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Posts tagged with "iOS 5"

Rumor: iPhone 3GS Won’t Get iOS 5

With Apple wrapping up its software announcements for the WWDC set to kick off in San Francisco on June 6, a new rumor suggests the two-year old iPhone 3GS won’t get the iOS 5 upgrade when Apple releases the first betas this summer and the final version of the OS likely this Fall. According to Russian analyst and Mobile Review editor Eldar Murtazin, the 2009 iPhone 3GS will stay on iOS 4, thus leaving the iPhone 4 and next-generation device Apple is scheduled to announce later this year as the only iPhone models capable of running iOS 5. Murtazin wrote in a tweet posted earlier today:

Just one comment. Apple iPhone 3Gs wont be upgradable to iOS 5.x. iPhone 4 will.

No additional details are provided by Murtazin in his Twitter timeline, leaving room for much speculation in regards to reliability of the rumor. When Apple released iOS 4 in summer 2010, for example, the company made sure it could run on the iPhone 3G, 3GS and iPhone 4. It was only with the first beta of iOS 4.3 (seeded in January) that Apple dropped support for the iPhone 3G and iPod touch 2nd gen – older devices the software team at Cupertino thought wouldn’t be capable of running the latest versions of iOS anymore. And again, Apple “unofficially” confirmed they were dropping support for the original 2007 iPhone in 2010, when Steve Jobs replied to a customer email and said Apple wouldn’t update the original iPhone in the future. Indeed, the 2007 iPhone can’t run iOS 4.

At this point, it’s unclear whether or not the iPhone 3GS will receive an upgrade to iOS 5, though Apple’s history seems to indicate that an iPhone lifespan varies from two to two years and a half. A report posted by 9to5mac earlier this month claimed that Apple was internally testing iOS 5 on the iPhone 3GS, although the website suggested that it wasn’t “immediately clear” whether the 3GS would eventually get the public version of iOS 5.

The iPhone 3GS was introduced on June 8, 2009, at the WWDC in San Francisco. It was released on June 19 in the United States, Canada and six more European countries, featuring faster performances with 256 MB of RAM, better camera with video capabilities, voice control and digital compass. The device is still available on Apple’s website at a discounted price of $49 for the 8 GB version. The iPhone 3GS runs the latest iOS 4.3.3, though the difference in performances is notable when compared to A4 and A5-enabled devices like the iPhone 4 and iPad 2.

[Thanks, Kevin]

iOS 5 Voice Recognition Interface Conceptualized

With far improved voice recognition expected to make its way into iOS 5, the next questions is how Apple will implement it. Well one person, Jan-Michael Cart, has thought of how it might be possible to implement and put together a well-thought out video demonstrating the concept (after the break).

There are number of aspects to the voice recognition he conceptualizes, starting with the notion that it can be used to navigate the entire user interface and is triggered by holding down the home button – much like how Voice Control currently works. Yet instead of bumping you to a whole new screen like Voice Control does, the status-bar will turn blue and serve as a visual guide as to when to speak and telling you how it interpreted what you said.

That’s a fairly straightforward extension of what iOS currently does, what is more intriguing is Jan-Michaels concept of how any text-field can have voice input. All you would have to do is press and hold the text-field and again the status bar turns blue and you speak. For somewhere like notes or mail (which don’t have a text-field but rather an area for a block of text) you would double tab to open the copy and past bar but which would also now have a microphone icon – pressing it would start voice dictation.

As would be reasonably expected, Jan-Michael also believes that APIs would be offered to developers to use voice-recognition and shows how the Facebook app would be an easy candidate for voice recognition support. Make sure to jump the break to watch the video by Jan-Michael, and if you like it, I would highly recommend checking out his YouTube page which has some other iOS 5 concepts including faster app switching using gestures and how widgets could be implemented.

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Apple Already Running Nuance Tech in New Data Center, WWDC Announcement?

