push notifications
Latest
Google Voice for iPhone is finally out on the App Store
Turns out, when Apple announced it was a day you'd never forget, maybe it wasn't talking about The Beatles. Last we heard, Google Voice was expected on the App Store "soon" ... and now here it is. Apple has relented in the battle to allow Google Voice functionality on the iPhone, leaving Google open to release its own official app for the service. It looks just as good as you'd expect -- you can sign into the service from anywhere, access your voicemail or even send text messages or Google Voice calls, and get push notifications when you've got a new message incoming. Obviously, you'll need a Google Voice account to use the app, but those are free and easy enough to set up. The app is only available in the United States, according to its description, so those of you outside the country are out of luck (for now). It's also probably not compatible with the iPad -- the listing only says it's available for the iPhone so far. Our own Mike Rose & TJ Luoma [TJ comments below that he objects to the iPhone-only restriction on the app, as he would like to use it to send and receive SMS on the iPad or iPod touch] are jumping for joy on this one -- we've got a lot of TUAW Google Voice fans, and having this functionality available on the iPhone is a very nice bonus even with the third-party apps already on the market. What are you waiting for? It's here -- go download!
Google app gets updated with push notification for Gmail
After many months of users having to resort to third-party or jailbroken apps to get push notifications from Gmail, Google has finally released an updated version of its iPhone app that now handily does that all for you. The update -- which is now freely available in the App Store -- allows you to sign into one or several Google accounts and set up Gmail and Google Calendar push events, which work just as you'd expect. It's not yet clear how consistently quick the app is at alerting you of new mail, though it seems to have a significant delay upon initial testing. So far connectivity to my Gmail account using the Mail app responds much quicker. As you can see from the screengrab of the update, you can specify quiet times for notifications, which could be handy if you tend to get a deluge of mail in the wee hours of the night. Google customers rejoice: push notifications are finally here!
Mail Notifier subscription service for the iPhone
When Apple introduced ActiveSync and Push email support for iPhone email, there were two reactions: 1) "Yay!" and 2) "What's this going to mean for battery life?" Any sort of "push" technology will reduce the battery life, but it is a trade-off many people are willing to make, especially when it comes to email. Mail Notifier is one of several applications in the App Store designed to avoid the battery drain of keeping an active connection to your mail server. I've been using it for a couple of months and it has worked very well with my Gmail (actually, "Google Apps") account. In fact, there have been times when I was sitting at my computer and my iPhone told me I had mail even before I saw it in Mailplane. Does it actually save on battery life? That's a difficult question to answer without doing tests in a controlled environment, but anecdotally and unscientifically I would say that it does seem to have improved my battery life. One of the nice features that Mail Notifier offers is the ability to set a "silent period" when you won't be disturbed by alerts. This is something that I wish Apple would provide globally, i.e. "Disable all push notifications between 11pm-8am" or each push application would implement individually, e.g. "If it is my move in Words With Friends during the day, play a sound and display an alert, but if it's my move between 11pm and 8am, just display an alert, but keep quiet. I might be sleeping." Mail Notifier is also said to work with free Hotmail accounts and AOL, although I did not test either of those. If you use webmail instead of Mail, you can setup Mail Notifier to open a web page instead of the Mail app. You can also setup different sounds for different accounts. That is a handy function if you have more than one mail account, or if you have a "multiple iPhone household" and want to avoid the "Which one of us just got an email?" confusion. Overall, the app has worked very well, and as advertised. However, there is some "small print" to attend to. I was surprised to see a large number of 1-star reviews on the Mail Notifier iTunes/App Store page. Then, I noticed a list of "top in-app purchases" for Mail Notifier. As I scrolled down to read the comments, I found that most of the 1-star reviews seemed to be about the fact that Mail Notifier is actually a subscription service, rather than just a one-time purchase. This came as a surprise to me. I was provided with a review code (see note below) that must have included at least 1 year of service, since I have not seen any renewal notices in the app. I did some looking around to see just how obvious this would be to a new user who happened to be browsing the App Store. My conclusion is that it really depends on whether you came in through iTunes on a Mac or Windows computer, or whether you used the App Store on an iPhone or iPod touch. Read on to see more.
