iPhonefreak width="190"

I get used to expecting Apple to deliver, and take it for granted I suppose, like we all should be able to.  My update via iTunes today couldn’t have been easier. A couple of clicks, and it happened in front of me, while I juggled e-mails and the telephone (the one plugged into the wall). I glanced over and saw the spinner here and there, and at some point it was done.

This one is an original iPhone btw… has not been hacked in any way. This is why, I suppose, I’ve had a good day with it. Unfortunate reports of brick-ing happening to hacked iPhones are already coming in this morning.

Even though we knew it was coming, seeing the iTunes icon was
gratifying. I don’t suppose I’ll do too much in-depth searching for
content on the iPhone iTunes interface, but just previewing a couple of
featured releases via WiFi was very cool. And when I hit the "Buy Now"
button, it had already loaded my iTunes username from my desktop
version during sync. I entered my password and the song downloaded to
the phone amazingly fast. It actually seemed much quicker than the
desktop version, although I may have just happened on some lucky
bandwidth. I did wonder though, if the iPhone may be connecting to a
whole new rack of iTunes servers for the occasion. Clicked right over
to iPod, and it’s there by artist, song, album art, etc.

The featured song I purchased, by the way, was a single by Iron And Wine… what a cool band, and a great bump for them today.

Another happy thing I discovered was that I can now create a set of
my own e-mail folders in Mail on my iMac, and they now show up on the
iPhone. This wouldn’t work for me before, and it’s an important fix, if
that’s what it was.

To do this, I eliminated the e-mail account I had set up on the
iPhone, and created a new IMAP  e-mail account in Mail on my iMac. It
must be designated an IMAP account in Mail, even though I used my same
old POP settings, etc. After entering my server/login info etc… I
went to Preferences/Account/Advanced and checked the "Automatically
Synchronize Changed Mailboxes" button and left the "IMAP Path Prefix"
field blank (even though I’ve seen an Apple tech note that says this
must be "set"). Then I checked the "Sync Mail Accounts" box under
"Info" in iTunes and synced the iPhone.

I will have some info on a great new e-mail management application
I’m participating in developing in a few weeks, but in the meantime
this is an important capability for organizating iPhone e-mail. Even on
the iPhone, one long list of e-mails in one mailbox gets to be a drag.

So generally it was all good… um, mostly. I understand there are
priorities and strategies to Apples rule. But we all know how easy it
would be for them to include a simple memo recorder in this OS. It
would have been a nice little cookie. Why, Steve?… I’ve got a recorder screen for greetings, and 5 gigs of space left… a little help?