Live Blog: The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009

Photo by: Pok Kusuwan

WWDC 09

Editor's Note:This was a live blog from The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco. The most current post is at the top.

3:09 PM/ET: And now I'm suffering from an historic case of numb thumb! Hope that was useful. And thanks for checking in.

3:05 PM/ET: Event is wrapping up. And it's done!

3:04 PM/ET: Short of Steve Jobs on stage, this is a home-run event for Apple . Big hardware advances (yes, I'm very surprised while investors are probably amazingly relieved!)

3:03 PM/ET: Showing the new iPhone ad to start airing soon.

Source: Apple

New iPhone 3GS

3:02 PM/ET: IPhones are also becoming more affordable! IPhone 3G drops to $99 for the 8GB version. This has to be a killer for Palm . And the new $99 version is available today. The new iPhone 3GS is available as of June 19. Aggressive pricing AND roll-out schedule. Very significant.

3:00 PM/ET: $299 for a 32GB version. The cheaper one is 16GB. Both come in black and white.

3:00 PM/ET: So how much? $199.

This is a live blog from The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco

2:59 PM/ET: Improved battery life. From 25 to 40 percent depending on video playback, music, net surfing and talk-time.

2:58 PM/ET: New built-in support for Nike+ . And now hardware encryption.

2:57 PM/ET: A digital compass, integrated into maps, and you can orient it into your heading. Neat. Accessibility is also a big deal: touch words and the phone will read it back to you if you're sight-impaired.

2:56 PM/ET: Voice control now too. Seems funny that the crowd is going so wild for some of these capabilities. My Blackberry does photos and video, and voice dialing as well. For the iPhone, it's about time. The cool thing about this voice control is that you can control ALL your apps, and graphics on the screen will prompt you for the various commands. And that again is what separates Apple from everyone else.

2:53 PM/ET: Slick video time-line and instant editing as well. And share it from the iPhone, and if "my carrier supports it," I can email it. (Another not-so-subtle knock at AT&T? Hmmmm.)

2:52 PM/ET: 30 frames per second, auto focus, auto white balance, auto exposure for the video camera.

2:51 PM/ET: "An incredible camera," says Schiller. The camera also captures video!

2:50 PM/ET: At least twice as fast as any other iPhone. 7.2 Mbps HDSPA. Brand new built in camera. Flickr says daily mobile users upload and share 3x as many photos as others. New phone features a 3 megapixel camera. Tap to Focus allows instant focus. Neat.

2:49 PM/ET: Apple unveils the iPhone 3GS, the S stands for speed.

2:48 PM/ET: An entirely new version of the iPhone 3Gs. The most powerful, fastest iPhone ever.

2:47 PM/ET: Apps available? Apple offers exponentially more apps than all other App stores. Combined.

2:46 PM/ET: 65 percent of mobile browsing is done on an iPhone or iPod Touch. That's stunning. Google's Androidat 9 percent is in second place.

2:45 PM/ET: Phil Schiller now coming back on stage. To call the iPhone 3Ga hit would be the understatement of the year he says.

2:44 PM/ET: Scott Forstall now doing some damage control. So un-Apple. Closing up the iPhone 3.0 demo, and it will be free to all iPhone users, and $9.95 for iPod Touch users, and available globally June 17.

2:43 PM/ET:Line6 and Planet Wavesare on stage for the final demo.

Digital modeling now lets you use hundreds of sounds, thanks to the MitiMobilizer, directly connecting your iPhone to your guitar and amp. It instantly changes the way your guitar sounds. Some minor tech glitches with this as well. Basically, total control of your guitar through iPhone. However, the app doesn't seem to work as advertised. The first glitch, with the science experiment from Pasco was a surprise, but now TWO big demo failures. This is weird. And really too bad. I'm sure the tech works in reality as well as theory! Also, electronic tuning too. "Which normally sounds pretty impressive," says Marcus Ryle. A big ouch.

