhone, whether or not to call it "Mac OS X" or something "lighter" was a marketing decision, but didn't change the facts. As long as Apple controls all applications, Apple will include just as much of the core facilities as it needs for those apps. So as consumers of this first model, we shouldn't really care if it's "light" or not; it does what it advertises.

The difference matters more when we think about future development. If they open up to other developers, the demand to restore other OS facilities will grow. It's also possible that Apple would feel they need to limit their own development to avoid having to restore what was previously removed, so they have a conflict of interest: keeping the OS small while adding new apps, and that could put a drag on development and innovation.

Luckily, as time goes on, they will be able to increase the amount of flash memory and beef up the operating system, simply because memory prices fall. I hope that will let them keep ahead of application demands.

 

[BoRegardless]

Rocketman, you & I have posted similar things between here Slashdot and elsewhere.

I called it a VCD, Virtual Communication Device. Lots of other names come to mind, but it is a blank slate, capable of doing whatever is needed through local software & a wide array of communication frequencies.

Between added frequencies (think IR & RFID), and newer RF schemas, and larger flash memories, more capable batteries, etc., THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING.

Steve Jobs was fantastic at choosing a manageable set of starting points, rather than defining an unreasonable set of features from day one. After all, we are on what, gen 5 for iPods, at least.

BoRegardless

Okay, I will post.

"iPhone" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN! "iPod" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN! "SMS" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN!

This means something really interesting. More apps are trivial to add and the list of possibilities runs into the dozens at minimum.

Buckle up for safety and prepare for Warp drive folks.

Rocketman

 

[Vulkan]

My thoughts on the iPhone

I am new around here, but i hope you can read me the same

I'll start by saying, that I'm a switcher. That being said one of the things that motivated me t switch, was keeping things simple. OSX is heavy built OS, but its simple.

I think the iphone announcement was awesome. The type of computer it is, and the offerings it has are amazing. I really liked the ease that it lets you merge two calls, and how you can control it without the need of a typepad or keyboard or even a click wheel. The 1st thing that popped in my mind, was that this is the second comming of the "Newton", and this is something I always wanted to see, a PDA running OSX. And the fact that like someone mentioned here, the phone, the sms, the ipod are more Apps than actual features of the system is amazing what it can and not do this great concept.

Sweet.

Now, if we think in the things that made Palm (back in the day), awesome and successful, was the availability to put in it whatever you wanted. One thing i said to myself as i watched the keynote when steve said this was running OSX, "I want to try to run World of Warcraft" in there. Or any other app i regularly use. Since its OSX and not some embedded OS, i thought, this is going to be huge, and i thought the hefty price tag was earning its weight.

I dont understand why Apple, is going to limit people in running any content they want. That was a huge letdown. Many of are fascinated because its a darned phone, whoop-de-doo. I was caught because as steve mentioned all the things that were running on it were applications. And they looked and work amazingly, but what use does it have for me if i cant use the widgets I want, and the apps i want running in there.

I think that is going to hinder it a lot. I can see it would be a great device and it can have a great success. With all the cool things, it has, I dont see it as the true successor of the ipod.

I want it, but i have my doubts if i should sink $600 in something that is goig to cost me everytime i want to put an app on... i really dont care what etwork it runs, i like cigular, my current pos of phone runs on them. But it bothers me a lot people will not be able to control what goes in there.

The bottom line is that this is all speculative wondering... the device is not out yet. So many things can happen, my suggestion is to let Apple drive and us sit in the back and enjoy the ride...

Like others have said, if they did an ipod with all the stuff this does, without the phone, and with 30gb capacity at least, id buy it tomorrow on the spot.

Kil

 

[DTphonehome]

500MB!! Thats very large for a smartphone OS. Symbian makes OSX ( in iPhone) look like total and utter bloatware!! LOL.

Not if it's truly OS X...remember, Steve talked about having CoreImage, CoreAnimation, etc, etc, built-in, and those are large (in size) and important technologies to have the iPhone work as it does (ie, CoverFlow, Aqua, widgets, etc).

I was initially skeptical about this running a "real" version of OS X, but as more information comes out, the more I believe it.

 

[Bosunsfate]

The thing I want to know: Will there be a hard drive based iPod, like the iPhone without the phone bit...

The answer, IMO, is yes....why wouldn't they have a 100GB version? If they don't replace the high end video iPod with this multi-touch interface then you'll see sales drop off.

Just look at all the people that would just buy the iPhone for the video only..

