Editor’s note: This blog post is authored by Andrew He, a Stanford student currently completing his Master of Sciences degree in Computer Science. Andrew is a two-time LinkedIn intern, and spent the summer of 2009 focused on the LinkedIn mobile platform.I suppose this blog post could have been entitled: “What I did on my summer vacation.” Truth be told, I’m just thrilled to see LinkedIn for iPhone v1.5 in the iTunes app store. There’s nothing more gratifying as a developer than to see your work go live.
This past summer, I was able to dedicate myself to enhancing the LinkedIn mobile platform. In the Fall of 2008, I was lucky enough to be one of the first students to take the new CS 193P: iPhone Application Development course at Stanford. I was looking for the opportunity to put that work to good use, and LinkedIn was excited to have me join the mobile team for the summer.
LinkedIn for iPhone v1.5 adds a large number of caching and performance improvements to the original LinkedIn application. For most people, however, the most noticeable change will be the addition of a single new module: Inbox.
The Inbox offers quick and easy access to three key features: Invitations, Messages & Sent Items. The Invitations tab shows you all of your pending invitations, making it easy to quickly accept requests anywhere. The user interface includes the image of the inviter (if available), which makes it that much easier to recognize them. The badge shows you quickly how many pending invitations you have outstanding.
The application also lets you send invitations, either by entering their email address, or by going to their profile and clicking the invitation button.
The messages tab offers quick access to all of of your outstanding messages from your connections. The badge on the tab shows you how many unread messages you have. We’ve tried to make it as easy as possible to get through your messages by replying or archiving each item. You can also send a message to any of your LinkedIn connections.
Most internships at high tech startups involve new technologies and cool products. But it’s not everyday that you get to ship a real product like this with the potential to benefit millions of users.
I just want to say a quick thank you to Adam Nash, Jaikumar Ramanathan, and the entire LinkedIn mobile team. There are a lot of exciting improvements to the LinkedIn mobile platform on the way, but for now, I hope the addition of the Inbox will make the LinkedIn iPhone application an even more essential tool for mobile professionals.
If you’re interested in helping us with feedback and suggestions for future versions of the LinkedIn for iPhone application, come join us on the official LinkedIn group.
Download the latest version (v1.5) of LinkedIn’s iPhone app here
- Topics:
- iPhone,
- LinkedIn Mobile,
- New LinkedIn Features
Comments
Good work on the Inbox man. Was really looking forward to this feature!! Keep up the good work.
Will we ever get a Blackberry App? Blackberry is the #1 phone for professionals and the top selling smartphone quarter after quarter.
But what do I know….
Very nice – can we have a blackberry app any time soon?
I just installed it and it works great. Thanks you !!
Can we get an Android version, please?
Hi.
I’m prepping up for an android-powered phone. Is development in this direction being considered?
What are the must-have things you were able to do with the iPhone API that cannot be done with a mobile web page?
You might be interested in the following article.
Are the iPhone and social networks making the classic Web and intranet obsolete?
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Hinchcliffe/?p=1007&tag=nl.e539
Great work:)
I’ve just installed it and it is working great.
Thanks
Andrew,
This is deff a killer app. Thanks for working so hard on it! What else is on the horizon that you can give us a sneak peak at? Are their other applications that you would suggest as well?
YT,
Jay
http://tinyurl.com/Join-Networks-on-LinkedIn
Very nicely done. With the speed-up and inbox, I’m finding myself reaching for the iPhone more and more (and the browser less and less). Great work!
Great, iPhones are at v1.5.
Most professionals use a blackberry, do you have any intent to develop a linkedin app for them ?
Ignoring remarks may not be the best PR move… just let us know, like:
A. No way
B. We wish but RIM systems are complicated
C. Yes, to come up soon
Thanks;)
Everyone – You may have seen this already, but just in case check out Adams latest announcement in his latest blog article titled Coming Soon: LinkedIn for BlackBerry.
Thank you for all your hard work. It is so nice to finally have an easy way to send and accept invitations while at conferences. Now when you meet someone you can quickly connect and not lose the contact.
Apparently 50 million people use LinkedIn – I would bet a far greater majority of these users use Blackberry.
When are you going to take a course to develop a BB app? I would have thought after iPhone app 1.0 you would have been busy developing for BB, Android, Nokia, etc. so ALL 50 million users can feel the love….
Why isn’t there a BB app already or in the works?
the application is great it would be great if we can get the blackberry application soon
Any chance of a LinkedIn app for Blackberry?
Is there an app for the Blackberry yet?
Good to hear that. What about apps for Nokia Symbian S60 V5 smartphones?
very nice butinvitation is not working on profile page (clicking on invitate button)
it asks for an email adress, which is not visible on the whole profile page, so this option is useless.
It’s a great enhancement Andrew.
Now what would it take for LI to allow us to see who our intermediaries are for our 2nd degree connections via the iPhone app?
This is one of our favorite features on the website, and seems like a natural fit for LinkedIn for iPhone. Something we are considering for future versions of the app.
Adam
Great work on the app, but where is LinkedIn for Android???
There are 3 US carriers at least 6 different types of Android devices. Let’s go LinkedIn!!!
I need to get out of the stone age and get one of these iPhone. I can’t beleive the stuff you can do with your phone these days.
@James and other folks who mentioned Android
We’ve just launched a beta version of our Android app.
http://blog.linkedin.com/2010/12/16/linkedin-android-beta/
We’re glad we could get this out to you before the holidays. Look forward to your feedback.