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iPhone OS 4.0 Preview Event Scheduled for This Thursday
- Thread starter mcdj
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With all these new iphones and ipads to play with, I wouldn't be surprised if more people switched from OS9 to OSX.
Well at least at WWDC we get to see the new Mac OS X version! Any rumor on what code name Apple is calling it?
i cant even describe the happiness i might go kiss my iphone
It is posts like this that made me walk MacWorld with a bit of mirth.
I hope they make the iPhone's Photos app more like the iPad's. I know the smaller screen makes it an obvious hindrance, but I still think that they can do a lot more with it. The music app became less reliable for me after the 3.0 update, so I hope they also fix that.
And I so hope they have an Expose-like way to handle multitasking. That would be so awesome. Maybe double-tap the home button and have Expose replace the quick iPod/phone thing?
And I so hope they have an Expose-like way to handle multitasking. That would be so awesome. Maybe double-tap the home button and have Expose replace the quick iPod/phone thing?
Very interesting and unexpected.
This is a good surprise, I was budgeted for a new iPhone this year so one with a new OS would be very nice indeed. Frankly unless they can pull a rabbit out of the hat, It is very likely I will need more powerful hardware to run Iphone OS 4.0.
Speaking of which both CLang and LLVM is really firming up and becoming much more useful to developers. So between much better tools and some refactoring there is hope for a faster OS. I suspect we are already seeing some of that refactoring in the iPad.
As to "iPhone OS" isn't that really a bit our fault. If I remember correctly Apple tried to get traction with the term Mobile OS some time ago but everybody defaulted to calling the OS "iPhoneOS". They could try to rename it again I suppose. Frankly I don't care as long as the don't confuse these products with Mac OS products.
As to the OS'es diverging I don't see that happening. The included apps will obviously be different but that is another issue altogether. Some apps just aren't going to work on the iPhone vs the iPad, but the core OS is likely to stay pretty much the same or track very very closely. Apple isn't stupid here they realize that keeping the entry point low for developers is a good thing. Especially after getting them to buy into Cocoa in Objective C in the first place. So I expect the OS and SDK libraries to remain pretty much the same excluding hardware issues.
Multitasking can certainly solve problem for many people, so yeah bring it on. Hopefully good control will be offered to the user.
One big issue for me is a mountable file system that is accessible both from the Mac and from apps on the iphone itself. I use my iPhone more and more for work and the ability to store and access files easily would be fantastic.
Along with multitasking I want a Dashboard like facility for the iPad level machines. The idea here is that all of the Dashboard widgets would get a portion of the CPU time even if the Dashboard is out of site. This to make sure the widgets are up to date even with the main app on screen. Now the big attraction here is that Dashboard effectively provides a scripting environment for the iPad. This isn't Python or Ruby but it isn't that bad for simple apps (widgets) you might want to knock off for yourself. It certainly brings balance to trying to do everything via the SDK - Objective C route. Plus the even bigger hope is that there will be a ipad app for development, lets call it DashPad for now. This would make for a nice on board development environment.
Better USB support all around and while we are at it better Bluetooth support. Especially of interest would be support for USB & Bluetooth serial devices and USB memory devices. The sad reality is that Apple needs more drivers and more communicative devices. Not in the WiFi global sense of communications but in the sense of very local. The iPhone OS devices could be very useful in the industrial world if they supported some of the legacy interfaces via adapters. It is my dream to be able to walk up to a PLC, CNC or other controller and to talk to it via a iPhone or iPad.
Apple needs to supply their own maps app. Something that can cache maps locally and on demand. The app should be flexible enough that specialize maps can be added without much effort. For example naval navigation apps, hiking apps and whatever floats your boat. It isn't that Google maps is bad it is just that one you have to be connected all the time and that they are focused to much on road travel. It seems like I most need maps when there are no phone services around. Like Google the hope is that Apple can offer up this info for a very low cost.
