Apple’s annual developer conference takes off this week, and as always, the opening keynote is the time for the company to showcase its future Operating System updates. There were also a few surprises.
Apple kicked off the conference by talking about iOS, its mobile operating system. As always, after a brief introduction by CEO Tim Cook, the charismatic Craig Federighi, Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, took on the stage to talk about the future of the iPhone.
Your iPhone, More Personal Than Ever
The demo started with the completely redesigned lock screen demo. Users will have the possibility to create multiple lock screens to match their mindsets (work, relaxation…). Each lock screen can prominently display widgets for quick information at a glance. A new notification view called “Live Activities” will allow apps like Uber to update you in a single tile rather than bombarding you with notifications for every update.
Apple Pay and the Wallet app continue to progress in their endeavors to replace your wallet entirely. Apple Pay Later allows people in the US to purchase something in 4 payments over six weeks. You can now track orders straight from the wallet app. Digital car and home keys can be shared easily and securely between people.
On-device machine learning and artificial intelligence have made another giant leap this year with subject detection in photos that allow to easily share the subject of a photo without its background.
The New Ventura
Apple also introduced their yearly update to the Mac: macOS Ventura at their event. It brings a new way to work on only a few apps without being distracted by other windows with “Stage Manager.” Safari also takes back the title of fastest browser. It also delivers a new feature called passkey in their fight to make passwords (and their security issues) disappear. There is a new way to handoff a FaceTime call from an iPhone to a Mac. macOS also gets some of the same features that both iPhone and iPad are getting.
The watch gets new watch faces and more health-related tracking, such as better sleep tracking.
iPad or Laptop?
The iPad is getting many of the same features as the iPhone and some extra ones. The goal is to turn it into a laptop replacement device. There is an entirely new way of multitasking on iPad with Stage Manager, which allows users to resize windows just like on the desktop. It is clear that Apple’s goal is to get more and more consumers to switch to the iPad. The iPad receives more collaboration features such as shared tabs and collaboration sharing via iMessage and FaceTime.
Some features announced apply to all Apple’s platforms. iMessage gets one that some other texting apps have had for years, the ability to edit a message after it has been sent and unsend it. Mail also gets great productivity features such as unsending emails, scheduling emails and follow-up to get a reminder to check back on something later. You can now create an iCloud Shared Photo Library so that your entire family can enjoy a complete collection of memories.
Not Just About Software
Apple also announced some hardware at the event. Two new redesigned MacBook Airs and a 13-inch MacBook Pro with their new M2 chip.
While this keynote is perhaps not as exciting as the ones Apple organized in the past, these new updates will still make these devices more useful to us than they already are.
That’s it for the WWDC highlights. Check out more Apple news here.
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