IOS7 is ...

[Noodle Lizard]

Android, isn't it? 

Admittedly I've never had an Android phone so my reaction may be well off, but that was the first thing I thought.  I like it, but it's a dick move on Apple's part - especially after the whole Samsung incident.

[Artemis]

http://www.itproportal.com/2013/09/19/ios-7-vs-android-43-apple-makes-major-progress-while-android-stalls/

[Still Not George]

Ha. Gotta love that click-grabbing headline.: "iOS catches up with years old Android features", becomes... iOS makes progress, Android stalls!

Wow. At least the article is marginally more reasonable.

[Blumf]

Ssssssh! They've paid a lot of money for thier iTunes jail cell, so it must be the best.

[Steven]

I think Android's apparent stagnancy has been a bit of a deliberate filibuster, the 4.3 update was only a marginal thing, as I presume they have something much larger in the works for the next release. I presume it will feature multi-window multitasking and heavy media integration, this fits in with what they're doing with the chromecast and play store.

The problem with iOs is that it isn't customisable, while some people see this as an advantage in that you can use someone else's phone easily, we're talking about mobile phones here which are very personal objects and not something you really want other people to ever use for the most part. With Android I can completely change the UI and graphical style and install all sorts handy apps that change how I use the phone directly. This lack of flexibility means Apple have to be more merciless in buying up, copying or stealing any ideas they can to integrate into their UI, Android doesn't need to do this as badly because distributers and end-users can customise the UI themselves, but they have copied some things like ripping off Swype for the Android keyboard. They're both huge multinational corps who I'm sure will rip off eachother anyway, but I think Google have the edge at least in the phone market.

Also, Where iOS 7 Features Come From

[HappyTree]

Simplify the icons and make them flatter if you must, but that bright green Messages icon is MS Paint shockingly bad.

We no longer need to imagine that infinite number of monkeys with their infinite typewriters. They already arrived and they made iOS7 instead of Shakespeare.

[biggytitbo]

IOS7 looks a lot more like windows 8/windows phone 8 than android to me.


I think it looks fine personally and works virtually the same as previous versions. The only fly in the ointment is the safari is the buggiest version they've ever released and a major step back from safari in ios 6.


As far android, the seemingly very minor updates google have been releasing the last year or so are deceptive because quietly behind the scenes they've been bypassing all the different handset manufactures and updating all versions of android from 2.2 onwards via google play services, whether the handset is locked down or not.

[Replies From View]

I think it looks fine personally

Agreed.  The promotional photos are quite garish with all the neon colours of the iOS applications bunched together on one screen, but in reality third-party applications take the immediate eye-sore element out.  On the same page as Messages, Calendars and Reminders for example I also have Facebook, The Good Beer Guide and Google Maps.  Also the bright green of both Messages and Phone have been diluted by the darker greens of WhatsApp and CityMapper.  It's not the early-90s nightmare it threatens to be, and really the overall impression you get is at last the "glass bubble" curve effect over the front of everything has gone.

I had an HTC Hero when they came out, and while I know Android have come in leaps and bounds since then one thing I can't get my head around is the appeal of widgets.  I can see the time at the top; I don't need it filling half the screen.  And for everything else tapping on the application isn't a tiresome chore - it never has been.  Of course this won't stop Apple and their biggest supporters suddenly saying how great widgets are if iOS ever has them, but they've always seemed superfluous to me and a strange thing to keep bringing up in the great mobile handset wars.

[Famous Mortimer]

I like widgets, not just for time / date / weather, but I've got one for birthdays, one for my most regularly used contacts...it makes the phone screen look a bit different and after using an iPhone for a year (3s) I've never looked back with Android.

But still, horses for courses and all that.

[Replies From View]

I like widgets, not just for time / date / weather, but I've got one for birthdays, one for my most regularly used contacts...it makes the phone screen look a bit different and after using an iPhone for a year (3s) I've never looked back with Android.

