One-fifth of iPhone owners already use Passbook to download “passes”— coupons, gift and loyalty cards, airline boarding passes, and movie and event tickets. It’s Apple’s attempt at a virtual wallet.

Large retailers — from Sephora to Target — and restaurant chains and Major League Baseball are already using it as a channel for acquiring and retaining customers.

So why don’t we hear more about Passbook?

In a new report from BI Intelligence, Business Insider’s paid subscription service, we look at the trends and numbers behind the Passbook ecosystem.

• What brands and retailers are present?
• How effective have Passbook campaigns been in driving consumer activity and raising brand awareness?
• How does it work? 

Access The Full Report By Signing Up For A Free Trial Today >>>

The report includes over a half-dozen charts and datasets — and an ecosystem graphic — examining the intricacies of the Passbook ecosystem. Subscribers receive full access to the BI Intelligence library of over 100 in-depth reports on the mobile industry, and hundreds of datasets you can put to use.

In our report on Passbook, we also look at some misconceptions and underrated opportunities:

• The Passbook ecosystem is a valuable back-door for developers who would like to market their apps more aggressively, grab more visibility and achieve higher download numbers.
• Passbook passes can be generated by websites and/or with the help of third-party vendors, they don’t necessarily need to be created by custom Passbook-integrated apps.
• Passbook is well-positioned to seize on recent retailer and consumer enthusiasm for location-based services, mobile coupons, and mobile-powered loyalty programs.
• We include a handful of mini-case studies, and examine data that reveals how successful certain brands and retailers have been with Passbook.

We also discuss Passbook’s relationship with the burgeoning and competitive mobile payments space, and the uncertainty surrounding its future as a payments platform. 

Will Apple add a payment-processing capability, so that users can make “walletless” credit card payments with Passbook? Will it be joined with fingerprint-reading technology, the rumored authentication feature to be included in iPhone 5S?

Apple has over 500 million credit cards on file. We review what brands and retailers are doing to hook into the ecosystem and prepare for the possibility that Apple will one day leverage these credit card relationships and turn Passbook into a real transactions platform.

It also includes an examination of the top barriers to widespread Passbook adoption: namely, the chicken-and-egg problem that ties relatively low app publisher adoption to a lack of wider consumer awareness.

For full access to the report on Passbook sign up for a free trial subscription today.

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You can simply use that iphone application on your iphone and that is stickNFind. All you have to do is just put the small bluetooth sticker on to a remote, or any important thing that you worried about, you can also put it to your childs backpack, or pet’s collar.

Then use your iphone to locate the item, when you will come close to the sticker it will start vibrate and showing the exact location of it. Isn’t it great thing. Its very easy to use this application, it has got the virtual leash feature that will let you know when one of your stickers gets too far away from you. Remember while using it that it only works within 100 feet of your iphone.

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Like other software releases, the new “Spirit” jailbreak can be applied to any iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch running firmware 3.1.2, 3.1.3 or 3.2, enabling users to break into their own devices and run programs not otherwise approved by Apple.

The jailbreak hack was first discovered by Dev Team member “Comex,” who Tweeted that the “Spirit” jailbreak wasn’t based on a browser exploit in April. The jailbreak was also posted on YouTube, showing that the hack provides a root shell with full access to the iPad file system.

The Dev Team is notorious for breaking into the iPhone OS, and subsequently making the exploits public.

Apple has its Apple’s iTunes and App Store under lock and key, enabling users to only access “company approved” applications. Jailbreaking occurs when users unlock their mobile devices, allowing them to access and run hundreds more applications, while giving them greater control and freedom to install more features and functions onto their iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch.

The latest jailbreak hack was first demonstrated on the iPad in early April, just three days after the release of the popular Apple tablet computer. Specifically, the latest jailbreaking program enables users to install an unauthorized digital equivalent to the Apple App Store called Cydia, which allows users to access unauthorized software such as “Backgrounder” — a program that gives users the ability to run more than one application at once. Cydia software was initially used in iPhone jailbreaks, but can be updated to run on the larger iPad.

