Apple Engineers Working Overtime on iOS 7's 'DeForstallization'

[3282868]

Again hatred for Apple maps? Accuracy aside, I really like the user interface for it.

Ditto. It's a shame the design elements of iOS maps couldn't merge with the data provided by Google. That would have been perfect.

A [slight] example of what can be achieved if companies worked together and still profited well. I'm sure it can be done. Corporate ego's, patents and suits, oh my!

 

[mdelvecchio]

This is called Tim Cook in charge:

- Listen to anal-ysts and follow them instead of leading on your own;
- Stop innovating;
- Turn a natural growth stock into Nestlé/Microsoft;
- issue debt when no debt is needed.

youre quite high. cook isnt listening to the analysts, who are predicting doom & gloom...in fact hes warned wall street NOT to listen to them. instead, he's focusing on turning profit -- huge profit. crazy profit. they are the most profitable PC maker AND in mobile. thats insanely awesome, and few have had this much success. they grew profits 14% last quarter -- not as high as prior but still huge profit and certainly growth. if we should all be so "unfortunate" as that, we'd be out of the economic slow down.

durrr

 

[johnhw]

Am I the only one that thinks that Apple will pull a Leopard on this thing? (Revealing new core tentpole features under Tiger (in this case, iOS6) skin). They don't want to be waiting few months with the UI already revealed and by the time it ships, everyone has copied Apple's new sleek UI. Just sayin.

(Sure, Leopard's UI was shown off already during WWDC and released few months after, but this is the mobile world. Everything can be changed within a span of few months. Unlike the desktop world which has to take at least a year.)

 

[mdelvecchio]

Tim Cook is a pathetic fool.

what other ceo is driving as much massive profit?

profit is the air corporations breathe. not stock price. remember that. profit is prime.

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Not once did I say I could do better, but since Cook has taken over, lots has gone down hill and more users will agree to that than not.

what you just said isnt fact or science.

the facts:

- apple is insanely profitable, and continues to grow each quarter.
- apple is the most profitable mobile manufacturer
- apple is the most profitable PC maker (all the others combined)
- but if youre into this sort of thing, apple's stock price is higher than most of Jobs' tenure

...get grounded in reality. profit is the air corporations breath.

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Like what was suffered? Mac OS X

huh? i enjoy OS X more than ever before. it's also has the fastest upgrade adoption rate OS in history... that is proof that people like it.

After this IOS thing dies they are still going to need to be selling computers.

BAHAHAHAHA!! HAH.... heh. thanks, man. thanks for letting us know even you dont take what youre saying seriously.

also - you do realize Apple is the most profitable PC maker in existence, right? more than the rest combined.

 

[portishead]

You're on a blazing rumour site. None of these things are confirmed. We know nothing.

It's not like Apple said "we're delaying iOS 7." It's not like they've said "OS X 10.9 has been delayed because of iOS 7." We don't even know what either of them will look like. We don't know any new features. We know nothing.

I don't understand some of the commenters sometimes. Do you just love to complain, or is there something I'm missing?

And yes, I'm aware of the history of Leopard being delayed so they could finalise the OS for the 1st gen iPhone; but the context of that is slightly different

It's not a rumor that Apple has focused more on iOS than OS X recently. So I'm not sure what your rant is about. I'm sure they'll get it out on time, but I bet some features get axed because they didn't have time or staff to do some things.

 

[Mr Fusion]

It's obvious that the schism created by his love for skeuomorphism, split the design team at Apple.
It makes him a weak leader, but how does it make him an ***hole?

I was under the impression Jobs was an ****** too to work for....

Steve was indeed. The impression I got of Forstall was he thought, "Gee whiz, Steve's an ***hole, so if I act like one too I can move up in this world."

I could be wrong though, maybe Scott is a nice guy who was just very passionate about his work. But in my experience I've met a lot less of those types of people than the former.

 

[spiderman0616]

I have never understood the people that are "bored" with iOS. I unlock my phone, use what I need, and lock it. I don't really spend any time messing around with the OS itself or thinking about how I wish it looked different. I just use it.

And do any of you understand the backlash Apple would get if there was a drastic change to iOS? If not, look at Exhibit A: Windows 8.

 

[StoneJack]

I have never understood the people that are "bored" with iOS. I unlock my phone, use what I need, and lock it. I don't really spend any time messing around with the OS itself or thinking about how I wish it looked different. I just use it.