But still, horses for courses and all that.

True; there's also the dramatic shift when replacing a handset from 2009 with any of the later ones.  From HTC Hero to iPhone 4S, and from iPhone 3GS to whatever you're using now.  A lot of people I know are still using the 3GS and are thinking of eventually ditching that for a newer Samsung one on the basis that the screens are more sharp.  They haven't even noticed that Apple's newer phones are sharper and faster than 2009 technology too.

[The Boston Crab]

They're all the same gay shit

[olliebean]

And so it begins...

Evernote, Mailbox, and Vimeo, all updated to iOS7-only versions. And overnight, my 4th gen iPod touch starts to become obsolete.

Apparently Apple is actually encouraging developers not to bother making their updates compatible with pre-7 iOS versions. Fuckers.

[Still Not George]

In many ways the biggest thing was Project Butter, part of Jelly Bean's release last year.

Up until then, Android phones had always suffered in comparison due to a difference in the way the two systems are designed to respond to input. Essentially, iOS has always given a massive amount of priority to UI transitions and similar elements, while Android has generally focused on broad processing. On the one hand, it meant Android handled multitasking much more easily than iOS (which was always trying to get past the problem of multitasking while always prioritising UI transitions), but on the other it meant that no matter how good your Android phone was, you would always experience a very slight lag before the UI responded. Many people never even noticed that tiny lag, but people who'd previously been iOS users immediately did and I can understand how it would drive people crazy pretty quickly.

So for a long time, when people talked about how iPhones/iPads just "felt" better, my assumption was always that on some level this was what they meant; that smooth operation without the microsecond lag that characterised Android.

Then, Jelly Bean came out. Now, any UI transition takes over the phone pretty sharpish the minute it starts, along with a whole bunch of other rather clever optimisations which have basically erased that lag completely. And lo, questions of "feel" no longer seem to appear in discussions comparing the two. So suddenly, everything else about the phones becomes much more relevant, as the primary thing dividing them has disappeared.

---

Oh, quick note btw - the S Beam thing mentioned in the article? It's bollocks. Samsung's implementation of Wifi Direct is gash and doesn't work half the fucking time. Sooner Google make their own version the better.

[Replies From View]

And so it begins...

Evernote, Mailbox, and Vimeo, all updated to iOS7-only versions. And overnight, my 4th gen iPod touch starts to become obsolete.

Apparently Apple is actually encouraging developers not to bother making their updates compatible with pre-7 iOS versions. Fuckers.

And the devices that can still run them will start becoming damn sluggish when developers start pointlessly including '64 thing' whizz bang shite for no reason.  I'll let you know when my 4S and my iPad 3 start becoming unusable.

[Blumf]

I had an HTC Hero when they came out, and while I know Android have come in leaps and bounds since then one thing I can't get my head around is the appeal of widgets.  I can see the time at the top; I don't need it filling half the screen.  And for everything else tapping on the application isn't a tiresome chore - it never has been.  Of course this won't stop Apple and their biggest supporters suddenly saying how great widgets are if iOS ever has them, but they've always seemed superfluous to me and a strange thing to keep bringing up in the great mobile handset wars.

Quite liked the HTC Hero hardware, the little 'chin' it had was neat. The version of Android on it was terrible though. 4.x Android is a much better experience.

The widgets are a massive boon though, customise the phone exactly how you want it, the controls/info you want, up front and centre. I don't know how iOS users can be happy with just app icons (indeed, I've known a few to ditch it for that very reason)

[Replies From View]

They're all the same gay shit

Correct.

[Replies From View]

The widgets are a massive boon though, customise the phone exactly how you want it, the controls/info you want, up front and centre. I don't know how iOS users can be happy with just app icons (indeed, I've known a few to ditch it for that very reason)

Well the placement of icons makes a big difference.  Several weeks before iOS 7 came out I made my handset feel more "like new" than iOS 7 has done by rearranging all the icons so that they were no longer defined by the needs of my PhD hell.  You don't need widgets to make your handset feel relevant, just a sense of things being bunched together in a meaningful way.

