Apple has added the ability to format external drives in iOS 18 and iPadOS 18, the major software updates for iPhones and iPads due later this year.
While the feature likely won't be tapped by all that many users, its inclusion is fascinating in that it shows just how far Apple has moved away from its original sensibilities with the iPhone and the iPad.
The feature was discovered in the iPadOS 18 beta by artist and developer Kaleb Cadle, who posted about it to his Substack ByteBits a couple of days ago. It was later found in iOS 18 as well.
Enlarge/ Apple bragged about the thinness of the M4 iPad Pro; it's apparently a template for the company's designs going forward. (credit: Apple)
Though Apple has a reputation for prioritizing thinness in its hardware designs, the company has actually spent the last few years learning to embrace a little extra size and/or weight in its hardware. The Apple Silicon MacBook Pro designs are both thicker and heavier than the Intel-era MacBook Pros they replaced. The MacBook Air gave up its distinctive taper. Even the iPhone 15 Pro was a shade thicker than its predecessor.
But Apple is apparently planning to return to emphasizing thinness in its devices, according to reporting from Bloomberg's Mark Gurman (in a piece that is otherwise mostly about Apple's phased rollout of the AI-powered features it announced at its Worldwide Developers Conference last week).
Gurman's sources say that Apple is planning "a significantly skinnier iPhone in time for the iPhone 17 line in 2025," which presumably means that we can expect the iPhone 16 to continue in the same vein as current iPhone 15 models. The Apple Watch and MacBook Pro are also apparently on the list of devices Apple is trying to make thinner.
On Monday, Apple announced it would be integrating OpenAI's ChatGPT AI assistant into upcoming versions of its iPhone, iPad, and Mac operating systems. It paves the way for future third-party AI model integrations, but given Google's multi-billion-dollar deal with Apple for preferential web search, the OpenAI announcement inspired speculation about who is paying whom. According to a Bloomberg report published Wednesday, Apple considers ChatGPT's placement on its devices as compensation enough.
"Apple isn’t paying OpenAI as part of the partnership," writes Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman, citing people familiar with the matter who wish to remain anonymous. "Instead, Apple believes pushing OpenAI’s brand and technology to hundreds of millions of its devices is of equal or greater value than monetary payments."
The Bloomberg report states that neither company expects the agreement to generate meaningful revenue in the short term, and in fact, the partnership could burn extra money for OpenAI, because it pays Microsoft to host ChatGPT's capabilities on its Azure cloud. However, OpenAI could benefit by converting free users to paid subscriptions, and Apple potentially benefits by providing easy, built-in access to ChatGPT during a time when its own in-house LLMs are still catching up.
Enlarge/ He isn't using an iPhone, but some people talk to Siri like this.
On Monday, Apple premiered "Apple Intelligence" during a wide-ranging presentation at its annual Worldwide Developers Conference in Cupertino, California. However, the heart of its new tech, an array of Apple-developed AI models, was overshadowed by the announcement of ChatGPT integration into its device operating systems.
Since rumors of the partnership first emerged, we've seen confusion on social media about why Apple didn't develop a cutting-edge GPT-4-like chatbot internally. Despite Apple's year-long development of its own large language models (LLMs), many perceived the integration of ChatGPT (and opening the door for others, like Google Gemini) as a sign of Apple's lack of innovation.
"This is really strange. Surely Apple could train a very good competing LLM if they wanted? They've had a year," wrote AI developer Benjamin De Kraker on X. Elon Musk has also been grumbling about the OpenAI deal—and spreading misconceptions about it—saying things like, "It’s patently absurd that Apple isn’t smart enough to make their own AI, yet is somehow capable of ensuring that OpenAI will protect your security & privacy!"
Yesterday at WWDC 2024 Apple announced its long-anticipated machine learning effort, a Siri overhaul dubbed "Apple Intelligence." The new system employs LLMs and diffusion model image generation while attempting to maintain a uniquely high level of privacy by splitting queries across three tiers of increasing anonymity and capability: on device, private cloud compute servers, and anonymized opt-in-only ChatGPT calls. Ars coverage on Apple Intelligence, and the ChatGPT integration.
The system will debut in the pending iOS 18, iPadOS 18, and macOS Sequoia releases and is composed of three separate layers:
1) On device, the primary mode which draws upon all personal information across apps, contacts, conversations, etc. to create a highly-detailed, user-specific context Apple refers to as a "semantic index." In addition to the ability to parse information currently displayed on screen when requested, there is a new developer API so that third-party applications can specify what kind of information Siri can draw from them, and request appropriate generated text and images. The specific information gathered and any derived data or personalized fine-tuning remains on your device, with the limited exception of difficult queries which are handed off to...
2) Private Cloud Compute, a semi-anonymous cloud-based neural network inference service hosted by Apple with exposure of personal data limited specifically to the query at hand, using a cryptographically-signed software stack and operating with a no-data-retention policy. The segment on Private Cloud Compute featured an unusually candid critique of the data harvesting common to machine learning systems by competing tech giants, without specifically naming...
3) OpenAI's ChatGPT, which will be available later this year and only with explicit user opt-in (on each individual query) for queries the new Siri detects as likely to benefit from scale beyond both on-device hardware and Private Cloud Compute. Data sent to OpenAI is heavily anonymized and multi-modal (meaning combined text and images) for asking questions about an image. Apple mentioned that other models may later become available, but did not specify whether this meant Google's Gemini, Facebook's Llama-3, or potentially even self-hosted endpoints based on open source models like Mistral 8x7b.
