I’ve made no secret of my overwhelming enthusiasm for the iPhone, and have sung its glories here and elsewhere many times. That doesn’t mean that I never get irritated with the device. I do. And, by far, my most frequent annoyance is with Safari — especially when using it with the EDGE network.

The problem starts with the obvious: The EDGE network can be impossibly slow. Its speed appears to vary from moment to moment, as a function of the current signal strength as well as more mysterious factors that you can neither predict nor control. Its speed range varies from barely tolerable to virtually useless. And the greatest negative impact of these slow speeds occurs when using Safari. There are times when it can take several minutes for a Web page to load; assuming it ever completely loads.

But the problems with Safari on the iPhone extend beyond just the overall slow speed. What often happens is that, after tapping to load a Web page, your hopes are initially raised. You see the progress bar advance (indicating that more and more of the page’s elements have loaded) to as much as 80% completion in a relatively short time. Then it all just grinds to a halt. There is no more movement for an indefinite number of minutes.

Even this might be tolerable if, in fact, 80% of the Web page was now loaded and accessible. It might turn out that all you need from the page is within that 80%. However, more likely, your Safari screen will be blank. Absolutely nothing appears until after the bar moves past this 80% barrier. As a result, there are many times when I have given up entirely — until I can get to a Wi-Fi connection.

If you do wait long enough for the Web page to appear, your troubles may still not be over. Suppose there is a link on the page that you want to check out, but you also want to be able to return to the page you are now viewing. For example, suppose after you load the New York Times’ home page, you want to click a link to read an editorial; but you also expect to return to the home page to scan the remaining article listings.

On your Mac, you would do this by opening up the editorial in a separate window or tab. Unfortunately, the iPhone’s version of Safari does not support any variation of this capability. The best you can do is go to the editorial and then tap the Back arrow to return to the previous page. Ideally, this page should at least load faster than it did initially, because Safari had cached its contents. Don’t count on it. Safari does do caching, but it is very ineffective in my experience. Typically, I have to wait almost as long for the page to reload as I did in the first place. Once again, I often wind up just giving up on Safari until I can get to a Wi-Fi connection.

What can be done to improve the situation? Four things, none of which should be a surprise by this point: (1) Improve Safari’s caching of Web pages; (2) Improve Safari’s ability to display partially loaded pages; (3) Add a tab (or similar) function to Safari; and most-of-all (4) offer a faster network than EDGE.

Happily, the faster network is all-but-certain to arrive with the new iPhones (apparently expected to ship any day now!). These new iPhones are widely reported to support the much-faster-than-EDGE 3G network. As to the Safari-specific upgrades, it’s not as promising. The version of Safari included with the latest builds of the iPhone 2.0 SDK appears very much the same as the current version. Of course, Apple could be holding back a revamped version until the public release. I certainly hope so.

In this month’s User Friendly View column, I offer my take on what an iPhone 2.0 future will be like. There were a few thoughts tumbling around in my head that didn’t make it to the column. I offer them here, as overflow comments.

First up is “push.” The demonstration of push email, contacts and calendar events at the March 6 iPhone Event was quite impressive. Unfortunately, as I understand it, these capabilities only work if you are connected to an Exchange Server. The only more general push function remains the one for Yahoo! mail (as noted here), which worked with the iPhone from Day 1.

I hope that Apple finds a way to extend these push features so that all users can get the benefit. One such solution would be for the iPhone to sync with .Mac. In this setup, when you sync Calendars and Contacts with .Mac (as determined by the Sync tab settings of the .Mac System Preferences pane in Mac OS X), any changes to the .Mac content would be instantly “pushed” to your iPhone. Your .Mac email would be similarly pushed. Some complications might crop up when you next sync your iPhone in iTunes, but these should be resolvable.

Not only would this open up push features to all iPhone users, it would provide an additional incentive to subscribe to .Mac—making it a win-win for both Apple and iPhone users.

