The new look of the iOS 7, Apple’s newest mobile operating system, is being hotly debated all over the Internet and is attracting plenty of criticism, including claims that it overly resembles the Android operating system and that some of its special effects make users nauseated. But there is no doubt that the operating system’s new configuration constitutes a revolution in Apple’s traditional approach to design.

Screenshots of the iOS7. – Photo: Reuters

Earlier this week, The Verge, an online tech magazine, revealed that the Israeli firm Any.do played a role in inspiring the system’s new look.

Speculation was rife about what Apple’s new design language would look like after the death of its legendary founder and CEO Steve Jobs. A significant shift was assumed when Jony Ive took over as the company’s chief of design, since Jobs was known to lean toward skeuomorphism – a catch-all term for digital items that retain ornamental elements of past, like making the application you use for taking notes look like an old-fashioned notebook. Ive, however, was known to be drawn to a more modern look, believing that today’s users no longer need such visual aids.

Apple’s Jony Ive. – Photo: Bloomberg

So where does Any.do come in? The company is a major player in the field of task-management apps, with a popular app that bears the company’s name. Any.do was founded by Omer Perchik, a veteran of the Israel Defense Force’s Center of Computing and Information Systems, and Itai Kahane and Yoni Lindenfeld, both veterans of IDF intelligence technology units. Although the company began developing its app for Android, once it issued its iPhone version it became a leading download from Apple’s App Store, with tens of millions of users. Recently it added a calendar application called Cal for the iPhone and it plans to issue mail and word processing apps.

But it’s the design that, according to The Verge, impressed the people at Apple. As a result, when Ive and his team began planning the appearance of iOS 7, the Israeli app was among those that supplied the inspiration for the system, along with other applications like the music app Rdio, the word game Letterpress, and competing task app Clear.

View original HAARETZ publication at: http://www.haaretz.com/business/1.551737