So Apple have announced iOS6:

http://gizmodo.com/5917359/ios-6-new-features-coming-soon-to-your-iphone-and-ipad
http://lifehacker.com/5917484/the-new-features-coming-to-ios-6
http://www.bgr.com/2012/06/11/ios-6-announced-iphone-ipad-ipod-touch-wwdc/

Some good features in there:
– Full facebook integration (at last).
– new Maps look good.
– FaceTime over 3G (handy).
– Being able to automatically respond to a phonecall with a text message will be very useful when I’m on the bike.

Thoughts?

Some nice new interesting features, photo stream sounds good allowing groups to be made.

i’ll wait for a more stable release and then get one of our dev’s to put it on my phone.

Two thoughts:
1) presentation was a big F U to Google
2) Cheesed off that iPhone 3GS will be ok to upgrade, but not the newer (original) iPad.

No Flash.

What a let-down. Again.

Hasn’t Adobe said that they’re going to kill flash?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/nov/09/adobe-flash-mobile-dead

Nothing in it that’s a big deal to me, and if it makes my 3GS go any slower I’ll be tempted to go personally to Cupertino and stick it somewhere it shouldn’t go.

Hasn’t Adobe said that they’re going to kill flash?

Yep.

Can’t come soon enough for me.

No Flash.

What a let-down. Again.

You haven’t got flash? Didn’t you get the secret update?

Has it caught up with ics yet?

Looks like only the iPhone 4S is getting the turn-by-turn navigation. Grrrrrr…

Oh well, guess I’ll be sticking with Navfree then.

Has it caught up with ics yet?

No, still virus-free and unfragmented 😀

Curious if i’ll be able to preserve my baseband :$

Excelllent I can get rid of Nav Free then.

Does anyone use Sirus?

On a sidenote, some people seem to think jailbreaking is all about piracy, but:

– FaceTime over 3G (handy).

This has been available since FaceTime was released via JB’d tweak.

Also, still no quick sms reply, another reason to JB and use Bitesms, as well as no shortcuts to simple switches, such as on/off for wifi/3g etc (sbsettings).

I sometimes use Siri but to be honest I forget about it most of the time.

More important, from an Apple perspective, is should I sell a kidney to get the new MBP Retina Sooper Edition?

Does anyone use Sirus?

no shortcuts to simple switches, such as on/off for wifi/3g etc (sbsettings).

Can’t say I’ve ever found the need for that.

Unless turn by turn uses cached maps, it won’t really replace TomTom – which runs on any old iPhone and copes with lack of network…..

This has been available since FaceTime was released via JB’d tweak.

Or just by using Skype instead. 🙂

no shortcuts to simple switches, such as on/off for wifi/3g etc (sbsettings).

That used to be a reason to jailbreak for me, but since moving to an iPhone 4 and iOS 5 I rarely ever bother turning off Wifi, 3G or Bluetooth anyway. Battery life is much better these days (I find anyway).

Can’t say I’ve ever found the need for that.

How can you miss what you have never known, Drac 8)

That used to be a reason to jailbreak for me, but since moving to an iPhone 4 and iOS 5 I rarely ever bother turning off Wifi, 3G or Bluetooth anyway.

I’ve never ever even thought about turning them off! If I want to conserve the battery for some reason I just put it in flight mode.

Unless turn by turn uses cached maps, it won’t really replace TomTom – which runs on any old iPhone and copes with lack of network…..

Can’t find anything that confirms or denies that. The new maps are vector-based rather than bitmaps, so they’ll certainly take up less space if they do cache them. Plus, since they are Apple’s “own” maps (rather than being licensed from Google) then they *could* do it without licensing issues.

Whether they do or not remains to be seen.

If I want to conserve the battery for some reason I just put it in flight mode.

But then you can’t get calls or texts. Just turning off Bluetooth, Wifi and 3G reduces the power consumption (a bit) but you can still be contacted.

But then you can’t get calls or texts.

Bonus!!!! 🙂

I don’t get many calls or texts anyway. It’s rare I do it too, usually when camping with no access to power to charge so it just turns my phone into a big watch if you like.

I get a HUGE amount more over the net (email etc) than I do over the phone. 🙂

More important, from an Apple perspective, is should I sell a kidney to get the new MBP Retina Sooper Edition?

This is what I want to know. I was set on getting a 13″ pro, but the new MBP 15″ is lighter and thinner, and with the educational discount it almost looks reasonable. The only issue is the small SSD. 250GB is no where near enough for all my music and HD video 🙁

Its all a bit MEH TBH. Can’t help thinking this is the start of a slow decline following Jobs’ passing 🙁

Can’t help thinking this is the start of a slow decline following Jobs’ passing

Heh.

No Flash.

What a let-down. Again.

Show me any mobile device that has run Flash properly. As far as I’ve been able to determine, Flash has never run properly on a mobile, Adobe have failed to get it to work with any degree of consistency. The only real irritation is that some badly designed sites insist on requiring Flash just for buttons, like the Glastonbury Festival ticket site, where in order to attach a photo and register for tickets, you need Flash installed! WTF! What incompetent idiot thinks that’s a good idea? And Flickr seems to require Flash just for the buttons to select photos to upload, so I can’t upload directly from my phone or iPad. Again, WTF! That’s just crap, lazy web design.
If a website requires Flash in order for me to see content, then they’ve failed massively to understand that millions of people now use touch screens almost exclusively, and every one of those people is a lost prospective customer.
Dammit, even Adobe have belatedly realised that software designed to be used with a mouse and cursor is utterly doomed with modern touch screens; how the hell do you do a ‘mouse hover’ with your fingertip?
And geoffj, just what on earth would it have taken to impress you? Explain, in detail, please, to the class; enquiring minds want to know.

