What processor will the iPhone use? That’s one of the great unanswered questions left in the wake of Apple’s launch of the iPhone this week, but a job ad on Apple’s website may hint at the answer.The open position is a networking engineer to work on the iPhone, and as the ad makes clear, Apple is looking for someone who knows the Mac OS and embedded platforms, and Arm processors in particular. The Apple iPhone An Arm chip would be the logical component for a device like the iPhone. Arm is already the dominant provider of smart-phone application processors, because its chips are powerful enough to meet the computing needs of these products while at the same time requiring little power—a critical component to keeping the phones running between charges.If the iPhone’s brain is Arm-based, it will represent a new direction for Apple’s Mac OS X operating system, which will power the device. To date, Mac OS has been ported to Intel’s x86 processors and IBM’s PowerPC, but Arm would represent a third platform for Apple’s operating system.On the other hand, it is possible that Intel or IBM could develop new processors that would meet the iPhone’s requirements, saving Apple from doing the porting work to make Mac OS run on the new platform, said Peter Glaskowsky, technical analyst with the Envisioneering Group. “To me the number-one unresolved question about the iPhone is: Does it use an Arm with a port, or does it use some new PowerPC or x86 chip?” he said.Glaskowsky said that even if Apple is looking for Arm skills, that doesn’t necessarily mean that Arm will be powering the iPhone’s operating system. “I wouldn’t read too much into that,” he said of the ad. “If you think about most modern smart phones … it’s very common for them to have four processors in the device.”Apple could be using an Arm chip to do something like voice compression or to simply process wireless networking signals. (Apple’s ad is for a “Bluetooth/WiFi” software engineer.)“It may have nothing to do with what’s running Mac OS on there,” Glaskowsky said.–Robert McMillan, IDG News Service (San Francisco Bureau)Related Links: Why Apple i-Anything Is a Non-Issue for CIOs and Corporate America Cisco Hits Apple With Lawsuit over iPhone Name Apple, Cingular Partner on iPhoneCheck out our CIO News Alerts and Tech Informer pages for more updated news coverage. Related content brandpost Sponsored by SAP When natural disasters strike Japan, Ōita University’s EDiSON is ready to act With the technology and assistance of SAP and Zynas Corporation, Ōita University built an emergency-response collaboration tool named EDiSON that helps the Japanese island of Kyushu detect and mitigate natural disasters. By Michael Kure, SAP Contributor Dec 07, 2023 5 mins Digital Transformation brandpost Sponsored by BMC BMC on BMC: How the company enables IT observability with BMC Helix and AIOps The goals: transform an ocean of data and ultimately provide a stellar user experience and maximum value. By Jeff Miller Dec 07, 2023 3 mins IT Leadership brandpost Sponsored by BMC The data deluge: The need for IT Operations observability and strategies for achieving it BMC Helix brings thousands of data points together to create a holistic view of the health of a service. By Jeff Miller Dec 07, 2023 4 mins IT Leadership how-to How to create an effective business continuity plan A business continuity plan outlines procedures and instructions an organization must follow in the face of disaster, whether fire, flood, or cyberattack. Here’s how to create a plan that gives your business the best chance of surviving such an By Mary K. Pratt, Ed Tittel, Kim Lindros Dec 07, 2023 11 mins Small and Medium Business IT Skills Backup and Recovery Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe