If you’re the type to abide by the rules and let Apple decide which applications you can and cannot run on your iPhone, then you’ll be just fine running third-party applications from the AppStore that don’t run in the background. Sure, they might offer you a saved-state feature that launches the 
application in to the same state you left it in, but without any active processes in the background, these official iPhone applications aren’t exactly multi-tasking friendly.
On the other hand, if you’re of the rules-were-meant-to-be-broken camp, there’s yet another reason to jailbreak that iPhone or iPhone 3G of yours. Admittedly, with the AppStore offering so many free applications that we’ve gone blurry-eyed trying to download and play with them all, there’s less demand for free jailbreak applications. But, what the new Pwnage Tool 2.0.1 and Winpwn jailbreak solutions offer are true multi-tasking applications from “rogue” third-party developers.
Apple has forced iPhone developers’ hands in keeping their applications restricted to running one at a time. While official Apple iPhone applications, like Mail and Safari, have no problem multi-tasking, third-party AppStore applications are left in the dark. That’s where jailbreak applications come in.
Since jailbreak application developers aren’t restricted by the same iPhone SDK restrictions, they can develop their applications to take full advantage of all the iPhone’s resources. That means third-party jailbreak applications can run in the background and allow true multi-tasking support alongside Apple’s own iPhone applications.
And, developers are updating their jailbreak applications to run with the new iPhone 2.0 OS. Says prolific iPhone developer Jonathan Zdziarski:
“This means that it doesn’t matter what kind of desktop OS you run, you can still build great iPhone apps. Some changes have been made to the private API headers from v1.x to make them code-compatible with 2.0. This means most of your 1.x applications will rebuild for 2.0 with very few, if any, changes. Saurik has also provided a signing tool to sign your applications (ldid -S /path/to/binary). You’ll need to do this only once to make your application run.”
I can see legit iPhone application developers going to the “dark-side” of iPhone development to create versions of their applications that can run in the background. We’re not likely to hear much from these types of developers, as they’d want to stay in Apple’s good graces and remain in the AppStore. But, I wouldn’t be surprised to see applications similar to those offered in the AppStore popping up in jailbreak-land. Legit AppStore monger by day, rogue jailbreak developer by night.
So, you want third-party applications that can multi-task with the best of ’em? Well, what are you waiting for? Go jailbreak that iPhone 3G or updated iPhone now!
[Via: iPhone Atlas]