Thoughts On iOS 5

iOS 5, the latest version of Apple’s mobile operating system for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch released today, comes with more than 1,500 new developer APIs and over 200 new user features. In our iOS 5 coverage, we have chosen to focus on the key functionalities of the OS, while leaving room for the most visible subtle improvements that have made it through Apple’s new release as well.

On a simple checklist, iOS 5 is the widest, most extensive software update ever released by Apple for mobile devices since the original iPhone OS in 2007. Not even iPhone OS 3.2, then iOS, which shipped with the iPad in 2010 could claim to have the same amount of new technology, user interface, APIs, cloud features and overall reassessment of the platform that iOS 5 presents today. But in the past four years, we’ve come to learn a new Apple product – be it a device or a major software update – isn’t strictly about the number of new functionalities a user can spot, or the APIs a developer can implement in his code. Those things certainly contribute to the concept of “major release” by adding their sheer number of updates – they just don’t form the full picture.

In iOS 5, the 200 new features Apple’s Senior VP of iOS Software Scott Forstall announced at WWDC in June are the consequence of an operating system completely re-imagined around speed, efficiency and interconnectedness. These three principles, intrinsic foundation of Apple’s vision for iOS going forward, define iOS’ independency as a platform, and ecosystem.

A key term in Apple’s iOS 5 parlance is “quick”. In iOS 5, you can quickly tweet thanks to systemwide Twitter integration; create a new to-do from the Reminders app; activate the Camera from the Lock Screen; even access all your missed notifications with a single swipe on any screen. Speed is key to iOS 5: as Apple devices gain faster processors and more RAM, an OS that’s equally responsive and lets you perform common tasks in seconds is functional to the user experience. A device can get an infinite amount of hardware upgrades, but an OS that’s not meant for speed will never feel fast when it comes down to regular usage. Luckily, that’s not the case with iOS 5.

Alongside speed, Apple focused on making iOS a modern operating system that doesn’t require a PC to accomplish certain goals or perform functionalities usually associated to desktop computers. At WWDC, Forstall said they looked in every corner of the OS, and asked themselves how they could make iOS better by adding new powerful functionality, while keeping it fast and intuitive.

“There is a feature for everyone out there”.

So, for instance, iOS 5 gained the capability of managing calendars directly on the device: users can now add, rename, and delete calendars, as well as view event attachments and share calendars with friends and family through iCloud. Previously, a Mac or PC was required to do this. Looking at the various apps that come bundled with iOS, it’s clear Apple’s intention was to add functionalities in a way that wouldn’t compromise the overall experience’s ease of use. Safari received a substantial update, adding tabs on the iPad for better web browsing and Reading List to save webpages for later; Mail can now compose rich text styles and indent/outdent lines in a message; with iCloud documents & data for developers, Apple has paved the path towards a massive increase of apps that will be able to effortlessly push documents across iOS devices. A first example of this can be observed in Apple’s mobile iWork suite, which comes with iCloud support out of the box. There’s more: iOS devices can now sync wirelessly to iTunes, and they support over-the-air (OTA) software updates, meaning you’ll be able to download and install iOS 5.1 when it comes out directly from your iPhone or iPad. Users who sign up for iCloud can buy new storage (for a price) on device, choose which app libraries to back up to the cloud, and set up a new device without needing to activate it through iTunes on a Mac or PC. iOS 5 now lets you delete songs manually from the Music app, change a device’s name without iTunes, and even edit photos. On top of these new options, iOS 5 devices automatically back up and share the most recent photos with each other through iCloud’s Photo Stream, and it’s now possible to create and manage photo albums without having to switch to iPhoto on a Mac.

What’s worth noting about iOS 5 – basic concepts and 200 new features aside – is that while a general trend on desktop operating systems seems to be a heavy focus on removing functionalities, iOS keeps adding new ones. In fact, if you take Lion into consideration, iOS 5 is where Apple keeps adding features to the checklist, whereas Mac users have been found lamenting the removal of several of their favorite features on the latest OS X upgrade.

And, really, the reason is extremely simple: iOS is a different paradigm, one that gave Apple a fresh start four years ago and that is still allowing the company to experiment. The checklist doesn’t matter when an OS that keeps gaining features still doesn’t feel like it should be simplified.

