Apple has announced some of the new features that will be in the upcoming release of iTunes 8.1. This information was posted on the iTunes "What's New" page.

Speed improvements
iTunes gets a speed boost. Now when it comes to loading large libraries, browsing the iTunes Store, and syncing your devices, iTunes responds faster than before.

Autofill any iPod
Now the convenience of Autofill works with any iPod. Let iTunes choose what songs fill your pocket and enjoy your music at random.

Import as iTunes Plus
Automatically import music from your CDs as higher quality, 256-Kbps iTunes Plus files. Watch a tutorial to find out how to import music from CDs.

As anticipated, Apple on Wednesday evening delivered iTunes 8.1 with performance enhancements, support for CD imports to iTunes Plus, and new Genius features. Separately, the company also updated its Front Row media application.

iTunes 8.1 (65.4 MB) "is now faster and more responsive," Apple says. "You will enjoy noticeable improvements when working with large libraries, browsing the iTunes Store, preparing to sync with iPod or iPhone, and optimizing photos for syncing."

In addition, iTunes 8.1 provides several other improvements and bug fixes, including:
Supports syncing with iPod shuffle (3rd generation).


Allows friends to request songs for iTunes DJ.


Adds Genius sidebar for your Movies and TV Shows.


Improves performance when downloading iTunes Plus songs.


Provides AutoFill for manually managed iPods.


Allows CDs to be imported at the same sound quality as iTunes Plus.


Includes many accessibility improvements.


Allows iTunes U and the iTunes Store to be disabled separately using Parental Controls.

iTunes 8.1 also includes a couple of security enhancements.

---

Front Row Update 2.1.7

Meanwhile, Front Row Update 2.1.7 (13.3 MB) has also been released, promising to deliver improved compatibility with iTunes 8.1.

On top of yesterday's announcements

-iBluetooth's launch
-Metal Gear Solid: Touch's March 19th debut
-iPod touch's untethered jailbreak debut
-iTunes 8.1 release
-iPod shuffle (3G) debut

Apple on Thursday announced plans to hold a special media event for journalists on its Cupertino-based campus that will offer a sneak preview of the next-generation iPhone operating system dubbed iPhone 3.0.

The event will take place at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time on Tuesday March 17th in the intimate setting of the Apple Town Hall -- the same venue used to introduce the company's new unibody MacBooks last fall and the original iPhone Software Developers Kit (SDK) last March.

ArsTechnica was amongst the publications invited and has posted the following image from the email invite.

At this juncture, there's no indication that Apple will use the gathering to divulge details of next-generation iPhone handset hardware, which is expected to be unveiled several months later at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference or another event of its choosing.

Developing...

So it looks like Apple’s planning on holding an event for iPhone 3.0 OS March 17th along with showing off an updated SDK. This would fit nicely with their brief history of having a preview software event followed by a hardware refresh in June/July. As far as what we’ve been told of iPhone 3.0, here’s what we’ve got:

MMS
Tethering via Bluetooth and USB

Steve Wozniak has fractured his leg while practicing for Dancing With the Stars.

ABC confirms that Cedars-Sinai hospital in Los Angeles xrayed and found a fracture but he'll be able to continue on the show.

His partner, professional dancer Karina Smirnoff was there for moral support as doctors performed an X-ray followed by an MRI showing that the Apple co-founder had a fracture.

Doctors told Woz that he could dance as long as he wears a removable cast and watches his foot.

According to ABC the Woz told doctors he loves being on 'DWTS' because he really "loves being a part of such a good and important thing." He also promises his next dance will be "wild and fast and all-over and crazy and fun, just like the first one."

good info...keep up the good work

Voicemail Forwarder, an application which forwards voicemails to email, has become the second app to be sold on the Cydia Store.

The application adds new functionality to your existing iPhone Visual Voicemail. Instead of only being able to listen to your voicemails on your phone, you can now share those iportant messages with a single click.

Voicemail Forwarder gives you a new button that fires up an email with the current voicemail attached to it. You can then send the email as normal to any recipient.

The application costs $2.99.

Rock Your Phone, an alternative app store for Cydia Store or Apple’s AppStore, is now open for business! First, Cydia Store opened and is now challenging Apple’s AppStore and now, Rock Your Phone has joined Cydia Store and is challenging Apple.

At the moment, Rock Your Phone only has 5 applications for sale, one being free (for limited time). Rock Your Phone does offer a 10 day trial unlike Cydia or Apple which is awesome! I can’t tell you how many applications I’ve boughten from the AppStore and to find out they are horribly unstable and sometimes they aren’t even what I expected. So, Rock your iPhone having a 10 day trial is a huge plus for me.

