Apple to launch iPhone 5 on 6 June?

Mark your calendars, clear your schedule, and ask yourself this: has Apple just set the date for the iPhone 5? If the fruit-flavoured phone maker sticks to past form, the next generation of iPhone could be unveiled to gasps of wonder on 6 June.

The boys and girls at Cupertino have set the date for the Apple Worldwide Developers' Conference, an annual shindig for makers of software that runs on the iPhone, iPad and iMac. WWDC 2011 will run from Monday 6 June until Friday 10 June, and for five days the Moscone Centre in San Francisco, USA will be packed to the gunnels with Apple ubernerds.

In recent years, WWDC has become the home of new iPhones. The iPhone 4 took a bow at WWDC in 2010, the iPhone 3GS popped out of a cake at WWDC 2009, and the iPhone 3G burst from Apple's chest at WWDC 2008.

But Apple may want to break the cycle, either to shift the spotlight back on to software or just due to general mardiness. This year's WWDC will reveal "the future of iOS and Mac OS", according to Apple boss Phil Schiller. We've just had an update to Apple's mobile operating system iOS -- iOS 4.3 on the new iPad 2 -- but it's not a major revision. Maybe we'll see iOS 5 launched, or perhaps previewed ahead of an Autumn release.

The next generation of Apple's OS X desktop software is Lion, which draws a number of features from its mobile counterpart. There's a new Launchpad which borrows the grid layout of apps, as well as full-screen apps and autosaving and resuming features.

Lion is roaring into shops this summer, and at WWDC developers will "see and learn how to develop world-class Mac OS X Lion applications", which probably means some big-name apps being shown off. Developers can bring their own code and work with Apple backroom boffins at the conference.

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