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iPhone OS 4.0 Brings Multitasking, Ad Framework For Apps
Low Ranked Craig writes "Apple had an event today to show off the next major update to the iPhone OS. iPhone OS 4.0 should arrive this summer (presumably with a new iPhone) for iPhone and iPod Touch, and in the fall for the iPad. According to Apple the update has more than 1,500 new APIs and 100 new features including the sorely missed multitasking. Other highlights include unified inbox, improved security, support for multiple Exchange accounts, application folders, iBooks, and iAd, an advertising framework for developers to put ads in their applications. The official word from Steve on Flash and Java remains a simple 'No.'" Updated 20100408 22:09 GMT by timothy: Read on for more information, including some bad news if you want to program for the iPhone in C# or Flash CS5.
alphadogg points out some what he calls surprise capabilities targeted at enterprise users and IT departments, including e-mail encryption and "mobile device management."
And CWmike adds more infomation at MacWorld about iAd, which he considers the biggest news in today’s announcement, writing that one way to look at the new advertising hooks "is that Apple can now leverage the App Store/iTunes ‘ecosystem’ lock-in in effect, and deliver to advertisers a huge captive audience."
Finally, binarylarry writes with a look from Daring Fireball at the new user agreement that goes along with 4.0: "Looks like Adobe's release of CS5 with the Flash-to-native compiler has been nixed by Apple's new user agreement: '3.3.1 — Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs.'"
And CWmike adds more infomation at MacWorld about iAd, which he considers the biggest news in today’s announcement, writing that one way to look at the new advertising hooks "is that Apple can now leverage the App Store/iTunes ‘ecosystem’ lock-in in effect, and deliver to advertisers a huge captive audience."
Finally, binarylarry writes with a look from Daring Fireball at the new user agreement that goes along with 4.0: "Looks like Adobe's release of CS5 with the Flash-to-native compiler has been nixed by Apple's new user agreement: '3.3.1 — Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs.'"
Ads on mobile phone? DO NOT WANT. Unless I get a free phone and free service, but even then I'm not sure if I could tolerate it.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
Every time I use an iPhone, I can't help thinking, "if only this had more *ads*." I mean, really, what good is a smart phone without pop-over advertisements?
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Read the article:
Apple looked at thousands of apps to determine what services apps would most need to keep running while in the background. "In iPhone OS 4, we're providing those services as APIs to developers,"
In other words, the iPhone still isn't capable of doing true multitasking, something that other smartphones - well, never lacked.
Instead you're still stuck with only being able to do the things that Apple has decided to allow their sheep the ability to do on Apple's phone - not what the lowly sheep that bought it wishes they could do.
Oh dear, iphone fans won't like this at all. They hate multitasking. They've been very vocal about it. I doubt they'll like the new iphone at all. They'll probably tell everyone that it's crap now :(
Wait a second here. Wasn't the lack of multitasking a feature that made the iPad and iPhone so great? It allowed you to relax and compute!
What are they doing? Why is Apple taking all of the zen out?
If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.
(or the presumed new iPhone to accompany OS 4.0)
...then yeah, no multitasking for you. Sorry about that.
"I'd just like to emphasise that taking a million years isn't a metaphor here..." -Rich Bradshaw
Couple things:
The multitasking method described is essentially identical to the one MS is using, with the process being halted in the background and the potential for it to be freed from memory at any time. The new addition is a background daemon or two that a program can contact to leave bits running while the rest is halted. Sort of a "low power multitasking." This is actually quite clever, and makes me wonder if it isn't using Grand Central closures to keep those bits spinning while the main process is halted.
The task switching method has apparently been cited as looking extremely similar to the way S60 switches. I wouldn't know, but that's pretty funny if true.
All in all, the critical juncture remains for me: The platform has been and will remain extremely closed. That alone is enough to ensure that I will stick with my N900 for the time being, and likely well into the future. I'll put my OS and developer interests behind MeeGo, and encourage openness.
It's their store. If you don't like it, don't buy their device. Or jailbreak it.
But they will use HTML5 for the ads! Progress! /s
The 3G and second gen ipod touch can get the update, but no multitasking support.
The 3GS and third gen ipod touch get multitasking (probably in large part because they have 256MB of RAM instead of 128).
