Apple announces WWDC 14 (June 2-6)

AlanS181824

mad muffin wrote: »

I wonder if it will be €0.89 for us?

I hope so.

Will pick up 20GB for my Mams iPad Air.

Unrelated but I really hope Android gets a cloud backup from Google like this.

AlanS181824

Graham wrote: »

Still €32/yr for 5GB + 20GB even on a Beta iOS 8 device.

Oh you're not serious?!!

Considering Google charges 1.99$ for 100GB, Apple need to get their new pricing out there fast.

Sad Professor

AlanS181824 wrote: »

When will their new Cloud prices come into effect?

Waiting to get 20GB for €$0.99

Autumn.

mad muffin

AlanS181824 wrote: »

I hope so.

Will pick up 20GB for my Mams iPad Air.

Unrelated but I really hope Android gets a cloud backup from Google like this.

I think google use google+

AlanS181824

mad muffin wrote: »

I think google use google+

Yeah they do, for photos and it works great.

They backup WiFi passwords and settings but nothing else.

I wish they'd have a similar system like Apple backing up app data too.

FourFourRED

Zcott

Must say, iCloud Drive is good, especially because it's built in. I don't see myself switching away from Dropbox for file sharing for work but I like the idea of all my documents in one place that isn't what Andy Ihnatko calls 'iCloud jail'.

Edit: the more I think about this the more I think that Apple have diluted their original vision for iCloud which was 'you don't need to know where this stuff is, the app holds it' and and more like Dropbox, which is what users seem to want. And it's the closest you'll get to a file system on iOS.

Frank Lee Midere

Zcott wrote: »

Must say, iCloud Drive is good, especially because it's built in. I don't see myself switching away from Dropbox for file sharing for work but I like the idea of all my documents in one place that isn't what Andy Ihnatko calls 'iCloud jail'.

Edit: the more I think about this the more I think that Apple have diluted their original vision for iCloud which was 'you don't need to know where this stuff is, the app holds it' and and more like Dropbox, which is what users seem to want. And it's the closest you'll get to a file system on iOS.

They've definitely backtracked.

Blazer

loving the new keyboard...similiar to swiftkey which I really missed from android.

FourFourRED

Frank Lee Midere wrote: »

They've definitely backtracked.

It's interesting because Walt Mossberg publicly requested Apple to make iCloud that little bit more like Dropbox in terms of storing more types of stuff and he even said it again to Eddy Cue at ReCode last week. He will be delighted with some of the iOS 8 features.

Zcott

Frank Lee Midere wrote: »

They've definitely backtracked.

Aodhagan wrote: »

It's interesting because Walt Mossberg publicly requested Apple to make iCloud that little bit more like Dropbox in terms of storing more types of stuff and he even said it again to Eddy Cue at ReCode last week. He will be delighted with some of the iOS 8 features.

Tim Cook did say at one point 'I read your emails' so it's good to know that Apple are listening. This release really does remove any great incentive to either jailbreak (quick replies, hooray!) or move to Android (extensibility, third party keyboards, app communication), so it's a huge list of things Apple have really checked off the list.

FourFourRED

Zcott wrote: »

Tim Cook did say at one point 'I read your emails' so it's good to know that Apple are listening. This release really does remove any great incentive to either jailbreak (quick replies, hooray!) or move to Android (extensibility, third party keyboards, app communication), so it's a huge list of things Apple have really checked off the list.

Yeah definitely. It was really positive. I don't care what features come from other platforms or whatever, as long as Apple bake them into the OS with their stamp on it & with a high level of quality.

If I could have the Adblock extension in mobile safari I would be extremely satisfied. Really looking forward to trying swype on iOS too.

Sad Professor

I don’t think Apple backtracked. iCloud still works as it did before. You don’t need to know where the stuff is and apps still have their own separate silos for storing documents in iCloud. The only difference is that in iOS you now have access to other apps silos, allowing you open and edit supported file types in more than one app. Same on the Mac except it now has the added advantage of an iDisk-like filesystem with access to all the silos. Sure you can throw all sorts of crap in there as you would in Dropbox and organise as you wish or not, but the casual iOS user will continue to use iCloud documents as they did before, i.e. via the relevant app.

DubDJ

I think the next few months are going to be really interesting concerning Apple, Apple seem to be offering a lot of the stuff people have asked for over the years, so I'm very hopeful with the hardware side of things too.

