Tech Tip — Apple Just Had Their Annual Developer Conference. What Should We Start Getting Excited About?
Every June, Apple brings together the developer community to share updates and innovations for all their operating systems. The event, known as Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), happens every June at the Apple campus in Cupertino, CA. This year’s event was held the second week of June. Typically, the first day of the event kicks off with an Apple Keynote presentation for both developers and media where they officially announce headline features that will be added to each of their operating systems. Most likely, in the last few weeks you have seen some of the news on the biggest of the new items. This year, there were no new hardware announcements, but Apple did finally introduce their full move into artificial intelligence (AI).
Tim Cook had been hinting at this announcement for the past several months. AI has been a buzz for the last year or two since ChatGPT stormed on to the stage and captured widespread attention at the end of 2022. AI means A LOT of different things. It is a hard topic to pin down because of the wide-ranging meaning that people apply to AI. In many ways, Apple has been incorporating elements of AI into their products for years. Siri, despite all of its faults, has been a form of AI for several years now. Even a lot of the machine learning that happens in things like the Photos app, calendar, maps etc. are types of artificial intelligence at work and have been for some time.
Last year, Apple made numerous mentions of machine learning, but never uttered the term artificial intelligence, or AI. This year, that remained true for the first half of their presentation. Then, they switched it up and introduced AI.
Before we jump fully into that topic, there were some new feature enhancements they announced that will benefit all users of Apple mobile devices.
Probably the biggest announcement that benefits all iOS and iPadOS users is the ability to customize home screens in a way never before seen on Apple devices. Android users will laugh, since they’ve had these options for years, but now iPhone and iPad users will be able to place their app icons and widgets just about anyplace they want on their screen. If you want to leave large blank spaces, you can. Just want a bottom row of apps, that’s an option. Plus, you can color and tint those apps to nearly any color you can imagine. Fully customized home screens.
Apple also brought that customization to the Control Center page. I actually think this will be the more useful change of the two. This should give users quicker, one touch access to many of the settings and features that are typically behind the scenes. I will be curious to see how people begin to put both of these to use once these options are available.
Photos received a big update as well. The layout and navigation will feel very different, yet I think more intuitive for almost everyone. More options to get exactly where you want to go in your photo library will be at your fingertips when the home page loads up. I like the ability to do more finite filtering and sorting. Being able to hide things like screenshots will make it easier to see the photos that you wish to share. As someone who mixes a lot of uses on my device, these filter options make a big difference.
Messages will also receive several updates to make using the app more fun for both sides of the conversation. There are more text enhancements features coming, as well as the ability to schedule a message. Again, for many uses of other devices or message apps, this has been a round for a while. But it is nice to now have it in the native Apple Message app. Don’t want to send a text late at night, schedule for the morning so you don’t forget or make the other person think they need to respond at a late hour. This is useful in many ways.
Apple has updated their Keychain password manager to a full standalone application now. I think this will be a big win for many people who have not adopted a true password manager. I found Apple’s Keychain limiting and have used 1Password for several years. I am not sure that I will switch right away, but this certainly is a big step in the right direction, and for everyone not already using one, this is a must have update to keep your private data secure.
There were other minor updates to Safari, Fitness, Freeform, and background settings. I will explore those as the updates become available this fall. Some of the enhancements for Apple Notes will be worth diving into for formatting and more use cases. I will look at that separately for sure.
In true Apple form, they took AI and made it their own. Literally, they introduced it as Apple Intelligence. More than just a marketing ploy, I think this was a clever and necessary distinction that Apple made to ensure users know this is not the same AI that other companies use. Apple highlighted the privacy protections they have gone to great lengths to ensure in using this new functionality. They stressed they are concentrating on making these useful tools for the users and not just gimmicky models that end up not adding much value.
Apple covered how most Apple Intelligence functions are handled directly on device, and when that is not enough computing power, they handle through their own secure data center that stays private, even to Apple. They explained how that would work to ensure that user data is never tied back to individuals and that it stays encrypted from end to end. I think this will prove important for most users, especially for corporate users, where some companies may get very nervous about devices that share information outside their protected walls. Apple has been very clear that they stand for privacy for the past several years; their AI is no different.
Even when Apple mentioned they have formed a partnership with OpenAI, the parent to ChatGPT, they were clear that no personal information is being shared. Users will be clearly asked for permission, and the user must opt in to having ChatGPT engaged to provide responses to any requests that fall outside what the device or Apple’s servers can handle. I think this is a great compromise and should allow users the best of all worlds.
There will be more details coming out over the summer as the developer betas get underway, and especially when public beta testing begins. Though, I would expect that the Apple Intelligence features will come later in the beta cycle, and may not even launch until after the full software release, presumed to be in September. I would also caution against expecting too much too soon. Apple is usually cautious in their approach to these types of things. They like to ease their users into new functionality. But, I do hope, and expect, that this will be the beginning of some great new use cases for our technology to do more (useful) things for us. I look forward to truly being able to use my phone to manage the calendar, schedules, tasks, and find information quicker than ever that is relevant for the moment.
What are you most looking forward to with the new iOS features and Apple Intelligence?
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