The world's smallest Mac is about to get a lot bigger. Passionate developers have cracked the code to write true native applications for the iPhone, beginning a new era of true binary development for the ground-breaking handheld computer.
There's only one problem: Apple wants to forbid these developers from doing what they do best. Yes, in the iPhone's topsy-turvy world, real software development is forbidden�"what developers are supposed to do is put together Web "applications" that can be hit by the phone's Safari browser.
Fortunately, programmers have been pretty ambitious there, too. Web "apps" may not have quite the power and punch of native applications, but they can keep you busy with simple games, let you access gigabytes of music and video, or add instant-messaging to a device that desperately needs it.
One warning: using some of these apps tends to make your iPhone rather toasty warm and completely guts your battery life. If you're streaming a lot of content over Wi-Fi (say, through Glide or Seeqpod) expect to get no more than a few hours' use of your iPhone on a charge.
As we scoped out our top iPhone apps, we kept in mind that we're PC Magazine . So almost everything in our list is Windows compatible. Here are our picks for the Top 10 iPhone Apps�"or, in some cases, PC apps to go with your iPhone.