Unlike previous exploits, the “Spirit” jailbreak is one that is untethered, meaning that users are not required to plug their devices into their computer every time they reboot. Up until now, hackers attempting to jailbreak the iPhone 3GS and latest iPod Touch could only apply a “tethered” jailbreak, which prohibited them from performing a hardware reset without connecting it to their computers via a USB cable.

There are some drawbacks for those who choose to go the jailbreaking route. For one, the warranties are voided once an Apple device is jailbroken. And users also eliminate any chance of receiving updates, patches or technical support from Cupertino.

However, this latest jailbreak release represents a big leg up for hackers in the continual volley between Apple and the jailbreaking community. But Apple will likely find other ways to thwart the Dev Team hacker community in their quest to fight piracy. In addition to running unauthorized third-party apps, jailbreaking can be used by hackers to steal software from the Apple App Store.

Resource:
http://www.crn.com/security/224700496

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The fixes, however, are subtle. The most significant one rights a network issue that caused Opera Mini to freeze at start-up. This release also set the app’s fallback language to English rather than Arabic, as it previously was (in other words, an error with a language pack will now revert back to English.) Opera Mini is now also available in Hungarian, and the company says it has fixed backend bugs and stability soft spots.

However, Opera’s mini update may disappoint some users who are on the lookout for Opera Mini to adopt multitouch pinch-to-zoom capabilities, finer-detail zoom levels, improved page rendering, and support for iPhone-optimized Web pages.

The fact that Opera Mini is a proxy browser that more or less beams an image of a Web page to your screen courtesy of Opera’s servers, can account for some of the user grievances. For instance, Opera Mini isn’t a native iPhone app, and therefore doesn’t have access to the pinch-to-zoom technology of iPhone’s Safari browser.

In the meantime, a brand-new entrant into the mobile browser space should have Opera reconsidering its position.

Skyfire, a previous Opera Mobile competitor on Windows Mobile and Symbian phones, has also on Thursday introduced Skyfire beta browser for Android. Skyfire’s browser is based on the same open-source WebKit engine used to build Safari–as such, it already employs pinch-and-zoom. Skyfire definitely has its sights set on a version for iPhone, which would bring it into direct opposition with its Opera Mini rival.

While Opera has gone on record boasting that it’s found a way around Apple’s browser restrictions using its own software code, the company’s stubbornness could lose users who care more about pinching the screen than they do about how quickly pages load.

It’s also worth noting competitor Skyfire’s buzzed-about ability to transcode and stream Flash video through the company’s servers. That, combined with multitouch support, could give Skyfire, and not Opera Mini, the next iPhone edge. Flash video has been the hot topic in mobile of late, with Google affirming that its Android OS update 2.2 will carry it, and Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ going on record to bestow his kiss of death for Adobe Flash on iPhone.

Opera may yet have a little breathing room to rethink its strategy before Skyfire and others make their iPhone move. Skyfire’s CEO Jeff Glueck told CNET in an interview that while an iPhone version of their native/proxy browser hybrid is certainly in the works, the company wants to make sure it can handle server hits comparable to a million new users in one day, assuming their success were to follow Opera’s in the first full day of its iPhone release.

Resource:
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-19512_7-20003802-233.html

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Skin doctor Dr Greg Pearson claims that the revolutionary app can improve people’s skin by shining a special light on to the owner’s face while they chat on the phone, reports The Sun.

The light kills off bacteria and promotes collagen growth, claims the medic.

Dr Pearson said: “This would have to go through a lot more clinical study before I could quantify its efficiency.

“I am fascinated by the concept that users would potentially be able to treat their acne while talking on the phone.”

Resource:
http://in.news.yahoo.com/139/20100209/868/ttc-now-iphone-app-that-can-cure-acne_1.html

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According to Engadget, the Android-powered Mini 5 just showed up in the FCC database with the WCDMA Band IV radios. Those radios only are used on one US network: T-Mobile’s (DT).