Google Voice is now your real-time pusher (on Android)
Once upon a time, Google undercut its own infant OS by offering rival platforms some of the best features of Android. Those days are long gone, and once again -- as much as we love Google Maps Navigation -- the poster child for only-on-Android functionality (in the US) is Google Voice. That's because as of this week, the Android version supports push notification of incoming messages in real time, as well as a neat interface for your reply (as evidenced by the above pic). Feel free to tease your iPhone and Pre-addicted friends, people; multitasking or no, they're not going to get a heads-up of incoming voicemail transcriptions with plain ol' HTML5.
Found Footage: Urban Airship's AirMail takes push notifications to the next level
Here's an exclusive TUAW video preview of Urban Airship's latest product, AirMail. Like their other products, AirMail is powered by a precompiled drop-in library that developers add to their iPhone applications. AirMail adds a whole new spin on push notifications by transforming them from lightweight messaging into a more durable and interactive product. Normally push notifications give a simple heads-up to users along the lines of "You have mail" or "Someone tweeted your name." AirMail goes further. It uses the iPhone's push notification infrastructure to enhance two-way communications between service providers and their customers. As this video shows, push notifications are no longer throwaway products. Using AirMail, they can be stored and referenced through an in-app library. Applications can create message histories that persist well beyond the life of a normal push message. What's more, those notifications can involve the user in a multi-directional process, whether confirming that they have taken their pills (as shown here), are ready to take a meeting, or that they acknowledge that a security alarm was triggered in error, among other uses.
Apple gets one-upped on homescreen contact patent
Quite a few people have been asking me what app it was that I used in that post the other day about the rumored new iPhone. Unfortunately, it wasn't an app (although the jailbreak apps LockInfo and Intelliscreen offer similar features) -- it was one concept among many that have been suggested for a potential new homescreen on the iPhone's next OS revision. There have been a lot of great ideas bouncing around for the kinds of information Apple could put on a completely revamped iPhone homescreen: an easier-to-read clock, a list of received push notifications, easy access to contacts and/or email, and more. It seems as though Apple is experimenting with some of those things as well: the company recently filed a patent for including a contact, with picture, on the iPhone's home screen as an icon. Rather than navigate through the system to find your aunt that you call all the time, you could save auntie's picture on the home screen, and then hit one icon to call her up. Unfortunately for Apple, as Engadget points out, the Android OS actually lets you do this already, so the chances of their getting this patent approved are low. But it does tell us that Apple is at least thinking about how they could make the homescreen a little more useful. They may still be tied to the icon scheme, but at least they're looking at adding a little more functionality.
Push for Gmail: it's here, it works, and it's limited
If you use Gmail, you have something to be excited about today, because you can finally have new email messages pushed directly to your iPhone when they arrive. For many users, however, their first response is "it's about time!" and others have even gone as far as saying "it's finally here, no thanks to Apple." This new feature, unveiled this morning by Google, has even been called a "workaround" to Apple's alleged refusal to support push email, but in reality this isn't the case. Push: What is it, and how does it work? To understand why push services have not been available before, let's first discuss what exactly push is. When a client (be it a mail program, Twitter client, or web browser) needs to notify a user when new content or information is available, it has to periodically connect to the server and check for changes. This is the way email clients have worked for years: the client checks with the server at a defined interval (usually every 5-15 minutes), downloads any new messages, and notifies the user that new mail has arrived. Many other services, such as RSS feeds, Twitter, Facebook, and even the Gmail website work the same way; they just check the server more often, which gives the appearance of real-time notifications. Other services, such as instant messaging clients, maintain a constant, active connection to the server at all times. When new information is available for the client, the server sends, or "pushes" the information directly to the client as soon as it is available. In corporate environments, mail services such as Microsoft Exchange have paved the way for push email, by having the mail client (usually Outlook, Entourage, or other clients that support Exchange) maintain an active connection to the mail server, which allows the server to notify the client immediately when new mail arrives. Read on to find out how Gmail push works, and what you need to know to get it set up on your phone.
