Wi-Fi

Earlier this week, news of the iDriver application, which was developed by computer science researchers at Berlin's Free University, hit the web. As the name would suggest, the application allowed users to drive a modified minivan, the "Spirit of Berlin." Per PopSci, steering, break and acceleration commands are sent over Wi-Fi and the demo video features researchers are driving it around an airport for testing.

Video below!

At long last and after months of rumors, China Unicom has reached a 3-year deal with Apple to offer the iPhone in China. According to Macworld, the company is expected to launch the phone in the fourth quarter of this year, it said in a statement. The deal brings the iPhone to a huge market in a country with nearly 700 million mobile subscribers.

Per TheStreet.com, an official representing China Unicom confirmed that the wireless carrier is currently in talks with Apple to function as the exclusive carrier of the iPhone in China, but denied that the company recently purchased five million handsets.

Apple has posted a new support document responding to issues with connecting to Bluetooth and WiFi on their 3GSs. According to the document, titled "Unable to use Wi-Fi or Bluetooth with iPhone or iPod touch because there’s no address listed for the device" if you have a grayed-out bluetooth icon, no address for either Bluetooth or WiFi, or you can't use a WiFi network even though it says you're connected, or you can't pair Bluetooth devices to your 3GS, then they list some things you can try to fix it.

UK iPhone carrier O2 has signed a deal with BT Openzone, adding another 3,000 Wi-Fi hotspots that O2 iPhone users can now access in hotels, airports and coffee shops, including Starbucks. This is in addition to the 5,000 owned and operated by The Cloud that iPhone owners can also access.
[via Macworld]

AT&T revealed a minor but pleasant surprise coming with the iPhone OS 3.0 software. They announced that all 20,000+ of their Wi-Fi hotspots in the U.S. will support auto-authentication, letting them skip the authentication process. That means that as of today, instead of having to sign in, your iPhone will automatically switch from 3G to Wi-Fi when you're at an AT&T hotspot. The hotspots are free to use on your iPhone for anyone with an unlimited data plan.

Silicon Alley Insider reports that a "pluged-in" source inside the cellular business has information that the next iPhone 3G will have a "significantly faster" internet connection than it's predecessor. It is not known if the source was referring to Wi-Fi or the cellular data connection, but both could potentially be upgraded.

AT&T's free Wi-Fi for subscribers to their iPhone data plans sounds great and all, and goodness knows we've been waiting for it long enough, but you have to jump through quite a few hoops to access it. Now it turns out that not only do they require cell data access, but the complicated process may make some users unable to use it.

We were pretty excited to hear about AT&T's free Wi-Fi for all iPhones subscribed to one of their data plans, but it doesn't surprise us that there's a catch. If you thought you could just wander into any Starbucks and sit down to enjoy some Wi-Fi, think again. Using their connection requires authentication, which you'll need a cell signal to complete.