And do any of you understand the backlash Apple would get if there was a drastic change to iOS? If not, look at Exhibit A: Windows 8.

Well, its your usage. I've seen people to install craziest wallpapers, strangest apps and jailbreak to put into most bizarre themes. There is a quite a large bunch of people who get satisfaction from such, sometimes extreme, customisation. You can check on jb servers how many themes are there and how crazy they may look. They think its a coolest thing on Earth to have live wallpaper or weird icons and most normal users will never understand it. So there are people who are drooling to see the new flat look, some are those customizers and some just want to see something fresh. As for me, big live weather and clock icons will do it for me, or a possibility to have open (empty) start screen for example, just to enjoy more a nicer wallpaper.

 

[jhmeader]

You say DeForstallization, I say IveIfication.

 

[leontief]

This just looks like a battle between Ives and Forstall. Now that Ives is in power he is doing all he can to deface Forstall's work. What a waste of time and effort. I wish that instead Apple would focus on real useful innovations like making cross platform compatibility between all iOS/OSX/Classic/etc so that all applications could run on all devices. They have the computing power and shouldn't be wasting human resources on the DeForstallization while there is real work to be done. This just points out how Apple is too much of a monopoly. Sad.

This pathetic rant is getting about as tiring as the constant complaints about "that's not the way the Holy One would have done it" Get on with life.

 

[I WAS the one]

Another Steve Jobs would never be in charge at Apple this is why:

1) To be like Steve Jobs you need to be BILLIONAIRE
2) To be like Steve Jobs you need to Co-Found Apple
3) To be like Steve Jobs you need to Give a Damn about other people thoughts
4) To be like Steve Jobs you need to Scare your employees to get what you want
5) To be like Steve Jobs you need to OWN everybody in the building

Nobody has those characteristics. I'm Sorry.

Only a Crazy Billionaire want to get up to work.

 

[calvinline]

Hoping this is about an IOS7 that extends and improves experience rather than simply a replacement visual language.

 

[charlituna]

That's great and all. But the bottom line is none of this matters to the customer. Either Apple puts up and performs or it doesn't. Apple can sort out its management mess on its own, but at the end of the day if features only work in a half-arsed way, if there are plenty of serious bugs/quirks, and if things don't improve then I don't think it's unreasonable to turn a blind eye to these excuses and just say, figure it out or step aside.

But none of those are things that necessitate more staff, just better use of the ones you have. Like Ive allegedly saying no to wasting time on moving shadows that only serve to look nifty

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Stupid thing to fire Apple's most talented engineering manager and then trash skeumophism. Especially, since Apple's greatest manager ever over the history of time, Steve Jobs, is said to have supported it.

That manager released a software that was full of bugs and was a PR nightmare and was a total jackass about it as he apparently was in general

Oh and has it been pointed out, Steve Jobs told Cook etc to do what they feel is right even if it goes against what he would have done. Because it is no longer his company. So if they feel that the time has come for a leaner, meaner iOS has come, Steve approves

I worry that the new software interface will lose the connection that ordinary people have to their iOS devices.

Why not try waiting to see what the software looks like before you bash it for what might happen

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Oh. Was it maps then? Still seems like a dumb idea, but for different reasons.

It was maps, it was for the multitude of major bugs in iOS 6 and for refusing to be a team player

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When the biggest talking point from Apple about iOS7 is how they're going to make it uglier, I start to worry.

If it makes it, in your opinion, uglier but it also makes it leaner, work better etc. I say good.

Remember that one of the biggest PR bits at the moment is how bloated the software on the Surface, Galaxy etc are.

All those cute but function free bits are unnecessary code bloat. Remove them and iOS has the talking point that it takes up even less space, giving users more for their stuff. Unlike those other boys

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I think skeuomorphism if good as long a it serves a purpose. When you flip a page in iBooks, you have the intuitive feel of having flipped a page like when reading a real book, unlike looking at a set of pages side-by-side.

Leather-stitches around the edge, however, is totally redundant. It's only purpose is decoration. I'm sure there are people out there who find it aesthetically pleasing, but this thread (among others) suggests that it's no longer in fashion.

And I think THAT is what Ive is talking about, removing things that are purely decorative.

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It's obvious that the schism created by his love for skeuomorphism, split the design team at Apple.
It makes him a weak leader, but how does it make him an ***hole?

