At long last there is a solution to save My Secrets’ data on your Mac. And, what a pleasure to say that, it’s a one-click solution which does not need any setup! As secure as possible. As fast as USB 2.0. No jailbreak required.

Well, to be honest, by “no setup” I meant installing two applications instead of one. I’m that bad, I confess. Compared to Wi-Fi connections, it is the lesser evil anyway. Feel intrigued?

The process is simple. So simple that I have to try hard not to use the word “dumb”. First of all, download and install Apple’s iPhone Configuration Utility. It comes with a nice installer, as is always the case with Apple. Then download My Backup, carefully read the included “Read Me First” document, launch the application, accept the license agreement and that’s all. The backup procedure normally takes a single click (if you have several iPhones and iPods attached at once, you will have to select the one you need in the Devices list). The restore procedure takes a couple of clicks more because you have to choose which of the available backups to restore.

What I find cool about it is that you don’t have to mess with your Wi-Fi settings, troubleshoot IP addresses and be paranoid because your neighbors can sniff your wireless traffic. If you use iTunes to sync your iPhone, your USB cable is always ready to get plugged in. This is the solution I wanted from the very beginning, so I’m twice as proud right now.

But, I hear you say, there must be a price to pay. In a sense, such a price does exist, but in the growing financial crisis I’m not making you pay through the nose. The rest of this post is dedicated to the price you are going to actually pay while using the software.

Permanent Beta

My Backup uses Apple’s private MobileDevice framework to transfer files over USB. There is no workaround. Trust me, I hate using private API and this is the second time in my life I had to reverse-engineer something. This is pure evil, period. However, the state of file-exchange things in the land of iPhone OS is so un-fucking-believably bad that it merits an exception to the rules. If you ever had any problems with iPhones not getting an IP address, with Wi-Fi providers blocking access to mobile devices, with opening firewall ports, with entering URLs like https://10.0.2.6:53498 and so on, and so forth, you want something more elegant, more intuitive, something that just works. Like iTunes. The question why you don’t deserve it is beyond my competence, so if you want an answer, please, ask it here, or better yet, here.

The downsides to using private API are well known. These API may change without notice, breaking every application depending on them. They are always undocumented, so there is no guarantee developers understand them correctly and use them as intended. In other words, using private API hurts application stability, threatens the integrity of user data and otherwise bugs end users. This is part of the reason why My Backup is free. How can I take money for a product I cannot fully support? How can I fully support a product whose basic functionality depends on something which is completely out of my control and which is not only unsupported by the OS vendor, but is also obfuscated enough to prevent me from using it? 

I’m saying all this as a warning. While My Backup has passed a certain amount of testing, it may behave erratically or crash under other circumstances. It may also interfere with iTunes’ backup/restore/sync processes, so I’m asking you to avoid it unless you do an experiment. In a nutshell, refrain from clicking buttons in My Backup while iTunes is transferring data to or from the same device. I’ll do that myself. That said, running iTunes alongside My Backup is OK.

If My Backup crashes, please, send me the crash logs. If something weird happens or you see an error message, let me know. There’s “Send Feedback” item in the Help menu.

The beta state of My Backup is going to last until the Second Coming or until Apple provides an official supported way to transfer iPhone applications data, whichever comes first. 

Windows Version

You may have noticed that there is no My Backup for Windows yet. I’ll be honest. If such a thing as a 100%-Mac guy exists, I am an approximately 120%-Mac guy. I have never used Windows API and I don’t even know where to start. Heck, I don’t even have a copy of Windows. I looks like Cocotron is my only choice, but I haven’t had time to touch it yet. I apologize to all Windows users who bought My Secrets. I’ll try to catch up on it, but everything takes time, and the Windows version will be no exception.

iPhone Browser

If there is a way to do something for one iPhone app, why shouldn’t it work for others? Of course, it should. I’m preparing an application for an open source release, which should be able to transfer any application files to/from an iPhone. The idea is to attract bright minds to this project and ultimately build a universal iPhone browser for Mac and Windows. There are many developers banging their heads against HTTPS servers on an iPhone and my contention is that they can really help to very efficiently solve the damn problem once and for all. If you are among them and can participate in an open source project, ping me.

Help Me

I am officially calling for help. To be more precise, I’m asking you to help the community of iPhone developers solve one little problem for the benefit of all iPhone users: build a universal cross-platform file transfer tool.

• If you are a registered iPhone/Mac developer, send your feedback here.
• If you are a Mac/Windows coder, if you have time and your day job does not restrict you on open source projects, send me an email.
• If you don’t know what programming is and apps on your iPhone lack desktop sync, send your feedback here.

I know we can do it. So let’s do it together!

Posted on Thursday, February 12th, 2009 at 18:42 under Announcements, Coding, Mac OS X, iPhone.
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