Facebook Connect on iPhone Stops Connecting; Connect’s Login UX Drops “Connecting” Language
If you haven’t noticed yet within your apps, the login screen for Facebook Connect has updated to feel more “iPhone friendly,” and Facebook has dropped this idea of “connecting” as a result.
Additionally, there are many cues in the new UX which assume an experienced Facebook user, which seems like a shift in Facebook’s approach for their API.
Facebook Connect side-by-side comparison
Notable changes include:
- Removed all “Connect” language in favor of “Login”
- Simplifies language overall, which assumes experienced user
- Title “Connect to Facebook to “Facebook Login”
- Removed description of what Facebook Connect is for
- Remove visual cue that helps users understand the purpose of the screen
- Removed Facebook terms/conditions fine print
- Removed “Cancel” button
- Asks for either your email or your phone number
- Increases size of user input fields
Hiring an iPhone Developer? Read This First.
The Business Insider has posted an article titled How To Hire A Great iPhone Developer and it features a few quotes from our creative director, Ryan Unger. It’s a good read with some valuable insight, so feel free to give it a look.
Get Well Soon, iPhone 3G Network!
When I first got my iPhone some two years ago, I rarely experienced connectivity issues. In fact, I was pretty proud of the fact that my phone and data service were so consistent. Flash forward to today, and I’ve moved from Cleveland (population: 500,000) to Chicago (population: 2.9 million), and the number of iPhone users has increased many, many times over.
Increasingly, I can’t hold on to a call. No joke—I drop calls every single day. And 3G data service? At this point, I feel like I’ve won the lottery when I see that beautiful little 3G icon instead of the letter “E” at the top of my screen. The other day, a friend of mine received nine visual voicemails all at once…and they had been left by recipients four days prior!
Make no mistake. Despite these issues, I absolutely love my iPhone. And thankfully, a recent article over at the NY Times has shed some light on why these issues are occurring.
You can read the article here.
Clearly, no one could have predicted the success of the iPhone. With a little patience, it looks like all of these issues will be ultimately resolved.
Apple Leads Cell Phone Industry with 32% of the Total Industry Profit
Question: How does a newcomer introduce just one cell phone, and absolutely obliterate their competition with respect to profit?
Answer: They build an iPhone.
Top Cell Phone Manufacturers' Estimated Revenues Compared to Apple's
In the cell phone game, the Apple iPhone only accounts for 8% of the total industry revenue, but 32% of the total industry profit. How they managed this feat is quite simple. They pull in a 40% operating margin, in an industry that averages only 7.5%. The next most profitable company in the industry, RIM, only takes in 20.7% operating margin.
[ iSmashPhone.com ]
3 Rules for Keeping My iPhone Applications Organized
I can still remember the good ol’ days, when the iPhone had no downloadable content. You had one home screen with all of your Apple-bestowed icons in a single place–no organization skills required.
Those days are long gone, and with a slew of amazing iPhone apps comes a puzzling question: How does one best organize the plethora of applications downloaded to an iPhone? In the past, I’ve tried sorting my apps in a million different (and often bizarre) ways, and frequently found myself looking at friends’ phones, trying to figure out the logic they’d applied to their own apps.
After some careful consideration, I’ve finally settled on my favorite way to sort iPhone app icons. Of course, these methods are purely based on my personal taste and strange sense of “logic,” so take this post with a grain of salt. That said, without further delay, my 3 Rules for Keeping My iPhone Applications Organized:
My iPhone's Home Screen
1. I am an Apple purist at heart, and in a nod to the 1st gen iPhone, I keep the original twelve iPhone icons on my home screen (note: these are in addition to the four app icons found on the dock at the bottom of the screen). These icons are: Messages, Calendar, Photos, Camera, YouTube, Stocks, Maps, Weather, Notes, Clock, Calculator, and Settings. The reason for doing this is two-fold. First, I find that through years of using my iPhone, I’ve genuinely memorized the location of these twelve apps. Clicking on them is second nature to me. The second reason I like this organization scheme is that having twelve home screen icons on your phone leaves a nice empty row between the upper twelve app icons and the home row. I find this aesthetically pleasing–to me, it beats having a home screen crammed to the brim with icons.
2. Apple has provided us with five more application icons since the first gen iPhone. These icons are: App Store, Compass, Contacts, iTunes, and Voice Memos. Based on my logic in Rule #1, one could reasonably argue that these Apple-given icons should be on the home screen of the phone (they are Apple-bestowed, of course). This would be a fair argument, except that there’s no way to fit them all on the home screen. For this reason, I opt to treat these five application icons the same as I do any other downloaded iPhone apps. Doing this still supports Rule #1, which aims to keep my iPhone home screen organized and uncluttered as it was in its first release.
3. Finally, the piece de resistance. For ALL application icons not located on the initial home screen of my iPhone, I simply arrange them alphabetically on secondary home screen pages. This way, I don’t have to wonder where an app should be located and any hesitation I have to download millions of apps is squashed. I’ve tried all sorts of ways to sort my downloaded apps, but nothing is as fool-proof and easy to remember as this method. My experiments with attempting to sort apps based on categories like “utility” or “games” have always ended up failing. Alphabetizing is simple through and through.
…Phew. I hope this makes some semblance of sense! Do you have a better method of organizing your iPhone icons? If you do, feel free to share with me. I’d love to hear your thoughts as I continue in my quest to find true iPhone nirvana.