Realm status iPhone app sends push notifications for the servers
Reader Jiang sent us a tip about his new iPhone application (App Store link). It's a realm status application that will track your realm's up and down times straight from Blizzard's page so you can check them anytime on your iPhone. And that in itself isn't that amazing -- there are other apps that will do the same thing, and even some that will do it for free (Jiang's app is $1.99). But Jiang's app will also deliver Push notifications for you, and that's something I haven't seen before in an iPhone app. You can set notifications for multiple realms, and then whenever one goes up or down, you'll get a notification on your iPhone about it.A few of the other apps are working on implementing Push notifications, so if you're patient, you might be able to get them for cheaper (or even free, though it usually does cost money to run a notification server). But if you absolutely want up-to-the-minute notifications when servers go up and down and are willing to put a few bucks towards a piece of iPhone software, there you go.
Scoreloop introduces Scoreloop Community for the iPhone
We've talked about OpenFeint quite a few times on the site before (and even interviewed the creators), but while they're definitely one of the biggest names in creating gaming communities for the iPhone, they're not alone. A company called Scoreloop has today announced a service called "Scoreloop Community," made up of two different features: a web presence, and a downloadable application for the iPhone that hooks right into other developers' games and apps and allows players to create avatars, view friends and their activities, and share challenges and high scores with others. Just like OpenFeint, Scoreloop says they're offering an easy-to-implement solution for push notifications, letting players send and receive messages (as well as promote and encourage usage of games in the service) and earn achievements and tokens.Of course, the real test for services like this will be in the implementation -- while OpenFeint claims a nice stable of developers, we still haven't seen too many apps take advantage of the latest and greatest versions (Pocket God is an extremely popular app that has implemented OpenFeint, but they use an older version of the software that doesn't have nearly as many features as the latest). Scoreloop says they've got over 50 game commitments from third-party developers already (it sounds like Zombie Pub Crawl is their biggest title yet), but even then, it remains to be seen exactly how devs will implement their functionality, and how players take to the service.If you're a developer looking to implement push notifications and social challenges and networking in your app, it seems that there's no shortage of companies willing to step in and help you do exactly that (you can download the free SDK, if interested, on Scoreloop's site). But in terms of how consumers view and will use these networks, it's still a very wide open field.
Push notifications go live on iPhone courtesy of Tap Tap Revenge
iPhone OS 3.0 may not be available to the masses for a couple days yet, but that's not stopping Tapulous (nor Apple's App Store overlords, apparently) from rolling out a new version of its ridiculously popular Tap Tap Revenge that's fully ready to take advantage of push notifications right here and right now. We've taken the new build for a spin, and in brief, it works as designed -- notification times ranged from near instantaneous to just under a minute. One of our editors here was testing on a cellular connection and the other was on a SIM-less iPhone 3G running just WiFi, so it looks like this setup will work pretty seamlessly regardless of what kind of connection you happen to be enjoying / tolerating / loathing at the moment. Follow the break for a quick video demo.[Thanks, Brandon]
Developers get first look at Apple Push Notification service on iPhone OS 3.0 beta
Well, what do you know: it really does exist. Apple's at last showing off push notifications outside the clutches of Cupertino, with registered iPhone developers getting a special version of the Associated Press app to test out on their super fine iPhones running the latest and greatest iPhone OS 3.0 beta 5. Devs are instructed to let Apple know if they don't receive notifications from the app within 48 hours, and it sounds like this is an ideal setting to test out the server and make sure everything is humming along nicely before us proles start choking up the network with our inane Twitter noodlings.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
