According to that blog, Apple is probably working on Facebook’s Event Calendar, Contacts to integrate with Calendar, Contacts app on iPhone, respectively. Currently, iPhone has easy setup options for you to setup your accounts on Gmail, MobileMe, Yahoo, etc. You can simply type in your details and you’re done. Facebook, might get listed in this as well.

There was a huge user request received by Joe Hewitt (iPhone Application Developer of Facebook) during development of Facebook 3.0 for iPhone. So, it might be possible that on the other hand Facebook team will work on existing Facebook App to get the proper end user integration.

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There was a case where what ever I did, did not work. Many attempts to install using iTunes after trying to change certificates, provisioning profiles have failed. Even the “iPhone Configuration Utility” failed to install the app. I had actually lost all hopes getting it installed on this device. But after a little prayer and just a little hope left, it just worked.

Why did it work? I do not have any answer. Can’t still figure it out. And that was the first time I tried installing an Adhoc build on a device for a Windows user!! Is it really so hard?

Could not install application on device: Error: A signed resource has been added, modified or deleted.

The image that you see here, is another failed attempt at installing an Adhoc build for a Windows user. But this got resolved real quick.

The reason: Mac allows file names to contain some special characters (like ‘*’) which are not valid on a Windows PC. This is one thing you can check if you come across errors of above kind. But not all of them will be the same as above.

If any one else has faced a similar problem and found a definitive solution, let us know here.

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Here comes iSimulate from vimov to your rescue. People at vimov have created a really useful utility for developers to test their applications which employ GPS and Accelerometer on the iPhone Simulator. Lots of time saved between installs right!!

iSimulate is an application which you download and install on your device to send accelerometer and GPS details to the app running on the iPhone Simulator. The app must of course embed the iSimulate library to be able to receive those details. All it takes to install the iSimulate app on your device, embed the library in your application and start using it is just around 5 minutes.

The newer releases of iSimulate even support video streaming. You can actually see the game or app on your iPhone or iPodTouch even though it’s running on the iPhone Simulator. This enables you to provide very accurate touches to the Simulator. This is a giant leap forward from it’s first days where you had screen filled with Accelerometer graph to simulate touches!!

iSimulate really makes testing your apps easy and quick. Go get your apps on to AppStore that much quicker!!

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iPhone SDK 3.1.2 is now available on the iPhone Dev Center. If you have updated your iPhone app development devices to iPhone OS 3.1.2, you will need to download and install the new iPhone SDK to continue your iPhone app development.

A version of iPhone SDK 3.1.2 is also available to developers who are running Mac OS X Snow Leopard. Please ensure you select the appropriate SDK based on your iPhone app development environment.

iPhone SDK 3.1.2 is now available

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“openURL” is the API to use to achieve any of the above and many more.
If you need to let your application users quickly dial APPLE from within your app, just include the following line

[[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:@"tel:8006927753"]];

Similarly, you could initiate SMS application by using openURL with “sms: “, but unfortunately you cannot fill in the SMS content as Apple does not yet support it.
There are many more things you could do with this API like launching Google Maps, Safari with any website like you want or even the AppStore links to your apps which you want the users to buy.

Checking support for URLs of other applications
Until the release of iPhone OS 3.0 it was not possible to find if there are any applications installed on the device which handle the URL scheme you are about to use. But now it is possible through the following API

- (BOOL)canOpenURL:(NSURL*)url

Call the above API before using “openURL” to make sure your call will “certainly” be handled by a registered application. If you were developing an iphone app which lets a phone call be made from within it, do the following

// this will fail if the device is an iPod
if ([[UIApplication sharedApplication] canOpenURL:[NSURL URLWithString:@"tel:111"]])
{
[[UIApplication sharedApplication] openURL:[NSURL URLWithString:@"tel:111"]];
}
else
{
// show an Alert here indicating that the call can’t be completed
}

Apart from using “canOpenURL”, do check the return value from “openURL” too and take appropriate action.

You should also use “canOpenURL” to find out if any features (like calling a number and SMS) that are not accessible on iPod should be disabled or hidden. Showing “phone” icons and letting them be clicked in your application on an iPod is a sure shot way to get your application rejected for uploading to AppStore.

Registering and handling custom URL schemes
If you are developing a great tool and can be used by other applications, you can register custom URL schemes and implement them. To create custom URL schemes just add them to your application’s “info.plist” file.

