iPhone double header: First native IM client AND first native IRC released

Big news today on the iPhone development front. This morning brings the release of both a native instant messaging client and a native IRC client.

Apollo IM just entered Version Negative 1, an early beta release. It is available as well via Installer.app. Apollo IM has been developed by "Arminius" and offers iPhone-native instant messaging capabilities. Future releases will support file transfer as well as MSN/Yahoo/Jabber/Gtalk support.

"Pogi"'s iRCm provides a GUI-based Internet Relay Chat client for your iPhone. You can join channels, issue raw IRC commands and take part in conversations. iRCm is available for download at Google Code, and packages have been loaded for both Installer.app and PXL.

Both applications have been developed with Shimmer/PXL, the iPhone auto-updates library. Shimmer allows iPhone code to "call home" and update themselves when new versions become available. Both developers are looking for feedback and plan to use this update feature to allow the program to keep growing via its installed base.

If you're interested in developing for either application, pop over to Google Code and download the latest SVN. Both projects offer a great opportunity to get involved in open source.

Thanks to Dylan Kenney