Soon you’ll wonder how you
ever got along without it!

Prologue

Getting Started with iPhone

The good news is that getting started with an iPhone is a simple, painless process. You’ve got your hands on one, so it’s time to get going. Because iPhone was activated when you purchased it, there’s no need to do any set up work before you can start using iPhone for all the great things you can do with it. In this prologue, you’ll get a tour of iPhone so you can use its controls and work with its interface quickly and easily. You’ll also learn about installing iPhone’s required partner, iTunes, that you use to move content onto iPhone and keep it in sync. You’ll also learn about an optional, but very valuable partner for iPhone, which is Apple’s MobileMe service. Last, you’ll learn a bit about how you can get the most out of this book.

Touring iPhone

You’ll find that iPhone is one of the most amazing devices ever because of how well it is designed. It has only a few external features you need to understand. For most of the things you do, you’ll just use your fingers on iPhone’s screen (which just seems natural), and iPhone provides a consistent interface so you accomplish most tasks with similar steps.

Getting to Know iPhone’s External Features

Take a quick look at iPhone’s physical controls and ports and learn to understand how you move around its screens.

•   Mute Off/On switch  This switch determines whether iPhone makes sounds, such as ringing when a call comes in or making the alert noise for an event on a calendar. Slide it toward the front of iPhone to hear sounds; a bell icon appears on the screen to indicate that Mute is disabled. Slide it toward the back of iPhone to mute all iPhone sound; a red dot appears on the switch, and a bell with a line through it appears on iPhone’s screen to indicate that it is muted. When muted, iPhone vibrates to let you know something is happening (assuming vibrate is enabled).

•   Volume  Press the upper part of the rocker switch to increase volume; press the lower part of the switch to decrease volume. The volume that is controlled depends on what you are doing. If iPhone isn’t busy, its ringer volume is controlled. If you are listening to music or watching video, the volume of what you are listening to or watching is controlled. If you are talking on the phone, the volume of the call is controlled.

•   Docking port  Use this port to connect iPhone to a computer using the included USB cable.

•   Home button  Press this button to move to the all-important iPhone Home screen. It can also perform other functions, such as displaying iPod controls when you press it twice.

•   Wake/Sleep button  Press this to lock iPhone’s controls and put it to sleep. Press it again to wake iPhone from Sleep mode. Note that if you are using iPhone to listen to audio when you press this button, the music keeps playing while iPhone is locked. If you hold this button down for a few seconds while iPhone is on, you’re prompted to shut it down. If iPhone is turned off and you press this button, it starts up.

•   Headphone port  Plug iPhone’s earbud headphones into this port.

•   Camera  iPhone’s camera lens is located on the back of its case near the top.

Knowing Why It’s Called a Multi-Touch Interface

Apple designed iPhone to be touched. The previous section describes the only physical controls iPhone has; as you saw, there aren’t many. Most of the time, you control iPhone by using your fingers on its screen to press buttons, select items on lists, scroll, zoom, type text, and so on. After you use it a while, you might want everything to work this way because it’s so easy and intuitive.

Most iPhone activities start at the Home screen, which you get to by pressing the Home button located at the bottom of iPhone. Along the bottom of the Home screen, you see the four major function buttons. Above those, you see applications on iPhone that do all sorts of cool things; as you add applications, the number of buttons increases. You can also create bookmarks for websites and store them as buttons on the Home screen. As you add applications and bookmarks, the number of pages of the Home screen increases so you can store them all on it. You can organize the buttons on the pages of the Home screen in any way you’d like.

The following figures highlight the major ways you control iPhone.

There are lots of things you do with iPhone that require you to type, and iPhone’s keyboard is pretty amazing. Whenever you need it, whether it’s for emailing, entering a website URL, sending a text message, and so on, it pops up automatically.

To type, just press the keys. As you press each key, the character you pressed pops up in a small window so you can see what you entered, which is useful feedback for you (you also hear audio feedback if you haven’t disabled it). The keyboard includes all the standard keys you expect. To change from letters to numbers and special characters, just press the .?123 key (press the ABC key to return to letters). It also has contextual keys that appear when you need them. For example, when you are entering a website address, the .com key appears so you can enter these four characters with a single press.

If you type a word that iPhone doesn’t recognize, it makes a suggestion about what it thinks is the correct word in a pop-up box. To accept the suggestion, press the space key. To reject the suggestion, press the pop-up box to close it and keep what you typed. You can also use this feature for shorthand typing. For example, to type “I’ll” you can simply type “Ill” and iPhone will suggest “I’ll” which you can accept by pressing the space key.

iPhone also attempts to correct the capitalization of what you type.

To edit text, press the text you want to edit. A magnifying glass icon appears on the screen, and within it you see a magnified view of the location of the cursor. Drag the magnifying glass to where you want to make changes and then lift your finger from the screen; the cursor remains in that location, and you can use the keyboard to make changes to the text.

