Even if Apple didn’t announce any new hardware yesterday, you can’t say Tim Cook’s keynote speech was uneventful.
The company announced OS X 10.10 Yosemite, the next incarnation of its OS X operating system, which will feature subtle window translucency for windows and the Dock, plus OS 7-style flat-looking icons. According to The Mac Observer, Apple added a Dark Mode to the operating system for developers and designers, and carried the theme’s look into applications, too. The company gave a little hat tip to coders and designers with a new Dark Mode view that changes many bright interface elements to darker colors, and improved font readability and consistency across apps and the OS.
OS X will be getting a more iPad-like Notification Center with a today view for easily checking your schedule and tasks. Notification Center also gained support for add-on widgets that let users customize exactly what information they see.
OS X’s Spotlight feature will see visual changes, migrating from its traditional place in the upper right hand corner towards the center of the screen. The search engine will also be able to collate search results from Bing, Wikipedia as well as Apple’s app and media stores.
Other new features include annotation and signature control in Mail, a new Safari interface with improved privacy controls and DuckDuckGo search support.
The new operating system will sport a new feature called Continuity that lets users start activities on any Mac, and then jump to another device and continue where they left off. The new version of Mac OS will also work as a speaker phone-like system for the iPhone with caller ID viewing, and the ability to answer and make calls from the desktop.
OS X Yosemite will be available as a free upgrade through the Mac App Store this fall, and as a public beta this summer.
Apple also announced iOS 8, the upcoming version of its mobile operating system. The new version is slated to include an improved Notification Center, gestures for quickly responding to messages, an updated version of Safari for the iPad, and more.
“iOS 8 offers simpler, faster and more intuitive ways to use your device with incredible new features like iCloud Photo Library, a new Messages app, the QuickType keyboard and an entirely new Health app,” Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering, said in a statement. “We’re also giving developers amazing new tools to make managing your health and your home from your devices an integrated, simple and secure experience.”
A new Mail feature will allow for improved visual support, such as being able to begin writing a Mail message, then quickly viewing other messages. The update will also offer improved searching, iCloud Drive support, improved enterprise functionality, voice memo support in iMessages and a new QuickType system which learns your writing style and will suggest words on the fly.
The update should also see improvements in the Notification Center and include a “Today” view, developers being able to add their own widgets in Notification Center apps.
iOS 8’s Safari web browser will also see improvements via a new tab view for iPad users and improved Spotlight searching from within Safari. The operating system will also add support for third party keyboards to the operating system, a long-demanded feature for some.
iOS 8 is expected to arrive this fall, albeit a specific date has yet to be announced.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.