Lion OS the Vista from Apple

Do you guys remember 2006 when Microsoft released the new amazing Vista?
Windows Vista contained many changes and new features, including an updated graphical user interface and visual style dubbed Aero, a redesigned search function, multimedia tools including Windows DVD Maker, and redesigned networking, audio, print, and display sub-systems. Vista aimed to increase the level of communication between machines on a home network, using peer-to-peer technology to simplify sharing files and media between computers and devices.
And then there was under Vista an app store for windows app.




Vista promised to be the closest to Mac OSX as even possible, even better.

I installed Vista on at least 10 computers and non of them worked well with Vista. Vista had from the beginning a lot of issues, the most famous was the high usage of memory and graphic power. Maybe Vista was just ahead of it's time. The computers in 2006 not fast enough and memory to expensive.

Vista was everything but successful and in less than 3 years it got replaced with Windows 7.
5 times more people are still on XP than on Vista, and three times more are using Windows 7 instead of Vista.

Apple released Mac OS X v10.7 "Lion" on July 20, 2011. Which includes native support for the Mac App Store, and brings many other developments made in Apple's iOS, such as an easily-navigable display of installed applications, to the Mac.

Lion is the biggest released since 2001 when cheetah was released (cheetah was the first Unix based Apple OS for the consumer. In 1999, Apple released the first Mac OS X server). Since 2001 every OS update did support PowerPCs. But Lion does only support intel processors and is 64bit instead of 32bit with removed Rosetta, making it incapable of running PowerPC applications.




Lion has many cool changes like improved mail and document auto-save. Within only a few days Lion got multiple million times downloaded which made it the fastest ever sold PC operating software.

As cool the new OS seems, as horrible it is for many people. Many people (I am talking to) are considering to switch back to Snow Leopard.

The first hurdle is, that there is no DVD to install from, you have to download the OS from the app store. Which can take a while. It is a 4 GB download. I would have preferred a similar download like Linux, where you can download the minimum required components and then decide which components you wish to download.

A lot of people complained about the slow download, that Apple now offers to their customers to come to an apple store to either download there or to get a download version on the MAC from the friendly apple employees.

You are even now able to buy a USB stick with the OS installed for $69 at Apple. Which is more than twice as much the download ($29.99 from the app store). I guess USB sticks are expensive.

After the install are the common issues I wrote in an older blog. Flash does not work anymore because Apple decided not to send it with the OS (you have to install flash manually as a download from adobe) many Adobe products having issues and non of the PowerPc apps are working anymore and got even deleted from hard drive.

But besides from these issues, there are many more. Many have reported that their computer is here and there freezing that they have to do hard resets. Network issues and printer issues are not rare neither. And then the new OS is eating memory faster than Joe Chestnut hot dogs.

Almost everybody is complaining about the slower speed of Lion. Overall there seem more problems than positive messages.





The most common problems are (found at ZDnet.com)
Random crashing that results in a totally black screen
Once the system crashes, it’s a hard reset time.
There’s no solution from Apple yet but it seems that the problem here is down to NVIDIA drivers and forcing the system to use integrated graphics only using a third-party tool (gfxCardStatus) helps alleviate the problem.
[A tipster has emailed in a possible solution - Navigate to ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/ (hidden by default, go to it by opening the Go menu in Finder, hold down the Option key and paste the full path above in Go To Folder) and delete all files that containing "windowserver" and then reboot the Mac. This process will need to be repeated if you hook your Mac to an external monitor.]
WiFi dropping
This is annoying (I’m seeing this happen, although not often). Basically the WiFi connection drops and the only way to get it back working is to switch the WiFi adapter off and then back on again.
A temporary solution to this is to create a script that pings periodically.
Poor MacBook Pro battery life
Installing Lion causes a significant drop in battery life.
This might be related to the fact that Lion doesn’t terminate application processes immediately when applications are closed or it could be a graphics driver issue not allowing the system to switch to integrated graphics from discrete graphics (again, gfxCardStatus might be useful).
Viewing videos crash causes freezing on new iMacs
All video types appear to cause the freeze - Flash, H.264, QuickTime, AVIs, MKVs, YouTube …
This is another issue that could be related to graphics card drivers … but perhaps not.

I can support all of them. I installed Lion on a new iMac 27 inch i7 with 16GB RAM and an old MacBookPro with 2GB RAM and should not have done any of this.

I run on my iMac Parallels and it crashes all the time the computer or at least iTunes and parallels. When my time machine is running then Parallels is warning me of performance issues. I guess 16 GB RAM are not enough.

All these new cool features are worthless if the OS is not good. Lion is a great idea but maybe just one or two years to early as Vista was. It is to buggy, Apple should have wait, but I assume, Steve Jobs did push for an earlier release that he can be part of it, as long he is still CEO.

Apple released (since tiger in 2004) every two years a new OS X version. I am 100% it will be this time only 12 months. Apple should have even called Lion MacOS XI because it is almost completely new, but of course for marketing purposes it does sound better if they are still on X version. Who else can say that their OS is still the same like ten years ago.

Lion had more updates in the last 4 weeks than Leopard in 6 months, this should tell us a lot.

There are many tricks to make Lion better, like there were many for Vista, but a good OS would not need such tricks or extra small software for making the OS better.

If I would need to give Lion review stars, I would not give more than 3.5 out of 5.

But maybe it is a smart chess move from Apple. Apparently all new computers which have Lion preinstalled are working like a swiss clockwork, this means we all should sell our existing Macs and buy a new MacBook Air or iMac.


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Steve Jobs is stepping down, good or bad?

The CEO of Apple (Steve Jobs) is stepping down and Timmy Cook will be promoted to CEO. Many companies are switching the CEO but non of them had a CEO like Steve. Steve had to left Apple in 1985 and came back in 1996 to help Apple to change. At this time (before Jobs returned) Apple was almost bankrupt and no important hardware player at all.

