Prior to updating all of our apps to support iPhone OS 3.0, we studied prior iPhone and iPod touch update adoption rates. Conclusion: be ready, customers upgrade fast. After one week in the wild, here’s what’s shakin’ (it turns out that updating was wise):
iPhone OS 3.0 Adoption
AdMob reported today that 44% of web requests in their network are now coming from the new OS. Conclusion: ForeFlight customers are early adopters on the bleeding edge!
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Team ForeFlight picked up an iPhone 3GS this morning at the local AT&T Store. We had pre-ordered the day of the announcement, so we just walked right in during AT&T’s “special” hours from 7:00am-9:00am.
Our first impression? The iPhone 3GS is fast. Very fast. It’s noticeably speedier when launching apps and surfing the web. The new compass is integrated with Google Maps and points you in the right direction.
Of course we took it for a spin with all of the ForeFlight iPhone aviation apps: ForeFlight Mobile, Checklist Pro, ForeFlight File, and AOPA Airports. All of the apps launch faster, and tapping between tabs is a little zippier. We work hard to make our apps run quickly, even on the older phones, so most of the speed changes are hard to measure with a stopwatch. (Think subsecond, not second.)
However, in ForeFlight Mobile, we install A/FD data and airport thumbnail diagrams to the phone so that pilots can use the app offline. This data takes a minute to download, and then a minute or two to install. We made the code as fast as possible, but the slower chips on the older iPhones and iPod touch models still take a while to install everything. Since pilots only need to do this once a month, it isn’t a big hassle – but we always love faster!
Here’s a comparison chart of installing the airport database and diagrams on a first generation iPhone (Edge), a first generation iPod touch, and the new iPhone 3GS. Download times are not included in these numbers; it’s only the installation of data (extracting and writing to disk).
As you can see, the iPhone 3GS is much speedier than earlier models. For pilots who are buying their first iPhone, we strongly recommend getting the iPhone 3GS instead of the earlier iPhone 3G model. And if you’re already a ForeFlight user and have the itch to upgrade, we can’t blame you!
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Tomorrow is “3-Day”! The third generation of Apple’s iPhone OS operation system – iPhone OS 3.0 – hits Apple’s software update servers tomorrow.
Are you curious to know how quickly iPhone owners upgrade? Charts put out by AdMob indicate that about 30% of iPhone owners will upgrade within the first week of a new iPhone OS release, and a steady stream of iPhone owners upgrade over the following weeks. That means a lot of ForeFlight customers (and we are grateful there are many of you!) will be sporting the new iPhone OS by this weekend.
We’re happy to announce that we submitted updates for all of our apps in advance of the launch. Apple is quite busy working through the backlog of apps awaiting approval, but we are confident you will at least see ForeFlight Mobile 2.3.2 shortly.
Here’s a quick rundown of the updates:
So, are you getting a new iPhone 3GS? Send in your first impressions! We’d love to hear.
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A new data cycle begins in 2 days and updated ForeFlight databases are available for you to download. ForeFlight Mobile and AOPA Airports users can download these updates using the Download Manager, accessible from the “Downloads” section of the application. If you don’t see that section, press the “More” button on the bottom of the application to find it!
And, as always, it’s OK to download them early! Your application will wait to use the new data until it becomes effective.
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