Cold, dead hands of Steve Jobs slip from iPhones: The Cult of Ive is upon us

Despite including the biggest changes to an Apple line since the iPhone launch, the fruity giant's iOS 7 is basically a series of odds-and-ends first seen on competitors' devices - and glossed with some Cupertino sparkle to make it shine. It's easy to poke fun at Apple when its designers refer to "a whole new experience of …

[Waspy]

Next up...

...Apple 'invents' wireless charging. Everyone borrows from each other but it is annoying to see the average user proclaiming how 'innovative' Apple stuff is when patently is is not. I have to admit that iOS7 does looks nice, but yeah, that's 'cause it looks like Meego, webOS and Meego

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Next up...

Cue the gnashing of teeth and hate filled atmosphere of the Fandroids.

So the iPhone has less features than the new Samsung, but be honest with yourselves, it's easy to pack a phone with features and technology and a higher pixel count screen, but if the features are useless or don't work properly and your eyes can't tell the difference in pixel density what is the point? It's an exercise in waste.

What do you really need a smart phone for? Strip away everything you don't need, don't want or is useless to use and you are left with an iPhone.

[tomban]

Re: Next up...

> but if the features are useless or don't work properly and your eyes can't tell the difference in pixel density

Like Siri, Maps and 'Retina' display then?

[Anonymous Coward]

Put an iPhone beside a...

Put it beside a top of the range Android phone, and not only it still looks old, but it also looks more like a bad copy. But I guess fanbois will be claiming all the stuff copied from Android was indeed invented by apple... :)

PS: I don't get it with the flat icons, to me they look ugly and incomplete. But I guess fanbois will also laud them now as the greatest design invention by apple...

[g e]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

They look like a phone from 7 years ago. Mostly because they still look like a phone from 7 years ago with different degerees of rounded corners.

IOS version 7 and they still can't display a lower case keyboard, either.

[Chris Thomas Alpha]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

I didnt cotton onto this.......you mean when you're typing in lower case, it shows the keyboard in upper case? how do you know visually which case the characters are going to be typed in? a highlight on the shift key?

sounds confusing....

[graeme leggett]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

@Chris Thomas Alpha

exactly that - the shift key (an upwards pointing arrow) is filled in instead of outlined

[Mostly_Harmless]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

"exactly that - the shift key (an upwards pointing arrow) is filled in instead of outlined"

that is a truly terrible bit of user interface design

[Vince]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

No no, you're using all the other keyboards wrong...

Isn't that how that sort of glaring stupidity is considered?!?

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

Even funnier, when you give your iPhone to someone who's blind to try out, and stick the screen-reader on he hits a letter and it says "capital T". That's not because shift has been pressed and that's what he's going to get but because it's reading the button he hit on the screen, and the keyboard only shows caps. Now that's crap.

Although I believe the RNIB still recommend the iPhone, and I don't think any of the others can muster anything close to the aids that the iPhone has built in.

[Mostly_Harmless]

RNIB

" I believe the RNIB still recommend the iPhone"

It's the Jesus phone. It can make the blind see and the lame walk!

[Lil Pete]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

I always found it perplexing and when given an iPhone to type a message on spent a few seconds pressing the shift key to turn off the caps lock!

[aj87]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

iOS quite clearly needed a refresh, and flat is the current in design, I'm sure gradients will be back but for now it needed to be changed.

Icons are really difficult to get them to look good, but these new ones really don't cut it, especially the new safari one, it does not look like it was designed by a professional. This concept did a whole lot better job of making the icons look both flat and professional, I almost thought it was the real thing when I googled it:

http://media.idownloadblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/iOS-7-concept-Simply-Zesty.jpg

Just compare the app store icon to the real apple one

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

"it does not look like it was designed by a professional.". It's probably one of the ones that Ives has done.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

Not a defence per se, but that is exactly how a typewriter (or keyboard) works, and the idea was to emulate something else, not invent something new.

A reasonable design goal given the state of play half a decade ago when essentially no one had a touch keyboard.

Personally, I think it is an excellent idea to flip the keyboard case, and trivial to implement. I want them to implement it in the keys on the MacAir!

However, Apple decided (and make no mistake, it was a decision) to emulate the keyboard.

[Rukario]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

> A reasonable design goal given the state of play half a decade ago when essentially no one had a touch keyboard.

The Sony Ericsson P800 came out a decade ago (2003), and its on-screen keyboard flipped case, and even keyboard character set depending on language. The outlined shift key to indicate case isn't so good because they're covered by thumbs!