And geoffj, just what on earth would it have taken to impress you? Explain, in detail, please, to the class; enquiring minds want to know.

These for a start:

And Smart Stay, which uses the front-facing camera to periodically check if it can recognise a pair of eyes looking at it and if not, it turns the screen off to save power.

There’s also Smart Call, which dials a contact’s number for you by raising the phone to your ear from the contact details screen. True, these seem like nothing more than gimmicks, but they are quite cool ones.

..from http://www.t3.com/reviews/samsung-galaxy-s3-review

I can’t upload directly from my phone or iPad.

Ermm! http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/flickr/id328407587?mt=8

And Smart Stay, which uses the front-facing camera to periodically check if it can recognise a pair of eyes looking at it and if not, it turns the screen off to save power.

There’s also Smart Call, which dials a contact’s number for you by raising the phone to your ear from the contact details screen. True, these seem like nothing more than gimmicks, but they are quite cool ones.

The first one would be usefull on a pad, where you might be reading something for a while without interacting with the screen, rarely the case with a phone.

The second one, well most of my contacts have 2 or three numbers, so I don’t see the advantage at all.

Not sure about the new maps.

https://twitter.com/corxo/status/212314131590692864/photo/1

Also, new maps aren’t necessarily “apple” maps – they credit TomTom in the licensing info.

Re: catching up with ICS?

http://developer.android.com/resources/dashboard/platform-versions.html

That’s current android version use. Just over 7% on ICS in 7 months. iOS 5 was 61% in 15 days…not sure what current numbers are off the top of my head.

Show me any mobile device that has run Flash properly.

What do you mean by “properly” exactly? Not that I’m the biggest fan of Flash but I’ve never noticed any issues with it, it Just Works on my phone as far as I can (anecdotally) tell.

That’s current android version use. Just over 7% on ICS in 7 months. iOS 5 was 61% in 15 days…not sure what current numbers are off the top of my head.

If you’ll pardon the pun, that’s kinda apples and oranges.

Apple control their hardware, so backwards compatibility is relatively easy for them compared to the multi-vendor Android arena. They have three closely related handsets to code for, as opposed to countless different Android handsets. Updates for older handsets rely on a) them being up to running it and b) the vendor putting in the effort to continue to develop for that handset. (HTC have now committed to guaranteeing upgrade support for a period of time on newer handsets, incidentally)

From the link there, most Android devices are running Gingerbread. It’s not immediately apparent from the version numbers (as you’ve got tablet-only ones in there) but that’s only one major revision behind the current ICS. That doesn’t really surprise me; ICS has only been released for a subset of phones so far, for reasons as per my previous paragraph.

Not that I’m really sure why it matters, anyway. Android has always had a rolling take-up, it’s the nature of the beast; it was the same story back when I had my first Android phone, only the numbers were smaller.

Someone compared iOS6 with ICS – my point was this is a poor comparison, as most people don’t have ICS, where as most do/will have the latest version of iOS.

Even if you say “consider only new devices” (which ignores the fact most people have phones a couple years), relatively few devices are shipping with ICS.

Of course, there are more models of android phone shipping with ICS than models of iPhone, so I guess I’ll bow out there 😉

Android has always had a rolling take-up,

But it’s never been this slow. Take up of ICS is far slower than adoption of 2.3.x, and it has arguably bigger implications (for app UI and design. There are some HUGE api changes.). ICS actually breaks compatibility with whole classes of apps (e.g. TTS engines, currently no 3rd party ones work on ICS).

Oh, FWIW I’m no iOS fanboy – the phone in my pocket is a WP7 device, and all the ones on my work desk are android (1.6, 2.2, 2.3 and 4, for reference).

Someone compared iOS6 with ICS – my point was this is a poor comparison

Ah right, I missed that bit.

ICS actually breaks compatibility with whole classes of apps (e.g. TTS engines, currently no 3rd party ones work on ICS).

Really?

I can’t be 100% certain offhand, but I’m pretty sure it’s working on mine. I think I’d have noticed if my satnav sounded like Stephen Hawking again.

Take up of ICS is far slower than adoption of 2.3.x, and it has arguably bigger implications

Maybe those two points aren’t wholly unrelated? If it’s a bigger job to port then that’s going to have one fairly obvious consequence.

From an app point of view though, I genuinely can’t think of anything I’ve used that hasn’t worked other than a game I got as part of a Humble Bundle pack (and whether that was ICS-related or not, who knows). I had ICS before it was released officially on my device, and even then I don’t remember any particular compatibility issues. I’ve seen plenty of apps apply updates for “ICS support” but as far as I could tell they were all working fine to start with.

Really?

I can’t be 100% certain offhand, but I’m pretty sure it’s working on mine. I think I’d have noticed if my satnav sounded like Stephen Hawking again.

Yup, really. Depending which satnav you’re using, and which voice you used before you might not come across this. The new built in voice is actually better than the old one too, but they broke the low level stuff TTS libraries depend on.

They’re vital to some work I do, and it’s pissing me off repeatedly telling a nexus S not to upgrade!*

*a bonus point if you know a good way to prevent this whilst maintaining the stock ROM…

Using CoPilot and, uh, Vox or SVox or something. Maybe it has reverted back to Pico and I didn’t notice due to it being improved. Hmm.