Apple Glasses: arrive in 2020 with an rOS operating system

Exactly as Bloomberg vaticinava a couple of years ago, the usually well-informed Ming-Chi Kuo confirms the rumors about Cupertino’s Augmented Reality smart glasses. And it raises: they will arrive in 2020 and will be based on a special operating system, called “rOS” that is “reality operating system.”

They seemed to have put a stone on it, in Cupertino, but no: here it comes back to talking about iGlasses, Apple’s Augmented Reality glasses. It all started in 2017, when the Nikkei Asian Review unveiled the secret plans of Catcher Technology – a key Taiwan-based Apple partner to assemble the first Apple smart glasses, along with components for iPhone, iPad and Mac:

“Based on what we have learned, [the new smart glasses] should be beautiful to look at and light to wear […] which makes the mounting of such a device very difficult to produce, and there are still several challenges to solve at present , “Catcher president Allen Horng revealed in front of the audience of analysts at the conference on the latest fiscal data.”

Obviously, mouths sewn on the client who, in theory, could be another compared to Apple, but the doubt is legitimate. Already at the time we knew that Apple is exploring the possibility of creating digital glasses that can connect to the iPhone and “show images and other information directly in the user’s visual field” and certainly there is more than one prototype in circulation, otherwise how to explain the mysterious sight accidents that happened recently at the Campus?

Tim Cook, then, was lapidary and exceptionally talkative about it: “there is still no such technology,” he said, “which allows us to do it with quality. The technology required for the display, and all the equipment that should be put on around the face represents a gigantic challenge in this sense. The field of vision, the quality of the display itself, are simply not yet up to par. ” Which certainly does not mean that they do not continue to try; that’s why, no matter what the iCEO says, we are certain that the iGlasses chapter is anything but closed.

Reality OS

“Just as tvOS runs Apple TV, macOS runs on Mac and watchOS on Apple Watch,” wrote Bloomberg in 2017, “‘rOS’ will make Apple glasses work. Geoff Stahl, former software manager for games and graphics at Apple, is one of the managers of the rOS software group. ” Secret group named with the code name T288, which is the same one that we have to ARKit.

The development lineup defined by the management is “very aggressive” and may simply prove too bold for this product; also because, as far as we know, the user-glasses interaction method has not yet been defined. There is talk of a set of touch displays, voice commands and head gestures, and new prototypes are baked at cyclical intervals:

Engineers are thinking about a number of applications, from maps to messaging, to more advanced features including meetings in virtual rooms and 360 ‘video playback. The company had discussed the possibility of combining a special version of the App Store to download content, just like it does on the iPhone, Watch, Apple TV and Mac.

However while Apple develops proprietary hardware, based mostly on the Oculus Gear VR in combination with iPhone and other hardware, the software is tested on HTC Vive devices. If and when the right combination of hardware, software and “irreplaceable applications” is found, the product will begin its climb to the Apple Store: and this will not happen anyway before 2020.

Update: New Confirmations

And now Kuo is back on the attack, with a note to investors confirming product development. Apple, the analyst explains, will cooperate with third-party brands to launch its first AR product in 2020, and one of the key suppliers will be Changying Precision.

The most interesting aspect, however, is that at least in the initial phase they will not be marketed as independent products as it was rumored some time ago: they will be launched rather like a companion device, an iPhone accessory. This will make it possible to lighten the weight and production costs of the hardware for the glasses, including the rest of the necessary hardware on the smartphone.

And if we cannot yet anticipate when they will be launched with precision, we are able to say that mass production could start by the end of the year, or at the beginning of the next. The Apple Virtual Reality revolution is coming. Everyone ready?