There are 68 iPhone bugs, and new ring tones, too

With difficulty, hackers add customized tones to the new Apple phone. Also, a list of known iPhone bugs emerges online.

Published July 16, 2007 9:12PM (EDT)

There are two nice bits of iPhone news today, both a result of folks' deep digging into the phone's architecture. The first concerns hacking: people working with the #iPhone dev crew I wrote about last week have put up full instructions on how to add customized ring tones to the phone.

Here's how to do it if you're using an Intel Mac, and here's the recipe for a PC.

But take breath before you jump in. The process is extremely complicated, and risky, too -- though there have been no reports of the scheme causing dead iPhones, you're working at such deep levels on the phone that killing the thing is not out of the question. (You don't have to take it apart physically, just its code.) Decide for yourself if the risk is worth the chance to hear "Funky Cold Medina" every time grandma calls.

In other iPhone developments, Apple Hound has put up an apparently comprehensive list of known iPhone bugs. After 40 hours of playing with the phone, they count 68 bugs that they say can be reproduced on any iPhone (they tested each one out on multiple units). Few look extremely serious -- there are some that cause data loss, but only after an obscure set of commands. See the bug list here.

Oh, and for proof that the ring tone hack works, watch this:

[Ring tone hack news via Compiler.]


By Farhad Manjoo

Farhad Manjoo is a Salon staff writer and the author of True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society.

MORE FROM Farhad Manjoo


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