Things I thought I could do with my iPhone

[bobolito]

1- Shazam on the iPhone can be used to tag songs. Just record a sample from a song you hear on the radio, and Shazam returns its title and singer. However, you cannot do this if that song is playing on the iphone. If you try this, music will stop, Shazam will freeze, and you'll probably have to reboot your iPhone. Sometimes this might be useful if you are listening to a streaming station which doesn't display the song information. Get another iPhone to tag the song!

2- Veency is a VNC server for your iPhone so you can connect your computer via VNC viewer and remotely use your iphone from your computer. A good use for this is if you need to type a lot of information and the iPhone virtual keypad is too hard for you to use. You can use this to type on your iPhone directly from your computer keyboard. However, keys like Tab, arrow keys, Delete, and numeric keypad do not work because the iPhone's keyboard doesn't support these features. Also, you have to keep on touching the iPhone's screen every time the screen goes to sleep. You cannot wake up the screen from your computer.

3- Pandora and AOL Radio can only play high quality audio via WiFi. When using them via 3G, they output low quality mono audio. There's no way to fool these apps into streaming hi-fi audio via 3G. Last.fm and others don't have this limitation.

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito 1- Shazam on the iPhone can be used to tag songs. Just record a sample from a song you hear on the radio, and Shazam returns its title and singer. However, you cannot do this if that song is playing on the iphone. If you try this, music will stop, Shazam will freeze, and you'll probably have to reboot your iPhone. Sometimes this might be useful if you are listening to a streaming station which doesn't display the song information. Get another iPhone to tag the song! 2- Veency is a VNC server for your iPhone so you can connect your computer via VNC viewer and remotely use your iphone from your computer. A good use for this is if you need to type a lot of information and the iPhone virtual keypad is too hard for you to use. You can use this to type on your iPhone directly from your computer keyboard. However, keys like Tab, arrow keys, Delete, and numeric keypad do not work because the iPhone's keyboard doesn't support these features. Also, you have to keep on touching the iPhone's screen every time the screen goes to sleep. You cannot wake up the screen from your computer. 3- Pandora and AOL Radio can only play high quality audio via WiFi. When using them via 3G, they output low quality mono audio. There's no way to fool these apps into streaming hi-fi audio via 3G. Last.fm and others don't have this limitation.

Hmm, I mostly use wifi for Pandora. I also like Tuner Internet Radio, althougth it is $5.99 now, I got it for $1.99.

I just tried pandora on 3G. It still sounds high quality to me,and stereo. Should it depend on the 3G speeds?

Yeah, I kinda figured that Shazam would not work with the iphone itself. But it is great when you are walking around and hear a piece of music on the somewhere or in the car. That is where I need it.

Thanks for the info.

[bobolito]

Originally Posted by viewfly Hmm, I mostly use wifi for Pandora. I also like Tuner Internet Radio, althougth it is $5.99 now, I got it for $1.99. I just tried pandora on 3G. It still sounds high quality to me,and stereo. Should it depend on the 3G speeds? Yeah, I kinda figured that Shazam would not work with the iphone itself. But it is great when you are walking around and hear a piece of music on the somewhere or in the car. That is where I need it. Thanks for the info.

Tuner for $1.99? LOL! I feel ripped! I did pay $5.99 for it but it has this annoying bug that causes audio to skip like a bad CD. So I can't really use it that much. I can tune to the same station via FStream or any other app with no problems.

Did you try Pandora on 3G using headsets? Did you load the next song after you switched to 3G? You can start listening to Pandora on WiFi and if you switch to 3G in the middle of the song the buffer will continue playing that song in high quality until it's finished even after you've switched to 3G. However, the following song will sound bad because you're loading it from 3G instead of WiFi. Try that and let me know.

In my case, Pandora (and also AOL Radio) sound noticeably poorer over 3G (like a 40kbps MP3), while on WiFi they sound near CD quality.

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito Tuner for $1.99? LOL! I feel ripped! I did pay $5.99 for it but it has this annoying bug that causes audio to skip like a bad CD. So I can't really use it that much. I can tune to the same station via FStream or any other app with no problems. Did you try Pandora on 3G using headsets? Did you load the next song after you switched to 3G? You can start listening to Pandora on WiFi and if you switch to 3G in the middle of the song the buffer will continue playing that song in high quality until it's finished even after you've switched to 3G. However, the following song will sound bad because you're loading it from 3G instead of WiFi. Try that and let me know. In my case, Pandora (and also AOL Radio) sound noticeably poorer over 3G (like a 40kbps MP3), while on WiFi they sound near CD quality.

