PrivateApis
Latest
Camcorder brings video recording to iPhone 3G and 1st gen
Want to record video on your iPhone 3G or 1st generation unit? No need to jailbreak anymore. A $0.99US app called "Camcorder (for iPhone 3G and 2G)" [iTunes link] promises real time video recording on your older equipment, similarly to the free Ustream app. So how does it work? In our initial and very quick try, not so badly -- but at the same time, really not so great. Prepare for a slow frame rate (tested on 3G and on a 3GS) with just okay audio. For $0.99, there's not much value there, especially considering you can't do anything with the videos you capture except watch them on your phone until you delete them (although they are backed up with your sandbox data, they are inaccessible except to iPhone geeks). The GUI is flimsy as well. For example, you actually have to reach under a toolbar to swipe-to-delete the most recent recording. While the entire application feels a bit like a rush job, you've got to admit that it's nice to have approved access to App Store video recording without jailbreak on older equipment -- but for now, you'd be better off with the Ustream app and the ability to save your videos to a destination. For jailbroken phones, I personally love Cydia's Cycorder app -- it has recorded many school plays and concerts. Camcorder provides a bit of the same functionality (albeit at a slightly lower quality) without having to go the jailbreak route. That's a good thing... and it will be a better thing when/if the app adds some export functionality. This app works by using the long-blacklisted UIGetScreenImage() function that I've written about in the past. (I discovered this use by scanning the application using my APIkit scanner.) Apple must have willingly given the go-ahead for its use, as their automated scanning must have picked the same function call. Good news on the "more flexible review" front. Since Apple recently gave the green light to the UStream video app, with Qik hot on its heels, it's likely we'll see more of these applications that provide iPhone video functionality for livecasting or recording from your device. So how much is Apple loosening up? It's hard to tell, despite the buzz surrounding recent "non-rejection" letters, where developers are warned about API use at the same time their applications are given the go ahead for App Store. I may just go ahead and resubmit my AppFlow application launcher that Apple rejected ages ago, which is full of unauthorized APIs from one end to the other. Maybe its time has come. Update: TUAW reader Josh points to the $0.99 iVideoCamera [iTunes link] also new on App Store (December 12), that does let you save to your camera roll.
Dear Aunt TUAW: My "private" APIs... aren't
Sometimes Auntie TUAW gets emails from anxious iPhone developers. In this case, the correspondent is running into issues with Apple's new automated checks for private API use in iPhone apps. Dear Auntie TUAW, I got an email from Apple's App Review team saying the code in my iPhone app uses private APIs. They pointed to -setOrder, which is a method I created in code, and -setThumbnail, which was created automatically from a Core Data property. But those are all from my own code, and thumbnail is actually a property for my CoreData class. Any idea why? I don't even have a setter for thumbnail, it is just a dynamic property for the CoreData class. I don't want to rename my properties because I'm not sure that CoreData will automigrate my renamed items and my users are going to start crying if everything breaks. Love & snuggles, Lauren Read on for Auntie's reply.
Apple rejects Unity games on the App Store
Touch Arcade has the news that the long-awaited Ravensword and a number of other games built on the Unity game engine have been rejected by Apple from the App Store. The problem appears to be a number of API calls in the engine (though not specifically the game themselves, as I understand it) that allow the games to access the iPhone's number and send it back to the developer's servers. Apple considers these to be private APIs, and they also got games developer Storm8 in trouble earlier this week; their games were pulled from the store in response to a lawsuit alleging that they were collecting data from users without their knowledge. Chillingo, publishers of Ravensword, contacted us about this story, and they said that while the Unity engine does allow developers to use these calls, they did not use them or collect any user information. We're also told that the problem APIs "have been removed," and Chillingo has resubmitted the game for App Store approval. As I understand it, this is the same type of issue that came up with Google a while back. It's not the same APIs (Google was using the proximity sensor back then), but now as then, it's Apple's call whether they will allow developers to use these private and undocumented calls. Obviously some apps on the iPhone have to access the address book from time to time, but it's Apple's call whether they can use APIs like that or not. This time, it appears, they said no. Update: Unity has also contacted us, and they say that the engine was updated to Apple's wishes as soon as they learned of the issue. They also would like to point out that while Storm8 did use the same private API calls, they don't use Unity to run their games. Storm8's update on the issue is here.