The Mini 5 is just a bit bigger than a big smartphone (HTC’s Evo will be 4.3 inches vs. the Mini’s 5 inches) but is being marketed more like a mini tablet — but one with significantly more screen size than the market leading iPod touch from Apple (AAPL). It is powered by the same Qualcomm (QCOM) Snapdragon processor that powers HTC’s latest Android phones as well. Unfortunately for Dell, it’s been only show running an older version of the Android OS, version 1.6 (vs. 2.1 on the latest Android phones).

Perhaps most importantly however, the Mini 5 will launch with a big content partnership from Amazon (AMZN) which will provide the device with music, Video-on-Demand, eBooks and anything else Amazon sells.

The questions that remain are: When will this device be sold and for how much ?

• Dell (DELL) could sell this through the carriers (T-Mobile in this case) like most phones and some Netbooks are sold
• Google (GOOG) could sell it ad-hoc like it sells the Nexus One (also on T-Mobile) on its website?
• Dell could sell this like Apple sells the iPad — With specialized unlocked data-only plans (though the Mini 5 can make phone calls)
• Dell could just sell this outright on Dell.com and let customers find their own SIM / plan options.
• Any combination of the above.

The device itself is probably going to cost south of $500 (if it wants to have any chance vs. the iPad and iPod touch) and any carrier deals will just bring that down further.

The Mini 5 is a big deal for Dell, which is coming to the US with its first Android devices and first portable devices since it killed the Axiom and Dell DJ lines years ago. Dell also sells a smaller Mini 3 in Brazil and China.

The Dell Mini’ 5’s size might be a good differentiator vs. Apple and HP which both make significantly smaller phones and larger tablets.

Speaking of larger tablets, Dell is slated to have a 7-inch version of its Mini Tablet at the end of the year and a 10-inch variety at the beginning of 2011.

Resource:
http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2010/04/19/fcc-database-reveals-dells-mini-5-to-come-to-t-mobile/

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On Monday evening, Opera Software announced that Apple had approved Opera Mini, the first alternative Web browser for its iPhone. After 24 hours, the free app was downloaded to 1,023,380 Apple devices, the company reported.

To get approval from Apple, however, Opera Mini could not be a true browser because Apple’s developer agreement forbids alternative JavaScript engines, and possibly Web rendering engines, from being released for the iPhone. But as Daring Fireball’s John Gruber pointed out, Opera Mini doesn’t actually render Web pages; it renders a compressed markup language called OBML, making Opera Mini more like a PDF reader than a Web browser.

Nonetheless, Opera said that iPhone users now “have a choice, and, as the numbers show, they are eager to explore new and faster ways to surf the Web on the iPhone – especially during heavy Web traffic,” according to Lars Boilesen, chief executive of Opera.

Resource:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2362734,00.asp

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This jailbreak will only work for iPhone 3G users on a Mac. It’s still in beta, so it’s very buggy. If you plan to jailbreak, know that your unlock will be compromised since Apple updated the baseband in the iPhone 4.0 beta firmware.

Resource:
http://www.iphonestalk.com/jailbreak-for-iphone-4-0-beta-1-available-now/

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Did you know that you will soon get to load your mobile phone with an app (short for an application) that can kill mosquitoes?!! This particular mobile phone module will use light and sound generated at a specific frequency to repel mosquitoes.

Indeed, mobile apps today can take on just about any role, or even channel a recital for that matter. Take Shafeeq Khan, for instance. This 29-year-old mobile repair shop owner in Uttar Pradesh has close to 30,000 followers who listen to his shayari over a mobile app called RockeTalk in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan the US and UK.

Besides these two examples, there are thousands of more utility-based apps to be purchased — a combination of products and services that enhance personalised experience on mobile phones. Most utility or productivity apps, offer a blend of technologies with functional benefits that cater to various social or professional requirements. With over 500 million mobile subscribers, growing by approximately 10 million per month, mobile networks in India have undeniably become the country’s largest distribution platform for delivering information and services to the masses through innovative applications.