Well I wouldn't trust my old ears for any comparisons. I tried as you suggested, and now I can hear a difference in audio quality, but it really doesn't bother me much. Mostly I'm on wifi anyway when I use it.

I use only the apple ear buds too.

I've used tuner internet radio for hours with no skipping. Again, mostly wifi. Must be the jailbroken software running in the background

[bobolito]

Actually I got skipping on Tuner before I did the jailbreak, as it was the very first app I installed in my iPhone. Also, the skipping happens on certain stations only, not all. It's inexplicable. But when it does, it makes the station annoying to listen and unusable because it happens randomly and constantly. Must be a problem with the decoder in the player that doesn't work well with certain servers/encoders because when I listen to the same stream using FStream, I have no skipping problems at all. I had the same situation happen with another player on my WinMo PDA where I never had any problems with CorePlayer, but with TCPMP the same stream would skip and jump ahead constantly. I thought it could be packet loss from the 3G network but on WiFi it does the same thing. But hey, as long as I have an app that doesn't have this problem, I'm happy.

See my situation is a little bit different than yours in the sense that I listen to music mostly when I'm driving, so I can't use WiFi to stream audio that much. Basically, I've dumped FM Radio and CDs for internet radio and I don't need to pay a separate subscription fee like satellite radio. I've read this is the wave of the future for the radio industry!

[bobolito]

Here are a couple other things I thought the iPhone could do:

1- You're listening to music and a call comes in. The iPhone will stop the music and let the call through. You answer the call and talk. When you're done, you expect the iPhone to go back to the music automatically. Nope! When you end the call, you have to go back and reopen the music app you were using (like Pandora or Last.fm) and restart the music. I believe automatic music resuming is only allowed in the iPod app because it can run in the background while on the phone while other apps cannot not run in the background. However, my observing this behavior closely leads me to suspect that maybe this is not entirely true. It is possible that the music app is just crashing when the call comes in which is why it doesn't resume when the call ends. Not sure about that one.

2- There are a couple of apps out there (like snappr) that will allow you to take a picture of a barcode using your iPhone camera and the app can scan the barcode, identify the item and offer you current prices on that item from several retailers online. Pretty handy if you are shopping around for the best price. However, the barcode picture has to be taken very closely to the iPhone's camera which doesn't have macro mode. Therefore, the picture comes out blurry (out of focus) and cannot be scanned. You have to buy a special case for the iphone that contains a special macro lens for the iphone camera to let you focus on close objects. Surprisingly, the G1 has macro mode capabilities so this is not a problem.

Here's another one, but this is more of a bug in 2.1: Many times I can be listening to music in my stereo and if a call comes in, when I attempt to answer I disconnect the 3.5mm cable to use the phone directly. Many times this results in the iPhone ending the call. I know the iphone allows you to have a conversation while your stereo is connected, but there are times this doesn't work correctly. Several times I've had the problem when I am listening to music and I receive a call, I touch the screen to answer without disconnecting the audio cable and there's no audio from the other end, and they cannot hear me either so they end up hanging up. But then again, if I disconnect the audio cable the iPhone can end the call right there. This is a major bug. It doesn't do it all the time, but I would say it does it about half the times.

[Jay2TheRescue]

The only music I do on my Tilt is streaming internet radio using WMP. Mine resumes by itself at the end of a call.

-Jay

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito Here are a couple other things I thought the iPhone could do: 1- You're listening to music and a call comes in. The iPhone will stop the music and let the call through. You answer the call and talk. When you're done, you expect the iPhone to go back to the music automatically. Nope! When you end the call, you have to go back and reopen the music app you were using (like Pandora or Last.fm) and restart the music. I believe automatic music resuming is only allowed in the iPod app because it can run in the background while on the phone while other apps cannot not run in the background. However, my observing this behavior closely leads me to suspect that maybe this is not entirely true. It is possible that the music app is just crashing when the call comes in which is why it doesn't resume when the call ends. Not sure about that one. 2- There are a couple of apps out there (like snappr) that will allow you to take a picture of a barcode using your iPhone camera and the app can scan the barcode, identify the item and offer you current prices on that item from several retailers online. Pretty handy if you are shopping around for the best price. However, the barcode picture has to be taken very closely to the iPhone's camera which doesn't have macro mode. Therefore, the picture comes out blurry (out of focus) and cannot be scanned. You have to buy a special case for the iphone that contains a special macro lens for the iphone camera to let you focus on close objects. Surprisingly, the G1 has macro mode capabilities so this is not a problem. Here's another one, but this is more of a bug in 2.1: Many times I can be listening to music in my stereo and if a call comes in, when I attempt to answer I disconnect the 3.5mm cable to use the phone directly. Many times this results in the iPhone ending the call. I know the iphone allows you to have a conversation while your stereo is connected, but there are times this doesn't work correctly. Several times I've had the problem when I am listening to music and I receive a call, I touch the screen to answer without disconnecting the audio cable and there's no audio from the other end, and they cannot hear me either so they end up hanging up. But then again, if I disconnect the audio cable the iPhone can end the call right there. This is a major bug. It doesn't do it all the time, but I would say it does it about half the times.