But with Steve return everything changed. He was able to make Apple to one of the biggest companies in less than 15 years. He is known not as manager but as a leader. He seldom did market research he just decided what people want and was mostly right. There was no research when Apple created the iPad, and if there would have been a research, we still would not have an iPad. But instead sold within 16 months over 26 million iPads and many other manufactures followed with their version of a tablet, but Apple still has 80% of the tablet market.

Wall street reacted on Wednesday, after the announcement, with a drop of 5% in Apple stocks.




Is this a good time for Steve to step down?

There is never a good time when you have success, but it is definitely a better time than 3 years ago.

Apple is not anymore just a company for Apple lovers many iPad, iPhone or iPod owners don't know much about Apple they just know they have an Apple product.
3 or 4 years ago, Apple was still an insider tip with cool products. Mostly bought by people who don't like Windows or did like to have cool looking devices. There were as we'll designers and people who decided Apple is a better fit, but at the end it were people who did put thoughts into buying an Apple product and knew exactly what they are going to buy, who the CEO of the company is and most likely even knew the story behind Apple.

But with the iPhone it started to change (the iPod was just a music player, which could be connected to a windows computer and iTunes. Nothing really changed for a windows user having an iPod) The biggest change came with the iPhone, even if the iPhone can be connected to Windows and iTunes it is different than the iPod, it has it's own (for the user visible) OS. And people liked it, not only the design of the phone (which is revolutionary) but the smooth new way to interact with a phone through a screen as user interface.

I will bet, that if you ask today 10 Apple product owners about Steve Jobs, 8 of them will know Steve and maybe 4 of them know even a little more about him. If you asked 4 years ago 10 people, 9 of them would know almost the whole Apple story.

This said, it is now a better time to step down, because Jobs is not so important for the average Apple user.

However I believe the Apple marathon will come slowly to a stop and it might come another one, but it will be for sure different.

Apple has their roadmap already defined for the next three years but a roadmap of new products does not mean these will be hits. Steve was famous to make very detailed decisions on each product. The white iPhone did got delayed, because he did not like the prototype. Or even for the first iPhone he rejected 3 prototypes before the iPhone finally hit the market. At NEXT it took him 6 months to find the right black for the Next cube.

Apple is much bigger than NEXT but the principal is still the same. Steve Jobs had the last saying for major products.

Without having him with his vision, the path will change. Please don't misunderstand, there a a lot of brilliant people at Apple and many might think they have better taste than Jobs, they know more about design etc. And this is for sure true and sure is, that one person at Apple came up with the iPhone 4 design, but at the end Steve gave his thumbs up. Steve is known as a risk taker who had many times good feelings or luck, and it worked very well out.

We already saw during his medical leave a big difference not having him driving the car. The few keynotes he did not oversee had gone pretty bad for Apple terms. Presentations did not work, wifi went down etc. Nothing big, but just not so perfect, as when Steve is controlling everything.

Every company which has a leader of such long time has the DNA of the leader, if this person steps down the DNA will change, there is no doubt.

His vision will die, because most of his vision is not yet known by the company or himself. Maybe it helps that is biography is coming out earlier as planed that all Apple executives can read it and maybe absorb some of his DNA.

I believe Steve did build a great team around him which does not need to be orchestra by him, but I believe as well Apple will change.

What will happen?

Who knows, but I could imagine that Tim Cook will give Apple a different DNA. When Bill Gates stepped down and Steve Ballmer took over, Microsoft changed too, but not to the worse. One known as the company with the number one OS on computers is now more an Enterprise company with solutions for big and mid size companies with products like Dynamics, SharePoint etc. Microsoft is still a big or even bigger company than10 years ago but a total different focus than under Bill Gates.

Microsoft changed and so will Apple. Maybe Apple finally will start to concentrate on businesses and maybe in 5 years the consumer part of Apple is only half of the business and not anymore 99% of the business.

Maybe Apple will go more into services and less hardware hence Tim Cook is more known for automation than product design.

Either way, I believe Apple will change and we will see this as soon as in the next 12 months it might be for better or for worse.

A high risk is the stock market, it might that now everybody is selling their stock in fear stock price will go down, this could be a cascading effect and could hurt Apple a lot. If the stock is down, Apple would react, either replacing Tim Cook or other executives, or trying to come up very fast with other products, which then might not as good in quality as we are used to. The biggest mistake Apple could do, is to look at their stock price and to react if the price falls too much. They need now to hang into it for the next 6 months till price got stable again.

We all will miss Steve and wish him all the best. He might have been for employees a pain in the butt or vendors might not have liked him, but he was one of the greatest entrepreneurs in the 21st century without having a famous university degree.

I always had the dream to work for Apple, but not only because of the products but because of his genius. I think in some ways he formed how I today make decisions as a manager and I am pretty sure I am not the only manager inspired by Steve.



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Location:Spinning Wheel Ln,Brooksville,United States

Star Wars in Cupertino

On June 7th, Steve Jobs did present his plans to build a new campus for Apple. Apple bought in the last 5 years 150 acre to fulfill the dream. The new building will look almost like a space shuttle as Mr. Jobs did phrase it.





Please watch the video. I am a big Apple fan, I even admire a lot of things Steve Jobs accomplished. Even the plans for the campus are awesome and surely a milestone for Apple, Cupertino, CA and America. But please who are these councils? The 20 minutes hearing was praising Steve Jobs for 15 minutes. And then these very unqualified comments like from Ms Wang about free
Wifi or free iPads. Or the mayor Mr. Wong who showed his iPad 2 and that his daughter with 11 years loves the iPad. Or that Cupertino needs and Apple store, and that the city will help if the store is not profitable (maybe all government employees must spend $10k a year at the Apple store) Does he has no dignity?
Of course I think as well that Cupertino needs an Apple store or at least the first Apple building as a museum, like Walmart in Bentonville has. But Wong could have said this in a better way more with style.









Steve Jobs slides during the presentation.