Stability and performance of the OS is a big thing but I don't have a lot of hope based on the direction SL is going. At least with respect to performance SL hasn't impressed me. Stability is hard to judge right now but it seems like we give up one sort of flakiness for another. At least with IPhone OS they don't have to maintain millions of lines of legacy code, so maybe it will be a better solid update.
Dave
This is a good surprise, I was budgeted for a new iPhone this year so one with a new OS would be very nice indeed. Frankly unless they can pull a rabbit out of the hat, It is very likely I will need more powerful hardware to run Iphone OS 4.0.
Speaking of which both CLang and LLVM is really firming up and becoming much more useful to developers. So between much better tools and some refactoring there is hope for a faster OS. I suspect we are already seeing some of that refactoring in the iPad.
As to "iPhone OS" isn't that really a bit our fault. If I remember correctly Apple tried to get traction with the term Mobile OS some time ago but everybody defaulted to calling the OS "iPhoneOS". They could try to rename it again I suppose. Frankly I don't care as long as the don't confuse these products with Mac OS products.
As to the OS'es diverging I don't see that happening. The included apps will obviously be different but that is another issue altogether. Some apps just aren't going to work on the iPhone vs the iPad, but the core OS is likely to stay pretty much the same or track very very closely. Apple isn't stupid here they realize that keeping the entry point low for developers is a good thing. Especially after getting them to buy into Cocoa in Objective C in the first place. So I expect the OS and SDK libraries to remain pretty much the same excluding hardware issues.
Multitasking can certainly solve problem for many people, so yeah bring it on. Hopefully good control will be offered to the user.
One big issue for me is a mountable file system that is accessible both from the Mac and from apps on the iphone itself. I use my iPhone more and more for work and the ability to store and access files easily would be fantastic.
Along with multitasking I want a Dashboard like facility for the iPad level machines. The idea here is that all of the Dashboard widgets would get a portion of the CPU time even if the Dashboard is out of site. This to make sure the widgets are up to date even with the main app on screen. Now the big attraction here is that Dashboard effectively provides a scripting environment for the iPad. This isn't Python or Ruby but it isn't that bad for simple apps (widgets) you might want to knock off for yourself. It certainly brings balance to trying to do everything via the SDK - Objective C route. Plus the even bigger hope is that there will be a ipad app for development, lets call it DashPad for now. This would make for a nice on board development environment.
Better USB support all around and while we are at it better Bluetooth support. Especially of interest would be support for USB & Bluetooth serial devices and USB memory devices. The sad reality is that Apple needs more drivers and more communicative devices. Not in the WiFi global sense of communications but in the sense of very local. The iPhone OS devices could be very useful in the industrial world if they supported some of the legacy interfaces via adapters. It is my dream to be able to walk up to a PLC, CNC or other controller and to talk to it via a iPhone or iPad.
Apple needs to supply their own maps app. Something that can cache maps locally and on demand. The app should be flexible enough that specialize maps can be added without much effort. For example naval navigation apps, hiking apps and whatever floats your boat. It isn't that Google maps is bad it is just that one you have to be connected all the time and that they are focused to much on road travel. It seems like I most need maps when there are no phone services around. Like Google the hope is that Apple can offer up this info for a very low cost.
Stability and performance of the OS is a big thing but I don't have a lot of hope based on the direction SL is going. At least with respect to performance SL hasn't impressed me. Stability is hard to judge right now but it seems like we give up one sort of flakiness for another. At least with IPhone OS they don't have to maintain millions of lines of legacy code, so maybe it will be a better solid update.
Dave
well its not unheard of. you can still buy a mytouch 3G from t-mobile which is still on android 1.6. the hd2 was just launched as well, which is essentially stuck on 6.5 for life. at some point you have to force people to upgrade. i just dont see 4.0 bringing a feature like multitasking and still offering support for the 3G with its slower processor and 128mb of RAM.
the other idea i guess would be to release a stripped down 4.0 for the 3G that would not include multitasking. i know they did this for MMS on the 2G, but multitasking is probably going to be much more of a core OS feature than MMS.