I going to disagree with you on this one.

1. Using the supplied Apple mic/earbuds:

a. Pandora: While listening, Pandora interrupts, the call is answered, and then upon hangup,Pandora reopens to my station and the music plays. It did skip to the next selection (or maybe it was time to anyway).

b. FM Tuner: The FM Tuner application reopens to my favorites, but I have to just start the listed station again.

c AOL Radio: Same as FM Tuner; the appl reopens after the call ends, and I just need to reselect from my listed favorites, ie the page I had opened anyway.

These are not really big deals to me. So the appl is not crashing and it returns to the appl after the call hangs up.

I notice something similar Safari. When it does crash and returns to the home screen. I just restart Safari and it takes me right back to the same web page I was viewing. That's great, if it's going to crash.

The mic and headphones work fine.

2. I saw the bar code appl, and had to laugh on how that would work. It's clear the camera does not have a macro. How did that pass the mustard test at the apple store?

3. Using the Apple mic/earbud while using the iPod and disconnecting them does not end the call for me.

[bobolito]

Originally Posted by viewfly a. Pandora: While listening, Pandora interrupts, the call is answered, and then upon hangup,Pandora reopens to my station and the music plays. It did skip to the next selection (or maybe it was time to anyway). b. FM Tuner: The FM Tuner application reopens to my favorites, but I have to just start the listed station again. c AOL Radio: Same as FM Tuner; the appl reopens after the call ends, and I just need to reselect from my listed favorites, ie the page I had opened anyway. These are not really big deals to me. So the appl is not crashing and it returns to the appl after the call hangs up. 3. Using the Apple mic/earbud while using the iPod and disconnecting them does not end the call for me.

That's why I suspect these are just bugs because it doesn't happen all the time. At first, I thought it was just coincidence or that maybe I did something wrong, but recently I am paying close attention to these things. It's not something that started happening all the sudden. This is something I've been observing since day one, but because it doesn't happen all the time or every day, it is hard to determine if it is a bug or "pilot error", so the more it happens, the more I am convinced that there is some kind of bug in the iPhone causing this. It's not something you're going to determine by just trying it once or twice to see if you can reproduce the problem, it's during casual use over the course of time and then eventually you can reach some conclusion. On top of that, you have to add other variables to the mix, such as the fact that I stream via 3G all the time while you do it over WiFi. You use Pandora more than I do, and I use FStream which has some other bugs of its own. But even using Pandora I had the problem where it disconnected the call when I unplugged the audio cable. But this happened only once so I thought maybe I did something wrong. But now that I've been looking at this more closely, and remembering back, I'm beginning to think that maybe I didn't do anything wrong and this is more likely the result of some bug in the firmware. On other occasions, however, I've had Pandora resume after the call ends normally. Bottomline is, there are other variables at play here and so we're going to find different results from our experiences.

Just for the record, I haven't had problems when using the iPhone/Ipod mic/earbud, the call ending problem has happened when using a regular stereo audio cable connected to my stereo system in my car or at home. That's why I specified that it was connected to my stereo system in my previous post. So here you have another variable that might be an issue in our findings. If you look at the iPhone earbuds, they have one more contact than a standard 3.5mm stereo audio cable, so the iPhone "knows" when you connect a standard audio cable and when you connect its proprietary earbuds. There is software code that behaves one way or another depending on what you plug in to the iPhone, and there seems to be a problem with that piece of code.

The Safari crashing issue, well yeah, it's getting on my nerves too so I am kinda learning not to rely on it for regular browsing. I rather get to a computer. I have noticed that it does return to the last page you were in when it crashed, but not all the time. 90% of the times it will return to the last page. The other 10% it will return to the page you had before that page. So there's a little bit of inconsistency in the crash behavior. Again, we might be using different pages when Safari crashes, so we'll probably have different behavior because of that.