Head over to RockYourPhone.com to get a RockID and download their desktop client (Windows and Intel Mac OSX - no PowerPC) and install it and install Rock Your Phone on your iPhone and start downloading some applications!

- source: http://RockYourPhone.com

Kevin Rose leaked some information about iPhone OS 3.0 during the live Diggnation show at SXSW in Austin last night.

<embed src="http://www.viddler.com/player/829ad9ef/" width="437" height="288" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowScriptAccess="always" allowFullScreen="true" wmode="transparent" name="viddler" ></embed>

According to Gizmodo, Rose revealed the following information:
- Cut and paste in 3.0
- Users magnify or double tap a word to bring up cut and paste
- Pinch “boundariesâ€

Apple may be set to reveal a tablet alongside the iPhone OS 3.0 during tomorrows media event.

Seth Weintraub of Computer World writes

The timing? Well, if this thing has to be put on a device in late Summer, Apple will probably want some software to run on it…probably even an App Store. If so, developers will need at least a few months to get their apps to run on this new little device. That means they should probably start right about now.

Then there has been the persistant “premium app storeâ€

iPhone 3.0 Software Preview

1:15 Demo running showing how customers will be able to purchase new content from within an application. Once you finish a game with 10 levels, you can purchase the next 10 from within the App. In terms of a geographic app like City Guides, developers will be able to sell "City Packs."

1:16 Moving on to Peer to Peer connectivity.

1:17 iPhone 3.0 will support auto-locate of devices in the same general area without having to use WiFi. The auto-discovery is performed over bluetooth, without pairing. This is powered by Bonjour and will benefit both games and other applications.

1:19 Scott says there are thousands upon thousands of developers building accessories for the iPhone, iPod touch. With the iPhone 3.0 SDK, developers are going to be able to create applications that work directly with their proprietary accessories.

1:21 Examples are a digital equalizer for a Boombox dock, FM transmitter with an app for changing stations, or even one for medical devices.

1:21 Moving on to Maps:

1:23 The heart of the Maps application is being turned into an API so that developers can embed Maps into their applications -- these embedded maps will support multi-touch commands, support the various modes such as satellite and street, and support GPS.

1:24 CoreLocation will also be available for Turn-by-Turn GPS apps. However, developers will need to supply their own Maps because Google isn't licensing their for this use.

1:25 Next: Push notification, which Apple admits it's late on. Says they had to completely redesign the server for Push Notifications. It's taken 6 months.

1:27 Apple tested background apps on rival OSs from RIM and Microsoft and found background standby time dropped by 80 percent or more with background enabled. Apple's solution will only see standby time reduced by 23%

1:30 Recapping Push Notification features: Can push badges, text, and sounds. Apple is customizing Push Notification for all 80 countries where the iPhone is available, making sure its optimized across all applicable mobile networks.

1:31 Apple's also adding a new API for streaming audio/video and another for in-game voice audio.

1:33 Other new open APIs include iPod Library access, the proximity sensor, audio recorder, the battery API, data detectors, text-selection, and more. A few iPhone devs have been asked to use the new SDK for two weeks and show off what they could create...

quick one: if i need to load apps on a ipod touch, i will need to unlock right? anyone know exactly how to do this?

Thanks

and what we've all been waiting for...


2:05 Moving on to the customer: iPhone 3.0 will have....

2:05 Cut, Copy and Paste

2:06 That's just 1 of 100 new features for end users, Forstall claims.

2:07 Demo: Double tap on a word in email brings up a copy/paste/cut popup. Then two icons appear that you can drag to further customize your selection.

2:08 "To select an entire block of text, put your thumb on the right drag point and drag it to where you want your block of text to end. You can drag the left drag point as well." - Giz



2:09 "You can drag between apps as well (obviously), through the same process. Double tap, then drag in order to select what text you like, then double tap and paste to paste it." - Giz

2:09 You can shake the iPhone/iPod touch to Undo.

2:10 Demoing copy-paste in third party app, from Ars: "Puts finger down, selection automatically highlights paragraph, copies text, opens a Mail message and pastes with formatting."

2:10 Demoing multi-phone emailing...



2:11 You can now tap an action button and select multiple photos that can then be copied and pasted into Mail.

2:13 Moving on to landscape mode

2:13 All applications getting landscape keyboard mode!

2:13 That's the wider keyboard layout, btw, that was only available in Safari previously.

2:14 Scott: New Messages application with the ability to forward and delete individual messages...

2:14 It includes MMS support.