Plus I always found widgets a bit distracting in the end.  On my iPhone I can see the time at the top, and if I want a big version of the time with the date underneath I can go to the lockscreen with no fuss.  I'm not fond of things moving about, trying to get my attention.  I have a "Breaking News" application that pops up headlines at the top of the screen, and that's about it.  Dedicated and detailed third-party applications for travel, weather and so on are only a click away, and I don't think I'd be able to get what I want out of them "at a glance" through a widget anyway.

[shiftwork2]

Widgets are useful for information but really come into their own for toggling things on and off, wi-fi, bluetooth, the 'flashlight'.  A quick tap.  If I want to turn the wi-fi off on my (admittedly 1st gen) iPod touch then I have to drill down through two menus.  It's crackers man, crackers.

[Replies From View]

Even before the new pull-up control bar I had my "Settings" icon amongst the four that are always rooted at the bottom of every screen.  So toggling anything important meant clicking on that then clicking on the thing to be toggled (these are at the top so no scrolling required).  That opened a side menu with the toggle switch.  Which is of course three presses in total, but it's no chore - probably akin to scrolling to find the screen with the dedicated toggle on it.  Plus I bury so many utility applications in folders because I don't want them filling up space on my screens that I imagine dedicated toggle switches sitting around would annoy me.

With the new pull-up control thing these toggles (aeroplane mode, wifi, bluetooth, night mode, orientation lock, a flashlight, a timer, calculator and camera[nb]The last two seem a bit bizarre and redundant to me, since the application icon is just there anyway.  They save scrolling, I suppose, if life is that short.[/nb], as well as music, volume and brightness controls) are just a single swipe up and a press, so if it was a problem before it shouldn't be now.

[Blumf]

I'm not fond of things moving about, trying to get my attention.  I have a "Breaking News" application that pops up headlines at the top of the screen, and that's about it.

Isn't that contradicting? I certainly wouldn't want that kind of distraction whilst in a normal app.

In general, if you find a widget distracting, that's suggests you've selected the wrong widget for the task or just plain don't need it.

[Kolba]

What, iOS doesn't have widgets? I just got my first smartphone a few weeks ago, a Nexus 4, and I love the widgets. On one screen I have a live window into my email inbox. Sure, I'd still get notifications that I'd received a new email without that, but to check who it's from, what the subject line is, and so forth, I'd then have to actually load my inbox, rather than just have it looking at me as soon as I pick up the phone.

Same for RSS feeds, Calendar entries and any notes you've written in something like Google Keep. That's 4 different apps I'd have to open and check each time I picked up the phone, but now I don't have to

[The Boston Crab]

Holly fuck man I just connect to a bluetoth in one clicks fucj

[Replies From View]

Isn't that contradicting? I certainly wouldn't want that kind of distraction whilst in a normal app.

In general, if you find a widget distracting, that's suggests you've selected the wrong widget for the task or just plain don't need it.

Slightly contradictory of me I suppose, but it's not especially imposing - just a little bit of text that appears at the top of the screen.  After a while you blank out things like that though, so I don't really perceive the breaking news anyway!  Seems a bit pointless then, but at times I depend on it. 

The thing I don't need is emails and facebook notifications being fed to me left, right and centre, for example (which is an option on the iPhone but I turn that stuff off).  I'd rather just open the application when I'm ready and deal with them then.


Trying to remember the widgets I used on my HTC Hero and I don't think I miss any of them even though I loved them at the time.  I had a London Tube one that told me when any underground lines were down; that was good but the application filling the same role now is far more detailed, and clicking on it isn't a strain of any kind.  I guess it's the same problem I mentioned earlier - all the comparisons I'm making with my iPhone 4S are with a 2009-era Android phone, not the same generation.

