Looks like Apple will unveil an iPad-focused operating system at WWDC later today.
As noted by Irish developer Steve Troughton-Smith, the company’s license agreement for third-party iOS development has been updated with references to “iPadOS,” strongly suggesting that the Apple tablet will at long last be finally getting a proper operating system of its own that would, presumably, take full advantage of the form factor and underlying hardware.
Holy crap it's true and on the dev downloads portal pic.twitter.com/gqPpTDmlOr
— Steve Troughton-Smith (@stroughtonsmith) June 3, 2019
Here’s an excerpted part from the updated developer agreement:
‘Apple Software’ means Apple SDKs, iOS, watchOS, tvOS, iPadOS, and/or macOS, the Provisioning Profiles, FPS SDK, FPS Deployment Package and any other software that Apple provides to You under the Program.
iPad is often criticized for being limited by its software, with some people to this date likening iOS on iPads to a scaled-up iPhone interface. There is some merit to such complaints although Apple should be credited for adding some notable iPad-only features in both iOS 12 and iOS 11.
With an iOS software branch specifically targeting iPad, Apple could implement whatever advanced features it wanted on iPad without iPhone-specific restrictions holding it back.
Some of the rumored iPad-specific features coming with iOS 12 are thought to include app windows with detachable panels for opening multiple windows within the same app (like multiple image projects in Pixelmator), mouse support as an accessibility feature, a redesigned Home screen and other changes.
What do you make of “iPadOS”?
Let us know in the comments!