Apple TV Hacking: hackers, grooveshark, Bluetooth stack
Family responsibilities have kept me from posting about many amazing developments going on in the Apple TV hacking community this past week but I assure you that things continue to move ahead quickly and in promising directions. Brian Chen wrote up a great summary of this effort over at Wired. This week has brought forth several new system enhancements including NitoTV enhancements and the recently-introduced Plex module that can be installed to the system menu.
There's more to come. The first alpha of the Apple TV grooveshark client has been written as a collaboration between NitoTV developer Kevin Bradley and @hackfrag, as shown in the video embedded below. Grooveshark provides peer-recommended music streaming as well as Pandora-like playlist generation. It's yet another exciting Apple TV add-on in its new iOS incarnation.
In addition, there's quite a lot of work under the hood (i.e. software enhancements without direct Apple TV menu interaction) that's under development. TUAW friend Matthias Ringwald recently took a road trip (well, an air-trip followed by a car ride) to California, where he collaborated with iPhone developer "Optimo" and Jay "saurik" Freeman in bringing his Bluetooth stack software BTstack to Apple TV. Ringwald reports that he's worked out how to perform key injection on the Apple TV, and a demo video follows.
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Family responsibilities have kept me from posting about many amazing developments going on in the Apple TV hacking community this past week...
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I like that they are trying to make some Apps for mobile devices, and now Apple TV, but they are just no good. Especially this Apple TV App could use some adjustments. :-)
I still just connect my MacBook Pro to the TV, and open up snoost.com when I want to listen to music in my living room.
I don't know if it could support a Hands-Free Profile, but it would be pretty neat to use the Apple TV in conjunction with the iPhone's mic as a speakerphone.
November 05 2010 at 8:17 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyReally? You want to speak into the iPhone's mic and have the sound played from your TV/Surround Sound? That seems highly impractical.
Video conferencing using the iPhone 4's FaceTime camera, while significantly harder to implement from a technical standpoint, would be much more appealing to me.
Yeah, I'd also like to see the FaceTime implementation too. As for the speakerphone idea, well, I live alone in a small apartment. Let's say I walk in while I'm on the phone with somebody, phone in one hand, groceries in another (and keys I just used juggled in there somewhere). I'd like to continue the conversation while putting away said groceries, but the speakerphone on the iPhone is going to get drowned out by the sound of rustling plastic bags, the fridge running, etc. But if the aTV is available as an audio source when I walk in (and the TV itself doesn't even need to be on with my sound system) then I could just set the phone on a nearby counter and talk knowing I'd be able to hear it.
i'm waiting for Hulu (or Hulu Plus) on the Apple TV 2G. Then it's totally worth the $99. Netflix is nice, but everything under the sun that connects to your TV has Netflix already. Hulu is still trying to get onto TV connected devices and that would set the Apple TV apart as a creature of its own.
November 05 2010 at 6:42 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyFree 720p content w/o commercials from TPB streamed via Plex > $9.99/month WITH commercials from Hulu
November 06 2010 at 4:33 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyApple TV 2 has bluetooth hardware? That's awesome if true. I never heard about it and it's not in the specs page at apple.com. More info?
November 05 2010 at 5:31 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyLike the iPad, the AppleTV 2 uses the Broadcom BCM4329XKUBG 802.11n Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/FM chip.
Bluetooth is not utilized by the AppleTV, so the hardware capability is not advertised.
The bluetooth keyboard support should have been added by Apple from the beginning. Why wouldn't they enable that option?
Would make search from the couch a much better experience. Even the "Remote" iphone app keyboard is not ideal, since you only get the tiny portrait keyboard (no landscape! WHY?!!).
Hopefully in the upcoming release that will be true. Yes, I agree, while the iPhone remove is "cool", it's not exactly perfect. It would be nice to see a simplified version of what is on the Apple TV listed on your iPhone...just a list of Menu's is fine, rather than blindly tapping away at a black screen. Same goes for function like fast forward, rewind, stop, pause, etc.
November 05 2010 at 5:02 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyBecause Apple is trying to make the AppleTV appeal to a more mainstream audience. Most people don't want a keyboard in their living room. Sometimes less is more when it comes to features and mainstream appeal.
November 06 2010 at 4:41 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply22 seconds to type "Megadeath". Ouch.
Almost as bad as listening to Megadeath.
Recording and typing with the remote is not easy ;)
November 05 2010 at 4:45 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down ReplyI didn't intend for my comment to be directed at the typing speed, though I guess it kind of sounds that way... Really I was complaining about Apple's expectation for users to type with that awful remote out of the box.
Thanks goodness for Remote.app.
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TUAW (or The Unofficial Apple Weblog) is a website devoted to tips, reviews, news, analysis and opinion on everything Apple.
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