The 4 new iPhone features I use most
Apple (AAPL) isn't scheduled to release the iPhone 3.0 until Wednesday, but like a lot of Apple watchers, I've been living with the Gold Master version for the past week. (It's available on the Web if you know where to look.)
The new firmware is a significant improvement over the old, but not in the ways I had expected. Cut & paste – the feature I'd lobbied for most heavily — can be a lifesaver, but it's not something I've used a lot so far. Ditto for landscape e-mail.
On the other hand, I find myself depending heavily on features I'd never thought much about — like Safari's new password autofill.
Apple's list of the top 20 new features of the iPhone 3.0 — starting with Cut, Copy & Paste and Landscape Keyboard — are listed on its website.
These, however, are the features that have been getting the heaviest use around my house:
- E-mail search. Spotlight search, which lets you search the entire contents of your iPhone, has been getting the most attention. But what I've been using most is the search bar that appears at the top of my e-mail inbox. If what I want to find isn't among the 50 e-mails stored on my iPhone, the search engine digs into the thousands of stored on my server and starts working its way through those.
- Safari autofill. Any browser worth its salt ought to be smart enough to remember the name and password you use on the sites you go to most often. I don't know why this wasn't available on the iPhone from Day 1, but now that it is I find myself visiting sites I had avoided because I was either too lazy to enter the password or too absent-minded to remember it.
- Automatic Wi-Fi login. This is a real timesaver if you spend a lot of your life in airports, Starbucks (SBUX)Â and other places with Wi-Fi hotspots that refuse to remember your mobile device from one location to another.
- Find My iPhone. I haven't really needed this yet — I'm pretty good about keeping my cellphone close at hand — but this is the feature I demonstrate the most because it's just so cool. If you have a Mobile Me account and you misplace your iPhone, you can see the phone's location on a Google (GOOG)Â map and send it a pinging noise and a "please return me" message. If it's lost or stolen for good, you can hit a kill button and remotely wipe all your data — passwords, secret phone numbers, embarrassing photos, etc. If the iPhone comes back home, just plug it into your computer and all your data will be restored.
I have two complaints with Find My iPhone, however: 1) it's turned off by default, something a lot of users probably won't discover until they've lost their phones and it's too late to turn it on, and 2) for reasons I don't understand, it only displays the iPhone's location within a one-block radius. See below:
Between Wi-Fi triangulation and GPS, Mobile Me ought to be able to locate the device to within a few yards. Seems like an easy fix. I'll be watching for it when iPhone 3.0 goes live officially on Wednesday June 17. The new iPhone 3G S arrives two days later.
Andy Tyler is wrong about the accuracy of civilian GPS. Check out the sport of geocaching.com! There are thousands upon thousands of small matchbook and altoids tin sized containers hidden all over the world by geocachers, who track and find these items using only their GPS. I have done this over 900 times and I can tell you that the accuracy of my GPS is usually BETTER than a 10 foot radius! And most of the time, when you let the device measure in place for about a minute…. ITS DEAD ON! (like standing on top of it) It certainly could track the iphone signal to within 10 – 20 feet. I'm guessing they opt not to based on privacy concerns.
Just a heads up — the "Find My iPhone" function is OFF by default. Not only that, they didn't make a separate "Find My iPhone" switch under General. Instead, you have to go to the Mail settings and select your Mobile Me account. Not thought out very well.
Did you guys ever consider that civilian GPS is not pinpoint accurate? This is to prevent other countries from using the technology for their evil purposes. Civilian GPS is accurate to 10 feet at best, but a block sounds about right.
JJ in Denver, as I understand it if you select "All" for searching, it will search email body text as well. Not really intuitive, but there you go.
Find my iPhone was on the money for me. The blue circle was about the size of the of the living room I tested it in, it just took a few minutes to close in.
I don't have any actual knowledge RE: the 1 block radius, however, having worked for OnStar, which has a device installed in GM cars for locating the car when stolen, I know that they could not give the location of the car to the owner of the car, for reasons of safety of the customer (i.e., if a thief has stolen your car, and you go to confront the thief and the thief then kills you, Onstar could be in legal trouble there). The feature on the iPhone, I suspect, is to help you determine that the phone is where you think it is, give or take. If it has been picked up by an evildoer, you could then show the police the general vicinity that the phone is in and they could take it from there.
@JimmyD: You mean brick it.
