Updated! Apple announced a version of its iOS that shows up as an interface on a car radio screen when used with an Apple device.
Called “iOS in the Car,” it will be available in about a dozen car makes in 2014.
Apple said 95 percent of the cars sold now have integrated playback and control from an iPhone or iOS device. “We wanted to take that to a new level,” said Apple’s Eddy Cue at an Apple developers conference Monday.
It appears the car radio screen can mirror the screen of the iOS device, taking the integration a step further than Siri Eyes Free.
Directions and messages and other services can be read to you “eyes free,” however, with the new iOS in the Car. You can also get your music and map, “eyes free.”
Car makers including Honda, Chevrolet, Volvo, Mercedes, Nissan, Ferrari, Kia, Jaguar, and others will offer the new iOS.
Cue said of iOS in the Car, “What if you could get iOS on the screen that’s built into the car so you could make phone calls, play music, go to maps, get your iMessages right on the screen of your car or eyes free using Siri.”
Also at the conference Apple announced a new iOS 7, which launched in beta Monday for the iPhone, for developers. Apple called iOS 7 the biggest change to the iOS since the launch of the iPhone. It includes a new free iTunes Radio service with many features similar to Pandora. The iOS also now provides multi-tasking for all apps (not just some) while still preserving battery life, said the company.
iOS 7 also presents translucent layers of screens that are linked to an accelerometer so your screen gets a unique 3D in motion feel.
Siri also now gets built-in Wikipedia and Bing voice searches.
Source: Apple, The Verge, TechCrunch, Engadget, CNN
Photos via TechCrunch
