As many of you know, Apple announced details on iPhone OS 4, which will be available in Summer 2010. There are several new features included in this release. The bigger ones have been dubbed “tent poles” (which makes me laugh…even though it shouldn’t). Here are the major features and my take on them.
Multitasking — This is way overdue. As wonderful as the iPhone UI is, the lack of multitasking is a deal breaker for some users. Apple promises that its implementation of multitasking will be intuitive and natural. Considering how easy-to-use the iPhone OS already is, I’m sure that will be the case.
Folders — This isn’t a big deal for me, since I usually only keep three pages of apps on my phone. However, I know a lot of people with ridiculously cluttered iPhones. For users like them, this is a godsend.
Enhanced Mail — This feature is also overdue and most welcomed. I’m currently juggling three email accounts that I use frequently. There are two other ones that I use every week or so. For business users, being able to sync to multiple exchange accounts is extremely powerful. Come to think of it, I use the Exchange method for syncing my Gmail contacts. Should I get a job at a company that uses Exchange (i.e. most places), it would be excellent to have both.
iBooks — Some people are thrilled with this feature, but not me. I will not read books on my iPhone. If I had an iPad, I probably wouldn’t read them on it either. I love the E-Ink display on my Amazon Kindle. It’s so easy on the eyes and comfortable to view for hours. I don’t understand people that prefer a backlit LCD/LED screen over E-Ink for reading.
Game Center — Achievements for iPhone games? Sure, why not?!? I know a few of you are Xbox 360 Achievement whores. Having those type of rewards implemented in the iPhone games ecosystem would make things more addictive and keep people playing. At the very least, I’m sure it will be a much smoother and more interesting implementation than what Nokia tried to do with the N-Gage platform.
Enterprise Features — RIM is the undisputed king of business smartphones with its BlackBerry line. Along with multiple Exchange account support, these features should have RIM more than a little scared. In the short term, BlackBerry will still dominate enterprise use, but its OS is falling way behind iPhone, Android, and others.
Some of you already started talking about iPhone OS 4 in Coffee Talk, but I’d love to continue the conversation here. What do you think of iPhone OS 4’s features? What tent poles excite you the most (*snicker*)? Are any of the minor features (spell check, enhanced wallpapers, etc.) interesting to you? Do you think not being able to multitask on devices before the iPhone 3GS is the real deal or a cheap way to get people to buy new iPhones/iPods? Chat it up at your earliest convenience (please)!
@ Sandrock
Yeah, P2P is huge, no doubt. But when anybody actually buys music… iTunes is the preferred method by the masses.
Like I said, there just simply is not torrents for alot of music. You won't find a torrent for Larry Collins, Esquarita, Big In Japan, just to name a few. Trust me dude, I'm all over torrents, and I can't find alot of stuff I'm looking for through them. But, iTunes or Amazon will have it. Long story short, P2P will get you all kinds of popular stuff, but for the eccentric people (like myself)… it's not enough.
Should I be ashamed to only have one email account?
No, you should be commended. Ha!
@Sandrock
You should just create another one or two just so you can say you have it, that's less messy than hari kari. haha
@bsukenyan
At least if I went with hari kari, I wouldn't have to worry about getting no sleep tonight.
@iBooks
I don’t see this revolutionizing anything. Even iTunes didn’t revolutionize anything because people are just to cheap to buy things these days. (Per to per did that.) Or maybe record labels/studios are the ones to cheap to understand the importance of free radio, which still hasn’t evolved in this tech age.
@Sandrock
I should just donate one or two of mine. lol
I actually just find it easier to have more emails than less. I have one that receives updates for all social networking. One for more business and professional (resume) stuff. One for all video game and online stuff. One for school. One for all things money related (ebay, amazon, mint.com, chase, discover, etc.). One for general contact and communication.
If I get an email in a certain account, I already pretty much know what it is for and know which accounts to check or wait for mail in.
@shockwave
I can't stand to use numbers. I find that Excel was so much better. Pages and Keynote are pretty solid though.
Let me or us know how the iPad works out for you. You getting 3G or Wifi and a mifi adapter?