I can understand that Apple is the biggest single employer in Cupertino and that Apple is important for the city, but please it is not necessary to slime so much around Mr Jobs. You could see that he even felt uncomfortable with so much drooling.

Steve Jobs knew his audience very well. He mentioned that his first job was at HP and under the line he said that HP made him what he is today. As a thank you, he decided to buy HP land when they downsized. Orrin Mahoney worked over 35 years at HP. Mark Santoro worked a while at Apple, Gilbert Wong kids went to same high school like Steve which Steve is sponsoring. Kris Wang worked as well for HP (1991-1992) and is very active in making Cupertino more children friendly and safer place for disasters. Barry Chang used to be a public safety commissioner.

Steve had for all of them something in his presentation. It took him a few minutes to warm up, but then he was presenting as good as he would present his gadgets.

Some facts:


Here is a link to the press conference after the hearing:
http://www.cupertino.org/index.aspx?page=26&recordid=465&returnURL=%2findex.aspx


Cupertino has less than 60.000 habitants but thanks to Apple a very high income average.

From Wikipedia:
As of the census[2] of 2010, there were 58,302 people and 21,027 households in the city. The population density was 5,179.5 inhabitants per square mile (1,999.8 /km2).The racial makeup of the city was 29.3% non-Hispanic White, 0.6% non-Hispanic African American, 0.1% Native American, 63.1% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 0.2% other races, and 3.0% from two or more races. 3.6% were Hispanic American or Latino American of any race.
According to the 2005-2007 American Community Survey of the US Census Bureau, the median income for a household in the city was $118,635, and the median income for a family was $133,098. The per capita income for the city was $44,774. About 3.6% of families and 5.2% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.9% of those under age 18 and 8.1% of those age 65 or over.[3]
According to the 2005-2007 American Community Survey, White Americans made up 37.4% of Cupertino's population. African Americans now made up 1.5% of Cupertino's population and American Indians made up 0.4% of the city's population. In addition, Cupertino now has an Asian American majority as this group now represents 55.7% of the city's population. Pacific Islander Americans remained at 0.1% of the population. Also, 2.5% of the population are from some other race and 2.4% of the population are from two or more races. Hispanics or Latinos remained at 4.0% of Cupertino's population.[4] In the 2000 Census, non-Hispanic whites made up 47.8% of Cupertino's population.[5] According to the 2005-2007 American Community Survey, non-Hispanic whites now represented 35.3% of the city's population.[6]
Cupertino was the only city with both a population over 50,000 and a median household income in excess of $100,000 in 2000 besides Naperville, Illinois.

Apple, HP and Oracle are employing 70% of Cupertino residents.

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WWDC keynote - a big attack against Facebook, Google and Microsoft

Today was Apple's yearly keynote and bedside what we already knew what will come some was unexpected. Steve Jobs lost more weight (I feel so sorry for him). He looked at least 10 pounds lighter than the last time.




Apple did clearly make the point that they are Microsoft, Facebook, Google and Amazon together and better. The attack wen to all of them.

The keynote was about Lion OS, iOS and iCloud. Exactly as we heard before.
But here a few interesting points. Steve talked many times about PC when talking about Macs. In the past everybody referred to Windows computers as PCs and Apple computers to Mac. In the keynote he talked many times about PC, because Apple is now so big that it is not just anymore a small company for desktops and notebooks. There are now over 55 million Macs on the market. Which makes Apple third biggest PC manufacture.
Lion will have over 200 new features, the most i liked is mission control.




A great feature to find and navigate through all your open apps and windows. Lion will be much closer in look and feel to iOS and supports better multi gestures. However in the demos we could see that it was not easy to use. But it is a step closer touch notebooks and touch screen desktops. Lion will be only available over the app store as download for just $29.95. This is great. And I only need to buy it once and can install it on all my Macs.

iOS:
iOS 5 will have over 250 new features and 1500 new APIs great for developers and users.



Apple sold over 25 million iPads in 14 months but more impressive is the total amount of iOS users: 200 million.
One of the new features in iOS is a better safari with tab browsing, twitter is build info the OS, there is a new overhauled mail program and finally a new way of notification. No disturbing alert boxes any more. Last but not least the game center gets more social aspects which has already today 50 million users, almost twice as big as Xbox live (Hello Microsoft).



The new iOS is an attack against Facebook and other social networks. iOS is now second biggest social platform. To make iOS a social platform users will be able to send and receive messages via iMessages through all iOS devices over 3G or Wifi regardless if it is a phone, a music player or an iPad.
Apple will even offer this features to Macs and PCs. Who needs in the future Facebook. The two big things in Facebook are games and status updates. All this will be soon possible through iOS devices and apple social platform. Apple even allows with iOS 5 to buy one app one time and to be installed on all iOS or Mac devices the user owns. I might need to ask Apple if I get my money back for pages and keynote which I bought multiple times.
The best part, iOS makes your phone cable free, we will be able to sync over the air, which will help to get more buyers because they don't need to have a
PC or Mac to sync or activate their device.
And if you think to buy a new camera, think again. iPhone is already number one device in uploading photos to flickr. Now it gets easier. The camera can be accessed through home screen and the sound button can be used as shutter. Hopefully this will speed the app. Today starting the photo app will take sometimes 10 seconds. To long to make an action shot.

The last part in the keynote was iCloud. First of all, I love it, because I will save $149 a year not using mobile.me anymore (family account). Today I got an email that my mobile.me will be free till it goes out of business (June 2012).



