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watchOS

219 'watchOS' stories June 2015
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Simple, minimalistic, small: The platform for the best smartwatch on the market

watchOS only runs on the Apple Watch and launched alongside the product back in 2015. It has seen several major revisions since its launch, such as axing glances, the friends UI, and more.

The original version of the software was very slow and relied on your iPhone for its apps. Everything presumably ran over Bluetooth, and would be unable to open any apps if your connected iPhone was out of range.

Apple quickly moved away from interaction model and pushed native applications as of watchOS 2.0, where the majority of the app’s interface and information were installed on your Apple Watch, instead of your iPhone.

watchOS 3.0 added support for background app refresh, which allowed apps to run in the background, but also enabled complications to be updated without needing to completely launch an app.

With watchOS 4.0, and the Apple Watch Series 3 with LTE, Apple took this interaction model a step further. The company introduced APIs to allow applications to run completely independently of the iPhone. This meant that users were allowed to stream Apple Music, get the latest News, or take a phone call without being in the range of your iPhone. However, an iPhone is still required to setup and manage your Apple Watch.

Learn more about watchOS by reading the articles below:

Apple announces watchOS 2 with third-party Apple Watch apps, new Timepieces, video playback, much more

Avatar for Jeremy Horwitz Jun 8 2015 - 11:30 am PT
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Apple today announced watchOS 2, a new version of the operating system for the increasingly available Apple Watch, promising support for native third-party apps, on-screen video playback, and a collection of many new features for both users and developers. The developer beta for watchOS 2 will be available today, and offered for free to everyone in the fall.

“For us, this is a giant moment,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook, discussing opening up the platform to new and powerful third-party uses before introducing Kevin Lynch to detail features, including…

New Timepiece functions: Apple is adding Photo face, Photo Album face, and a Time-Lapse Face covering five different cities to the collection of Watch faces; Photo and Time-Lapse were slated to be part of watchOS 1.0, but didn’t make the cut. Additionally, Complications are being opened to developers; they’ll work on Modular face and others that support Complications currently. Twisting the Digital Crown, a new feature called Time Travel will let you see meetings and other events in the future all getting updated as the clock moves forward. Additionally, a new Nightstand mode will display the time and an alarm, when the Watch is laid on its side during charging on your nightstand.

Communication: You will now be able to add friends directly through the Friends secreen, and use multiple colors in Digital Touch drawings. Mail will let you reply to email, and Phone will let you receive FaceTime Audio calls with superior audio quality to regular phone calls.

Many more new features, including video playback, are discussed below…


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Simple geometric banners depicting iOS, OS X and ‘watchOS’ spotted at WWDC

Avatar for Benjamin Mayo Jun 7 2015 - 3:37 am PT
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MacStories’ Federico Viticci has posted an interesting image of WWDC banners from the second-floor of Moscone West, the WWDC event venue.

These images show Apple highlighting its three platforms: iOS, OS X and watchOS. These banners do not follow the same pattern as previous years with dramatic photography in rectangular banners. These are more like full-height wall posters with simpler geometric logos. Each image has the name of Apple’s OS written in a light font-face (the image is not clear enough to see whether this is Sans Francisco) on a simple background of multicoloured translucent shapes.

What’s particularly striking about this photo is that it confirms a rebranding of Apple’s smartwatch operating system. On Apple’s current public marketing, the Apple Watch is described as running ‘Watch OS’. By these banners, it can be seen that the new name for this platform is actually ‘watchOS’.
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