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito The Safari crashing issue, well yeah, it's getting on my nerves too so I am kinda learning not to rely on it for regular browsing. I rather get to a computer. I have noticed that it does return to the last page you were in when it crashed, but not all the time. 90% of the times it will return to the last page. The other 10% it will return to the page you had before that page. So there's a little bit of inconsistency in the crash behavior. Again, we might be using different pages when Safari crashes, so we'll probably have different behavior because of that.

Yep, you use the phone differently than I do.

Safari almost never crashes on me. I use it a LOT too. It's my main browser at home sometimes and the main feature I use with the iPhone, more than music. It's returned 100% to the same page. So do other appls, like the New York Times appl.
I rely on Safari alot, and don't understand most of the complaints over at HoFo with it. But then they get a lot of strange behaviors over there.

[bobolito]

What happens is many HoFoers use Safari for websites like HoFo, Gizmodo, Engadget, etc. and I've been able to prove that Safari can't stand those sites. Every time I load one of those in about a minute or so Safari shuts down. So of course Safari will be useless for them. It seems that Safari is not well suited for complicated websites (until they fix that problem). That's why rather than using the full Netflix site (which also crashes Safari) I use the mobile version which I never have a problem with. First time I tried to browse the Netflix full website, I was browsing through Recent Releases which has a horizontal banner that you can scroll to see the movie titles and it's a flash module. A few clicks later while scrolling that flash module Safari decided to crash on me. To be a little more specific, it seems that sites that use flash animations (banner ads, or menus) are the ones that hang and crash Safari, and today, most of the popular websites out there use some form of flash, either for menus or some kind of animation or presentation.

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito What happens is many HoFoers use Safari for websites like HoFo, Gizmodo, Engadget, etc. and I've been able to prove that Safari can't stand those sites. Every time I load one of those in about a minute or so Safari shuts down. So of course Safari will be useless for them. It seems that Safari is not well suited for complicated websites (until they fix that problem). That's why rather than using the full Netflix site (which also crashes Safari) I use the mobile version which I never have a problem with. First time I tried to browse the Netflix full website, I was browsing through Recent Releases which has a horizontal banner that you can scroll to see the movie titles and it's a flash module. A few clicks later while scrolling that flash module Safari decided to crash on me. To be a little more specific, it seems that sites that use flash animations (banner ads, or menus) are the ones that hang and crash Safari, and today, most of the popular websites out there use some form of flash, either for menus or some kind of animation or presentation.

Gee! I've used Hofo and WA web sites half a dozen times a day or more, everyday since July, with Safari on my iPhone with almost ZERO problems. Including responding to posts, but mostly reading. I'll spend 10's of minutes on each site too, for each visit.

So I don't think I see any proof of that!

[bobolito]

In that case, consider yourself lucky.

Which HoFo website are you using in your iPhone, the WAP version or the full site? Of course, with the WAP site you're likely not to have any problems. How about Gizmodo and Engadget? did you try those?

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito In that case, consider yourself lucky. Which HoFo website are you using in your iPhone, the WAP version or the full site? Of course, with the WAP site you're likely not to have any problems. How about Gizmodo and Engadget? did you try those?

I use the full site for HoFo and WA only. I never went to the other two.

Call me lucky!

[spleck]

Originally Posted by bobolito What happens is many HoFoers use Safari for websites like HoFo, Gizmodo, Engadget, etc.

Just an FYI: Engadget and all the weblogs sites have an iphone version at i.engadget.com, i.autoblog.com, etc. Without 3G, the low complexity is nice. Gizmodo has a mobile version at m.gizmodo.com, but I haven't been impressed with it.

I'm really surprised there are no great mobile/iphone versions of the forum engines for WA, HoFo, etc.

[Charlyee]

Originally Posted by spleck I'm really surprised there are no great mobile/iphone versions of the forum engines for WA, HoFo, etc.

There is a great mobile version of WA that you can choose from the drop down list in the right bottom corner. I believe it is called "WA Mobile Skin".

Please give it a try
Palm850/v0100 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 7.11)

[spleck]

Originally Posted by Charlyee There is a great mobile version of WA that you can choose from the drop down list in the right bottom corner. I believe it is called "WA Mobile Skin".

That IS a lot better. I'm just surprised there's no iPhone, or user customized versions for many sites. ESPN's iPhone site is probably one of the best adaptations for the iPhone and makes me think of all the things that COULD be.