With iCloud all my calendars, mails and contacts will be synced to all my devices instantly. I hope it will work, because with mobile.me it did not go well and I had all the times sync issues and at the end some calendar entries 20 times repeated or contacts 10 times in my contact list. Even Steve said that mobile.me was far from good.
But iCloud has much more. Free documents sharing between your devices and friends (mo need for dropbox anymore). It works from the beginning with pages, keynote and numbers, however the API will e available for developers to put other documents types into the cloud directly out of the apps. Google doc sounds very familiar but Apple makes it easier no upload necessary all can go directly through the apps.
ICloud is up to 5GB free (Photo streaming and mail does not count, they a free anyway) this a pretty good deal. Yeah finally I don't need to email images I made with my iPhone to my iPad that I can use them in my blog. They are just synced to all devices if I wish. Up to 1,000 photos on iO
S and unlimited on PC and Mac. Photos will stay 30 days in the iCloud enough time to sync the photos.

And of course Steve had to say it. "one more thing".
ICloud does not only put your documents, photos and calendar in the cloud, it allows you to put your songs there as well. But instead of uploading the songs, iTunes will have your music you bought in iTunes automatically in the cloud and will be available on all your devices.



But what was the one more thing? Exactly what I was wondering in my older blogs. As an example I have collected over the last 20 years over 20,000 songs and I bought only 100 in iTunes. For only $24.95 a year, I can have all my songs in the cloud. It does not matter if I have 5,000 or 200,000. If I want, ITunes can scan my library and will make all my songs available in the cloud. I only need to upload the songs Apple does not have. They say they have over 18 million songs, and they


believe most of our songs will be already in iCloud. This means syncing an iTunes library takes the most a few hours not weeks like with amazon or google.



Both services require that we need to upload our songs to their cloud because they don't have yet agreements with the big labels.


Over all the keynote was interesting and when reading between the lines we could read that Apple is going away from Software company. Apple is a platform which delivers the OS, the hardware and the service.

So far all major changes did work out for Apple. Ping, Apple TV and mobile.me maybe not, but this new redefining of Apple might work very well.

I guess Steve sees it like Jack Welch once said. It is harder to stay number one than to get to number one, therefore we should always redefine our competition when we are number one to be not anymore number one.

Steve looked sicker than ever and had problems to walk, I hope he sill be soon better. Regardless if I like him as a person or not (I even don't know him), he deserves to be healthy and he did something with Apple which nobody had thought about 15 years ago.



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Location:Spinning Wheel Ln,Brooksville,United States

Monday the big day - WWDC Apple keynote

Steve Jobs will open the keynote on Monday at the WWDC. Unlike like usual we already heard what it will be about. But we should not be so certain. Usually Apple keeps their topics as secret but not this time, or maybe there is still a secret.




The invite does indicate that iOS and Mac OS X will merge closer together.

That Steve Jobs is doing the keynote is a good indicator that something big will be shown. Steve is not working active because of his cancer and did not attend a few keynotes, because of this reason. He only comes to the stage when he believes he can give it more importance and bigger hype when he does the keynote. The keynote is mostly around the new OSX Lion, but we already heard that he will talk as well about iCloud. Apple's cloud music service or more. I cant wait to hear if iCloud might replace MobileMe. My subscription is ending end of June. I have a family account for $149 and would be happy to replace it with something more affordable. However Apple is a hardware and service company. I don't think I would get my service cheaper, but for sure more out of it. ICloud might be free with Lion OSX and/or starting as cheap as $30 a year.
Even if Apple has some software and two OS, I don't think I can define Apple as a software company. Apple will offer software cheap or free to support their services and to run their hardware. Software is just a necessity for Apple. Nothing they will make big money with it ($2 billion is mot much for Apple, which is now bigger than Microsoft and Intel together).
A lot of people are speculating that this time no new hardware will be presented. But maybe we get a sneak preview of the new upcoming iPhone or airport (airport could get iOS and could serve as your device to VPN with iPad perfectly with all your other Macs)

I am still not convinced we know everything which will come.

The best speculation I read was at the PcMac.com website (see below)
A few things I might not agree. Steve Jobs said many times a vertical screen is not build to be a touchscreen. But maybe Apple introduce a new iMac which the screen can be flipped to be horizontal like a patent Apple filed a while ago.
Or maybe we see Apple's entrance into fitness. Apple filed a few months ago for a patent using NFC for fitness centers. As soon you are on a workout machine your phone will recognize it and store important data or plays certain music to your workout.
It is really funny how much everybody (including me) is speculating about the keynote, nobody believes we know already what will be said. I am sure I am watching the keynote.