2:15 You can send files such as contact cards, audio files, locations, pictures, etc.

Not all features will be available on the original iPhone, such as MMS and stereo Bluetooth.

You can watch the keynote here.

Thanks for the 3.0 updates mitch.

I may be missing something here but how could things like iBluetooth bring bluetooth to 1st generation iPhones but Apple themselves can't?

After years of Apple kicking its fanboy base with its autocratic and expensive gizmos, it appears that one app developer has finally come clean with what he thinks of them.

Its latest application for the iPhone is a product called Icount which seems innocent enough, if not a bit challenging for the average fanboy.

However the logo that accompanies the product seems to be arranged in a way so that the letter 'o' is dropped.

Of course his must be an accident, after all Apple has made a big thing about how it does not allow swearing in its Iphone Apps.

Quite how it failed to notice a logo with the rudest word in the English language smack bang in the middle of the front page of Itunes is beyond us.

We conclude that Apple is trying to tell its users something, subliminally

iBluetooth Cracked!!!

Here are the steps to get the app to work

download this file!

http://www.4shared.com/file/92470170...h_cracked.html

1. Remove the iBluetooth App
2. Install it again (from the xSellize repo http://xsellize.com/cydia/username-password/)
and don't open iBluetooth!
3. Copy the cracked iBluetooth_ to:
/var/stash/Applications/iBluetooth.app
4. Reboot your iPhone and it should work just fine!

(p.s check if the iBluetooth_ properties are 7777!, If there not change it in to 7777)

also have how to crack cyntact but i havent tried it yet...hav fun with the bluetooth...

AT&T will begin offering “no commitmentâ€

A new feature in the iPhone 3.0 firmware appears to let users remotely pinpoint a lost or stolen phone by securely requesting the device’s location via Apple’s MobileMe service.

The setting appears under the MobileMe settings page, where push updates for mail, contacts, calendars, and bookmarks are configured. Below these settings is a simple control to activate “Find My iPhone.â€

An update to the Cydia Installer has added a new feature which can queue packages for batch installation.

To use the feature press the Cancel button when at a Package’s Confirm Install screen. This will bring up two large buttons: Continue Queuing and Cancel and Clear.

If you press Continue Queuing you will notice that the package is highlighted in light green. You can now go and queue up more packages.

When ready to install press the Manage tab at the bottom of the screen then press the Queue button at the top right of the screen.

A chart comparing the features in iPhone OS 3.0 and the features in the upcoming Android Cupcake Update has been posted by LifeHacker.

As you can see from the chart the iPhone and Android have come a lot closer in capability. One of the main differences still being Push Notifications versus Background Processes.

BigBoss has issued a warning asking non developers not to install the iPhone 3.0 Beta on a live iPhone. He stresses that this early operating system is for developers only and lists some important reasons why...

1) The iPhone OS will probably expire every couple of weeks. If you are out and need a phone the day it expires you are screwed. You will not be able to use the iPhone until you restore to the “upgradedâ€

Smarthouse, an Australian website is claiming that as per their source, Apple's new iPhone which is widely speculated to be released in June will include an OLED screen made by LG.

If this rumor is true then an OLED screen along with a better battery pack could address one of my biggest gripes about iPhone 3G which is poor battery life.


Smarthouse claims:

"It’s believed that a new iPhone and iPod Touch due later this year will include an OLED screen made by LG who last year scored a multibillion dollar deal to manufacture display screens for Apple."
The current iPhones make use of LED-backlight display. A significant benefit of OLED displays over the current LCD display used in iPhones is that OLEDs do not require a backlight to function. Thus they draw far less power and, when powered from a battery, can operate longer on the same charge. The other advantage of OLEDs is that since they don't need backlight, they can be much thinner than an LCD panel.

OLEDs also enable a greater range of colors, gamut, brightness, contrast and viewing angle than LCDs because OLED pixels directly emit light.

But the biggest technical problem for OLEDs is the limited lifetime of the organic materials which has also limited their use.

Mac Rumors is also skeptical about this rumor as it has been doing the rounds since 2003 but Apple has yet to adopt that technology for any of its products.

After signaling its intent to follow Apple's wildly successful iPhone into the smartphone business, Dell's first attempts to produce a phone have been rejected by the carries for being too dull and lacking enough differentiation to stand out in a competitive environment, according to a report.

A research note published today by Kaufman Bros. analyst Shaw Wu said that Dell's new prototypes, capable of running both Windows Mobile or Google's Android, simply didn't interest the carriers.