[julianh72]

Re: Put an iPhone beside a...

but that is exactly how a typewriter (or keyboard) works, and the idea was to emulate something else, not invent something new.

But isn't one of the the big point of the iOS7 "refresh" supposed to be that they get rid of so-called "skeuomorphism"?

Why make your on-screen keyboard emulate a dumb physical keyboard when it can actually show you exactly what character it will actually place? Should it use "Alt" codes (like a physical keyboard) for "smilies" and other emoticons as well?

[thesykes]

Re:iPhone keyboard

How does the iPhone keyboard offer extended characters? By that, I mean all those accents, graves etc. used in non-English words? For example, I have Swype, and a long press on the "a" key first gives me the @ character, hold a little longer and 11 options appear... aàáâãäåæ©@ᵃ

Never used one and the keys give no indication of there being any extra functionality.

Just wondering.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Re:iPhone keyboard

Just so. Hold the key a little longer and choose from the list, since long before Swype appeared.

[ThomH]

Re: Re:iPhone keyboard (@thesykes)

At least in iOS 1–6, you just long press the letter and a popup shows the options. Slide your finger to the one you want and release. Options for the long press on a are aàáâäæãåā. The copyright symbol seems to be available only on the emoji keyboard as far as I can see, @ is accessible on the symbols page and I failed to find a superscript but that doesn't mean it isn't in there. I'd have been unlikely to guess that § is paired with & for example.

[Andy Roid McUser]

Apple Invents

"the fruity giant's iOS 7 is basically a series of odds-and-ends first seen on competitors' devices - and glossed with some Cupertino sparkle to make it shine."

We all see Apple for what they are, but they do have great pixie dust. I wonder what they could do with a turd ?

Genuinely interested to see this new interface, maybe they will invent the 'Back Button' ;-)

[g e]

Re: Apple Invents

You could always post one to Cupertino to see...

[Cliff]

Re: Apple Invents

You can't polish a turd...

(But you can roll it in pixie dust)

[Oninoshiko]

Re: Apple Invents

as it turns out, you actually CAN polish a turd. Probably not surprisingly, they went to a Japanese art to figure this out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiJ9fy1qSFI

[Paul E]

8 year old with paint

Icons look to me like someone gave an 8 year old a picture of the iOS6 screen and told them to copy the icons using paint.

[g e]

Re: 8 year old with paint

Maybe Ive's kids designed it then

[Tim Brown 1]

Does it do widgets?

Does it do widgets? This to me is the biggest difference between Android and IOS. Redesigned icons are neither here nor there.

I have an Android phone (HTC Desire S) and an iPad2 . I find Android much more useful for 'at a glance' info since I'm able to configure the home screens to show me stuff I want to know regularly in the form of widgets.

[Eponymous Cowherd]

Re: Does it do widgets?

No it doesn't do widgets. That would require:

• Apple to admit Google got it right
• A major rework of iOS far beyond the iOS7 tweaks

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: Does it do widgets?

I'm not sure I really miss widgets on my phone, since I moved from Android to Windows Phone and finally to iOS. I had the best widgets, then mediocre ones, and now just badges. What I really liked about setting up my Android home screen was the ability to have different sized icons. So the most important icons can really be made to stand out, by having them double or even 4 times bigger. That way, I can select them quickly, even when I'm only half looking. Widgets were just a nice-to-have feature. Obviously others may disagree - and that's why it's good we have several competing OSes.

Just allowing this would do wonders for that nasty confusing grid of icons which is iOS. Would improve having to wade through 6 screens of 20 similar icons each, to find the one you want.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Does it do widgets?

Having widgets showing my upcoming appointments and latest emails all at a glance is indispensible to me. Had it on Windows Mobile back in 2006 on my HTC, then on my Nokia E71, 72 and C7, now on my Samsung Android phone and Tab. I honestly could not imagine iOS would not support widgets and I never noticed on my colleagues and friends iToys that it was missing, I just assumed it was out of view on the next home screen. Wow. that's one of the biggest ever fails I can imagine and further proof that the iHerd convince themselves even more that what they have is by far the best, even when it's not.

[Mark .]

Re: Does it do widgets?

Every time there's a new OS update or phone from them, my usual reaction is "You mean they didn't already have that??"

[majorursa]

Re: Does it do widgets?

Most iPhad users don'teven know what a widget is (let alone a scrollable widget). For me smartphone or tablet would be useless without them, I get nearly all my daily info without ever 'opening' an app, all info is on the desktops, updated all of the time. Of course iPhad's do not even have that, a desktop.

