New to modding devices? Wanna Jail Break your iPhone? Here are some thoughts:
This evening I was pretty exited because of a friend’s twitter post on the availability of a solution to (finally) jail break my 3G iPhone. Sadly that announcement spun me into a downward geek spiral which sucked-up most of my evening. Bleary eyed, seduced by an orgy of firmware tweeks, video applications and interactive lock screens I lost myself to the forbidden side of modern device ownership.
When I came to my senses and the frenzy of exploration wore off, I realized that although the potential of a Jail Broken (3G) iPhone is great, it just isn’t for everyone. If you like to get dirty go ahead and break the seal it’s a painless process and to recover it’s pretty easy. If however you use your iPhone as one of your primary communication tools I’m not sure the process or applications available are worth the risk (yet).
Many of the indie applications on Cydia and Installer are for previous firmware editions (Original iPhone operating system) and they quickly crash the phone or don’t run at all. As a result you’re going to waste time sifting through applications, testing and uninstalling. The potential and temptation of a Jail Broken iPhone lies in it’s ability to do things like tether a 3G’s Internet signal to a laptop, freeing VoiP applications like Fring to use 3G, stream video using applications like Qik, copy & paste, run background applications (non Apple), GEO location, and cosmetic tweeks that allow background, icon and lock screen changes.
Out of the hundreds of applications available I’ve picked a few free ones (and one trial ap) which may be worth risking your sanity for:
a. Qik Streaming video app for your iPhone. A slick application worthy of being on iTunes and one worth Jail Breaking for.
b. iPhone Modem “iPhoneModem is an application for the iPhone that aims at making it really easy to use the iPhone’s Internet connection on your computer.”
c. Intelliscreen Make your iPhone’s lock screen usefull by adding weather, calendar, mail, sms etc. *Pay app after 10days.
d. Insomnia “Insomnia is an iPhone native application
that, when enabled, will prevent the iPhone from sleeping, thus overriding its default behaviour. This allows background applications to continue to run and WiFi to work long after the screen has been switched off. (The iPhone’s default behaviour is to sleep 30 seconds after the screen has gone off, when not docked and charging that is). *Developers notes.
e. Winterboard Skin your phone, backgrounds, icons, sounds etc. Think MySpace without the Glitter font. *A blog post from iphoneincanada.ca about lag issues with winterboard.
I think the most important things to consider before jail breaking your iphone is: how much time can you lose (installing/restoring/maintaining) it’s not like Apple’s app store, what’s your technical ability to recover? And last never forget “What would Elvis do?” (I honestly have no idea but it made for a cool header image.)
Comments? Suggestions? @ryantaylor on twitter [www.twitter.com/ryantaylor]
*Update: Suggested blog posts/comment threads & resources*
- Another ‘Top 5 iPhone Cydia/Installer Applications’ Post
- http://thebigboss.org & a post on Performance Issues
- Forum: http://hackint0sh.org/
- Blog/Forum: http://modmyi.com/
- iPhone Browser (for PC) Copy Move Delete Files on your iPhone
