How did the military information team of the Israel Defense Forces influence the design of iOS 7?

ByWilliam Hook

There is no unnecessary effect and simplicity is impressiveFlat designWas adopted at iOS 7, so the impression has changed drastically, but the appearance of iOS 7 actually involved the military information team of the Israel Defense Forces.

Taskmasters: how Israeli intelligence officers helped inspire the look of iOS 7 | The Verge
http://www.theverge.com/2013/10/9/4817146/taskmasters-how-israeli-intelligence-officers-helped-inspire-the-look-of-ios-7

In October 2009, I sold face recognition API to FacebookFace.comOf investors and entrepreneursEden ShochatMr. Israel's Sports and Training FacilityWingate InstituteI was there. What he was calling wasGeekConIt was a gathering, where there were lots of things that are amazing but I do not know what to use for what. One team responded to heat and made a robotic suitcase that the owner comes with no matter where he goes, and one team made a mechanism to log in to the computer by making a password from the silhouette when jumping with a trampoline and jumping It is like being in. It was the inflatable sex doll "Alice" which was able to talk with artificial intelligence with the most impact on people.


I invented Alice is a team led by Omer Perchik, 25 years old. Shochat immediately sprung with Perchik. "I really like his way of thinking and I am appreciating him as a technician, and in the lowest project he tailors the team to a rock star," Shochat said. Two people stayed in touch and after seven months Perchik talked to Shochat about the next project.

Perchik's content was not sexy like 'Alice' announced in Israel, it was not as obvious as the To Do list, it was building a next generation task management tool for mobile devices. His software had already attracted hundreds of thousands of Android users, but there was a plan to make a further evolved version. that is"Any.do"This application will be downloaded to millions of users worldwide and will also affect the appearance and atmosphere of iOS 7.

Perchik told Shochat that it is necessary to make money first in building this application. Perchik thought that it was necessary to gather talent from the military information team of the Israeli Defense Force to thoroughly rebuild the productivity management of the mobile world and create a perfect To Do list.

The photo on the left is Perchik.


To IsraelUnit 8200There is a group called thousands of soldiers and this organization is responsible for deciphering communication information and code from the torrent of information contained in the Internet etc. to find and remove threats threatening the state. Unit 8200 is a computer virus targeted to each facility in IranStax netIt is an expert on information gathering which is said to have talked about developing in collaboration with the United States.

Unit 8200 in Israel is legendary and is said to be "an expert in finding a single needle in hay". Even a member of just 18 years old, if it says that a supercomputer is needed for a commander of a unit, after 20 minutes it will be possible to do anything as part of the training, such as a super computer being delivered at hand Yes. The members of Unit 8200 are 18 years old and already work in the data center as the center of the project.

While attending college, Perchik shared a weekend with a friend Aviv from unit 8200. Normally, before going to the club Perchik will drop by Aviv's house and drink one or two drinks at one time, Perchik will arrive at Aviv's house "One day I came to drink It is not because of it ". "Today I want you to make a list of people I saw so far, I will decide who to hire with reference to it," Perchik notes, Aviv is the wisest 20 people he knows Unit 8200 list members and Perchik started to hire them.

Perchik drafted while studying abroadAfter three years of military serviceI went back to college to study business and law. Besides studying, I started optimizing web design and search engine as a small work, but I got bored at once. One day, when helping a friend to apply for a visa, he was irritated by his to-do list. He wanted something faster, cleaner and more automated. At that time the shape of what Perchik made is clear.


In 2011, Mr. Perchik attracts 13 teams through Aviv's connection. Half of the team was a member of unit 8200. What was in the head of Perchik is an application that helps users by collecting their intentions and suggestions. For example, if a user puts items in the To Do list, Any.do will help the user purchase the item, and if you have entered any event in the Any.do calendar it will automatically take a taxi I will call you, and so on. It makes user's life easier, and the application itself is free. Revenue is obtained from connections with affiliates.

In order to make this vision a reality, we need professional language analysis, so Perchik emphasized the special ability to analyze the sentences of the members of unit 8200 and to see the algorithm. "What I brought to that year is" I think that all things are possible "," says Yoni Lindenfeld, a member at the time and now acting as an engineer of Any.do. "We can not talk much of what we have done, but we met a lot of talented people anyway."

While the information team is on the job, Perchik starts to hire members building user interfaces. First we started with Android, which can be built more easily, but most of the To Do list at the time was a design imitating paper and pen. So Any.do reproduces a texture similar to the real thingSky morphic designWe will stop using. The skew morphic design was often mentioned in contrast to the flat design, and at that time it was used more frequently in Windows than iOS. "The To Do list at that time was not a thing consumers use everyday, but it was similar to an item used by a businessman in an office," said Jonathan Saragossi who was in charge of design at the beginning. "What we wanted to do was something in our daily lives, not a tool of work."

The feature of Any.do application is what is called "Any.do moment". According to Any.do, this is a reminder function that keeps users from leaving the application, notifying the smartphone to ring and to launch the application at a fixed time every day to inform "It is time to plan one day" I will. In-app interactions are displayed on only one screen and gestures including voice usage are used. And in June of 2012, Any.do was released iOS version, the application was downloaded more than 7 million times for both Android and iOS.


Any.do has affected a lot of things, but there is Apple in it. This year Apple made a flat design for iOS, according to stakeholdersRdioYaLetterpress,ClearWith Any app such as Any.do is one that inspired Apple. He is senior vice president of Apple's industrial design groupJonathan IveHe gave me a list of applications that showed "how iOS evolves", and it seems that Any.do was at the top of it. Apple has not commented on this subject.

When iOS 7 unveiled in July 2013, new trends for simplicity such as light fonts and minimal decoration were revealed. The leather stitching that was in the calendar, the chopsticks that were in the game center, etc are gone, there are only white spaces, text labels, simple geometric shapes. "Removing unnecessary design elements and focusing more on your content .... I focus on your content," Apple says, but this is what Any.do had from the beginning.

In June 2013 Perchik Mr.Any.do CalI released a smooth calendar called iOS. The next plan of the team is to make an application on email. The motto of Any.do is "every day, a good day", and the construction of all the applications supports this mission. "There is no point in making wonderful technologies that no one uses, meaning that we need to make something used every day," Perchik said.

Even now the members of Unit 8200 analyze the data and make connections between users' desires and the consuming world around them. "We understand what people are doing and we are investing a lot of technology to help them," says Lindenfeld. "There is a big plan in the future for us", it seems that the future where members of Any.do once worked for secrets will open their works to the world in an open manner .

ByDanelle Joy Abalos