Just read this info this morning from Apple Hot news rss:

Today, 04:44 AM
Like to get the latest news from your Facebook friends? Check the movie listings at Fandango? Browse the newest photos posted on SmugMug? Update your weblog with TypePad? Or play a great game of Big Bang Sudoku? It’s all possible. Simply by visiting www.apple.com/webapps/ on your iphone or iPod touch, browsing the library, and bookmarking the web apps you enjoy.

http://www.apple.com/webapps/?sr=hotnews?sr=hotnews.rss

Downloading apps right now for my touch!!

Hey! this is much more like it
Most apps appear quite US-centric (like most widgets), but it certainly commits Apple to new apps on the iPhone and Touch, and suggests that an SDK can't be too far behind.

Naaah, I take that all back (and didn't even edit my own post). These are nothing more than unoptimized browser-style applications, that already exist, and have just been collated on Apple's page. I'd too quickly thought they were new native applications that read/wrote information via the web (it's still off to modMyiPhone for those). This is really nothing closer to an SDK, and concedes no ground to running Java on these devices.

Yeah, I agree! I had high hopes, but am a little disappointed since realising that it is just a library of browser based apps. Still better than nothing.

Of course they're browser-based! The 'web' in 'webapps' isn't there to just look pretty!

My only excuse for not realising such a blatently basic concept was that I was bleary eyed when writing it and had been excited by another article I read on Engadget:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/10/11/i...mail-and-more/

OK then, as you seem to have missed the point, they're read-only browser-based apps. The word web indicates the protocol used for I/O (in this case, mostly I), not the application framework required to run them.

Yeah, so you don't "download" so much as "surf to".

But considering that Apple has been pushing web-based applications on the iPhone and iPod touch, instead of 3rd party applications that you install, isn't it obvious that by 'webapps' they mean 'applications on the (world wide) web?

Incidentally, I was hoping Apple would allow widget development for the iPhone/iPod touch, just like with Dashboard. This will probably come eventually.

For some users, I think it's analogous to whether they feel that an RSS feed is a 'webapp'. If a user is satisfied with an RSS feed that maintains no state about each remote client, and permits no input, then that user will be satisfied.

I can't see one app which is worth browsing to. Ovulation calendar? Several 'to-do' lists, sudoku games, tip calculators, converters, show how many words a minute you type etc. All pretty useless.
Even the weatherbug one has temperatures in F and I can't see anywhere to change it (plus the maps etc are all for US).
Where is Googlemaps? Where is a disk usage monitor?

Indeed. After using an iPod with 3rd party apps and the first party apps from the iPhone there isn't a whole lot web-based apps could tempt me with.

The quality of the 3rd party apps varies a bit but some are simply amazing. If Apple don't eventually release an SDK then there is something really wrong the people making these decisions.

Try this: http://touchmaps.x10hosting.com/.

I originally intended to just play around with the Google Maps API and see how easy it would be to make a version for my iPod, but I got a bit carried away and ended up copying a lot of the iPhone Maps application. It's a bit slow, and because it's a web app you can't use gestures to pan/zoom (tap to re-centre), but it works!

I guess it's kind of pointless now with all the gaolbreaking going on, though...