Earlier this year, GM announced that it would be ditching CarPlay and Android Auto for all of its future EVs starting in 2024 in favor of a proprietary system. Now the all-new Cadillac Escalade IQ EV has been unveiled with a massive 55-inch LED display that could offer an amazing CarPlay experience. So will the company’s popular luxury SUV turned EV get an exception? GM says nope.
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GM’s autonomous driving division, Cruise Automation, announced the launch of the beta version of its autonomous ride-sharing app currently being used by employees in San Francisco, where they operate a fleet of autonomous Chevy Bolt EV test vehicles.
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In the last few weeks we’ve heard about a poaching war between Apple and Tesla, a couple hires by Apple from the auto industry, and a whole lot of speculation followed by reports that Apple has a team of hundreds working on an electric vehicle. But who exactly is working on the project at Apple?
We can learn a lot about the scope of the research Apple is doing from the talent on the team, so we’ve talked to our sources and compiled a list of some key employees Apple has hired and assigned to the project.
A couple things we learn from the hires: Evident by this long list of automotive experts, it’s clear Apple’s ambitions go well beyond just its iOS-based CarPlay in-dash system. Well beyond software too, as many of the names below are hardware engineers coming from Tesla, Ford and other notable automotive related areas. In fact, the majority of employees on this list that are reporting to team leader Steve Zadesky come from an automotive hardware background and many only joined Apple recently or around the time Cook reportedly approved the electric car project.
Apple today seeded Xcode 6.1.1 GM (build 6A2006) to developers ahead of a public release. The release includes a number of fixes for Apple’s new Swift programming language, Interface Builder, Xcode Server, and more.
Version 6.1.1 follows Apple’s release of Xcode 6.1 in October with updated SDKs for the recently released OS X 10.10 Yosemite and iOS 8.1.
The release is available for developers to download from Apple’s developer portal now. Developers can view Apple’s full release notes for Xcode 6.1.1 here.
When iOS 8.0 launched, it shipped without support for SMS Forwarding, one of the many “Continuity” features that were demonstrated to work between iOS devices and Macs running OS X Yosemite. The reason for this was fairly simple: there was no need to include the feature if Yosemite was not yet available to the public.
Earlier this week Apple delivered the first beta version of iOS 8.1 to developers. Aside from a few design tweaks, not a whole lot of changes were visible, though there were references and initial support for Apple Pay, indicating that this would be the update to enable that feature. Now it seems the update will also activate the SMS Forwarding function.
Apple has released OS X Yosemite GM Candidate 1.0 for developers via the Mac App Store today. Candidate 1.0 of OS X Yosemite GM follows the release of the first iOS 8.1 beta to developers yesterday and Yosemite Developer Preview 8 two weeks ago. Apple is expected to debut to the new version of the Mac operating system to the public next month. We’ll update with changes found in the new version, and feel free to share any discoveries in the comments or via tips@9to5mac.com.
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Apple has pushed a Golden Master build of OS X Server for Mavericks to developers today in preparation for a release later this month. The Golden Master build is the finalized version of the software. Earlier this month Apple released the GM build of the consumer version of OS 10.9, which is expected to be one of the topics discussed at the company’s October 22nd event.
The OS X Server GM has a build number of 13S440 and is available in the OS X Developer Center.
Apple is closing in on finishing up work on OS X Mavericks ahead of its public launch, according to a source familiar with the new operating system’s development. This source says that the operating system will reach Golden Master status internally by the end of this week or early next week, and it will be labeled as a build number in the high 13A590s or low 13A600s. This will be a slight increase over the current developer build that is version 13A584. Earlier today, Apple seeded OS X Mavericks build 13A598 to members of its AppleSeed program, but it is unclear if that new version will ever reach developers.
AppleSeed members believe that this build is a GM candidate, but a source says that Apple is already internally seeding newer builds. The source has also corroborated our previous report by indicating that OS X Mavericks is currently scheduled to arrive on the Mac App Store within the last ten days of the month of October. Mavericks was supposed to reach GM status a few weeks ago, but critical bugs have kept pushing back the release, according to claims from sources.