Following last week’s speculation of Apple negotiating a deal with voice-recognition company Nuance for future integration in iOS devices, TechCrunch reports today more details on the rumored collaboration between Apple and Nuance, which should be a major announcement at next month’s WWDC in San Francisco. According to the website, the partnership between the two companies goes as far as to allow Siri – previously purchased by Apple – to be integrated into iOS 5, using Nuance’s voice recognition technology in the backend. Siri, in fact, was based on Nuance’s tech while providing more information of its own, and since the acquisition last year Apple had to make sure Nuance would still license the software (they even hold multiple patents for it) to use in the future version of Siri – likely a native feature in iOS 5.

For this reason, TechCrunch speculates Apple may be already running Nuance’s tech on its servers in North Carolina, through the massive data center that should begin operations this Spring. With deals likely already inked ahead of the WWDC, Apple might want to pass information through their own cloud to make voice recognition faster for all users, scalable, and more secure.

In digging into the information about the relationship between the two companies, we had heard that Apple might actually already be using Nuance technology in their new (but yet to be officially opened) massive data center in North Carolina. Since then, we’ve gotten multiple independent confirmations that this is indeed the case. And yes, this is said to be the keystone of a partnership that Apple is likely to announce with Nuance at WWDC next month.

More specifically, we’re hearing that Apple is running Nuance software — and possibly some of their hardware — in this new data center. Why? A few reasons. First, Apple will be able to process this voice information for iOS users faster. Second, it will prevent this data from going through third-party servers. And third, by running it on their own stack, Apple can build on top of the technology, and improve upon it as they see fit.

Valued at over $6 billion, an acquisition of Nuance was quickly dismissed last week as an expense Apple wasn’t ready to consider, suggesting a partnership would make more sense in order to keep things running (in Siri and the future iOS integration) at a lower cost. The fact that Apple may be running Nuance’s tech on its own backend, however, seems to suggest that Apple has at least negotiated a way to get direct control of the service, which, again, should power the next version of Siri for iOS 5. TechCrunch speculates voice recognition will be one of the WWDC’s big announcements, although it’s unclear whether third-party developers will get immediate access through a series of APIs or not.

The WWDC kicks off on June 6, and Apple has already formally announced that they’ll unveil the future of iOS and OS X at the developer-oriented event. Voice recognition has long been in the rumors as a major new functionality of iOS 5 – alongside a new notification system, maps, and social services – which should be previewed next month and released this Fall at Apple’s usual September media event.

Apple Negotiating With Nuance Over Voice Recognition Technology?

A TechCrunch post from late yesterday suggests that Apple and voice recognition company Nuance have been negotiating a deal for months following Apple’s acquisition of Siri. Siri, which Apple acquired last April, developed an iPhone app that was marketed as a “virtual personal assistant” and would listen to audible questions from a user (such as “where can I find parking around here”), and would respond with an answer.

In a previous report, TechCrunch said that they believed the acquisition of Siri would lead to iOS 5 having “assistance technology [that] is said to be deeply integrated into the OS for all the different services offered.” However, Apple has had to renegotiate deals with all the partners of Siri since it acquired them and apparently the one hold out is Nuance. According to TechCrunch’s sources, the negotiations between Apple could be as big as an acquisition or just a partnership.

Apparently an acquisition is unlikely at this stage, likely for a number of reasons mainly surrounding the cost; Nuance is a public company valued at over $6 billion, furthermore much of that value is because of various licensing deals that would likely be stopped if Apple bought Nuance. The other alternative is that Apple partners Nuance and licenses the voice recognition technology; and at this stage it is the more likely option according to TechCrunch’s sources. The hold up is apparently because of Nuance CEO Paul Ricci being a “really hard bargainer”, going as hard as Steve Jobs would in the negotiations and resulting in a standoff between the two companies.

Apple does have alternatives to dealing with Nuance, it could build its own service but this would be fraught with legal issues (Nuance holds many patents) and would take time (that Apple may not want to spend) or it could go with Google, but given the current smartphone battle this seems unlikely. Consequently it seems unlikely that Apple has any good alternative here, particularly given how well the Nuance voice recognition technology works.