[PJI]

Re: Does it do widgets?

"... having to wade through 6 screens of 20 similar icons each,...".

I feel that there must be a better way than icons or widgets. I imagine live icons, i.e. widgets, use a lot more power and I value battery life, as they imply that the application is running.

Anyway, you can organise the icons into folders. So you can cut it down to one screen of folders if you find navigating between screens tiresome.

[thesykes]

Re: Does it do widgets?

You imagine wrong. On average, by far the biggest battery killer appears to be the screen, widgets make no discernible difference to my battery life.

Suppose it depends on the widget, but, on my phone I have a switch widget, which uses no power unless I click on one of the switches. A calendar, which shows static data (sync turned off). A 3G usage and data usage widget, which only update when needed. Add in a music player which again does nothing most of the time and quick access widget to various media apps.

If however you decide yo have live Facebook & Twitter feeds constantly churning away on your home screen, your battery will no doubt curl up and die pretty quickly. And it'd serve you right too.

[Jes.e]

Re: Does it do widgets?

Can you nest the folders?

Android doesn't do that but I'm running Lightning Launcher over here on my Nexus.

Brilliant!

Ps. I can also have widgets within folders!

[Observer1959]

Re: Does it do widgets?

I've been using widgets on my Macs for years. Hit the F12 key and the screen changes to show all my widgets. I too use to use them a lot more but now only have a few.

On my iPhone 5 I've set up folders as categories and organize all my apps into these on the home page. I keep games on page 2 and that's it. I love using folders and give them names in all caps for easy reading. I hated flipping through numerous pages of apps.

[Chris Thomas Alpha]

apple copied palm and then android for it's multitasking

in ICS and Jelly Bean, when you open the application switcher, they appear like cards, contain actual window contents and you can flick them to the side or upwards depending on the orientation of the device to indicate to close or dismiss an application.

palm had the first implementation of this, but android followed suit and then apple?

sure, wow....innovation right? just like the apple notification area isnt a more basic version of the android notification area, what are they going to copy next? widgets in the main screens? or is that still off the table cause it wastes battery? odd, since my htc one x goes a day without charging and has main screens full of apps.....

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact that iPhone is continuing to lose market share says iPhone owners are nothing more than Fad Whores!

[Anonymous Coward]

So if they all go out and buy Android phones does that make Android owners "Fad Whores"?

[ThomH]

Umm, except that iPhone sales are up 40% year-on-year. It has decreasing marketshare in a rapidly growing market, not really allowing us to conclude anything much about the individuals.

[Anonymous Coward]

"By repainting the exterior and adding some new features, Apple has taken the wind from its rivals and made the iPhone desirable again, or at least that's the hope."

W O W, desperate!

[`TSeng]

Jesus christ you people can't half whine, don't like it - don't buy one?

Problem solved

[Chris Thomas Alpha]

well, it's not that, yes, to avoid this "innovation" we can just not buy one, but it's that this is practically forced down our throats through the tech media that we just get all rowdy and pi**ed about it and if they didnt patently lie about their innovations they clearly stole from somebody else and proclaimed it's the next best thing, nobody would care, but they are all the time crying on and on about how innovative they are that people feel the need to spend energy rubbishing their claims and making fanbois cry about it

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't think you make "fanbois" cry, they just wonder why you get so worked up about a phone you don't own.

[Mark .]

But then I wonder why people get so worked up in the first place - e.g., the media giving loads of hype even before the product is released, or strangers in the pub interrupting a private conversation about Android to evangalise about their iphones (yes, this has happened to me).

This at least is a forum to discuss technological products. If you're going to play the "why care, it's only a phone" card, then that point should be put to the people and media who are talking loudest about one particular platform/company, all over the place.

[PJI]

trying to find

your similar comments after the recent Samsung and Microsoft presentations or about the mountains of HTC and other advertisements assaulting me daily.

[Tom 38]

You're so perturbed by all this Apple talk that you came on to the register, read a story on it, read the comments, and then replied to someone about it. Frothy.

[AceRimmer]

You ain't seen nothing yet

Have a look at the comments on the windows 8 articles!

Nuclear bomb as a flame seemed too under stated

[Anonymous Coward]

Problem solved?

