After all the previewed features and great news about iOS 5 (OTA updates, wireless sync, new apps, iMessage), Apple confirmed that iOS 5 will ship this Fall (perhaps with a new iPhone?), with a first developer seed available later today. The best part? Just like iOS 4, iOS 5 will run on your iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS (unlike a previous report claimed, 3GS is supported), iPad and iPad 2, iPod touch 3rd and 4th gen.
Photos courtesy of This is my Next.
Following direct Twitter integration, Newsstand and all the new features of iOS 5, Apple has just announced what many were hoping for in the months leading up to today’s keynote: wireless syncing. Dubbed PC Free by Scott Forstall, the new feature will allow for a variety of cord-free functionalities such as no iTunes required for activation, over-the-air software updates, Delta updates to only download what’s changed in the new OS.
From This Is My Next:
We said, why do people go back to a computer? Calendars, people create or delete them. You can do that now. Photo editing, you can do it on the devices. Even mail — you can create folders. So if you want to cut the cord, you can. So you no longer need to plugin to update your software. And they’re now Delta updates. Instead of downloading the whole OS, you only download what’s changed.
More on this later when Apple will seed the first iOS 5 beta.
Update: new cloud-based features have also been introduced in the App Store app without needing an update. The App Store application on iOS 4.3 already has a new Purchased tab that, similarly to the Mac App Store, allows you to get a list of all the app you’ve previously bought, also from other devices.
Rumors about iOS 5 getting “deep” Twitter integration were also true: the WWDC keynote revealed a few minutes ago that iOS 5 will indeed come with a new Twitter settings panel to authorize with your account on-device, and start tweeting pictures or web pages right away with the “Tweet Sheet”, a new system-wide popup menu used on the iPhone and iPad to send tweets. Twitter will also be integrated in the contacts to fetch profile pictures, as well as Maps, YouTube and Safari.
Official update from Twitter’s blog:
And today we’re working with Apple to make sharing on Twitter even easier: Twitter is built right into iOS 5, coming soon to iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices worldwide.
This means that you’ll be able to sign in to your Twitter account once and then tweet with a single tap from Twitter-enabled apps, including Apple’s apps—Camera, Photos, Safari, Contacts, YouTube, and Maps. And developers of all of your favorite apps can easily take advantage of the single sign-on capability, letting you tweet directly from their apps too.
Photos courtesy of This is my Next.
The rumors were true: at the WWDC keynote Scott Forstall has just unveiled the new notification system of iOS 5, which as reported earlier today looks similar to the way Android deals with notifications through a pulldown menu from the status bar. The new system reminds us of Cydia plugins LockInfo and Mobile Notifier (who creator Peter Hajas was recently hired by Apple) in the way it presents notifications in a single place, both anywhere on the Springboard and in the lock screen.
As a rumor from this morning suggested, you can swipe on messages in the Lock screen to launch the associated app, check out weather and stock widgets in the Notification Center pulldown menu, quickly dismiss notifications when they become visible at the top with a white interface.
Photos courtesy of This is my Next.
At the WWDC keynote, Phil Schiller has just announced that OS X Lion will be available only through the Mac App Store as a 4 GB download. The surprising news comes after rumors of Lion also set to be distributed on DVDs and portable USB keys – that is no longer the case.
With 3000 new APIs and 250 new features, Lion will be released in July at $29 in the Mac App Store. A new developer preview will be available later today.
Photos courtesy of This is my Next.
At Apple’s ongoing demo of OS X Lion at the WWDC, the company has announced the new OS will come with 250 new features, highlighting 10 of the most important ones on stage. Among them, a new version of Photo Booth that goes fullscreen thanks to Lion’s new functionalities and is able of some basic face-tracking for a new “dizzy” effect that puts a nice bird animation around your head.
We expect a new Lion build to become available later today. Photos courtesy of This is my Next.
The WWDC 2011 keynote kicks off in less than two hours, and people waiting at the Moscone West are being let inside the convention center as we speak. As last minute speculation on what Apple is going to unveil with its upcoming major new version of iOS, This Is My Next claims it has received word from an inside source that iOS 5 will feature a new Apple messaging protocol for free SMS and MMS texts between iOS users – in the style of RIM’S Messenger application that lets BlackBerry owners communicate with each other for free. Just like FaceTime allows iPhone owners to video chat, the new messaging app could enable iPhone, iPad and iPod touch owners to exchange text messages for free using Apple’s own solution:
The word is that Apple is readying it’s own MMS / SMS protocol which will be a native part of the phone. We’re not entirely clear on how this would work, but apparently it will be able to automatically identify iOS users and route the message accordingly. We’re told the functionality would be similar to third party applications like Textie, but with less fuss.
