The iPhone 3.0 Upgrade: 100 New Features for iPhone Users

Once an iPhone has entered your life you’ll probably find it difficult to imagine living without one. As great as they are, however - like with all new technology - as soon as you’ve mastered it and gotten over the "wow factor" you’ll quickly be finding faults and thinking of ways it could be improved. That’s where software updates come into play. . .but you never know for sure if the improvements will be the ones you’re looking for.

Here’s some news that might be of interest to you if you’re an iPhone devotee. If you haven’t heard already, iPhone 3.0 is on its way. Apples claim that with it will come 100 new features. If you’re a developer, you can look forward to over 1,000 new programming tools for the iPhone. You can expect to see the next update for your iPhone early this summer, so let’s take a look at what it could mean for you and your i-Life.

iPhone Cut-and-Paste

An iPhone cut-and-paste function – finally! You take this for granted in Word or other text editors, yet without it you’re reduced to actually writing something down (yes, with a pen and paper) and retyping it when you switch to another application. The new function is supposed to be pretty user friendly, and involves double tapping the text you want, and adjusting to select text with expandable "handles."

Push Notification

Your iPhone is not a true multi-tasker, but the upgrade will allow apps to work even if you’ve closed them, with the primary program running in the foreground. At the moment, only Mail, SMS and of course, the phone function can run in the background. IPhone 3.0 will introduce "push notification," which allows the phone to maintain a persistent data connection to an Apple server.

Bluetooth and Peer-to-Peer Connections.

iPhones will finally be able to talk directly to each other without an intermediary Internet connection, putting its Bluetooth technology to full use. Instead of being limited primarily to headset connections, now the technology will allow new possibilities in the form of peer-to-peer connection. Uses? Think of what you can do if another iPhone user is nearby: chatting, exchanging contact information, sharing files. . .and more.

Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS)

Ever heard of MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service)? It will be the new SMS app for sending messages, and goes way beyond the standard text messaging capabilities. You’ll be able to send photos, sound files, contact information in vCard format (used by the OS X address book) and Google Map location information. You’ll also be able to send more than one picture as an email attachment and if ATT&T cooperates, iPhone 3.0 could allow tethering, or sharing the 3G Internet connection with your Mac (or even PC). This sounds great, but one potential downside is that you will probably have to pay more for the upgraded capabilities.

iPhone Search

iPhone search capabilities will come with the upgrade. Like cut and paste, searching your applications - especially your email – is something you take for granted until you find yourself scrolling through hundreds of emails or manually searching through other files. iPhone 3.0 should add Search to most applications, such as Calendar, iPod, Mail and Notes. Spotlight will appear for system wide searches after a simple slide left from the Home screen. . .and if we’re lucky, developers may be able to use these search features in their own apps.

Better iPhone GPS

The iPhone is great for it’s basic GPS capabilities, and these will be improved in 3.0. This may open up the possibility for developers to create maps that come closer in design, function and usability to current navigation and GPS software like that available from Tom Tom, Garmin and Magellan. This might make mean a more useful iPhone GPS for the average consumer.

For iPhone aficionados to iPhone developers, iPhone 3.0 is one more reason to look forward to summer.

MacUsersGuide offers the latest news, reviews, how-tos and expert opinions on everything Mac users need to know. Find out more about the latest developments with the iPhone3G.