Not really. We are all indulging in a bit of "schadenfreude" as Apple fades away after having years of arrogant to$$ers$ showing off their shiny toys, believing that they were superior to the rest of us for choosing apple and believing they were richer by being able to afford one, etc, etc. One can ignire it for a while, but they would not stop. In the meantime android, windows and even Nokia's various platforms and devices are better than iOs ones by a fair margin, yet the fanbois still delude themselves, but even more so. It's funny and yes there is a slightly sadistic streak in us, i.e, schadenfreude, watching them sink.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Problem solved?

Dear dear! I suppose Apple's sin was to make the first such mobile that actually became popular, made a profit and created the market for the others.

Tell you what: I believe there are still plenty of excellent, simple, low cost mobile telephones available, both new and second hand, actually out-selling the "smart phones", world wide. Just go and get one. Ignore the latest stuff if you do not need it.

Or shut up and be grateful that Apple had the design ability to make something we all wanted.

[Mark .]

Re: Problem solved?

"first such mobile that actually became popular, made a profit and created the market for the others."

Not even remotely true. Go look up the list of phones by sales (I think there's one on Wikipedia). The original iphone sold a few million, which is way down the list (and it's only with more recent models that Apple have gradually been going up that chart).

The Telegraph had a good list of top 20 selling phones too recently. Totally dominated by Nokia, with phones both before and after 2007. The best selling smartphone is a Nokia, too.

I don't know about profit, but I doubt Samsung and Nokia were making a loss all those years before 2007.

I don't care what phone people use - it's the either incorrect statements of fact and history revisionism that I'm correcting.

"be grateful that Apple had the design ability to make something we all wanted."

I'll be grateful, the day that I see Apple users thank all the other companies for making things that "we all" want, and for inventing and popularising phone and smartphone technology.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Problem solved? @Mark

"I'll be grateful, the day that I see Apple users thank all the other companies for making things that "we all" want, and for inventing and popularising phone and smartphone technology."

I'd be grateful if I didn't have to trawl through your moronic comments here.

[Observer1959]

Re: Problem solved?

Wow dude talk about the head in the sand. Go grab EVERY model of smartphone from the year 2007 and lay them out on a table. Bring in 5 people who have NEVER used a smartphone and ask them to examine all the phones without any input from you. I can guarantee they will be shocked at how game changing the iPhone was.

That's right you don't know about profit, so let me tell you something, that IS the number one reason a company is in business and why Apple became the wealthiest company in the world. It's not about marketshare, it's about profit and all other makers don't come close to what Apple rakes in.

[Philip Lewis]

Re: Problem solved?

"fade away" - rotfl

Some people on this site need their brains re-attached to the stem.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why one?

I don't like it, and I've not bought lots. I'm considering not buying several more this week.

[greensun]

Except it's not that simple.

If Apple succeeds with its closed systems and patent wars, innovators will suffer. I assume many people commenting are ( wannabe ) innovators themselves ( I know I am ), hence the schadenfreude when Apple's evil ways turn to shit amd true innovation triumphs.

[Eponymous Cowherd]

Pub bragging rights?

"Even the parallax view – fluff that shuffles the wallpaper as the phone tilts – is vitally important as it marks the iPhone out from the crowd. It’s the feature that will be shown off in the pub to prove the owner's superiority."

Right up to the point they see someone's Android device running a live wallpaper like the beautiful Ocean HD wallpaper.

Doesn't matter how you dress it up, iOS 7 is still a pig wearing lipstick.

[Argh]

Re: Pub bragging rights?

Or any of the parallax phone tilting live wallpapers. I've been using one for 8 months now.

[Anonymous Coward]

Still in two minds as to whether to allow the update on my iPad2 or not. The actual technical upgrades are an improvement but the redesign is ghastly.

The pastel shades all blur into one mess of colours after a while and is more form over design. Instead of taking the best elements of the Andoid and WP UI its taken the worst elements and looks like its going to be a pain to use.

[Anonymous Coward]

wow innovation or is it recycling?

Nice to see Android running on an iPhone....oh hang on!

Nice to see Aero Glass making it onto an iPhone.

Palette theme matching like Windows 8 / WP8.

They really DO talk it up, it's like foreplay, prepare to be reamed!

The bottom line : an IOS refresh. Sadly for them, it's starting to look like "just another phone". It's eye candy. The paralax is fine, but just a gimmick, it's not useful in any way so, how does that fit in a "pure design ethic"?

Surely, in a "pure design ethic", you leave out the stuff you don't need. They've made iOS prettier - not more useful.

[Darryl]

Re: wow innovation or is it recycling?

Even 'prettier' is debatable.

[Destroy All Monsters]

The age of Accelerating Shiny

"but the iPhone was starting to show its age"

FTW .... man, FTW.