Even if they don't allow multitasking for every app. I hope to see some sort of freezing drying. Where when I come back to the app its in the same state the last time. I hate exiting an app, going to another app, and then coming back to the app and having to start from the beginning.
How can multitasking work with a lousy 256mb of ram in both the 3GS and even the ipad. Multitasking relies heavily on ram. It would be a disaster in my opinion. Maybe in some new hardware versions, but in the current crop we will be back to iphone 1.0 slowness.
Speaking of which.
The worst thing that happens with iPhone / Itunes and photo syncing is the shrinking of your pics to "save space on the iPhone". This sucks royally because it limits your ability to zoom in and scroll around on pics that have detail you want to see. IF I want any pics compressed and other wise shrunk in size I would do it myself. Shrinking may very well be the best case in many instances but sometimes you really want to see all the info in the pic. Granted one issue here is the total lack of RAM in these devices but really who's fault is that?
As to the Expose approach I think something like that is coming. It likely won't be unlimited but rather would allow for a small number of multitasking apps. This would be OK, I don't need millions of apps running in background, at best one or two right now.
dave
The worst thing that happens with iPhone / Itunes and photo syncing is the shrinking of your pics to "save space on the iPhone". This sucks royally because it limits your ability to zoom in and scroll around on pics that have detail you want to see. IF I want any pics compressed and other wise shrunk in size I would do it myself. Shrinking may very well be the best case in many instances but sometimes you really want to see all the info in the pic. Granted one issue here is the total lack of RAM in these devices but really who's fault is that?
As to the Expose approach I think something like that is coming. It likely won't be unlimited but rather would allow for a small number of multitasking apps. This would be OK, I don't need millions of apps running in background, at best one or two right now.
dave
I expect multi-tasking to be activated from a gesture like on the MacBook Pro trackpad, like three or four fingers down to see all of the apps
it's rumored that double clicking the home button will bring u a expose like layout so u can choose which program u want to bring to the front.
Agree on both counts. Though as for the second part, since the phone app (or at least some part of it) runs all the time, it would be even better if answering the phone didn't actually send an exit message to the foreground app (just send it a background message instead).
Actually you need to yell at the apps developer.
Apple provides the hooks for the developers to store their apps state already. The problem is many don't even try, which I understand in some instances. So if you have an app that doesn't store state and you think it should send a nice E-Mail off to the developer.
Apple provides the hooks for the developers to store their apps state already. The problem is many don't even try, which I understand in some instances. So if you have an app that doesn't store state and you think it should send a nice E-Mail off to the developer.
Exactly what I had in mind. Although I can see multiple users sharing a touch as well, no reason not to include the option there too.
How can multitasking work with a lousy 256mb of ram in both the 3GS and even the ipad. Multitasking relies heavily on ram. It would be a disaster in my opinion. Maybe in some new hardware versions, but in the current crop we will be back to iphone 1.0 slowness.
iPhone 1.0 was the fastest.
So we will see the Iphone OS 4 on Thursday, followed up by hardware at WWDC in June. Apple has done it that way in years past and I do not see that changing. The only thing that has had me curious is that reference in an earlier front page post about Iphone 3,1 3,2 and 3,3. Unless those signal for different carrier models, I dont know why Apple would have 3 different models. AN Iphone Nano still seems unlikely.
iPhone / iPad/ iPod in industrial applications
I share the same dream. And while they are at it develop similar drivers for the Mac hardware too, so that I can leave that horrible Thinkpad behind, and not having to deal with legacy software that runs on XP. Did I mention I HATE WINDOWS!! It is constantly in the way of me wanting to do things, interrupting me with unneeded balloons and messages etc etc etc.... yuck! there rant over, feel better again
