WWDC 2014 Keynote

[ControlD]

For myself, I don't see the point. I don't believe the majority of people need access to a file system.

I do believe that now, however, with the extra API's that are in place and the ability for a app to share its sand boxed files with other apps, that there will be a third-party app in time for the iOS 8 public release that will let you copy whatever you want over to it and be able to open it in any other app that updates to iOS 8 compatibility. So I think all the bases will be covered.

Do you think we will be able to copy our music files over to a iOS device allowing us to bypass iTunes for moving locally stored media? When I think of "access to the file system" in regards to my (Android) phone, this is what I am thinking of more than needing to get to the core system files. I want to be able to move music / media / random files onto the device without needing a specialized piece of software. A bonus would be to store those files in my own hierarchy as well (to match the structure of my locally stored media).

 

[TheStu]

For myself, I don't see the point. I don't believe the majority of people need access to a file system.

I do believe that now, however, with the extra API's that are in place and the ability for a app to share its sand boxed files with other apps, that there will be a third-party app in time for the iOS 8 public release that will let you copy whatever you want over to it and be able to open it in any other app that updates to iOS 8 compatibility. So I think all the bases will be covered.

You may not even need a third party app. iCloud Drive should take care of that, and you can even set up folders within it.

 

[vi edit]

I don't want to monkey with iClouds or wifi pairing or any of that crap. None of it is as fast, reliable or convenient as using the simple little USB cable that comes with every iDevice.

Let me plug it into my computer of choice and give me a simple folder structure for "movies", "pictures", "music" and "documents". I can copy and paste at will there. I don't need deep level access to the file structure of the device.

iPhones are about 1/4 of the way there. You can access pictures on an Iphone from a PC without needing to use iTunes. Just take that a few steps further for other media.

 

[TheStu]

I don't want to monkey with iClouds or wifi pairing or any of that crap. None of it is as fast, reliable or convenient as using the simple little USB cable that comes with every iDevice.

Let me plug it into my computer of choice and give me a simple folder structure for "movies", "pictures", "music" and "documents". I can copy and paste at will there. I don't need deep level access to the file structure of the device.

iPhones are about 1/4 of the way there. You can access pictures on an Iphone from a PC without needing to use iTunes. Just take that a few steps further for other media.

They did at least fix the problem where you couldn't connect your iPhone to someone else's computer. It's closer to what you want, but you still need iTunes.

 

[vi edit]

I missed the wifi calling feature in the list. Curious to see how they implement this. Will you be able to take inbound calls over that? This is kind of a big thing for me since my new office has literally *zero* cell coverage and it torches my battery. Wonder if you can disable cellular radio and flip to that if you have good wifi coverage and crap cellular.

 

[Fingolfin269]

Do any of you develop apps? Just curious about your take on the Swift announcement. I don't really understand the potential there but sounds like it was received well at the conference.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Hopefully, you paid attention to the name of the event: Worldwide Developers Conference.

As a rule, this event is intended to show Apple's future software direction, not hardware. The company hasn't introduced an iOS device at WWDC since 2010, and even its Mac introductions aren't guaranteed (they depend heavily on what Intel chips are available). Developers need time to work on iOS 8 before the next iPhone hits, and Intel's Broadwell CPUs won't be ready until late this year... really, if you're surprised that there was no new hardware, you aren't a student of history.

It's typical bias. Certain people will ignore any software improvements Apple's showing off and call it a "yawn fest," and then proceed to claim its also boring because it has no hardware.

 

[blairharrington]

I don't want to monkey with iClouds or wifi pairing or any of that crap. None of it is as fast, reliable or convenient as using the simple little USB cable that comes with every iDevice.

Let me plug it into my computer of choice and give me a simple folder structure for "movies", "pictures", "music" and "documents". I can copy and paste at will there. I don't need deep level access to the file structure of the device.

Aren't music and movies pretty much simple to manage at this point? Upload your music to a cloud service. Transfer your movies to your iDevice using one of many apps that do this via wi-fi upload.

 

[ControlD]

Aren't music and movies pretty much simple to manage at this point? Upload your music to a cloud service. Transfer your movies to your iDevice using one of many apps that do this via wi-fi upload.

That seems like a rather roundabout solution to get your locally stored media onto a phone though doesn't it? Upload all of my music to the cloud at the mercy of my IPS's upload speed. Then, turn around and download that exact same data to my phone over my wireless connection. All for media that is literally a USB cord length away from my phone.

 

[blairharrington]

That seems like a rather roundabout solution to get your locally stored media onto a phone though doesn't it? Upload all of my music to the cloud at the mercy of my IPS's upload speed. Then, turn around and download that exact same data to my phone over my wireless connection. All for media that is literally a USB cord length away from my phone.

