Apple Posts Web Development Guidelines for iPhone

[inkswamp]

Users want to be able to customize their experience to suit their needs, and this web-app thing is a frusterating half-baked comprimise.

sucks apple...just sucks....

Seems we're a little early in the iPhone's life to start making sweeping judgments about what its users want, but I do understand that there are probably some developers out there eager to do something more complicated than a web app. For that reason alone, Apple needs to start examining other ways of letting developers in.

But, this is a situation where Apple has a tricky balance to maintain. On one hand, they need to play nice with the developers. On the other hand, they need to protect the security and stability of the iPhones. I'm not sure what kind of compromise they will figure out for satisfying both needs, but I bet they're already looking into it.

 

[csubear]

and self-signed certificates are not available on iPhone.

So if I want to run ssl on my web server I have to get my cert signed by a real CA?? You know how much those cost.

 

[nagromme]

But, this is a situation where Apple has a tricky balance to maintain. On one hand, they need to play nice with the developers. On the other hand, they need to protect the security and stability of the iPhones. I'm not sure what kind of compromise they will figure out for satisfying both needs, but I bet they're already looking into it.

The reasons to open up iPhone development to all are obvious. I hope it happens!

The reasons NOT to are as follows, and I hope Apple does NOT open up development until all three are very well addressed:

1. Stability. When a random third-party app crashes, it reflects on the device, fairly or not. Other "smartphones" have been known to crash and lose the call you're on. I'm not jealous of that.

2. Security. The iPhone was recently evaluated as the most secure smartphone ever. Not having to contend with random, unpredictable, unproven apps is the reason.

3. Ease of use--THE big feature of the iPhone, and NOT good to mess with. Random apps which are sometimes built in an iPhone-like way and sometimes not would greatly degrade the experience of using an iPhone. Apple must provide tools and guidelines to make apps work (and look) like an iPhone (with gestures) NOT a Mac (with pointer). Those take time to develop, and even then, will developers all follow them, or will they try all kinds of crazy and cool UI experiments of their own?

Some kind of compromise may be needed. I suspect one is on the way.

 

[Krevnik]

So if I want to run ssl on my web server I have to get my cert signed by a real CA?? You know how much those cost.

What it means is that you get harassed by Safari every time you first browse to the site, asking if you accept the certificate. The behavior is the same as on the desktop.

I haven't checked to see how this affects IMAP/POP servers.

 

[brasscat]

I vote that Apple develops a plug-in for xcode that provides a structured environment to developing additional widgets for the phone. There are ways to securely limit the functionality through available command sets. This can be done - and it would be a big step to opening up the phone for 3rd party development. Since it's all OSX, they should be able to maintain security the same way they do with the desktop environment (I don't see Apple trying to "lock down" the desktops, why is OSX on the iPhone any different?).

Writing "web 2.0 apps" is just a fancy way of stating you can write web pages for the phone. Big deal. Can I write a Google Earth for the phone (as an example)? Not really with only javascript, ajax, and html at our disposal.

 

[pieman02]

What was Apple's reason for not enabling apps to be installed on the iPhone? If it was a security issue (and the phone runs on OSX), isn't OSX the most secure OS ever? ow does putting it on a phone make it more vunerable?

Also I wonder is Apple is just waiting until they can have high capacity iPhones so apps wont be a big % of the stuff stored on them (more room for music, AND the apps).

 

[janey]

it looks like this is basically what apple told the developers at WWDC. Of course that was all under NDA and i dint take notes, so its nice they have released this.

Pretty much a rehash of the iPhone session.

...too bad they don't have an event listener so when the phone is physically rotated, the developer could do something as well with the code.

Actually there is. Not sure how, but I already know that Colloquy (the IRC client) has a web interface for the iPhone that hides the input box when the phone is horizontal because the keyboard uses up way too much space, forcing you to go vertical to type.

1. Stability.

There is something called sandboxing..