[bobolito]

Fox News has a great iPhone version of their website. It even has videos you can play.

http://iphone.foxnews.com

[bobolito]

Here's another thing I thought I could do with my iPhone:

- Set the alarm to go off at a certain time, then turn off the iPhone (completely off) and expect the alarm to go off. I just learned that the iPhone cannot do this. In addition, if the alarm is missed under those circumstances, the iPhone will not sound the alarm when the user powers it up. Normally, regular phones can be powered off completely and an alarm event will power them up at the designated time.

Anyone know if WinMo devices, Blackberries and Treos power themselves up on an alarm event? What about the G1?

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by bobolito Here's another thing I thought I could do with my iPhone: - Set the alarm to go off at a certain time, then turn off the iPhone (completely off) and expect the alarm to go off. I just learned that the iPhone cannot do this. In addition, if the alarm is missed under those circumstances, the iPhone will not sound the alarm when the user powers it up. Normally, regular phones can be powered off completely and an alarm event will power them up at the designated time. Anyone know if WinMo devices, Blackberries and Treos power themselves up on an alarm event? What about the G1?

Yeah my Nokias could do that. Pretty neat but I never turn mine off, so a mute point.
BB's are never off. Yep no off switch. Only removing the battery turns them off.
Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5F136 Safari/525.20

[Charlyee]

Originally Posted by viewfly Yeah my Nokias could do that. Pretty neat but I never turn mine off, so a mute point. BB's are never off. Yep no off switch. Only removing the battery turns them off. Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5F136 Safari/525.20

Same with my Treo 750 and Treo Pro.

[Jay2TheRescue]

I remember my iPAQ never shut off, but on the Tilt if I hold the power switch in for a moment a dialog box pops up to give you the option to completely turn off the device.


-Jay

[Charlyee]

Originally Posted by Jay2TheRescue I remember my iPAQ never shut off, but on the Tilt if I hold the power switch in for a moment a dialog box pops up to give you the option to completely turn off the device. -Jay

Yes, I remember my QTEK 9100 being the same way.

So does the alarm work in your Tilt even if is turned off?
Palm850/v0100 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 7.11)

[Jay2TheRescue]

I don't know Charlyee. I've never tried. If its "completely turned off" I won't get calls.

-Jay

[bobolito]

Yet one more thing I thought I could do with my iPhone:

- Use it as a DJ for a party!

Yes, the iPod player in the iPhone plays all your music, but what if you have it connected to your stereo, playing music in a party and all the sudden someone calls you? The music stops and the party stops! The only way you can avoid this is by removing the SIM or forwarding calls to another number. Let's not forget this is an iPhone, not an iPod!

[spleck]

Originally Posted by bobolito Yet one more thing I thought I could do with my iPhone: - Use it as a DJ for a party! Yes, the iPod player in the iPhone plays all your music, but what if you have it connected to your stereo, playing music in a party and all the sudden someone calls you? The music stops and the party stops! The only way you can avoid this is by removing the SIM or forwarding calls to another number. Let's not forget this is an iPhone, not an iPod!

Airplane mode should work too.

If you're at home, a better solution is iTunes on your computer and an AirportExpress connected to your stereo. You can use the Remote on your iPhone to control iTunes and phone calls shouldn't affect your computer. There's other non-apple solutions to the wireless streaming too, but I'm not sure what works with Remote.

[spleck]

Originally Posted by viewfly BB's are never off. Yep no off switch. Only removing the battery turns them off.

I have found that submerging a phone underwater turns them off regardless of whether they have an off switch. The advantage is that it also works on phones with a sealed battery. Not sure of any "disadvantages".

[viewfly]

Originally Posted by spleck I have found that submerging a phone underwater turns them off regardless of whether they have an off switch. The advantage is that it also works on phones with a sealed battery. Not sure of any "disadvantages".

I guess the alarm is a little harder to hear underwater...

[bobolito]

Originally Posted by spleck I have found that submerging a phone underwater turns them off regardless of whether they have an off switch. The advantage is that it also works on phones with a sealed battery. Not sure of any "disadvantages".

LMAOL!

I think the only disadvantage would be inability to get the phone to turn on again.

[spleck]

Originally Posted by bobolito LMAOL! I think the only disadvantage would be inability to get the phone to turn on again.

Yes, I discovered that after my son slobbered all over my previous Moto. I believe it was his way of claiming my phone as a toy.