Speaking of enterprise, the initial reaction to the new enterprise features in iPhone 2.0 have been largely very favorable (see this Macworld article for one example). Although I am not an IT person or enterprise user myself, it certainly seems that Apple did a bang-up job here. Still, I retain some substantial skepticism about what will happen down the road. Apple, from the earliest days of the Mac (I am thinking back as far as to when the LaserWriter was introduced in 1985), has had its eyes on the business and enterprise market. Yet, despite many attempts (some of which seemed very appealing at the time), it has never succeeded in getting a significant share of this market.

I have to wonder whether the iPhone may run into similar trouble. Some have already cited the iPhone’s restriction to one carrier (AT&T in the U.S.) as a significant impediment. This echoes opinions, from years past, that PCs were preferred over Macs because IT people did not want to risk dependence on only one vendor (Apple) for hardware. Apple is much better positioned today (with billions in cash and a sterling reputation) to refute similar arguments for the iPhone. But they will still come. There are also the traditional cultural conflicts that Apple always has to contend with (as detailed in this Mac Observer column).

Personally, I am betting that the iPhone can defy the naysayers and break through the enterprise ceiling (much as the iPod did in its market). But past history tells me to be a bit cautious in my optimism.

Finally, going back to the March 6 event itself, those on the stage were able to demo the iPhone by mirroring the iPhone display to a large screen. As someone who gives presentations from time to time, I would love to be able to do this myself. Unfortunately, this is apparently not possible with the iPhones currently for sale. Yes, there are composite and component video cables for the iPhone, but these only work to “watch videos or slideshows” (as quoted from the Apple Store description). Isn’t it about time that Apple gave this feature to “the rest of us”?

Apple’s iPhone media event ended just minutes ago. So this is a very rough first take of my reaction. And my reaction overall is positive. The news is much better than my worst fears, although a little worse than my highest hopes.

Here are the upside highlights:

• Developers will get full access to the iPhone’s toolbox. From the sound of things, any software that Apple can write in-house, developers will be able to do as well. For example, the iPhone accelerometer will be accessible, as seen in some of the cool games that were demoed.

• Apple will release an iPhone Simulator that allows developers to test out their iPhone apps on a Mac.

• The iPhone SDK is free to developers and a beta version will be available today!

• Distribution of iPhone apps to users will be through an “App Store” application on your iPhone. YES! This means that you will be able to get software onto your iPhone directly from the phone itself. You won’t need to go through the iTunes application on a Mac or PC (although there will be iTunes access to the apps as well). Steve said you should be able to access the App Store via Wi-Fi or EDGE.

• The App Store will permit distribution of free software. Other than an initial $99 fee to publish software, there will be no charge for posting free apps. Developers will get to decide whether and what to charge for their software. Apple will take 30% of the price, if it is not free.

• Although Apple will place some limits on what software is allowed (no porn was mentioned, for example), it seems like Apple is not going to be overly restrictive here.

Now for the bad news:

• The iPhone Software Update 2.0 that allows users to get all of this software will not be available until June. The wait continues!

• Apple will apparently do its best to prevent developers from distributing software on their own. Exactly what this will mean for the software currently available via jailbreaking is not clear. Maybe Apple simply won’t officially support alternative distribution methods, but will still tacitly allow jailbreaking to continue. However, I suspect Apple will try to put an end to jailbreaking. Whether or not they can succeed remains to be seen.

• Aside from the new enterprise features (which I am skipping over here, except to say that the ability to mass delete and move email messages is extremely welcome!) and AIM for the iPhone (which may be included as part of a default iPhone installation), no other upcoming new iPhone features were announced. There was no mention of a 3G iPhone, more open Bluetooth access or voice-dialing, to name three things that I am especially looking forward to seeing.

• There was also no mention of whether or not third-party software will be able to allow hardware devices to connect to and work with an iPhone. I am especially thinking of something like a wireless keyboard. It remains unclear whether or not such devices will be possible via the SDK, but it seems unlikely. Apple did specifically say that they would not support any apps accessing the Dock Connector, outside of those that are approved for Apple’s “Made for iPod” program.

