Could somebody please make Mike Arrington a Web App?

Mike Arrington of TechCrunch claims he is quitting his iPhone as soon as he can port his number to Google Voice. I don’t think he realizes someone could have a web app that solves the Google Voice and iPhone interaction within days.

We don’t need a full blown Google Voice application on the iPhone. A simple web app would do. In fact, it would probably be better for overall adoption because only a small percentage of people update their apps religiously.

Given Google’s API for GV, and the speed at which the native apps were developed, this isn’t a stretch. A couple decent web developers could get this launched by Monday… In time to save Arrington and the world from an unnecessary rant on the failings of Android.

Setting up new mail notification on an iPhone using ONLY the Gmail web app

My iPhone Dock

I made the jump from the iPhone’s included mail application and may swap out the Phone app for a Google Voice web app later, too. The above image is my iPhone dock. Sean McKeever on Facebook asked how I get notifications for new mail being received. Here’s how I do that…

First off, with the iPhone Mail app I never used new mail notification. There’s just too much email every day and having notifications on would turn the phone in to a jumping bean. The little counter of unread messages is nice, of course.

That changes with Gmail and filters. One can receive customized notifications via SMS of new messages based on sender, subject, account, or any other attributes.

  1. Create a filter for a desired message type.
  2. Have the filter results be “Forward it to:” and set your_number@txt.att.net (it’ll cost you a text message if you’re not on an unlimited plan).

This nicely sets up important alerts if you need them. I use these for messages I need to know about immediately… Typically messages sent directly to me and sent from somebody important.

Google Voice – A web app could replace my iPhone dialer (and probably will)

Google Voice iPhone

There’s a lot of noise about Apple rejecting the Google Voice application in the App Store. While a native app would be fantastic, I’d be fine with a good web app. The existing rev is little more than a WAP site and requires three clicks to dial a contact.

It would be incredibly simple to mimic the iPhone’s phone app interface in a web app. It’s just a list of favorites, list of recents, list and search of overall contacts, and voicemail. With HTML5, all of these features from a single web app are simple.

With HTML5 and SQLite the images and local databases can be cached, too. This would allow extremely fast load and minimize any network traffic for initiating a call. I’d probably even swap out the iPhone icon on the home screen for a GV web app shortcut.

iPhone Tethering, Best Tether Ever

The tethering experience on the iPhone 3G S with iPhone 3.0 OS is slick. Engadget’s how-to can get you up and running. After that, Internet access is attained in 1 step: Plug iPhone in to USB. Nothing more. That’s it. Plug it in and the tether initiates as seamlessly as plugging in a USB ethernet adapter.

Configuration

Alternatively bluetooth can be used, but incurs the bluetooth bottleneck penalty like other mobile phone tethers. USB allows the full 3G. I’m also partial to leaving bluetooth and wi-fi off to conserve battery life.

So basically you plug in USB and immediately the network connection becomes active. Dead simple. No configuration and no dead phone battery.