According to reports he refused to take feedback from anyone but Steve, wouldn't show up for meetings with other teams and so on. There are also rumors that he would smack talk other teams in front of his staff and via emails

That sort of thing is what makes him an ass

 

[JohnDoe98]

But none of those are things that necessitate more staff, just better use of the ones you have. Like Ive allegedly saying no to wasting time on moving shadows that only serve to look nifty

I completely agree. We don't know that they are understaffed. For all we know the engineers who moved to the iOS project might have been dedicated to UI so there is no major loss to OS X's progress. But the news was concerning, and for my part, it seems the trend in the last couple of years indicates everything is rushed out. That to me does suggest they need more people since those they have can't actually do "better".

I like the concept of "doing more with less" to optimize efficiency, but that assumes satisfactory progress.

 

[fiveainone]

I agree. I think one of the things that might have attracted Jobs to them is that they make a potentially cold piece of technology feel more friendly to average users and especially to people who wouldn't normally use technology. I think it's been one of the reasons that iPhone adoption has been so high. People know what a notepad looks like, or a calendar. And for better or worse, Forstall and his team created analogs of them on iDevices. It probably made some people feel less threatened by the technology.

I think the trick to making skeuomorphisms work is to have that look integral to the function of the app. For instance, DJay is definitely a replica of a real turntable, but every piece of eye candy in that app is there for a reason and serves a function. However, the leather binding on Calendar is unnecessary. It serves no purpose other than to make it look like fake leather. (And again, for some people maybe that's comforting.)

Really good point. Never actually thought about it that way. But yeah, I'm sure people seeing notepad helps their brain to connect something they know to this new piece of technology they're using for the first time.

 

[alephnull12]

It was maps, it was for the multitude of major bugs in iOS 6 and for refusing to be a team player

Thing is, I don't think maps was necessarily so bad.

The app itself is good.

The mapping database is / was not so good in comparison to google, but unless they go the route of licensing map data from a long time player or outright buying out a long time player (e.g. Garmin), they're not going to start off on day one with a very accurate mapping database no matter what they do.

Yes shipping ****** alpha or beta software is unacceptable at Apple, but shipping alpha or beta database information should not be.

Whether it's search or mapping or whatever, creating a "big data" database on the server side is never going to create a polished product on day one. If you would wait until that happened, the product would never ship.

Look at what Google does. They always start with a beta product, let users tinker with it online, and gradually improve the service until their databases for the service eventually become polished. Some people say this strategy sucks for software, but unquestioningly, it's essential for online services requiring "big data."

Why apologize?

 

[Rogifan]

That manager released a software that was full of bugs and was a PR nightmare and was a total jackass about it as he apparently was in general

Oh and has it been pointed out, Steve Jobs told Cook etc to do what they feel is right even if it goes against what he would have done. Because it is no longer his company. So if they feel that the time has come for a leaner, meaner iOS has come, Steve approves

Apparently the gloss and skeuomorphism is what gives Apple devices their premium feel. At least that's what Mötley Fool says...

According to reports he refused to take feedback from anyone but Steve, wouldn't show up for meetings with other teams and so on. There are also rumors that he would smack talk other teams in front of his staff and via emails

That sort of thing is what makes him an ass

But he was a Jobs protégé and came from NeXT. The rest doesn't matter, right? /s

 

[2IS]

If it makes it, in your opinion, uglier but it also makes it leaner, work better etc. I say good.

Remember that one of the biggest PR bits at the moment is how bloated the software on the Surface, Galaxy etc are.

All those cute but function free bits are unnecessary code bloat. Remove them and iOS has the talking point that it takes up even less space, giving users more for their stuff. Unlike those other boys

One of the talking points for iOS NOW is lack of features/options compared to what Google offer.

Remember also that iOS is already one of the leanest fastest mobile OS' if not the fastest.

So you're saying Apple is talking about taking things out (when they're being begged to do the opposite) to make it leaner/faster (which no one is really complaining about)

Apple needs to talk about what they are going to put IN iOS7, not what they're going to be removing.

I'm not sure you can spin this in a good light. Neutral at best.

 

[damir00]

Ive is going to wreck this, big time.

 

[ct2k7]

Ive is going to wreck this, big time.

Like he wrecked the design of the iPhone, right?

Of course hardware and software design is different, but wreck is going way too far. I am intrigued in the least.

