Dial 0 for Opinion: What the iPhone SDK is missing

Now that we've had a few days to digest the information coming out from Apple about the iPhone (read review) SDK and application environment we have to admit that we're pretty impressed. Apple seems to have avoided many of the pitfalls that people were concerned about, including allowing free applications, opening the SDK to anyone who wants to develop and making publication and availability of applications accessible. That's not to say that there are no drawbacks, however, and some important things still need to be worked out. Read on for our top items of concern.

Multi-Tasking: One of the biggest concerns raised about iPhone applications is that those developed by third parties are not allowed to run in the background. This could have serious impacts on things like instant messaging clients, twitter clients and other applications where you want to be constantly connected. We understand Apple's desire to keep third party applications from creating stability problems by running constantly in the background, but the simple fact of the matter is that some system is going to have to be devised to allow this on at least a limited basis. On possibility is allowing developers to create plugins for their applications for a background notification system that can monitor a data connection and notify the user when something needs their attention. Whatever happens the current system will seriously hobble some applications and constrain the potential usefulness of the iPhone as a device.

System Access: Another major concern is that applications will run in a sandbox that precludes developers from creating system level enhancements to the iPhone. It's likely that Apple is both concerned about stability and wants to ensure that the iPhone user experience is consistent across devices in making this choice. We believe, however, that users should be able to make those decisions for themselves, and it would be great if developers could expand the iPhone's system level capabilities by adding things like copy & paste, program managers and interface enhancers, amongst others. If Apple does not create some kind of system for such things to be developed within their rules you can be sure that the thriving unofficial application space will continue to fill this need for power users that want such utilities.

Donation-ware & Trials: Apple's distribution model for the iPhone has both its drawbacks and bonuses. On the one hand having all applications in a single repository means that users can easily find the application they might want or need. It does, however, put limitations on how developers can monetize their applications. We're willing to wait for more information on this, but in particular we wonder how Apple will handle developers who want to create trial versions of their applications and those who want to put out applications that are free but where you can easily donate to the developer if you want. It would be nice to see support for both of these models in the final iPhone Application store.

Data Access: Apple has already indicated that there will be limitations in the type and amount of data transfer that applications can engage in. For example Steve Jobs indicated that VOIP applications will only be able to use the Wi-Fi connection and applications that are "data-hogs" are already on the list of applications that can be disallowed. Regarding the former it makes sense to limit cellular data access for VOIP applications when the iPhone is limited to the slower EDGE network, but what about when a faster 3G data connection is available? On other platforms you can easily use such a connection for VOIP services. It's also inevitable that as faster data connections become available on the iPhone you can create more powerful data-based applications. For example what if someone where to create an application that allows you to upload photos to Flickr? Would that be limited to Wi-Fi even if a fast cellular data connection were available? What about Bit-torrent? How these limitations involve could have a significant impact on whether the iPhone platform can keep up with the Joneses as a data device.

File Access: Another limitation that has come up is that applications will only be able to access data stored within the sandbox the application works in or via an approved API, for example photos and contacts are available to applications. This could significantly limit the opportunity for applications to play off of each other. For example can you create an image editor that will then save the image back to the iPhone's regular image store so next time you open that image up in the native photo viewer you will see the changes? Similarly with music, will Amazon be able to create an application that allows you to download music directly to the phone and have that music become available in iTunes? If you receive a Word document in an email will a document editor application be able to access that file and save it back to the native store so you can email it back out? Once again this is an area where third party applications on other platforms are not so constrained and it could hobble many innovative opportunities for iPhone developers.

Synchronization: Something that hasn't been addressed by Apple at all, so far, is whether third-party applications will be able to synchronize data with your computer. This will likely be particularly important for PIM applications, document editors or financial applications. For example I use the program OmniFocus for task management on my computer. They have already indicated that they will be developing a version for the iPhone, but what I want to know is whether tasks will be synchronized between my desktop and the iPhone whenever I tether? Similarly I use iBank for financial management and it would be great to have an iPhone application that would allow me to add new transactions or just view my current balance, but if I add transactions on the iPhone application how will they get back onto my desktop application? This problem could be dealt with by using web based synchronization options like a WebDAV server, but this could create security concerns if you're not hosting the service and create complications for users if they need to figure out how to host it. It would be much preferable to have an Apple approved way to create conduits into iTunes so applications can synchronize data between their computer and applications on the iPhone.

We're sure that as the next few months develop we'll get answers to some of these concerns, whether they turn out to be satisfactory is another question. Some concerns probably won't be dealt with for quite awhile longer, however, if ever as Apple struggles to create a whole new application eco-system for the iPhone. To be fair we mention that other platforms, like Windows Mobile and Symbian, have addressed these concerns, but these platforms are also much more mature. How Apple takes the best from what these platforms offer while still providing a stable and powerful environment will be key to how successful the iPhone is in the long-term. Apple's made some good decisions already, we hope they continue to do so.