Mobile service providers either want basic phones they can sell for free (as the majority of LG units do) or headline grabbing models that can stand out and hopefully pull new subscribers from rivals, such as AT&T's iPhone 3G, Verizon Wireless' BlackBerry Storm, T-Mobile's Android G1, or Sprint's hopeful Palm Pre.

"From our conversation with supply chain and industry sources," Wu wrote, "it appears that it ultimately came down to lack of carrier interest and small subsidies, making it difficult for Dell to make a profit. In our view, the last thing Dell needs is to enter another money losing business as it seeks to preserve its operating margins of 5%-6%.â€

Apple has announced many new features in iPhone OS 3.0; however, only developers currently have access to the new software. However many of these features are available via free and paid apps found either in Cydia or the App Store.

Gizmodo has posted a nice list of features and associated applications which you can see below. You likely will need to jailbreak your iPhone before continuing.

Cut and Paste: Clippy (Cydia, Free while in Beta)
Apple's ridiculously delayed cut and paste solution looks slick. Slicker than Clippy, the best unofficial C+P solution, which still gets the job done though.

GPS Turn-by-Turn: xGPS (Cydia, Free)
xGPS does use Google's Maps, and does turn-by-turn brilliantly with active GPS tracking.

Tethering: iPhoneModem/PDANet (Cydia, Free)
Tethering via these jailbreak solutions works in the meantime, but be careful with how much data you use to not raise any eyebrows at the Death Star.

Email Multiple Photos: Emailpix (App Store, $US3)
Emailpix does it fairly smoothly, though, and gives you a choice of resolution to send to save time.

Bluetooth File Transfer: iBluetooth (Cydia, Free 15-day trial)
iBluetooth lets you pair with your computer to send and receive files. It's kind of buggy, but does work

Universal Search: Search (Cydia, Free)
It doesn't search your applications or your iTunes music like the 3.0 version, but Search is great for the most valuable searching situation: email. It also searches contacts, notes, SMS and the web.

Accelerometer Controls: mCoolPhone (Cydia, Free Trial/$3)
While mCoolPhones can't touch your iTunes functionality, it lets you assign shake events to various other phone functions, like answering calls.

Notes Sync: iPhoneNotes (Mac-only desktop App, Jailbreak required. Free)
To pull off native notes sync, make sure you have OpenSSH installed on your jailbroken phone and grab iPhoneNotes, which will import all of your notes and also sync back any text file you have on your computer.

Background Apps/Push Notifications: Backgrounder (Cydia, Free)
You can use Backgrounder to force official App Store apps to keep running even when you switch away to another app. It's great for keeping IM apps open and signed in while you do other things.

Landscape Keyboard: iRealSMS (Cydia, €10) and EasyWriter (App Store, Free)
For email, try the free EasyWriter App Store app, and for SMS, there's iRealSMS, which also adds a number of other features for hardcore texters like quick-replying and advanced sorting.

MMS: SwirlyMMS (Cydia, $8) and Get MMS (App Store, $4)
The best is SwirlyMMS, but even that doesn't work very well with AT&T's MMS provider

Get MMS, on the other hand, makes receiving MMS messages via AT&T's annoying web interface a little easier. It takes a screengrab of the login and password AT&T sends, and lets you save the attached video or photo.

Voice Memos: Epiphany (App Store, $2)
We love Epiphany, which buffers its recordings and only goes back in time to grab the important parts when you tell it to.


Adding Features Still Missing From iPhone 3.0:
- Video Capture: Cycorder (Cydia, Free)
- Flash: iMobileCinema (Cydia, Free)

CyDelete is a new application which deletes jailbroken iPhone applications straight from the SpringBoard just like Official App Store apps.

—–
Since the dawn of Cydia, users have been struggling to remove applications they’ve installed with it. Uninstalling a package is a seven-step operation at best: Start Cydia, Manage, Packages, (locate package), Modify, Remove, Confirm.

With the advent of CyDelete, however, Cydia packages can now be removed like any App Store applications- hold down the icon, wait for them to start wiggling, and tap the X. What was once cumbersome is now integrated into the standard iPhoneOS workflow. It is a lightweight MobileSubstrate plugin that only does anything in Wiggle Mode.

CyDelete will not remove applications that are not managed by Cydia, though they will be branded with an X. From SpringBoard’s standpoint, applications managed by Cydia and applications just sitting in /Applications are one and the same. CyDelete will also not remove Cydia itself, for safety reasons.
—–

You can install CyDelete from the BigBoss Cydia Repository.

Animated Weather Elements HD V2 by MNIDHK

http://macthemes2.net/forum/viewtopic.php?id=16793347




Places a nice image of the current weather on your lock screen.