iPhone OS4 Becomes iOS4 and Apple Will Move 100 Million Devices This Month

At WWDC 2010, Apple brings us iOS4. No, it’s not a completely new Operating System, but they’ve decided to drop the Phone part and make things simpler. According to jobs, this is their “most ambitious release to date.” It sports over 1500 developer APIs and over 100 new user features. The most obvious of these new features being multi-tasking. This has been a huge issue for many potential iPhone users and detractors and Jobs sticks with the same talking points as to why they’ve taken so long to implement it, saying “Some people were saying you weren’t first with multitasking — the same was true with cut/copy/paste. But we took some time to figure out how to do it right.”

During the iPhone 4 presentation, Jobs was unable to pull up a web page. Apparently, there were 570 WiFi base stations in the room and they were messing up the demos. Before he began the iOS4 presentation, he actually said “All you bloggers need to turn off your base stations, put your notebooks down.” Many blogs actually did stop live blogging, but GDGT was hearing none of that.

11:06AM – And yes, we’re still here. Sorry Steve.

11:06AM – People are jeering… “come on guys.” Oooookay. “Are we done? So, number six: iPhone OS4. The most advanced mobile OS in the world.” Big applause.

11:06AM – “I’ve got time…” laughter. “This is a testament to how far we’ve come, isn’t it?”

11:05AM – “If you want to see the demos, there’s no way to do it. Set ‘em on the floor.” This is really awkward.

11:05AM – Wait, Steve is seriously asking everyone to stop liveblogging? They’re serious!

In any case, the show must go on. One of the primary uses for multitasking that I’ve heard was for streaming music while doing other things. This is the first thing we see during the keynote, Pandora streaming music while Jobs checks his mail. That alone is probably worth some applause. A few other iOS4 features to note:

• Folders – easily keep things organized and categorized
• Retina display integration
• Mail – unified inbox & threading
• Enhanced Camera & Photos apps
• Deeper enterprise support – this includes features like better data protection, wireless app distribution, and multiple Exchange accounts

Another interesting point is the addition of Bing as a search option. It’s an HTML5 presentation of Bing done by Microsoft. As Google and Apple move directly into competition, some speculated that we might see Google removed from the iPhone. It looks like simply adding another option was as close as Apple was willing to go. Google still remains the default, though.

Apple will sell the 100 millionth iOS device this month. That includes iPhones, iPod touches, and iPads. A pretty awesome number to think about and Jobs ends by saying, “There is definitely a market for your applications.”

About the Author
Rahsheen has been a certified geek since before it was the thing to do. He started programming and tinkering in the 4th grade. Now, Rahsheen mostly writes on various sites about technology trends in social media and mobile. . He is also a musician, singer, rapper, writer, and producer. @rahsheen - +Rahsheen Porter - coachrah.com
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