SDK

We've been waiting for copy and paste on the iPhone for a long, long time, but despite our pleas, Apple still says that it's not at the top of their list of priorities. In the meantime, a very creative college student by the name of Zak White has created his own alternative that looks to be the first viable copy/paste solution between multiple apps that doesn't interfere with Apple's SDK.

The NDA looming over iPhone app development has been causing developers a lot of frustration. It's viewed by many to be largely unnecessary, and blocks open collaboration among developers, limiting the resources at their disposal. But there may be a reason for Apple to be doing all of this.

Even before the iPhone 2.0 software was released to the masses, rumors were circulating that 2.0.1 was already in the works. It looks like they have a little more in store than just a routine update, as they have seeded a beta version of iPhone 2.1 Firmware (Beta 1, Build 5F90) to developers.

So the App Store is great. It gives the hundreds of developers who didn't want to take their time developing for an unofficial software platform the ability to publish apps for the iPhone and iPod touch. But it's still far from perfect, and the restrictions involved with the SDK are beginning to prove that we really can't do without hacking after all.

Late Thursday, Apple released beta 8 (build 9m2199) of its iPhone/iPod touch software developer kit while beta certificates issued before June 9th also expired. The beta, a 1.25 gigabyte download, includes iPhone firmware version 5a345 and according to sources, improves stability as well as mentions a developer-only version of iTunes 7.7, which developers can use to "install iPhone OS Beta 8 on your Apple devices."