Guide to native applications for the iPhone

The world of iPhone-native applications has evolved tremendously in the past few weeks. Once requiring a lengthy jailbreaking and installation process and plagued by a dearth of utility, third-party iPhone binaries can now be easily installed (at least under Mac OS X) through a GUI that requires no user interaction with commands or scripts and have matured from proofs-of-concept to include functions that are of use to the average iPhone owner.

Installing the applications There are two viable methods for getting third party iPhone application binaries onto the device, one much more elegant than the other.

The first, and generally superior method is to use Installer.app, which is now accompanied by a GUI-based Mac OS X application that will literally do everything for you. Just download an launch the application, select your iPhone firmware version, and let it do its thing. In short order, you will have the Installer icon on your iPhone’s home screen.

The second is to use our 5-step guide, which requires significant use of the Terminal, and doesn’t offer a method for installing applications directly from your phone. The only advantage to this option is that it allows you to install any application you can download over the Web from your computer. Since the iPhone can’t yet download applications through Safari and install them, this is the only option for items that aren’t listed in the sources scanned by Installer.app. Fortunately, most of the useful applications are listed in Installer.app’s sources.

Your best bet is to put Installer.app on your iPhone, then install OpenSSH (under “System” in the Installer.app interface) immediately. You can then use the fifth step in our 5-step guide to transfer any applications you can’t find through Installer.app to your iPhone.

Once you have Installer.app on your iPhone, there are a few things you’ll want to do immediately:

• Tap Update and check if there is a new release of Installer.app available. If one is listed, tap it, then tap the Update button to make sure you are running the latest version.
• Tap Install, then tap Community Sources and install it. This will dramatically increase the number of applications available for download and installation through Installer.app
• Install Launcher, listed under System. This application will allow you to access all of the other applications installed on your iPhone — a major point since the iPhone’s home screen is limited to sixteen icons, so you won’t, by default, be able to access more than four third-party applications. As such, Launcher should be the first third-party application aside from Installer.app and Community Sources you install, so it will appear on your home screen and allow access to other apps.

• As aforementioned, install OpenSSH under System. You will also want to install BSD Subsystem right away. The former will let you transfer applications from your desktop system and the latter is necessary for proper operation of OpenSSH and some other applications.

Useful applications

Now that your iPhone is primed to receive and make use of third-party binaries, let’s take a look at what is available. Unfortunately, many of the current binaries still fall into the purely demonstrative category or are of little use. A select few, however, enhance the functionality of the iPhone in meaningful ways. Make sure you’ve installed Community Sources as mentioned above, then check out these apps:

SendSong Under “Multimedia” in Installer.app, this application will let you pick any song stored on your iPhone and play it, send it via email, or, most usefully, add as a ringtone. Uses a simple scrolling interface to access songs.

MobileFinder Under “Utilities” in Installer.app, this is a Mac OS X Finder for your iPhone! Sort of. This application will let you browse files on your iPhone, and launch applications by double-tapping them. It also lets you copy, paste and delete items, as well as create new files and folders. This program shows a lot of promise, and while it has a few kinks, we imagine it’s utility will prove invaluable as things develop.

Squid Under “Productivity” in Installer.app, this is a file browser for your iPhone. Similar to MobileFinder, except it allows you to quickly modify the permissions of files you locate — useful if an application won’t execute, or you want to restrict access to certain items. Be careful, however; modifying permissions of system files can have pernicious results.

VNotes Under “Multimedia” in Installer.app, this is a basic voice recorder for the iPhone. Record through the mic, playback through the speaker. Recordings are tagged by date and time, and can be deleted by tapping the Edit button.

MobileTerminal Under “System” in Installer.app, a Terminal for your iPhone. Useful for browsing files through the command line, launching scripts that make use of runtime environments (see below), and much more.

Runtime environments There are already Perl, Python and Ruby runtime environments for the iPhone that can be used to execute scripts written in these languages from the MobileTerminal. We’re still searching for useful applications, so please drop us a line if you’ve found one.

Games Check under “Games” in Installer.app. So far the iPhone game selection is relatively paltry. Lights Out! is certainly the best designed, performing and entertaining title so far. There’s also an NES emulator (for which you’ll have to [illegally] download ROMs. Other than these, we’re still waiting for anything killer.

Uninstalling applications

Just tap “Uninstall” in Installer.app and you can remove any applications stored on your iPhone. Alternatively, you can consult our 5-step guide, SSH into your iPhone and delete items using the rm command. We recommend the former, however, for the sakes of safety and convenience.

What to do if your iPhone becomes unstable or you want to delete all hacks

If your iPhone starts becoming unstable or exhibiting strange behavior as a result of third-party application installation, you can easily bring it back to normal operating mode by performing a restore. Click the Restore button under the Summary tab. Restoring the phone will erase contacts, calendars, photos and other data on the phone, but will restore automatically backed-up information including text messages, notes, call history, contact favorites, sound settings, widget settings, etc. If things go terribly wrong and your iPhone refuses to restore, see our piece titled “How ‘Recovery Mode’ can rescue your iPhone.”

Feedback? info@iphoneatlas.com.