Gallery: Apple adds multitasking to iPhone 4.0

Steve Jobs announces new features to iPhone 4.0 - the biggest is multitasking for the iPhone, iPod and iPad.

By Andy Smith, Contributor on April 8, 2010

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A quick first look at scenes from Apple's iPhone 4.0 event.

Here comes a recap of the seven of the 100 user features and 1,500 developer APIs in iPhone 4.0. The first is multitasking. The developer preview is being released today. iPhone and iPod Touch users will see it this summer - for iPhone 3GS and third-generation iPod Touch. For the older devices will run most things but not multitasking - because the hardware can’t support it. iPhone OS 4 hits the iPad in the fall. For more read the live blog by Sam Diaz.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs takes the stage to announce some key features in the new iPhone OS version, which he says will be released this summer. The upgrades include multitasking, background audio, background location, voice over IP, a new folders feature, flicking between pages of apps on the phone, and the new iAd mobile advertising platform.

Meanwhile, third-generation models of the iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch will be out this summer. And the newly released iPad will get OS 4.0 in the fall.

The newly released iPad, meanwhile, will get OS 4.0 in the fall.

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Developers can access a preview of iPhone OS 4.0 beginning Thursday, Jobs says.

They can now access calendar, photo library, still and video camera data, quick look, and SMS inside their apps, Jobs says.

Photo credit: James Martin

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New custom wallpapers are demonstrated.

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Scott Forstall, senior VP of iPhone Software, takes the stage to explain how multitasking was done. "We looked at the tens of thousands of apps, and distilled down the services that these apps need to work in the background. Then we implemented these services ourselves in a way that preserves performance."

Photo credit: James Martin

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Forstall explains how you can now use audio controls on the iPhone lock screen.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Music service Pandora can now run in the background while you switch between apps. The iPod controls which work with a double tap of the home button, now work for Pandora, too.

Tim Westergren of Pandora gives a demo of how it works.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Next up, Forstall announces voice over Internet Protocol on the iPhone. He says one out of every nine international calls are connected by Skype. And now, when users are on Skype, the phone calls will keep going even when you're using other apps.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Skype's David Ponsford takes the stage to demo the application on the iPhone, noting that the service has amassed more than half a billion registered users.

Incoming call invites come in as a standard iPhone/iPod notification. Clicking the answer button just brings that app back.

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Using Skype, incoming call invites come in as a standard iPhone/iPod notification. Clicking the answer button just brings that app back.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Forstall demos the new background location services. There are two classes of applications--things like turn-by-turn directions (TomTom, Garmin, et. al.) and social-networking applications like Loopt.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Forstall says Apple is using cell towers to make new GPS services work without using a ton of power.

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There's now an indicator on the status bar to let you know if an app is using your location (kind of like the little satellite logo in Android).

Users can also enable or disable location by app in the settings menu. Apple is including a little arrow on the location services menu that will let you know if that particular app has used location within the last 24 hours.

Forstall demos the next new service, background location. He says there are two classes of applications--things like turn-by-turn directions (TomTom, Garmin, et. al.) and social-networking applications like Loopt.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Jobs gets back up on stage to announce "folders," a solution for flicking between pages of apps on the phone.

Jobs calls the folders implementation "beautiful."

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Create a folder by placing your finger on an app until it jiggles. Then you drag one app on top of another and it instantly makes a folder. The icon changes to show you a small preview of all the apps that are in there.,p>When you tap on the folder it expands to show you the apps. "You can have as many folders as you like," Jobs says.

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Jobs demos a revised mail app. Some of the new features include:?? * Unified in-box (all your various accounts in one in-box); more than one Exchange account.? * Fast in-box switching (to still switch between accounts in the new unified mailbox).? * The ability to organize by thread and group together messages by date.? * The capability to open attachments with whatever app you have installed on your machine.

Photo credit: James Martin

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iBooks is coming to the iPhone/iPod Touch. It looks like a smaller version of its iPad sibling.

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With iBooks, titles can be read on any devices. Apple is also syncing what page you're on between all those devices (as Amazon does).,p>"Winnie the Pooh" is getting bundled in as a free book.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Forstall moves on to new features for enterprise users, noting that 80 percent of Fortune 100 companies are using iPhones.

New features include:

* Better data protection. Encrypt all your e-mail, including attachments with PIN codes.

* Mobile device management. Letting IT managers deploy iPhones and manage them remotely.

* Wireless app distribution. Companies can push out custom apps over the air instead of relying on an iTunes sync.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Forstall talks about a new developer preview called "Game Center,:" a "social network for gaming." It offers matchmaking, friend invites, leaderboards, and achievements.

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Jobs announces a new platform called "iAd,"--mobile advertising that's built into OS 4.0.

Apple wants to help developers make money off their creations, Jobs says, but "most of this mobile advertising really sucks, and we thought we might be able to make some contributions."

Photo credit: James Martin

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Jobs says ads are easy on the desktop because of search. But people are spending all their time within apps. "This is where the opportunity to deliver advertising is," Jobs says.

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Jobs says the average user is spending 30 minutes a day using apps. That's 10 ads per device each day.

He says he wants to get 1 billion ad impressions per day by the end of the year.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Jobs demos iAds in a simple news reading app. If you click on a Toy Story 3 ad, for example, it takes over the whole screen.

Jobs says it's all done in HTML 5 (making a crack at Flash).

Photo credit: James Martin

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Another ad demoed has a built-in memory game users can play.

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Jobs demos an Air Jordan shoe ad within another app. It has a little horizontal time line viewer where you can see all the variations of the shoe throughout the years. There's also a Nike ID shoe making tool right within the ad.

Photo credit: James Martin

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Jobs wraps up by concluding that Apple has shown off just seven of 100 new features with the new OS. There are 1,500 new developer APIs.

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