Guesses on Apple Announcements at WWDC

A couple are pretty far out there, but sometimes those are the most plausible as Apple announces "crazy" things now and then.<p>&#62; iOS runtime within Mac OS to allow iPhone apps to run as Dashboard widgets and iPad apps as first-class desktop apps.<p>This one will never happen. Like Flash on touch devices iOS apps on a desktop or notebook makes little sense. No gyro, compass, gps, accelerometer.<p>Of course now that I said never Apple will announce a new line of super touch-enabled gyroscopic accelerometered displays. Shipping in September.<p>&#62; Realtime, continuous syncing of iOS devices will mean never having to plug your iPhone or iPad in to your computer again, or even the need for a computer for syncing at all.<p>Better stay next to a wall charger.<p>Task level integration and continuous media play across devices would be really awesome. Fun list :)

I usually don't pay attention to these kinds of guesses BUT this Kevin Fox really has some good insights on the pattern of Apple's strategy.<p>Apple wants to essentially create a line of physical devices varying in performance (dumb devices to smart devices), size (shuffles to desktops), and where you use it (on the go vs the living room vs the office).<p>This may sounds pretty obvious until you take into account the fact that they want a) the experience to be seamless and familiar and b) software (to how much ever extent is possible) to be as hardware independent as possible. That's what's going to make it killer. Apple wants to use the Internet functionally and practically not just recreationally.<p>iCloud being the enabler of all this? That would be quite an announcement! I think iCloud is going to be FREE since these services are what will make even the basic Apple experience so premium and worth the price tag.

I think there will be Garbage Collection added to iOS5.<p>Apple a year or two back had a big presentation at one of their WWDC's about a new multi-core garbage collection for Snow Leopard.<p>With dual core in the new iPad 2 and I imagine coming on the next iPhone this represents a perfect time to newer apps porting over.

I'm surprised no one mentioned that Facetime over 3G will probably be revealed too in iOS 5.

&#62; Universal login using your Apple account: Walk up to any Mac, sign in as a guest using your Apple account credentials and you’ll be brought to the same desktop you get on your personal machine.<p>This is interesting. It sounds to me like something people think they want, but wouldn't really use that much without a big social shift - we're too attached to personal belongings (at least here in the US), and we're too mobile and independent to share.<p>Suppose people actually did want this, or thought they did - the result on sales sounds too unpredictable and risky to try, anyway. Would people start sharing computers more, meaning fewer sales? Or would they get more users temporarily by converting Windows users, but ultimately damage their ceiling through the new shareability?<p>This sounds like a dream that no one would implement.

I have a feeling that Steve is going to announce his retirement.<p>I have nothing but a weird gut feeling to go on here, and I know it's a ridiculous idea, but because of it, I'm kind of dreading the key note.

I think the one big thing will be ... an A5 based combined set top box/high powered Wi-Fi router that allows you to opt into Apple's worldwide wireless network by powering a node (you can also pay or maybe everyone pays but the people donating bandwidth get Apple bucks).<p>Other features:<p>App Store, FaceTime, Thunderbolt (obvious).<p>Touch remote included - where do they save money vs ipod touch? no memory, lower res, monochrome? maybe eink?<p>Femtocell functionality -- Massive applause line when smiling AT&#38;T CEO shown. See, it's not an end run around the carriers. At least not totally. Or not yet.<p>Cloud gaming ala OnLive, arcade business model- bye bye consoles<p>Easy to use QoS/throttling ala Ga Tech's recently demo'd Kermit.

given this: <a href="http://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/03/itunes-leaks-automatic-download-over-the-air-updates-in-ios-5/" rel="nofollow">http://www.macrumors.com/2011/06/03/itunes-leaks-automatic-d...</a><p>app updating without syncing seems to be a go.

New Cinema displays to support Thunderbolt? That's what I'm holding out for.

All these speculations are wrong. Last night an extraterrestrial entity appeared in my dream, and it was revealed to me that Apple's big announcement will be the 'iConsole', with which Apple will enter the console market, to crush the Xbox and PS3.