Former iOS chief Scott Forstall is back from the dead. In a rare appearance, he appeared an event Tuesday night at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California, where he discussed the birth of the iPhone and his relationship with Steve Jobs.
It’s the first time he's spoken publicly since he was ousted from Apple in October 2012
Forstall also spoke about the concept of skeuomorphic design, claiming he had "never heard of skeuomorphism" when he was working on iOS and that it sounded "unnatural”.
"When I look at design - when I look at good design - it's approachable, friendly, you can use it without a manual. It's fun. We talked a lot about photo-illustrative design. It was infused into the design sense of Apple by Steve Jobs since the original Mac. We used these design philosophies. It doesn't mean we loved it, or loved every single part of it. We know it worked. How do we know it worked? You just have to watch people use it.”
Where things got really interesting is when Scott spoke about the origins of the iPhone. The TRUE origins.
Forstall claimed that before the iPhone was conceived, Jobs had initially wanted a tablet with capacitative touch and multitouch in order to get one over on someone he "hated" who worked at Microsoft.
"It began because Steve hated this guy at Microsoft. That is the actual origin," Forstall said, before adding that it wasn't Bill Gates. After hearing the person boast about Microsoft's tablet and stylus development, said Forstall, "Steve came in on a Monday, there was a set of expletives and then he said, 'Let's show them how it's really done'."
Apple may have left a big clue in iOS 11 that points to huge design changes coming later this year to the iPhone 8.
While doing some testing with the new Do Not Disturb When Driving feature, eagle-eyed Apple observers have spotted a new icon for Siri in iOS 11 that appears to be a perfect replacement for the Home button Apple is supposedly planning to ditch.
The pseudo-Home button, first noticed by AppleInsider, can be found at the bottom of iPhones and iPads. It’s about the same size as the physical Home button, but doesn’t have a Touch ID ring around it.
Ikea has revealed a few new details about its augmented reality collaboration with Apple that lets customers test out virtual pieces of furniture in their homes before they buy them.
The app is scheduled to launch this fall alongside the official release of iOS 11. At launch, the app will boast 500-600 products that customers will be able to try out in their homes. This ultra-precise technology will allow them to be positioned on real backdrops in 3D with millimeter-accurate positioning.
In a recent interview, Michael Valdsgaard, digital transformation manager at Ikea
Ikea will aim to debut new products in the app before they arrive in store. He also said that Apple’s augmented reality platform was of interest to Ikea because of its guaranteed reach. “It will be the largest AR platform in the world overnight,” he said. “That’s super interesting to us.”
As of iOS 11, most iPhones will be switching from JPEG to HEIF.
HEIF is the new photo format that Apple is using to replace JPEG. And it probably will replace JPEGs, because the iPhone is the most popular, most-used camera in the world
HEIF — or High Efficiency Image File Format — is the still-image version of the HVEC — or H.265 — video format. Its main advantage for you and me is that photos saved in HEIF are roughly half the size of JPEGs, and of better quality
HEIF offers other advantages over JPEG. While a JPEG is a single image, HEIF can be a single image or a sequence of images.
Automatic setup
When setting up a new iOS device, there's now an option to hold it near an existing device to automatically copy over settings, preferences, and iCloud Keychain.
To use Automatic Setup in iOS 11, you need two devices running iOS 11To start the process, you aim the camera at the moving sphere on your old device’s screen. Just like Apple Watch.
After choosing your WiFI network, the iPhone user is greeted with the traditional password screen, but on iOS 11 when the iPhone is brought near your iOS 11 device, a card your device notifies you that the iPhone wants to join you network.
You can then tap and send your password to your guest, which recognizes the password, fills out the information, and connect to the Wi-Fi.
After selecting a WiFi network to join, iOS 10 users must enter a password for secured networks, but on iOS 11 and High Sierra, you can bring your close to a device which has access to that WiFi network and that device can transfer all required credentials directly to your connecting device!
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