With with WWDC rapidly approaching, and iOS 5 fairly likely to make some kind of appearance, one would presume that Apple would be at this stage rushing to finalise a deal with Nuance, particularly if it is a major cornerstone of the iOS 5 experience. One final point made by MG Siegler in the article is that;

And the truth is that Nuance needs Apple too. Not only are they also threatened by Google, but Nuance technology is simply not very meaningful without apps that utilize it like Siri. And many of those apps are appearing guess where: iOS.

[Via TechCrunch]

Developer Gets First iOS 5 Crash Report, Hints At New Map APIs

FutureTap, developer of popular augmented reality app for iPhone Where To? we covered here, received earlier today a crash report coming from a device running iOS 5. The crash report, also posted online, doesn’t come as a total surprise in the way it confirms Apple is field-testing the new OS internally with App Store applications; however, a selector named MKUserLocationBreadCrumb indicated as the cause of the crash seems to suggest Apple made some changes in the location and map APIs, as widely speculated.

Just received the first iOS 5.0 crash report. MKUserLocationBreadCrumb sounds interesting.

Already fixed the iOS 5 crash. Now the big question: Mention in the update notes?

No further technical details have been provided by the developers, but it appears that changes made in the map APIs for iOS 5 (still referred to as “iPhone OS 5.0” in the report) may cause obvious incompatibilities with current iOS 4-based apps. Apple is expected to officially introduce iOS 5 at the WWDC ‘11 in June; rumors in the past weeks claimed Apple would offer an on-stage demo, as well as first developer betas soon after the main event. Virtual assistant software Siri, bought by Apple last year, is rumored to play a big role in iOS 5, alongside new cloud, social and location-based features. [via 9to5mac]

Rumor: iPhone 5 Won’t Feature “All-New Design”

As reported by AppleInsider, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo with Concord Securities issued a note to investors this morning including details of the next-generation iPhone, allegedly scheduled for a Fall 2011 launch with a possible announcement at Apple’s usual September media event. According to Ming-Chi Kuo, the iPhone 5 won’t feature an all-new design marking a departure from the current iPhone 4 industrial hardware design – rather, it will be a “slight modification” with the addition of the Apple A5 processor, and a Qualcomm baseband for CDMA and GSM models.

His checks with supply chain sources indicated that the next handset from Apple will not feature an all-new-design, but rather only “slight modifications” from the iPhone 4.

Specifically, Kuo has heard that the iPhone 5 will include the faster A5 processor already found in the iPad 2, as well as a higher resolution 8 megapixel rear camera. He has also been told that Apple will switch to a Qualcomm baseband for both GSM and CDMA models, along with an improved antenna design.

The analyst believes “trial production” of the new device will start in August, with massive production for retail distribution in September. Whilst Ming-Chi Kuo has a good track record when it comes to Apple rumors (he pinpointed the rumored white iPhone 4 release in April, and the fact that the iPad 2 would feature a 1024 x 768 display with iPod touch-like cameras), it is worth noting that several reports in the past weeks indicated the iPhone 5 wouldn’t ship until this Fall, or that Apple was considering an updated design with a metal back and a redesign antenna system. Among other rumors, NFC capabilities and a bigger screen to face competition from Android handsets which come with bigger displays than the iPhone’s.

Last, Ming-Chi Kuo claims the biggest selling point of the iPhone 5 will be the new operating system, iOS 5, Apple will unveil in the next months. iOS 5 is set to be previewed at the WWDC in June, and previous speculation suggested it would be a heavily cloud-based OS with new social, location and music features built on top of a “locker” for media Apple will include in a future (quite possibly free) version of MobileMe.

Rumor: Siri “A Big Part” Of iOS 5, Demo At WWDC

Following this morning’s formal announcement from Apple about the WWDC ‘11, a number of reports surfaced indicating this year’s conference will be a software-related event, with the focus on iOS and Mac OS X Lion. Several bloggers and journalists have reported there won’t be a single hardware announcement at the WWDC, meaning a new iPhone – for the first time in years – won’t be announced at the June event.

Such an announcement, of course, lead many to speculate what features of iOS 5 (Lion has already been demoed and released as a preview to developers) will exactly make their way to the WWDC stage. TechCrunch now reports Siri, the startup bought by Apple last year, will play a big role in iOS 5 and a first demo of the integration of the technology will be shown at the WWDC.

