On Monday, June 8th at the World Wide Developer Conference, Apple announced its release of the iPhone OS 3.0. From leaked media to insider information, the announcement didn’t come as that big of a surprise. However, the excitement is still hard to contain.
Not only did Apple announce the new 3.0 OS, but they also revealed the new iPhone 3G S phone. The best part is that we don’t have to wait in suspense all summer for them. The iPhone OS 3.0 will be available for download this Wednesday, June 17th. While the new iPhone 3G S will ship and be available for purchase at the Apple stores on Friday, June19th.
Without skipping a beat, Apple once again has started the next wave of cutting edge technology for the mobile world. iPhone OS 3.0 itself is not that sensational to the end user on the surface, apart from cut/copy/paste and voice control. The real difference is what’s inside and how the apps can be implemented.
Here at Trapster we wasted no time getting down to business to bring you the next version of Trapster for the new iPhone OS. Welcome, Trapster 3.0! Since long expecting a new OS from Apple, we had plenty of time to come up with some amazing new features and functionality. Trapster does an amazing job exploiting the “under the hood” improvements of iPhone OS 3.0 in several areas:
Launch Time
First let me just say, it’s been hard to hold back my excitement on this update I’m about to announce, since it makes reporting a trap even easier! On OS 3.0, Trapster launches in just eight seconds using the native maps API.
Eight seconds its huge! The old app took a full 28 seconds to launch, because we were forced to use a Safari Web view and about 1000 lines of JavaScript. The faster load time is really, really, important when you want to report a trap you just spotted, especially if you’re not already running Trapster.
Maps
Next we added two new map display views. Just as with Google maps, Trapster 3.0 now has the ability to view the Trapmap in Satellite and Hybrid form. Pretty nifty!
Another cool feature is the small map snapshots that enhance the turn by turn directions. Having the small maps makes it so much easier to see where on the map you’re located, where exactly you’re going, and the turns you will need to make to get to your destination.
And lastly, we made voting on traps even easier. A simple sliding window rolls across the screen as you approach traps with a thumbs up (for good) and a thumbs down (for bad.) Our community is growing fast and we need your input on traps to keep Trapster as accurate as possible, so that’s why voting is an easy and painless process.
Push Notifications
You can now receive push notifications (APNS) as you drive. This means you don’t have to be running Trapster to get speed trap alerts. This feature rocks since we all know the iPhone doesn’t support background running apps!
We already do something similar in Trapster 2.0 using text messages, but the APNS implementation is cleaner and conserves users’ text message bill if they are subscribed to alerts in large areas.
The End is Only the Beginning
Overall, the app “feels” as different from the old one as a Ferrari does from a Cadillac. Words can’t do the difference justice. We hope you personally experience the magnitude of change.
Trapster has over 400,000 traps in our world-wide database, adding hundreds more each day. With 60 percent of our customers using the iPhone, we knew how important it was to build a better application using the OS 3.0 capabilities.
Let us know what you think about the new features and functionality. Oh and if you are ever in the San Diego area, you should make it a point to stop by our beach-front office for a meet and greet with the whole team. Make sure to bring your bathing suit, as we have plenty of surfboards on hand!
