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With only a few hours to go before Apple unveil the next iteration of the iPhone OS, I find myself wondering what they have in store for us. Last year everyone thought Copy  & Paste was coming, but Apple stated it was too far down the priority list for OS 2.0. This year is different though, as the OS matures I feel we will see more and more noteworthy features added. So what am I hoping for? What can we firmly expect?

Expected

Copy & Paste – Already well talked about on the rumor sites, this would be a welcome addition for most. Latest news suggests you will double tap on a word which then invokes the magnifier bubble, you then use it to select your text.

Multi-tasking – Ever been using an IM client and clicked on a link someone sends you? It opens Safari, then closes down your chat! Multi-tasking could solve this, but I fear it is too memory hungry to work flawlessly. I can’t see me opening a memory intensive game like Chop Sushi, then switching to Mail to read emails, then going back to the game, without any crashes.

Push Notification – Promised by Apple last September, this uses a ‘Cloud’ system where an App could store live data while it was closed, once you reopened the App, it streamed back the data off the Cloud to leave you back where you started. Either Apple have given up on it, or they have been fine tuning it all winter.

MMS - sending picture messages to other mobile users, would be handy for some, but I honestly find myself using email more and more these days. That said, being able to receive them direct to an Inbox would be a lot easier than going through your carriers website. I use an App called MMS [iTunes] for it at the moment

Wanted

Turn-by-Turn Sat Nav – If you’ve ever used your iPhone to plan a car journey you will know it’s basically no good. In fact, if you are driving alone it can become quite dangerous fiddling with the maps trying to figure out where you are! The fact no solution has been offered by a 3rd Party could be a clue.

Photo Booth – With the iPhone’s built in H264 and Core Image hardware, then why not? It works well enough with the iSight. It could even offer a video recording mode.

To-do’s – Where on earth are these? Why have Apple had the facility in Mail and iCal for so long and it’s nowhere to be seen on the iPhone? I’m putting money on this showing up in OS 3.0.

Notifications – Why does the iPhone only alert you to a text message or missed call? Why not emails too? I know it sounds bad, but a Windows Mobile style Agenda view with upcoming iCal events, To-do’s and Emails would be great.

Forwarding SMS – Ever been sent a funny joke and want to pass it on? It’s not possible without retyping it! I propose a method of holding your finger on a text bubble to bring up an menu of choices, such as Forward, Delete etc.

Phone number search – Currently you can only use the contact search to search by name. There’s been many times where a friend has asked me “whose number is this?” only for me to go through my whole phonebook looking for it!

Well that’s enough for now. I’ll be blogging my thoughts later on tonight after I’ve had a good watch of the Keynote. Stay tuned.

With the announcement that Apple are to stage an event on Tuesday 17th March to showcase the upcoming version 3.0 of the iPhone OS, everyone is left wondering if this means a new iPhone is also on the way.

It happened last year..

This time last year Apple did a similar thing. They held an iPhone OS 2.0 software roadmap event on the 6th of March. During this event they unveiled the new OS to the public, showcasing some of it’s more impressive features. The update was dated for a June 2008 release. Around the corner was Apple’s next big event, WWDC 2008, here they officially announced the iPhone 3G, and told us it would come with OS 2.0 installed.

Repeat performance?

This year the OS 3.0 event is taking place slightly later in the month, but the fact it is taking place at a similar time is interesting. Is this going to be a yearly focus? I certainly hope so. Website iPhoneFootprint have worked out possible dates for this years WWDC based on bookings taken by the Moscone Centre. The two possibilities are May 16th-22nd and June 6th-12th. The latter of which seems to be the more likely choice. So this keeps everything in a similar time frame to last years goings on, but is there any evidence yet of a new iPhone?

CSI Cupertino..

So all we really have to go on is dates. What other evidence has cropped up? Well, earlier this year we were treated to some ‘leaked’ pictures of a new iPhone casing, supposedly showcasing a new metal back, akin to the iPod Classics. Then just a few days ago we heard news of O2 UK planning on cutting the iPhone prices in May. When you put all the circumstantial evidence together, it sure does seem like a new iPhone is imminent.