With iOS 7 and 8 it seems like a lot of the features people have been looking for and complaining about not being in iOS are finally being added. Redesigned UI, Control centre, quick reply, third party keyboards, extensions, iCloud Keychain, widgets (sort of) as well as a lot of others I can't think of. Apple are finally giving people what they want as well as adding the features we never knew we wanted. I never knew I needed 'Handoff' before yesterday but not I can't live without it

FourFourRED

Apple have now allowed Chrome for iOS to potentially be as fast as Safari, it was handicapped previously.

Zcott

Sad Professor wrote: »

I don’t think Apple backtracked. iCloud still works as it did before. You don’t need to know where the stuff is and apps still have their own separate silos for storing documents in iCloud. The only difference is that in iOS you now have access to other apps silos, allowing you open and edit supported file types in more than one app. Same on the Mac except it now has the added advantage of an iDisk-like filesystem with access to all the silos. Sure you can throw all sorts of crap in there as you would in Dropbox and organise as you wish or not, but the casual iOS user will continue to use iCloud documents as they did before, i.e. via the relevant app.

You're right that it works as before but iCloud was supposed to be the modern version of iDisk, in that it's not actually a disk. For a long time that was the whole idea behind iCloud and embodied Apple's philosophy of 'you don't need to know what's under the bonnet'. I think to regress slightly towards iDisk shows a big change in Apple's thinking because of the success and widespread use of Dropbox, Google Drive, etc. This is what the market wants and I think Apple realise they were too restrictive with iCloud 1.0.

In some ways it's a microcosm of the entire keynote - they're saying yes to things users want instead of either ignoring them or saying no.

Sad Professor

I would dispute that Apple ignore or say no to user requests. For as long as I've been using Apple computers and devices they've almost always eventually given people what they wanted, they simply took their sweet time doing it and did it in what they considered the right way.

Sharing files between different apps was a problem they were going to have to solve. Like multitasking and cut-and-paste, it’s a necessary complexity. But Apple wanted to do it in such a way that didn’t make things confusing to non-techies and without compromising the security and stability of the device and the privacy of the user's data. From a usability perspective, the key thing for Apple is that users are engaging with their documents via their apps rather than via a filesystem. iCloud Drive doesn’t change this.

I don't think Apple were blind to the success of DropBox or the need for similar features. They actually tried to acquire Dropbox but were rebuffed and as a result they had to develop their own cloud service from the ground up. Creating that infrastructure takes time. I don’t think were in a position to be offering Dropbox and Google Drive levels of cloud storage to their millions of users 3 years ago, hence how restricted iCloud has been to date (e.g. Photo Stream).

symbolic

Sad Professor wrote: »

without compromising the security and stability of the device and the privacy of the user's data.

Could you expand on this? Or a link to the details. I would be interested in what this involved. Thanks.

DubDJ

symbolic wrote: »

Could you expand on this? Or a link to the details. I would be interested in what this involved. Thanks.

Check out this article from The Verge and watch the video from the keynote embedded in the article which explains how Apple will keep user data safe with sandboxing.

Zcott

Sad Professor wrote: »

I would dispute that Apple ignore or say no to user requests. For as long as I've been using Apple computers and devices they've almost always eventually given people what they wanted, they simply took their sweet time doing it and did it in what they considered the right way.

Sharing files between different apps was a problem they were going to have to solve. Like multitasking and cut-and-paste, it’s a necessary complexity. But Apple wanted to do it in such a way that didn’t make things confusing to non-techies and without compromising the security and stability of the device and the privacy of the user's data. From a usability perspective, the key thing for Apple is that users are engaging with their documents via their apps rather than via a filesystem. iCloud Drive doesn’t change this.

I don't think Apple were blind to the success of DropBox or the need for similar features. They actually tried to acquire Dropbox but were rebuffed and as a result they had to develop their own cloud service from the ground up. Creating that infrastructure takes time. I don’t think were in a position to be offering Dropbox and Google Drive levels of cloud storage to their millions of users 3 years ago, hence how restricted iCloud has been to date (e.g. Photo Stream).

Yeah, I remember they tried to buy Dropbox a long time ago and it didn't come off, but I don't think that iCloud drive was in their original internal roadmap for iCloud. I do think with the rumoured Preview and Textedit apps for iOS (which didn't appear) they were looking at how to share files between devices but iCloud Drive seems to be their solution to it.

