New rumors on iPhone 3.0 background apps

by Justin Horn on May 15th, 2009 @ 5:09 pm

John Gruber brings up the possibility of background apps in iPhone 3.0 again after reading an article by Dan Frommer.

Dan Frommer:

Here’s two potential scenarios we’ve heard. Treat these as anecdotal rumors for now, as we don’t know how realistic they are.

• Apple might allow users to select two apps that can run in the background.
• Apple might selectively allow some apps to run in the background. We assume that developers could apply for permission to run in the background, and that Apple might approve or deny them based on the resources they need and how well they behave with the operating system’s stability.

Gruber points out that this is a pretty sketchy rumor, but is in line with a rumor he heard way back at MacWorld in January:

What I heard then was that Apple was working on a vastly improved dock for your most-frequently used apps, and that there’d be one special icon position where you could put a third-party app to enable it to run in the background.

I do think there is a good chance we will get background apps in a few months as one of the big surprises with iPhone 3.0, but it will only be availble on the new 3rd gen iPhone. The current models simply do not have enough app memory, not to be confused with the storage memory of 8GB and 16GB, to handle background apps. I do believe 3rd party apps could run in the background on the new iPhone if the rumors of the app memory going from 128MB to 256MB are indeed true. Another hint at background apps came from Digg’s Kevin Rose when discussing iPhone 3.0 rumors at SXSW. In response to a question on background apps he says “No, no Background Apps. They said they couldn’t do background apps”. Then after the douche bag to his right says it’s never going to happen Rose goes on to say studder “…no..uh.. it will happen”. Even though he says no at first, his hesitation sounds like it could happen, but only with new hardware.

I really hope they introduce background apps in a couple months as it would fit nicely into the short list of possible hardware upgrades (digital compass, faster CPU, more app ram, more storage, improved battery life, etc.) that would entice owners of the iPhone 3G to shell out another $200 to $300 bucks for the new model.

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iPhone, Speculation

1.
1. Pre’s battery the big let down…Apple smart for delaying background apps on iPhone? | When Will Apple?

   June 4th, 2009 1:02 am

   [...] there is another phone out there right now that can do better. If the 3rd gen iPhone can support background apps and deliver the battery life the Pre can’t, it will truly be the “Pre Killer”. [...]

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