Details on ios7

[TheStu]

If that's the case, strike the whole thing and start over.

Overall, I like the more substantive iOS changes, but getting into details, the icons are so glaringly contradictory they look badly amateur. Flat icons... mixed with garish over-saturated gradients. Absolute flat right next to rendered 3D. Sometimes stark black and white iconified, next to a literal color depiction... on and on just opposing bad design decisions one after the other.

Seriously, if I saw this mess as a free GoLauncher skin I'd say it would rank among the weakest of those. Icon wise, Apple really phoned it in.

My understanding is that they actually kind of did phone in the icons... 7 months from Forstall's ousting until WWDC, not enough time to do everything.

 

[WelshBloke]

Lol. I don't think that it's time to panic yet there's time for them to tweak things yet.

On a slightly wider note, I never worry too much about the stock icons because if they are really stylised then all the third party ones look really odd next to them. I've tried plenty of icon packs and it's always a hassle finding appropriate ones for every app.

 

[cronos]

You guys complaining about the icons are crazy! The icons are just fine as they are.

I don't get what that guy did with the 'alternative' iOS 7 icons. I looked at the side-by-side comparison before I saw the caption and I thought for sure that the improvement was the one on the right as they all look better to me.

 

[dagamer34]

This is what iOS 7 should have looked like: http://dribbble.com/shots/1112094-iOS-7

 

[Oyeve]

This is what iOS 7 should have looked like: http://dribbble.com/shots/1112094-iOS-7

Wow. That's even more boring than ios6.

 

[MrX8503]

You guys complaining about the icons are crazy! The icons are just fine as they are.

I don't get what that guy did with the 'alternative' iOS 7 icons. I looked at the side-by-side comparison before I saw the caption and I thought for sure that the improvement was the one on the right as they all look better to me.

The biggest change is that the icon inside the app square is smaller and has more padding. The current design has the icon too big and close to the edge. It looks amateurish.

It's no surprise either since the icons were designed by Apple's marketing team.

 

[ibex333]

So anyway, now when I know what iOS 7 will be like, I take back all that shit I always said about Android and Android phones. Now I might as well switch over to Android since there wont be any difference. The only difference is that iOS 7 is more like an early version of Android. : ( One that looks "gay" like the Windows RT to boot!

 

[dlock13]

So anyway, now when I know what iOS 7 will be like, I take back all that shit I always said about Android and Android phones. Now I might as well switch over to Android since there wont be any difference. The only difference is that iOS 7 is more like an early version of Android. : ( One that looks "gay" like the Windows RT to boot!

You can't just say it's like an early version of Android at all. It's essentially just a reskin of an already well established OS. This will give it new life, and the sad thing is everything on the iPhone will just work. I mean just think about AirDrop for a second. That will most definitely work with certain types of files/invites/whatever. Then you think about a way on Android and you have thousands of ways. NFC could be one, but it's device depending. Samsung devices have support for WiFi direct whereas my HTC Droid DNA might only be able to send a small picture/file/link. (Not sure, haven't tested) Anyway, you get my idea.

Even though it looks weird, you know you're going to get the same, solid functionality from iOS, and you can always depend on it.

 

[Zaap]

Even though it looks weird, you know you're going to get the same, solid functionality from iOS, and you can always depend on it.

Pfft. All this 'just work' nonsense. My wife can't even get her pictures off her iPhone to her OWN Macbook without some confusing iPhoto shuffle (POS even worse than iTunes.) I'm sure there are ways, but they aren't obvious, nor any more 'just work' than any android solution. It fails miserably at file transfer when we're out and about. Dropbox on iOS is all but useless.

Meanwhile, my Android phone is plug and play on virtually any computer, or I can just hand off the SD card if push came to shove. NFC, BT and other means are just icing on the cake.

 

[Aganazer]

Pfft. All this 'just work' nonsense. My wife can't even get her pictures off her iPhone to her OWN Macbook without some confusing iPhoto shuffle (POS even worse than iTunes.) I'm sure there are ways, but they aren't obvious, nor any more 'just work' than any android solution. It fails miserably at file transfer when we're out and about. Dropbox on iOS is all but useless.

