What The iPhone OS 4.0 Means For IT

In the week since Apple offered a glance at the upcoming iPhone OS 4.0 update. Whatever talk isn’t centered on the promised multitasking feature is focused on Apple’s iAd advertising platform. But if you use the phone in a business setting or if you’re responsible for supporting employees who are using the iPhone, Apple’s preview offers plenty of hints for what to expect when the iPhone 4.0 arrives later this summer.

The trouble is the fact that we’re talking about hints and not concrete details. The challenge anytime Apple rolls out information well ahead of a product release is that the details can be decidedly sparse. As long as you keep that in mind and you are willing to apply a bit of logical speculation though, you can get a good idea of what to expect from the iPhone 4.0 update on the IT front.

Management

Managing devices in an IT setting has proven to be one of the major weaknesses of the iPhone (this includes any device that runs the iPhone OS, including the iPad.) iTunes needs to be set up right outside of the box to set up the iPhone without any other options. Even after the initial setup, there are a series of roadbumps. An example of this would include the post-provision setup being done wireless, but to install in-house applications that your company might use, you have to use iTunes. You can install configuration profiles wirelessly but major updates require iTunes. A case that is two steps forward, one step back.

Some of these bumps will go away in iPhone OS 4, as businesses gain the ability to distribute applications wirelessly. If you are a business running with hundreds or thoughts of devices to manage, the capability is more than a little important. The ability to push applications out from a central location via WiFi or 3G means far less work, and less time worrying about iTunes being up to date or even installed. (Mac users don’t have to worry about a computer without iTunes, but on the Windows side, it’s a completely different story, and furthermore if you are a Linux user, it isn’t even an option.)

Along with wireless app distribution, Apple also plans to update the iPhone OS to be more compatible with third-party management frameworks such as Sybase. The idea behind this is that Apple will build in the hooks these management vendors need to that their customers can do things like wirelessly configure devices, keep tabs on device compliance with company policies, and remotely wipe or lock devices outside of Mobile Me and Exchange ActiveSync.

For individual users or even smaller businesses, none of this is a big deal but for larger companies, these are hugely important capabilities. It’s also not hard to see the need for this in education markets where Apple hopes to get entire schools crammed full of iPads. Giving schools a way to wirelessly manage these devices would be an important sales point, especially if you go from box to student without ever needing to touch iTunes. If you can update the device wirelessly, it would be even better.

Security

The iPhone OS has also taken its share of knocks over security issues. Some of these criticisms have been overblown or just plain incorrect, but other security concerns are valid. Take the lack of encryption in 3GS models or the way the encryption was set up on the 3GS – once you get the passcode, all the data on the device is completely available. Encryption has been more of a “keep them out if they steal the phone and can’t get past the passphrase” philosophy.” Albeit being better than nothing, it still isn’t great. With iPhone 4.0, Apple seems to be changing the way it implements encryption. It looks as if the company is giving users the ability to use a personal passphrase as an encryption key for data on the device for things like email and attachments. Apple is also implementing new APIs to allow developers to encrypt their data as well, so if someone manages to get a hold of your iPhone, it’s hopefully much harder for them to get your data. Some things remain unclear about this forthcoming change. For example, does this mean that Apple will allow you to encrypt your entire device, where the hardware supports it, without using the hard key that is the same for all devices, or will this ride on top of existing encryption? Will this allow two-factor authentication vendors to implement smart cards so that access to your device is more secure? We don’t know, and as of yet, Apple isn’t telling either. Securing data for the iPhone OS devices, including the iPad is important for companies to do and Apple should surely expect to fix security issues. Along with encryption changes though, Apple will also be adding more support for SSL VPNs. To be specifically clear here, the iPhone has had VPN access for some time, with a Cisco client in the 3.x timeframe. You could use SSL VPNs prior to iPhone OS 4.0 but you were limited to going through a webpage since there was no “native client.” With version 4, Apple looks to be increasing the support for SSL VPNs so that the connection experience is more seamless and tap into capabilities like VPN-on demand so that things “just work.” Companies such as Juniper and Cisco have been mentioned in conjunction with this new support, so they’re likely to be early supports of this feature and hopefully other vendors like F5 will follow suit as well.

Apps

During its iPhone 4.0 event last week, Apple talked about features such as support for multiple Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) accounts and the support for Exchange 2010. What they didn’t clarify was whether support for Exchange 2010 means it’ll work the same way things worked with Exchange 2008 or 2003 server, or if the support will be for Exchange 2010-specific features. We did note a few more features by carefully reading the smaller points on a feature slide during Steve Jobs’ presentation. A particular point for CalDAV users, like everyone using Apple’s iCal server, it involves creating meetings for CalDAV calendars. You can do that now with EAS accounts, but not being able to do it with CalDAV is very annoying. Version 4 will have support for the new CardDAV standard. The whole ordeal is a nice feature to mention but not quite as impressive given the state of standard and current implementations. Will iCal in version 4 finally support shared calendars via iCal on the desktop? Will you be able to set which shared calendars you want to see? Will you be able to set delegation to your own calendars on the device? We don’t know but we’d like to know. The same thing goes for shared mail folders and shared address book folders.

One feature we’d love to see but doubt it’ll work with current hardware is support for Kerberos and Single – Signon. Even if you have Single – Signon on the desktop, password changes are a pain on iPhones. With IMAP/CalDAV/CardDAV you have to change your password separately for each account whereas EAS combines mail/calendar/contacts in one service and therefore only requires one password change.)

Will iCal in version 4 finally support shared calendars ala iCal on the desktop? Will you be able to set which shared calendars you want to see? Will you be able to set delegation to your own calendars on the device? We don’t know. Same thing for shared mail folders and shared address book folders.

Finally, what about Apple’s own management applications? While the iPhone Configuration Utility is handy for building profiles for devices, it’s not something we’d want to manage hundreds or thousands of devices with. Will Apple update their tools that run under Mac OS X 10.6 and Mac OS X 10.6 Server or will we have to wait until Mac OS X 10.7 to see these changes? Still an unclear aspect.

The Outlook

Overall, we’re more than pleased by the changes seen in both the iPhone OS 4.0 Event Video and on Apple’s website. Even with a fairly large amount of questions that remain unanswered, the improvements in the iPhone OS 4 are going to make the system administrator’s life more than a little easier. Seems like Apple is starting to head in the right direction from an IT stand point.