Just say no to iCloud Drive – for now

With the pending release of iOS 8 on September 17 and the subsequent availability of iCloud Drive as part of the upgrade, fair warning from some of the development and Apple press community.

You can go back and upgrade at any time, but unless you want a file-syncing nightmare on your hands, you’ll wait for Yosemite’s official release.
Macworld

As iCloud drive requires iOS 8 (let’s assume you will be upgrading) soon to be available, and OS X Yosemite which is currently not available, Mac and iOS devices will not sync through iCloud Drive if you are running an iOS 8 and OS X Mavericks (or earlier) combination.

Therefore, when upgrading to iOS 8 – select the Not Now option when confronted with the iCloud Drive screen during the installation process (once Yosemite is on your Mac, iCloud Drive can then be activated on all your devices).

Don’t use iCloud or don’t own and sync with a Mac? – upgrade and embrace iCloud Drive until your heart’s content.

Read more from two developers here:

FAQ: iOS 8 & iCloud Drive
iCloud Changes in iOS 8

Wiser Web Wednesday – WWDC Edition

Wiser Web Wednesday – a weekly link to posts of interest from around the web:

Photo courtesy Apple

Photo courtesy Apple

Another Wednesday rolls around, and for WWW this week, we’ll keep with the flavour of the moment in the Apple technology world, WWDC 2014, and the announcements which came out very early yesterday morning (Australian time). I think I’ll also avoid doing a ‘W’ character count on this post.

A reasonably large number of articles on this event have been doing the rounds, and judging by these and the rain of positivity (with perhaps the exception of the free tier of iCloud storage remaining at 5GB) in my Twitter stream, most of the announcements have been well received by both developers and those who far more capably and professionally than I, cover such news (all with nice images to boot, providing a good indication of what these things will actually look like to the end-user).

Firstly, a couple of great Aussie sites, whose authors took one for the team and attacked Tuesday’s 3am start with vigour, then had the composure to write a couple of great pieces on what they saw and heard:

Reckoner
James Croft on the improved integration planned by Apple, in a post with a great overview of OS X 10.10, Yosemite:

As I watched the keynote this morning at a cheery 3am, I was struck by how much Apple are pushing seamless integration between their platforms now. Yosemite weaves a slew of new features –passive and active, cloud and local– into its design. Most of them have a central tenant; to drastically simplify life for a user with both a Mac, iPad and iPhone.

WWDC 2014: OS X Yosemite

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, the guys have also recorded a special edition of the Reckoner podcast to discuss all things WWDC 2014:

Episode 46 | WWDC 2014

Appletalk
Benny Ling gives an idea on the magnitude of some of the forthcoming developments across the platforms:

Apple kicked things off by saying it was an even with three main focuses — OS X, iOS, and developers — and then they went on to deliver one of the biggest Apple events in recent history.

WWDC 2014 Wrap Up, Sherlock All The Things Edition

And from some of my other favourite sites:

Macstories
While Federico loaded up on espresso for the days ahead, Graham Spencer’s roundup of OS X – Yosemite:

Introduced by Apple’s Senior Vice President of Software Engineering, Craig Federighi, Yosemite brings a big new redesign to the Mac that is reminiscent of last year’s iOS 7 redesign. Continuity between OS X and iOS is also a huge aspect to the Yosemite release, including a so-called ‘Handoff’ feature, instant hotspots, and support for making phone calls and sending text messages from a Mac.

OS X Yosemite Overview

Further, there are at least a half-dozen more articles relating to WWDC 2014 announcements under the Macstories WWDC tag – espresso really does work:

Macstories WWDC 2014 Tagged Posts

512 Pixels
Stephen Hackett on the possibilities created with improved iCloud services, platform integration, continuity and Apple’s long term game plan for platform “lock in”, given the current state of affairs:

While the company’s hardware continues to be the best in the industry, Apple’s software and services have slipped in recent years. OS X and iOS are still the best two operating systems on the planet, but there are cracks in the hull.

Bridging The Gap

Apple
Of course there is always the primary source on these matters. Although I enjoy reading the opinions of those outside the mothership, clearly Apple itself provides a polished summary of the key features, and as usual, some beautiful images:

OS X Yosemite: Coming this fall
iOS 8 Preview

No doubt further, more in-depth analysis and opinion will emerge over the next few days and weeks, and if you are at all interested, checking back on the above sites for reliable information and balanced opinion (without endless rumour and speculation) would be a worthwhile endeavour.

WWDC 2014 Keynote

It was about this time last year my interest in all things tech took an upward turn. Having just started ‘blogging’, I was keen to find ways of improving my writing workflow, and given my use of Apple’s iPhone and iPad, looked forward to hearing about the changes looming in iOS 7, which I would be viewing on these devices quite often from that point onwards. Overall, despite a few bugs and crashes, I have been happy with what iOS 7 brought us.

Expectations for the announcements at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) this year? To be honest, nothing specific other than a keen interest in what Apple has planned for the future. After buying a Mac late last year, my entire (personal) digital existence now lives within this ecosystem.

OS X – Yosemite

Having tuned in early this morning (Australian time) to the live stream of the Keynote presentation kicked of by Tim Cook, the main focus was on both consumer and developer updates to both the OS X and iOS platforms.

We saw the introduction of OS X 10.10 “Yosemite” (available as a free update later in the year), continuing the new naming convention after Mavericks was introduced last year. Featured were a redesigned interface (translucent background, new app icons and sidebars); updates to Safari, Mail, Calendar and Spotlight; a today view in an expanded Notification Center which now has support for widgets; the ability to make phone calls and SMS from your Mac, along with improved interaction with iOS devices. The improvements to iOS communication include having AirDrop now active between Macs and Mobile devices (finally), and iCloud drive with the ability to sync folders on the Mac to iOS and Windows (think Dropbox).

iOS 8

As far as iOS 8 is concerned, as expected, no great change to the interface itself, however some interesting updates were evident to text input, in the form of Quicktype predictive typing and the ability to add system wide third-party keyboards. Also seen were improvements to Spotlight search and Notifcation Center, in line with the changes in OS X; better gestures for Mail; new Message thread features; a Family Sharing feature (to include Apple IDs) and the integration of iCloud drive as note above. Other features that seem very promising include “Handoff” which allows you to pick up on your Mac exactly where you left off on your mobile device, and the “Extensions” feature, allowing developers better access to inter-app communications. Two other areas Apple were rumoured to be exploring were confirmed, with both HealthKit (Personal health and fitness monitoring) and HomeKit (home automation) also shown to developers.

The above is just a small sample of what was presented this morning however I’m looking forward to seeing how these changes might improve the way I do things on both platforms, in particular, how the new integration features will assist in communication between the mobile and desktop operating systems.

A great roundup of this mornings events can be found at the The Unofficial Apple Weblog, and I believe the boys on the Reckoner Podcast will be discussing what was unveiled further this evening.