Apple bans iPhone drones

Garry Qualls September 9, 2010 at 11:02pm

I am pretty sure that this rule just prevents you from getting an application approved for the Apple App Store that uses their onboard GPS and lets you easily turn your iPhone into an autopilot. An iPhone has integrated accelerometers, gyros, 3-axis magnetometer, cameras, bluetooth, wifi, 3G internet access, a touch sensitive screen, a pretty decent CPU, and a decent development environment...So I think it would compare quite well to other smart-phone-based autopilots.

Chris interviewed a guy on the DIYDrones podcast who already has an app in the App Store that lets you control a regular RC vehicle using the iPhone, (which is clearly allowed under this rule along with the Parrot App). You could use a variation of his iPhone-audio-out-jack-connected-to-the-RC-TX-module hack to control the vehicle and write an app that would check your twitter feed every few seconds to see if you had uploaded any new commands. A lot of us would pay more than $10 for that app, if they would approve it.

I am pretty sure that the prohibition against using the iPhone hardware as the brain of an autopilot has been in the legalese you agree to when you buy a new iPhone ever since they added GPS to it, so this rule just backs up that hardware use restriction from the software approval side.

That being said, you can always jailbreak an iPhone and load any code you want into it. If you are interested in Android development, you might want to track Jaron's work with his UAVPlayground project. I think he might end up with a groundstation on his android phone, which is pretty exciting. Since that is remotely controlling something, that would be allowed on the iPhone, as well. Android fans might also want to take a look at the Beagleboard. It can run the Android OS and, out of the box, it weighs only one gram more than an Arduino Mega.

I had assumed that this language was just inserted into the iPhone agreements to insulate them from liability lawsuits, but the ITAR angle wouldn't surprise me either.

Jeff September 9, 2010 at 8:19pm

All i can say is....... IPhone 3GS for Sale!!!!

Jack Crossfire September 9, 2010 at 6:57pm

Export rules. That's what happens when you tie your work into a big corporation. They'll probably ban its use as a ground station.

Max September 9, 2010 at 6:49pm

All the more reason to jailbreak and dump that silly itunes software ;)

Jeffrey Johnson September 9, 2010 at 5:56pm

I personally have no interest in doing any UAV dev on iPhone or any other iOS platform. I just found this interesting. It also should be pointed out that this restriction would prevent you from distributing an app through the app store, but NOT from developing one or even distributing it via the Ad-Hoc method which is usually used for Beta distribution. I imagine noone actual does care to develop for iOS, but it is interesting that apple does specifically ban it.

I am (slowly) working on porting some of our old work on PictEarth to the android platform. Stay tuned.

Admin

Thomas J Coyle III September 9, 2010 at 5:12pm

It is probably being considered a liability issue by the Apple Inc legal department here in the USA if the Drone crashes causing damage and is being controlled by an iPod.

Just a thought.

Regards,
TCIII

Gerry Lichter September 9, 2010 at 5:08pm

Might have to do with legal restrictions on exports?