Oh, and one more thing. Following our report on iOS 5, we heard a tiny bit more about it.

A year ago, Apple bought Siri, a virtual personal assistant startup that had released a very cool iPhone app. The Siri team and technology are now said to be a big part of iOS 5.

The use of Siri’s artificial intelligence and assistance technology is said to be deeply integrated into the OS for all the different services offered. And the team is now putting the finishing touches on the elements that will be demoed at WWDC, we hear. This tech may also be opened to developers for use in third-party apps — though that information isn’t quite as concrete.

The Siri iPhone app is still available in the App Store for free, and it allows users to “speak” to their iPhones to book restaurants, movie tickets, taxis and much more. Siri is undoubtedly a great piece of technology and this rumor, combined with previous reports of Apple looking to improve speech recognition functionalities and navigation in iOS, certainly backs up the theories of Cupertino engineers building a completely new OS focused on speech, new maps and more “human” interactions.

Another report by TechCrunch yesterday pointed to iOS 5 being released this fall with new location and music services. With an iOS 5 beta (likely) to become available at the WWDC in June and the time needed for developers to update their apps, it makes sense for Apple to wait until their usual September music event to launch the new OS and cloud services. In the meantime, you can check out the old Siri demo video and product description below. Read more

Rumor: Cloud-based iOS 5 Coming this Fall with New Location & Music Services

Following the speculation that Apple might soon seed a GM build of OS X Lion to developers, TechCrunch now reports the long-awaited major revamp of iOS, dubbed iOS 5, has been pushed back to fall, with a possible WWDC preview in June. The rumor is interesting because it breaks Apple’s usual release cycle and media event pattern: in the past years, Apple previewed a new version of iPhone OS (and then iOS) with a media event in March / April, and then released it by the WWDC, or soon after that together with the availability of a new iPhone model. And in the past years, this plan has worked quite well for Apple: developers had time to test the OS in the months leading up to the WWDC, whilst everyone else was getting ready for a new iPhone in June / July. According to TechCrunch, this is about to change.

Citing “two solid sources”, MG Siegler reports this year’s plan involves a preview of the new OS at the WWDC, and a public release “this fall”. Putting the pieces together, as TechCrunch also notes, pushing iOS 5 back to fall would play well with Apple’s usual music event in September. But why would Apple use the music event to do some major iOS-related announcement? TechCrunch speculates it’s all about the cloud: the rumored “music locker” service will be ready this fall, and being a major new feature of iOS 5 Apple might as well wait until September to unveil it. iOS 5 is also rumored to introduce a new UI, a new notification system, direct OS X integration. Read more

New MobileMe Cloud Music Service To Cost $20 Per Year?

According to a report posted last night by The Music Void, Apple is finalizing the details of a new MobileMe “locker” service for music that would allow users to store their songs in the cloud, and stream them to iOS devices anywhere. The website reports Apple has been pushing music labels to accept the terms for an April launch, and apparently Warner has already agreed to Apple’s cloud-based plans for the new MobileMe “locker”. Of course, to guarantee an optimal rollout of the first version of the service, Apple would need to sign Universal and EMI over – two other big players in the music industry. The Music Void speculated Sony may be the most difficult one to convince (perhaps because of the eBook reader rejection?), but in the end the major music labels should accept (once again) Steve Jobs’ plans to move music to the cloud, for everyone.

In the past weeks, several rumors surfaced indicating Apple is about to launch a revamped MobileMe. Many reports, however, claimed the new MobileMe would be free, whilst The Music Void says the locker service would cost around $20 per year. Considering this “locker” cloud service was also mentioned by the WSJ in February, we speculate Apple may be planning on making the sync features of MobileMe free (email, contacts, calendars, bookmarks, etc.) and launching other paid options as well, such as a locker for music, movies, and so forth.

Last week, another rumor claimed the new MobileMe might launch next month for free, and a German website previously reported Apple is organizing a media event to announce iOS 5 and MobileMe in the second week of April. At this point it seems very clear that Apple is working on something new for MobileMe, and we should know more in a few weeks when Apple previews iOS 5. [via 9to5mac]