Cydia

Apple plans to release the iOS 5 Notification Center this fall, which makes it possible to easily access information from the lock screen or anytime with a simple gesture on the task bar. Fortunately for those who have already jailbroken their iOS devices similar functionality already exists. All it takes is a properly installed and configured tweak called LockInfo.

Although LockInfo costs $7.99, the app is worth the price for the new features it makes possible right now. It also comes with a 14-day free trial so you don't have to commit before trying out the app. If you don't think it's worth the money Cydia can easily remove LockInfo before or after the free trial ends. To install and configure LockInfo follow these steps:

Push notifications are great, except when they constantly interrupt what you're doing on the iPhone. Luckily for iPhone owners with iOS 4.0 or later developer Peter Hajas has released a tweak that greatly improves iPhone notifications. In fact, Apple has even hired Peter to implement his MobileNotifier software in iOS 5.

If your iPhone is jailbroken you can install this tweak and start enjoying the benefits of MobileNotifier immediately. To get started, open Cydia and follow these instructions to add a repository.

Pandora users are limited to the amount of times they can skip a song depending on what type of account they have. This restriction can be annoying by causing you to get stuck listening to songs that you don't care for or heard too many times. Luckily there is a way to get unlimited skips thanks to Cydia.

Due to the terms of Pandora's music licenses, Pandora One listeners are only allowed to skip 6 songs per hour (per station). Free listeners are limited to 12 skips per day. Giving a song a "Thumbs Down" or "I'm tired of this song" rating after it is finished, does not count as a skip. But if you truly grow tired of a song, and decide to make it official while its playing, it will cost you one skip.

There are software packages available to help backup Cydia applications installed on your jailbroken iPhone. Both of the options (PkgBackup and AptBackup) have their advantages but some users don't want to pay $7.99 or be dependent on iTunes to save their list of apps. If this sounds like you, follow these instructions to backup and restore your Cydia apps.

Adding new sources for iPhone software packages in Cydia makes it possible to take advantage of what independent developers have to offer on their repositories. As long as your iPhone is jailbroken with Cydia installed you can add a repo by following these instructions:

1. Open Cydia and navigate to the Manage tab.

The popular skinning app for jailbroken iPhones, DreamBoard, is now free on Cydia. DreamBoard is a great alternative to Winterboard because it doesn't require you to restart your springboard every time you change themes. Dreamboard also allows much "deeper" themes and user-interface redesigns compared to Winterboard. Where Winterboard basically allows theme developers to re-skin existing iPhone graphics and interfaces, Dreamboard allows theme developers to build entirely new interfaces and methods of displaying information.

Apple's new iOS 5 has already been jailbroken by iPhone Dev Team member MuscleNerd who tweeted yesterday, "iOS 5 jailbroken: via limera1n + tethered boot... Not too many surprises." The tweet was accompanied by a picture (shown below) of Cydia and iSSH icons displayed on the screen of a 4th-generation iPod touch.

It looks like Apple essentially has done nothing to patch the known, existing exploits. Presumably this is because the next generation iPhone will have the iPad 2's A5 processor (or similar), which is not vulnerable to the existing bootrom exploits. In other words, though this jailbreak (a tethered one at that) delivers a jailbroken iOS5, it doesn't deliver a jailbroken iPhone 5 or iPad 2 running iOS 5.

iPhone Dev-Team member MuscleNerd has posted a screenshot of his jailbroken iPod touch 4G. A bootrom vulnerability has been discovered by @p0sixninja that will make it possible to jailbreak all iOS devices running the latest firmware including the iPhone 4. Chronic Dev Team members are currently developing new jailbreak tools based on the vulnerability, otherwise known as SHAtter.

Now those looking for some good apps on jailbroken iPhones can participate in one-stop-shopping. The two jailbreak app stores known as Cydia and Rock Your Phone are merging into one entity. The resulting app store (to be known as Cydia) will be the largest independent iOS app store.

Rock Your Phone has been providing apps to the jailbreak iPhone community for 18 months, with $3.3 million in sales. Saurik over at Cydia explains that the merger is really more of a strategic reorganization of the two companies to foster cooperation.

You may be in the market for a good iPhone unlock. Everyone likes to save money roaming overseas. Some of us just can't stand our current wireless carrier and want to break free. Turns out there's more than one solution available.

Two of the top competing software packages have been released and they are very similar. Even their names, purplesn0w and ultrasn0w are so alike it can be confusing. Turns out that geohot, the developer of purplesn0w, released his source code.