In today's iCafe Spotlight, we focus on iPhone Social and how to update your status. Updating your status lets other members in our iPhone community know what's happening in your life. You might have noticed the "Activity Stream" in the right hand column of the site. This constantly updates as members update their status, add applications, post photos and more in iPhone Social. Those of you familiar with Facebook, updating your status is no different here at iCafe and it's a great way to interact with fellow members. As a reminder, status updates is just one of the requirements needed to take part in our "Face the Community" contest, featuring more winners than any of our previous contests! Updating your status takes seconds! Here's how to update your status.
Registered members (not a member, click here) click on the Social tab to visit iPhone Social.
Click on the pencil icon to the right of your Profile Picture. This will allow you to type your status update. Click save and your status will appear in our activity stream.
If you find yourself watching movies on your iPhone or perhaps you use the nifty Night Stand clock (App Store link), then you might find yourself in the market for stand that proudly displays your iPhone. Sure you can pick up an iPhone holster that doubles for a stand for under $10, but what's the fun in that. The folks at Geeky Gadgets via CNET have created a stand using a few pencils and rubber bands.
With a staggering amount of mobile devices on the web you want to take a look how your site looks on the hottest new devices such as Apple's 3G iPhone. As much as I love design, when I'm mobile and looking for content I appreciate clean simple accessibility.
Smartphones like the iPhone do have full html browsers but navigating through pages and links can be time consuming on non-mobile ready sites. Optimizing your site for mobile readiness reduces loading times and makes your site work a lot smoother with Edge or 3G connections. Additionally it will avoid displaying unsupported formats on your site such as flash (sigh ....).
Last week, a story in the NY Times alluded to the fact that Opera mini had bee rejected by Apple because it "competes with Safari". Mac insider John Gruber of Daring Fireball did some digging and according to his sources, Opera Software has not submitted Opera Mini to Apple. Gruber goes on to say that if Opera Mini were submitted, it could very well be declined for violating guideline 3.3.2 of the iPhone SDK Agreement.
According to MacRumors, developers have received the second version of the 2.2 firmware beta. The first 2.2 beta included elements of Google Street View, as we reported then, and this 2nd beta fully enables this feature.
Street View on the iPhone will make its mapping capabilities very similar to those of the new T-Mobile G1. Street View enables a realistic view of your current location in Google Maps, and also includes a compass function that automatically adjusts the view as you move around on the G1. Street view is currently available on Google Maps online (pictured below), and iPhoneYap has pictures of how it will look on the iPhone in the 2.2 firmware.
Hottrix, an independent developer who created iBeer, has filed suit against Coors for copyright infringement. Both companies released beer applications on July 11th, however Hottrix claims their app iBeer was designed before iPint which happens to be the Coors version. Hottrix points to a 2007 video that shows the use of the iPhone's accellerometer to pour the virtual beer.
Mintyboost is offering a kit that transforms an Altoids Chewing Gum tin into a portable iPhone USB charger that works with both iPhone and iPhone 3G. It also works with the iPod family. This kit isn't for novices though, as it requires a soldering kit and a steady hand. The Mintyboost kit will set you back $19.50. You'll need to secure a tin of Altoid's Gum, as it's surprisingly out of stock on their site. For all the sorted details on how to create this dandy portable USB iPhone charger, check out forum member psylichon's how to guide in our forums .