Bottom line: Having to wait until June for the Software Update, after expecting it to be available by February, is obviously a big disappointment. However, once June rolls around, all will be forgiven and forgotten.

Most users will be more than satisfied, at least in the short term, with what the Software Update allows. I would guess that about 90% of the third-party software now available via jailbreaking will wind up in the App Store. For the typical iPhone user, that should eliminate virtually any incentive to jailbreak their iPhone. Some software, perhaps apps that allow direct manipulation of the contents of the iPhone’s drive and certainly apps that perform actions that Apple does not want to permit (such as unlocking the SIM), will still have to depend upon jailbreaking. But most users won’t want such stuff, or at least won’t want to risk jailbreaking to get it.

On the plus side, by Apple completely opening up its iPhone toolbox and providing a “legal” method for third-party development, we should see a much wider and more elaborate selection of software than now exists. The games that were demoed today, for example, far exceed the rather minimalist games now available via jailbreaking.

So yes, we could have gotten a bit more. But we could have gotten a lot less. Yesterday, the iPhone was one of the greatest technological devices ever invented. Today it is even better—much better. It’s hard to complain about that.

Recently, I recommended against jailbreaking an iPhone running the latest software, unless you were in a risk-taking mood, especially with the SDK’s arrival expected so soon. If you were already using a jailbroken iPhone, running iPhone software 1.1.1 (as was the case for me), I recommended sitting still, again until after Apple’s SDK release.

However, as is common in the rapidly-changing world of jailbreaking, I have already changed my tune a bit.

First off, jailbreaking methods have improved and become more reliable. And don’t worry if you’ve just upgraded from version 1.1.3 of the iPhone software to version 1.1.4; most 1.1.3 jailbreak methods still work for 1.1.4.

Second, what I predicted in a previous blog entry has apparently been confirmed — at least as much as these things can be confirmed in advance of Apple’s official announcements — by iLounge.com. In particular, Apple’s SDK announcement coming this Thursday is not likely to signal an end to the advantages of—or need for—jailbreaking. Jailbreaking is likely to remain the only way to get third-party applications onto your iPhone for months to come—and perhaps much longer, if ever, for applications that don’t make it to Apple’s “approved” list.

As a result of these two converging facts, I decided the time was ripe to update my iPhone to version 1.1.4 and jailbreak it. So I did it today. Even if it turns out that the news on Thursday is better than I expect, I no longer see a downside here. Still, if you are thinking you’d rather wait before jailbreaking, I wouldn’t argue with you.

For the record, I used ZiPhone to jailbreak my phone. I highly recommend it. It worked perfectly and took only a couple of minutes. To avoid some potential problems, I restored my iPhone before doing anything else. This had the side-effect of updating my 1.1.1 iPhone to 1.1.4. I next launched ZiPhone and selected the “Jailbreak” option. ZiPhone did all the rest, including installing the key Installer application. After that, I added my selection of “hacked” applications and resynced the phone. Done.

One caution: ZiPhone still does not work on the latest iPod touches. Otherwise, it seems as easy and as solid as you could hope for.

Next stop: Waiting for Apple’s March 6 iPhone event.

The more closely I scrutinize Apple’s latest iPhone event invitation, the more I begin to believe that we will not actually see the SDK released next week. And it may be even longer before users have access to SDK software.

For starters, there’s the wording: “Please join us to learn about the iPhone software roadmap, including the iPhone SDK.” Why use the word “roadmap” at all? Why not simply say: “Please join us to learn about the iPhone SDK” or “Please join us for the unveiling of the iPhone SDK”?

The word “roadmap” suggests a journey. And a journey takes some time. It makes me think that we are going to learn new details about Apple’s plans for the SDK next week, rather than actually see the release of the SDK.