@ Sandrock
You are aware that iTunes has been the #1 music retailer in the world since 2008, right? They beat Walmart, dude. Considering all the other online services that have a similar market and still can’t get past Walmart… iTunes must be doing something right.
iBooks… I really don’t know. I don’t think they’ll win over the hardcore literary people the way they won over the hardcore music collectors (when we buy music… let’s face it, you can’t find torrents for a LOT of the stuff I tend to look for but iTunes or Amazon will have it). However, comic books… I can see. I don’t know about you and your hometown, but all the comic stores I went to as a kid are now gone… save for one, but Eides in Pittsburgh is an exceptional place. Eides is an underground culture mecca. It’s 3 floors, bottom floor is comics and rare toys, second floor is rare music including imports and rare music merch, third floor is every movie that exists on DVD and occult books. I can’t tell you how cool that place is.
But anyway, I could see iBooks doing alot for comics… or at least I pray it does.
Typing my first post with my iPad. I've got to admit the keyboard is a deem to work off of. It's way better than my iPhone. I've already downloaded several free books and apps and think I could get used to this. Browsing the web is a dream too.
@smartguy – you're an accounting major, right? I could imagine numbers isn't quite robust enough for you. However, I think microsoft is going to be releasing some form od office for the ipad in the near future.
I only got the wifi version. I think id rather go with Spring or Verizon's mobile hotspot instead of At&t's crappy 3G. I'll put some meow impressions of the ipad on the site as I play around with it more.
I’m really not interested in this software upgrade. Nothing here really strikes me as necessary. I have grown accustomed to not having a multi-tasking smartphone. It really doesn’t bother me. Unified inbox is meh to me as well. I prefer having the 3 accounts on my phone separate. Don’t mix business, pleasure and school altogether.
The next iphone will have to be something really spectacular for me to buy another one. My current 3G model’s receiver is starting to fail and the phone freezes up on me often now. The mention of what the biggest features in OS4 will be almost makes me think Apple is going to sit on the 3GS for this year and not introduce a newer model.
3GS is a great device, but it will have to come down in price for me to justify buying it.
@N8R
They are doing good. No doubt about it, but I know to many people with more than half their music coming through per to per. Raspady (sp?) had a reinvigorating effect on the music industry IMO. iTunes has cashed in on that market.
I’m with smartguy on having inboxes (sp?) separate. If I wanted all my e-mails to be going to one e-mail then i wouldn’t have a need for 2 or 3 accounts. Once a jb is available for the 4.0 OS then i will upgrade it but it’s a not a big need for me to do it.
@shockwave
ahhhh the disadvantage of typing on the ipad shows through. i hate that predictive text!
@ Mailboxes
I think it will be similar to how the Mail app works on a Mac. My Mail App automatically synced my accounts when I first plugged in my iPhone.
In the Mac app, you can view the mailboxes separately, or you can just see them combined together. When I read my mail on my computer, I rend to read the separate boxes. But on my iPhone, that little red circle bugs me. So I usually just scroll through all the emails quickly without reading them because most of them I already read on my Mac and it hadn’t synced yet. So… being able to see all of them in one mailbox will make scrolling through them fast to get rid of the little red circle even faster.
@tokz, ha, spring was probably my fault. The predictive text works a lot better on ipad than iPhone I've found
Personally the 4.0 update has sealed the deal on me getting an iPad. I’m going to limit my laptop use from here on out. I figure once I buy a bluetooth keyboard my iPad will be just as capable as my laptop for basic functions. Plus I can Remote connect to my work and home computer when on the run for more advanced use.
@Folders – I love this idea. all my apps are separated in to types already such as banking, games, and social networking. This is really going to simplify my phone.
@Multitasking – The only thing I think I’d use it for is Pandora, but I think I’ll grow to really like it over time.
@new mailbox – This is key, I have 3 email accounts and love this idea. I also like the idea that you can easily switch back to the old view for separation.
@iBooks – this was a must for me getting the iPad – I love the phone reader apps on the iPhone and now that I can sync my kindle app and iBooks for reading on the road I’m going to get a lot more out of it. I almost never read hard copy books and I don’t see the point in getting a kindle for the same price with 10% of the functionality of iPad
@gamecenter – pretty cool, I like the idea of matchmaking being made simple, but I’m not much of an online gamer. I only play iPhone games occasionally so we’ll see if I really get in to the achievements stuff.