Furthermore, This Is My Next also corroborates rumors we’ve heard about the revamped notification system and widgets, claiming that iOS 5 will feature Android-like notifications with a white pulldown menu from the status bar that will list recent notifications and widgets.
Messages will appear and then slide back up in a unobtrusive manner, similar to webOS. There have been some leaked screenshots floating around the web for the last 24 hours, but those are not the real deal. The actual window looks more like a white, gradient Growl notification.
The notifications will be constantly accessible through a pulldown window which you reach by swiping at the top of the screen downward… just like Android. Not only will this screen house your recent notifications, but it will tout proper widgets like weather, stocks, and more.
Last, according to the website the lock screen will also go under a major refresh with notifications displayed on screen with the app’s icon on the left so users will be able to swipe over them to go to the specific application that sent the message.
We’ll be liveblogging the WWDC 2011 keynote here in less than an hour.
As reported by John Paczkowski at All Things Digital, according to Apple executives the number of mobile operators carrying the iPhone worldwide has increased to 200, from 186 at the end of March. The expansion, teased by COO Tim Cook in late February alongside the possibility of “lower priced offerings” and other prepaid market offers, is noteworthy for Apple, but still a relatively low figure when compared to RIM’s 500+ carriers selling BlackBerry devices.
Aggressive expansion, actually. Since the end of the March quarter, Apple has expanded the number of iPhone carriers to 200 from 186, according to company executives.
So 14 new customer bases in which to dip, further juicing sales of the device.
Following speculation of low iPhone sales in Q3 2011 due to the rumored lack of a hardware refresh in June (being the WWDC focused on software-related announcements such as iOS 5 and iCloud) with a new iPhone likely coming out this Fall, analysts and investors seem to believe that Apple’s iPhone sales will manage to meet expectations thanks to the release of the white iPhone 4 and the aforementioned carrier expansion. For instance, the iPhone 4 launched in India two weeks ago after an 11-month wait. Apple is also expected to introduce the iPhone 4 on more international CDMA networks to expand into a new market segment, though as of today the CDMA iPhone 4 is only available on Verizon Wireless’ US network.
TechCrunch posts a photo of what could be the Home screen of an iPhone running iOS 5, set to be officially introduced tomorrow at the WWDC keynote in San Francisco. TechCrunch doesn’t report the original source of the photo and says this might be a well-realized mockup based on recent rumors and speculation, but MG Siegler notes some interesting facts about the image may suggest it is genuine and not another Internet fake:
Could it be? Is this it? iOS 5?! I honestly have absolutely no clue. But it certainly seems like it at least could have the right idea.
Before you go yelling “fake” on the obvious things, a couple notes. First of all, yes, 11:54 PM is in the future — in the United States. But if the Weather app is to be believed, this is clearly a European version of iOS (note the 23 degree Celsius in the icon instead of 72 degree Fahrenheit as you would see in the U.S.). Second, the Camera app icon is totally different, and looks a little odd being all-black, but who knows, maybe it’s changing. The icons are in the “correct” default order. Finally, if the talk of deep Twitter integration into iOS 5 is to be believed (we heard a bit, others have heard a bit more), it’s entirely possible that these new-style Twitter notifications could be working in iOS 5 right out of the box.
It is true the photo above has the icons in the same default order every device comes out of the box with. Another detail: in the Utilities folder next to the iTunes Store, there seems to be another app right below Calculator. In Apple’s default configuration, there are only four apps in the stock Utilities folder. If the image is to believed, iOS 5 would come with the old iOS 4 default wallpaper (as the WWDC banners indicated) and a revamped camera icon. It wouldn’t be the first time Apple updated a stock app’s icon with the launch of a new version of iOS 5.
More importantly, the image shows the rumored Twitter integration with a new notification bar. Several reports in the past week claimed Apple was working on “deep” Twitter integration for iOS 5 with features such as native photo uploading and contact access from the Address Book.
TechCrunch has a pretty solid track record when it comes to Apple rumors and last-minute leaks, though there are always some questionable images showing up before every major Apple event. We don’t put much faith in the photo either, but we’re posting it for discussion as it seems to fall in line with rumors we’ve heard in the months leading up to WWDC 2011.
Update: TechCrunch now says they’re hearing this is the “right idea”. We’ll know more tomorrow.