Then there’s the graphic image of the roadmap itself, which shows a road with markers for “Enterprise” “SDK” and “Software Update” spaced out along the way (in that order). One interpretation of this is that new Enterprise features will be made available (or even just announced) first, followed by the release of the SDK to developers (perhaps a beta version initially), followed by an iPhone software update that (finally!) allows users to obtain the SDK-dependent software.

Within such a framework, the SDK could be out within a few weeks while the Software Update may not become available for another several months.

And yes, this is all just speculation. Perhaps I am over-interpreting the tea-leaves here. A week from now, we’ll know for certain.

The HP-11C and HP-15C calculators are, quite simply, the best single-line display calculators ever created. If you don’t absolutely need a graphing calculator, they remain the best handheld calculators ever…period. This is true despite the fact that they date back to the 1980s. These HP marvels came with a sumptuous array of built-in functions together with a simple yet powerful method for programming (which allowed you to expand way beyond its built-in features). They also sported a sleek thin design that still surpasses any of the calculators on the market today. Best-of-all, they used RPN (Reverse Polish Notation) for data entry.

RPN, for those of you unfamiliar with this odd-named duck, is the alternative to the algebraic method of data entry. The algebraic method is found on virtually all other competing calculators (most notably the ubiquitous handhelds from Texas Instruments). You know you’re working with RPN if you use an Enter key instead of an Equals (=) key. Of course, the differences go beyond that simple distinction. Skipping over details, let me just say that, for anything beyond the most simple calculations, RPN is much easier to use, easier to keep track of what you’ve entered, and less prone to making mistakes. If you have ever been frustrated by entering a complex expression involving parentheses, for example, RPN will seem like a direct delivery from heaven.

Unfortunately, RPN lost out in the calculator wars. Even Hewlett-Packard largely abandonned it. They still make the HP-12C (a financial real estate calculator variation of the 11C). Beyond that, their calculators have either shifted to algebraic-only or a combined algebraic-RPN system. I am sure the reason for this is that, at first glance, RPN seems quirky and hard-to-learn. Admittedly, it does have a slightly steeper learning curve than algebraic entry. But once you make the minor effort to get over the hump, you are more than rewarded for your efforts. It may not seem like it at first, but RPN’s “inside-out” method of working through an expression mimics the way you would do such calculations in your head—much more so than the algebraic method.

I still use my trusty HP-15C. However, I must admit that it spends most of its time in a drawer of my desk. That’s because I now do almost all of my calculating on a Mac, via spreadsheets and such. And if I do want an HP-15C while working with my Mac, I simply launch a nifty emulation that’s almost as good as the real thing. The only remaining advantage of the “real” 15C is its portability.

This (finally) brings me to the main point of this blog entry. Last week, I was browsing through the list of programs available for my hacked iPhone (as viewed from the Installer utility) and discovered a set of HP calculator emulations (11C, 12C, 15C and 16C). I installed the 15C. It’s fantastic! After launching it, the phone becomes an HP-15C. The entire display is filled with an exact image of the calculator. To use it, you just tap the virtual buttons. The net effect is almost identical to pressing the physical buttons on an actual HP-15C. If you ever want to show off the advantages of a touchscreen interface, you’d be hard pressed to find a better example!

In a sense, I now have my HP-15C back in my pocket again. Actually, it’s even better. My “new” 15C doesn’t have to compete for space with my iPhone. The iPhone is the 15C. Ahhh…the joys of the iPhone…and iPhone hacks!

I only hope that, after the iPhone SDK is released in a few days, the HP-15C is one of the third-party programs that will be “officially” available, so I won’t need a hack to get it.

I am still happily using iPhone software 1.1.1—even though 1.1.3 is the current version and includes some cool new features, such as Maps “My Location.” Why am I still stuck at 1.1.1? Because I don’t want to abandon all the third-party software I’ve installed, software that I was able to put on my iPhone only after “hacking” or “jailbreaking” the device.

