Xblaze

The new iPhone 4 was announced last week, and alongside it, the release date of the newly renamed iOS.

Some of you may be fortunate enough to have access to the iOS 4 beta software and may have tried out Xblaze on iOS 4. Those that have will know that it’s not exactly what one would call “stable”.

I have been testing Xblaze on iOS 4 and its going to take some work, but I hope to get a compatible update out soon.

In other news some of you have been asking how much of the new APIs Xblaze will be taking advantage of with the new release. The answer to this question isn’t as exciting as you probably hope it will be.

Multitasking.

In April, at their unveiling of iOS4, Apple announced multitasking support for the iPhone. My initial reaction was one of relief, thinking I’d be able to escape the never ending requests for push notifications, and instead just allow Xblaze to run in the background. Unfortunately, the way Apple has implemented multitasking means that there are a number of restrictions surrounding what types of apps can use it and what those apps can do while in the background.

First of all, only VoIP, navigation and audio streaming type apps are allowed to actually run in the background. Any other type of app is ‘suspended’. Even those apps that can run in the background become very limited while there.

Suspension is when an app is literally ‘paused’ and sent to the background. The current state of the app is saved to memory. When the app is brought to the foreground it is “defrosted” and returns to the exact same state as you left it.

Apps that are allowed to run in the background will suspend most of their functionality but keep the core services that it requires running.

For instance, the popular VoIP app Skype will be able to receive calls while in the background, and close the app while a Skype call is in progress, because it keeps it’s socket connections to the Skype server open when it is sent to the background. But while its in the background all the Instant Messaging features of Skype are suspended and do not run meaning instant messaging does not work while Skype is in the background.

This was very bad news for Xblaze when I found out. I had some contacts at WWDC this year and they were able to confirm that instant messaging apps will *not* be allowed to run in the background. When you couple this with the fact that Xfire requires a constant connection to its server, kept alive by a ping of around 5 minutes, it means that Xblaze won’t even be able to take advantage of being suspended. This is because after those 5 minutes are up, Xfire closes the connection, effectively kicking you off the server, disconnecting you. When you return to the app after suspending it, you’ll find that you have been logged out and will have to reconnect, just like you do now.

The experience with Xblaze on iOS4 is likely going to be exactly the same as it is now – having to keep the app in the foreground in order to be able to send and receive messages to and from friends. And I’ll say it again – the way Xfire works just doesn’t allow a sensible way to support Push Notifications.

This saddens me in some respects and in and effort to change things I have raised a feature request with Apple and made my voice heard on the developer forums, but I fear that nothing is going to be done about it. It’s the way things are and that is that.

It puts a sour taste on something that could have been such a great feature…

Just a quick bug fix. 1.1.2 fixes an issue that would cause friends that were both a friend and a clan member to fall out of the Xfire group when a new friend was added.

Hot on the heels of Xblaze iPhone 1.1 is Xblaze for Mac 1.1.

That’s right folks, again, I promised you that I would merge the changes I made to the Xblaze iPhone source back into the Mac version. That is now done and you can download Xblaze for Mac with clan support and less crashes than ever!

Head on over to the Xblaze for Mac OS X page and hit up the download link!

So last week, I promised all Xblaze iPhone users Communities (clans/guilds) support.

Those waiting will be happy to know that today I submitted Xblaze 1.1 to the App Store reviewers. Xblaze 1.1 contains the communities support that I promised, and it’s working really nicely, if I do say so myself.

I’m hoping that the update won’t get held up too long being reviewed, and that you can all get hold of it soon.

Meanwhile, check out the screenshorts of clan Xblaze’s communities support:

Also in this update is

• Manage your Xfire preferences
  • Turn nicknames on and off
  • Hide/show offline friends
  • Hide/show friends of friends
  • Hide/show timestamps in chats
• Numerous bug fixes
  • Prevent a crash when a friend logs off while you’re chatting to them
  • Corrected ability to add friends of friends or clan mates to your friend list
  • Corrected the behaviour that allowed a user to attempt to delete a Friend of Friend from the FoF group (which also prevents a crash)
• Spruced up the Xblaze icon somewhat, looks a little flashier.

So I hope you all enjoy this eagerly anticipated update. And thank you all for your continued support for Xblaze!

Just got the email last night that Xblaze iPhone 1.0.2 is now live on the App Store .

New in this update:

• Better support for Avatars
  • Xblaze iPhone will now download the same avatar that is shown on your Xfire profile page, regardless of whether it is a custom upload, a screenshot clipping, a gallery avatar or the default Xfire avatar.
  • Avatars are cached properly, Xblaze no longer relies on the system level cache, and the avatars are written to the filesystem for faster loading and to prevent unnecessary network access
• A few UI tweaks, mainly using a grey selection style for the table cells and a new icon to dismiss the keyboard in the chat view.

Go grab it!

An update for Xblaze iPhone has just gone live on the App Store.

This update fixes a timing issue where the app could get stuck on the “Connecting…” screen while attempting to log in. This seems to happen more often on very fast internet connections (so using Xblaze over 3G is more likely to work than on a super fast wifi connection).

This has been fixed now, so those of you with super fast wifi connections can rest assured.

I’ve also just pushed the 1.0.2 update into review, which includes better support for avatars and caching, and a few UI tweaks too, so there’s something to look forward to in a few days.

(Ps. I’m absolutely loving this new faster turnover with the App Store approval process! Hehe)

Very happy to announce that Xblaze has just been approved by Apple and should appear in the App Store very very shortly!

I’m really happy about this, and I’m really impress at how fast Apple worked through my submission. The app went into review at 9:15am EST, and was approved by 15:51pm EST. That’s just over 6 and a half hours! Excellent work Apple!

So everyone must go and download it, and don’t forget to leave a review!!

PS. I’ll have a page up soon where you can see a screen cast of the app…

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who signed up for the Xblaze iPhone Beta. Your input and feedback has been extremely useful throughout the testing period.

I would also like to announce that Xblaze iPhone has now been submitted to the App Store for review! I’m hoping the approval process won’t take that long, and Xblaze should be available to download very shortly.

Here are some screen shots to tide you over

Xblaze 1.0.3 is available on the download page. Go grab it.

New in this version:

• Fixed a bug that prevented Xblaze from connecting when Adium starts if you check the “Connect when Adium opens” option.
• Fixed an issue where Friends of Friends were randomly bring shown in the contact list. Current solution is to not show any friends of friends at all. A friends of friends solution will be worked out in a later release.

Hey guys, just a heads up that Xblaze 1.0.1 is up on the downloads page. Go grab it!

• Xblaze will now show typing notifications when your friends are typing, and send typing notifications to your friends when you are typing.
• Plugged a few minor memory leaks