I am looking for a credit card reader which can hook up with an iPhone/iTouch and supports the external accessory framework of the iphone sdk.
Do you guys know any solution to the problem?
Is there any credit card reader that supports the official specifications of iPhone accessory model or any way to hookup an the off the market reader to the iphone and get the data over bluetooth or the 30-pin connector?
Someone has built a prototype that fits over the headphone jack.
I haven't seen anything commercially available though.
I don't know of any credit card reader that connects to iPhone/iPod out of the box. I do however work on external accessory for iPhone/iTouch.
In order to make an external accessory for iPhone/iTouch you need to apply for "Made for iPod" program with Apple. This gives you the access to technical specifications for iPod Accessory Protocol and necessary hardware. I can't go into any details here doe to NDA. Sorry. It's not very complicated.
Once you implement iPod accessory protocol you will be able to communicate with iPod. You get a NSInputStram and a NSOutputStream in your application that you can use to communicate with iPod. It's strictly user space so no mocking about iPod USB driver/serial port or anything like that.
Hope this helps.
I saw the rep at the Apple store used a swipe device which attached to the back of the iPhone to process my transaction.