Now before you start posting comments, I am fully aware that there are reportedly ways to successfully hack 1.1.3. I could apparently have my cake and eat it too.

Thanks, but I prefer to save the calories and pass. The biggest reason should be no surprise. Apple will be releasing its iPhone SDK (Software Development Kit) later this month. This will, finally, provide an Apple-supported method for adding third-party software.

I have some hope that the SDK will wipe out any need to hack the iPhone. But I am not betting on it. I suspect that Apple will maintain at least a degree of control over what you are permitted to install. For those who want software not on Apple’s “approved” list, jailbreaking will remain the alternative. When that happens, I’ll reconsider my options.

But even if the SDK wasn’t coming, I’d likely defer on updating my iPhone. For now, I don’t see any point in taking even a small risk on the current jailbreaks.

And, to be clear, jailbreaking 1.1.3 carries some very definite risks. Depending upon which method you choose and your current iPhone setup, jailbreaking may: (1) simply fail to work and could require that you restore your iPhone with possible loss of data; (2) break certain iPhone features (including the very My Location feature that would be my prime reason for updating); (3) prevent SDK-supported software, when it becomes available, from working (unless you “undo” the jailbreak).

If that’s not enough to keep “jailbreaking” off the table for you, consider that the current methods are not exactly a piece of cake to install. For starters, in almost all cases, if you are already running 1.1.3, you’ll have to downgrade to 1.1.2 or even 1.1.1, before you can get the jailbreak to work. This is a multi-step process in itself, and not for the cautious Mac user. In any case, finding clear well-written instructions can be more difficult than actually doing the install. Gone are the days of the one-step Web-based process that worked with 1.1.1.

Finally, there is the deal-breaker for me: there is no clear consensus on the best way to jailbreak. From the perspective of an “outsider” to the hacking community, it looks like a confusing mess. I suspect it may seem that way even to those in the know.

The first publicly released hack for 1.1.3 was posted by Nate True around January 24. Nate was a member of the the iPhone Dev Team (a group responsible for most of the iPhone jailbreaking methods). However, the Team claimed that Nate’s method made use of material copyrighted by Apple and was thus potentially illegal (my guess is that Apple views all jailbreaking methods as having questionable legality, but that’s another story). Anyway, as a result of this breach, Nate was apparently “kicked off” the Dev Team.

A few days later, the iPhone Dev Team released its own 1.1.3 jailbreak. But don’t get too excited. The team pointed out, that this was not their “true” jailbreak method. Rather, this was a stopgap “soft-upgrade” method. The true method, when released, would be superior, with none of the potential problems of the stopgap method.

So why not just release the true method right away? If only things were that simple. The true method was being kept secret. Why? The logic was to wait until after Apple released the SDK, thereby preventing Apple from including a block to the true method in its next SDK-supported update to the iPhone software. This logic presumes that Apple remains unaware of the true method and would work to stop the jailbreak if it could. Plausible assumptions, but by no means certain.

Meanwhile, an update to a program called iJailBreak—and its iJailBreakMobile cousin—arrived on the scene. These utilities offered yet another way of jailbreaking your iPhone. The Mobile utility had the advantage of being able to jailbreak 1.1.3 directly from the iPhone, freeing the process of any dependence on a computer. However, it only worked if you were already running a jailbroken iPhone running 1.1.2 or 1.1.1, so you still would have work to do before you can use this utility. As I understand it, and I admit to have some trouble following all the soap-opera twists-and-turns here, these utilities are not a product of the iPhone Dev Team.

In quick response, the iPhone Dev Team released its own “computer-free” method for jailbreaking 1.1.3. It was labelled the “Official 1.1.3 Upgrader” (as if there really is anything official about any of these methods!) and you accessed it via the Installer utility on a jailbroken iPhone.

