is there any chance that external memory or even a flash card reader could be attached to the connector down the iphone and could be used as addition to the main memory, you could load up music and films so to say and the iphone would handle it correctly, meaning music on the attached mem would be part of the music inventory and the same with movies.
in plain words, would it be possible to add memory to the iphone externally thus having the 8 gb (4gb) + added memory and the sum being recognised and used as normal iphone memory with all its functions.

sorry for my phrasing but 1) my english is a bit rusty 2) early in the morning 3) think one up.

cheers

I've been looking into this, but haven't got very far yet. Here's the thread:

http://hackint0sh.org/forum/showthread.php?t=6885

The iPhone's microprocessor in theory has the ability to act as a USB Host as long as Apple didn't have it disabled. I don't think they did. It already has some of the necessary frameworks to support USB use, so I don't think it's that much of a stretch if the hardware can be made to work. Currently there are 3 impediments to getting exactly what you're asking to work:

1. Figure out how to switch the iPhone into USB Host mode. I'm working on this, but have not had any luck so far.

2. Build working USB mass storage drivers for the iPhone as they don't currently exist. This should not be too difficult as it would probably be mostly a port from OS X.

3. Build the unix tool 'mount' to work on the iPhone. Again, this is just a port from OS X or BSD. Many other similar tools have been successfully ported, but no one seems to have tried to port mount, probably because it wouldn't be useful for anything at the moment.

Once the USB drive is mounted, it would be simple using existing tools to symlink the drive's contents wherever you want it so that the iPhone would see it as if it's part of the main file system. Not sure if iTunes would recognize the size increase, though, but I'm sure someone could find ways around that.

Originally Posted by lh99

I've been looking into this, but haven't got very far yet. Here's the thread:

http://hackint0sh.org/forum/showthread.php?t=6885

The iPhone's microprocessor in theory has the ability to act as a USB Host as long as Apple didn't have it disabled. I don't think they did. It already has some of the necessary frameworks to support USB use, so I don't think it's that much of a stretch if the hardware can be made to work. Currently there are 3 impediments to getting exactly what you're asking to work:

1. Figure out how to switch the iPhone into USB Host mode. I'm working on this, but have not had any luck so far.

2. Build working USB mass storage drivers for the iPhone as they don't currently exist. This should not be too difficult as it would probably be mostly a port from OS X.

3. Build the unix tool 'mount' to work on the iPhone. Again, this is just a port from OS X or BSD. Many other similar tools have been successfully ported, but no one seems to have tried to port mount, probably because it wouldn't be useful for anything at the moment.

Once the USB drive is mounted, it would be simple using existing tools to symlink the drive's contents wherever you want it so that the iPhone would see it as if it's part of the main file system. Not sure if iTunes would recognize the size increase, though, but I'm sure someone could find ways around that.

i read your other thread; quite interesting and extensive stuff. so as far i understood it the problem is to switch the usb to host mode. so first question: does the iphone actually ever switch to host mode under special circumstances? (i'm thinking of some special features as the interface with the BMW, hard to believe it doesnt)
another way of getting there would be maybe thru the terminal. you can do it on the mac, since the iphone is running darwin aswell one should be able to do it as well;problem is to find the correct process. hmmm....maybe with probing the connector thus generating cpu load it would show up on -top command in terminal.

Most accessories for the iPod/iPhone use an RS232 type serial communication protocol, not USB. The only one I know of that uses USB is the camera connector. Unfortunately, it's not compatible with the iPhone.

apparently the usb and most other hardware is directly controlled thru the mach kernel, unlike the mac os x mach kernel which does this thru various ktext modules. the iphone seems to handle it all directly thru the kernel since the hardware is actually always the same so making it needless to have the option to add easely support for new hardware unlike on mac computers which it's handier to ad ktext modules for new components or new hardware instead of rewriting the whole kernel.

so i think it will be actually much more difficult than originally thought to get direct access to the iphone's hardware, in this case the usb controler.

anyone with other opinions?

apparently the usb and most other hardware is directly controlled thru the mach kernel, unlike the mac os x mach kernel which does this thru various ktext modules. the iphone seems to handle it all directly thru the kernel since the hardware is actually always the same so making it needless to have the option to add easely support for new hardware unlike on mac computers which it's handier to ad ktext modules for new components or new hardware instead of rewriting the whole kernel.

What's your source? According to the web page below, the iPhone not only uses kernel extensions, but it has one for USB already running:

http://www.roughlydrafted.com/RD/RDM...5A410D108.html

Nothing to say that another kernel extension couldn't be added if needed, although I agree that this would be significantly more difficult.