So, with Apple preparing to hold an iPhone Software Roadmap event this Thursday, people are eagerly anticipating news about how Apple will handle an SDK for the iPhone environment.

Many developers were frustrated–and many web developers had our curiosities pleasantly piqued–when Apple initially announced that “software” would be available for the iPhone in the form of Ajax web applications. Naturally, many of the disappointed folks were irritated because the web platform is something that they’re entirely unfamiliar with, probably having backgrounds in Objective C or something similar; probably a minority were disappointed because their target application legitimately could not be powered by HTML and Ajax.

That said, it is indeed a very thought-provoking concept: Using web technology as your application environment. As most web developers will attest to, there honestly isn’t that much that a typical application does that cannot be accomplished with web technology. With the advent of Ajax frameworks, applications built with web technology can have very similar responsiveness and dynamics of a “classic” application. Especially when you remove the burden of cross-browser compatibility, in the iPhone’s case.

But with the iPhone/iPod Touch scenario, it is irritating that the application has to reside in Safari and has to be loaded off the web. It almost feels as if Apple was trying to push something that wasn’t…quite…ready. Something like AIR!

AIR accomplishes everything that Apple was suggesting for the iPhone environment, but for the desktop. Use web technology, but write a “compiled”, stand-alone application that really doesn’t even have to use the web. Use HTML. Use Ajax. Use Flex and Flash. Have a nice encapsulated application on your desktop. Especially when you throw the Flash technology into the platform, it is now a very capable environment for a large variety of applications, without being constrained to the browser. Wouldn’t it be great if that same cross-platform environment, AIR, worked on the iPhone as well?

Oops, Flash technology isn’t currently supported by the iPhone. That is actually another source of contention. And the AIR environment does lose some of its punch without Flash and Flex, even though its HTML/Ajax implementation can do a very decent job with most typical applications.

Steve Jobs has made it clear that he likes the idea of web technology powering iPhone apps. Now, consider some of the facts. Apple announces the iPhone SDK will be released in February, and then fails to deliver. Meanwhile, Flash still isn’t found on the iPhone, and Adobe “invents the wheel” by getting web technology to drive native apps through its work with AIR. Is there a common theme with these events? Perhaps something like: Are Apple and Adobe working together to get the much-needed Flash technology onto the iPhone and, subsequently, releasing an SDK that uses AIR technology, with hooks into the iPhone system just like AIR currently has hooks into the Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X desktop operating systems?

It wouldn’t be the first time Apple has had to wait for its partners, or take the heat for them. For instance, Apple has clearly been taking a lot of heat for many factors of the iPhone that are clearly not in Apple’s interest, but in AT&T’s.

And this scenario would fit the circumstances around Adobe’s development of AIR. Adobe has been working on AIR since well before the iPhone was released, but AIR wasn’t officially released until February 25, 2008. Even if Apple and Adobe were working closely together, there just hasn’t been enough time for AIR to get released and hooks to be developed to provide iPhone-specific functionality in AIR. Adobe has understandably concerned itself with its own business first. With that done, attention can turn to Apple to support them in concluding their own business.

Of course, this prediction is a reflection of my own desires as much as it fits the circumstances. As a developer that uses Adobe technology including Flex and AIR, and an Apple enthusiast for more than 20 years, I would love to see things happen this way. Undoubtedly we will have a clearer idea of Apple’s iPhone development roadmap after this Thursday.

As if the thought of an “iPhone AIR” isn’t confusing enough.

I couldn’t understand why everything on my new iMac started creeping really slow. The last straw was when iTunes started skipping.

I opened up the Activity Monitor in the Utilities folder, set it to view “All Processes”, and noticed that a process named “PrintJobMgr” was using a lot of processor time and took up over 600MB.

As it turns out, this has been discussed on Apple’s forums. It seems to be happening to people when there is a print job that never was printed, and thus is continually waiting in the print queue. I’m not sure how, but this is exactly what happened on my iMac, and deleting the print job in the queue fixed the problem.

I’m hoping Apple fixes that one soon.

You’ll get display server issues if you try to install Ubuntu v7.10 in Parallels. But the Parallels Tools CD does have drivers to fix those problems. This blog post, Ubuntu 7.10 Install Guide, helps you get past the display server issues long enough to get the OS installed, and then gives instructions on how to get the Parallels Tools installed.

It worked great. Instructions were very clear and the process was mildly simple.

This Mac user is particularly cranky today. I got my copy of Mac OS 10.5 Leopard like a good little Mac user and installed it on my aluminum 24-inch iMac via the Archive and Install option. I then went through the process of creating a new user account, copying over my bookmarks, mailboxes, address book, calendar, files, etc., as well as reinstalling all of my apps.

My OCD felt much better having a nice, clean, system. After reinstalling the iLife apps from my System Restore discs, there were some updates available, so I started the system update process. Halfway through, my system took a hard freeze and I couldn’t do anything. I even connected via SSH from another machine and tried to kill potential suspects that might have been causing the freeze. Nothing. I tried to reboot from the command line. Nothing.

With no other recourse, I did the unthinkable: I held down the power button. Not a terribly big deal, right?

Upon rebooting, I was welcomed with the registration window that appears the first time you boot up a new Mac. “Weird, but that’s fine,” I thought. I filled it out. Upon finishing, the window disappeared and reappeared, asking me to fill it out all over again. And again. And again.

I’m completely locked out of my computer because I can’t get past that registration window, and don’t know what to do without reinstalling the OS again.

Here’s one cranky Leopard user. At least, I wish I could use it.

UPDATE: This issue is confirmed on Apple’s support page. I discovered this from Ars Technica’s Infinite Loop blog (ironic, isn’t it?) in the iMac 1.2.1 Update article.