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Expectations for this year’s WWDC

Cyril Roger

Cyril Roger

  • Updated:

Apple’s much awaited WorldWide Developer Conference (WWDC) starts today at 10:00 am Pacific Time. The event which takes place at Apple’s favorite exhibition complex, the Moscone Center in San Francisco, will last from the 9th to the 13th of June, and will gather developers and IT professionals from the world around to learn about Apple’s technological innovations. Just like last year, the iPhone will be the main focus of the conference, but developers will also have the chance to work with Apple engineers and attend over 150 sessions and labs on everything else Mac.

WWDC 08

The exciting thing with the WWDC though is all about predicting what Apple will reveal. There’s always a great deal of secrecy, Apple-style, during the event, and always something that Steve Jobs pulls out of his sleeve. Last year Apple surprised us with the complete feature list for Mac OS 10.5 (Leopard), Safari for Windows, and the iPhone SDK. So what can we expect this time?

  • iPhone 2.0 – Expectations run high for what should be the second release of Apple’s star product. We could very well see the mobile device finally run on 3G networks and big changes in the software development kit. Also expect an App Store in iTunes and GPS support.
  • Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard – There’s been talk of Apple releasing a new operating system. However, according to many sources, the so called Snow Leopard would not offer drastically new features but would show significant improvements in security, reliability and design. The big question then is how much will Apple charge for it?
  • Mobile Me service – Remember how we told you the .Mac online service would change? Apple should announce a complete revamp of the service including better integration with the iPhone and more powerful syncing capabilities.
  • Design Awards – Extremely valued by software developers, the Design Awards recognize the best apps built for Mac. We tried to make a guess for this year, but there really are no clues as to which software will win the prize.
  • 4″ and 7″ Multi-Touch devices – According to a Wall Street analyst, Apple could release new highly portable devices which make use of its new trackpad technology seen in MacBook Air. These devices could run on 3G networks.
Cyril Roger

Cyril Roger

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