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
Now if only iPhone owners could do what they want with the hardware they purchased.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
Because you want to be able to look something up (through your browser, in your mailbox, whatever) while having a conversation on Skype.
Pretty good is actually pretty bad.
Cry a little louder and harder, bitches! We can't hear you from way up here on awesome mountain! What's that? You're mad and are going to form an open committee to discuss ways to retort in a GPL-based, socially pluralistic manner? In three years time, you'll have a shoddily constructed riposte AND a donated-by-Cory handkerchief with which to wipe away your salty tears? Keep debating, pansies! I'll be figuring out a way to put some TRUCK NUTS on my iPad.
A good reason for the OS to support multitasking: Assume you hit 'upload' in your favorite application and now want to do something else while the data is slowly streaming out to the server. This allows you to move on to do something else.
You aren't the one multitasking though because, from your perspective, you're done with that previous task. This lets the application/OS do the multitasking that allows you to move on and do something else. Apple would argue this "good" vs making you think about it as a new task: "I want this upload to complete so I'll run this application in the background while I do something else then I'll come back and close this application when it is done". In the latter case you truly are doing the multitasking.
Only Apple could get away with promoting that as a feature: Pay for an app, fire it up and watch an ad for Nike, can't wait!
Can someone tell me why I would want a multitasking phone yet this study says it adversely affects brain learning?
Because a phone is not a brain? A mutitasking computer helps *me* to not multitask by doing things in the background for me. "You, program. Do this. Okay, now that that is being worked on, I can forget about it until it's done."
Can someone tell me why I would want a multitasking phone yet this study says it adversely affects brain learning?
I don't follow your line of reasoning, but find it fascinating.
0 = 1 + e^(Alt something)
So now you have iPhone developers having to worry about which hardware they are running on:
* Older OSes that can't multi-task versus newer iPhone hardware
* Larger screen sizes on the piece of junk iPad versus the tiny iPhone screen rez
Isn't 'fragmentation' the latest talking point for Apple and Apple fans in the media after the 'teh most apps' failed to have any effect on slowing down the massive Android surge?
Will ads only be shown when ad-supported apps are running...
Yes.
or ***HOT SLASHDOTTERS WANT TO TALK TO YOU!!!*** will you be interrupted with ads no matter where you are?
I'm sorry, but it's hard to take you seriously when you're happily posting on an ad-supported site about how you say 'no-thanks' to ad-supported apps.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
Go ahead and jailbreak an iPhone 3g and try to run more than 2 apps at the same time. It slows to a CRAWL.
It's just going to keep getting worse with the rate Android is leaving the crappy old iPhone OS behind and the absolute flood of new Android based devices that make the iPhone hardware look like old 1970s pocket calculators in comparison.
Actually, the rate at which new devices are coming out is holding developers back at truly using Android to it's potential. Android is awesome as a platform, but in the end applications make or break the experience of your device. I tried to find 10 decent games for Android tonight and it was an absolute pain to get things that weren't complete pieces of crap. The quality of the apps in Apple's App Store is really *a lot* better, there's more to choose from and they're generally cheaper too. Android's got some serious work in this field until they can really compete.
Pretty good is actually pretty bad.
Sorry, but it is NOT true multitasking. Applications will have to be re-written to act like a service, then they will be "suspended" and enable quick application switching: http://www.precentral.net/apple-plays-its-multitasking-card-its-no-ace
"What Apple is doing instead of 'true' multitasking is offering seven different OS-level services that apps can take advantage of in lieu of actually running in the background: audio, VOIP, location, push notifications, local notifications, task finishing, and fast app switching. To switch to a recently opened app, you double-tap the home button and a dock of your recent apps pops up"
If you want to see real phone multitasking in action, and with a wonderful UI to go along with it/manage it, look at how Palm WebOS does it.
The Apple Hipster Douchebag Multitasking Roadmap
> Multitasking sucks and is unneeded. I don't want stupid multitasking I just want to focus on one app at a time.
> OMG!!! We are finally getting multitasking!!!
> Apple's half-assed multitasking is 'pretty slick' Apple 'invented' multitasking
I'll be dumping iPhone as soon as my current jailbroken 3GS is considered obsolete. I shouldn't have to literally break the law to make my phone run and work how I, the USER, want it to. I can no longer tolerate Apples' insistence of controlling everything i do and censoring my content, as well as locking in the app marketplace so that THEY profit from every transaction, therefore forcing me to pay higher prices than i would otherwise in a completely free and open market. I'm switching to andriod rather than upgrading. I encourage everyone else to as well.