Apple's new iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 updates are mostly good news for users of older Apple devices—with the exception of a handful of iPads, the new updates will run on most of the same hardware that can run iOS 17 and iPadOS 17.
For iPhones, that will cover everything from the iPhone XR/XS and newer, including the 2nd-gen iPhone SE; the 7th-gen iPad and newer; the 3rd-gen iPad Air and newer; the 5th-gen iPad mini and newer; all 11-inch iPad Pros; and the 3rd-gen 12.9-inch iPad Pro and later. Here are the full support lists:
The iOS 18 support list. [credit:
Apple ]
The iPad drops support for most models with an Apple A10 or A10X processor, including the sixth-generation iPad, the 10.5-inch iPad Pro, and the second-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro.
On Monday, Apple debuted "Apple Intelligence," a new suite of free AI-powered features for iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS Sequoia that includes creating email summaries, generating images and emoji, and allowing Siri to take actions on your behalf. These features are achieved through a combination of on-device and cloud processing, with a strong emphasis on privacy. Apple says that Apple Intelligence features will be widely available later this year and will be available as a beta test for developers this summer.
The announcements came during a livestream WWDC keynote and a simultaneous event attended by the press on Apple's campus in Cupertino, California. In an introduction, Apple CEO Tim Cook said the company has been using machine learning for years, but the introduction of large language models (LLMs) presents new opportunities to elevate the capabilities of Apple products. He emphasized the need for both personalization and privacy in Apple's approach.
At last year's WWDC, Apple avoided using the term "AI" completely, instead preferring terms like "machine learning" as Apple's way of avoiding buzzy hype while integrating applications of AI into apps in useful ways. This year, Apple figured out a new way to largely avoid the abbreviation "AI" by coining "Apple Intelligence," a catchall branding term that refers to a broad group of machine learning, LLM, and image generation technologies. By our count, the term "AI" was used sparingly in the keynote—most notably near the end of the presentation when Apple executive Craig Federighi said, "It's AI for the rest of us."
The biggest feature in iOS 18, the one that affects the most people, was a single item in a comma-stuffed sentence by Apple software boss Craig Federighi: "Support for RCS."
As we noted when Apple announced its support for "RCS Universal Profile," a kind of minimum viable cross-device rich messaging, iPhone users getting RCS means SMS chains with Android users "will be slightly less awful." SMS messages will soon have read receipts, higher-quality media sending, and typing indicators, along with better security. And RCS messages can go over Wi-Fi when you don't have a cellular signal. Apple is certainly downplaying a major cross-platform compatibility upgrade, but it's a notable quality-of-life boost.
Prioritized notifications through Apple Intelligence
Apple Intelligence, the new Siri, and the iPhone
iOS 18 is one of the major beneficiaries of Apple's AI rollout, dubbed "Apple Intelligence." Apple Intelligence promises to help iPhone users create and understand language and images, with the proper context from your phone's apps: photos, calendar, email, messages, and more.
Apple, a latecomer to artificial intelligence, has struck a deal with OpenAI and developed tools to improve its Siri voice assistant, which it is set to showcase on Monday.
They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.
We’ve published posts on how to back up your iPhone to iCloud, and how to backup an iPhone to a Mac. Another method is to backup using the iTunes app on a Windows system.
Choose whichever backup method works best for you, and will continue to work.
They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.
One of the most cost effective ways to backup your iPhone is to save backups to your Mac. Backups are made automatically whenever you connect your iPhone to your Mac with a lead. Be aware though that backups can take up a lot of space on your Mac, and that if your Mac is lost, stolen, or inoperable, then you won’t be able to access your iPhone backups. If you need daily backups or backups that can always be accessed from anywhere, you may prefer to backup your iPhone to iCloud.
This guide tells you how to enable backups to your Mac, and how to check that everything is working as you expect.
First, connect your iPhone or iPad to a Mac using a cable.
Open the Finder app and select your iPhone from the list of Locations.
Click General.
Under Backups, choose Back up all of the data on your iPhone to this Mac.
To encrypt your backup data and protect it with a password, select Encrypt local backup. You will be prompted for a password.
Click Back Up Now.
We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it
They say the only backup you ever regret is the one you didn’t make. iPhone backups can be used to easily move your apps and data to a new phone, to recover things you’ve lost, or to fix things that have failed.
The most convenient way to backup your iPhone is to have it backup to iCloud. Backups are made every day, automatically, provided your phone is connected to power and locked. Be aware though that backups take take up a lot of your iCloud storage, and your phones’ data plan if you choose to backup when you aren’t connected to Wi-Fi. If those are likely to be problems for you, you might prefer to backup your iPhone to your Mac.
This guide tells you how to enable backups to iCloud, and how to check that everything is working as you expect.
Open the Settings app.
Then tap where you see your name and Apple ID, iCloud+, Media & Purchases.
Next, tap iCloud.
Scroll down and tap iCloud Backup.
Toggle Back Up This iPhone to on.
This may reveal a Back Up Over Cellular Data or Back Up Over Mobile Data toggle. This creates backups when you aren’t connected to Wi-Fi. Because backups can use a lot of data, toggling this on may cause you to exceed your data plan.
Once you have made a backup, you can access it from this screen under ALL DEVICE BACKUPS.
You can return to the previous screen by tapping the < iCloud link at the top. This screen shows you how much storage space your backups are using. To see a little more detail, tap Manage Account Storage.
Scroll down the list of apps until you see Backups to see how much storage your backups are using.
We don’t just report on phone security—we provide it
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