It sure explains how Rajiv Kumar, CEO and founder of RockeTalk, managed to get a subscriber-base of 1.5 million users for his mobile app, which runs on close to 550 models of mobile phones, mostly low-end ones (priced at about Rs 4,000). RockeTalk is a free mobile phone app that enables users to create text, voice, photo and video messages, and share them. It also enables users to join communities and chat with individuals and groups over GPRS (mobile internet). “Next step is to get the app on Apple’s iPhone and introduce it to 3G markets in the West. “In India, too, 3G will accelerate growth since it will enable real-time networking,” says Kumar. With no advertising budgets, RockeTalk was introduced to users by bundling it on LG and Samsung handsets and through tie-ups with operators like Idea and Airtel.

Innovation: Name of the game

Mobile device makers like Micromax believe a mosquito repelling app on its low-cost handsets would do well with consumers. Rohit Sharma, COO of Micromax, draws on Nokia’s torch-phone that became vastly popular among the masses, “If a torch-phone can work, then a mosquito-repelling phone can be a hit, too.”

Media, pharmaceutical, retail and even governments are asking app developers to create mobile apps. App developers like 2ergo, which have created iPhone apps for the UK-based newspaper The Guardian, have seen their apps being downloaded 70,000 times in just four weeks. Ramesh Krishnan, COO of 2ergo, explains how a pharmaceutical company approached the developer for an app that could prescribe a healthy diet to individual users to maintain the right body mass index (BMI). “We are developing this app for devices based on various mobile operating systems and it will be offered by the pharma company as an advisory app to healthy living,” adds Krishnan.

The company is also keen on developing a voice-based app, along with state governments and local governing institutions that will enable users to request a birth certificate, marriage licence or register real estate with just a click on their mobile phones. “This app needs extensive government support. We have received encouraging feedback from government bodies. We strongly believe that e-governance can take a new leap with mobile apps,” says Krishnan.

Companies call in

Krishnan’s confidence is shared by Infosys. The software major has forayed into developing mobile applications and is working with a large retail partner to launch an app that would manage your grocery list. Subhash Dhar, senior vice-president and head (communications, media and entertainment business) Infosys, explains: “Infosys is keenly following the mobile app economy and is working with partners on various productivity and utility- based apps.” The company is also developing apps that will allow users to book, rent and even schedule taxi pick-ups (GPS-controlled vehicles) from any part of the country.

With Nokia continuing to command 60 per cent of the handset market, the company is making sure that its users carry the ‘smartest’ phones. Soon, Nokia mobile phones will come with ‘Nokia Bots’, a collection of add-ons that autonomously learn a user’s personal preferences and improve experience with customised features and tricks. These add-ons observe how the phone is being used and automatically configure and activate themselves. So, for instance, if you are in a meeting, your phone can automatically set itself to silent mode or prompt you to activate the same.

With user spending an average seven minutes on apps on every usage, Jasmeet Gandhi, head (services marketing), Nokia, reckons the company needs to have apps that will deliver services within the stipulated time. “We are also hopeful of engaging our rural customers with transaction-based apps and services that work on the SMS platform.” For its urban consumer, Nokia hopes to put the mobile phone’s camera to good use. “We are experimenting with apps that will allow users to capture images, upload them directly and even search details of the captured visual images,” he explains.

‘Walmart of mobile apps’

CanvasM, the joint venture between Tech Mahindra and Motorola, is yet another company purely focusing on utility applications. The company has close to 6,000 applications still under wraps. Jagdish Mitra, CEO of CanvasM, is confident about apps meant for commercial transactions and mobile banking. Mitra’s aim is to be the “Walmart of mobile applications”. The company is also working on a project for a retail giant to deliver barcode-based discount coupons. “The idea is that the customer will just have to put their mobile’s screen in front of the scanner and the barcode will be read for earning discounts,” explains Mitra. Industry research suggests that mobile coupons can increase footfalls by almost 17 per cent.

