Apple’s Scott Forstall, VP of iOS Software, took stage to unveil the next major version of the iOS, the iOS 6, along with a new version of iTunes today at WWDC 2012.
This year, Apple was pretty transparent in letting people know what was coming at this year’s WWDC 2012. The company’s banners, that read iOS6, iCloud and Mountain Lion at the Moscone Center and then at the Keynote, Scott Forstall took stage to unveil the next generation of iOS with pride. The Steve Jobs kind VP, also mocked at Android Ice Cream Sandwich, calling it “some diary product OS” while showing the stats of iOS’s adoption rate.
Now, coming to the features that iOS has, we need to accept, this is a very major release for both Apple and the iOS users. The new OS looks like it has been completely re-written and also features a completely new 3D maps application built right into the OS, dumping Google Maps.
“iOS 6 continues the rapid pace of innovation that is helping Apple reinvent the phone and create the iPad category, delivering the best mobile experience available on any device,”
Says Scott Forstall during the keynote and then, he went on to talk about some more features, mainly Siri of iOS6. Siri now has a deeper integration with the OS and it can now help you open an app or do almost everything you wanted to do on your iPhone 4S or new iPad. Yes! Siri is now available for the new iPad too.
The next major feature is the Facebook integration into the OS. Just like the Twitter integration, that came up with iOS5, Facebook now has a deeper integration with the OS. Users will be able to share the apps from the app store, post a status message right from the Notification Center and much more.
Shared Photo Stream was the other feature that came out with iOS6. Users will be able to share their Photos via Photo Stream with other Photo Stream users and also, Apple has built a system that allows the users to like or comment on the photos that are being shared. Moreover, the Photo Stream can now be accessed via web at http://photos.icloud.com/.
And now comes the new Maps app for iOS. The new Maps app for the iOS6 excelled in what we’d ever thought it would be. It now has a 3D renderings of buildings and you can hover over the cities with ease. And with this release, Apple dumps the Google Maps application and now has their own Mapping solutions for the iOS devices. Apple has revamped the entire app, which now sports turn-by-turn GPS navigation, which is powered by TomTom. But the downside is that, the maps does not work across the globe. We are currently testing the iOS6 Maps in India and it fails to give the directions for almost all the queries!
Talking about the compatibility, the iOS 6 is for iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPad 2, new iPad and the fifth generation iPod. Unlike the iOS 5, iOS 6 does not support older iOS devices like iPhone 3GS and iPad first generation.
The iOS 6 is currently available only for the Developers within the iOS Developers Program with Apple, which costs $99. And here’s the official Press Release from Apple after the break.