Ste Packaging

I’ve just added and/or updated the following application packages for the iPhone & iPod Touch:

1. [upd] EvolutionRGB (1.0) [See developer’s notes, below.]
2. [upd] iAthan (0.08 beta) [Fixed issues with automatic alerts; reduced daemon’s CPU consumption]
3. [upd] Splitter (0.4.0) [Developer: “I’ve written a new version of Splitter and updated its icon.”]
4. [upd] iGo (1.5) [Now supports zoom to allow better placement of the pieces when playing the 19×19 boardsize.]
5. [upd] VoiceDial (1.01) [See developer’s notes, below.]
6. [upd] LocateMe (0.5) [See developer’s notes, below.]
7. [upd] Contrasense (1.5) [New graphics; 3 new levels; 3 cars to go.]
8. [new] iEatHalal (0.01 beta) [See developer’s notes, below.]
9. [new] iCrossword (0.1) [See developer’s notes, below.]

EvolutionRGB notre:

• drawing has been improved, thick lines are used instead of circles, so that finger moves are always connected
• rasterizing the drawing is much faster now (for the large brush sizes)
• the randomness has been improved (less patterns visible)
• single circles can now be drawn by a tap and slow release (200 ms) - previously you had to move your finger

VoiceDial notes:

• Preferences automatically converted to binary file format - faster start up
• Improved memory handling - CRITICAL! - solves problem with casual iPhone restart …
• Free for first 25 runs
• After 25 runs application keeps functionality but requires confirmation before execution. In former version execution was not possible at all when trial expires.

LocateMe notes:

• way better triangulation, more accurate positioning
• improved exception handling
• display of network and country
• display of cell information
• improved cache

iEatHalal notes:

• “*iEatHalal - the Mobile Halal Food Guide for iPhone and iPod Touch*. Be confident about what you eat! Get the FREE Halal/Haram food guide and always have this reference guide with you while you shop. You’ll never need to remember those e-codes and ingredients again.”

iCrossword notes:

• Loads the puz file format popular with online crossword puzzles such as the New York Times newspaper
• Double-tap navigation bar to get to options screen. There you can get info about current puzzle and perform operations on it.
• Add new .puz files into /var/root/Library/iCrossword/puz

-ste

I will no longer be able to test iPhone applications on the 1.0.2 firmware, as I have upgraded my testing iPhone to 1.1.1, in preparation of going to 1.1.3. My personal iPhone is running 1.1.1 also. Once the test iPhone is happily running a jailbroken 1.1.3, I will likely upgrade my personal iPhone to 1.1.2.

So, goodbye 1.0.2 …

-ste

Thanks to IRC user “Wheat”, I now have a WebClip icon for the blog site. Just navigate to my blog on your 1.1.3 iPhone or iPod Touch and create a WebClip for the site - the icon will be the familiar one from the top left of my blog pages, the blue, three-toned image. Thanks Wheat!

-ste

Yesterday, I worked with Nate True to help him release a 1.1.3 jailbreak for iPhones (FAQ, here). My part of it was the “1.1.3 soft upgrade” package, version 1.0 (he wrote it - I just made it available).

It was discovered that there was a problem with that, if you weren’t starting from a freshly wiped iPhone. Basically, if you had my OpenSSH package installed and performed the upgrade, your iPhone was left thinking OpenSSH (and a lot of other stuff) was still installed. However, because it wasn’t really there, combined with how I wrote the uninstall script for it, you were unable to “uninstall” it and make Installer.app think it was gone, so that you could actually install it again.

While I was asleep, Nullriver was kind enough to create and release a package called “1.1.3 OpenSSH Fix”, version 1.0. After you install it, you will be able to “uninstall” the non-existant OpenSSH package, which will then allow you to reinstall it properly.

I have just released a new version - 2.0 - of the “1.1.3 soft upgrade” package, that addresses this problem. During install, it saves a copy of Installer.app’s LocalPackages.plist file as “/var/root/LocalPackages.plist.old” and then when Nate’s script runs, it deletes the original, making Installer.app forget that anything had been installed. Then, after the upgrade, you are free to install whatever you want, unhindered by Installer.app.

Why did I save a copy of the LocalPackages.plist file, rather than just delete it? Glad you asked. Some people may have moved their Applications directory to the Media partition. After they upgrade, all their old apps (at least the ones that reside entirely in the Applications directory) are still there, but Installer will not know about them. For those folks, they can use the old plist file to edit the new one and add back the apps they want to (if you do this, make sure you keep the 1.1.3 versions of Apple’s apps, and not the old ones). Or, they can delete the copy of the plist file, and delete their old Applications directory and start fresh.

Another problem is that because the “1.1.3 soft upgrade” package ends with a reboot, it cannot clean up after itself, leaving you a “/var/root/Media/softupgrade” directory lying around that takes up around 300MB. If you want, you can ssh in and remove that entire directory after you successfully have upgraded and reinstalled OpenSSH. Look for a “cleaning” package from me soon, that you can just install and uninstall, to clean it up for you if you don’t have OpenSSH installed.

-ste

I’ve just added and/or updated the following application packages for the iPhone & iPod Touch:

1. [upd] Backgammon (2.1) [minor changes and bug fixes]
2. [upd] Caissa (0.86-alpha) [Board/pieces preview in prefs window; chessboard coordinate letters added; various bug fixes]
3. [new] An uncommon spiritual path (1.0) [An eBook by Dr. Dion A. Forster]
4. [del] Listen [Removed from distribution at developer’s request.]
5. [new] Pirate2 Costume (0.01) [A costume for “DressUp”.]

Note: Remember, with the new caching system, you generally will not see new or updated packages right away, no matter how many times you might manually refresh (so please don’t!) - if you don’t see something listed here, after one refresh, then wait at least 30 minutes before you refresh again. Better yet, wait just over 24 hours and Installer.app will auto-refresh when you run it - saving bandwidth and frustration, with no manual refreshing needed at all.

-ste