Apple might have postponed the official iPhone Software Development Toolkit last month, but as the Unofficial Apple Weblog reports, that hasn’t stopped someone from porting a BitTorrent client to Apple’s cell phone.
The work was undertaken by a hacker who calls himself core, and more details can be found on the CoreOS – iPhoneUnix blog. Core’s iPhone BitTorrent client is based on the Transmission open-source client for Mac OS X and Linux, and it currently runs on the iPhone in command line form. Users are warned not to try it over the EDGE network—the Unofficial Apple Weblog says peer-to-peer software “takes down EDGE faster than toppling a Jenga pile”—so this solution only seems useful through the iPhone’s Wi-Fi connection.
Of course, the utility of having a BitTorrent client on a handheld device is currently somewhat limited for users who’d rather stay on the right side of the law. Until more services use the protocol to legally distribute movies, music, and TV shows, folks can always use their iPhone to download the latest Ubuntu ISO, though.
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