WWDC Part 1
Apple announced a lot of new things at WWDC some we already knew were going to be announced others we didn’t know. I will keep this post consumer oriented. If you want to know about the new API changes or even the new coding language Apple announced today swift you can go to apples development site or you can go to the iBook store where they have released a book about Swift.
OS X Yosemite:
After the normal numbers and look how grate we are sepal, the first thing they talked about was OS 10.10 Yosemite. The first thing you will notice is the new flatter UI just like iOS 7. The other thing you might notice is the redesigned icons as well. But there is plenty of things you don't see.
Have you ever been lazy like me and had your iPhone charging across the room or even in another room and then you hear it ring, and you just ignore it cause you don't feel like getting up up from your desk to go answer the call. Well I don't know about you but I have. With Yosemite you will never have that problem cause OS X will connect to your phone and show a little notification on your Mac and let you pick up the call on your Mac. They didn't show it off or mention it but it seems like you will be able to pick up the call on an iPad as well.
This hand off will work with other apps as well. If you start working on a Pages document on your iPad when you go to your Mac you will see the Pages icon to the far left of the task bar. When you click it, it will open pages right were you left off on your iPad. This also works the other way too. So you make some more changes on your Mac then maybe you leave and you need to make some more changes on your iPad you will see the pages icon on your lock screen of your iPad and all you have to do is swipe up and the document will open right in pages were you left off on your Mac. A lot of this is to make OS X and iOS aware of each other and what you are doing on these devices and make it easier to get things done.
If you are some one who has a hotspot plain from your wireless carrier you can simply connect to your iPhones hotspot with out touching your phone on your Mac or iPad. Just look for networks and your phones hotspot will just show up.
This one is kind of a enhancement to an old feature. AirDrop was introduced a few versions ago but it only worked with other Macs and they added Airdrop to iOS in iOS 7 but to only worked with iOS devices. Now Airdrop you can use Airdrop on the Mac you can Airdrop files to your iPhone or iPad and vice versa.
iCloud drive will be a new part of the Apple ecosystem. iCloud drive will be a Dropbox type system were you can store files on iCloud that will sync to all your Macs and your iOS devices. It will also let you view documents that you have created on thrived party iOS apps. This will use your iCloud storage but the good news is apple has come out with new pricing plans with 20 GB of iCloud storage starting at .99 per month.
There was a few smaller things I will go over quickly. If you like to use iMessages on your mac and iPad but wish you could reply to the text messages from your non iPhone friends well your wish has been granted. Your iPhone will pus normal text messages to your iPad and your Mac in the Messages app. Apple has flatten the all the built in apps such as Mail, Calendar, and contacts. Notification center on the Mac will also get a change with a Today tab that will support widgets. The Mail app will gets a markup tool so you can add comments and drawings to photos or PDF’s that you are sending.
So much will be changing with OS X Yosemite and it will be coming this fall. But if you are feeling brave or you have an extra iMac or MacBook and you want it sooner sometime this summer Apple will release an open beta of OS X Yosemite. According to Mac rumors it will be limited to the first million people who register. You can register at Apples beta page. This post is longer than I planed on and so I will do a part 2 tomorrow about iOS 8.
Rumor Round Up
Tomorrow is WWDC and everything will change, well maybe not right then and there but we will find out more about the changes that will be coming. We defiantly know Apple will be talking about iOS 8 and OS 10.10. We might even see some other things as well.
iOS 8:
I guess I have to start this off with something we at least know they will be talking about tomorrow iOS 8. I would guess with this update they will have minor changes and tweaks to the mobile OS with a few major features to talk about. One of those features that have been rumored is a split screen feature so you can have two apps up at once. As seen here at macRumors.
One of the other well known rumors would be Health Book. This rumor seems to be like a Passbook type app that would be a one stop shop for all your health needs. They would have some type of hook for people who make things like fitbit to hook in to Health Book and tell you about all the information that it collects about you. It might even be able to work with blood sugar meters and you would be able to keep track of your blood sugar readings if you are diabetic. The idea would be to have any medical device could have a way to connect to your phone and give you accesses to your own medical information. MacRumors has info about this rumor as well.
The last thing I want to talk about as far as iOS 8 rumors is this live tile feature. If you have used Windows 8 or Windows Phone you might know of live tiles. The idea is to be able to see information about an app with out having to open the app. How this might work on iOS is you maybe tap and hold on the Mail app and once it starts shacking and you might get another option to make the icon bigger maybe up to 4 icon sizes bigger. Once you do that it would not only show the little red dot to say how many e-mails you have but it would also cycle through previews of the new e-mails. Once again MacRumors has info about this.
OS 10.10:
OS X we know will be talked about tomorrow at WWDC this will be OS 10.10 right now we think might be called OSX Yosemite. The major change we think will be coming in this version of the OS is a flater design. Just like the change from iOS 6 to iOS 7 we might be seeing design changes coming to OSX that will make it look similare to iOS 7 with its flatter design. I feel this will be a nice change. iMore has more about the rumor.
Hardware:
Normally WWDC is not a place were Apple announces new hardware. But there are rumors that they might talk about either a new iMac, iPhone 6 or iWatch. I really doubt that they will talk about any of these things. Hardware is normally discussed in the fall.
All of theses are rumors and you never know none of this could be announced tomorrow. They key note will be tomorrow at 10 AM PDT and you can watch it at Apples WWDC site.
