Skype has released a multitasking version of its eponymous iOS app, allowing users to make and receive calls while Skype is running in the background.
“You can receive Skype calls while other apps are running, even when your iPhone is locked,” says Peter Parkes, Skype’s blogger-in-chief. “And during a call, you can keep the conversation going while you switch to another task, such as checking a movie listing or reading an email.”
Parkes also revealed that Skype has dropped plans to charge a supplement for making calls over 3G.
“We believe that better call quality and better availability (which is achieved with an app capable of multitasking and/or making calls over 3G) lead to increased call frequency and longer calls,” he wrote.
Skype can now make and receive calls in the background
Skype 2.0.1 is a free download from the App Store.
What you won’t find on the App Store is Handy Light, a flashlight app with a secret.
Ostensibly the app was just another illuminator, but with a bit of fiddling with an iPhone’s Wi-Fi settings it illicitly enabled tethering — sharing the phone’s internet connection with other devices, such as a laptop.
Tethering apps are not accepted into the App Store — Apple has built the feature into iOS and it’s up to network providers whether they allow it — while apps with hidden features are explicitly banned. So it came as no surprise that Handy Light was pretty quickly extinguished.
Also extinguished, this time by Amazon, was a guide to iLife ’10 — an as-yet-unreleased version of the Mac software suite that includes iPhoto and iMovie.
A page on Amazon France said that iLife ’10 for Dummies would be published on 23 September.
Strangely a guide to the similarly unannounced iWork ’10 is still listed, with an October publication date.