What we'll have to see is what will the be the first "Just one more thing"....will it be a Leopord, iLife, iWork release, or something to do with the iPods...

The only guarantee...there will be MORE than just one more thing.

 

[Rocketman]

Rocketman, you & I have posted similar things between here Slashdot and elsewhere.

I called it a VCD, Virtual Communication Device. Lots of other names come to mind, but it is a blank slate, capable of doing whatever is needed through local software & a wide array of communication frequencies.

Between added frequencies (think IR & RFID), and newer RF schemas, and larger flash memories, more capable batteries, etc., THIS IS JUST THE BEGINNING.

Steve Jobs was fantastic at choosing a manageable set of starting points, rather than defining an unreasonable set of features from day one. After all, we are on what, gen 5 for iPods, at least.

BoRegardless

Agreed.

Apple has been shipping 802.11n in actual hardware for several MONTHS now. Less than a year after THAT the ATN (VCD / iPhone) gets released.

I'll bet you a beer it ships with hardware capable of being software upgraded to 801.11n.

I'll bet you YA beer that the Edge it ships with is software/network upgradeable later to something akin to or better than Sprint's wireless data protocol.

Remember EDGE is Gen 1 wireless data, and while the most widely deployed in the USA (right -now- when it matters for ATN), is not the most widely deployed in the world, and not the fastest in the USA anymore.

As for the folks saying "why can't" I install my own apps?

I have an answer to that. The boot INSTANCE of OSX is protected. What about a second INSTANCE of OSX running any app and having no access to the phone protocols whatsoever, only a tunnel going out the data streams (internet)?

Hmmm?

Rocketman

 

[Deslock]

He also confirms that the only other applications to be expected for the iPhone will be coming from Apple for the time being.

I would like nothing better than to ditch the embarrassment-of-an-OS that is Windows mobile (crappy interface, intermittent syncing, crippled web browser, nightmarish memory management, unreliable alarms!, and all-around temperamental and sluggish behavior).

But the iPhone's amazing hardware and multitouch interface do me no good if it doesn't have a spreadsheet, ssh, file encryption, and Windows remote desktop (either via a standalone app or iPhone's Safari with something like logmein).

 

[oogje]

"Mac OS X" != "OS X"

Apple doesn't typically throw around terms willy nilly. How many places on Apple's web site do we see "OS X" that's not preceded by "Mac". I only see "OS X" in reference to the iPhone. The device may be running a full version of "OS X" but I don't know what that is. I'm familiar with "Mac OS X" but not this other version that appears to have recently come into being.

 

[stcanard]

No debate there, but is "XP" the 2 MB kernel, or is "XP" the set of APIs and libraries and utilities that the user sees?

In my point of view, it's the latter.

That may be your point of view, but as far as the definition of "Operating System" goes, its the former (plus a few of the very core, basic libraries). "Operating" in "Operating system" refers to the software's ability to operate the basic hardware on which it is installed.

I know this is semantics that will be debated ad-nauseum -- but -- as long as the kernel that the iPhone runs is built off the XNU codebase it is running OSX, plain and simple. There is no debating that.

Now, how much of the Macintosh APIs get carried over into the embedded version of OSX, that can be debated and will be until developer details come out.

 

[mfdynosore]

I registered just to say that this is the best explanation of the situation I have seen in the thread or anywhere else for that matter. All of us need to read and understand what Rocketman has written below.
br

Okay, I will post.

The release of Intel Macs went well AHEAD of schedule so when Macworld rolled around, they were all Mac-ed out!

The "iPhone" (Apple Tablet Nano) is actually a full-on computer with power comparable to, say, a Powermac G4-800 mhz. This is a handtop display centric computer. How much did you pay for your Mac Plus with a small fraction of the power and capacity of the ATN? $2700, and that was 1984-1986!

"iPhone" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN! "iPod" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN! "SMS" is literally MERELY ONE APPLICATION on this ATN!

This means something really interesting. More apps are trivial to add and the list of possibilities runs into the dozens at minimum.

Now some will fixate on the "mere 8gb" capacity. Remember this well. The ATN is an internet always-on appliance via cellular Edge and 802.11g now. Rev 2 or 3 will have 3G cellular and 802.11n, and even 802.16 wimax.

You only need local storage for apps and cache. The device can stream from the internet and download from the internet on a real-time or near real-time basis.

Is your music and movie collection on a computer which is on the internet? You can log onto your OWN computer with this device from ANYWHERE there is either cellular Edge or 802.11b/g access. There may be a very few places that does not apply, but not many.