A Secondary Screen on My iPhone
50 Useful iPhone Tips for Librarians and Researchers
College@Home created a list of 50 useful iPhone tips for librarians and researchers, and it actually brought up a few points directly related to mobile marketing…
2. Creating a texting service for patron questions. Giving patrons the option of texting in their questions to the library can make it easy for those who prefer to avoid telephone conversations the ability to get quick and easy answers to simple questions, and if librarians within your library are using iPhones they can respond to questions in between checking in or shelving materials and other tasks.
5. Check how your site looks on an iPhone. Many sites don’t quite translate well to mobile devices like the iPhone. Check how your library’s webpage looks by using an online tool like iPhoney or by checking it yourself on an iPhone.
7. Optimize your site for mobile devices. If you’ve checked out how your site looks on an iPhone and the result is not so great, consider creating a special page for mobile users to access your site. Many libraries are already doing so to maximize the usability of their webpages by patrons.
18. Track requests. You can use your iPhone as an easy way to alert patrons that their requests have arrived whether by phone, email or text and you can record and keep track of these requests as well.
23. Create content that’s easy to browse over an iPhone. If you’ve decided to develop a version of your site that’s more easily compatible with mobile phones, consider scaling it down the the basics. Simple search tools and information will be easiest to browse on the go.
The Rather Difficult Font Game
I just stumbled across a great game on ilovetypography.com called The Rather Difficult Font Game. If you’re a fellow typophile, you should check it out. And, should you have the hardware, there is also an iPhone version to play with as well.
Punchkick Interactive has officially been approved by Apple to become part of the Apple iPhone Developer Program, and we are curious as to the number of other developers who were also approved—so, we decided to start a tally.
If you have been approved by Apple to participate in the iPhone Developer Program, then leave a comment. We will update the tally here daily.
1 developer has been approved.
As a bit of background, U.S. applicants rejected received an e-mail stating: “Dear Registered iPhone Developer, Thank you for expressing interest in the iPhone Developer Program. We have received your enrollment request. As this time, the iPhone Developer Program is available to a limited number of developers and we plan to expand during the beta period. We will contact you again regarding your enrollment status at the appropriate time. Thank you for applying.”
Applicants outside the United States received an e-mail stating: “Dear Registered iPhone Developer, Thank you for expressing interest in the iPhone Developer Program. We have received your enrollment request. At this time, the iPhone Developer Program is only available in the US and will expand to other countries during the beta period. We will contact you again regarding your enrollment status at the appropriate time. Thank you for applying.”
Learn more about Punchkick Interactive’s iPhone software development capabilities.
Adobe’s CEO, Shantanu Narayen, said Tuesday that Adobe has officially started development of a Flash player suitable for use on Apple’s iPhone and hopes to finish development by June.
Narayen made the comments during a conference call with investors, explaining that Apple’s recent release of an iPhone software developers kit (SDK) has afforded his company the necessary tools to finally begin work an iPhone version of Flash Player.
“We believe Flash is synonymous with the Internet experience, and we are committed to bringing Flash to the iPhone,” he said. “We have evaluated (the software developer tools) and we think we can develop an iPhone Flash player ourselves.”
Adobe hopes to deliver their missing product via Apple’s new App Store, set to open in June alongside the release of iPhone software version 2.0.
So much for Jobs’ comments about the iPhone not being able to support Flash because of a limitation with the Flash player. It seems ridiculous that Apple’s position is a limitation in the Flash Player given that the Flash Player works perfectly on the Nokia 810, countless other portable devices, the Skyfire browser, Pocket IE, and Opera Mobile 9.5. I am very happy to hear about Adobe’s new position on the issue.
Source: Apple Insider, Wall Street Journal
Learn more about Punchkick Interactive’s iPhone software development capabilities.
Open Mouth, Insert Foot
Every once in a while—perhaps as often as the solar equinox or emergence of the breeding cicadas—I open my mouth and say something I later regret. And when I do so, I feel it is my duty to own up to my mistake. So, with my sneaker on my plate, I apologize to all of you about my July 5th rant, Why a True Apple Fan Would Never Buy an iPhone.
Why, you ask? Allow me to explain.
I decided that I needed a smart phone with true email capabilities about two months ago. Looking around at the options out there, I wasn’t particularly blown away by any of the smart phones I played around with at the Verizon store. On second look, the iPhone started to seem like a phone I could (*ahem) learn to live with.
Fast forward two months.
My iPhone and I are best friends, and in some countries, possibly married. I absolutely cannot live without it. The email software is incredible and syncs perfectly with my .Mac account and IMAP business account. The camera is beautiful and I find myself constantly taking pictures with my phone—something I’ve never done in the 11+ years I’ve been a cell phone user. I use the iPhone religiously for iPod purposes, and my video podcasts have never looked better. And the Safari browser has proven to be a mid-argument-dispute-resolution miracle on more than one occasion.
Sure, the iPhone has some problems. Edge isn’t too quick, and 8 gigs just isn’t enough memory. But the goods FAR outweigh the bad. Software updates have even fixed a number of the issues I once complained about. Reading through my previous post, I’ve had to ask myself: Am I so jaded that a technical marvel like the iPhone can elicit a complaint from me?
Mr. Jobs, if you’re reading this, please accept my apology. Please continue to deliver me gadgets like the iPhone. And please forgive us tech-geeks when we are overly critical. We don’t mean it.
*Sometimes.
Learn more about Punchkick Interactive’s iPhone software development capabilities.
