It never hurts when a programming language becomes accessible to a wider audience.
During the WWDC keynote on Monday, Apple announced that Swift 2, the update to its Swift programming language, would receive significant changes.
A number of enhancements to the language are planned, adding Objective-C generics, a faster debug mode, C function pointer APIs and more.
One of the more unexpected announcements at WWDC, given the audiences reaction, was that Apple would be introducing a new programming language called Swift. Craig Federighi commented on how Objective-C had been the backbone of Mac and iOS development for 20 years, and with the phrase, “What it would be like if we had Objective-C without the baggage of C…?”, the developer crowd seemed to express its stunned approval in ooooooo’s and ahhhh’s until finally erupting in applause. According to Federighi, “It totally rules!”.
Continue if you are nerdy and excited by this sort of thing.
As we reported last month, speculation on the next revision of the Apple TV has begun. Now the Apple TV is back in the news with some speculation more focused on what kind of content Apple might be bringing along with the new hardware. The discussion has popped up smack in the middle of Comcast’s intention to buy up Time Warner Cable, which may be playing a part in how Apple moves forward with its plans for the Apple TV. It has been reported that Apple has been in negotiations with several content providers to serve up their programming directly to Apple TV users, but the media companies keep pulling out of talks fearing a loss of revenue. This leaves Apple with no choice but to deal with the cable companies for content.
You can’t knock additional streaming options if they’re offered to you…
The Walt Disney Company, while sorting out the future of the online video Web site Hulu, has an app in the works that may render Hulu passé for some people.
Per the New York Times, the app will live stream ABC programming to the phones and tablets of cable and satellite subscribers. The app could become available to some subscribers this year, according to people briefed on the project, who insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about it publicly.
With the app, ABC, a subsidiary of Disney, will become the first of the American broadcasters to provide a live Internet stream of national and local programming to people who pay for cable or satellite. The subscriber-only arrangement, sometimes called “TV Everywhere” in industry circles, preserves the cable business model that is crucial to the bottom lines of broadcasters, while giving subscribers more of what they seem to want — mobile access to TV shows. The arrangement could extend the reach of ads that appear on ABC as well.
Disney already distributes similar live streaming and on-demand apps, known as “Watch” apps, for ESPN and the Disney Channel. Special hurdles exist, however, for the ABC app, in part because of contracts between the network and the companies that produce some of its shows that were written before mobile phone video streaming was even possible. Other complexities involve ABC’s local stations, which might — if not courted properly — feel threatened by an app.
But ABC, seeing shifts in consumer behavior, is pressing forward. The network has started to talk with stations about how to include them in the live streaming app. Illustrating the difficult contractual issues, ABC offhandedly first mentioned a forthcoming Watch ABC app in a news release nine months ago, when it signed a deal with Comcast to make several Watch Disney apps available to Comcast subscribers.
But the network live streaming ability is inching closer to fruition, the people briefed on the project said. A spokesman for ABC declined to comment.
Stay tuned for additional details as they become available.
Hype from the computer industry always makes things a bit more interesting, but it’s sometimes informative.
Per CNET, an Apple job listing suggests something big will be coming to OS X 10.7.
The listing states the following:
“Are you looking to help create something totally new? Something that has never been done before and will truly amaze everyone? Are you excited by the prospect that what you helped create would be used every day by millions of Apple customers? Then come and work with the Mac OS X software engineering team to help build a new and revolutionary feature for Mac OS X.
We are looking for a senior software engineer to help us create a revolutionary new feature in the very foundations of Mac OS X. We have something truly revolutionary and really exciting in progress and it is going to require your most creative and focused efforts ever.”
The announcement goes on to further describe an ideal candidate having familiarity with HTTP protocols and other Web and Internet-based programming experience, suggesting the next version of OS X will be more integrated in the Web and networking.
Either way, it could be the start of something nifty.
Albeit Apple will now have to ponder what large and deadly cat to name Mac OS X 10.7 ever.
The best I can think of is “ocelot”…