- Prompts Users to Make iCloud Part of Their Daily Digital Life
- AirPlay ‘Mirrors’ the Entire Screen onto a TV a la Intel’s WiDi
- Faster; Compatible Apps; Same Look & Feel
HP’s WebOS is dead. RIM’s Tablet OS is faltering badly. Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 is only now coming to market. The Intel-backed MeeGo is merging with another Linux-based OS. That leaves Apple’s iOS to fight off the Android hordes.
Apple this week made iOS 5 available. It’s faster and free for any iOS device. Unlike Google, Apple is not fragmenting iOS by forking out into different versions.
Like the iPhone 4S that launched last week, iOS 5 is evolutionary, not revolutionary. There is no change in the user interface. The look and feel is the same. Existing apps will run on iOS 5 and automatically use its new features.
Most significant is that it’s the first iOS to integrate Apple’s iCloud service.
The iCloud service is $24.99 per year.
An iCloud feature called iTunes Match synchronizes tunes on a user’s PC including tracks that were not purchased from the iTunes store. Once someone has stored a track in the iCloud, they will be able to log in on an Apple device and download it — foreshadowing the studios’ UltraViolet, eh? It’s another sign that Apple waits for no one when it comes to implementing a much-needed technology.
Music, TV shows, apps and books that have been purchased from iTunes on any PC or Apple device automatically download to all the person’s other PCs and iOS devices — as long as the content is still on the iTunes store.
New features include:
- iCloud, the name for Apple’s network services, stores and synchronizes Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Notes and Reminders. It can find a person’s iPhone and nearby friends that have iOS 5 devices.
- iTunes is part of the iCloud and automatically stores and updates iOS 5 devices’ music, TV shows, apps, books, photos and documents.
- Photo Stream, part of iCloud, sends photos taken on one iOS 5 device to a person’s other iOS 5 devices.
- Backup allows users to backup files and the state of their iOS 5 device to the iCloud — device settings, app data, home screen and app organization, photos, videos, ringtones, iTunes purchases and messages. Apple said it makes it easy and quick for users to restore a new iPhone or iPad to what was on the one they lost or damaged.
- Double clicking the Home button presents an alternative lock screen that offers instant access to audio playback controls and the camera.
- Apple’s AirPlay lets videos, slideshows and pictures easily and wirelessly be displayed on an AirPlay equipped TV. Apple said games and other apps that support VGA or HDMI output should also support AirPlay.
Apple approaches Intel’s WiDi technology by letting the user wirelessly display a “mirror” of the entire screen of the iOS5 device from an app. The $100 Apple TV is required.
- Twitter is now integrated, not just an app.
- Newsstand lets users subscribe to newspaper or magazine apps, which update new issues automatically and in the background as soon as they are available.
- Notification Center sends incoming notification alerts as a banner message that quietly disappears on its own.
- Users can pull down a listing of recent alerts in the Notification Center such as email messages and app notifications plus stocks listings and a local weather app.
- A listing of alerts can be viewed from the lock screen.
- Mail, Contact, Calendar, Notes and Reminder are iCloud-synced so they are matched with similar Mac OS X apps and Microsoft’s Outlook.
- Reminders include a to-do list, which can be a single or recurring reminder. They can also be set to activate when a person leaves or nears an area — “don’t forget the umbrella.”
- The updated Safari browser is faster and includes the ability to compile a list of articles for later reading and tabbing.
Scott Forstall, Apple’s SVP of iOS software, said, “We’re constantly challenging ourselves to figure out how can we make the user experience even easier, even more intuitive, while at the same time adding more powerful functionality.”
Well done!
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