Operators like Virgin Mobile, too, have caught on. Beginning with apps like Hatke Learning, Virgin Mobile provides insights into various alternative career options. Another app, called Hatke Naukri, developed with Naukri.com, informs users about openings.

Apps unbound

There are hundreds of utilities out there on app stores — some useful, some not. Here are a couple of our recommendations that we believe will give a bang for your buck:

Making mouse of an iPhone

For $1.99 (Rs 88), Air Mouse Pro (AMP) lets you convert your iPhone into a wireless mouse or trackpad. The app puts to use the phone’s built-in accelerometer to translate hand motions into mouse movements. AMP gives you two options to control your system. The first is via a touch-pad-style interface, where you drag your fingers around the screen in the same way you would on a notebook. The second mode is through the use of the accelerometer. The basic concept is that you press and hold the button in the middle of the mouse buttons and then tilt the phone in the direction you wish to move the mouse.

Do you have Wikitude?

Wikitude is a free, location-based Wikipedia app for mobile phones based on the Google Android platform. Aimed at tourists, this app superimposes information about points of interest on either a Google map or through the mobile camera’s viewfinder. The app calls this ‘augmented reality’, and it’s a pretty cool effect. If you’re looking for more information on where you’re located and the surrounding area, this app is perfect.

Readymade emails

If you want to cut short the time taken for emailing people you stay in touch with a lot, go to the Apple’s App Store and download the $0.99 (Rs 44) Mail Quick app. This allows a user to, with one or two clicks, open an e-mail template already addressed to a person on a favourites, list. Users can select a person they email often and, by clicking on the app icon, a mail already addressed to that person will open. They can also enter multiple addresses and have preset subject lines.

Location-based friendships

Affle, better known as creators of SMS 2.0, plan to have a location-sharing and -tracking service (for the Symbian platform) that lets members know where their friends are and share photos or notes about locations with others in an area. Members can post photos or comments about their location or activities and discover new people who use this niche app, ranging from within a few feet to an entire region. Affle has not indicated the app’s price.

Compile your own dictionary

Nokia is testing a new app for its mobile device, called the custom dictionary. This app can store user-defined words that are used frequently while typing. The words are then used in predictive text input. While price is undecided, the app will allow users to add and delete words from the dictionary, and even scan text files to add them to a text library. Other features include ability to transfer the dictionary to other devices.

Resource:
http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/ringing-in-an-appday/391576/

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Physical appearance

One thing you expect from newer versions of Apple products is; they will be slimmer and lighter than their predecessors. Unfortunately, that has not been the case with the iPhone. From what we understand of Apple so far, if it is physically possible to make something smaller, then they will make it. However, it seems that with the iPhone they just couldn’t and each new version came with the exact same dimensions as the older one.

The reason for this could be because Apple kept adding new features to the iPhone with every new version. Newer features also require more power and hence a bigger battery. This is why they couldn’t make the device smaller as it would then require a smaller battery.

With the fourth generation iPhone, we feel that Apple, instead of adding more features to the phone, will instead concentrate on how they would fit the current features into a slimmer and lighter body.

However, that would mean the fourth gen iPhone will have a fully plastic rear, just like the current iPhone 3G and 3GS, as it would be impossible to fit all the radio antennas inside a slim metal casing without disrupting their functionality. This was the reason for them to move away from the full metal back of the first generation model.

Another theory of ours is that instead of a slimmer body they will retain the current dimensions and instead make the rear side resemble the one on the iPad Wi-Fi + 3G model. This model of the iPad has a black plastic strip at the top where it hides the radio antennas. Since the iPhone has the exact same radio units inside the 3G model of iPad, it would work just fine. This would also make the iPhone a part of the ongoing aluminum-ising of Apple’s product line.

Display

Conventional wisdom suggests that Apple would equip the iPhone 4G with a higher resolution display, possibly even an OLED display, like the one on the Nexus One. But I have reasons to believe that neither would happen. Allow me to explain.

First I’ll explain why I think Apple won’t bump up the display resolution on the iPhone. The reason is simple: apps.

