Not too often does engineering and magic co-exist but Apple believes so in their soon to be launched iOS 5 that was recently unveiled at their developer conference WWDC 2011.

Apple’s main message was mostly to do with their iCloud solution and how it will allow for syncing content from your iPhone, iPad and iMac seamlessly and how “it simply works”  but a large and more interesting focus during the conference was to do with Apple’s newest launch of iOS.

As Pacific Cellular is a provider for iPhones we thought it would be nice to give you a rundown of what to expect when iOS5 hits the street in the fall.

Notification Center
How notifications previously occurred on the iPhone was a bit of a sore spot for many Apple owners; an archaic popup notification would come up on screen when you received a text message or an alert. Apple has taken the Android approach in iOS5 and has made a place for all notifications in a drawer like place where you can swipe down from the top of the screen and see a list of all of your various alters and notifications. The more recent notifications are listed on the top of the screen and color coded based on if missed or not.  Lastly that a stock and weather updates are now nested in the notifications tray for quicker access than going to the separate app.

When you receive a new notification they also appear on the top of your screen in an unobtrusive manner and then will disappear if not selected. Notifications also will reside on the lock menu so you can at a glance look to see all the exciting things occurring while you ignore your iPhone during a meeting.

iMessage
Blackberry rise in the consumer market and claim to fame was BBM (blackberry messager)  and Apple never had any competitive solutions to sway hardcore Blackberry users…until now. iMessage is pretty much the same as blackberry messager where it sends encrypted short messages to other like devices (iOS 5 devices only) and isn’t considered a text message but the data consumed sending that message is taken off your Bell data allotment.  All the messages reside in one area on the iPhone and will be color coded to indicate if an iMessage or a regular SMS message.  This “magical” messaging service will also allow users to see sent, delivered and read notifications so can always know if the other party has received it.

Newsstand
Want to read your “The Economist” or “Time” magazines on your iPhone or Ipad?  Well now you can; just like iBooks were launched with the last major release of the OS, iOS 5 allows people to purchase and read publications on the go. Once you have a subscription, new issues will automatically get pushed down to the device.

Twitter
iOS 5 will include native Twitter integration. It will be possible to Tweet websites in Safari or photos within the Camera app.  If you don’t use twitter now would be the perfect time to jump on the bandwagon as it seems like these crazy will be around for good.

Reminders
One of the biggest things missing from iPhones in the past is the reminders application.  This way now you can list tasks to assist you in organizing your life and prioritizing your day.

Camera
The improvements on the camera application are somewhat substantial if taking photos on your smartphone is a regular occurrence. You now would be able to edit photos on the go by adding basic features such as auto-enhance, red eye reduction, rotation, and cropping.  While taking a photo you can quickly jump straight into the camera feature by double tapping the home button and then while in the application you can zoom by pinching and lock focus and exposure by holding down on the part of the image.

Safari Reader and Updated Tabs
Safari on the mobile has always been abit different than on the desktop version; with IOS 5 you are able to now have the same functionality when it comes to viewing and organizing your browsing experience. Old web pages are now cached when not active so you don’t need to reload any pages when moving from one page to another.

Safari reader strips out all formatting from a webpage and leaves you with raw text and images which gives you a larger clearer view of the content you are reading.

Odds and Ends
Out of more than the 200 new user features we simply couldn’t summarize them all in a nice little article.  Here are some of other various new features that were left out.

Feel free to get a demo of any iOS 4 or iOS 5 (when launched) features at any of our locations. Our Apple certified staff are more than happy to assist.