Spotlight search lets you find contacts, apps, and iPod tracks, just by typing their names.
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The Apple nerdosphere had a meltdown Wednesday, when Apple released Version 3.0 of its iPhone firmware. Breathless, sweaty fanboys and girls filled Twitter with messages describing in excruciating detail how they were downloading and installing the software.

The iPhone 3.0 software is a treat, making a good smartphone even better. It delivers some new capabilities, like long-overdue copy/cut/paste support, Spotlight search, and push notifications, as well as small user interface refinements that make the device more pleasant and efficient to use. And the Find Your iPhone and Remote Wipe security services are surprisingly interesting. The upgrade is free to iPhone users, $10 for iPod Touch users.

In The Spotlight
Let's start with my favorite new feature: Spotlight search.

The iPhone runs many applications, and stores a lot of data, and it can be difficult to sort through that much information. I have 65 applications installed on my iPhone. That's not even a lot compared with some people; I know some who have maxed out the full, 148-app capacity of the iPhone. Finding a particular app in that stack can be unwieldy.

Similarly, in previous versions of the iPhone software, searching or browsing through the Contacts list could be slow and frustrating.

Apple has solved this problem by adding Spotlight search to the iPhone. To access Spotlight, go to the first screen of applications on the device, then flick left one more time. That calls up a search box and pops up the onscreen keyboard. Start typing, and the iPhone searches your applications, address book, e-mail, Notes, calendar, and iPod in realtime. Tap on an item to open it. Searches execute nearly instantaneously.

Spotlight will make finding applications and data much easier on the iPhone. Unfortunately, it doesn't index the content of third-party applications -- although it will find the applications themselves. I hope Apple expands Spotlight search soon.