In revised iPhone SDK License agreement:
3.3.1 -- Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs. Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++, or JavaScript as executed by the iPhone OS WebKit engine, and only code written in C, C++, and Objective-C may compile and directly link against the Documented APIs (e.g., Applications that link to Documented APIs through an intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool are prohibited).
"It takes many nails to build a crib, but one screw to fill it."
The older iphones and ipod touches don't get multitasking likely because they only have 128 MB of RAM.
I was disappointed to find out the ipad only has 256 (same as the 3GS). RAM is cheap, and there's no lack of space inside the ipad for an extra chip. With the way Safari currently works, it starts dumping web page caches as memory fills up. That means going to another "tab" (through an expose-like interface) can often mean re-loading the page from scratch, in practice. Word is the iphone 3GS does this a lot less, so it's definitely something they need to address for the ipad. Because the expose is two taps instead of the one required for tabs, and because of this reloading, I find myself using substantially fewer open browser windows on the ipad than on a desktop.
I'm starting to think they need to use part of the flash memory to cache things, especially with multitasking (that's what the "fast app switching" I presume does - save the full state of app memory on flash). The biggest downside to this is it wears down the flash.
I was a little disappointed to find out that the ipad release will be "fall". So far, though, the only time I've really wanted multitasking (or some pseudo-multitasking) is to play audio from Pandora or Magnatune while doing other tasks (and you can use the Magnatune website to stream since Safari's media player multitasks). Most of the other features are really for iphone users (ibook app, improved mail - though unified inbox will be nice).
By the way, anyone looking for an extremely thorough review of the ipad should look here. I have no relation to the author, but I found he covered things extremely well.
"The universe seems neither benign nor hostile, merely indifferent." --Carl Sagan
Interestingly enough nobody seems to have mentioned this gem yet. To summarize, Apple has decided to forbid
While this is clearly aimed squarely at Adobe and their Flash compiler I can't help wondering what does it mean even for C++ libraries such as Qt or wxWidgets (that I'm personally most interested in) as, with a bit of bad faith (that Apple doesn't seem to luck), they could be construed to be "intermediary compatibility layers" too. And this definitely seems to exclude using Perl, Python, Ruby or anything else.
If anybody had any doubts about Apple openness, this should hopefully be enough to dispel them (although whom am I kidding... there will surely be people able to justify this as well).
"Looks like Adobe's release of CS5 with the Flash-to-native compiler has been nixed by Apple's new user agreement: '3.3.1 — Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs.'"
That's the old agreement. The new agreement adds:
"Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++, or JavaScript as executed by the iPhone OS WebKit engine, and only code written in C, C++, and Objective-C may compile and directly link against the Documented APIs (e.g., Applications that link to Documented APIs through an intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool are prohibited)."
That's the bit that nixes Flash.
Will it let you install your own applications on it however you like? No? Well it's still an essentially useless toy then.
[scratches head while reading your comment] I don't see any advantage on multitasking neither, we humans must be designed against doing more than a thing at once.
"Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++, or JavaScript"
Looks like the flash cross compiler just had a stake driven in it's heart.
Got Code?
Android has already had this since the G1
AS well as a bunch of features the iPhone is just now getting, and a bunch it doesn't have.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
As opposed to the iPhone, where you have your choice of fart apps, or clones of crayon physics games.
--Obyron
Older devices will have a trimmed down version of the iPhone OS 4.0 which will not include multitasking because the older devices have 128MB of RAM.
They will most probably have the ads API.
No, he is accurate.
The Android platform is growing very fast, and already on many different devices. It also has had all these new features the Apple is just now getting around to putting into the iPhone. Plus several features the iPhone doesn't have.
Let see:
Easier and cheaper to develop for
On a lot of devices over 20 different device
coming out on a lot more devices a half dozen tables are slated for EOY
user can load what they want on it, so dev son't need to go through the Apple hoops. It's an option the user has to turn on, but it's there.
the iPhone was ahead of it's time, but not any longer. Now it's playing catch up.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
While i agree with most of what you said, there's one thing that i think you should know about the multitasking bit.
