Apple’s upcoming wearable device, based on iOS, will run third-party applications and, furthermore, may come equipped with an App Store, according to two sources with knowledge of the new device. It is currently unclear if the App Store will be full-fledged, like on the iPhone and iPad, or if it will be a special section with in the iPhone App Store for apps that play nicely with the new wearable device.
A small handful of high-profile social network and services companies with apps on the iPhone and iPad App Store have already been seeded with a pre-release version of the Apple SDK (Software Development Kit) for wearables under strict non-disclosure agreements. One of the developers with access to the pre-release SDK is Facebook, according to a source. Facebook is also said to be finishing up work on an iOS 8-optimized version of its iPhone app with improved notifications. The social network is also experimenting with ways it can leverage the new Notification Center widget APIs.
The SDK was seeded “very recently” to these developers, and Apple likely wants to demonstrate some third-party wearable apps at Tuesday’s event, according to one source. Apple, in the past, has provided select developers with early versions of SDKs in order to boast new apps on the keynote stage. For example, several apps from companies like AOL were shown off with the first public demonstration of the iPhone SDK, fancy gaming and drawing apps were demonstrated alongside the first iPad in 2010, and the iPhone 4S’s dual-core A5 chip was launched alongside a graphics-intense video game…
The new Apple wearable will be released early next year, which will give developers of all kinds ample time to design, build, and polish their own apps by the time the new hardware actually hits the streets. The new SDK will likely have deep ties to iOS 8’s Extensions, HealthKit, and HomeKit APIs. Additionally, the Apple wearable device’s SDK will make good use of the new Continuity, Handoff, and Widgets features for iPhone users to be able to easily transfer content from the smartphone to the wearable and vice versa.
To be revealed on Tuesday, the wrist-worn Apple wearable will boast a fashionable appearance, but still function as a smart watch with fitness-centric features. Sources first revealed to us in January that the device includes a miniaturized system-on-a-chip to store a multitude of sensors ranging from sweat detectors to pulse readers to motion sensors. The device will also include new wireless sensors (including an NFC chip) to act as a conduit for Apple’s upcoming mobile payments platform.
Sources also said that a key component of the new device’s software will be mapping functionality that is reliant on the new sensors. Apple has assembled a group of fashion, fitness, payments industry executives, and medical sensor experts over the past two years to create this device, and pre-event marketing seems to indicate that the watch could live up to the hype.
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Who’s betting twitter and Facebook are some of the select few.
I was guessing Diaspora and Identi.ca
Diaspora? I haven’t even heard about them in a few years though..
Diaspora is a good shout, though relatively unknown. Apple now know it’s not just geeks and nerds that watch and read about these keynotes. Announcing Diaspora are working on an app for the iWatch won’t really help market the device. Saying that twitter and/or Facebook (the 2 biggest social networks on the planet) are working on an app to release with the iWatch will bring it to the attention of many more people.
^ WOOSH
It’s good that Facebook gets it early, they need all the time they can get, and then still won’t be able to produce an app that isn’t terrible. Just don’t run the Facebook app on your iWatch, unless you want the battery to last 20min. Remember the recent report that employees were giving it low expectations on battery life? That was while running the Facebook app. Okay okay I kid Facebook, but seriously Facebook is terrible, and the world would be better if it didn’t exist.
In the future we won’t have phones. It won’t matter how big the screen is. It’ll be about smart watches and what they’re capable of doing. For those who are sick of lugging around a cell phone are going to rejoice at the thought of only needing a smart watch. Hope to see 4G LTE capable smart watch not just one that pairs with a phone.
For many with a phone, it’s a source of much information, whether it be business or social. For portability there won’t be a better way to get so much information. Could you imagine searching the web on a smart watch? Quickly booking train tickets from a taxi because you’re late? Finding out the closest bar for you and your mates in a city you don’t know?
Apple is investing heavily in Siri which makes sense that one day you wouldn’t have to type to search or book anything you could simply say: “Hey Siri, book a flight to Cupertino” and with iWallet you’d be charged.