I still haven't got one and it's "showing its age"?

Then again, I used to work on VMS....

[Paul Shirley]

copying Googles mistakes?

I wonder how completely Apple will copy Google. Google kicked of the flat icon craze some years back and have gone way too far with it, creating icons so cryptic I struggle to use some apps.

Without Jobs to rein them in I wonder if Apple will out compete Google in incomprehensible UIs? Be funny to see because no Apple fan will ever admit they can't understand their Apple device ;)

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: copying Googles mistakes?

"Google kicked of the flat icon craze some years back" Did they fuck! Honestly, you fandroids come out with some beauties...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: copying Googles mistakes?

Innovations on the WWW started this whole minimalism and flat look.

[ThomH]

Re: copying Googles mistakes?

I heard they kicked off the flat icon craze at Xerox PARC by having only two colours.

[Anonymous Coward]

Did they fix MAPS and make THAT FLAT?

or are they still driving roads into the sky?

[Eddie Knopfler]

Lowercase keyboard?

@g e... Why does anyone need a keyboard that changes case to reflect the outcome of a key press?

I'm quite happily typing this on a physical keyboard and haven't gotten myself confused once just because the case of the key label hasn't changed inline with my shift/caps lock commands.

Or is that how Android has "innovated" the keyboard? Or wait, did they "invent" it?

[phr0g]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Quite different. I imagine most people rarely use the caps lock on a real keyboard (except Eadon), rather they simply press shift at the same time therefore it is rather difficult to not realise you're typing in uppercase, whereas on a screen keyboard most will indeed press caps lock.

It is very useful to see what is being typed. And more to the point, it's possible so why not? Or at least have a choice.

I have an HTC One X and an iPhone 5. The HTC keyboard is a masterpiece in comparison to one on iOS. And what's more, I can change it to any number of other keyboards.

[QuinnDexter]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Are you sure you have an iPhone 5? And do most people indeed press caps lock a lot on a phone? Have a look at the iPhone keyboard and you will see you cannot hit caps lock, as there isn't one. You have to double-tap the shift key for caps lock.

For personal preference, and having used keyboards for the last twenty-something years (ZX Spectrum +2, with built in Datacorder FTW), I know what letters sit where, on a Qwerty keyboard anyway. My previous physical keyboard had many of the letters rubbed off the keys due to overuse. I don't need to see what is written on the keys, couldnt care which font they are in, or whether they are upper or lower case. As long as I can make out that there is a key clearly destinguisable from those around it and the background I can generally string a sentence together.

[Eddie Knopfler]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Quite different?

I guess that's a perspective thing.

For me, it's not a requirement or something I'd flag up as being a differentiator between devices (e g's point). I rarely look at the keyboard when typing on either a physical or virtual keyboard and for a device the size of a phone fingers or thumbs would obscure the key one wishes to strike anyway - which implies you wish to use other areas of the screen to provide a visual clue as to the outcome of a key press, potentially detrimental to accuracy?.

I don't think iOS users should be forced into having a static label on keys any more than I think Android users should be forced to have a keyboard that changes. As you imply, choice is the key.

Either way, I don't think I'd ever choose a device based on what the OS UI puts on a virtual keyboard to represent the outcome of a key press; Especially not in order to feel better when my new device was placed next to something that offers alternate functionality.

[PJI]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

You can change it to any number of other keyboards? Funny, I do that on my old iPhone too. I use a UK one plus a couple of other European language ones for when I must write in those languages. Just swap with a single key press. Or had you not yet found that? Or am I misunderstanding you? Did you want to use three at a time, all on the same screen?

[graeme leggett]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Parallel vs serial

In typing on a physical keyboard with 2 to 10 fingers, you can just hold the shift key with one finger while you hit keys with the other(s).

On a virtual keyboard using one finger (phone), you toggle the shift - so its more caps lock - with your thumb and then tap the letter key.

With a case changing virtual keyboard - trivial to code if your design ethics don't get in the way? - you have a clear idea of whether caps are on or off.

[James Hughes 1]

Re: Lowercase keyboard?

Unrelated, but I have to remove the caplocks key from keyboards as I am always hitting it by accident and not noticing it ('cos I'm a crap touch typist and getting worse). So it would be useful for me if the keyboard DID change its letter to lower/upper.

[Tachikoma]

I'm pretty sure I downloaded this theme for MIUI on my Galaxy S1 a few years ago...

[Darryl]

http://www.appszoom.com/android_themes/themes/my-little-pony-theme_nygr.html

[RainForestGuppy]

IOS8

I reckon next years IOS 8 update will have a START button

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh Jony, where di it all go wrong?