Nope. Once your music is in the cloud you have the power to do as you please with it. You don't even need to locally manage it on your computer ever again after it's uploaded to the cloud.

 

[ControlD]

Nope. Once your music is in the cloud you have the power to do as you please with it. You don't even need to locally manage it on your computer ever again after it's uploaded to the cloud.

So, you then either need an unlimited data plan or deep, deep pockets to access your media. I like the ability to keep music local for things like running or traveling, which in this case requires exactly the steps I mentioned above.

That's the game. Put everything on the cloud and then pay for more and more data to access it.

For streaming media, the cloud is great. I think we were talking about managing media locally however (for offline use). In this case simple file management would be the easiest solution.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

So, you then either need an unlimited data plan or deep, deep pockets to access your media. I like the ability to keep music local for things like running or traveling, which in this case requires exactly the steps I mentioned above.

That's the game. Put everything on the cloud and then pay for more and more data to access it.

For streaming media, the cloud is great. I think we were talking about managing media locally however (for offline use). In this case simple file management would be the easiest solution.

It really is a pity that unlimited internet is going away with now how prevalent cloud services are now. Glad I live in a major metro area so I have good reception for T-Mobile's unlimited internet.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Even if I had unlimited internet, LTE streaming is a killer on battery life. If you can get 40 hours on an iPhone playing music versus 8 hours LTE streaming, which would I pick? To save some battery of course and actually use battery for my screen and surfing and other things. Cloud is nice to have so I don't put 64gb of MP3s onto my iPhone, but it doesn't completely replace local storage.

And how do you plan on streaming 1080p BD rips? It's doable at 20mbit LTE, but its going to destroy the network if everyone else does it too.

 

[AznAnarchy99]

Even if I had unlimited internet, LTE streaming is a killer on battery life. If you can get 40 hours on an iPhone playing music versus 8 hours LTE streaming, which would I pick? To save some battery of course and actually use battery for my screen and surfing and other things. Cloud is nice to have so I don't put 64gb of MP3s onto my iPhone, but it doesn't completely replace local storage.

And how do you plan on streaming 1080p BD rips? It's doable at 20mbit LTE, but its going to destroy the network if everyone else does it too.

Back with my Galaxy Nexus it was an issue since my phone lasted 1-2 hours streaming heavy from LTE. With my iPhone 5s it'll last a day and that's all I need it for until I come home to my charger.

 

[ControlD]

I missed the wifi calling feature in the list. Curious to see how they implement this. Will you be able to take inbound calls over that? This is kind of a big thing for me since my new office has literally *zero* cell coverage and it torches my battery. Wonder if you can disable cellular radio and flip to that if you have good wifi coverage and crap cellular.

Why aren't you doing WiFi calling with your current phone? I have almost non existent cell coverage in my house so I use WiFi calling all of the time. It has been supported on other platforms for some time now.

If Apple builds it into the OS and the cost is free I can see that being yet another tempting reason to go back, but it isn't something unavailable to you now.

 

[blairharrington]

So, you then either need an unlimited data plan or deep, deep pockets to access your media. I like the ability to keep music local for things like running or traveling, which in this case requires exactly the steps I mentioned above.

That's the game. Put everything on the cloud and then pay for more and more data to access it.

For streaming media, the cloud is great. I think we were talking about managing media locally however (for offline use). In this case simple file management would be the easiest solution.

Uh.......what? You simply pin your music to your device. No need to use your data plan. Full access for offline use.

 

[ControlD]

Uh.......what? You simply pin your music to your device. No need to use your data plan. Full access for offline use.

I feel like we are going in circles here

So, to get your music on your phone (stored locally for offline use) you had to:

(a) upload the music to the cloud
(b) download that exact same file from the cloud to your phone (that is the act of "pinning").

Seems silly.

OR, you are out and about. You never had time to pin that music to your phone so you now have to rely on your mobile data to access those files.

Seems silly AND expensive.

In the meantime, I could have simply plugged in the USB cable, opened my file manager of choice and dragged my files to the (magically) accessible phone file system and bypassed the cloud completely.

Better than all three options when in a hurry? Use a OTG cable, plug in a USB jump drive and play my music from there.

 

[blairharrington]

I feel like we are going in circles here

So, so get your music on your phone (stored locally for offline use) you had to:

(a) upload the music to the cloud
(b) download that exact same file from the cloud to your phone (that is the act of "pinning").

Seems silly.

OR, you are out and about. You never had time to pin that music to your phone so you now have to rely on your mobile data to access those files.

Seems silly AND expensive.

In the meantime, I could have simply plugged in the USB cable, opened my file manager of choice and dragged my files to the (magically) accessible phone file system and bypassed the cloud completely.