“Hey Siri…”…
All it takes is time for the voice and search/executing technologies to become seamless with one another.
I hope you’re kidding. People aren’t going to be calling on a watch. It also has a tiny screen, it’s good for certain things. It is in no way a phone replacement and is in no way designed to be such.
I’m not kidding at all. There’s a lot that we use today that someone at some time said we didn’t need nor would we use.
Dick Tracy used to always make phone calls on his two-way wrist TV device which looked exactly like Apple’s wearable device. He liked phoning the ladies for a quick booty call. Could you believe there were people who thought his wrist device was impossible to have?
Plug in some headphones in it and you’re good to go.
Think youre wrong: yesterdays phones had smaller screens than todays smart watches and nobody complained.
As for talking to watches, yes its awkward and looks silly at best – but consider two things: first, there are even today people walking around, headset in the ears and talking to the bottom of their phones which they are holding in front of their faces (no, not because of video calling ;) )… and second, there is a good way around it: headset – well, as long as you are using it the way its supposed to be used and not the way described under ‘first’ :D
I see enough people who constantly wear the earphone/microphone that I can see those folks using the watch phone. Not Dick Tracy style, talking to their wrist, but using it as a dial/interface device.
Smart phones will be dumb, the watches will be smart. Bring your own size
Not so fast. Sure, some day. But the break-through that Apple WILL show us is how a wrist device complements that ‘mainframe in your pocket’, i.e. the SmartPhone. The SmartPhone’s brings 3 things: A big screen for complex settings of preferences for the wearable (just like iTunes for the iPod); LTE and Wifi consume power and cost that you don’t want to add to a wrist device; The SmartPhone can accommodate a big battery, to do all the hard work, while the more passive Wrist device uses a tiny fraction of the power.
It has been rumored that Apple has set low expectations for the battery life of the iWatch (~24 hours/charge based on usage) however as technology advances, as it has in the mobile phone industry, it makes sense that with each iteration of the iWatch, we’ll see better features including a longer battery life. Just look how far we’ve come in the past ten years. This won’t be quick, but I think it’ll be eventual. Just my opinion :)
I feel like the smart watch will “replace” the smartphone like the smartphone “replaced” the PC. That is, it does a subset of things better/faster/smaller and takes advantage of its mobility and presence. Other things will remain best addressed using other tools.
I can imagine quick text messages, voice messages, health metrics, home automation, mobile payments, indoor navigation, and Apple TV being ideal candidates. I don’t ever see web browsing, video chat, reading, or those things ever working on a 1.5 inch display. Even 10 years from now there will be a place for the smartphone, even if it is unrecognizable to us today – it’s a once in a generation thing that is really still in its infancy.
“from now there will be a place for the smartphone, even if it is unrecognizable to us today”.
Why not remove Smartphone, and just use your Smartwatch, and your tablet in your bag for bigger screen?…
Excellent…..
Reblogged this on Apple Rumors.
This would explain why it won’t be released until 2015. Developers need time with the SDK.
Just like the original iPhone?
No?
Original iPhone announcement 6 months in advance had nothing to do with developers of any kind.
@PMZanetti
Whoosh… that was the point. Apple announced the original iPhone months before release, and the SDK didn’t arrive until the following year.
There’s nothing stopping them from releasing any device and later releasing the SDK for the device (if at all)… note the Apple TV.
Exactly. Developer release, followed by a consumer release. This levels out revenue and supply chain management. So nice.
An iWatch-only App Store? It doesn’t make sense to me. Installing an app on the iPhone should automatically display a new widget/app/watch face on the iWatch, not differently from Notification Center widgets in iOS 8.
It will function 100% on it’s own for many things. Pairing it with another iOS device, specifically an iPhone will add a lot more features, but this device will function on it’s own I’m sure of it.
It’s not being unveiled at the iPhone event because it’s just an accessory, it’s being unveiled at the iPhone event because it’s the best time/place to do so.
What iPhone event are you talking about? Apple hasn’t once referred to the Special Event on September 9 as an iPhone event.
