Next Versions Of Mac OS X and iOS At WWDC

This week Mac and iOS developers gathered in San Francisco for Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference. On Monday Steve Jobs and other Apple executives talked about the upcoming releases of Mac OS X Lion, iOS 5, and the new iCloud Service.
Lion will be released in July and sold exclusively as a download in the Mac App Store for $29.99. The new OS will change how the desktop, spaces and applications work with a new Mission Control feature that will make moving between tasks more like iOS. There will also be autosaving, versioning and resuming functions as well as an updated Mail application.
iOS 5 will come out later in the fall for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. There will be a new notification center, new Safari features and updating over wi-fi. There will also be a new iOS-to-iOS messaging service.
Somewhat of a surprise is news that MobileMe will be discontinued in favor of a new iCloud service. iCloud will do some of the things that MobileMe did, such as syncing information between devices. It will also allow you to sync music, apps, photos and books. While iCloud will be free, it remains to be seen what will happen to some MobileMe services like web hosting, photo galleries, iDisk and email.
Some features of iCloud are available now. By updating to iTunes 10.3 on your Mac you can sync purchased music wirelessly. You can also browse the iBookstore using iTunes on your Mac.