After the
first Hello World application, hacker NerveGas and the people at #iphone-shell have built Apache, Python and other Open Source apps for the iPhone. Yes, your iPhone can now be a web server and do all sort of 1337 things. This also means that
third-party applications for iPhone will happen no matter what. People, Doom could be just around the corner. [UPDATED 3:07AM EST: As a bonus, check their progress on the
iPhone unlocking after the jump.]
The working installations, created using iPhone-hacking-genius Nightwatch's toolchain, include a working Apache installation, Pytho and "a growing binary kit including routing tools, vim, curl and much more." The binaries can be downloaded from the iPhone web wiki web page, but keep in mind that these are only indicated for technical-oriented people, not consumers.
As for the unlocking progress, here's the latest update:
We have confirmation of the existence of some attempt counter for the unlock: with no unlock attempts +XLOCK returns: "PN",1,0,"PU",5,0,"PP",5,0,"PC",5,0,"PS",5,0 with unlock attempts +XLOCK returns: "PN",3,0,"PU",5,0,"PP",5,0,"PC",5,0,"PS",5,0
The unlock handler dies if the first number is >1 but we're still not sure of its exact meaning and how it is set due to some odd behaviour we observed.
Currently the semantic is believed to be:
0=Unknown, 1=Default/Locked, 2=Unknown, 3=Unknown (has to do with attempts), 4=Lockable, 5=Unlocked
While this could seem irrelevant, it probably means that they could try to control the unlocking attempts counter so they can start a full force attack on the total unlocking without making their iPhones useless. One step at time, but steady progress.
These guys are really amazing. If you know what you are doing and want to help, join the effort at the
#iPhone IRC channel. If not, stay tuned for the ready-for-public-consumption versions of their applications.
