It really isn’t a great secret that jailbreaking iOS devices is an extremely popular pastime and the activity keeps on growing with the passage of time. iOS device owners often go down the jailbreaking route for a number of different reasons, some jailbreak to enhance the stock experience and alter the way the system works, and some do it to drastically change the visuals of the operating system, while some merely use it as a mean to gain a software based unlock to use their devices on unofficial networks.
Developers who produce software for mobile smartphones and tablets are always looking to push the boundaries and are readily including the-next-big-technologies in their apps. In the past, we have seen apps reduced to minimalistic works of beauty, decisions made to remove buttons and houses navigation handled entirely by user gestures, and more recently, we are starting to see the serious emergence of augmented reality in mobile applications.
We are all involved in a modern world that is connected through social media and made smaller by gadgets like the iPhone and iPad which allow us all to remain in constant contact with each other. Apple has provided us with the technology to stay connected, but the development community also has a responsibility to provide us with apps that want us to connect to one another and share our interactions.
Anyone who is an avid user of the top of the range smartphone or tablet such as the iPhone 4S, iPad or the new Google Nexus 7 tablet will appreciate the difference that a beautiful looking app can bring. Functional apps are all well and good, after all, we expect a purchase or download to fulfill its purpose but an app that does what it says on the tin while looking beautiful pushes the user-experience to a new level.
For those amongst us are who registered members of the Twitter micro-blogging service and also happen to own an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch will know that when it comes to choosing a Twitter app, it is a difficult choice. Out of the multiple Twitter apps available on the App Store, they all pretty much offer the same experience packaged into a different user-interface, that was until Tweetbot came along and raised the bar with an entirely custom UI mixed with great gestures and user interactions.
With Apple actively working on the sixth-generation iPhone which is likely to see a public release towards the end of this year, users of older generation devices like the iPhone 3GS and even the original iPhone could be forgiven for thinking that the time has come to look for an upgrade or purchasing a more up-to-date unit. The core functionality of the iPhone has remained stable since 2007 but the hardware has greatly improved with each release, with the most notable changes coming in the form of the Retina display with the iPhone 4 and incremental processor and memory upgrades.
Touch is a now the dominant method of input for mobile devices. Although touchscreen based devices have existed for a long time, they were popularized and made user friendly with the introduction of the iPhone in 2007 and iPad in 2010. In his original iPhone keynote, Steve Jobs categorically stated that if the device requires a stylus, you’re doing something wrong. And we tend to agree with him to some extent, emphasis on extent.
Research In Motion's BlackBerry OS is clearly struggling to maintain relevance in the current consumer market, but with all three of the major mobile operating systems having taken steps to implement some description of voice-recognition functionality, it appears BlackBerry will also be joining the party, too.
Although Android is quite a distance ahead of the competition in terms of reach and overall user numbers, it does have its caveats, and one glaring issue prominent from the beginning has been that of audio latency. Android Jelly Bean (4.1) has just released to a number of devices, and although it is a significant improvement on previous iterations (ICS saw playback latency of around 88ms), the audio lag issue still exists.
With a considerable amount of ground to make up already on the various app hubs available from the likes of Apple, Microsoft needs to deliver the goods with its Windows 8 Store, and the Redmond company has now released details via the MSDN Blog of how its new store will distribute apps.
