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IOS Apps Demonstrated Running on BlackBerry PlayBook

24 points by zainny 14y ago

dpearson 14y ago
Due to the complexity and breadth of the iOS APIs, I have my doubts that this is a reimplementation, especially one completed by one developer. If that's not the case, this would be technically feasible, but of dubious legality.
- zainny 14y ago
  The developer provides some additional information in the forum which I found interesting: http://forums.crackberry.com/news-rumors-f40/real-fake-ios-apps-running-playbook-729197/index6.html#post7451600 http://forums.crackberry.com/news-rumors-f40/real-fake-ios-a... But yes, quite an amazing achievement for just one person.
- ajross 14y ago
  But as with all things, you don't need anything like 100% coverage to get an app to work. Just handle the obvious stuff, and patch as needed until your target works. Then repeat. This is how WINE worked in the early days: you don't start with a copy of the win32 API, you start with a program you want to run and see where it fails. Most apps, for obvious reasons, use only a tiny fraction of the platform. And those bits they do use aren't always critical. Facebook, for example, wants location information but would be happy if you just lied to it and gave it a hard coded value.
  - duskwuff 14y ago
    And -- as with WINE! -- games probably use much fewer of the overall APIs than a "desktop" application (like Facebook) would. There's no need for any of the complicated UI widgets, for instance.
younata 14y ago
How much longer until he gets a cease and desist from apple? (Or is emulation legal?)
- pook1e 14y ago
  I'm actually curious about this as well, is this actually legal? If it is similar to Wine, then isn't it just as legal as running Windows games in Linux environments?
- ajross 14y ago
  Emulation is absolutely legal. There is a long history of emulators of all sorts in the market. And of course there was an important decision just last week that held without ambiguity that the mere interface to a program is not covered by copyright.
rsanchez1 14y ago
I'm buying myself a Playbook. They're on clearance everywhere (more so than they already were) now that they're being discontinued.

24 points by zainny 14y ago

Due to the complexity and breadth of the iOS APIs, I have my doubts that this is a reimplementation, especially one completed by one developer. If that's not the case, this would be technically feasible, but of dubious legality.

zainny 14y ago
The developer provides some additional information in the forum which I found interesting: http://forums.crackberry.com/news-rumors-f40/real-fake-ios-apps-running-playbook-729197/index6.html#post7451600 http://forums.crackberry.com/news-rumors-f40/real-fake-ios-a... But yes, quite an amazing achievement for just one person.
ajross 14y ago
But as with all things, you don't need anything like 100% coverage to get an app to work. Just handle the obvious stuff, and patch as needed until your target works. Then repeat. This is how WINE worked in the early days: you don't start with a copy of the win32 API, you start with a program you want to run and see where it fails. Most apps, for obvious reasons, use only a tiny fraction of the platform. And those bits they do use aren't always critical. Facebook, for example, wants location information but would be happy if you just lied to it and gave it a hard coded value.
- duskwuff 14y ago
  And -- as with WINE! -- games probably use much fewer of the overall APIs than a "desktop" application (like Facebook) would. There's no need for any of the complicated UI widgets, for instance.

younata 14y ago

How much longer until he gets a cease and desist from apple? (Or is emulation legal?)

pook1e 14y ago
I'm actually curious about this as well, is this actually legal? If it is similar to Wine, then isn't it just as legal as running Windows games in Linux environments?
ajross 14y ago
Emulation is absolutely legal. There is a long history of emulators of all sorts in the market. And of course there was an important decision just last week that held without ambiguity that the mere interface to a program is not covered by copyright.

rsanchez1 14y ago

I'm buying myself a Playbook. They're on clearance everywhere (more so than they already were) now that they're being discontinued.