We’ve had a busy year.  Lots of projects for lots of different people, but little progress on our own mobile apps.  Until now…

We’ve got several new products in development, and while we can’t share any details right now, we promise they’re very exciting and we can’t wait to share them with you!

One exception…

Longitude. No one was happy that we discontinued Longitude. Frankly, neither were we… but time was not on our side. Almost a year later, after much demand – and a need for – an update to Longitude, we’re back on it and almost ready for a beta release. Google’s Latitude app works, sure… but sometimes it doesn’t update for days, sometimes it’s updates are within thousands of feet, and it doesn’t utilize the beautiful iPad display! We’re fixing those issues.

There will be two releases: one on the App Store and one in Cydia.  The apps will be virtually identical, except the jailbroken app will provide the option to update on an interval in the background rather than waiting for location updates, and it will provide an SBSettings toggle.

The App Store release will come as soon as possible, but the jailbroken release won’t be available until the iOS 5 untethered jailbreak is released (though we’re hoping that will be sometime in the next week).

To be more specific, we wanted Longitude 2.0 to be perfect. Since the release of iOS 4.0, there have been several Latitude apps released to the App Store – but none that offered quite the customizability we wanted to offer. We built many prototypes and spent countless hours testing different combinations of possibilities (mainly related to update frequency and precision in the background), but as other business priorities surfaced, Longitude kept being pushed to the backburner. In October, we finally got the time to finish the app, and submitted it to the App Store. Two weeks later, the app was rejected and we were informed that the app was crashing on older devices (iPhone 3GS). Since we’ve all upgraded to iPhone 4, we didn’t have any 3GS accessible to test the issue, and so once again, Longitude 2 was placed on the backburner. Since then, we’ve been extremely busy preparing to launch a new product (which you’ll hear about soon) and simply haven’t had the time to dedicate to diagnosing and repairing Longitude’s crash issue.

Monday, Google finally released their own Google Latitude for iPhone. Once we heard this news, we quickly installed it and began testing it. After a couple days of use, we’ve determined that it’s constantly running in the background and updating our locations as we move around. It’s not always as precise as we’d like it, nor can it update at a specified interval (due to limitations of iOS’ backgrounding APIs), but it does work.

Since it’s an official release from Google and it’s free, a large percentage of users who would have otherwise purchase Longitude will now simply download Latitude. Given that our potential customer base has decreased significantly, that we would now be competing with a free official app, and that we have many other far more exciting (you’ll know soon enough) priorities right now, we have decided to discontinue Longitude at this time. The existing version shall remain in Cydia for use on devices that don’t support multitasking, but for devices that do, we recommend using Google’s Latitude.

We apologize to all of those who have been waiting patiently for Longitude 2. It just doesn’t make sense for us to spend additional development time on nor release a product that we would then have to support when there’s a free official alternative. For those of you who have purchased Longitude, we thank you.

It turns out the Spirit and JailbreakMe jailbreaks disable the iPhone’s code signing check, whereas older jailbreaks such as redsn0w (even the newest releases of it) and blackra1n do not disable this check.

Combine that with the fact that the latest version of Longitude is a “fat binary” – meaning that the app itself contains two versions: one for older processors, and one optimized for the processors in the iPhone 4 and iPad.  What we didn’t know when we released 1.6 is that fat binaries can’t be signed the same way as non-fat binaries.  We’ve since learned and corrected the issue, hence the release of 1.6.1.

For those of you who don’t know, code signing is something the iPhone does as part of its security architecture.  After a binary (the app) is compiled, what’s known as a checksum is generated using some crazy math operations, and then that checksum is signed and stored as part of the binary.  You might be asking yourself, “what’s the point?”.  There are two reasons to sign applications:  First, to make sure they’re from a legitimate source.  In the iPhone’s case, it’s to ensure only apps that are approved by Apple can run on the phone.  Of course, we see how well that worked..  Secondly, though, it’s to ensure that the application remains unmodified.  If even a single byte is changed, the app’s signature is no longer valid.  This is good to ensure that applications aren’t tampered with, so you can’t, for example, install an app that’s intent is to log into some third party service but instead sends your login information to a malicious hacker.  In other words: code signing is good.

Longitude 2.0 will be a free upgrade for users who purchased Longitude since the release of iOS 4 (June 21, 2010), and a $0.99 upgrade for all other existing users.

Version 1.6 fixes iOS4 compatibility, plus fixes an old bug where the iPhone would power on to perform an update even if completely powered off.

We are pleased to announce the release of Longitude 1.5.1. This new version contains many new features and bug fixes:

* International support (sorry about the last version!)
* Improved battery life and memory footprint
* Fixed memory leak
* SBSettings toggle
* Update Now button
* Last update result
* Additional update intervals
* Latitude no longer displays “Your location is set manually”
* About screen updated & scrolls
* New support section with FAQs
* Support request with built-in diagnostics for quick troubleshooting
* No more dependency on the iGoogle page

This version is available NOW on Rock Your Phone! All expired trials have been reset, so those of you who experienced issues with the first one should be able to try it again and will hopefully be pleased with the result!

In celebration of the new year, Longitude is ON SALE for $0.99 until midnight of 1/3/2010 EST.

Longitude will be available on Cydia within 24 hours, and the same sale applies. Any purchases made from Rock Your Phone now will automatically work for Cydia at any point in the future.

If you encounter any issues with the new version, please note that there is a new “request support” feature built into that will include a diagnostic report so that any issues you experience may be quickly and easily resolved.

Thank you for your support, and we wish you the very best in this new year!

Related Links:

• Official Product Page
• Rock Your Phone Product Page
• Modmyi.com Featured Article

Longitude is an automatic background updater for Google Latitude, keeping Latitude up-to-date with your location without any work on your part.  Just install the app, configure it once, and you’re set!

This is the first and only product on iPhone to accomplish this.  Unfortunately, due to Apple’s restrictions, this product is only available on jailbroken phones.

Longitude is currently available from the Rock Store for $1.99.  Coming to Cydia soon.

Related Links:

• Official Product Page
• Rock Your Phone Product Page
• Modmyi.com Featured Article