There's a lot of confusion in regards to Siri being ported with Apple connectivity. Here's the truth.
Over the past few weeks, there has been a lot of news of Siri being ported to older devices floating around the internet. There have been numerous people who have been able to transfer the Siri files onto their older devices, however the main issue was getting Siri to connect to Apple's servers. Without Apple connectivity you're unable to utilize Siri whatsoever, making it just a useless component to your non-iPhone 4S device. A few developers such as Steven Troughton-Smith and Jack (Jackoplane) have been working constantly to hack Apple's code in order to get Apple connectivity. It's been a rigorous task as performance as well as connectivity need to work hand in hand.
During the past week, there has been a lot of confusion in regards to the status and the people involved with the Siri port. Information has been misconstrued or even wrong in some areas. Here's the truth and full story:
Originally, Jack was the first person to be able to get any non-iPhone 4S device to connect to Apple's servers. This was done using his own private DNS server. When knowledge of this was publicly known, the only people who were able see it live and working was myself and Alex Heath of iDownloadBlog. There are a few other prominent players in the jailbreak community that saw this in action as well but requested to remain anonymous. Since the beginning of Jack's involvement with Siri, I have been his primary beta tester. Alex and I hand in hand served as mediums for communicating what was going on to the best of our ability to those not in the loop.
The server captured data going to and from the device and Apple's server and his device and changed values accordingly. This spoofing technique proved as a viable option, but after a ton of testing, a lot of issues came up. The method was cumbersome and didn't fit the profile for distribution purposes. It would require a lot of maintenance as well as funds to uphold a DNS server that could support a ton of traffic. Jack shelved the DNS idea and resorted to having to hack the actual files in order to get Siri to work with Apple's servers via the device. At this point in the scenario, Jack reached out to 5+ developers in the jailbreak community to start the process of getting Siri packaged and working 100%. Steven Troughton-Smith and previously spotlighted people in the Siri scene had been very quiet at this point and was making no indications of further developments with regards to Siri.
While working with developers, Jack's main goal was to ensure that the port worked 100% and that it would mesh well with the jailbreak environment (i.e. Mobile Substrate). Since a jailbreak is required to use Siri on any device other than the iPhone 4S, it was key that Siri was optimized for the jailbreak environment. Days were spent packaging dylibs and other files to get it package ready for a possible release.
In the mean time, Steven didn't make any statements saying that he was still involved publicly, however behind the scenes, he was very much active. As of tonight, Steven was able to get in touch with Grant Paul (chpwn) who has access to a jailbroken iPhone 4S, courtesy of the iPhone Dev-Team. While Steve and Grant were spending time with one another, they were able to get the key chain files they needed from the jailbroken iPhone 4S and simply copy and paste the files onto their respective non-iPhone 4S devices. This process proved successful and allowed them to use Siri on their devices with Apple connectivity.
After all this, one might be quick to judge Jack and call him a liar or someone that has stolen files from the other parties involved. This is not the case and anyone that has publicly stated that this was the truth is incorrect. There were a lot of reasons and drama-related issues that kept Jack from demoing Siri weeks ago.
There have been a lot of people involved with the port as well as those who've had full knowledge of what has been happening. Those people include myself and Alex Heath as mentioned earlier, iH8sn0w, and a few others. The past few weeks have been like walking through a room of egg shells. Information that was crucial to its progress were needed to be concealed as well as the methods behind doing so as well.
According to Steven in his interview with 9to5Mac, they will not be releasing this hack to the public. This is due to the immense about of piracy required to get the port working as it is. If there is a method by which to port Siri without infringing on Apple (and getting sued) Siri will be publicly available. Until a method is found to work around the piracy issue, there is no ETA for a release of this Siri hack.
So when it all boils down, the current state of the port is just a publicity stunt.
The whole ordeal with this information airing on 9to5Mac in the way it has been has caused a lot of frustration and drama in the community between all of us, including Jack. Updates on the progress of this whole situation will be revealed as it hits the wild. Jack, Alex, and I are not here to discredit Steven and Grant's accomplishment with Siri. It's quite exciting, however there is much more going on behind the scenes than people know about currently.
Stay tuned.
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