• To the root element of your application’s “info.plist” file, add a row with key named “URL types”.
• Expand it to find “item1″ in it, expand it and edit the value for key “URL identifier” to look something like “com.yourcompany.yoururlscheme”
• Add another row to “item1″ with key “URL Schemes”. Type in the first few characters of your URL scheme.
  For an example, if you wish to use url formats like abc://part1/part2, just enter “abc” for URL Schemes

Once you have created and registered your own URL formats/schemes, you can handle incoming URL requests by implementing the following UIApplicationDelegate method

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication*)application handleOpenURL:(NSURL*)url

Before parsing and/or handling the URL, make sure it is in the right format and follows all rules of your URL scheme.

The above method was the only place where you can handle incoming URLs until iPhone OS 3.0 arrived. For iPhone OS 3.0 and above, the preferred place to handle incoming URLs is

- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication*)application didFinishLaunchingWithOptions:(NSDictionary*)launchOptions

This method should return whatever “handleOpenURL” API would have returned if it were implemented. If you implement the above delegate method of UIApplication, IPhone OS will not invoke the following methods

- (void)applicationDidFinishLaunching:(UIApplication*)application
- (BOOL)application:(UIApplication*)application handleOpenURL:(NSURL*)url

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iPhone being a “one app at a time” device, apps get interrupted by incoming Phone Calls, SMSs, Calendar Events, Alarms or Push Notifications from other apps on the device.
The iPhone SDK provides a few methods in UIApplicationDelegate which can be implemented to handle the interruptions and keep user’s experience as flawless/seamless as possible.

The Interruption
- (void)applictaionWillResignActive:(UIApplication*)application

This method lets your application know that it is about to be interrupted by the iPhone OS. The name of the method suggests that your app will no longer be active, and will not respond to any user actions until the interruption is taken care of. An interruption like an incoming phone call or an SMS can either be accepted or dismissed by the user, and this is where you have to perform all tasks necessary to resume if the user chooses to leave the application. If the app was a game, it could save any game state needed for a resumption later.

The Resumption / Interruption Dismissed
- (void)applicationDidBecomeActive:(UIApplication*)application

When your application is about to become active again, this method is called by the iPhone OS. If the user decides not to leave the application and dismisses the interruption this is a good place to allow the user resume using the application. Since the application has not yet been closed, all the required state to resume is still in memory and continuing using the app is really as simple as a Pause/Resume feature.

The Interruption Accepted
- (void)applicationWillTerminate:(UIApplication*)application

If the user decides to leave the application or accepts an interruption, this method call from the iPhone OS notifies us of that intention. This is the place where you save all necessary state of the app/game to resume later.

The best place to save all game/app state to resume later is “applicationWillResignActive”. The simple reason being, all iPhone interruptions need user’s input to either accept or dismiss the interruption. This action from the user might needs a few seconds of his/her time to understand what the interruption is and what to do with it. This duration should be just enough for a well written application to save all state. Whereas, in the case of the application being closed by the user, iPhone OS wouldn’t wait for the app to complete saving state. The time available is really short and many applications might fail to save state.

Since there are multiple reasons and ways for an app being closed, state saving method calls need to be placed both in “applictaionWillResignActive” and “applictaionWillTerminate”. But ensure you don’t waste precious time in saving app state at both places. If the user closes the application by pressing the “Home” button, use “applictaionWillTerminate” to save state and necessary cleanups. If the application is being closed due to an interruption, save state in “applictaionWillResignActive” and perform any necessary cleanup in “applictaionWillTerminate”.

So, make it a point to use various UIApplicationDelegate methods to maintain user experience and reusability of the app. Keep your users glued to your application or game and return to it after an interruption.

For more tips and strategies on iPhone App Development, click here. For iPhone app marketing tips, try this link.

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If you too are experiencing the same problem, here is the solution to continue iPhone development with iPhone SDK 3.0 for your iPhone running iPhone OS 3.0.1.

1. Log-in to your MAC with an Admin account and launch the Terminal application (You will find it in /Applications/Utilities)
2. Copy and Paste the following line into the Terminal window
ln -s /Developer/Platforms/iPhoneOS.platform/DeviceSupport/3.0\ \(7A341\) /Developer/Platforms/iPhoneOS.platform/DeviceSupport/3.0.1

Note: If you have not installed iPhone SDK 3.0 in the default location “/Developer”, replace the “/Developer” directory in the above line as appropriate.

You can download the iPhone 3.0.1 Advisory guidelines document from iPhone Dev Portal

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