The way that apple described it's multitasking capabilities in iPhone OS 4.0, seem to be identical in how android handles multitasking - eg your app can have a background worker, that does stuff in the background (media player, IMs, background task for periodically checking stuff), and then the user-visible multitasking of switching apps, where the app that was used gets its state saved, then the process gets killed. If that app is then resumed the code handles the reading of the state.
This behaviour has been there since Android 1.0 (@override onPause() and @override onResume())
Currently, developers use the in-application ads to monetize free applications. This means that the only people who will see those apps are freeloaders who don't want to pay $0.99 for the full version of the app. Those folks won't tap on the ads, and even if they do, they won't buy stuff. Epic fail.
The article is unclear if e-mail has been expanded to support multiple user logins. This to me is the deal-breaker with an iPad -- I'd have one sitting on the coffee table today if it had support for multiple user logins to keep e-mail sorted and private. But I'm not going to get an iPad for each member of the household just to keep e-mail private. So is that fixed or not? When they fix it, instant sale. Until then, nope.
Oh, good. This means that iTunes will stop pestering me about upgrading my first-gen iPod Touch to the latest-and-greatest firmware.
Kid-proof tablet..
I'm not saying that there isn't a lot of crap in the App Store too. But there's quality there that's absolutely unmatched on Android. Games like DrawRace, Flight Control, I Dig It, Racer, GeoDefense, not to mention classics like Lemonade Tycoon or SimCity... all truly fun and great games. That sort of stuff just isn't there for Android.
Pretty good is actually pretty bad.
Funny comment :)
Multitasking slows down human learning, so don't try to learn Spanish whilst making cheesy bacon chips. You'll get distracted!
This is why we have hardware like phones and computers to multitask for us.
Nick
I just downloaded some of the release notes (the beta is slowly coming over my pipe), but yes, it is using Grand Central to do the multi-tasking. It is listed as one of the key foundational technologies added.
There's also quite a bit of documentation on how to use "blocks" (closures and lambdas to you unwashed, non-Apple people).
I agree, it is clever to use GCD. But I'm also very surprised--I didn't think GCD was light-weight enough for something like the iPhone. Pretty cool!
P.S. I'd link or copy and paste, but *technically* that would violate the NDA you sign as an iPhone developer. Hey wait, does talking about it ... [Apple gestapo busts down door] :-)
"Doubt your doubts and believe your beliefs." -- Switchfoot, Ode to Chin
http://www.google.com/phone
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
In a lot of ways this reminds of the start of "Macs vs PCs". Apple wants more control, so other manufacturers flock to the second best choice. This results in a whole lot of "hype" for the alternate which ends up winning the battle.
Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes. - Mahatma Gandhi
Seriously, Apple is beginning to suffocate us developers. Instead of providing a way allow parallel user apps to either exit cleanly or kill them to avoid hogging CPU, Apple comes up with a way to tell you that Apple will provide for parallelism, you just have to hook into one of our services. Seriously, as a developer, that is very frustrating. We know the app that we are making and know where opportunities for parallelization lie. We dont want apple to tell us that. To avoid a few apps that misbehave, apple now thinks that it should not allow multitasking at user level at all!
My Android phone (Milestone) does this,
no...
wait...
It doesn't.
Many devices can implement proper multi-tasking without sacrificing speed. I easily have 3 to 5 applications running at the same time on Android without any problems, the only slow downs I have ever seen on Android were when I used a custom ROM on my HTC Dream, replacing that with HTC's Android 1.6 image fixed it.
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
You prove the parent's point nicely. You're so attached to multitasking that you're willing to sacrifice battery life. Of course battery life has something to do with the topic, IT'S A PHONE. And you can say "Welcome to fast smartphones" all you want, but for most people these features:
- Has a reasonable battery life
- Doesn't require me to swap batteries
- Lets me listen to music in the background
Are more important than this feature:
- Lets me run sendmail in the background
iPhone has the first three and has since the beginning. You running around saying "Yay! Multitasking!" isn't saving Palm, and I say this as a Palm customer of over a decade that has gone iPhone.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Why not panic? Those N1 sales are with basically no advertising. If Google decided to start running TV ads round the clock like Apple does those sales figures could change pretty quickly.
