Caixin News Agency, June 11th (Reporter Tang Zhixiao) The annual Apple Developer Conference has officially been held.
As in previous conferences, Apple introduced hardware system updates such as iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS Sequoia, watchOS 18, tvOS 18, etc. This time, Vision Pro has welcomed its first system version update.
Apple CEO Tim Cook announced that the Vision Pro will be officially launched in multiple countries including China, Singapore, and Japan, with a starting price of 29999 RMB. Pre orders will be accepted on June 14th and will be released on June 28th, with a limit of 2 units per customer.
Apple has officially released its first generative AI model, Apple Intelligence. Siri will have higher permissions, support natural language understanding, analyze content and instructions in different applications, automatically polish emails, summarize memos, and implement generative images. At the same time, it will support text generation and provide various styles such as sketches, illustrations, and animations.
Apple Intelligence has two processing methods: end-to-end testing and cloud processing. Apple emphasizes that Apple Intelligence's private cloud computing has chip level data protection, and all data will not be stored. Apple also cannot access related data, ensuring user privacy and security.
The big Apple model has finally arrived
Apple's AI model, Apple Intelligence, is the focus and finale of this press conference.
Apple stated that its intelligence has a powerful, intuitive, complete, personal, and personal five fold feature, placing generative models at the core of iPhone, iPad, and Mac.
Specifically, Apple Intelligence has the following characteristics:
Firstly, it supports natural language understanding and can automatically recognize the importance level of notifications for reordering. It can not only automatically polish emails and summarize memos, but also achieve generative images;
Secondly, it supports global analysis of content in different applications and cross application adjustment of data and information;
Thirdly, it supports private cloud computing technology. If the computing power on the terminal side is insufficient to support task processing, it will be sent to the private cloud for computing.
Apple also emphasizes that all information adjustments have the highest level of privacy protection, do not collect data, only process data, and private cloud computing has chip level data protection.
Siri is the most beneficial application for Apple Intelligence this time. Not only has the icon been updated, but it will also add a "screen recognition" function, which can add addresses from information to contact information, extract flight information from emails, and automatically fill in ID numbers.
Common text proofreading and polishing, text generation of images and emoji, AI retouching, and even call recording functions are also logged into iPhone.
Apple also announced that Siri will be able to connect to GPT-4o in the future, but its access requests will not be recorded. This feature will support multi terminal systems such as iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS, but currently only some devices support it, such as the iPhone 15 Pro series, terminals equipped with M1 and later released chips.
It is worth noting that Apple Intelligence is still in an internal development testing state and will not be immediately available to developers until the fall of this year. Currently, Apple Intelligence only supports English, and Siri and device languages need to be set to English (US). Some features, more languages, and platform support will need to wait until next year.
Vision OS welcomes its first major version update
As a conference focused on software applications, Apple has released updates to operating systems such as iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS Sequoia, watchOS 18, tvOS 18, and Vision Pro has also welcomed its first major version system update.
Firstly, Vision OS 2 has added the function of converting regular photos to 3D photos and enhanced the display mode of trains/airplanes.
Apple has opened up its immersive video production technology to third parties. For example, Canon's newly launched lens will be able to shoot 360 degree videos and use Final Cut Pro for editing.
After connecting to a Mac, Vision Pro can expand to two 4K screens and support more gesture controls, creating a more free and spacious workspace.
The customization level of iOS 18 has been further improved, with application icons supporting custom colors and custom arrangements for displaying background wallpaper.
The control center supports third-party applications, and users can freely customize the size of control center components. The control center adds page card settings and swipes and switches between different page card control centers.
IOS 18 has introduced game mode, which can reduce background activity, maintain higher frame rates, and lower wireless audio transmission latency when enabled.
After the iPhone 14 series, phones will support sending satellite messages, even if the other party has not activated satellite services, they can receive messages.
The SMS application of iOS 18 has introduced support for RCS (Fusion Communication), which can send multimedia SMS similar to iMessage to Android users.
The new version of the Mac system is named macOS Sequoia, which enhances interaction with the iPhone.
The mirror phone feature has finally been introduced to macOS, allowing users to directly control and access all apps and data on the iPhone on macOS Sequoia.
Safari browser has added a web page information summary function, which can extract key information from web pages, such as phone numbers and addresses, as well as generate and outline directories for web pages.
Games have always been a weakness of Mac computers. Apple has launched a new Game Porting Toolkit 2, making it easier to port games to the Mac platform. Assassin's Creed: Shadow, Resident Evil 7, Phantom Palu, and other games will be available on Mac this year.
IPadOS 18 has added the same customization features as iOS 18, as well as the missing calculator function for many years. It has also added the Math Notes feature, allowing users to directly handwrite mathematical formulas to obtain visualized processing results.
On terminal operating systems such as iOS, macOS, iPadOS, visionOS, and Windows, Apple has launched a universal password management app that can record passwords for wireless networks, applications, websites, and other devices, as well as support the function of logging in through an Apple account.