2:38 PM/ET: You can even unlock the member car you chose using your iPhone.

2:37 PM/ET: Now bringing up zipcar and Luke Schneider. Zipcar lets members share their cars. The app shows all available zipcars nearest your location.

2:36 PM/ET: Scott Forstall is showing a science experiment. That's failing bad. Showing a balloon that's trying to inflate. Ouch. I'm sure this experiment worked a hundred times in rehearsal. And Forstall even showed up in goggles and labcoats. Oh well. Good humor all around. Too bad.

2:32 PM/ET: Now showing Pasco, a science teaching software program. ((I should mention that there are some groans now. Too many demos. The crowd seems to want to see new hardware. New iPhones. Apple has had this problem before. Steve Jobs (no, he hasn't shown up) could hold a crowd through so many demos. Those days are gone.))

2:30 PM/ET: Now ngmoco:) with co-founder Neil Young. Star Defense is the latest project. Stephanie Morgan helped develop the game and she's going through a demo. Exceptional graphics. Truly beautiful. (You hearing this Nintendo DS ? Sony PSP ?)

This is a live blog from The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco

2:26 PM/ET: Coming this Summer, TomTom for iPhone.

2:25 PM/ET: The TomTom app also comes with a windshield attachment. Excellent. Complete with charger. Nice.

2:24 PM/ET: Now bringing up TomTom, to oohs and ahhs. Peter-Frans Pauwels on stage now, talking about the very best maps and navigation now coming to the iPhone. (Did you catch that Google?)

2:23 PM/ET:Iceberg Readerfrom ScrollMotion will also feature text books!

2:21 PM/ET: Now Josh Koppel from ScrollMotion, bringing publishing content to the iPhone. Over 500 best-selling books now, and soon 50 major mags, 170 newspapers and 1 million books to the Apple App Store.

2:20 PM/ET: Dr. Cameron Powell from Airstrip Technologies. Showing Airstrip Critical Care, featuring push notification.

Think "beeper" on steroids.

Alerts about patients and then instant access to a patient's records. Better, a doctor can access all the equipment, the waveform data, coming from a patient's bedside. And then, a doctor has complete control over the data he receives by scrolling back, moving forward. Isolating key data. This could allow remote medicine in a way really never conceived before. Awaiting FDA clearance. This is very cool.

2:16 PM/ET: 27 licensed vehicles and motorcycles. Ferrari, Bughatti, Aston-Martin, Ducati. Use your car stereo as background music for your game play, accessing music from your iPhone. I assume this is for those passengers in the backseat?!

2:15 PM/ET: Now showing some developers who have already been working with OS 3.0, beginning with gameloft, a prolific games developer. Mark Hickey showing Asphalt 5.

Turn by turn directions on Google Maps using core location. Also, Push notification (scoring alerts, instant messages). Again, previously announced.

2:11 PM/ET: Now opening the iPhone to accessory makers who can build hardware that will link via software to their iPhone. Companion apps can talk through the dot connector or even wirelessly over Bluetooth.

2:11 PM/ET: Support for peer to peer connectivity. Again, something that has been announced. Great for game-players who want to play iPhone to iPhone, but any app that wants to take advantage of sharing.

2:09 PM/ET: New app for iPhone (showing a great iPhone clip from "30 Rock.") The new feature is "Find My iPhone." A service available to MobileMe customers. Log into MobileMe using any browser and it will show you on a map where your phone is. Or send an alert message so you can hear it pinging. And it even works of you left your phone in silent mode. This is the kind of tiny little detail that makes Apple so cool. And, if your phone really is stolen, you can send your phone a remote "wipe" command, and it'll erase all your personal data. If you find it? Plug it back into iTunes and just update to re-populate. This alone is an amazingly neat feature.

2:05 PM/ET: Languages: adding support for Hebrew and Arabic, Greek, Korean and Thai. Support now for 30 languages in OS 3.0. And all have portrait and landscape keyboard.

2:04 PM/ET: Support now for HTML 5 as well within Safari.