 

[gnasher729]

I was under the impression Jobs was an ****** too to work for....

That's what you hear sometimes. But I can tell you one thing: The best person to work for is one who makes the company make money, so you can stay with that company as long as you like, unless you mess up yourself, and you won't lose your job because the company can't pay you. And on that scale, Steve Jobs was an excellent boss to have.

 

[damir00]

I am intrigued in the least.

So am I, in an impending train wreck kind of way.

 

[durant35]

I have never understood the people that are "bored" with iOS. I unlock my phone, use what I need, and lock it. I don't really spend any time messing around with the OS itself or thinking about how I wish it looked different. I just use it.

And do any of you understand the backlash Apple would get if there was a drastic change to iOS? If not, look at Exhibit A: Windows 8.

Exactly. I like my iPhone because of the way it works with my other Apple products, my car stereo, its camera, quality of the apps...I dont sit there gazing at it and needing the OS to entertain and dazzle me. Im not 13. However, I am all for some tweaks to make things easier to access.

 

[charlituna]

That's what you hear sometimes. But I can tell you one thing: The best person to work for is one who makes the company make money, so you can stay with that company as long as you like, unless you mess up yourself, and you won't lose your job because the company can't pay you. And on that scale, Steve Jobs was an excellent boss to have.

You raise a good point. Jobs got the job done. Yeah he could be a jerk and a tyrant folks say but the job got done.

Forstall on the other hand was apparently a jerk etc like his hero Steve but without the results. In fact if the anecdotes are even close to true his buggy software may have cost the company thousands in replacement phones for borked wifi (not only wouldn't connect but was totally greyed out) and manpower dealing with complaints about how the software caused cell data overages (true not just rumors thanks to the borked wifi).

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But he was a Jobs protégé and came from NeXT. The rest doesn't matter, right? /s

When the Master's dying breath to his senior protege is 'Do not listen to my heart but your own, my student' , being a fellow protege isn't going to protect you from a possibly well earned ass kicking.

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Apple needs to talk about what they are going to put IN iOS7, not what they're going to be removing.
.

And they will, at WWDC.

As for talking about what they are removing, Apple hasn't been saying any of this. It's rumor by analysts and blogs for hits, based on the details of Ive being in charge of UI and his previous comments against use of skeuromorphic elements. For all we on know, iOS 7 will look exactly the same as the first six.

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Ive is going to wreck this, big time.

He'd have to do worse than Forstall's iOS 6 and that bar for quality was rather low. not all the issues have even been fixed yet. Hell iOS 7 might be the 'no new features but we fixed all the crap from iOS 6' release more than anything else.

 

[Vanilla35]

The Real World

This just looks like a battle between Ives and Forstall. Now that Ives is in power he is doing all he can to deface Forstall's work. What a waste of time and effort. I wish that instead Apple would focus on real useful innovations like making cross platform compatibility between all iOS/OSX/Classic/etc so that all applications could run on all devices. They have the computing power and shouldn't be wasting human resources on the DeForstallization while there is real work to be done. This just points out how Apple is too much of a monopoly. Sad.

You guys are looking at it all wrong. In fact, yes, it is basically a form of power switch, and that is obviously the predominant factor in the change of style. However that's how the real world works sometimes. Not everything can just be changed on a whim. It is extremely rarely the case that an individual will come up with the best case scenario for a company (where the most amount of fans are pleased) and it be heard correctly. Likely because not every individual is head of software design! Likewise Ive has been in charge of Apple's hardware design for years. The iPhone 4, 4S (like that really counts), iPads, iPad Mini, were all designed to a very modern, sleek, and stylish design. Imo, the skeuomorphism doesn't all match up with what I think the OS should look like (game center is definitely too much, and maybe calendar too - but I feel like the notes app is fine), however I think some of the shadow effects and animations are fine. However, Ive is now making the Modern designed hardware, match the software. I for one think this will make for some incredible symmetry throughout the device. It's not going to look boring, but it will look different. It's not going to look like Google now...that's a minimalist perspective, not necessarily what all flat designs look like. But like I said, things change like this in the real world, and it's the only way that things can progress. Think of this as a good thing, because it is allowing apple to change. It is not every year that a company with as many customers to cater to like apple has the opportunity to switch out the head of software design and make a change. Appreciate it. If not this, you'd be living with the same staling OS for the next 6 years...oh wait, didn't that already happen? Lol