As for flash, Samsung has announced 16gb flash now. I wonder how long it will take Apple to go to that in this device?

In the old days we used to have client-server, where you sat at a "dumb terminal" and talked to the mothership. Then we had "thin clients" which were real computers wired on where the dumb terminal used to be, and it could display graphics and do minimal local tasks. Then we had "thick clients" which were full-on local computers able to do main tasks as well as talk to several other motherships.

ATN is a "physically" thin, "virtually" thick client which is quite capable of talking to multiple motherships (multi-homing), and has MORE local compute capability than so-called thick clients of only 5-10 years ago. It does so WIRELESSLY FROM ANYWHERE, IN YOUR HAND!

For those of you interested only in Macs, Upon Leopard release, Intel will also be updating the chipsets behind the main processor. It will make practical 4-core chips in medium class computers like iMac, and 8-core chip-groups in higher class computers like MacPro, and many-core chip-groups in X-serves, and beyond.

Buckle up for safety and prepare for Warp drive folks.

Rocketman

 

[Marx55]

Why not a portable Powerpoint/Keynote device?

Sir. Intel literally ran a commercial about 2-4 months AGO showing exactly that.

Any Internet link for that? Thanks.

 

[Marx55]

Sorry for my ignorance, but what does "ATN" stand for? Thanks.

 

[mrrory]

Exactly. I want a widescreen/touchscreem iPod with WiFi and web browsing, just replace the phone and SMS parts with iChat, and I would definitly buy one, but as a phone, I just don't see myself buying one.

Yep, I'm kind of with you on this one... I have a Sidekick 3, and I rarely, use the phone... I'd replace the sidekick with the iPhone, but I'm not sure how much I care for the "phone" features... I'm not a big fan of Cingular either.

I bought a new shuffle because I found it inconvenient to carry around my full size iPod... I think I just want the iPhone version that has wi-fi, iChat, Safari, Mail and no contract! That'll do me.

Maybe they'll release an iPhone nano, not necessarily smaller in form, but function.

 

[areyouwishing]

I can install a full version of os x at 1.8GB doing a custom install with no extras. That includes all the apps. All this OS X really needs is...

Darwin/Networking
Mail
Widget Support
CoreAnimation
Safari
Google Maps
Inkwell (maybe)
Phone App
iCal
Address Book
iPiddle software (coverflow)

 

[Cepe Indicum]

Sorry for my ignorance, but what does "ATN" stand for? Thanks.

Marx55; I was a little confused too, but it's from Rocketman's excellent overview of the iPhone.

See the post by mfdynosore where it's fully quoted. ATN = "Apple Tablet Nano".

 

[notjims]

About this "no programming alowed" stance...

I can understand not allowing native code. But I need certain small bits of functionality, like a tiny monitoring system to see how my servers and networks are at any given time, and I'm looking at dashboard widgets.

Do you suppose you will be able to add dashboard widgets? These operate in a nicely constrained environment and presumably could safely be loaded and run without compromising the phone. I can accomplish the same result in a web page, but at a greater network bandwidth cost and probably a more awkward UI sequence to get to it (browser..bookmarks..pick as opposed to just a poke for my widget).

On the downside..

• This lets people put ugly icons on the screen
• Widgets are resource intensive in the current incarnation, there may not be enough horsepower
• It might sidetrack whatever vision Apple has for future directions

 

[Doctor Q]

Sorry for my ignorance, but what does "ATN" stand for? Thanks.

Rocketman called the iPhone the "Apple Tablet Nano" (ATN).

 

[Digital Skunk]

Just Give Me iWork Mobile

I have iWork, the first one, not 06. It is great. I am trying to ween myself off of Word. Can't stand word. The only reason I use it is to please and cater to other people that are a bit too Windowy to understand that Word sucks in plenty of places. For what I use it for, Word isn't that great, no where near Pages. I hope that the iPhone can sync with iWork (Pages and Keynote) flawlessly. It would be another addition that would be greatly appreciated by us power users. Will need to do some productivity while on route to a meeting or class, or something like that. Wouldn't mind leaving my laptop at home and working on documents and presentations on my iPhone...

If the battery would last long enough.

 

[cyberrob]

Usb 2.0

did anyone see the press release with the little mark usb 2.0 needed?!?

in fulll lenghts:
iPhone requires a Mac with a USB 2.0 port, Mac OS® X v10.4.8 or later and iTunes 7; or a Windows PC with a USB 2.0 port and Windows 2000 (Service Pack 4), Windows XP Home or Professional (Service Pack 2). Internet access is required and a broadband connection is recommended. Apple and Cingular will announce service plans for iPhone before it begins shipping in June.

so will the iphone also sync via firewire (400)?!? Anybody read anything about that?!? why isn't it syncing via wi-fi?!? would be so cool

 

[AidenShaw]

I know this is semantics that will be debated ad-nauseum...