OS X Lion
Apple may give away parts of iCloud for free with its new Lion OS, Apple Insider's Hughes reports, citing unnamed sources.
"People familiar with Apple's plans indicated to AppleInsider that at least one of those secrets is expected to be that at least some of the services included in iCloud will be offered for free to Mac users who make the upgrade to Lion," he writes.
What's more, Lion itself could be pretty aggressively priced. Apple only charged $29 for Snow Leopard when it released its last major update to OS X, and Hughes reports that one source—albeit one with "an unproven track record"—claims Apple's planning to do the same for Lion.
"Whether Apple will choose to go with the same sub-$30 pricing of Snow Leopard when Lion goes on sale is unknown. But software now plays a very small part in Apple's bottom line, and the company is said to be interested in ensuring that users quickly upgrade to the latest version of Mac OS X, through incentives and low barriers to entry," he writes.
Going forward, "Apple will announce that by early 2012 every screen they make will be touch-enabled, including the entire Mac line," prophesies veteran Apple developer Kevin Fox on his fox@fury blog.
"While it will be several years before OS X apps require touch, there will be universal gestures that will be useful in today's apps from day one, and more gestures that tomorrow's apps can choose to support to augment the pointer-and-keyboard model.
iCloud
Apple's iCloud venture could mark the beginning of the end of the personal computer as a major product line for the company, argues Brian Caulfield of Forbes.
"Far from being an offering that's a 'nice add-on,' to Apple's business, iCloud seems poised to replace the PC as the hub in Apple's 'digital hub,'" Caulfield writes.
Going forward, how much cash will Apple haul in with iCloud? Given reports that Apple will charge $25 a pop for the service (unless they give it away for free as per AppleInsider?) and sell ads around it as well, ZDNet's Larry Dignan calculates that the company could make $1.2 billion in iCloud revenue in a calendar year.
"That's not a huge deal for a company the size of Apple, but it's not chump change either," writes Dignan, who reached his revenue projection by assuming that a third of new iPod owners and half of new iPhone and iPad owners will sign up for iCloud.
But is $25 the right price? Apple Insider's Hughes indicates that the $99 Apple charges for its perhaps-soon-to-scuttled MobileMe service may be what the company charges for iCloud as well.
So will iCloud really be all that Apple is touting it as?
"My guess is that iCloud is to MobileMe as iPhone was to Newton: a complete, deep, polished solution after an underwhelming market failure," Fox writes on fox@fury.
Security
Ars Technica's Jacqui Cheng thinks Apple's recent actions to defend Mac users from the MacDefender scareware attacks of recent weeks could signal that Apple will "be taking a more aggressive approach to integrating malware detection in Mac OS X."
It had better, says PCMag's John Dvorak, because MacDefender is a sign that "the Apple Macintosh is now subject to the same sort of abuse that the PC has endured and survived over the years."
iOS Devices
Fox has a ton to say about what he's hoping Apple will do for its iPhone, iPad, and iPod devices. A lot has to do with building bridges between Macs and iOS devices. Here's a sample of what he's looking for at WWDC:
- Realtime, continuous syncing of iOS devices will mean never having to plug your iPhone or iPad in to your computer again, or even the need for a computer for syncing at all.
- Built-in screen sharing of Mac OS to the iPad, to do lightweight actions on your Mac from your iPad.
- iOS runtime within Mac OS to allow iPhone apps to run as Dashboard widgets and iPad apps as first-class desktop apps.
- Task-level integration between iOS and Mac OS. If you have a spreadsheet open in Numbers on your Mac and you open Numbers on your iPad, the document you were working on will open up. Real-time synchronization will be integrated as an OS-level service available to developers.
- Unification of the App Store to encompass Mac, iPhone, iPod, AppleTV and iPad apps. Ability to make a single purchase for all the environments the app supports.
- Stripping out the App store from iTunes. iTunes will be the media storefront and the App Store will be the resource storefront.
- The only new devices announced at WWDC will be updates to facilitate the new software functionality. Some have speculated on new AirPort base stations built around iOS to make VPN easy and mainstream. This seems very likely. It will be important to have one device that is always on and available, and AirPort is a sensible bet.
- AppleTV + App Store updates probably aren't there yet, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear announcements in order to get developers building apps.


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iPad 2 presented by Steve Jobs

I was wrong, Steve did present the new iPad, but i am sure he did it because he wanted to do it, not because everybody was asking for. The question now is if he is coming soon back to run the company in person.
I guess the speculation is going on again. I could not attend the event nor did i find streaming (i had to work), wondering how healthy Steve Jobs looks to get a feeling if he is returning soon.
The new ipad is impressing, much thinner, lighter and faster, but not really something we did not expect (i had expected more memory). The two cameras will be great as well the ability to stream movies on TV. I am not sure with the new smart cover, it does only protect the front which does not hinder to get scratches in the back. And the magnetic band seems for me nothing which can hold forever. But at least it is innovative.

For all who missed the event, here is an overview found at yahoo:
Here are our live notes:

12:59 The event's about to get underway. Supposedly a lot of Beatles music being played. Now "Here Comes The Sun."

1:00 Ryan Block thinks Steve Jobs is going to lead the keynote.

1:02 Steve Jobs is out on stage! He's getting a standing ovation, according Macworld.

1:04 iBooks has passed 100 million books downloaded, Jobs says. And as we've seen, Random House is now joining the iBookstore. Wonder how that compares to Kindle ebook sales?

1:05 The App Store has paid out over $2 billion to developers cumulatively, Jobs says, via Macworld. And Apple recently shipped its 100 millionth iPhone. And it sold almost 15 million iPads in 2010, more than every tablet PC ever sold.

1:08 The App Store has over 350,000 apps, more than 65,000 are updated for the iPad.

1:10 Om Malik tweets: "Wow. Steve is looking thin, but boy I am glad to see him on stage making the presentation."

1:11 Jobs has been taking shots at Android and Samsung, appropriately. Now they're showing off an iPad propaganda video.

1:17 Apple slams the competitors with a slide: "2011: Year of the copycats?" Now it's time for Apple to show off the "iPad 2."

1:19 So here's what's new: As expected, dual-core A5 processors, up to 2X faster CPU, and up to 9X faster graphics. And front- and rear-facing cameras. And a gyroscope.

1:21 It's thinner than the iPhone 4 -- 8.8 mm. And it's a bit lighter at 1.3 lbs, down from 1.5 lbs. Comes in black and white, and white will ship from day one. (Versus the iPhone 4, whose white version still hasn't shipped.) AT&T and Verizon support, but unclear if they're separate models or one model with both wireless capabilities. But same 10-hour battery life.

1:24 Same prices, starting at $499.

1:25 Shipping on Friday, March 11. Before RIM's first PlayBook ships, before HP's first TouchPad ships, etc. And of course WAY before any Windows tablets ship.

1:27 iPad 2 will have HDMI out, including mirrored video. It seems that you can watch on a TV what's on the iPad's screen. Pretty cool.

1:29 There's also a new magnetic "smart cover" that seems to be a major improvement over the old cover. Check out Engadget for more.

1:31 People are going nuts about this cover. Would be funny if that's the reason I upgraded. Remember when magnets killed computers?

1:32 Now Apple's Scott Forstall is coming out to talk about iOS 4.3. Wonder if he'll say anything about iOS 5, or if that's going to be coming at a later event.

1:33 Wow, the case comes in a zillion different colors. Looks very cool.

1:34 New iOS supports iTunes home sharing, according to Macworld. Can stream music, movies, and other media to your iOS device.

1:38 As predicted, there's PhotoBooth software, and FaceTime, to use the new cameras.

