WatchOS 10 Gets New Watch Faces, Redesigned Apps And More

Apple unveiled watchOS 10 today at its Worldwide Developer Conference, with new watch faces, updated apps, and a new Smart Stack that shows pertinent widgets only when they are required.

For bikers, there are new metrics, workout views, and Bluetooth connectivity for power meters, speed sensors, and cadence sensors. For hikers, there are new compass waypoints and maps features. The Mindfulness app provides extra resources to help with mental wellness. Currently available as a developer beta, watchOS 10 will become a free software update this autumn.

The Apple Watch display is being used more by apps like Weather, Stocks, Home, Maps, Messages, World Clock, and others to provide more glanceable information. According to Kevin Lynch, Apple's vice president of technology, the Activity app for Apple Watch and the Fitness app on iPhone make monitoring daily movement even easier with additional details, improvements to sharing, a new trophy case, and Apple Fitness+ trainer suggestions.

With a flip of the Digital Crown from any watch face, a new Smart Stack's widgets can be unlocked to deliver timely information that adjusts to the user's context. For instance, Weather might display the forecast in the morning, while the Smart Stack might display boarding tickets from Wallet when you're flying.

Reminders and Calendar will move up to the top to show future events or tasks, and running apps like Podcasts will also move up for easier access. Users can enjoy watch faces like Portraits with Smart Stack while still having rapid access to the information they care about.

The new design language can be used by developers to upgrade their apps. The NBA app makes following a favorite team even more compelling with team colors and new game details, and with Waterllama's redesign, users can quickly glance at their hydration from the last seven days with just a turn of the Digital Crown, according to Lynch. For instance, Streaks now makes use of the entire display to show progress and access tasks.

The side button now makes it possible to swiftly activate Control Center over any app at any moment. Any recently used apps can be accessed by double-clicking the Digital Crown.

NEW WATCH FACE

Palette and Snoopy are two of the new watch faces that come with watchOS 10. The Palette face uses three unique overlapping layers to represent time in a wide range of colors, and as the time changes, so do the colors on the display.

Additionally, a brand-new watch face with images of Snoopy and Woodstock brings the Peanuts comic strip to life on the Apple Watch. The characters converse and play with the watch hands, respond to the local weather, and even become active when the user exercises.

MENTAL HEALTH

Users of watchOS 10 can record their everyday moods and fleeting emotions using the Mindfulness app. Users can choose how they're feeling, determine what is having the largest impact on them, and describe how they're feeling by turning the Digital Crown to scroll among multidimensional shapes.

Users can view insights to determine what may be influencing their state of mind in the Health app in iOS 17 and iPadOS 17 — whether it be associations or lifestyle elements like sleep or exercise. Additionally, the Health app now has access to depression and anxiety exams that are frequently used in clinics. These assessments may be used to identify risk, connect users to local resources, and generate PDFs that can be shared with their doctor.

SIGHT HEALTH

Nearsightedness, or myopia, is the most common cause of vision impairment worldwide. The International Myopia Institute advises kids to spend at least 80 to 120 minutes a day outside to lower their chance of developing myopia. With watchOS 10, Apple Watch adds the capability to use the ambient light sensor to track time spent outdoors. On an iPhone or iPad, users can examine this data in the Health app.

All ages can benefit further from time spent outdoors in terms of their physical and mental wellbeing. Additionally, kids who don't have their own iPhone can use Family Setup to connect their Apple Watch to their parent's iPhone so that their parents can see how much time their children spend outdoors thanks to Health Sharing.

Myopia risk factors include reading too closely and using devices or other objects up close. In order to encourage users to move their smartphone farther away after holding it closer than 12 inches for an extended period of time, Apple claims the new Screen Distance feature makes use of the same TrueDepth camera that underpins Face ID in iPad and iPhone.

When a device is locked with a passcode, Touch ID, or Face ID, all Health app data, including mental health and vision health data, is encrypted.

ACCORDING TO APPLE, ADDITIONAL WATCHOS 10 UPDATES INCLUDE:

• NameDrop allows users to easily share contact information by bringing Apple Watch close to someone else’s iPhone. Apple Watch users can also use NameDrop by tapping the Share button in My Card in the Contacts app, or by tapping the My Card watch face complication, and then bringing Apple Watch face to face with someone else’s Apple Watch.
• Offline maps on iPhone provide access to turn-by-turn navigation, estimated time of arrival, places in Maps, and more while away from Wi-Fi or cellular services. These features can also be used on a paired Apple Watch that is in range of its companion iPhone.
• Users can now initiate playback of a FaceTime® video message and view it directly on Apple Watch. Additionally, Group FaceTime audio is now supported on Apple Watch.
• The Medications app can send follow-up reminders if a medication hasn’t been logged 30 minutes after the scheduled time.
• Apple Fitness+ introduces Custom Plans, a new way to receive a custom workout or meditation schedule based on day, duration, workout type, and more; Stacks, which allows users to select multiple workouts and meditations to do seamlessly back to back; and Audio Focus, which gives users the ability to prioritize the volume of the music or the trainers’ voices.
• Apple Watch offers enterprise customers features to enhance productivity and safety in the office or in the field, such as hands-free communication and responding to notifications on the go, or Fall Detection on a job site. watchOS 10 introduces support for Mobile Device Management (MDM), enabling enterprise customers to remotely and centrally install apps and configure accounts on a fleet of devices, with features such as passcode enforcement, and configuring Wi-Fi and VPN settings. With this update, Apple Watch can further help improve employee wellness, productivity and health, and safety monitoring.

The developer beta of watchOS 10 is available to Apple Developer Program members at developer.apple.com starting today. A public beta will be available to watchOS users next month at beta.apple.com. watchOS 10 will be available this fall as a free software update for Apple Watch Series 4 or later paired with iPhone Xs or later, running iOS 17. Some features may not be available in all regions or all languages, or on all devices. For more information, visit apple.com/watchos/watchos-preview.

watchOS 5 Adds Walkie Talkie, Tracking Activities And More

During Apple’s WWDC 2018 keynote, Apple announced watchOS 5. This update will be making it even easier for Apple Watch owners to communicate with others and keep on track with exercising through a host of new features announced today during the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference keynote.

Apple announced that Apple Watch sales grew 60% during 2017, which explains why the device is showing up on wrists everywhere! The emphasis in watchOS 5 will be to make it easier for Watch owners to do the two things that are the primary focus of the device: communicating with others and tracking activities.

watchOS 5 will have competitions built-in where you can challenge a friend during a one week period to reach a specific level. During that week you can see how you and your competitor are both doing and offer encouragement (and taunts) designed to get them moving more. Apple has added a number of new activities to the Activity app as well. It's now possible to track yoga workouts and hikes. Hiking will give a much more accurate reading of calories burned by combining information on heart rate, elevation gain and loss, and more. 

The running activity now shows a "rolling mile pace" with the time of the last mile updated constantly. There's also a custom pace alert and a way to track cadence.

One issue that many Apple Watch fans face is starting and stopping their workouts in the Activity app. watchOS 5 brings automatic workout detection; if it sees that your heart rate and motion have suddenly increased, it will start tracking activity and do it retroactively to the beginning of the workout. It also "sees" when activity has slowed down and can automatically end workouts.

One feature that many Apple Watch users are going to love is the new Walkie-Talkie press-to-talk function. With a tap on the name of a person you wish to talk to, you just hold down the Talk button and say what you want. No dialing or typing is involved;  you simply get a voice message to your recipient immediately. 

The Siri watch face is getting an update as well, with the newly announced Siri shortcuts (kind of a mixture of Siri suggestions and automation) coming to watchOS 5 as well. For the first time, you'll be able to add third-party apps to the Siri Watch face as well. It's no longer going to be necessary to say "Hey, Siri" to get Siri's attention with the Watch -- the Watch will listen for commands just by raising your wrist and talking. 

One great new feature is the ability to interact in notifications. For example, if a person has made a restaurant reservation in Yelp and gets a confirmation notification, they can not only confirm the reservation, but also add or subtract people from the reservation -- all in the notification.

Web content can now be viewed on Apple Watch with watchOS 5. If someone sends you a link in a message, the web page is viewable through WebKit in watchOS. If a reader-compatible page is available, that's what WebKit uses to format the information for the Watch.

The Podcasts app is coming to Apple Watch. You can ask to have podcasts automatically synced to your Watch or ask Siri to send the latest episode to your Watch. 

Apple’s 2018 WWDC Keynote Will Be Held On June 4

Apple has sent out press invitations to the 2018 Worldwide Developers Conference keynote, scheduled for Monday, June 4 at 10am PT at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California. The conference will run Jun 4-8. WWDC provides an opportunity for developers to learn more about how to create new experiences across Apple's platforms for the Mac, iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, and HomePod. Look for announcements about the upcoming versions of macOS, iOS, watchOS, and tvOS.

Apple Updates iOS, macOS, watchOS And tvOS

Apple has released updates to macOS, iOS, watchOS and tvOS that resolves an issue of crashing when an Indian language character is received by certain messaging apps.

The bug causes causes app and system crashing on iPhones, iPads, and Macs due to a specific letter in the Indian language Telugu. Apple devices can’t render the Indian character, causing apps or the entire system to crash. If the character is sent in an iMessage, for example, the recipient's Messages app will crash when the conversation is opened. 