2. Security. The iPhone was recently evaluated as the most secure smartphone ever. Not having to contend with random, unpredictable, unproven apps is the reason.

There is something called sandboxing...

3. Ease of use--THE big feature of the iPhone, and NOT good to mess with.

Why not let the end user decide what they want to run? That's my biggest gripe. I'll run the piece of **** software if I want to. And if I need it, a buggy and disgusting program is vastly preferable to having none at all.

What was Apple's reason for not enabling apps to be installed on the iPhone? If it was a security issue (and the phone runs on OSX), isn't OSX the most secure OS ever? ow does putting it on a phone make it more vunerable?

Because Steve likes coming up with ******** reasons to restrict what people can and can't do on the phone because in the end it does somewhat reflect back on Apple. Or they just haven't had the time to do something like that, yet.

OS X is also not the most secure OS ever.

Also I wonder is Apple is just waiting until they can have high capacity iPhones so apps wont be a big % of the stuff stored on them (more room for music, AND the apps).

Umm...on my 8gb iPhone I've used half for music and movies. I don't have much more to put on there. It's not like apps are going to be 1gb a piece. If you look at the free space available, the OS and the apps don't take up that much space. What's the harm in a few more?

 

[nagromme]

There is something called sandboxing..

There is something called sandboxing...

Which does not prevent apps from crashing and reflecting badly on the new platform. And it has not made other phones secure.

 

[janey]

Which does not prevent apps from crashing and reflecting badly on the new platform. And it has not made other phones secure.

Sandboxing doesn't prevent apps from crashing, it can prevent the app from doing anything unwanted along with it, e.g. crashing the rest of the phone.

Apple cannot possibly require all apps to not crash, given how hypocritical that would be. They also can't have a system where all apps that want to be on the iPhone has to go through rigorous testing, although they could have like a certification program of sorts.

And people already deal with ridiculous apps that definitely don't follow any sort of HIG from Apple (wait, Apple doesn't follow theirs either...), apps like Disco.

If people WANT to keep all those sweet little closed iPhone features, then they can. Nobody is holding a gun to their head making them install 3rd party apps. If Apple wants such tight control, maybe they need to create some of these apps themselves. Hi Apple, could I PLEASE get documents to go or mobile office on my iPhone? Please?!?!?!


The same argument you present can be applied to virtually anything out there, including Mac OS X. But it seems that people are rather happy running their 3rd party apps on OS X! Even though they crash, they crash the system, they muck around with files...yeahhhh.

The problem with never providing a real iPhone SDK is that if Apple doesn't partially **** themselves over by letting it happen, they will definitely **** themselves over trying to sell a closed-platform phone with no room for 3rd party software. for ****'s sake, even the iPods can do things the iPhone can't, like the games.

 

[dangleheart]

Apple is really blowing it with this. How am I supposed to use these apps on my commuter train which rarely has internet access, or on a plane? This is a the single biggest flaw with the iPhone. The web apps I've tried so far are pretty lame and no fun to use.

The next thing coming for web based apps is the ability to do something with them at the client when there is no internet connectivity. Google is big on this. That should be mature in the next 6 to 12 months. I think that concept should port over to the iPhone. It will still run in the browser context/sandbox even when there is no internet connectivity and then sync up with the web server when connectivity is established. It should work OK for a vast variety of applications.

 

[janey]

The next thing coming for web based apps is the ability to do something with them at the client when there is no internet connectivity....It should work OK for a vast variety of applications.

Yes, but there are some apps that just won't work as a webapp.

It was ridiculous, insulting and infuriating to tell people at WWDC that the best Apple could do is to point out the obvious webapp solution.

 

[soapsuds]

No way to handle double-tap and drag?

I was hoping there would be some way to pass double-tap and drag to a webpage; perhaps some extension that forces the page to be exactly 320x480, disable scrolling and zooming, and then let javascript get those messages somehow. That would open up a lot more options for web apps, especially games. Obviously native apps would be far superior, but I suspect that even if Apple allows 3rd party apps, it will just be a select few approved developers. It's entirely possible the iPhone doesn't have the same kind of protection between apps and kernel or app to app that a modern OS does, either due to hardware limitations or performance tradeoffs, in which case Apple will never open it up to hobbyist developers.