1:41 iOS 4.3 is out March 11 as well, and will be a free download for iPad, iPhone (GSM), and newer iPod touches. As Macworld notes, it seems Verizon iPhone has been left off.

1:42 Now they're showing off iMovie for iPad, as we expected they would. Let's see how this compares to the video editing software built into Android's Honeycomb OS.

1:48 Macworld says you can upload iMovie videos to YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, CNN iReport, and to iTunes. SOCIAL!

1:50 There's also Garage Band for the iPad now, too. Make music on your tablet.

1:53 By the way, if you want to see big photos of all of these things, check out Engadget.


1:57 This Garage Band software looks really cool. It uses the iPad's accelerometer (motion sensor) to see how hard you're pressing the keys, etc.

1:59 So, who wants to go buy a Xoom today?

2:04 Garage Band: Only $5. Very cool.

2:10 By the way, if you're still following along, Apple's website is up with the new stuff. And here are some photos of the iPad 2.

2:14 Event's wrapping up. That's it. No iOS 5 today, no Apple TV App Store.

Will Steve Jobs present the new iPad?

Today is the big day. Apple is going to present the iPad 2.



But more important and more unclear is, if Steve Jobs will make the presentation.
Jobs left Apple a few months ago at an undefined period for medical leave.
Shareholders of Apple asking since then to get a statement about Jobs health to understand if he is coming back to run Apple. Jobs was, since his returned to Apple, the driver of the company and influenced the direction of Apple very strong.
Jobs not coming back might change the future of Apple and it's stock price.
Jobs was seen in the last few months once or twice at the Apple campus and is daily on the phone with Apple executives but he did not run active the company. He attended last week a dinner with Obama. This is all we know.

If Apple would be a different company and Steve Jobs somebody else, then he would be at the presentation today to show the world all is fine.
Board of Directors would have made him to come to minimize the risk for assumptions and to keep the stock stable.

But this is Apple and Steve Jobs. He does not care what other people expect, this made him and Apple what they are today.
If he is presenting the iPad, then only because he wants and not because other want to see him.
I doubt he will present the iPad, it is not a major product release, it is not magical enough.

We will see today.


- Posted using BlogPress, please follow me on twitter @schlotz69

Where is Apple future?

Steve Jobs has his third leave in three years and this one could be long, maybe forever.
We all know that he is famous for being very active in product development. He did multiple times delay product releases because he did want to have in the last second a change or did not like something on the product like the color. His most famous detail for perfection was during Next. When he was looking for a perfect black color of the Next computer. It took many rounds and months till he was satisfied with the color.
He has the same sense for detail with the white iPhone 4 which comes supposedly in March on the market with almost a year delay.
Steve Jobs is not by nature a software developer or a designer, but he has a gift for esthetic. Apple created beautiful consumer devices since he came back. No other mainstream computer company has build so many good looking and easy to use devices.
Steve is a great negotiator, who knows how far he can go, he is so arrogant that he rather prefers to lose a deal then giving up from his position. This is a big gamble which paid off many times.
It will be no harm for Apple if his leave is less than a year, but the longer he will be not anymore active in the day by day business, the bigger is the chance that Apple will lose the sexiness.
A company like Apple has already in their drawer new products for the next 12 to 18 months but after this the absence from Steve could change a lot.
A good friend of mine and I are always discussing how great and simple Apple products are. But he always says Apple needs to be more business friendly to be really successful. I don't agree. I believe one reason why Apple is so successful is, that they did not too much care about businesses but consumers.
Apple would need to make compromises on their hard and software which would have as an effect that the computers are not so beautiful anymore and not so easy to use.
Take as an example the iPad. Simple to use, long battery life and a wonderful piece of design.
Apple says that 80% of the top 500 businesses are evaluating to have iPads in their company.
But i think it will be never a notebook replacement or a total business unit. It is build on a platform where not many enterprise developers are around and not many of these top companies would have such developers in their teams. Most of them are using enterprise applications which are either not working on the iPad (because of safari browser and missing components) or only available with reduced functions. It might be a great tablet for sales people for their CRM if is available for the iPad. There is a salesforce mobile app version (right now only for iPhone) but this app does not work well if the company has a modified and customized salesforce site.
Using salesforce with the browser on the iPad does not make fun neither. The screen is too small and using just touch is annoying when you need to do a lot tasks or if you have to fill out opportunities. Dynamics has the same issue with mobile app (MS has no mobile version but 3rd parties are offering mobile clients) and the web app is not working on other browser than IE (at least the CRM 4.0 version).
Finance would not be able to use the iPad neither because apps like numbers are too simple to do the work finance departments would need?

I believe Apple went so big, because Steve did not want to make compromises to be a real business solution. He knows for designers the hardware is great, but for the average office person he would need to build a computer which could support enterprise software market leaders.

With Steve leave we will see very soon small signs that he is not active anymore. We will see more products released which are only 98% or less perfect.

But the longterm effect (if he is not coming back within a year) are more drastic.
Apple will try to push more into business direction which will let the consumer suffer. As an example if Apple get a breakthrough in the business world, more and more hacker will try to hack into Apple systems and more viruses will occur for Mac OS. At the end the companies are prepared for it but the consumer will be not. As a result Apple might be almost as vulnerable as Windows.
Companies will push Apple to produce computers less good looking but more resistance against dirt and heat than home computers.

New products will be released rather earlier than late with more bugs as we like. If a company has a strong CEO, then finance or the CFO can't push the teams to develop faster to stay in budget. Without Steve the CFO will have more power to get products faster out of the door to get earlier revenue in.

Apple will be not anymore so good in negotiating and will take too many compromises which will take Apple's uniqueness away. Apple won't build products how they believe should be, but how the partners influence them.