2:04 PM/ET: AutoFill remembers user names and passwords.

2:03 PM/ET: New parental controls as well. Tethering, which allows you to share your iPhone net connection with your Mac. No wi-fi? Share your net connection from your phone to your PC or Mac! Bluetooth or USB. Seamless experience, Scott says. AT&T also not named as a carrier supporter of this and the audience erupted in laughter and groans. Seems like AT&T is falling behind. This could become a big competitive issue for Apple if AT&T doesn't get its act together.

Photo by: Pok Kusuwan

WWDC09

2:00 PM/ET: Adding "Spotlight," a single location on your homescreen that lets you search across your phone.

Again, expected.

iTunes: now be able to rent and purchase movies right from your phone.

Also purchase TV shows, music videos and audio books. Support for iTunes U as well.

This is a live blog from The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco

1:58 PM/ET: Talking about adding MMS. Requires carrier support, and 29 carrier partners will support. AT&T will support "later this summer," and crowd groaned!

Hysterical.

1:57 PM/ET: Going through many of the attributes, including "Landscape," and in OS 3.0, Landscape goes to every key application.

1:56 PM/ET: Scott's back on stage. "An amazing year, and we owe it to our developers." Unveiling iPhone 3.0 and 100 new features. Cut, copy and paste, and this was unveiled at the last Apple event.

1:53 PM/ET: Now showing a video featuring some of the app developers and what they've created for this platform.

1:52 PM/ET: Sold 40 million iPhones, and iPod Touches. On April 23, 1 billion apps downloaded in just 9 months.

1:52 PM/ET: Scott Forstall now talking about iPhone. "Response has been staggering." Developers have download the software developer kit 1 million times. 50k apps on the App Store now.

1:48 PM/ET: Family pack for those with multiple Macs for $49. Developer Preview version available today, but the final release will be in September, a month ahead of Windows 7.

1:48 PM/ET: Snow Leopard available for all Intel-based Macs. $129 for Snow Leopard. But for all Leopard users, only $29. Wild applause!

1:45 PM/ET: Bertrand back on stage. MS Exchange support from 2007. Now wrapping up the Snow Leopard portion of the presentation.

1:44 PM/ET: Now giving a demo of Exchange.

1:42 PM/ET: Now talking about the Mac for business. Microsoft Exchange support in Snow Leopard, mail, iCal, address book.

1:41 PM/ET: Lots of power in the platform, and a kind of drool factor for developers here.

1:40 PM/ET: Talking graphics now. OpenGL, but Apple wants to move beyond that. Devised OpenCL, the "c" stands for computer. Hardware abstraction, C-based language, an open standard as well.

1:38 PM/ET: Now showing Grand Central Dispatch, a way to make multi-core computer engines far more efficient.

1:37 PM/ET: All major apps now running 64-bit.

1:36 PM/ET: Bertrend back on stage. Powerful new technologies in Snow Leopard. Talking about "incredible set of components." Lots of RAM, very powerful processor, and GPU with enormous raw processing power. 64-bit takes advantage of lots of applications.

1:35 PM/ET: Instant visual timeline of the video clips. Super easy to edit, and sharing options to YouTube and iTunes also one click away.

1:34 PM/ET: Now showing Safari 4. The fastest browser on any site. "Stunning speed," he says. Showing ESPN , Google Maps . Very fast. Creates a kind of dashboard of top viewed sites. Showing Full History Search. Color flow view of browsing history (think iTunes album covers on your iPod.) This is a sweet feature. You can even organize them by topic or keywords. Showing QuickTime X (ten) as well.

1:30 PM/ET: Craig Federighi, Mac OS Engineering VP is now on stage, showing Docs and Stacks. Scrolling feature is nice. Finder now adds a magnification control to make thumbnail icons bigger. Play a movie in the icon and magnify even while it's playing. Showing DocExpose, another way to look at various apps that all might be open simultaneously. Neat.