 

[emotion]

The lack of locally-stored "apps" (and data) is also my biggest frustration, but the more I learn the more I'm confident this will improve.

In Apple's web development document, they specifically mention (and link to) the emerging standards from WhatWG. This includes local data storage, which will allow "web apps" to not only run locally but also store data locally on the iPhone.

They may also be looking at Google Gears, another way of doing (sort of) the same thing.

Now that Apple has released the product and the documentation, the online "apps" will get better really fast. In time, they'll provide a mechanism for locally stored apps and data.

Good post. I thinik this is the route Apple will take.

 

[rob@robburns.co]

Non-web apps

I had expected apple to allow dashboard widgets on the iPhone. Apple basically reused three dashboard widgets almost unchanged: stocks, weather, and calculator. I could imagine another tab on iTunes where users could install dashboard widgets and configure the app arrangement on the home view.

I think those apps would be very safe and Apple successfully rousted developers to create thousands of widgets. I think we'll eventually see this happen.

I also think we'll eventually see full-fledged apps on iPhone. We still don't even know what APIs are included on the phone. For example, no Java. However, what about Cocoa? What about OpenGL? How much of Quartz/CoreGraphics is there?

Particularly on the Cocoa front. Apple has been increasingly moving the functionality of Cocoa to an independent pure-C API (the Core* and *Core APIs). Its possible iPhone apps have to use those pure-C APIs with no OpenGL. This makes app development a bigger challenge than creating Cocoa or Java apps.

 

[emotion]

I had expected apple to allow dashboard widgets on the iPhone. Apple basically reused three dashboard widgets almost unchanged: stocks, weather, and calculator. I could imagine another tab on iTunes where users could install dashboard widgets and configure the app arrangement on the home view.

I think those apps would be very safe and Apple successfully rousted developers to create thousands of widgets. I think we'll eventually see this happen.

I also think we'll eventually see full-fledged apps on iPhone. We still don't even know what APIs are included on the phone. For example, no Java. However, what about Cocoa? What about OpenGL? How much of Quartz/CoreGraphics is there?

Particularly on the Cocoa front. Apple has been increasingly moving the functionality of Cocoa to an independent pure-C API (the Core* and *Core APIs). Its possible iPhone apps have to use those pure-C APIs with no OpenGL. This makes app development a bigger challenge than creating Cocoa or Java apps.

I think we might find out some more of these details over the coming days/weeks. Like we did when the AppleTV came out.

 

[em500]

Some things simply can't be done as a web app or widget, and I'm not just talking about esoteric niches. I'd like to see someone write a DivX/Xvid player in Javascript, for instance.

 

[CaptainHaddock]

1. Stability. When a random third-party app crashes, it reflects on the device, fairly or not. Other "smartphones" have been known to crash and lose the call you're on. I'm not jealous of that.

2. Security. The iPhone was recently evaluated as the most secure smartphone ever. Not having to contend with random, unpredictable, unproven apps is the reason.

3. Ease of use--THE big feature of the iPhone, and NOT good to mess with. Random apps which are sometimes built in an iPhone-like way and sometimes not would greatly degrade the experience of using an iPhone. Apple must provide tools and guidelines to make apps work (and look) like an iPhone (with gestures) NOT a Mac (with pointer). Those take time to develop, and even then, will developers all follow them, or will they try all kinds of crazy and cool UI experiments of their own?

I think most people who want a full-fledged SDK now underestimate those problems (especially 1 and 3).

From what I hear, the fluidity and immediate feedback of the device is amazing. The UI always responds instantly — and it should on a modern computing device. And yet, all applications are basically running in RAM at once for instant application switching.