If anything, iPhone and iPad users will start asking for more tomorrow.

What’s even more obvious to me is that iOS is starting to feel like a “connected OS” in its fifth version. Apple is “cutting the cord” under the large “PC Free” marketing umbrella that defines iOS’ independency from desktop computers, and for the first time iPhones and iPads are acting as devices fully aware of each other’s apps and data. The emblem of this renewed interconnectedness is iCloud: Apple’s new cloud service enables apps to push documents back and forth between devices, and it allows iPhones and iPads to manage their own cloud storage and the data that gets backed up to the cloud. Photo Stream connects a device’s recent photos with others’ camera rolls, and iTunes in the Cloud makes sure new and past purchases are immediately pushed on all your devices and always available for re-download, respectively.

For the first time in years, using and installing new apps doesn’t feel like adding new data silos to a confined environment. There’s still a long road to iOS apps’ full capability of “talking” to each other, but with iCloud now up and running, the task doesn’t seem as complex as it did yesterday.

iOS will never be “complete”.

In his WWDC keynote in June, Steve Jobs said: “You know, if the hardware is the brain and the sinew of our products, the software in them is their soul”. In Apple’s vision, a modern software – the “soul” of a device – is able to evolve and fit to the circumstances and change its behavior accordingly to new user requests, the app market, and third-party developers. The flexibility of iOS – and the reason Apple doesn’t care about legacy software as much as other companies do – can be easily spotted looking back at the original iPhone, or the first version of the App Store from 2008. iPhone OS was never “done”. The App Store itself was never 100% complete – the Store is just a showcase for an ever-changing landscape of mobile applications built on top of new technologies offered to developers. Yet sometimes those developers come up with new solutions to existing problems and better ways to improve the functionalities Apple gave them out of the box.

iOS, the App Store, the mobile ecosystem, the cloud, third-party developers – they’re all connected and, at the same time, independent from each other in a way that ensures evolution is consistent, but resilient.

That’s why iOS 5 is both a milestone and a starting point: it sets a new standard for developers who are now given access to thousands of new APIs, but it still lacks some functionalities that many will begin requesting tomorrow and, probably, Apple will deliver at its next WWDC keynote. You will hear about things such as better podcast and document management, streaming of music and movies through iCloud, iChat for iOS and Notification Center widgets throughout the next year. It’s just the way the iOS ecosystem works: as new technology comes around and it’s adopted by the users and developers, it’s time to start wondering about what’s next. About the direction the ecosystem needs to take to be stable, flourish, allure third-party app makers and, more importantly, evolve.

Today, there’s iOS 5. It’s fast, efficient and connected in a way that iOS 4 never was, and perhaps didn’t need to be – because it was too soon. As Apple begins to roll out its iCloud services and developers start writing new software that takes advantage of modern APIs and technologies, the next few months will prepare the road that will lead us to the introduction of iOS 6 next year. At the same time, users will get accustomed to the new functionalities of iOS 5, and a new breed of quick, productive and connected applications will rise on the App Store, eventually finding its way back to the Mac as it’s always done in the past years.

iOS 5: it just works - and now it does more.

Apple Releases OS X 10.7.2

As part of this week’s iOS 5 and iCloud rollout, Apple has released OS X 10.7.2, an update for OS X Lion users that brings full iCloud compatibility to the Mac, as well as various new features and bug fixes.

From the changelog:

The 10.7.2 update is recommended for all OS X Lion users and includes general operating system fixes that improve the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac. It also includes support for iCloud, a breakthrough set of free cloud services that automatically and wirelessly store your content on iCloud and push it to all of your devices.

Getting started with iCloud is easy. After installing the update, OS X will automatically present an iCloud setup panel. Simply enter an existing Apple ID or create a new one and then follow the on screen instructions. To learn more about iCloud visit http://www.apple.com/icloud.