Now I just have to figure out if I want to get Verizon or Sprint’s Mobile Hospot
@shockwave
logging in via VPN will allow you to execute software not sold in their store? I’m not sold on the ipad. A Bluetooth keyboard seems to just complicate the whole thing. I’d rather just use my 13inch MacBook.
I find the iPad too locked down for it to be a serious threat to my laptop.
So if you do the 4.0 update will it automatically merge your mail app? This will kill my organization.
@smartguy – its’ remote desktop so you’re just borrowing the apps on the client. It’s not quite as useful as a lapto but should be able to handle most everything I’m doing. Especially once I have Pages and Numbers.
Personally I think the iPad will be a lot better than my 13 inch macbook. I hate scrolling on the track pad and I think the bluetooth keyboard will be nice because it can just go in my work bag. but it isn’t required, adding to my portability.
Also, the mail app having all inboxes show up at once is an option, one you don’t have to go with if you prefer.
I think the gamecenter thing sounds pretty cool, I don’t know how quickly it could catch on simply because I don’t see people as really being hardcore gamers on their iphone. I see it as just casual achievements, i.e. achievements for completing games and chapters, etc…not collecting 1001 light seeds (just as an example). The achievements probably shouldn’t be too hardcore in my opinion.
The mail thing I guess I don’t understand what the real change will be there. I just have 6 gmail accounts that I use, and any other email that is not a gmail simply gets forwarded to it’s similar gmail. I took my school account and simply created a gmail of the same name so that the only difference is one is a @bsu.edu and the other a @gmail.com. It’s the simplest solution I thought of, and it makes sense to me.
@shockwave
yes spring was one of the many. Now that I think of it, they shouldve added an update of predictive text with os 4.0
This link also showed up in my Alexa toolbar, I thought alot of you guys might be interested:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/09/adobe-go-screw-y…
I hope that something actually gets done more than Adobe just stomping it's feet. Not just by Adobe, but I do think that the way that Apple runs everything over there is a little shady and evil. It's stuff like this that makes me think of them as evil…
http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/03/the-veil-l…
@bsu
HTML5 means Apple can give two shits about Adobe.
@Smartguy
Yeah I know they really can care less about Adobe, and Adobe definitely has no sway over Apple (otherwise I think they would have had flash support a long time ago). I just think that from the things I have heard, similar to what is in that article link I just posted, Apple is doing plenty of things that seem shady and very control freakish. I like my ipod touch (only the second Apple product I have ever owned, the first was a free ipod shuffle) but I don't like hearing about how they pull apps with little explanation, and how they turn down plenty of apps without any explanation, and also how the first rule of the apple dev. program is: don't talk about the apple dev. program. and the second rule of the apple dev. club is: don't talk about the apple dev. program. I like my freedom's pretty well, and while they might not be directly infringing on any freedom's, it certainly sometimes feels like they are infringing on someone's, and in turn depriving the public from some apps and information.
@all
another interesting article.
http://dualshockers.com/2010/04/09/its-on-apple-c…
I happen to think that this is a little off and would gladly play a more hardcore game on a DS rather than an iphone.
@bsukenyan
How many of those 50,000 games are actually games though? Do they count all the bear simulator apps as games?
@Sandrock
I believe that they do count a lot of the simulator apps as games, it partially depends on what category the developer places the app in though- to the best of my knowledge. Apple also counts lite and full versions of the same game towards that 50,000. So any lite version of a game that can upgrade to a full version by purchasing it, that counts as 2 games. And there are a lot of lite games out there, so really I think the number of games they can boast is a lot less than 50,000…but it is hard to say for sure.
I think there is also something to be said about quality of the games. They compare their 50,000 to Nintendo and Sony. But The phantom hourglass on DS is a much better game than a big game like that could hope to be on the iphone. There are bigger games on the iphone that have done really well (Call of Duty: Zombies, GTA Chinatown Wars, etc.) but those games are few and far between compared to the amazing number of mindless, terrible, and lite games that plague the app store.