Quote:
Originally Posted by
cy_starkman 
Has anyone considered that the main problem with this "leak" and the iPhone nano idea is that if the screen is a different resolution or aspect ratio then all the apps will be incompatible. Any cheaper iPhone will be based on the same screen shape and I'd say size since higher dpi screen (smaller) or the chips to somehow scale everything in real time would make this "nano" more expensive. The only way out is if the whole OS and dev environment goes vector graphics.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
bikertwin
No because there are no applications for (regular, non-Touch) iPods. It's just data (music) and Apple controls the user interface.
With the iPhone/iPodTouch, programmers have to write to the screen, so it's very important that the screen's number of pixels stay the same.
So like the OP implied, if this is a physically smaller screen but with the same number of pixels, then it would be fine. Apps should run fine on it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
wobegon
Except everything would appear smaller - onscreen buttons, text, everything. That could impact usability greatly, which is another knock on this rumor. If targets onscreen become too small, third party developers would likely want to put out two separate versions of their apps to compensate for the smaller screen.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
appler0x
Apple won't release a new iPhone with a different sized screen anytime soon; every single app in the App Store is written to accommodate a screen with those dimensions. Yeah, you can have the same pixel count, but with a smaller screen, it'll probably be too dense and cause eye strain. The iPhone is different from the iPod when it comes to revisions: iPods don't have thousands of apps to run. Apple won't force developers to create separate versions of their iPhone/iPod touch apps just to run on a smaller screen size. And don't think for a second that they'd create another phone without access to the App Store.
If they do anything with the iPhone at Macworld SF '09 (sadly its last), they'll modify the existing one, not add a new one. My guess for the next iPhone: 32-64GB capacity, HD-out (dock-to-HDMI possibly), better camera, tv/movie rentals right from the phone, 802.11n. (Does anyone else want printing on a networked printer?)
The site making these claims is probably just looking for publicity. But don't bet on anything big for Macworld; it'll probably just be Mac mini and iMac updates, in addition to iWork and iLife updates. Possibly a Snow Leopard preview, but since it's mainly only stability/security/tech improvements and not necessarily noticeable new features, it might wait for another time.
Not being a developer, I don't know if this is true or not. Is anyone here an iPhone developer?
These apps don't HAVE to be written for a particular resolution, unless the SDK doesn't allow for future resolution changes, which would be shortsighted.
I have a Solitaire app for my old Treo 700p. with a 320 x 320 screen. Before that I had two generations of Samsung Palmphones, the i300, and the i330.
Both the Samsung's had a usable resolution of the old 160 x160 sort. The app was released several years before the 320 x 320 screens became available.
But when it transferred over to my new Treo, I was surprised to find that it had resized itself properly, with more detail, rather than just a poor upscale, or playing on a smaller part of the larger screen.
As for the different screen size, yes, but only for typing. The icons are more than large enough now, and the screen size doesn't look that much smaller. Many programs take advantage of the GPU to allow for magnification, if the app needs it at times. I don't see a major problem.
Maybe we would finally get the horizontal keyboard for all apps that so many of us want.
Don't forget that idea this doesn't work, they we couldn't get a larger, higher resolution screen, for some future device based on this platform either.