Meanwhile, my Android phone is plug and play on virtually any computer, or I can just hand off the SD card if push came to shove. NFC, BT and other means are just icing on the cake.

Not to mention that with intents and default apps you can make it "just work" the way you want it to.

I get that to fully take advantage of Android that you need to be a bit of a power user, but this IS AnandTech forums, right?

 

[TheStu]

Pfft. All this 'just work' nonsense. My wife can't even get her pictures off her iPhone to her OWN Macbook without some confusing iPhoto shuffle (POS even worse than iTunes.) I'm sure there are ways, but they aren't obvious, nor any more 'just work' than any android solution. It fails miserably at file transfer when we're out and about. Dropbox on iOS is all but useless.

Meanwhile, my Android phone is plug and play on virtually any computer, or I can just hand off the SD card if push came to shove. NFC, BT and other means are just icing on the cake.

See that's weird about the pictures, every Windows computer I plug my iPhone into I get a pop-up asking if I want to pull the pictures off. And iPhoto can be configured with Photo Stream, and to automatically pull the images off the phone.

 

[bearxor]

Pfft. All this 'just work' nonsense. My wife can't even get her pictures off her iPhone to her OWN Macbook without some confusing iPhoto shuffle (POS even worse than iTunes.) I'm sure there are ways, but they aren't obvious, nor any more 'just work' than any android solution. It fails miserably at file transfer when we're out and about. Dropbox on iOS is all but useless.

Meanwhile, my Android phone is plug and play on virtually any computer, or I can just hand off the SD card if push came to shove. NFC, BT and other means are just icing on the cake.

She must have chosen iPhoto to be the default action whenever a camera is attached when she first started it. Which is a great idea if you're heavily in to cataloging your photos and stuff.

Connect the phone and quit iPhoto. Start Image Capture (Applications Folder). You'll see the iPhone in the left hand column. At the bottom of that column all the way in the lower left corner is a small icon that looks like a little arrow. Click it. You'll get the dialog for 'Connecting device x opens:'. It should say iPhoto. Just change it to Image Capture (which is what I like to use) or Preview (if you want something a LITTLE bit simpler than Image Capture).

I know that doesn't address your point of "In Android I have direct access to the file system!" but it should fix your wife's issue.

 

[nickbits]

My trial of iOS7 is over. I can live with most bugs and quirks but after the nike+ app completely drained my battery from full after 3 hours I put ios6 back on my 4s. Bluetooth + GPS seems to kill the battery way worse than ios6. That isn't something I can live with. I don't know if that is because of the beta version or it is something that will be in the final but I will not be putting 7 back on my 4S, final or not.

 

[bearxor]

My trial of iOS7 is over. I can live with most bugs and quirks but after the nike+ app completely drained my battery from full after 3 hours I put ios6 back on my 4s. Bluetooth + GPS seems to kill the battery way worse than ios6. That isn't something I can live with. I don't know if that is because of the beta version or it is something that will be in the final but I will not be putting 7 back on my 4S, final or not.

Come on man, we're going to have a lot of betas between now and September.

 

[Brian Stirling]

So Apples answer to declining relevance in the smart phone and tablet space is a cosmetic change -- wow...

Which begs the question ... will the next iPhone be a Winter, Spring, Summer or a Fall? Lipstick on a pig...


Brian

 

[Ns1]

Pfft. All this 'just work' nonsense. My wife can't even get her pictures off her iPhone to her OWN Macbook without some confusing iPhoto shuffle (POS even worse than iTunes.) I'm sure there are ways, but they aren't obvious, nor any more 'just work' than any android solution. It fails miserably at file transfer when we're out and about. Dropbox on iOS is all but useless.

1. Dropbox automated camera uploads or
2. Plug into computer, browse camera photos area or
3. photostream to da cloud

get a new wife.

 

[bearxor]

get a new wife.

I think this is probably good advice for most of us.

 

[Zaap]

1. Dropbox automated camera uploads or

LOL! Quite possibly the most round-about, dumb ass way anyone could possibly transfer a shit-ton of photos. Yes, every time she snaps a photo- and especially all the lousy ones- I want them eating through mobile data. To say nothing about how efficient that is, vs. a simple file transfer.

