It should come as no surprise, but it seems like Apple may be working on over-the-air updates for iPhone so we can finally cut the cord, almost.
9to5 Mac is reporting that Apple and Verizon have been looking to provide “wireless software updates since early this year.” Presumably Apple will negotiate with other carriers and roll this out to all iOS devices, regardless of carrier, when iOS 5 is released.
9to5 Mac notes two important issues:
- Updates are now over 600MB. Apple would have to make these smaller to get the carriers to agree to push these things as they are. We believe that Apple will make the updates much smaller by using incremental patches rather than full OS downloads
- iTunes provides the backup to the iOS device so a failed update would need some sort of backup. We think there will be a Cloud-based backup system.
With the recent 4.3.3 update sucking up over 600MB of bandwidth, it’s easy to believe Apple will likely make smaller, incremental updates as 9to5 suggests, lest you go over the stingy data cap and strain the carrier’s network. It’s also reasonable to assume that iTunes in the cloud will provide a wireless backup in case of a failed over-the-air update. Mark Gurman also points out that Apple TV does wireless updates already, so it’s time for other iOS devices to get onboard.
Apple has been on a tear lately with their cloud strategy by purchasing iCloud.com and opening a massive data center. Prepare to see a preview of iOS 5 at WWDC next month with a subsequent public release containing cloud services this fall.
via 9to5 Mac
