So, thoughts on what X.7 and X.8 are gonna look like? Given the fact that Steve now considers Apple a mobile devices company (What happened to a consumer electronics company? Or the Digital Hub?) What sort of role is OS X going to start to take? What new sort of devices could Apple shoe horn OS X into?
My theory for either X.7 or X.8 is that Apple will start blurring the line between one computer and another (finally) so it could make sense for a user to have a MacBook Air and an iMac at home, and to continually have their home account synced between the two. I imagine Time Machine with a few (or a lot) tweaks could manage to keep up to date copies of your text documents, email, music, photos, graphics, etc. Movies might be a bit of an issue so I'd say by default the movies folder shouldn't be synced but that's just me.
We've all heard rumours of an iMac that's a cross between an iMac and an iPad, and I think that'd be pretty sweet, having OS X full on for normal work, but the option to switch to a touch based interface. I kind of doubt that'll ever actually come to fruition though as most people would just buy an iMac and an iPad, and I think Apple would rather have you do that.
I think the MacBook Pro, may eventually move to something kind of like a really big Nintendo DS. This probably won't happen for my guess is like three years or more, but I imagine once Apple has people trained to use the iPad as a typing surface, the keyboard and mouse space on all MacBooks will be replaced by a large glass multitouch screen that will work as track pad, and extensible keyboard. Imagine working in Photoshop and having instead of a keyboard
to remember which tools are attached to which keys, just having them all laid out? I kind of wonder if the command, option, cntrl, and shift keys should remain actual keys with that, or if there should be actual buttons. My guess is that they'd be converted to touch surfaces as well, though I think it would be more helpful if it was an actual button... I imagine Apple would pick form over function in this regard though.
if the whole multi touch screen came into being, I imagine the dock would actually be moved to the lower part of the screen, and when you touched a stack it would actually slide the keyboard away.
Of course the potential issue with this is, what happens to old hardware that doesn't have the second screen? I imagine they could be left with a "classic" mode, though I'm sure people would complain.
A few reasons I don't see this happening right away though, obviously cost, also I think Apple will wait until more people are used to typing on soft keyboards. This also could be something that would debut on a specialized line, MacBook Touch, or something like that, though to be honest I sooner see Apple using the Pro line for it.
The iMac and Mac Pro would end up with an external keyboard/pad, though it would probably end up being more expensive than today's models given the materials required. I imagine the Mac Pro and the iMac will probably be two of the biggest concerns in this area... (well more the iMac since Apple has never minded charging an arm and a leg for the Mac Pro.)
But yah, the whole multitouch pad, plus the syncing of multiple Macs and other devices running OS X are probably going to be the next big features that I can think of.
What else do you think Apple will be working on? Perhaps Apple TV will evolve into an actual TV (not any time soon sadly) perhaps there will be a dedicated iPod with a really kick ass camera? (Probably not) An Apple branded video camera? (Oh wait that'll be the next iPhone)
Only other thing that I can think of is perhaps Apple foraying into the dumb phone/feature phone market though I highly doubt that, I think they enjoy their crazy high margins and the fact that cheap people can't get their phone.
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