This is a live blog from The Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco.

1:27 PM/ET: 64-bit JavaScript performance is now 50 percent faster. QuickTime X also debuting. Modern foundation, hardware acceleration, ColorSync, and HTTP streaming.

1:26 PM/ET: Chinese characters also get an update, with users now being able to use the trackpad to draw the character they need, and the computer will figure out which one to enter. Character recognition. Safari 4 also ships today for Leopard, Tiger, and Windows XP and Vista (which now gives new competition to Microsoft's "Bing,"unveiled recently.) Safari 4 also coming to Snow Leopard.

1:23 PM/ET: Going through the Search feature of Snow Leopard. Showing how to de-clutter the look of your desktop and it organizes all your windows nicely. Pretty. Also, installation is now 45 percent faster than its predecessor, and you can recover 6GB of your disk space because of the size of the OS. JPEGs will also open twice as fast.

1:20 PM/ET: "We come at this from such a different place," he says. "We are proud of Leopard."

1:19 PM/ET: "Microsofthas dug quite a big hole for itself with Vista," and is now going through the big knocks on Windows, which he says will carry over into the Windows 7 operating system, "the same old technology as Vista," he says, "just another version of Vista." Ouch.

1:18 PM/ET: Leopard is the "most successful productApplehas ever had," he says.

1:17 PM/ET: Now we're moving on to Mac OS X, and Bertrand Serlet is on stage.

1:16 PM/ET: Updating the MacBookAir today as well. 1.8GHz processor for $1,499; and a 2.1GHz processor for a few hundred dollars more. Both versions $300 less than existing MacBookAirs with similar capabilities on the market today.

1:15 PM/ET: Also available as of today.

1:15 PM/ET: New version of the 13 inch MacBook as well, also with an SD card slot. Up to 8 gigs of memory storage, up to a half terabyte as well, backlit LED keyboard, and finally, a FireWire connection! And now it too is a MacBookPro, starting at $1,199.

1:13 PM/ET: It'll sell for $1,699, or $300 less than before: 2.53 GHz, 4 gigs DDR, 250GB storage, 9400M graphics, SD card slot. Goes to $2,299, but you can configure your own online. New version of the 17 inch MacBook as well, also now $300 less expensive than before, shipping today.

1:13 PM/ET: Fastest notebook ever; 3.06 Ghz and up to half a terabyte in storage.

1:12 PM/ET: Adding an SD card slot for digital camera users.

1:10 PM/ET: Same thinness, lightness. Display is more vivid than ever.

1:09 PM/ET: Up to 7 hours battery life, a 40 percent improvement. New Lithium Polymer batteries allowing for 1,000 charges, or 5 years of re-charge life.

1:08 PM/ET: Talking about the uni-body construction of the MacBooks. Even though Apple has a "huge lead," the company is unveiling a brand new version of the 15" MacBookPro.

1:08 PM/ET: Bertrand Serlet of OS X and Scott Forstall of iPhone software will join later. Now focusing on the Mac.

1:07PM/ET: Schiller showing a chart of the OS X active users. From 2002 to 2007, from 2 million to 25 million uisers. But since 2007, the number has soared to 75 million. Tripling the installed base. "Astounding."

1:06 PM/ET: Great ads. Phil Schiller now on stage.

1:03 PM/ET: Apple Refreshes iPhone, Laptops

We're just moments away and Apple, I'm told, will unveil a complete refresh of its iPhone line. While the form factors will look much the same, a source with knowledge of the new products tells me the guts of the devices will undergo a complete overhaul.

The changes include a faster processor and other new hardware innovations internal to the device. He would not be more specific.

At the same time he tells me the new phones will be priced "aggressively," spawning speculation of the first sub-$100 iPhone.

I'm also told there will be a new laptop. Details to come. The event is beginning, with a customized I'm a PC ad greeting attendees.

Hysterical.

This is a live blog from TheApple Worldwide Developers Conference 2009 at the Moscone West in San Francisco.

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