With 10.7.2, Apple is now allowing Lion machines to integrate with iCloud for email, calendars, contacts, Safari bookmarks and Reading List; these items will automatically be stored in the cloud, and pushed across all your devices. As Apple previous detailed in the iCloud transition Q&A, some features of the old MobileMe service have been maintained in iCloud, such as Back to My Mac (remote access to a Mac from another Mac on the Internet) and Find My Mac, a new feature integrated with Find My iPhone that will allow Mac users to find a missing Mac by locating it on a map through iCloud.com or the Find My iPhone app. Find My Mac works similarly to its iOS counterpart in that owners of a stolen or missing Mac can locate it, track it, and send messages to the Mac’s screen remotely. It’s also possible to lock a Mac and remotely wipe it. Read more

Apple Releases iOS 5 [Direct Links]

Apple today released iOS 5, a major update for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch that adds over 200 new user features including Notification Center, iMessage, iCloud support and PC Free. iOS 5 is now available for download in iTunes; to install the new software on your iOS device, connect it to iTunes via USB and “Check for Updates” in the device’s info screen.

Originally previewed and seeded to developers at WWDC in June, iOS 5 is a major update that enables developers to implement thousands of new APIs to take advantage of Apple’s latest technologies in their apps. Apple has already started approving third-party apps built for iOS 5, with several of them available in the App Store today. iOS 5 introduces new functionalities like Notification Center, a new systemwide interface for keeping track of missed notifications; iMessage, a free text messaging solution for iOS 5 users; Twitter integration built into Safari, Photos, YouTube and Maps; iCloud, a new cloud service that automatically stores your content and wirelessly pushes it to all your devices, including Macs and PCs. iCloud, expected to roll out today as well, will allow users to keep their contacts, calendars, bookmarks, mail, notes and more in sync across multiple devices; the service is integrated into iOS apps and comes with a web counterpart available at iCloud.com.

Other features of iOS 5 include Mail and Safari improvements, a new camera button in the Lock Screen, AirPlay Mirroring to an Apple TV and a systemwide split keyboard to make it easier to type on the iPad.

For a complete overview of the new features of iOS 5, iCloud and editorial pieces on today’s software updates, visit this page on MacStories.

iOS 5 direct download links:

AirPort Utility Now Available for iOS 5

Apple today released AirPort Utility for iOS, an app to configure and manage AirPort devices on a local network. An early beta version of iOS 5 showed that Apple was building support for managing AirPort stations (such as the AirPort Express and AirPort Extreme) right into the operating system; however, as we noted last week the Golden Master release of iOS 5 included a link to download AirPort Utility for iOS from the App Store, which wasn’t available.

AirPort Utility requires iOS 5, which will become available publicly later today. You can install the app by clicking on “Manage This Network” on your iOS device’s WiFi settings for an AirPort station.

The app isn’t showing up in iTunes search yet, but here’s the direct link that should be available shortly: AirPort Utility

AirPort Utility provides a straightforward interface to manage AirPort devices on a local network. The app shows AirPort stations that are connected to the Internet, and on the iPad gestures are supported to zoom out the view and get a better visual of all the available devices. Tapping on the Internet icon will let you see the status of your connection with Router Address, DNS Servers and Domain Names; tapping on an AirPort Device will show a popover menu with the device’s name, IP Address, Serial Number, Software Version, Network and connected Wireless Clients. You can check out the connection status, IP Address and Hardware Address for each connected client.

Tapping the Edit button will enable you to configure various settings of an AirPort device, including File Sharing and Disks for an AirPort Extreme, DHCP and NAT, WAN Setup and Access Control. You can restart a base station from the app and restore it to default settings. You can manage the Internet Connection settings for the device, activate a Guest Network and change the WiFi Mode of an existing network. Overall, it appears the AirPort Utility app for iOS 5 has implemented much of the options available in its Mac counterpart.

More screenshots after the break. Read more

Apple Releases Find My Friends

Apple today released Find My Friends, a new iCloud-based application that allows users to locate their friends on a map, and share their location with them. The Find My Friends app enables you to share your location with selected contacts, and see where they are  and what they’re up to on a convenient map interface. Find My Friends is integrated with Maps and Contacts, so you’ll be able to find routes to a specific place or check on the location of someone that’s already in your Address Book.

One of the key features of Find My Friends is temporary sharing, a functionality that enables users to share their location with a group of people for a limited period of time. Users can share location for a few hours, days, or weeks, and when the time’s up the app will automatically stop sharing. Users can accept and decline friends requests easily from Find My Friends, and Apple has also implemented Parental Controls for parents who’d like to restrict access to location settings.