They are morphing him into Steve Jobs - first the glasses then the polo neck.....

What great innovations did iOS 7 bring - I missed that part?

Flat icons? Transparency? more voices on Siri? task manager? parallax? radio?

Apple resorting to the old Apple technique of taking something from someone else and polishing it up and announcing it as a brand new and innovating thing. By copying Android they are showing what hypocrites they are. Watch how predicted sales figures (which will still be amazing) fall short of "analyst predictions" and the share prices tumble again.

Without Steve Jobs, Apple is being run by the money men - he was the only one that stood up to them.

Still at least they are bring out a watch....... Manzoni would understand what's happening it's Merda d'artista!

[wolfetone]

"... to the iPhone owner there's nothing more important than being shiny."

The writer has it spot on with this statement, and it basically voids any more discussion. The iPhone will be, and forever has been, the Fisher Price "My First Smartphone" to the masses.

But fair play to Apple for peddling the same crap and making people want to buy it, and to pay £300/£400 per time. And fair play to Apple for showing to the World + Dog that there are indeed idiots everywhere, and they all have far too much money than sense.

[Anonymous Coward]

@wolfetone - £300 to 400?

£500 to 700 if you have to pay VAT.

Still, there are plenty of people in the world who will pay VW group extra money for a badge with 4 rings instead of one that says "VW". It's like deer: the ability to waste energy on great big horns impresses the females.

[Joey]

Whatever you say...

...I know what platform I'll be developing for!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Whatever you say...

just be careful you don't produce something that can make Apple money... just ask Instagram, Spotify and Pandora....

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Whatever you say...

Don't forget to bring out your pastel set for the UI on your new designs

[Madboater]

I must have been asleep for some time

Since when was "new Icons" a killer feature? I mean, if I travelled back in time and told my younger self that I had a phone, that was synced with all my contacts, emails, videos, photos files etc, so that when I got into the office all those things were available on my desktop, and when I got home they were all available on a tablet style device, my younger self would be impressed and looked forward to the future. However if I told him in the future, we will have new "flat" icons, I think my younger self would have been so unimpressed that even the fact I could travel back in time wouldn't have recovered his interest in any way.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: I must have been asleep for some time

It's not just icons, the whole GUI appearance has changed and many of the applications rebuilt, expanded etc.

[BorkedAgain]

Re: Re: I must have been asleep for some time

Way to miss the point, Anon...

[mavelous]

Silly article

"Apple is a cult of celebrity, and could have faltered at the death of its charismatic leader and company co-founder Steve Jobs"

Really?

That's quite an opinion.

Doesn't say much for the decades of work by Apple workers who plugged along with the Mac in a world of Windows crap. OS X computers are easily the most effective yet elegant interfaces, and the iPhone has been a wonderful addition to the tech world.

Does that mean that Android is inferior?

Of course not. It is a much more viable rival to ios7 than windows ever was, yet Windows was the superior market seller.

The entire article is full of childish slams regarding a perceived view of Apple.

Congrats on having a job in the pundit world.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Silly article

Doesn't say much for the decades of work by Apple workers who plugged along with the Mac in a world of Windows crap.

That would be NeXT workers actually. The old MacOS was a piece of crap, just as bad as DOS era Windows, and the hardware was pretty lousy (remembers the LC series and shudders). The joke at the time Jobs returned to Apple was not that they were buying NeXT, more that they were paying NeXT to save them.

[ArmyCrow]

Honestly...

So, you've got an iPhone, yeah? Happy with it? Does it do what you want it to do? Great, I'm pleased for you!

So, you've got an Android handset, yeah? Happy with it? Does it do what you want it to do? Great, I'm pleased for you!

So, you've got a Windows handset, yeah? Happy with it? Does it do what you want it to do? Great, I'm pleased for you!

I'm in the latter group. There aren't many of us but the handset is great and does what I want it to do. Does that make me think the first two groups are idiots? No. It makes me think you're different than me. Not worse. Not better. Just different. If you think as a user of a specific handset is an idiot because they chose different than you then just keep that opinion to yourself as it makes you look petty and jealous.

Summing up: I win.

[Mostly_Harmless]

Re: Honestly...

Very nicely and rationally put, and coming from someone in the Windows camp.

Eadon please take note

[ItsNotMe]

Re: Honestly...

Excuse me Sir, or perhaps Madam...but if you continue to come here and post completely rational statements, I am afraid I am going to have to ask The Management to suspend your account.