If Apple just lets you put anything on there, pretty soon you'll have memory-leaking or CPU-intensive apps that make everything else grind to a halt, and buggy programs that crash the device.

Setting ground rules for the user interface also seems extremely important. No developer outside of Apple currently has a good handle or understanding of the new UI paradigm Apple has just introduced. Even at Apple, these rules are probably in flux, but once the iPhone (handheld OS X) platform has stabilized, I'm sure they'll be publishing guidelines and carefully vetting what can be installed on the iPhone.

 

[dgdosen]

Missing Stuff

To me, and I'm not a javascript developer, this guide is missing actual reference! I'd think Apple would create a bunch of template css and javascript information for typical applications.

For example - why not create a bunch of reference content in a similar look and feel for what you see in the Settings applets:

- CSS for common color and fonts on a the top toolbar
- CSS for common color and fonts for any status bar on the bottom of the screen
- CSS for common fonts and spacing for content - for example, in the mail app.
- Sample images for the typical types of buttons like "Edit", "Done" , "+" and "-"
- Sample images for typical experiences
○ The > for navigating to the next page
○ The + and - effects on editing pages
- Sample script for visual effects - page wiping, +/- icon wiping
- Best practices for creating objects used in scripting on a page…


Stuff like that. Is that too much to ask for? If apple provides that stuff, we can focus our time on developing content and not the UI sugar.

 

[bignumbers]

Yes, but there are some apps that just won't work as a webapp.

It was ridiculous, insulting and infuriating to tell people at WWDC that the best Apple could do is to point out the obvious webapp solution.

Absolutely. And if I remember correctly, they were essentially told so in the Q&A. They got the message, and I doubt any of it was a surprise.

My theory is the OS X on the iPhone is quite different than the OS X on a Mac. Lots of features iPhone users see are buried in private, still-in-development frameworks. Apple doesn't want to expose private non-finalized frameworks, and I can't blame them. I give them two or three rounds of iPhone software updates, then we might see something. I sure hope so.

We'd also need a real iPhone simulator for debugging, something they'd need to write. (Someone might be daring enough to hack the webkit source...)

Another way to look at it: The iPhone is a five-day-old computer platform. What development tools existed when the Mac 128K was five days old? Probably a messy assembler. MPW didn't even come along for two years - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_Programmer's_Workshop#History_of_MPW.

Given there's a relationship to Mac OS X and a hearty demand this will happen faster on the iPhone, thank goodness.

 

[kcmac]

snip
My theory is the OS X on the iPhone is quite different than the OS X on a Mac. Lots of features iPhone users see are buried in private, still-in-development frameworks. Apple doesn't want to expose private non-finalized frameworks, and I can't blame them. I give them two or three rounds of iPhone software updates, then we might see something. I sure hope so.
snip
Another way to look at it: The iPhone is a five-day-old computer platform. What development tools existed when the Mac 128K was five days old? Probably a messy assembler. MPW didn't even come along for two years - snip

Given there's a relationship to Mac OS X and a hearty demand this will happen faster on the iPhone, thank goodness.

I agree. Apple clearly has created something here vastly more powerful than just a phone, or an ipod, etc. It has been quoted by many analysts to be the most powerful handheld computer to date.

Most of the griping seems to be more centralized around on not how the iPhone performs but on what it has the potential to do that it does not meet at this time. That in my estimation is a good thing.

Apple is pretty good at getting the big things right at the beginning. They are always harassed for more features, etc. Eventually, they keep adding new things here and there. That will certainly be the case here with updates, new apps, etc.

This still has got to be the best version 1 thing they have ever done. It is not perfect, nor will it ever be. But for all the griping, the hating (which I just don't understand) and the moaning, the reviewers/users still seem to state that they love their iPhone or can't wait to get one.

 

[nydoofus]

I use a PPC-6700 Windows Mobile 5.0 phone myself and I can understand the arguments against releasing an SDK. I basically find myself resetting the phone about twice a day (oddly, that's an improvement over my old Treo which was hitting 6 times a day).