In terms of implementation, does anyone know how it works? Obviously on Mac it's a folder, but on iOS is there an iCloud Drive app, or is it limited to a document picker within an app? I'd love to see the ability to attach a document from my iCloud Drive to an email within an existing email thread instead of sending the document from whatever app created the document.

Gumbo

Aodhagan wrote: »

Apple have now allowed Chrome for iOS to potentially be as fast as Safari, it was handicapped previously.

The main reason I deleted it on my phone and iPad was it kept crashing constantly! Have gone back to safari since ios7 and quite like it now.

Sad Professor

Zcott wrote: »

Yeah, I remember they tried to buy Dropbox a long time ago and it didn't come off, but I don't think that iCloud drive was in their original internal roadmap for iCloud. I do think with the rumoured Preview and Textedit apps for iOS (which didn't appear) they were looking at how to share files between devices but iCloud Drive seems to be their solution to it.

Preview and TextEdit iOS apps wouldn’t have solved the problem of needing to share files between different apps, though. The limitations of app-specific silos affected users who didn’t even own a Mac. I mean, lets say somebody was using iA Writer to write in Markdown and decided to switch to Byword. How do they get their files out of Byword?

Perhaps you are right and Apple were trying to come up with a different way of doing it, but I really think it was mostly down to a lack of infrastructure at the time with Apple fearing Dropbox-like syncing would too much pressure on their servers. Remember the problems with MobileMe and .Mac because Apple certainly do. iCloud isn’t the most reliable either and it remains to be seen how well it will hold up to the extra load.

In terms of implementation, does anyone know how it works? Obviously on Mac it's a folder, but on iOS is there an iCloud Drive app, or is it limited to a document picker within an app?

On iOS it’s only accessible with an app's document picker. There’s no iCloud Drive app.

I'd love to see the ability to attach a document from my iCloud Drive to an email within an existing email thread instead of sending the document from whatever app created the document.

If I’m understanding you correctly, that’s exactly what you’ll be able to do. This is my point about sharing files between apps being a necessary complexity that probably couldn’t have been solved any other way than with iCloud Drive.

Blazer

signed up for the iOS developer program and it's been 2 days now with no activation in sight.
Surprise at Apple's lax support for this...its a simple click and pay and it should be done within mins not days.
Looking on the web it appears this constantly happens especially around iOS beta releases but then again why the long delays...crazy

Graham

Blazer wrote: »

signed up for the iOS developer program and it's been 2 days now with no activation in sight.
Surprise at Apple's lax support for this...its a simple click and pay and it should be done within mins not days.
Looking on the web it appears this constantly happens especially around iOS beta releases but then again why the long delays...crazy

Around the time of iOS Beta releases a grey-market pops up selling device slots in registered developer accounts specifically for gaining access to beta releases. I would guess the delay is a deliberate attempt to reduce the number of developer accounts being setup for this purpose.

Blazer

guessed that alright. I suppose the delay makes sense then.
Had it on my spare iPhone 5 and it worked fine before Apple implemented the activation checks and tempted to try it out on my main device.
Just going to test it out first before making the plunge.

Graham

Unless you are developing, I would wait. Many of the new features are for developers to incorporate into Apps and/or require a Mac running Yosemite Beta.

Hint: I'm glad I didn't install either beta onto primary devices, particularly the iOS beta.

Blazer

I'm a sucker for upgrading...I used to spend more time putting roms on my HTC one than using it so I switched back to ios as I preferred it.

Graham

Blazer wrote: »

I'm a sucker for upgrading...I used to spend more time putting roms on my HTC one than using it so I switched back to ios as I preferred it.

Just be prepared for completely vanishing virtual keyboards, hanging/crashing browsers and much of the new stuff not working yet (OS X to iOS Airdrop or handover).

Blazer

Graham wrote: »

Just be prepared for completely vanishing virtual keyboards, hanging/crashing browsers and much of the new stuff not working yet (OS X to iOS Airdrop or handover).

cheers..that's exactly what I was looking to hear
test phone for the moment then

symbolic

Sad Professor wrote: »

This is my point about sharing files between apps being a necessary complexity that probably couldn’t have been solved any other way than with iCloud Drive.

Why is iCloud Drive needed to share files between apps?