In the future, please try to restrain yourself, for the good of the community. Thank you.

P.S. However, no love for Blackberry users I see. Hmmm?

[ArmyCrow]

Re: Honestly...

Pfft, Blackberry users - what do they know?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Honestly...Pfft, Blackberry users - what do they know?

We don't know anything. We live in a damp cellar with no windows surrounded by horse manure and piss and periodically someone throws in more horse manure and another bucket of piss. The wonderful advances in technology pass us by. Truly we are the helots of the mobile computing world. Nobody cares what we think, nobody even bothers to target our rubbishy bits of electronic tat with malware, nobody can be bothered to discover our pointless opinions on things and store them in big databases.

We're so backward we think lockscreen notifications,efficient multitasking, gestures, flat icons and layered windows aren't anything new.

[WelshDog]

Re: Honestly...

Very nice. You speak the truth and hopefully it will make a few people think about how they treat and characterize others.

Certainly better than what I usually say:

"Why don't you grow the fuck up!"

No one responds well to that apparently.

[Lost in Cyberspace]

Re: Honestly...

Completely agree.

My iphone is easy to use. Does what it needs to brilliantly. Love the visual voicemail integration, love the apps.

Windows phone also looks simple but lacks the apps I want.

Android is a power users choice, it has some niche apps and I love the customisation. But I don't recommend it to smartphone n00bs. There's a few niggles that can make it a bit fiddly (fragmented Android etc).

You make your choice and you live with it. No need to hate the opposition, accept that there is now healthy smartphone competition and eventually all platforms will both innovate and Borg some of the best features from the others. Who are the winners? All of us smartphone users...

[Michael Tansley]

Re: Honestly...

Nicely put.

I think your words can be applied to many other places such as Windows versus Mac versus Linux distributions, car brands and just about anything else.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite as pointless as I thought.

Damn. I was all set to ignore IO7, and then I looked a little closer at the control center, and realised that, innovative or not (spoiler: its not), its bloody useful, and would save me much frustration. Currently turning wifi and bluetooth on and off on my ipad is really quite involved, and I do it a lot, so this would be really helpful - for me, its actually worth getting the upgrade just for this feature. Its actually a tad slicker than the Android eqivalent, taking 1 less tap to get to the frequently used settings.

Shame the rest of it is so blah, really. More than 8 tabs in safari is nice, but I can't see any single other thing I care about. The changes hinted about the phone app look interesting, perhaps bringing it up to Android levels, but I already jumped ship to Android for my phone anyway.

[Charlie Clark]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

Good points. Of course, Apple is now playing catch up. By autumn the next version of Android will be out, multiuser support, especially on tablets will be the next multi-tasking. Innovation is something Apple used to do quite well.

[Matt_payne666]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

My winPho8 device has a small tile for BT and WiFi right there on the screen to toggle them...

I still have my iphone, its just an ipod with satnav now and It was a godsend when apple moved the BT option to the main page of the settings... it was a pain having to navigate several trees deep to disable it in the past.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

To be fair, I have a widget on Android that puts the bluetooth/wifi/mobile network/gps controls right on the front screen. No need for delving into menus at all.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

So do Meego N9 users.

And jailbroken iPhones have a plethora of options.

[Observer1959]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

The cool thing about the control panel/menu on iOS 7 is that it will change according to what is being used.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

Makes sense.

My (2 year old) Blackberry has a icon for networks, once there I can switch wireless, mobile data, etc on or off with a tap.

On my iPhone 3, it's two taps to get as far as the wireless slider, and 3 to get to the mobile data sliders.

[MrE]

Re: Not quite as pointless as I thought.

With my Android phone I just swipe down from the top and turn WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth, Sound, Powersaving, Mobile Data, and even App synchronisation on/off in a tap or swipe and tap, was available on ICS and my current Jellybean install.

[Indolent Wretch]

Music Player

Any chance the words most desirable phone and music player will now allow me to play a track and queue another one to play next? Without having to download a 3rd party app or create a disposable 1 track play list to piddle with? Or were the flat icons more important?

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks like Vista Aero and Flip 3D!!

It's the Vista Phone!

[ukgnome]

Bloomin 'eck

It's not like Apple murder kittens, the design is OK

the unlock screen looks like jellybean and the icons look like big shiny kids drawings of what computer icons should look like.

It's not gonna set the world on fire, but hey - no drowned kitties

[wondermouse]

iTunes Match - still not supporting large libraries?