Hot on the heels of the Upgrader, a developer named Zibri released ZiPhone. As stated on the iPhone Atlas Web site, this software “claims to jailbreak, activate and unlock all iPhones running software/firmware 1.1.3 (including out-of-the-box) devices. The ZiPhonepackage uses the ‘true’ jailbreak method that the iPhone dev team was attempting to keep secret until the release of Apple’s official SDK…” However, it is not a product of the Dev Team—and I have seen no “official” confirmation of its “trueness.”

For what it’s worth, as of yesterday, I couldn’t even get the ZiPhone package zip file to decompress on my Mac. It hardly seemed to matter, at least for Mac users, because Zebri’s blog states that the Mac OS X version no longer works (assuming it ever did). I downloaded an apparently new version today. It did decompress, but it is still not clear that it can successfully jailbreak an iPhone.

For those of you who are still following all this, iJailBreak 0.5.1 was released yesterday. The unique claim of this latest version is that it can jailbreak an iPhone running 1.1.3—no need to downgrade to an earlier firmware version. However, it does not yet support the iPod touch, only an iPhone. It is apparently based on the ZiPhone method.

So where do things stand now? Well, you can choose among illegal methods, official methods, secret methods, true methods, false methods(?), computer-free methods, methods that don’t really work, and on and on. If you want to venture into this world, fully aware of all the risks and hassles, do so. But for anyone with the least bit of reluctance, I recommend staying away—at least until after the SDK comes out and hopefully after the hacking community cleans up their act, gets their house in order, and comes up with an agreed-upon reliable method for jailbreaking.

When you rent a movie via the iTunes Store, you have 24 hours from the time you start watching the movie until it is erased from your drive. That’s marginally better than the situation with Comcast (my cable provider). With Comcast, the 24 hour clock starts ticking from the moment I rent a movie, whether I start watching it immediately or not—making me feel a bit like Jack Bauer in 24. With the iTunes Store, you have a generous 30 days within which to start watching the movie.

The problem for me, even with iTunes Store rentals, is that I often want to watch a movie over two nights. The 24 hour limit gets in the way here. If I start watching at about the same time each night, I won’t get to see the second half of the movie—because I will have exceeded the time limit. A 36 (or even a 30) hour rental would make so much more sense. I know I am not alone here. A recent column by David Pogue makes the same point.

This is one reason I never rent movies from Comcast. It’s also a reason why I have been reluctant to try rented movies from the iTunes Store. Still, I downloaded one the other day, primarily as research for an article I was writing.

With the movie now on my drive, I naturally began to wonder exactly how strictly the 24 hour limit was enforced.

It turns out that it’s not enforced all that much.

What did I do? The most obvious thing I could think of. I changed the time. More specifically, after starting to watch the movie and putting the 24 hour countdown in motion, I went to the Date & Time System Preferences pane. From here, I unchecked the option to set the time automatically. Then I pushed the clock back a day.

Sure enough, iTunes now said that the movie had an extra day remaining before it expired. I still wasn’t sure that this would have the desired effect. But it did. The 24 hour period passed and the movie continued to play.

With success coming this easy, I figured I couldn’t be the first person to have come up with the idea. I was right. When I did a Google search, I found several similar reports.

There are couple of hiccups that can occur if you start pushing times around. iTunes may get a sense that something is a bit off. Occasionally, especially after changing the display size via iTunes’ View menu, the movie window may go gray or the sound may stop playing. Often, just closing and reopening the movie a couple of times will get things working again. As a last resort, I found that if I quit iTunes and reset the clock to less than 4 hours from the expiration time, the movie would always work fine when I relaunched iTunes.

I’ve made no attempt to see whether the extended time limit would hold if I transferred a movie to an iPod or an iPhone. I see possible complications here, as these devices have their own clocks. But I leave that for someone else to worry about.

In any case, I imagine that Apple will eventually find a way to prevent these time extensions from working. But who knows? Apple at first tried to block iPhone users from creating their own ringtones for free. In a 180 degree turn-around, Apple later not only ended the blockade but offered tools for creating ringtones using GarageBand.