[Replies From View]

What, iOS doesn't have widgets? I just got my first smartphone a few weeks ago, a Nexus 4, and I love the widgets. On one screen I have a live window into my email inbox. Sure, I'd still get notifications that I'd received a new email without that, but to check who it's from, what the subject line is, and so forth, I'd then have to actually load my inbox, rather than just have it looking at me as soon as I pick up the phone.

Same for RSS feeds, Calendar entries and any notes you've written in something like Google Keep. That's 4 different apps I'd have to open and check each time I picked up the phone, but now I don't have to

The notification centre holds stuff like this, but it's not as customisable as Android's widgets.  I can set my emails to be checked more regularly so I receive them in real time (like text messages) rather than when I open the application, but I don't want them constantly appearing like that, and doing that drains the battery faster I think.

Other stuff in the notification centre besides emails and text messages by default includes brief weather information, calendar entries, reminders, notes and so on.  Most applications have the option to feed into it.  Not sure whether it does RSS feeds.

[Still Not George]

The notification bar holds stuff like this, but it's not as customisable as Android's widgets.  I can set my emails to be checked more regularly so I receive them in real time (like text messages) rather than when I open the application, but I don't want them constantly appearing like that, and doing that drains the battery faster I think.

See, none of this affects your battery life in any particular way on Android. Mainly cos everything you have running is running all the damn time anyways.

[Replies From View]

See, none of this affects your battery life in any particular way on Android. Mainly cos everything you have running is running all the damn time anyways.

I honestly haven't checked whether it does or doesn't drain the battery faster on iPhones.  I just don't want my emails pinging up in real time.  I'm a bit shit when it comes to too much information coming at me - I unconsciously blank things out and I end up missing everything.

[Steven]

I don't really understand this touted move into 64 bit architecture on a phone, I don't see what the advantage is other than say, ooh cooey, look, it's doubly as many numbers, buy it! For the most part desktop machines don't even really take advantage of being 64 bit, and you need a ton more RAM which is expensive in a phone.

The apps currently being produced and in the near future will not take advantage of that amount of RAM I don't think. And as far as 8 cores go, I don't think there are any apps that really use more than 2 cores mostly at the moment, any other slow down is probably coming from the graphic department.

The only place these sort of features start to become some use is when you are using the phone or tablet as a desktop with desktop designed apps, and Apple and Android don't do this at the moment, only the fledgling Ubuntu mobile OS.

[Replies From View]

I don't really understand this touted move into 64 bit architecture on a phone, I don't see what the advantage is other than say, ooh cooey, look, it's doubly as many numbers, buy it!

Exactly.  That and the ongoing process of making older devices obsolete by making them undesirably sluggish.

[Blumf]

Phones are going to start running up against the 4GB limit on RAM 32-bit systems are subject to. There are messy ways to extend this limit whilst sticking with 32-bit but the best answer is to move on up to 64-bit architecture. I'm sure Apple will be sad about the forced upgrades this will entail, "Boo-hoo" they'll say, "We really hate ripping our customers off"

Certainly as you start to mulit-task more and work with bigger files, the extra memory will begin to matter. But it seems iOS stuff is still stuck down 1GB level, so this looks a little premature for Apple.

[Replies From View]

Phones are going to start running up against the 4GB limit on RAM 32-bit systems are subject to. There are messy ways to extend this limit whilst sticking with 32-bit but the best answer is to move on up to 64-bit architecture. I'm sure Apple will be sad about the forced upgrades this will entail, "Boo-hoo" they'll say, "We really hate ripping our customers off"

Certainly as you start to mulit-task more and work with bigger files, the extra memory will begin to matter. But it seems iOS stuff is still stuck down 1GB level, so this looks a little premature for Apple.

Good points; I hadn't thought of that.  Maybe what seems premature now won't seem so premature in a year though - once the 64-bit architecture is in place and developers have caught up they'll probably want to make a significant jump in multi-tasking and file sharing with the iPhone 6.