Spire – A Legal & Functional Siri Port for Non-iPhone 4S Devices

by Mahesh Kukreja · 1 comment

in Apple


Ever since Apple released Siri along with iPhone 4S back in October, iOS hackers have been trying to port Siri on non-iPhone 4S devices. H1Siri was released by some Chinese hackers. But H1Siri relies on copyrighted material & hence is illegal. About 10-15 days back, Apple re-released iOS 5.0.1 for iPhone 4S. This iOS 5.0.1 version’s ramdisks are non-encrypted due to which the main filesystem keys are obtainable. This helps to get Siri’s files without any piracy.

Siri on iPhone 4

[via Flickr]

Now with the help of developer Steven Troughton-Smith, Chpwn and Ryan released a public Siri port known as Spire. Spire is available in Cydia and works on jailbroken iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPod Touch 3G/4G & iPad 1.

Here’s a excerpt from Chpwn’s Spire blog post:

Spire is my (along with Ryan Petrich) new tool for installing Siri on previously unsupported, but jailbroken, devices. Spire is a small download, but while installing it will download Siri itself (directly from Apple). Spire is available in Cydia right now — go get it! This will use about 100 MB of data, so please connect to Wi-Fi before installing.

However, Spire is not a complete solution. Apple still requires authorization to use Siri, so information from an iPhone 4S is still required. To insert this information, Spire allows you to enter your own proxy server address. I’ve put up a list of my ideas on how you might get access to a proxy; hopefully you can figure something out.

In short, you can get Spire working on your jailbroken iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad if you’ve a Siri proxy. Currently you can set up your own Siri proxy by using westbaer’s SiriProxy fork. But you need to have access to an iPhone 4S for certain authorization requirements. It can be your own iPhone 4S or any of your friend’s/relative’s iPhone 4S. Here’s a tutorial for setting up your own Siri Proxy using SiriProxy fork method.

How to install Spire on Jailbroken iPhone 4/3GS, iPod Touch or iPad?

Spire is available in Cydia in BigBoss’s repository.

1. Launch Cydia & let it update the package list. Then simply search for “Spire”

Search Spire - Cydia

2. Choose the package “Spire” & install it. Make sure you’re connected via WiFi. Spire will download about 100 MB data from Apple servers

Install Spire

3. After installation, your iDevice will reboot. If you’ve a tethered jailbreak, make sure to boot tethered via redsn0w or iBooty. Then go to Settings. Here you’ll see option “Spire”

Spire

4. Tap it & then enter the Siri proxy address

Siri Proxy - Spire

Spire Proxy Hosts:

There are not many Spire Proxy servers at the moment. But here’s one I’ve found. I’ve not tested it personally yet.

Website URL: http://www.sirikeys.com/

Price: $5/month

Proxy URL: Will be sent to you after registration

I’ll update this list as soon as more public proxies for Spire (Siri port) are available.

In the mean time, Chpwn is working on other methods to set up a Siri Proxy without iPhone 4S authorization. Also, once iPhone 4S is jailbroken, the authorization issues can be completely bypassed. Till then stay tuned for more news. You can subscribe to my blog or follow me on Twitter to stay updated.

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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Srikz December 27, 2011 at 2:11 pm

Here’s a tutorial on how to install Siri on iPhone 4 and other older iDevices http://t.co/5Sh5YdLX

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