iPhone Firmware 2.0 includes Live Location Tracking feature & Improves Javascript Performance

I have some more interesting details on pre-release build of iPhone firmware 2.0 which came bundled with iPhone SDK beta 2 released last week.

I had written about the iPhone firmware 2.0 here, here and first covered as part of the In-Depth Coverage: Apple reveals details of their much awaited iPhone SDK.

All the details available after the jump.

The pre-release build of iPhone firmware 2.0 which is currently in the hands of some select developers and which is expected to be available to iPhone users in June includes a new live location tracking feature that will automatically track the user's location in the Google Maps application.

In iPhone firmware 1.1.3, the Google Maps application on the iPhone had got an update to pinpoint your location using Wi-Fi base stations and cell tower triangulation. This "Locate Me" feature however was not automatic, to find out your location one had to hit the "Locate me" button each time. This enhancement in iPhone firmware 2.0 of automatically tracking the user makes it more like the real GPS.

This is similar to the functionality that was introduced in one of the popular native iPhone applications called Navizon called “moving mode” that will update your location every 10 seconds, thus providing an even closer emulation of real GPS. So if you can't wait for iPhone firmware 2.0 which is expected to be released in June then you can checkout Navizon.

In the pre-release build of iPhone firmware 2.0, it has also been observed that Javascript execution is now more than 33 percent faster as compared to previous versions of the iPhone firmware.

According to a test run using Celtic Kane’s benchmarks, in the previous iPhone firmwares i.e. iPhone firmware 1.x, Safari clocked in at around 30 times slower than 1.83 GHz MacBook Pro, with iPhone-generated test times in excess of 9000 ms on average. However, the same test run on iPhone firmware 2.0 clocked in at just over 6000 ms, more than 33 percent faster than before.

The reason for the enhanced performance could be due to the updated version of the webkit (build 525.15) which is used to render the pages in Safari.

[via iPhone Atlas]

 

 

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