iOS7 and other Apple WWDC announcements: Very early thoughts

This week, Apple kicked off its annual WorldWide Developers Conference (WWDC). Apple uses the keynote for WWDC to announce its annual updates to iOS and MacOSX. This year, on June 10th, Apple kicked off the conference with something rare for it in the recent years, expectation. Apple tends to be the market leader and its product launches are sureshots. This year, very many questions have been asked about Apple losing its innovation credentials and becoming a boring value company. Apple was expected to show that it is still one of the benchmarks for innovation in the business.iOS7All eyes were on a much rumored redesign of iOS7. Last Fall, the iOS boss, Scott Forstall left the company. He was credited with much of the skeuomorphic elements in iOS. While it was unique in 2007, the mobile OS design paradigm has shifted significantly in the last few years towards a flatter UI with clean and simple design. Much of the credit for this new design goes to Microsoft with its Metro UI which made its appearance in Windows Phone 7 and has since become part of all Microsoft products from Xbox 360 to Windows Phone 8 to Windows 8.Jony Ive, the hardware design guru credited with the hardware innovations on the iPhone and iPad replaced Scott Forstall as the design head for software and his stamp was expected on iOS7. True to expectation, iOS7 is a completely redesign of the UI elements of the OS. For a complete breakdown of the new look iOS7, see these Verge, GigaOM and Engadget articles.Here is my take on what I saw from the keynote. iOS7 is a clean new take on iOS. It looks simple and minimalist without garish embellishments (old Notes, GameCenter and Calendar apps, anyone?). But a lot of it is clearly inspired from other OS's. The multitasking on iOS7 is strongly inspired from webOS card based system. A friend and ex-Palm engineer went so far to call it iwebOS.The new notifications pull-up menu is inspired strongly from Android. The new weather animations on iOS7 remind me of HTC Sense default weather app. The new Settings menu looks an awful lot like the one Samsung packs with its Galaxy devices.And then there is the UI. There is no better homage and show of respect to the original Metro UI designers at Microsoft than what Ive has done with the new iOS 7. Outside of the large fonts, so much of the new UX looks like what Microsoft created originally. Lot of white space (recently spotted in Android Jelly Bean also), flat and clean lines and very simple flourishes. Apple adds in 3D perspective on some apps which is intriguing but otherwise it is as 2D as it gets.With much of iOS7, there is Apple playing catch up with all other mobile OS's and bringing their own to parity. And that is not a bad thing. Apple is better at pulling all these individual ideas from elsewhere into a cohesive whole and it seems to be doing that with iOS7. For a non-geek consumer which is Apple's forte, there is so much improvement from the old iOS that it will be lapped up. People will take some time adjusting to the new icons for apps but once the adjustment period is over, there will be lots of love for iOS7.Apple will use its "inspired and borrowed" ideas to make iOS7 better and more a template for future iterations of the OS. As ReadWrite summed it up,  Apple knows how to craft a winner from borrowed ideas.Other AnnouncementsWhile iOS7 was the main event for the keynote conference, there were a lot of other announcements from Apple. Quite a few for a 2 hour show. Apple announced the next version of its Mac OSX operation system- Mavericks.Mavericks looks like an incremental update to the OS. There are a bunch of small but interesting updates to the OS like finder tabs, tagging and more. Of greater interest is the increased integration with the iOS. Apple Maps is coming to Mac as is iBooks. Both of them are overdue because all competitors offer the service. Also "Chrome to Phone" like functionality "Send to iOS" is coming to Mac/iOS Maps. Notifications will also be shared across OSX and iOS. A bunch of low level power and memory usage optimizations were unveiled which makes the OS a battery sipper. Overall, a much needed update without any single major feature.Apple announced its Pandora competitor with iTunes Radio. It is exactly the same kind of service like Pandora- comes free with ads and free without ads with an iTunes Match subscription. A version of iWork for iCloud was also previewed.MacBook Air was refreshed with the new Intel Haswell processor giving it an awesome 12 hours of battery life (Macbook Air 13 inch). At $1099, the Macbook Air continues to be one of the best laptop offerings in the market, period.The most intriguing announcement was a completely and radically redesigned Mac Pro which is not scheduled for launch until Fall. The cylindrical looking box looking very unique and time will tell if it matches with performance. The MacPros have always been pricey offerings and there is no indication this will be any different. Of interest is the fact that the new MacPros will be built in the US.In ConclusionApple had a lot of announcements stacked up for the day. Having slotted iPad launches for Spring/Fall and iPhone/Music launches for Fall, summer has become the OSX and iOS update time. Additional PC refreshes  also seem to tag along for summer and fall based on the product. So a refresh to Macbook Air, MacPro and iWork were all expected and long due.iOS7 was the most important part of the conference and rightfully so. After 7 years, this is the first time things feel really refreshed. The iOS design while completely utilitarian and minimalistic was also getting stale and boring. iOS7 redoes much of the OS and offers everything in a new light.Everything old is new again.