But the biggest effect will be in product releases. Nobody can replace Steve and his feelings when which product should be developed. Apple will again (like when
Steve left Apple to start Next) develop too many products and bring to much confusion and diversity to the consumer. Some would like to have more choices when buying Apple computers but honestly these people are geeks and not Joe average.

Apple is too big not to be a big player anymore but without Steve, the chances are high that Apple will not keep the number one position. Over a decade Apple could fall back four of five spots.



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad.
Please follow my twitter account @schlotz69

Steve Jobs is taking another medical leave

Steve Jobs announces today that he is taking another medical leave. It is a wise decision for his health, but how will be the impact for the company?

The last time he took a medical leave, Apple went through couple of problems and small accidents.

We all know Steve is very active at Apple and many things are going through his control. His staff is so used to his supervision that they seem sometimes to miss to verify all details, because he will look through it as well.
We can't blame them, because Steve changes things many times in last second. But as a result we get great hard- and software. Depending how long his leave is, it could negative influence the stock market and the new products coming up. His sense for details was and is important. The future will show how the impact is or of we have again security breaches or other simple things not working.

Soon will be an announcement of the new iPad and in Summer of the new iPhone, and nobody yet could present the keynotes so good like Steve.
I wish him well and hope he will be soon actively back.

See article from yahoo news about his medical leave:

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Apple chief executive Steve Jobs announced Monday he is taking a new leave of absence from the technology company "so I can focus on my health."


"At my request, the board of directors has granted me a medical leave of absence so I can focus on my health. I will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company," Jobs said in an email to Apple employees.
Jobs said he had asked Tim Cook "to be responsible for all of Apple's day to day operations" in his absence.
"I have great confidence that Tim and the rest of the executive management team will do a terrific job executing the exciting plans we have in place for 2011.
"I love Apple so much and hope to be back as soon as I can. In the meantime, my family and I would deeply appreciate respect for our privacy."

Jobs went on a medical leave in 2009, and later disclosed he had undergone a liver transplant as part of treatment for pancreatic cancer.

New Apple TV coming soon

More and more rumors are pointing to a new Apple TV sooner than I expected. In the mean time Apple is talking with TV companies to get a better deal on shows. Rather than a consumer is buying an episode for $1.99 to $2.99, Apple wants to have the price around $0.99 to rent an episode.
The new Apple TV is rumored to have iOS. Hopefully we can upgrade the older Apple TVs.
We have in our household two Apple TVs, but we seldom use them. Main reason is that we don't watch so much TV.
Another reason is the pricing model and that we have a DVR with our Dish Network. If i watch TV it is either a documentary or a serial like True Blood or Warehouse 13.
I record them with my DVR to avoid advertising. I use my Apple mostly to watch DVDs i had moved into iTunes.
Netflix is right now my favorite, i get the movie I want within 2 days and can stream some movies even instantly through my Wii.
Painful at Netflix are shows which have per DVD only 3 or 4 episodes. With my netflix account I can have only one DVD at time, it takes weeks till I have all episodes through netflix.
And i think this the reason Apple is trying to get shows cheaper into iTunes. With movies it is hard for Apple to compete with Netflix, they have much more movies available but shows might work.
Steve Jobs called once the Apple TV a hobby, and he is right, as long TV producers don't change their model, no set up box can compete with TV. I have right now 250 channels and a DVR, i can basically watch anything i want any time.
On the other hand Internet and set up boxes are putting pressure on the TV, as soon people can get almost the same amount of information and shows through set up boxes like Apple TV, then they might switch instead of paying a $100 something bill each month.
Advertising will and need to change for TV. It will be much more product placements than commercials. New technology allows to render any product via computer into movie or show.
Producers will get smarter in shooting shows to allow to change a product placement on the flow to be more time sensitive. I actually see a big market for start ups in this sector.
In a few years from now, we might not have classic commercials anymore, but commercials as a part of the show, totally integrated. When an user sees an item they like, they can click on it (with mouse or remote control). The TV goes then into split screen, the show stops and user can read more about the product or see a complete 60 second commercial with the ability to buy instantly the product. TV will not anymore just stream, the user can send information back, it gets much more interactive. Basically TV will be the internet of tomorrow. The only difference is that this Internet will be motions rather than flat text. The Internet will be a big movie. The speed will be there and the need is already here.



- Posted using My iPad

Location:George J Bean Outbnd Pkwy,Tampa,United States

Apple's numbers are strong and what comes next?

Apple Inc.'s quarterly profit surged 78%, as the company booked strong initial sales of its iPad tablet computer and the latest version of its smartphone, the iPhone 4.

The company also issued a strong forecast for the current quarter, allaying immediate concerns that the iPhone 4's high-profile antenna problems might slow Apple's sales. Apple's revenue in the quarter ended June 26 rose 61% to $15.7 billion.

Apple's quarterly profit jumped 78%, thanks to continued strong demand for its gadgets. It sold 3.3 million iPads and 8.4 million iPhones in the quarter. Sameer Bhatia and Rex Crum analyze the numbers with Simon Constable & Lauren Goode.

Full article here:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703724104575379473713612064.html?ru=yahoo#mod=yahoo_hs

But more important than this info that Steve jobs and Tim Cook are saying that one more new product is coming this year.
Quote:.... "amazing new products still to come this year."

