Tag: regulars

📅 January 21, 2009

Apple’s AppStore on the WWW

appstore

Maybe some of you might knew about this, but i just found out about it. The Apple AppStore is finally on the web. The appstore itself it was a revolutionary release, changing the way users conception about finding and install applications for their mobile phones.

This online version of the App Store, which is clearly not sanctioned by Apple, runs on Google’s App Engine. As Amit Agarwal notes, Apple uses a rather cryptic XML format for delivering the pages in iTunes. However, the developers of the online App Store have found a way to decrypt these XML files and render them as regular HTML.

There are some limitations tho, because at one point or the other, you need to run iTunes in order to install an app. Given Apple’s litigious nature, we don’t know if this version of the App Store will be around for a very long time, but it’s a great resource if you just want to link to an app in the store, for example, without your users having to open the desktop iTunes app (which, after all, is not available on all operating systems).

📅 January 15, 2009

Create a Free iTunes Account

Some of you regulars here on FSMdotCOM know that i cant buy any app from the appstore. Why? Because Apple didn’t accept my credit card. iTunes was telling me that it’s a debit card and they dont accept that. There was no paypal payment option, so i was pretty much stuck.

What most of you don’t know is that i was kind of obsessed with the iPhone ( wanted one before the 1rst iPhone came out ), so by the time i got one, i knew a lot about the iPhone and jailbreaking and all that. Anyway… i got my iPhone, went home and first thing i did was to  jailbreak it. Now in order to install cracked apps on it, you need to have at least one ginuwine app installed ( free or paid ) right? And i didnt have an iTunes account.

Well if Apple didnt like that i live in Romania, i changed my address and now i live somewhere in NYC.The only thing is that i cant buy nothing from the iTunes store, i can only download free apps. And that kinda bugs me , because i would pay for some of the apps im using ( not too many ). They are great apps and the developers need the financial feedback.

So… how can you create an iTunes account w/out a credit card or any other payment option :

  • Download and install iTunes – duhhh
  • Go to the bottom of the iTunes homepage and select your country ( if your like me, you’ll probably want to choose US )
  • Click on one of the App in Top Free App and than click Get App
  • A box will pop up asking you to log in. When you will see that just click on Create New Account and than click Continue
  • Once the page has loaded tick I Accept and click Continue
  • Insert your details ( if you are not living in US , you might wanna google search for a address and a phone number) ( insert your valid email address ) Then click Continue
  • Next window will be the Payment Method window. Don’t worry there will be a option that says None at the end of the row, Click that one. Now fill out your details, And click Continue
  • Go to that email (if its not there, check Junk/Spam folder) and click the confirmation link.
  • iTunes will pop up. Enter your email address and password and voila. You got a functional free iTunes account 🙂