In my case though, the problems don't really reside with my third party apps. I have a ton of programs installed. Examples include TomTom 6 for GPS (something that's really annoying not to have on the iPhone, I mean, the places I'm likely to get lost in are the places where I have no cell service), OctroTalk for IM (Apple will probably add an iChat soon), Opera (since IE sucks) and a few other programs. None really crash on a consistent basis.

What does crash a lot is Windows Mobile 5 itself. I lose my bluetooth connection about 2-3 times a day. My SD card stops working randomly. The phone refuses to lock onto a carrier when I'm leaving a train tunnel.

Personally, I feel that with a good SDK, and proper sandboxing, it should be easy to open up the iPhone to developers. If this is done, it can erase one of the huge advantages Windows Mobile still has.

 

[john7jr]

What it means is that you get harassed by Safari every time you first browse to the site, asking if you accept the certificate. The behavior is the same as on the desktop.

Uh, no. Not according to the document we're discussing.

Safari on iPhone does not support:

• Custom x.509 certificates

...

Diffie-Hellman protocol and DSA keys and self-signed certificates are not available on iPhone.

If you can verify otherwise I'd love to hear it.

 

[StrongBad]

I feel really bad for the peeps using the "no real SDK" thing as an excuse not to buy one. Sure, if you don't havevthe cash or don't want go spend the cash, that's fine, but the lack of third party apps is a non-issue for the target iPhone buyers.

First, everyone on these sites raves about google's online office apps freeing us from the stranglehold of microsoft, but now that's not good enough? If anything this proves web apps are a major player. If google can makes a spreessheet in a web browser (the impossible task 3 years ago) I think some dudes can whip up minesweeper or chess in their spare time.

Second, I have yet to see someone lay out plans for an app that (1) can't be done as a web app and (2) has major appeal to the majority of iPhone users. I'm talking pipedreams here either, like "I wish my phone could drive my car" more like "i wish i could use my iphone to control my itunes on my desktop". (FYI - thats totally possible)

Third, I see allot of crappy iphone apps being linked all over the place, most are simple front ends for sites that already work on the iPhone. Sure, 37signals made a cooler version of their TaDa list a x apple has iPhone specific trailers out there, but this is lacking creativity. Maybe apple didn't do a real SDK because they knew no one would have a "killer app" idea until they use iPhone for 6 - 9 months.

 

[nydoofus]

I feel really bad for the peeps using the "no real SDK" thing as an excuse not to buy one. Sure, if you don't havevthe cash or don't want go spend the cash, that's fine, but the lack of third party apps is a non-issue for the target iPhone buyers.

First, everyone on these sites raves about google's online office apps freeing us from the stranglehold of microsoft, but now that's not good enough? If anything this proves web apps are a major player. If google can makes a spreessheet in a web browser (the impossible task 3 years ago) I think some dudes can whip up minesweeper or chess in their spare time.

It uses AT&T. Oops I lost a signal. Oops I went into a subway tunnel.

Second, I have yet to see someone lay out plans for an app that (1) can't be done as a web app and (2) has major appeal to the majority of iPhone users. I'm talking pipedreams here either, like "I wish my phone could drive my car" more like "i wish i could use my iphone to control my itunes on my desktop". (FYI - thats totally possible)

GPS in a place with no signal, with turn by turn directions. AvantGo.

Third, I see allot of crappy iphone apps being linked all over the place, most are simple front ends for sites that already work on the iPhone. Sure, 37signals made a cooler version of their TaDa list a x apple has iPhone specific trailers out there, but this is lacking creativity. Maybe apple didn't do a real SDK because they knew no one would have a "killer app" idea until they use iPhone for 6 - 9 months.

This is true, the mad rush is creating a lot of poor apps. The best ones will filter up after a while.

 

[Yankees 4 Life]

hey i was wondering if abyone had created a damn good app yet cuz all the ones that ive seen arent that good...