Find My Friends can be installed by visiting iCloud.com on an iOS device and tapping on the link to install the app. The iCloud.com website was updated last night, allowing access to everyone with an iCloud account, also removing the “Beta” label from the homepage.

iOS 5 is required for the Find My Friends app. iOS 5 is expected to become available later today. If Find my Friends isn’t showing up in iTunes search yet, here’s the direct link that should become available shortly: Find My Friends

More iOS 5 coverage here.

Read more

iPhone 4S Review Roundup

What’s the overall consensus of the iPhone 4S? Photos are noticeably superior to the iPhone 4, Siri works well (though has some limitations), and the phone itself is a whole lot faster thanks the A5 chip. Combine that with the dual antenna (the first of its kind) that’s eliminated previous problem areas for the reviewers, and we have a spectacular upgrade.

Brian X. Chen:

And then there’s the antenna. Now that metal band surrounding the iPhone contains two antennae for your cellular services, and when you’re on a call, the handset will automatically switch to the antenna that’s pulling a stronger signal.

From my experience, talking on an iPhone 4S on AT&T sounds noticeably clearer than it did on past iPhones I’ve owned. In areas with good reception, the handset still hasn’t dropped a call. And no, I haven’t experienced any degraded call performance when holding the phone “the wrong way.”

David Pogue:

Speech recognition. Crazy good, transformative, category-redefining speech recognition.

Apple won’t admit that it’s using a version of Dragon Dictation, the free iPhone app, but there doesn’t seem to be much doubt; it works and behaves identically. (For example, it occasionally seems to process your utterance but then types nothing at all, just as the Dragon app does.) This version is infinitely better, though, because it’s a built-in keyboard button, not a separate app.

M.G. Siegler:

Apps that used to take a longer time to perform a task — applying a filter in Camera+, for example — now work much faster. More generally, every app seems to load quite a bit faster. The best way to see this is to load the Settings app that is built into iOS. On the iPhone 4, it can take up to 3 seconds to load. On the iPhone 4S, it loads in less than a second. And the 4S is faster at switching between apps when multi-tasking.

Jason Snell:

The iPhone 4 antenna issue probably garnered more attention than the true scope of the problem deserved. Lots of cell phones have attenuation issues. In more than a year of heavy iPhone 4 use, I’ve rarely changed how I held the phone in hopes of getting a better cellular signal. It happened, yes, but no more than a half-dozen times. Still, I am happy to report that it seems that Apple has eradicated this problem entirely. If you shied away from the iPhone 4 because of attenuation issues, it’s safe to go back in the water.

Jim Dalrymple:

One thing I particularly noticed was the animations when launching and switching apps. When an app is launched or closed, it is supposed to zoom in or out — this wasn’t always evident in previous versions of the iPhone.

The iPhone 4 would sometimes show animations, but a lot of the time, an app would just appear.

The increased performance of the iPhone 4S is great news for developers. They have been pushing the envelope of Apple’s hardware, releasing more complex, graphics intensive apps that require this power.

Joshua Topolsky:

The iPhone 4S took some of the nicest, cleanest photos I’ve ever seen from a mobile device. If you’ve ever thought about using a phone as a replacement for your point and shoot, feel free to start taking that concept seriously. The 4S produced crisp, balanced, colorful photos that were surprisingly low-noise and never over-saturated.

Vincent Nguyen:

The result is video you might not think has been filmed on a phone. One of the issues users often experience when filming on their handsets is jerkiness in the final clip, with the quest to make a lighter smartphone also creating one which is too easy to move around in video mode. Apple’s digital image stabilization does a great job of smoothing things, though, without leaving things over-processed. Add in the on-device editing – either basic trimming as standard, or using the optional iMovie for iPhone app – and the iPhone 4S proves itself more than worthy of a place in the photographer’s pocket.

Walt Mossberg:

The system understands multiple, colloquial forms of a question. I asked, “Will the weather get worse today?” and Siri answered, “I don’t think the weather is going to get worse” and displayed a weather chart. You can check stock prices, addresses, map directions and much more. It also answers in a friendly fashion, saying things like “Coming right up” or “I’m not sure what you said, Walt.” And it has some cute answers built in. When I asked it “What’s the best phone?” it said, “Wait… there are other phones?”