I would happily subscribe to iTunes Match - but it doesn't support large libraries, and looks like it STILL won't.

My collection of tracks - mainly ripped from my own CDs - is around 100,000 tracks. iTunes Match just won't support this, which is a real disppointment!

[chr0m4t1c]

Re: iTunes Match - still not supporting large libraries?

The 20,000 track limit applies to unmatched tracks, not everything you've ripped yourself. Anything you rip from a commercial CD that can also be bought in iTunes should match and not count towards the limit.

I have over 800,000 tracks in my library and the limit doesn't cause me any trouble at all.

In fact, IIRC, if someone else has already uploaded a copy of the track then it will also "match" and not count towards your limit. I know I have some stuff that's not available through iTunes, but is still "matched".

[king of cardboard]

One million new app icons please

The flat design language will look great until you swipe off the oh so tastful home screen, when you will b e bombarded with hideous glassy round edged app icons. Swipe to settings and carded apps are 2 of the. best.jailbreak features, i hope they keep up the good work copying jailbreak features a decent filemanager and a break from itunes would be an innovation

[menotu]

Thanks for an HONEST opinion... you of course realize the iSheep will trample your email to death now, re the very true, shiny being important comment.. loved it ...and it's so true..

You have to admit tho, Apple knows it's customers..

You can fool some of the people all of the time

You can fool all of the people some of the time

But you can fool all of the iSheep ALL OF THE TIME

[Cozzer79]

Really?

Funnily enough, most of the features mentioned here are already in iOS6 - and I don't find iOS any older feeling than Android. Personally, I prefer a phone that fits in my pocket when I sit down - but now I can transfer my Angry Birds progress to any device, my next one might not have shiny fruit on the back.

[Observer1959]

Re: Really?

Watch the last half of Monday's keynote posted on Apple's website. You will see how Apple actually implemented these new features and more.

http://www.apple.com/apple-events/june-2013/

[Alex C]

Not an iPhone user but

I find this a very positive move from them - I hope it leads to lots of new innovations rather than just being a facelift. Apple really wowed the world when the iPhone first came out and all the way up to the 3gs or perhaps 4 depending on your outlook.

Jonny Ive has shown his talents time and again and I really hope this sparks a new era for them. Who knows - if it's good enough (and doesn't require sodding iTunes) I and countless iApostates may come back.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hummmmmm!

" Despite including the biggest changes to an Apple line since the iPhone launch, the fruity giant's iOS 7 is basically a series of odds-and-ends first seen on competitors' devices"

Me wonders how many competitor's copyrights that Apple is going to step on and get sue?

[Wiibloke]

Astounded

It never fails to astound me how many people that clearly don't like Apple products read articles about them then continue to bitch and moan about how bad it is or how bad Apple are. I admit, I like Apple products but I don't go trawling through Android forums and articles looking for something to mock.

[Eponymous Cow Turd]

Re: Astounded

True...not just Apple though - plenty of Windows haters out there too

[julianh72]

"Parallax View" wallpaper - an iOS7 innovation?

"Even the parallax view – fluff that shuffles the wallpaper as the phone tilts – is vitally important as it marks the iPhone out from the crowd. It’s the feature that will be shown off in the pub to prove the owner's superiority."

What, you mean like "3D Image Live Wallpaper" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=opotech.image3Dlwp or "PhotoSphere Live Wallpaper" https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=fishnoodle.photospherewp_free&feature=search_result#?t=W251bGwsMSwxLDEsImZpc2hub29kbGUucGhvdG9zcGhlcmV3cF9mcmVlIl0. on Android?

Gee, it didn't take long for Android to rip-off all the latest "innovations" in iOS7, did it?

;-)

[Christopher Rogers]

So...

We have a piece that says Apple are playing catchup and have been out-manouvered by other OSes and all they have really done is add some polish yet "Specifications aside, the interface hasn't aged well."

So the writer's fanboism shines through for shiny shiny??

Its a good jobs for Apple that content is king.

On a side note, the new Mac Pro looks fantastic. That would be a nice machine to own.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: So...

Back in the day, knew the original Mac as the doorstop form factor. Thirty years ... the new Mac Pro looks to me like a hitech trashcan. Great spec. as should be at price and should do well in the style conscious video edit market.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: So...

Great spec? I stopped reading the reviews at "maximum 16GBytes" and when I realised that the box may be that small, but the RAID array has to go outside it. Along with the external USB hub.

Basically Apple have taken the CPU and graphics cards out of the box and put them in a neat little non-expandable cylinder to stick on your desk.