If the character is pasted into the Safari or Chrome address bar on Mac, the browsers crash. This behavior extends to virtually any system text field on iOS and macOS, resulting in many third-party apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger being affected as well.

macOS High Sierra 10.13.3 is available at the Mac App Store via the Updates tab. You can download iOS 11.2.6 by navigating to the Software Update section of the Settings app on your iPhone and iPad. watchOS 4.2.3 can be found in the Watch iOS app on the iPhone. tvOS 11.2.6 is available from the Apple TV’s Settings app.

Apple Announces watchOS 4

During there Worldwide Developer Conference keynote today, Apple announced watchOS 4 is coming later this year. The update will provide new watch faces, one of which will be powered by Siri intelligence. The Siri face provides data that changes as the day progresses, with a rotation of the digital crown providing a 3D-list of what's been going on. Other faces include a fun Kaleidoscope face that uses images to create a moving kaleidoscopic image, and new animated Toy Story faces.

The Activity face now provides coaching, letting you know when you're getting near a goal to give you a "nudge" to keep moving. Apple's also going to provide workout challenges that are tailored to your current activity, and will provide much more exciting celebrations when you reach a goal or make a challenge. Apple also announced that many major gym equipment manufacturers are planning on supporting Apple Watch two-way syncing. This ensures that both devices see the same results in terms of calorie burn and "mileage"; expect to start seeing some of those home and professional gym devices later this year. The Music app will now automatically sync music to the Watch, and the device will support multiple playlists. Last but not least, there's a new scrolling app Dock that appears to make selecting apps a lot easier than searching all of those tiny round icons. 

UPDATE 9/13/17 - watchOS 4 will release on September 19.

Apple Sends Out Press Invitations For WWDC Keynote

Apple has sent out invitations to the press for its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) and will kick things off with a keynote address on Monday, June 5, at 10 AM PT. WWDC 2017 will be held at the McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, California. The conference will run June 5-9 and will focus on the latest versions of macOS, iOS, watchOS, and tvOS. Thoughts ? Will Apple announce any new products at the event ? I'm really interested to see what Apple adds to iOS and MacOS and how they will improve it. 

WatchOS 3 Focuses On Improving The Performance Of The Apple Watch

Today at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference keynote, Apple previewed watchOS 3, promising improved performance with the ability to launch apps instantly, enhanced navigation like the new Dock and all-new fitness and health capabilities for Apple Watch. Launch times should be “instantaneous” as watch OS 3 lets you keep your favorite apps in memory, does background updates, and refreshes data before you bring them up. This software update introduces the Breathe app, designed to encourage users to take a moment in their day to do deep breathing exercises for relaxation and stress reduction. The Activity app now includes the ability to share, compare and compete as well as enabling wheelchair users to close their Activity rings. Activity sharing is now directly connected to the Messages app, so users can communicate, motivate and celebrate with friends and family with new Smart Replies specially customized for Activity and Workouts. In watchOS 3, the Activity app experience is now optimized for wheelchair users. Wheelchair pushes contribute to all-day calorie goals, the “time to stand” reminder is now “time to roll” and there are dedicated wheelchair-specific workouts. SOS in watchOS 3 enables people in critical 

situations around the world to initiate a call with emergency services through their iPhone or while on Wi-Fi, and notify their emergency contact by simply pressing and holding the side button. The Apple Watch gets even more personal with new watch faces in watchOS 3, including Minnie Mouse, Activity and the simple and Numerals. Even more apps can launch straight from the watch face including Workout, Music or Messages. Users can also now add complications to the Photo, Motion or Timelapse watch faces. It’s easier to customize watch faces and discover third-party apps with the new Faces Gallery in the Watch app on iPhone. watchOS 3 will be available this fall as a free update to Apple Watch. Apple Watch requires iPhone 5 or later running iOS 8.2 or later. 

Apple Has Announced The Date For Its WWDC Keynote

Apple has announced that its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) keynote will take place on June 13 at 10 AM PT at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. WWDC 2016 runs June 13-17 and will show case the future of OS X, iOS, WatchOS, and tvOS. According to Apple, the Keynote and State of the Union “promise exciting reveals, providing inspiration and new opportunities to continue creating the most innovative apps in the world.”

Apple Releases Watch OS 2.0.1 For The Apple Watch

Apple has released the Watch OS 2.0.1 update for the Apple Watch. The update comes alongside the releases of iOS 9.1 today. The update adds the new emoji found in the aforementioned iOS update, as well as improvements to the battery life. Among the additional bug fixes, several address issues, such as software updates not loading and another that could cause instability when someone set Live Photo as their watch face. The update size is 62.8 MB and can be downloaded through the official Apple Watch app for iPhone. What do you think of this update ?