“Apple’s ‘Continuity’ initiative is all about using the right device for the right task at the right moment and shifting between devices seamlessly,” Ryan Faas writes for Computerworld. “It very much leverages all of Apple’s solutions to create a very smooth flow from iPhone to Mac to iPad and, in some instances, to iCloud.”
“AirDrop will work between iOS 8 and OS X Yosemite — both due out this fall. One of the biggest advantages of AirDrop, in both its Mac and iOS iterations, is that the technology functions completely without any configuration,” Fass writes. “Macs and iOS devices won’t even need to be on the same network to share content — as long as they’re near each other, they can detect and establish ad-hoc access. This allows for immensely easy collaboration at a moment’s notice and is so much simpler than signing onto a corporate network share, attaching a file to an email, or using a flash drive to transfer information.”
“Building on that effortless ease-of-sharing is Handoff, a new feature that will allow users to, well, hand off a task from one device to another,” Fass writes. “You can, for instance, begin composing an email on an iPhone and then finish the process on a Mac. Handoff really demonstrates, perhaps more than anything else that Apple announced at the keynote, the value of its ecosystem and the company’s focus on delivering an end-to-end user experience.”
“The ability to relay text messages and voice calls (complete with caller ID and the contact information associated with the caller) from an iPhone to a Mac, or to answer or initiate calls on a Mac — using an iPhone or making the call directly from the Mac — give us another peek at the unified vision, centered around the user, that appears to be Apple’s goal moving forward,” Fass writes. “Another feature Apple execs highlighted, sure to be a hit with road warriors and those of us who occasionally work in coffee shops, is an automatic hotspot feature. Using your iPhone as a hotspot isn’t new, of course… but Apple has made using it completely effortless. There’s no need to configure a network or pair your Mac to your iPhone using Bluetooth; the connection simply occurs automatically with your iPhone appearing in the network menu in the Yosemite menubar.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: With chintzy network PCs and a morass of incompatible iPhone knockoffs, Google’s garbage “platform” (or anybody else’s, for that matter) simply cannot compete.
Related articles:
At WWDC 2014, Apple unleashes thermonuclear war against Android – June 3, 2014
Why developers are going nuts over Apple’s new ‘Swift’ programming language – June 3, 2014
Apple just delivered a knockout blow to Android with iOS 8 – June 2, 2014
Xcode 6 features resizable device simulators, paving way for iPhones with new screen sizes – June 2, 2014
WWDC 2014: Apple sets the scene for its next decade – June 2, 2014
Apple unveils new versions of OS X and iOS, major iCloud update with iCloud Drive – June 2, 2014
Apple’S WWDC news bores investors, not developers – June 2, 2014
Apple’s HealthKit aims to unite wearables and fitness apps – June 2, 2014
Apple releases iOS 8 SDK with over 4,000 new APIs – June 2, 2014
Apple unveils iOS 8, the biggest release since the launch of the App Store – June 2, 2014
Apple announces OS X Yosemite for Macintosh – June 2, 2014
I wonder how AT&T will respond to the tethering issue.
My first thought also.
Somewhere at AT&T a group of individuals who actually meets everyday, came together and watched the keynote on a wall sized 4k TV we customers paid for. They sat around a $50,000 conference table and sipped imported Arab coffee flown in on a corporate coffee run this morning. (They keep a couple of Gulfstreams running back and forth). Then they asked themselves the same question they ask everyday. “How can we f&*k our customers today?” Only it was a slightly different version. “How can we F&*k these damn iOS people with these new tools Apple has given us?”
Why would AT&T be upset about this at all? They charge through the fucking nose for tethering. This doesn’t make tethering free, just easier to turn on.
That’s why you need to switch to Virgin Mobile.
Last I checked, Virgin Mobile charges extra for the tethering option and they just started throttling download speeds if you exceed their limits.
And yes, I am a pretty satisfied VM customer.
I noticed the near tethering demo that was being done too. I would love to be able to grab my Mac’s e-mail using my iPhone when no network Wi-Fi is around.
A lot of this may be to get CarPlay working too. The car’s system is wired to the iPhone and uses the iPhone to work maps, messages, Siri, … Apple may have to give up on this issue of blocking tethering soon. I spend $139 more for the iPad to have cell tower ability and yet, iPhones are everywhere around the iPads.
“Apple is now moving in new directions and beyond where Steve Jobs might have gone”
Why would Jobs would not move beyond? What a weird headline.
I agree. This is exactly the same direction that Steve Jobs was heading for many years but the technology wasn’t there yet.
Who was the idiot(s) on here claiming that airdrop between OSX and iOS was impossible because of incompatible file systems. Come on own up, last time I take notice of that sort of ‘informed’ nonsense.
The phone aspect really excites me. For the past 20 years or so I have longed after a completely programmable call control centre where I can block any set caller or call type etc, etc, crete specific programable call responses to those types if I didn’t want to answer or was out and could never understand why the Mac had never been brought into the phone system to help accomplish this sort of total control.
Met a guy many years back who had managed to incorporate something of the sort on his pc but was very limited functionally. Ok so this development isn’t exactly what I am envisaging but its only a matter of time before that is created and a lot more.
I watched the show yesterday and the “continuity” aspect had me really excited. When people get access to it – especially those of use with iOS and OSX devices, your eyeballs will pop. It’s just so cool how you can start something on one device, put it down, pick up another device that has a little icon representing what you were working on on the first device and just continue without missing a beat. It’s so totally Apple-esque in its elegance.
I have AT&T unlimited data on my iPhone, which I’ve been jealously guarding since the original iPhone. They do not allow me to use my phone in their version of “hotspot” (one can somewhat understand their concern.) Does the Apple hotspot capability operate independently of the AT&T hotspot?
It just makes hot spot easier to turn on. The mildly annoying issue now is to turn on hot spot (you wouldn’t want it on all the time), you first have to find the phone, open settings, turn on hotspot, etc. Now the device you want to use to connect, the computer or iPad for instance, can ask the phone to turn on hotspot for you. No doubt, you will have had to connect with this device on hotspot at least once before so it already has the hotspot password.
Sadly, nope.
I’m in the same boat, and this may be the final straw that convinces me to drop my unlimited plan for tethering.
Maybe I should just bite the bullet and go for the T-Mobile plan and use the break the contract program. I’m tired of AT&T dinging for HotSpot use or FaceTime use.
T-Mobile pays your early termination fee from your other cellphone contract when you join.
Yeah I just checked the site again. 😊
Virgin Mobile: $50 a month unlimited everything, including tethering for up to 5 devices at the same time. $30 a month if you only want 300 min. but the data plan above remains.
Data is the last vestige of the carriers. If Apple were to take over and offer it for free or near free, we wouldn’t need them anymore. Let’s go Apple. Do it now.
Why what-if’s? Steve is dead know one know what he’d have done. Apple will live or die by current leadership. Enough already. Useless article.
I want a variant that will make it easy for the cloud to default to user’s servers. If cloud farms come under attack one day, the losses could become catastrophic.