At the top of the screen, you see various icons that provide you with information, such as the state of iPhone’s battery, Airplane mode status, the kind of network you are connected to, and so on. Keep an eye on this area as you use iPhone.

When iPhone is asleep and you press the Wake/Sleep button or the Home button, iPhone wakes up, and its screen activates; you see the Unlock slider. Drag the slider to the right to unlock iPhone so that you can work with it. You move to the iPhone Home screen or to the last screen you were using.

In most cases, you should just put iPhone to sleep when you aren’t using it instead of shutting it off. It doesn’t use much power when it sleeps, and it wakes up quickly when you want to start using it again. (In fact, you seldom need to turn iPhone off.)

To change iPhone’s volume, press the up or down volume buttons. An icon pops up to show you which volume you are changing and the relative volume setting. When the volume is set, release the volume button.

If you want to turn iPhone off, press and hold the Wake/Sleep button until the red slider appears at the top of the screen. Drag the slider to the right to shut down iPhone.

To restart iPhone, press and hold the Wake/Sleep button until the Apple logo appears on the screen. In a moment, you see iPhone’s Home screen, and it’s ready for you to use again.

Preparing iTunes

iTunes is the application you use to move content (music, podcasts, movies, and so on) and information (such as email account configurations) onto iPhone. You need to download and install iTunes on your computer or make sure that you are using the most current version if it’s already installed. To get started, jump into any of the following sections that apply to your particular situation.

You might find yourself in one of two situations on the iTunes front. If you are a Windows user and have never used iTunes, you have to download and install it, which is covered in the next section (if iTunes is already installed, skip over that section). If you’re a Windows or Mac user and already have iTunes installed on your computer, update it to make sure that you are using the latest version; the section titled Updating iTunes covers how to do so.

After iTunes is installed and updated, you should get an account at the iTunes Store, which enables you to purchase content or rent movies. As you might guess, there’s a section called Obtaining and Signing in to an iTunes Store Account if you don’t already have one.

>>>step-by-step
Downloading and Installing iTunes on a Windows PC

1.  Open a web browser.

2.  Move to www.apple.com/itunes/download/.

3.  Uncheck the two check boxes.

4.  Click Download iTunes Free. The installer application starts.

5.  Follow the onscreen instructions to install iTunes.

Updating iTunes

1.  Open iTunes.

2.  On a Windows PC, choose Help, Check for Updates. On a Mac, choose iTunes, Check for Updates. The application checks your version of iTunes against the current version.

3.  If you are using the current version, click OK to clear the dialog telling you so. If you aren’t using the current version, you’re prompted to download and install it. Follow the onscreen instructions to download and install the newer version.

>>>step-by-step
Obtaining and Signing In to an iTunes Store Account

1.  Open iTunes.

2.  Click iTunes Store. You connect to the Internet and move into the iTunes Store.

3.  Click Sign In. The Sign In dialog appears.

4.  Click Create New Account. You move to the first screen in the account creation process.

5.  Read the information and follow the onscreen instructions to create an Apple ID. After you complete the steps, you receive your Apple ID and password.

6.  Click the Sign In button.

7.  Enter your Apple ID and password.

8.  Click Sign In. You are logged into your iTunes Store account.

Using MobileMe with iPhone

Apple’s MobileMe service provides you with a number of features including online disk space, an email account, online photo gallery, and more. When it comes to iPhone, MobileMe offers one primary benefit, and it is a really good one. With MobileMe, you can keep your contacts, calendar, Web favorites, and MobileMe email in sync between computers and your iPhone wirelessly. Instead of having to connect iPhone to a computer to move information over the USB cable, the information is moved directly from the Internet onto iPhone via its Internet connection. Not only is this easier, but your information remains much more current on all your devices.

MobileMe works by moving information from a computer or iPhone to the MobileMe “cloud” on the Internet. The information is then downloaded from the cloud to each device so that all devices have the same information on them.

MobileMe isn’t free. Currently, an individual MobileMe account is $99 per year, while the cost of a family account is about $149 per year. However, you can sign up for a free trial account that is available for 60 days. At the end of that period, you can choose to cancel the account if you don’t find it valuable.

There are three general steps required to use MobileMe with iPhone. One is to obtain a MobileMe account. The second is to configure MobileMe on your computers; this task is slightly different on Windows PCs or Macs, so there’s a section for each kind of computer. The third step is to configure iPhone to access the information provided by MobileMe; these tasks are described in the relevant chapters (for example, using MobileMe to sync calendar information is described in Chapter 8, “Working with Date & Time and the Calendar”).

>>>step-by-step
Obtaining a MobileMe Account

1.  Use a Web browser to move to www.apple.com/mobileme/.

2.  Click Free Trial.

3.  Follow the onscreen instructions to obtain your MobileMe account. At the end of the process, you’ll have a MobileMe member name and password. You use this information to access MobileMe services on all your devices.