Since before 3.0 iTunes requires you to unlock the iphone for syncing. Wouldn't it be possible to require that the iphone be unlocked in order to be able to turn it off? Restarts remain enabled, though.
Anyways, pulling the SIM card trumps anything you do, 
I found a full iPhone 3gs 3.0 review including NEW damage warranty and hidden features at http://www.dailypennies.com SWEET!!!
Clearly thos of you that don't want to see this used nefariously do not have children. I'm making a track your child app for this!!
Dad 101…
@JayKay: excellent point and better feature if it had it. I am sure all that would be required would be a software upgrade.
my question is should I get it? I am up for a upgrade May 2010, but some of the features that are not in the software update are enticing. I like my current 3G iPhone but I am suffering from mediaphoria. Wanting the newest and best. However, for all I know next year in June there will be a new one. iphone 2007, iPhone 3G 2008, iPhone 3GS 2009, whats next year the iPhone 4GST? It runs on 4G, the "S" is for speed, and the "T" is for transformer.
Does anyone who is using 3.0 know if it finally supports Mobile Me aliases? I really NEED that feature supported.
I think there should be a passcode to turn Find My iPhone on or off on the iPhone. This would make it a much better security feature. As it is, it's good for showing off the iPhone, but all a thief has to do is turn it off and that's the end of any benefit of Find My iPhone.
As for searching mail, as far as I can tell, it only searches to, from and subject. I does not appear to search the body. Am I missing something?
Could I hook up a 3G laptop USB type device to an iPhone, and then talk on skype unlimited for cheaper than an iPhone contract would run from AT&T?
ex ped: You don't need the USB device. There's a Skype app for that.
"FYI. the gps with google maps will only pinpoint the direct location if the phone is moving." Posted By JR, troy, mi
Sorry, JR, but GPS is unaffected by motion. The more likely scenario is that when PED hit "Find my phone", the phone was on his desk or his belt inside the building. GPS doesn't work worth a hoot inside buildings. Inside the building, the iPhone reverts to cell tower triangulation and, as a last resort, SkyHook, which can only locate your device to several hundred feet at best, 1/2 mile at worst.
If PED left his phone on a park bench, it may work better (but may not still be there by the time he gets to his computer).
ex ped: PED here. I'm in my leafy backyard and based on the blue dot in the Maps app, my iPhone knows precisely where it's at. Mobile Me, however, is still showing a one-block radius. (My daughter tried following me on my computer as I wandered down the street, and the resolution never got any better.)
Wow thats a Pretty cool feature… but Dad you never loose your phone
ex ped: That's right, Lizzie. But if your mom ever gets an iPhone, I'll always know where she is — or at least where she left it.
FYI. the gps with google maps will only pinpoint the direct location if the phone is moving. If it is stationary, google maps will only be able to locate it approximate location. Either way, its still better than losing you phone.
First of all, you've obviously never jailbroken an iPhone. Having the Find my Phone feature to lock it would be a joke, as I have unlocked several iPhones through the free jailbroken software on the net. Wiping it is much better. And the reason for it being turned off in default has to do with having a MobileMe subscription which not everyone will opt for. Why have a feature turned on if it is not being used? Lastly, you say you had a hard time finding it. Duh! That's the point should someone find your phone and try to turn that feature off and continue to use the phone.
Are you kidding me wondering why its limited it to a 1-block radius? You have to prevent people with ulterior motives from using it for nefarious purposes. Same concept as the limitations of civilian GPS vs. the military GPS system guiding a bomb down an airvent of an enemy bunker.
You clearly haven't used the find my iphone feature much. You should comment about how the feature is disabled on your phone by default (and difficult to locate I might add). How many people do you think are going to realize this AFTER they lose the phone and go to locate it? Also, the wipe is nice, but why not lock it? The wipe is going to restore to your defaults (go bye enabled find my phone). Plus, locking it would make it useless to someone who finds it. When you wipe it, it's now valuable to them. How about this, if the phone is on vibrate, and you ping it through find my phone, it actually overrides the vibrate and makes a sound. Pretty cool, unless you had your volume turned down. Why didn't they turn the volume all the way up in the override? Good in ideas, lame in execution.
ex ped: Good point about it being off by default. I'll add that.
Not having a chaperone type service is exactly why I will not buy an iphone. I love the chaperone application that verizon has everything else pales in comparison.