Since being announced at WWDC, OS X Mavericks is said to have picked up a few minor unannounced features. Namely, the Messages and FaceTime applications have received the ability to block phone numbers and Apple IDs from sending the Mavericks user messages and/or FaceTime calls. This addition brings parity to iOS 7 and the two operating systems will sync in this manner. While this enhancement is probably not surprising, it has not been present in any Mavericks Developer Preview to date. (Update: The aforementioned addition is coming in a point update in the coming weeks) Mavericks will also bring the launch of iCloud Keychain…
BGR is reporting that Apple is preparing to release the final beta release of iOS 7, beta 6, sometime next week followed by a final Gold Master release ahead of Apple’s expected September 10th iPhone event. It’s not exactly that surprising, as next week would mark two weeks from the release of beta 5, and Apple was on a two week schedule prior to the Developer Center outages. BGR is also claiming that Apple plans to seed a final GM version of the software on September 5th to employees and partners and release it to developers after the event early next month:
After iOS 7 beta 6, Apple will be seeding a GM (gold master) version for its employees and partners to test starting around September 5th. This will mostly likely be the software that is released to the public later on in the month of September, barring any major bugs or problems that might be discovered… After Apple and its partners are comfortable with the gold master build, the company will release it to developers on September 10th, the day of the company’s iPhone event.
It’s not hard to predict that a GM is just around the corner, as Apple would clearly want to have it ready for its September 10th iPhone event. BGR doesn’t provide a specific source of the information, but a release of the final iOS 7 version on September 10th to developers is a given if Apple continues in the tradition of years past.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AtPakZmF_M
GM announced in November 2012 that it would bring the Siri’s Eyes Free feature to the Chevy Sonic and Spark vehicles in 2013, and it officially became the first company last month to offer the enhanced Siri integration in its vehicles. GM has today kicked off a new marketing campaign to highlight the feature that allows drivers to activate Siri through a dedicated button on the steering wheel in its 2013 Sonic.
Apple originally announced a number of automakers that would include support for the feature in future vehicles, including: BMW, Mercedes, Land Rover, Jaguar, Audi, Toyota, Chrysler, and Honda. Honda confirmed earlier this year that Siri Eyes Free would be available in its 2013 Accord, Acura RDX, and ILX models.
Some more videos showing off Siri Eyes Free are below:
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The iOS 5 GM (seeded earlier today) doesn’t require a registered UDID, which is great for users who aren’t developers and want to get an early look at iOS 5 before it is released next week. Past betas have required a registered UDID with the Developer Center to get the software running on the iOS device.
The GM, however, apparently only calls for the iOS 5 GM software itself and iTunes Beta 9, which we are letting commenters link to. We do warn you however that you should do this at your own risk. We make no claims to the validly of the software and really you should probably be paying for the cheap $100 developer license.
If you have better download links, drop them in the comment section below.
According to a posting on the Apple Developer boards this afternoon, Apple will be resetting iCloud Backup data on Thursday, September 22nd. We believe Apple is performing this reset for the release of iOS 5 GM, which will be released around the same time of the reset. iOS 5 GM will be the last release before iOS 5’s official debut in early October, like we previously reported. This reset doesn’t include data from mail, contacts, calendars, reminders, or bookmarks.
On Thursday, September 22, the iCloud Backup data will be reset. Backing up to iCloud or restoring from an iCloud backup will be unavailable from 9 AM PDT – 5 PM PDT. If you attempt a backup or restore during this time, you will receive an alert that the backup or restore was not successful. After this reset, you will be unable to restore from any backup created prior to September 22. A full backup will happen automatically the next time your device backs up to iCloud.
Along with iOS 5, we are hearing two new iPhones will be accompanying it, and will be announced in late September and available for purchase October 7th-ish. Check out last week’s post for all the details.