Smoothie likes to rewrite my own posts :D
And, WHAT iPhone event?
No, it won’t. It will be an iPhone accessory that probably cannot even be activated without an iPhone tied to the same Apple ID.
I can almost guarantee you the WAY YOU ACTIVATE is from your iPhone.
Watch. You’ll see. This isn’t a standalone device, at all.
It’s a stand alone with many functions needing an iPhone. I’m talking about the iPhone event, that everyone knows is the iPhone event. Thought it was clear that they were about to announce the next iPhone? Did people miss the part where every year they announce a new iPhone in September? Apple doesn’t have to tell you it’s an iPhone event to know it’s an iPhone event.
Wonder how it will differ from android wear, the moto 360 looks really nice, well once apple announces there’s we just have to wait for Microsoft
The Moto 360 looks awful I think, for multiple reasons. The only acceptable looking one so far is the new LG, check it out
So far all of the watch devices have missed the mark. No one I know except a couple tech geeks have bought one. Using it is a laughable experience: they awkwardly press buttons on it and futz with their phones.
If Apple releases a watch-like device, it will have to be a game changer. A tiny smartphone + heart rate monitor miniaturized and around your wrist isn’t good enough. Dick Tracey be damned.
mildly off topic here…
it has been rumored that this wearable should record health information.
what i want to know from watch users, do you guys sleep with your watch on?
I think a lot of people will when they get this. It has to be very comfortable obviously, but it will obviously monitor your sleep and other health markers while you are sleeping, and wake you at the optimal time with vibration.
so you should wear it somewhere on your body most sensitive for vibration, I suppose
I really do think this may be a full phone…
Nike.
I may be wrong but this is the first time Apple has a countdown on their website for a keynote. What kind of devices other then smartphones have countdowns, or timers? Hint hint iwatch :)
An oven/range.
Toasters. Bombs.
iMushroomCloud
Bring it on Apple. Everything you do is awesome.
I posted a link to the real iWatch and it was censored twice. What’s going on with 9to5Mac? The Chinese leak video unmistakably showed a functional iWatch that could only have been made by Apple.
Must be fake because people “in the know” are fully aware there is no watch. That was a ruse. The real product is an iBelt. Think a fashionable utility belt, sort of like Batman’s, but available in multiple colors – including yellow/gold. ;)
In addition to all the electronics and positioning hardware, sources close to the development also say it will hold up your pants. I didn’t get confirmation if it would work with shorts at launch.
They pulled it because it’s a fake. There’s a YouTube video from June with the exact same footage and it clearly states it’s somebody’s render, not an Apple device.
It’s clearly not a render. Not even Michael Bay’s guys could fake a video like that which goes in and out of focus. The quality of the hardware and the way it comes to life is all Apple. If it was pulled it’s because Apple told them to pull it.
You talking about the video where the guy says ‘oh shut’ at the end?
Yeah, and if it’s old news as I’m being told then it was purposefully swept under the rug by Apple. No one on Earth has the resources to make a functional mock up with that super high quality and the animations are not fake since the camera is moving. That’s either the ladies iWatch or a near-ready prototype of it. The bracelet design tapers into a shape that would be so hard to for anyone but Apple to design and manufacture.
Jorge, that video, to anyone really good with the 3D package of their choice and video editing apps, is a cakewalk. Not a one day project, but doable with consumer software and hardware without any issues whatsoever.
It looks great and it looks realistic, but that’s not evidence that someone didn’t whip it all up in their cry-dedicated and brilliantly executed spare time. Cost be damned, if you have the talent and are willing to spend the time, theres no additional monetary cost.
Bruno hate to tell you but you’re delusional if you think this can be done with a laptop and a 3d suite. Not like this. Show me one example on youtube or anywhere else of CGI of this quality. One of us will be wrong in 2 days if i am i will come back here and eat crow.
I’m more interested in the future SDK for CarPlay. It seems most consumers won’t bother to do a ton on their smartwatch with such a small screen, limited battery life, etc.