Apple makes iPhone more like a computer than ever before with iOS 7 Multitasking, AirDrop and the Share widget

“iOS is built off the same UNIX kernel as Mac OS X. This means that, like Mac OS X, Apple could have given the iPhone more fully featured multitasking than we have previously seen,” Sanjiv Sathiah writes for Electronista. “In Mac OS X, multitasking and fast app switching in the form of Expose and Mission Control have been very popular. This has been emulated in the Android mobile OS and applied successfully. However, for reasons of battery conservation and perhaps even simplicity, Apple has avoided implementing full multitasking and fast app switching on the iPhone — until now and the advent of iOS 7.”

“Full-featured multitasking is something that many iPhone fans have been craving for some time and Apple’s implementation of it here is excellent, even in its current beta form,” Sathiah writes. “Another significant improvement that Apple has made in iOS 7 is the way users can share files with others. Apple is taking its Bluetooth implementation to new levels in iOS 7 with AirDrop, which uses both Bluetooth 4.0 and Wi-Fi to share files… Apple has also enhanced the layout and functionality of its general Share widget. This is most apparent when sharing photos in the Photos app. In the past, iOS users have been limited to sharing one photo at a time… In iOS 7, users can now share multiple photos at once by selecting each image from the camera roll that they want to share.

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Sathiah writes, “Apple has gone well beyond window dressing with its next-generation release. An updated look was important for the 6-year-old operating system, but it has become the central talking point. It might take some time for the masses to realize, however, that Apple also has done a whole lot to make iOS much more functional (and more computer-like in the process) than it has ever been.”

Read more in the full article here.

17 Comments

  1. was there anything iOS couldn’t do before this real multi-tasking?

    i’ve seen lookout and other crap on android do real multitasking and have no interest in it

    1. Theres really no such thing as “real multitasking.” Choosing an app by a screenshot or a icon makes not difference. Plug the brain can only do one thing at once anyhow.

      1. And thankfully, iOS 7 does not provide “real multitasking”. It will allow some applications to get resources on patterns and trigger behaviour, but still it is nothing like battery killing all-time background hell as Android does. It is smart multitasking that got even smarter to negate minor lacks that pre iOS 7 versions had.

  2. Oh yeah, let’s do this to all computers at Apple…

    Move all documents into the apps that created them and allow only one file to be transferred between them at a time…

    …and watch Apple Inc. collapse in a matter of days.

    You dimwits!

    1. Nothing like:
      – projecting an imaginary happening
      – based on that, projecting the collapse of Apple (for the 5,137,000th time)
      – And then insulting everyone

      1. Perhaps it’s not just a stupid quip by YAPCFB. Rather it’s a tongue in cheek shot at what MS did with wind8 and the totally unusable system that resulted in (on both tablets phones & PeeCee hardware) As apposed to what Apple has done which has been fantastically usable and successful on both?

        Is that it Mcman? are you actually being sarcastic & self deprecating?
        😉
        /s

  3. I still don’t understand why Apple won’t make (allow) iOS apps to work on the Mac. Perhaps this could be accomplished in a limited environment or window similar to the Desk Accessories of old, or maybe similar to the way today’s widgets work. I think, if thought through well, this could expand Apple capabilities of both platforms (the Mac’s OS X and all iOS devices).

    To further explain, I think of my iPhone as a remote collection device — camera, altimeter, soundmaker, etc. — for my Mac. Why aren’t the capabilities I mention above further integrated.? I do NOT mean to merge systems, but to better integrate the smaller, more compact iOS capabilities into OS X. If I can use FaceTime from my Mac, why can’t I use the Mac as a telephone as well?

    Just think, the possibilities are largely untapped, and possibly limitless.

    1. I agree to a point . . . some apps absolutely rely upon the interaction of a touch screen or use of the accelerometer, etc.

      I imagine Apple’s answer would be that the developer should port the app to OS X and then submit it to the Mac App store — nothing prevents this from happening now.

    2. I so agree. The one thing about Mountain Lion that irritates is that I can’t just use apps I so rely upon on my iPad. At first I thought I could find a widget to cover it but few seem to be available, indeed widgets seem to have disappeared completely in recent years to make the concept practically useless in reality. Just replace them with apps that can be device aware ASAP and it cut out the confusion.

  4. The problem with iOS7 multitasking is that it burns through your battery; I’m barely getting a half-day’s worth of use on it right now. This will need to improve significantly before release if Apple doesn’t want a trainwreck reaction from millions of users.

  5. “. . . emulated in the Android mobile OS and applied successfully. However, for reasons of battery conservation and perhaps even simplicity, Apple has avoided. . .”

    In other words, it wasn’t so successful on Android.

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