Another article which mentioned the same quote http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/21/technology/21apple.html?_r=2&partner=yahoofinance

I am right now taking bets. I already mentioned that Apple might reinvent their Apple TV, but maybe not.
Steve said that at the end of year will be more than 100 million devices running facetime. And we did hear that a lot of companies like Google are working on Internet TV boxes. As I posted earlier I believe Social TV could be the next thing.
if Apple is redoing their Apple TV with iOS 4 it will have a camera, but would it make sense, my Apple TV is in a cabinet, away from the the TV.
Maybe Apple is working on a TV with iOS 4 , build in camera and perfect 3D. We should not forget that Steve did own and founded Pixar. Plus he is still on the board of Disney. Perfect to develop cool TV experience (maybe new UI) and good connection to tons of movies. And Apple has already their cinema displays. My iMac has 27 inch which is pretty decent.
But TVs are different than phones or computers, Apple needs to have too many sizes to offer. You can't just have one or two versions.
I think Apple can, Apple will be able to sell to the public only three sizes of TV, from 32 inch to 52 inch.
But this again would be too easy. The TV market is pretty extreme busy with Sony, Samsung, LG, Panasonic etc.
My best bet is that the next big thing from Apple will be something like a new version of Apple TV and something like a TV. Something which exists since many years but is not really used in normal households, only seen in offices and home cinema rooms.
Apple will reinvent the screen projector. Something which does not need a special screen to get best quality. A projector running iOS 4 which can be in any ankle to the wall and still delivers a trapeze free picture.
Something which comes with a free wireless iSight camera which can be positioned anywhere we want and follows our eyes.
Ok i admit, having an extra camera is not really Apple worlds. They want to sell products, which you unwrap, plug into the wall and works.
If it is not a projector then it is maybe a TV, an all in one TV with build camera (why is there no TV with build camera anyway?) and the input device/remote is either your apple remote, your iPhone or iphone touch and of course your wireless apple bluetooth keyboard.
To round the whole idea up, the ipad will be able to stream movies which are bought through the new Apple real TV or projector.
I think whatever Apple will bring out, will be one device which does not need another device to work, no screen, no computer, no external camera.
BTW the projector or TV idea is not totally out of my mind. Samsung which got a big order from Apple to build the 9.7inch displays for the iPad, got another big order to build 5 million 42 inch LED displays, without telling who did place the order, it could be Apple.
On the other hand, Apple has 12 new granted patents which few of them could indicate importance for a new type of TV.

http://www.latestpatents.com/apple-patents-granted-on-20-july-2010/#more-9851

12 US patents granted on 20 July 2010 and assigned to Apple

1 D620,020 Graphical user interface for a display screen or portion thereof
2 D620,004 Electronic device
3 7,761,811 User interface for assisting in the installation of an asset
4 7,761,800 Unified interest layer for user interface
5 7,761,798 System and method for controlling the screen display appearance for a data processing system
6 7,761,488 File creation API
7 7,761,414 Asynchronous data synchronization amongst devices
8 7,761,118 Database programs for handheld devices
9 7,760,767 Wide area peer-to-peer synching in a decentralized environment
10 7,760,559 Integrated circuit with separate supply voltage for memory that is different from logic circuit supply voltage
11 7,760,528 Method and apparatus for providing high speed, low EMI switching circuits
12 7,760,187 Visual expander

1,5,7,10,11 and 12 can be useful for a very fast HD TV with 3D, where you might can plug in your iPad.

12 could indicate my dream since i have an iPhone. A 13inch screen and docking station for the iphone, where i plug my phone in and bang I have my personal computer with big screen and external keyboard. After the work day is over, I take the phone out of the docking station and go home.

Please let me your ideas know what device is coming next.

- Posted using My iPad

Location:4,United States

The new iphone is coming

Thanks to gizmodo, we already knew or at least guessed how the new iphone looks and what it can do. But of course there was more to expect and I took my time to follow Steve’s  keynote (at least partly).

A really funny think was of course that Steve needed help, because the Wifi sucked at the conference. Never try to show something over Wifi if the whole audience can access the same wifi. After putting all phones and notebooks down, it worked well. It is the second time that I saw such unnecessary issue at an apple announcement. Remember when Steve showed the ipad and the New York Times website? Half of the page was filled with blue bricks because of missing flash plug in?

He did better in the past, or at least had his people better under control that such things won’t happen (like the “lost” iphone). But I guess Apple tries to go mainstream and loses focus on the details.

Here are my 3 top new features.

 FaceTime

It is not new, video chat is available in Europe since UMTS as well phones with two cameras (I remember a friend of mine brought one in 2006 to the states. But I am sure apple optimized video chat. Unfortunately Facetime is only over Wifi and iphone 4S to iphone 4S but of course a smart marketing move. As you can see in apples commercial it is focused on family and makes totally sense for me, and taking the deaf people in account is a great idea.

HD Video

I think 5 MB pixel camera is good enough for still pictures. If you want to have more than you need better lenses anyway and should have maybe a SLR. But the really good part is HD video. How often do we look at our kids doing something funny or see UFOs in the sky and don’t have our video camera with us. We run in the other room to get the camera and we are back the situation is over. Having HD in the pocket all the time is just awesome.

Voice Control

Finally. I am so annoyed that somebody is calling me when I am listening to music, need to get my phone out of my pocket and till I have taken the call, I either hang up or did something else funny. Voice Control will save my life and I can see many cool apps using voice control embedded in the phone instead over internet and server (like Siri-  BTW I love Siri)

A great phone, I might not like the new form, it is almost too much looking like if Microsoft would develop a phone.

But the best move ever is the announcement that apple will include in their own app advertising. With this Apple makes sure everybody can justify having ads in their apps even if they are not free, and this means a lot new advertising potential.

What Steve did not Say

There was no mention about Apple computers or MacOS X updates, this tells me that Apple really want to focus on mobile. Apple did not make it to the market leader for Apple hardware, but is close to be the leader in mobile. Already now we have almost 100 Million mobile apple products and counting (if we count ipod touch into it). Google is no competitor yet, yes there are more android phones sold than iphones in Q1, but there are over 80 devices using Android but only 2 iPhones. If we compare Googles phone with the iPhone then we know who the winner is.

There was no mention of facebook or twitter included in the iOS. This is sad; I was hoping it will be. Yes with multi tasking it is not necessary but I don’t like the multi tasking idea, this will bring the iphone to crash through memory overflow if it is not done perfectly, but how can Apple control 200.000 apps in these terms.

I would have preferred twitter and facebook as a part of standard like other phones are offering. We should not forget that facebook has 400 million users and 5% of them are using iphone.