IOS 7 really changes the look of IOS and is the first change in the visual appearance of IOS since the iPhone was originally released. They have changed the way IOS looks and I have to say that I am not a huge fan of the new look. To me it looks rather cartoony compared to the old design.They have changed the appearance of all of the icons. The new design was predicted to be "flat" by many people and I think it is, but not in a good way. Apple are known for their innovation and I do not think that they have done a good job with this new look. I think it is rather flat and not very imaginative. What have they changed visually? The look screen, the icons, the font, and the signal bars. There are other significant changes that are not visual but I think they could have done a lot more to revamp IOS. I will not really know what I think of it until I get my hands on it but for the moment I am not a huge fan of the visual appearance, I think that they could have done more.
One of the things that I took away from the overview they gave us of IOS 7 today was that they have taken some things from Android and have put their Apple spin on it. One of these things is the lock screen; instead of the traditional slide to unlock we have become accustomed to with Apple devices they have now lost the slide to unlock bar that used to be and now just have the text and the arrows pointing upwards, similar to many Android devices. I am not sure why Apple have done this, I have never seen anything wrong with the slide to unlock and the only reason I can think of this is that they completely wanted to revamp IOS. Another feature they I feel that they have slightly taken inspiration from Android is their new multitasking. The multitasking on older versions of IOS left a lot to be desired I felt and was never true multitasking, however, their new multitasking, similar to Android, appears to be a lot better. Just like the previous version you double tap the home button and you enter the multitasking screen and, although Apple were not clear on this, it looked like you could see live previews of the apps and now supports all third apps which is a vast improvement and then you will be able to close apps by hitting the "x".
There are many new features in IOS 7, some of the great, some of them not. From what I have seen so far my favourite would have to be control centre. This is a great addition to IOS and this is something that has been missing from all mobile OS's I feel even though on Android you can get apps which do something similar it would be great to get something like this stock. Control centre allows you to swipe up from the bottom of your screen and quickly access many key features such as brightness, wi-fi, air plane mode, change your music track and other great things. This is a really convenient way of changing many things quickly efficiently and I feel this is one of the best additions to IOS 7.
Safari is another feature that has been updated for IOS 7 and appears to be quite a lot better. It opens up into full screen browsing and allows you to pull down the search bar. Another new feature is the new UI for tabs. Instead of the traditional bars at the top of safari underneath the search bar you now press the tab button and you are taken to a screen where you can browse through all your tabs similar to a vertical cover flow. It looks pretty nice but I still think that I prefer that the Chrome tabs, although it is a huge improvement.
Another major update that they have done in IOS 7 is the camera app. They have added filters, similar to Instagram, to give the photos a more "professional" look which I think I think is a nice feature and instead of having to tap a button to change what camera mode you are in such as HDR or panorama you just swipe across the page. I think this is a great addition as it allows users to quickly change between modes to get the photo that they desire quickly. Along with changes to the camera they have redesigned the photo app for the first time since the iPhone was released. The main introduction into the photos app is Moments which is a new way to organize your photos and videos based on time and location.When looking at the Moments screen you can zoom out and it will show you your photos organized by the collection and Moments and then if you zoom out again it will show all your photos from different years. I am not sure how I feel about this and will have to wait and see until I get my hands on it. You can also share photos by the iCloud now.
IOS 7 has also added a few other neat features. One of these being if you tilt your screen your background will rotate with it so it will remain flat whatever angle you are looking at it. It also responds to the background colour that you have by changing the colour of certain to that such as the unlock screen for your pass code. These are quite nice little features but nothing too big.
There were some other updates as well such as updates to the music apps and to Siri and the addition of air drop but I will not be covering these now.
I will not be able to get my hands onto IOS 7 until it is fully released as I am not a developer unfortunately. Thanks for reading and hope you enjoyed my take on IOS 7. Keep an eye out on my blog as I will covering other things that were announced at Apple's WWDC and also things that were announced at E3.
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