We aren't going in circles. You are implying that manually managing your music is better than using the cloud.

I completely disagree. Once your music is stored onto the cloud, it's there forever. You simply pin your music when in a wi-fi area. (Home, public wi-fi, etc.) The only scenario is if you don't pin something beforehand and want to stream it away from wi-fi. If that's an issue for you, then yeah, I guess the cloud isn't for you. I personally pin what I know I'll want beforehand. It's pretty rare that I'll want to play something when I'm out and about and I don't already have it pinned to my phone.

You seem to be implying that what I'm suggesting is 'silly'. Uh, that's what millions of people are people are doing now instead of using iTunes or another piece of software to manage music locally.

You want to continue using a USB cable? That's fine. But what I'm suggesting actually makes all the sense in the world versus using cables and file managers. Also how can someone not have the time to pin their music but they do have the time to use your methods instead?

 

[ControlD]

We aren't going in circles. You are implying that manually managing your music is better than using the cloud.

I completely disagree.

I can live with that. We just use our devices differently. I suppose that's (my antiquated usage method) why I don't have a iPhone anymore. That's what's cool about having choices.

 

[pm]

I'm old and old-fashioned too. One of the things that prevents me from the whole cloud is that I'm not sure where all of my music files came from. I'm not openly admitting to piracy on an online forum, but certainly some of it (a small percentage) dates back to Napster, some of it (a larger percentage) comes from ripping from my own CD's to MP3s, some comes from Walmart .wmv DRM'd download purchases where I de-DRM'd them to get them to play on an iDevice and then the majority are legitimately DRM-less files that I bought from Amazon or Apple. But the fact that I'm uploading stuff to the cloud seems to open this up for some form of inspection by the powers that be and I'm not sure what I got where (there's some 1GB+ of it). So I like to think that no one cares if I'm using on my own device but if I clouded it then I might get some letter in the future saying "we did a search of your library, matched them to known songs on Napster, and you owe $45 million for these 12 songs that you got from Napster 12 years ago". Probably I'm paranoid, possibly I should do a scrub of my library and ditch stuff that I downloaded back when Napster was thought to be semi-legal, but in the meantime, I'm going to just keep plugging in USB cables.

 

[jpeyton]

Is Apple making positive changes? Of course. Whether they are truly unique features, or "borrowed" features from their competitors, the stuff introduced at WWDC is all for the better.

The question is, are these positive changes enough to help them slow their marketshare erosion worldwide?

 

[cronos]

Is Apple making positive changes? Of course. Whether they are truly unique features, or "borrowed" features from their competitors, the stuff introduced at WWDC is all for the better.

The question is, are these positive changes enough to help them slow their marketshare erosion worldwide?

As a user, to be honest I don't give a damn about Apple's market share, and I seriously do not get why we should. Not unless you're a stock holder.

This type of events always get me excited, as positive changes/improvements from anyone is always a good thing, because that just means that it's going to push the technology forward, for others to want to make something even better.

Sure, Android had established most of the cool features Apple introduced yesterday, but if Apple figured out how to make them smoother and nicer, it would push Google to improve their stuff to make them even better. This is a good thing!

 

[ControlD]

As a user, to be honest I don't give a damn about Apple's market share, and I seriously do not get why we should. Not unless you're a stock holder.

This type of events always get me excited, as positive changes/improvements from anyone is always a good thing, because that just means that it's going to push the technology forward, for others to want to make something even better.

Sure, Android had established most of the cool features Apple introduced yesterday, but if Apple figured out how to make them smoother and nicer, it would push Google to improve their stuff to make them even better. This is a good thing!

Well said.

I actually like the direction Apple seems to be moving in. I'm not ready to trade in my Note just yet, but I am intrigued again.

 

[Red Storm]

The more Apple goes down the path paved by Android, the happier I am. Slowly (and I do mean SLOWLY) but surely they are opening up, I actually feel like changing default applications might be a possibility some day, though I still prefer Android by a mile.

 

[Commodus]

To me, the question of drag-and-drop for large media collections (which is really what we're talking about here -- iCloud Drive would be fine for a lot of one-off document uploads) comes to more a matter of preference than any kind of need.

It's fine if you don't like iTunes, but I never quite get why some people get a kick out of spending hours meticulously organizing their music collections into folders, editing ID3 tags and the like... me, I'd rather just lump them into an app or cloud service and let it do the hard work. That's especially true if you have a whole bunch of things to update at once. iTunes and other syncing apps save time -- that's one reason why the iPod dominated MP3 players while others (which often relied on drag-and-drop as a crutch) floundered.

Besides, there are trickier audio elements to handle, like podcasts and audiobooks. Drag-and-drop doesn't handle those very easily, especially if you want it to resume listening where you left off.