The iPhone currently has 150,000 applications for it on the App Store, all designed to work for one resolution: 320 x 480. If tomorrow Apple introduces an iPhone with a higher display resolution, all the current apps would have to scale to fit the higher resolution display, just like they currently do on the iPad. They will work, but they won’t look good.

But that’s just one issue. What about applications that will be created after the iPhone 4G if a higher resolution display is released? The developers will then have to write apps that would work on the new as well as the old low resolution iPhones and iPod touches. They cannot ignore the new ones because higher pixels would let them do a lot of interesting UI changes and they cannot ignore the older ones because there are millions of them out there. This will be troublesome for developers and I doubt Apple would allow this to happen.

Also, an increase in resolution will necessitate changes in the UI and basically the OS itself. And since the iPod touch runs the same OS, it will have to be given the resolution bump as well or else Apple would have to keep working on two OSes simultaneously, which they wouldn’t want to. Also an increase in resolution would also necessitate an increase in size of the device, which somehow I doubt Apple would do. So all in all, it seems to me that an increase in screen resolution seems unlikely, at least for now.

But does this mean the iPhone will never get a higher resolution display? Who know, maybe it will, if Apple manages to solve the above mentioned problems somehow.

Now I’ll explain the OLED part of the argument. Now this time I don’t have any solid reasons to back it up but just a gut feeling that says “they won’t do it”. I’m not saying that Apple hates OLED or anything. It’s just that they don’t find it worthwhile enough right now, just like Blu-ray. Plus they are heavily into the LED-backlit LCD panels now and their latest obsession is with IPS technology. I doubt they would use IPS technology on the iPhone as it wouldn’t make much sense but what I doubt even more is Apple using OLED on the iPhone or on anything for that matter for the foreseeable future.

Long story short, we think the iPhone 4G might just sport pretty much the same display as the current model. However, you can expect minor improvements. It’s not as if the display on the current iPhone is at the pinnacle of LCD technology and performance, and it can definitely be improved further without adopting any new technology.

Camera

The current iPhone 3GS has a 3.2 megapixel camera with autofocus and also capable of recording videos in VGA resolution at 30 FPS. When asked about the fourth generation model’s camera, our theory is that the resolution of the still camera will remain pretty much the same. Apple is not a big fan of high resolution cameras or else they wouldn’t have launched their first phone with a 2 megapixel camera.

Another reason why I don’t think the camera resolution won’t increase is because of what we discussed earlier, the size. A higher resolution sensor also takes up more space inside the casing. Now if Apple is looking forward to make the iPhone slimmer, putting in a higher resolution camera would be the last thing they would want to do. You might then ask what about phones like the HTC HD2, which are pretty slim and yet has a high resolution camera. Well, in case of the HD2, the lens juts out considerably from the body – something you will never find on any Apple design. So, yes, the camera stays as it is.

Video has become a big deal for Apple recently. They put video recording on the iPhone 3GS and gave a convenient option to upload it on YouTube. They even went ahead and fit in a camera on the iPod nano. Not just any camera, but a video camera that records just videos. Also, recently we have observed Apple talking a lot about HD videos in particular. They talked about HD video playback on their Macs, they also talked about the HD video playback on the iPad. This leads us to believe that there is a possibility of the iPhone 4G actually recording videos in HD resolution. Maybe not full 1080p but definitely the 720p variety. Considering that Apple seems to have no plan to enter the digital camera market, they might as well make their iPhone do all the work.

I doubt Apple would advertise the iPhone 4G’s HD viewing capability though, well apart from the ones that it records. They would rather want you to do that on the iPad (which means you probably won’t get YouTube HD app on the iPhone 4G). Viewing HD videos on that low resolution screen won’t be much fun.

FM radio

We have a feeling that the iPhone 4G might have an FM radio built-in. The reason for this is the appearance of FM radio on the iPod nano recently. Apple vehemently avoided FM radio in their music players all this time, and then suddenly one day they decided to put it in the iPod nano. They even went ahead and put in the Live Pause function for the radio, which no one else offers. Also, when the iPod touch 3rd generation came out last year, the guys over at iFixit discovered during one of their usual product breakdowns that the latest generation touch actually has an FM radio receiver built inside but is disabled for some reason.