2. Plug into computer, browse camera photos area or

Why just photos? Why not a logical file system to browse *any* file type and use it with the app of choice? iOS users on this whole lame 'ecosystem' kick are simply complacent with a very limited system.

3. photostream to da cloud

Again, another round-about way of doing something simple. So that's what this whole 'just works' thing is?

get a new wife.

I can understand my wife being satisfied with second-rate technology that 'just works' even though it doesn't a lot of the time. In a nutshell, she and her friends are who they make this stuff for. What I can't understand is a lot of other people who should insist on it being better, who don't.

 

[Zaap]

She must have chosen iPhoto to be the default action whenever a camera is attached when she first started it. Which is a great idea if you're heavily in to cataloging your photos and stuff.

Connect the phone and quit iPhoto. Start Image Capture (Applications Folder). You'll see the iPhone in the left hand column. At the bottom of that column all the way in the lower left corner is a small icon that looks like a little arrow. Click it. You'll get the dialog for 'Connecting device x opens:'. It should say iPhoto. Just change it to Image Capture (which is what I like to use) or Preview (if you want something a LITTLE bit simpler than Image Capture).

I know that doesn't address your point of "In Android I have direct access to the file system!" but it should fix your wife's issue.

Thanks for this, but it's not really so much that it's an "issue" per-se, it's just that I'm just taking issue with the whole "it just works" thing. As if these steps inherently better than the Android way, for instance. All "it just works" translates to in this context is: "Do it Apple's way." That's fine if you enjoy doing everything however Apple demands. I just find a lot of it roundabout and could so easily be simplified if it weren't based on silly pretenses.

For example, the 'we can't possibly have a file system!' thing is all just a pretense, I'm guessing based on the assumption by Apple that most of their users will get confused by something 'complex' like proper file management. To me, it's a glaring contraction with the notion that mobile devices will replace desktop computers, if their function level is going to remain stuck in a 'noob' mode forever.

I wish Apple would advance into the notion that even their newest customers won't remain 'noobs' forever. Generations are now growing up using iOS and mobile devices. Start working on what their needs will evolve into. I still believe the best devices have uses far beyond what their creators even imagine for them- but Apple arrogantly has no concept of this when it comes to the mobile space. (They do mostly have the concept of it with Macs at least). I wish they'd have the option to keep iOS in 'noob' mode, or for others to move on to a more advanced level with more options and choices.

 

[RampantAndroid]

So Apples answer to declining relevance in the smart phone and tablet space is a cosmetic change -- wow...

Which begs the question ... will the next iPhone be a Winter, Spring, Summer or a Fall? Lipstick on a pig...


Brian

If you think iOS7 is just an icon change, you didn't actually look at it.

 

[bearxor]

Thanks for this, but it's not really so much that it's an "issue" per-se, it's just that I'm just taking issue with the whole "it just works" thing. As if these steps inherently better than the Android way, for instance. All "it just works" translates to in this context is: "Do it Apple's way." That's fine if you enjoy doing everything however Apple demands. I just find a lot of it roundabout and could so easily be simplified if it weren't based on silly pretenses.

For example, the 'we can't possibly have a file system!' thing is all just a pretense, I'm guessing based on the assumption by Apple that most of their users will get confused by something 'complex' like proper file management. To me, it's a glaring contraction with the notion that mobile devices will replace desktop computers, if their function level is going to remain stuck in a 'noob' mode forever.

I wish Apple would advance into the notion that even their newest customers won't remain 'noobs' forever. Generations are now growing up using iOS and mobile devices. Start working on what their needs will evolve into. I still believe the best devices have uses far beyond what their creators even imagine for them- but Apple arrogantly has no concept of this when it comes to the mobile space. (They do mostly have the concept of it with Macs at least). I wish they'd have the option to keep iOS in 'noob' mode, or for others to move on to a more advanced level with more options and choices.

I understand your thinking and I know my suggestion wasn't really addressing what your actual point was.

