AppleInsider Staff
Website visits from devices running the unannounced iOS 7 have seen a significant increase in recent weeks, as Apple gears up for the mobile operating system's official unveiling at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference in June.
Traffic from devices running iOS 7 has spiked since April 29.
Traffic from devices running iOS 7 tracked by AppleInsider has spiked over the last week, server logs show. While the number of iOS 7 devices was relatively flat through April 29, appearances of the operating system grew significantly on April 30, and have persisted ever since.
A similar increase has also been seen by tablet optimization company Onswipe, TechCrunch reported on Wednesday. iPhones and iPads running iOS 7 seen online have IP addresses that can be traced to Cupertino, Calif., and San Francisco.
Apple has already publicly revealed that it plans to show off the next major update to iOS at WWDC, which will run from June 10 through 14 in San Francisco. Also promised to be showcased is OS X 10.9, Apple's next Mac operating system upgrade.
"We can’t wait to get new versions of iOS and OS X into (developers') hands at WWDC," Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller said in a press release last month.
Recent reports have claimed Apple is hard at work on the next version of iOS, and may have even seen some internal delays due to major changes to the operating system. As a result, it's rumored that Apple has reallocated some of its engineers from other teams to accelerate work on iOS 7.
Despite the "dramatic changes" that are said to be in the works, iOS 7 is still expected to release on time without holding up the launch of Apple's next iPhone. iOS 7 will mark the first major release under the direction of Human Interface team lead Jony Ive.
Apple's iOS team saw a major shakeup late last year when Scott Forstall, the head of iOS development, was ousted from the company. Forstall's preference for so-called "skeuomorphic" design elements, or those that resemble real-life objects, has been a part of iOS for years, in the form of leather textures for the iPad Calendar app, and the look of a felt casino table in Game Center.
Ive's apparent dislike for skeuomorphic design has led to expectations that many of those elements will be removed from iOS 7, giving the platform a fresh look under its new regime.
Andrew Orr
Amber Neely
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
25 Comments
I'm falling so far behind, it's not even funny. I'm just getting up to speed on iOS 6 programming! lol
Our site had it's first visitor using iOS 7.0 on 12/14/12. Since 4/1/13 we've had 12 visits, although most of those were before 4/15/13. Nothing like the sustained pattern pictured above.
Our site had it's first visitor using iOS 7.0 on 12/14/12.
Since 4/1/13 we've had 12 visits, although most of those were before 4/15/13. Nothing like the sustained pattern pictured above.
Interesting. Could you tell what screen resolutions were being run?
While I expect much of the skeuomorphic design to be gone, I don't know why that is seen as a major design change. In many cases it will take little effort upon the part of developers to remove the offending design. Beyond that I don't expect Johnny to go hog wild on killing skeuomorphism as it isn't the biggest shortcoming of iOS 6. Better uniformity yes, but I suspect much of the developer effort is going into actually improving the various apps that make up iOS base. On the flip side I'm expecting more features in iOS which I believe would be where the Big Crunch would come from. Getting new features up and running is a far bigger unknown that a few GUI changes. The fact that testing has apparently ballooned is telling, most likely indicating that they are to the point where the system is already fairly stable. This could be a sign that new iPhones will follow WWDC within a month or two. If nothing else WWDC should be very interesting this year. I'm still thinking there will be a Mac Pro replacement announcement. The internals of iOS and Mac OS should get some interesting new features. It is no wonder that the event sold out in two minutes.
Is anyone doubting that iOS 7 and OS X 10.9 will be demoed at WWDC? [quote name="Dave MacLachlan" url="/t/157429/traffic-from-apples-unannounced-ios-7-spikes-ahead-of-wwdc#post_2323931"]I'm falling so far behind, it's not even funny. I'm just getting up to speed on iOS 6 programming! lol [/quote] Try as I might I can't seem to get a handle on programming. It just seems so [I]illogical[/I]. The concepts are logical but the syntax used to create the code just doesn't register with me.