Apple unveils music streaming device, changes to iOS

In a bid to counter the advance of Google's Android mobile operating system, Apple has brought radical changes to the software powering iPhones and iPads and also unveiled a new music-streaming service.

The new operating systems were unveiled by Apple chief executive, Tim Cook, as he delivered the opening address of Apple's annual WorldWide Developer Conference in San Francisco yesterday (See: Apple expected to reveal digital radio, changes to software at developers conference).

The company, which had seen its stock slump from a high of over $735.53 last September to less than $450 currently, is desperately looking for a hit product to reassure investors and customers that it was still capable of maintaining its lead.

However, with major hardware release of new iPhones and iPads not set to happen over the next few months, the focus was on new Macbook Air laptops and new operating systems for both computers and mobile devices.

In line with expectations, the new software comes with strikingly different visual cues with a flat and colourful design replacing a 3D opaque pallet featuring greys and blues. It now sports a new edge-to-edge look, using translucency to highlight underlying content, as also new typefaces and new icons.

Meanwhile, in among the longest keynotes from Apple for years, lasting two full hours, Cook and colleagues tried to fight back following a tough year. But whether this would be enough to put Apple back on track would be debatable.

Apple needed to show it could still communicate and  innovate and had fresh and appealing ideas – and lots of them, according to commentators.

However, the key to the show was the iOS reveal, the new, flatter design of iPhone and iPad software created by Jony Ive, the Briton who came out with the iconic designs for the iPhone, iPod and others. It remains to be seen though, whether it would be possible for him to change the existing software into something classier, which was important, according to commentators.

The problem with iPhone and Apple Mac software was that it pretended to be something else, so the  calendar came with a border designed to look like stitched leather, complete with a corner of torn paper visible where last month's calendar had been torn off. This is dubbed skeuomorphism, where one thing is made to look like another.

According to commentators, the transformation of iOS had been stunning, with eye-popping effects that seemed to make the background images sit behind the app icons, so that when the phone was tipped, the two moved separately.

The redesign job has been a thorough one, they point out and something as fresh as paint, and though it did not mean that the Apple system was far ahead of its rivals, it was definitely better-looking.