As for the future of computing, I tend to agree that Apple's vision is probably the closest. Not to drag the conversation too off topic, but computers and mobile device will be treated more like appliances for the vast majority of users i the future. People won't want to navigate file systems. They'll want to add their cloud account, where all their files are stored, and use their applications that look for files stored on cloud storage. The end goal, I believe, is to have your table, phone and desktop all have the same base user interface with access to the same files and apps across all devices and the ability to move seamlessly between them.

Of course, OF COURSE, some people will still need what we would still consider 'real computers'. But I would gamble that this segment is not significantly large. The vast consumer market of people wanting what are essentially going to be dumb terminals is going to be where the money is at. Not in hardware, but in services and ecosystem. I believe that's the future and I believe that's the future Apple and Microsoft are aiming at right now. I believe that even in 2007 Apple was thinking more about what 2020 was going to look like than what 2013 was going to look like and I don't believe Google is that forward looking right now. I believe Apple is concentrating more on the future at the expense of the present.

Now I totally get where you, and a lot of others are coming from. I think that you should probably comes to grips with the fact that Apple is simply not targeting you as a consumer. They, quite simply, will never implement the features you're looking for in a consumer device. I would put money on an "iPhone Pro" that costs $200 more than a standard iPhone and a separate, but compatible, iOS Pro version that gave some extra features like plug and play usb access to the file system or the ability to set any app as a system wide default before those features wound up in the mainstream iOS version.

That doesn't make the approach iOS is taking wrong, it just makes it wrong for people like you. Just like I don't feel Android is right for me. But I don't sit around wondering asking myself "Why are Android users so dumb? Why can't they just SEE what I see?". I just sit back and enjoy using what I like to use and try to always try everything to make sure there's nothing I don't like better out there.

That was way longer than I intended.
tl;dr - "Yeah, well, that's just like, your opinion, man!"

 

[MrX8503]

Again, another round-about way of doing something simple. So that's what this whole 'just works' thing is?

If you have an iPhone, you'd be stupid not to use iCloud. When you have iCloud, everything just works without thinking.

 

[WelshBloke]

If you have an iPhone, you'd be stupid not to use iCloud. When you have iCloud, everything just works without thinking.

I more got the impression that he was saying that it's a very round about way of getting your photos from your phone to your PC. Which it is.

I do use cloud based photo services but there's a lot of wasted bandwidth if you're just trying to get them to your PC.

 

[Zaap]

Of course, OF COURSE, some people will still need what we would still consider 'real computers'. But I would gamble that this segment is not significantly large. The vast consumer market of people wanting what are essentially going to be dumb terminals is going to be where the money is at. Not in hardware, but in services and ecosystem.

First off, we're not actually in disagreement. I get what Apple is doing. I understand it, and often I praise it. I understand the concept of things becoming appliances more than geeky tech gadgets.

Where I think we disagree -and where I think Apple (and MS and others) are being short-sighted is that none of this has to be such a slash and burn proposition. You don't need a separate 'iPhone Pro' for someone who's outgrown the appliance, you simply give the appliance the ability to serve multiple needs. The noob can do things the hand-held way, and the experienced user can do things more advanced ways. Neither has to detract from the other. The pro is happy and the noob has a place to grow into as their needs mature, besides off to another platform.

The equation that I don't get with this whole thing that's constantly thrown out: so more and more people are going to become consumers and merely consume content. Okay. I agree. I assume we're talking greater numbers of people as well as greater percentages of the total population.

Why then does it naturally follow that the (I'm assuming greater numeric amount of) content that's produced for (I'm assuming a greater headcount of) people to consume will be created by... far fewer people???

So based on this concrete law of the universe now- let's all rush like madmen to toss out as much stake as we possibly can in anything to do with the businesses of content creation... even as content consumption grows like wildfire. I must be missing something, because I sense a big fail in there somewhere.

 

[Fingolfin269]

So Apples answer to declining relevance in the smart phone and tablet space is a cosmetic change -- wow...

Which begs the question ... will the next iPhone be a Winter, Spring, Summer or a Fall? Lipstick on a pig...


Brian

What would you do?