 

Twitter Updates iOS App with iOS 5 Twitter Integration, New iPad DM Interface

Twitter released an update to its official iOS client today, adding an improved sign up experience, integration with Twitter’s own picture service, and a redesigned Direct Message view on the iPad. As we detailed with our coverage of Tweetbot 1.7 earlier today, iOS 5 is now allowing developers of Twitter-enabled apps to fetch account credentials directly from the iOS Settings app, rather than forcing users to re-authenticate with their accounts every single time. The official Twitter client, as we expected, implemented iOS 5’s single sign-on to allow users to get already-configured accounts from the Settings. The feature is optional and new accounts can still be added manually, but as I wrote with the Tweetbot update, it’s very convenient to be able to add accounts without entering usernames and passwords anymore.

Also new in Twitter 3.5 is direct upload of photos to Twitter’s photo sharing service, available at pic.twitter.com. This can be configured in Twitter’s Preferences both on the iPhone and iPad. What’s new to the iPad is a much improved Direct Messages interface, which has been updated to order DMs chronologically and by thread with a new clean design. Gone is the DM popover from the app’s sidebar, too. iPad owners can now also tap on a location to show tweets nearby.

Twitter 3.5 is available on the App Store now.

Apple Releases iTunes 10.5

Apple today released iTunes 10.5, a new version of its media manager that adds a number of improvements and official support for devices running iOS 5. The next major version of Apple’s iOS is coming out this week on Wednesday, October 12th, and iTunes 10.5 will be required to sync devices that will be upgraded to the new software. For iOS 5 devices, iTunes 10.5 brings WiFi Syncing, a new feature that will allow owners of an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch to sync apps and media wirelessly through iTunes.

iTunes 10.5 was originally seeded to developers in June, when Apple also released the first beta version of iOS 5. Since then, we noted iTunes 10.5 included some minor graphical updates to the interface; this summer Apple also rewrote iTunes’ codebase to take advantage of Lion with full 64-bit support, and this new version of the app includes the changes we originally reported here. iTunes 10.5 also adds support for iCloud, Apple’s new cloud service that allows users to store digital purchases in the cloud, and re-download them at any time on any device. This functionality was previously activated as “beta” and called iTunes in the Cloud; as Apple notes, “iTunes in the Cloud is now part of iCloud”, but that doesn’t change the way songs and apps have been able to be pushed across devices since last June. iCloud will also be officially launched on October 12th alongside iOS 5.

As we detailed in June with the release of “iTunes in the Cloud” as beta for iOS 4.3 and iTunes 10.3, iCloud support in iTunes allows users to re-download all previously purchased songs, TV shows, apps and books at no additional charge. In the new Purchased section of iTunes, users will find a link to browse previous downloads and re-download them at any time. Another option to automatically fetch all new downloads from any device and save them on a Mac or PC – called Automatic Downloads – is also enabled with iCloud on iTunes 10.5.

The ‘Purchased’ screen is a really handy feature to easily and quickly find a previous purchase and instantly download it or even download all of your previous purchases with just one click. The feature, which is also included in iOS 5, is part of Apple’s iCloud, which was unveiled at yesterday’s WWDC keynote. The ‘Purchased’ screen also gives you some fairly powerful tools to find the exact purchase you want, either from just searching, only displaying items not downloaded to your iTunes library or just list the purchases alphabetically.

You can download iTunes 10.5 from Apple’s website, or directly on your Mac through Software Update.

Update: Full changelog of iTunes 10.5 below.

What’s new in iTunes 10.5

  • iTunes in the Cloud. iTunes now stores your music and TV purchases in iCloud and makes them available on your devices anywhere, any time, at no additional cost.
  • Automatic Downloads. Purchase music from any device or computer and automatically download a copy to your Mac and iOS devices.
  • Download Previous Purchases. Download your past music, TV, app, and book purchases again, at no additional cost. Previous purchases may be unavailable if they are no longer on the iTunes Store.
  • Sync with your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iOS 5.
  • Wi-Fi Syncing. Automatically sync your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iTunes any time they’re both on the same Wi-Fi network.

Update #2: It appears iTunes Match has been removed from this public version of iTunes 10.5 – iTunes Match is still developer-only and launching at this end of this month.