For sure

However, if you ask a zillion Mac users why the OSX operating system is better than the Windows operating system - everyone from Steve Jobs to the soccer mom who just switched will say things like "iTunes", "the dock", "aqua", "iwork", "it's pretty", ....

Nobody will mention XNU...

 

[celavato]

iChat Missing; Still Buying One

I think the lack of iChat is unfortunate. Instant messaging would be much better on the iPhone than on a Mac, especially when you're not at your desk. Cingular would still make money when WiFi is not available plus SMS is no substitute for IM. I still plan to buy one, but let's hope Apple someday releases an iCommunicator with no cell phone but WiFi, Wimax, and beefed up online communications software, including iChat and perhaps even Skype or Vonage. (One can dream.)

PS: Let's hope Apple also adds voice dialing without training.

 

[Aardy]

It's all about stability

I dont understand why Apple, is going to limit people in running any content they want. That was a huge letdown. Many of are fascinated because its a darned phone, whoop-de-doo. I was caught because as steve mentioned all the things that were running on it were applications. And they looked and work amazingly, but what use does it have for me if i cant use the widgets I want, and the apps i want running in there.

I think that is going to hinder it a lot. I can see it would be a great device and it can have a great success. With all the cool things, it has, I dont see it as the true successor of the ipod.

Apple wants to control the 'user experience' and the stability of the iPhone. Allowing third party apps to be loaded in willy-nilly without any sort of control could be disastrous. I saw a quote from SJ himself, the gist of which is this: "You don't want your phone crashing or freezing in the middle of a call or text message just because you have loaded a new app into your phone".

If Apple write everything then they are in the unique position to make sure it works correctly and without everything going belly-up just because you have decided to try the latest version of Doom 3D Mobile.

MS Office interoperability: Virus checker anyone? 'nuff said.

Primarily it's a phone, and as such we want it to be rock solid without all the other bells and whistles mucking things up.

 

[Zadillo]

lol, ur opinion is not towards the functionality of the machine when you got it, all i was saying is about expectation before you buy it and reality when u actually have the machine in hand.

Is that clear for you?

Im not promoting Palm here, if thats what u think I was trying to say. Obviously u now sounds very excited about this iPhone, probably already begin to save money for it (if you do need to save for it). Im sure u have the expectations for iPhone, but you won't have in in hand and compare the reality with your expectation. So what YOU and OTHER future iPhone users will feel? lets wait and see.

Actually I've been changing my mind on the iPhone; I'm looking forward to it, but more likely at this point to NOT get the initial revision. I'm probably going to keep chugging along with the Treo for the time being until I have a clearer picture of how third party development will work for it, etc. I don't have a lot of third party needs, but I'm hoping for them to be met one way or the other.

Unfortunately, options are limited. I went to the store to look at the Treo 680, and also the Windows Mobile-based Treo 750. I found both to have problems.... I also tried one of the Cingular 8525 models running WIndows Mobile, and it was somewhat nicer, but the OS still felt really clunky and cluttered to me and unresponsive.

I should probably take a closer look at some of the Symbian devices. And there are also some Linux smartphones coming out which might be interesting.

I think Palm is doing a disservice to NEW Treo buyers though, who generally aren't aware of the mess the platform is in right now.

-Zadillo

 

[Some_Big_Spoon]

Exactly. They're not compromising, or doing anything too outrageous, just leaving out all the you pointed to and more.

What goes out, maybe can go back in

 

[jhande]

As for the folks saying "why can't" I install my own apps?

I have an answer to that. The boot INSTANCE of OSX is protected. What about a second INSTANCE of OSX running any app and having no access to the phone protocols whatsoever, only a tunnel going out the data streams (internet)?

Hmmm?

Rocketman

Exactly. By building a chinese wall (sandbox), or hell, like you say, running a seperate instance of OSX with access to all comms + storage, there would be no possibility of damaging the built-in or approved apps.

In fact, why not just sandbox unapproved (unsigned) apps, while signed apps are 'let in'?

I proposed something like this in another thread (I forget which one, there have been so many) and I really can't see how difficult it can be.

BTW, ATN is hereby adopted as my moniker for this device. Let's see how far this meme spreads. P'haps it will reach SJ, and he'll see how we view it.