On Monday, Apple offered up a final release candidate of iOS 4.2 to developers and begun soliciting apps built for it, suggesting that the company is close to hitting its promised mark of releasing the update in November. Apple previewed iOS 4.2 for iPhone and iPad at its September media event.
On its developer portal, Apple posted a message Monday asking developers to get their apps ready for iOS 4.2. This is important because, until now, developers could only submit app updates designed for the currently shipping versions of iOS—4.1 for iPhone and iPod touch, 3.2 for iPad.
Apple also issued iOS 4.2 GM for developers, a “Gold Master” version of the OS which is the version that will ship to end users like you and me.
Once it’s released, iOS 4.2 will mark the first time that all three of Apple’s mobile devices unite under the same version of iOS. Working against one version of the OS across all devices should simplify things at least somewhat for developers, but it will also bring the OS’s latest and greatest tricks to all devices as well.
iOS 4.2 will also require iTunes 10.1, a beta of which has been available to developers for a couple weeks.
iOS 4.2