This strengthens our beliefs that the iPhone 4G would have an FM radio built-in. Apple would also issue a firmware update to the current iPod touch owners, which would unlock the dormant FM receivers inside their devices and then everyone can go back to listening music the old fashioned way. I’m pretty sure the Live Pause feature of the iPod nano would be carried over as well.

Hardware

I’m sure you are wondering if this is the hardware section of the article, and what the hell have I been talking about all this time? Well, here I’ll be talking about the processor; the heart of the device. The parts that make it tick. Well, you get the picture.

Before you start fantasizing about the iPhone 4G getting the 1GHz A4 chip from the iPad, we would ask you to stop right there and come back to reality. From what we think, the iPhone 4G will be rocking pretty much the same hardware as the current iPhone 3GS and there are two pretty good reasons for that.

First is that the hardware is pretty good and even though we have started seeing 1GHz smartphones like the Nexus One and HTC HD2, they run a different operating system. The iPhone OS can run smoothly on the current hardware so there is no real need to upgrade it. Even if Apple introduces HD video recording, it can still handle it. Remember the Samsung Omnia HD? It records HD video with the exact same hardware.

Secondly, a faster processor would require a bigger battery, something Apple could probably not fit in the current body; leave alone a slimmer one.

Connectivity

As far as the connectivity is concerned, once again we believe the iPhone 4G will be near identical to the current iPhone 3GS. There is a small chance that the Wi-Fi will be upgraded to support 802.11n, but that requires a lot of processing power, not to mention battery power. The iPod touch Wi-Fi unit is capable of 802.11n, as discovered by iFixit, but that doesn’t mean Apple will unlock it. It’s quite possible it is the same chip they use on the iPad, which does have 802.11n support. There is also a chance that Apple might come up with a CDMA version of the handset for certain markets.

iPhone OS 4.0

If there is one thing we are sure that the iPhone 4G will have it is OS 4.0. In fact, OS 4.0 would probably arrive even before the 4G model is launched, like they did with OS 3.0.

So what can we expect in 4.0? Well, the thing that we keep hearing most is the introduction of full-fledged multi-tasking, like you would do on, say, a Symbian or Windows Mobile handset. The current iPhone OS does support multi-tasking but it is limited to a handful of applications that have been built-in to the OS, such as Mail, Messages, Safari, etc. Third party applications cannot take advantage of it. However, there have been talks that Apple is introducing proper multi-tasking on 4.0.

The reason why Apple had avoided implementing traditional multi-tasking previously is because they were concerned that it would impact the battery life of the iPhone negatively. But if the rumors are true, then they have probably found a way to solve that problem. Or maybe it is just that; a rumor.

We might also see some improvements to the core applications. An updated version of the mobile Safari would definitely be nice. They might also replace the traditional Google search with Bing search (that is if the ongoing cold war between Apple and Google continues to rage). However, if they do that then they probably won’t just stop at Google search for Safari and would probably eradicate Google Maps as well, which I doubt they will right now. So expect Google services to be around for a while on the iPhone.

After the launch of the iPad, we have a feeling that some of the apps on the iPhone might take on a similar look and feel as their older siblings. So the iPod app could turn into the iTunes app and so on. Some people are even speculating that the iPhone would get the iBook Store, but we doubt that as it is one of the selling points of the iPad and Apple won’t take that away from it. Also, reading books on the smaller screen of the iPhone wouldn’t make much sense anyway.

Apple might even add Flash support to iPhone. Yeah, right! There are more chances of them equipping the iPhone with a rocket launcher than Flash support!

Well, that’s all we have for you now. But like we said, if you have anything else to add (and we are sure you will) then please mention them in the comments section below.

Resource:
http://www.techtree.com/India/Features/iPhone_4G_What_To_Expect_And_What_Not_To/551-110237-899.html

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