What can we expect from iPhone OS 4.0?

This is a pivotal point in the life of the iPhone OS. There are any number of directions in which the little workhorse of an operating system could go, given all that is now being asked of it.

Imagine being a cell phone operating system for Apple. At first, all you needed to be was brilliant, the answer to the prayers of Apple fans everywhere, the best consumer phone OS available. Then, it was decided that you also needed to get better at the business side of things, because all those things that consumers liked about the iPhone would be useful in business as well. Lately, Steve Jobs has taken you aside and informed you that you also need to manage a device eight times bigger that ever before, and by the way, there’s a lot riding on how well you do that.

The big hope from all of those groups is that Apple will code in true multitasking, according to TechTree.com. That would make a lot of sense. Business users need it. And it seems likely that the iPad will be a lot more popular if the operating system can handle more than one application at a time. Imagine having to shut down whatever you’re doing in order to do absolutely anything else. That limitation, once known, would be likely to cost the iPad a lot of sales. There are rumors that say 4.0 will have multitasking. There are other rumors that it won’t. Apple is not saying.

Video chat, and all that portends, made an appearance for a while in a revision candidate of the upcoming OS and then reportedly disappeared as quickly as it popped up. It would, of course, require a camera on the display side to work, and then it would allow a user to not only video-chat but also to do video phone calls via VOIP, like with Skype. There is also a lot of talk about new multi-touch gestures for use in the new OS, and support for those would be great. And, of course, full support for most of what is added for the iPad should come along at no extra cost, as long as the iPhone hardware can support it.

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