We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
"Sales rate"? Are you projecting from the first month of sales for the Nexus One to a uniform total sales for the year? By that logic the iPad alone has a "sales rate" of roughly 109 million.
Man who leaps off cliff jumps to conclusion.
Between apple and sony, the world seems to be going towards lawyer locking of everything as fast as possible.
I'm not sure about other people, but that sanitized future world is kind of really depressing.
Next step is you'll have to spend all your digital money to the 4 big corporations that control and enforce each of their platforms integrity in totalitarian ways.
News... that only come from a couple big media agencies.
Games... that check permanently online they're unmodified, and require trusted platforms banning any form of liberty/homebrew.
Videos&Music... that only come out in DRM form with you-are-only-renting-from-us terms.
Internet connections... where you can only do what the isp deems safe.
etc...
On a lot of devices over 20 different device
That's a *feature*? "Yay we get to target 20 different CPU characteristics / featuresets / screensizes etc.!"
Nope, not a feature at all.
``If you don't want to see the ads, don't buy ad-supported apps. There is almost always a more expensive ad-free version.''
Gad! Stop kidding yourself with statements like these: you paid full price so ads wont appear for the now fully fed. Fallacious: see cinemas with 30 minutes of boring-obnoxious ads & trailers!
See paid! cable television "broadcasts" riddled with ads. See PBS shows larded with 5 minutes of introductory wheat fields, granaries, mines, wind fields ads. See XM/Sirius radio with ... ^.^
without once bothering to wonder whether it's appropriate on a small-screen embedded device. It isn't.
Calling someone a "douchebag" just because he has a more functional brain than you do is not nice. Remember, most people are far more intelligent than you, don't hate them for it.
If multitasking isn't appropriate on a small-screen device, why has the iPod and the iPhone had it from day one? They have you know. The difference between pre 4.0 and post 4.0 is that this functionality is now available to comapnies that are not called Apple. As you should know if you have ever used an iPhone, the Apple music player goes on playing in the background when you do other stuff on the phone. Try it. Press the "iPod" icon on your phone. Start playing music. Hit the home button - can you still hear the music? Sure you can. Bring up Echofon and check what Twitter is all about. Can you still hear the music? Of course you can. You can because the iPhone has had multitasking always, but only for Apple.
You are a moron sir, for calling people names just because you are so in love with Steve Jobs that you can not take valid criticism of his products. A sad moron in fact.
Ahh, the typical Apple approach to things.
"What, that??! That's not a feature!". "Multitasking? That just drains your battery, nobody wants that!".
Android will bury Apple for the same reason the PC buried the Mac. There will be a dozen companies coming out with fancy new hardware at a breakneck pace that Apple cannot keep up with.
It's already happening - the HTC Evo is to the iPhone what the iPhone was to an el-cheap Windows Mobile phone. Sure, the next iPhone will bridge the gap but Jesus, what's coming out later this year in the Android camp? I can't imagine.
"Beaming"/bluetooth contact/file transfer worked pretty bloody well for my Nokia and Sony Ericssons. Indeed, iSync made it wonderfully easy to wirelessly sync updated contact info to my Mac. Why is this missing for the iPhone?
(indeed, why didn't Apple use iSync for the iPhone?)
Man who leaps off cliff jumps to conclusion.
Oh yes, can't wait the moment when all the flash haters/html5 lovers will get to have obnoxious ads written in HTML5. And probably harder to block by something as simple as "click to flash". I see Steve is really pushing for that. Yay for standards-compliant advertising !
I'm sorry, but it's hard to take you seriously when you're happily posting on an ad-supported site about how you say 'no-thanks' to ad-supported apps.
Slashdot has ads? (checks it out with safari...) OMG :-) I was unaware. Thank you, adblock.
'Once scientists, even the dim-witted social scientists, get muzzled, the Western Civilization is finished.' - oldhack
I do not like this kind of solution. Why would I want to give money to a company that doesn't want me to do what I want with a device I paid for? It's stupid to pay somebody who is acting against your interests.
I consider this to be a very temporary solution at best. I might be willing to do it, but only if no alternative is available. Since the N900 exists, I have no reason to consider buying an iPhone.
Heh, that's a funny thing to say.
It's not that I don't want you to have a choice. I'm just giving some friendly advice, based on past experiences. Buy it all you want if you like, but don't complain if you end up running into the limitations one day.