Configuring MobileMe on a Windows PC

1.  Open the MobileMe Preferences control panel. (If you don’t have this control panel, you aren’t using the current version of iTunes. Go back to the section called Updating iTunes and update your version.)

2.  Enter your MobileMe member name and password.

3.  Click Sign In. Your computer connects to your MobileMe account. In the Account Status section, you then see information about your account, such as the amount of disk space you have, when the account expires, and so on.

4.  Click the Sync tab.

5.  Check the Sync with MobileMe check box.

6.  On the top drop-down menu, choose how frequently the sync happens. For example, to have the sync performed hourly, choose Every Hour. Choose Automatically to have the sync performed every time data changes or Manually to perform the sync only when you click the Sync Now button.

7.  If you want your MobileMe contact information stored in Outlook to be included in the sync, check the Contacts check box.

8.  If you want your MobileMe calendar information stored in Outlook to be included in the sync, check the Calendar check box.

9.  To have your bookmarks moved into the MobileMe cloud, check the Bookmarks check box and perform step 10. If you don’t want this, skip to step 11.

10.  Choose the web browser where the bookmarks you want to sync are maintained (Internet Explorer or Safari).

11.  Click OK. If you selected any option but Manually in step 6, the information you selected is moved from the computer to the MobileMe cloud where you can access it on iPhone, and the process is repeated according to the schedule you set. If you selected Manually, click the Sync Now button to move the information.

12.  Move to the section Managing MobileMe Syncs.

Configuring MobileMe on a Mac

1.  Open the System Preferences application and click the MobileMe icon.

2.  Enter your member name and password.

3.  Click Sign In. Your account information is configured , and the MobileMe pane updates to show that you have configured MobileMe.

4.  Click the Sync tab.

5.  Check the Synchronize with MobileMe check box.

6.  On the pop-up menu, select how you want synchronizations to occur. You can choose Manually to sync manually; choose a time, such as Every Hour, to sync at those times; or choose Automatically to have syncs performed whenever included data changes.

7.  Check the check box next to each item you want to include in the sync.

8.  Click Sync Now. The information you selected is copied onto the MobileMe cloud where you can access it from iPhone. Future syncs happen according to the schedule you set, or if you selected Manually, you have to click the Sync Now button to sync your information.

9.  Move to the section Managing MobileMe Syncs.

Managing MobileMe Syncs

The first time you sync information via MobileMe (or if you reset your sync options), you decide how you want information to be moved. You are prompted via the MobileMe Sync Alert dialog.

1.  At the prompt, choose how you want information to be moved. Choose Merge all data if you want the data on MobileMe to be merged with the information on your computer. Choose Replace data on computer to replace the information on your computer with information stored on the MobileMe cloud. Choose Replace all data on MobileMe to have the information on your computer copied to the MobileMe cloud.

2.  Click Sync. The sync proceeds.

During syncs, you are prompted when the amount of data changes beyond the limits you set on the MobileMe Preferences control panel or the MobileMe pane of the System Preferences application. For example, you may choose to be notified when more than 5% of the computer’s data will change. When this happens, you see a dialog that enables you to make selections about how data is moved. You can use the controls in this dialog to review the changes and accept or prevent them as you see fit. When you’ve decided, you click the appropriate Sync button to allow the sync to proceed. If these prompts get too annoying, move back to the MobileMe preferences and increase the percentage of data change that triggers a notification or disable the notifications entirely.

Using this Book

This book has been designed to help you transform an iPhone into your iPhone by helping you learn to use it easily and quickly. As you can tell, the book relies heavily on pictures to show you how iPhone works. It is also task focused so that you can quickly learn the specific steps to follow to do all the cool things you can do with iPhone.

Using iPhone involves lots of touching its screen with your fingers. When you need to press part of the screen, such as a button or keyboard, you see a callout with the step number pointing to where you need to press. When you need to drag or slide your finger along the screen, such as to browse lists, you see the following icon:

The directions you can drag are indicated with arrows.

To zoom in or zoom out on screens, you unpinch or pinch, respectively, your fingers on the screen. These motions are indicated by the following icons:

When you need to press twice, such as to zoom out or in, you see the following icon:

When you need to rotate iPhone, you see this icon:

Because iTunes and iPhone work with both Windows computers and Macs, this book is also designed for both platforms. When there are significant differences, such as applications you use to store photos, you see task sections devoted to each type of computer. You can safely skip over sections focused on a type of computer you don’t use.

iPhone hardware is now in its second generation, which is typically called iPhone 3G because it can use AT&T’s or other provider’s high-speed wireless networks. However, first generation iPhones are still very capable, and with software updated to the current release, original iPhones can do almost everything that the second-generation iPhones can do.

When there is an exception to this and original iPhones can’t do what’s being described, you’ll see a note so stating. Just skip over that information (of course, you could always upgrade to the current version of iPhone too!).

It’s Not All Good