Whether it is the summer or fall, one thing is for certain - we will see the iPhone 5 launch sometime in 2012. With that in mind, rumors have been flooding the media as to what we can expect Apple to bring to the table for the 6th generation iPhone.
How Apple could have developers make iPhone 5 compatible apps right now without revealing the new screen size
However no rumor is as strong as that of a larger display. At the moment speculations suggest that that it more than likely will have a screen of 1136x640 and have the resolution of the iPhone 4S with the same width but with an additional 176 pixels when it comes to height. This would alter the current ratio of the screen to 16:9 instead of 3:2.
So the next big question is exactly how would apps look like on a taller screen given that iPhone app developers have to date focused on a 3.5-inch screen size only. The answer is simple. The app should scale itself to make use of the extra height. Now DaringFireball's John Gruber has stated that there are some apps that do this already however not all. When it comes to display banner ads for example, the ads float on top of it the apps unlike webOS where the app compresses and leaves some space at the top or bottom for the banner ad to run. That may be just the angle Apple needs to make app developers start with creating iPhone 5 compatible apps without letting the secret out of the bag. Gruber explains:
"What has occurred to me, though, is that Apple could, with the (presumed) upcoming WWDC introduction of iOS 6, further encourage developers to be flexible in this regard by changing the way notification banners are displayed. As it stands, notification banners are shown one at a time, and cover the content of the underlying app. WebOS seemed1 more elegant in this regard — WebOS notification banners stacked on screen, and the current app shrunk to fit the remaining space. If Apple introduced something like this in iOS 6, they could encourage iOS developers to adopt the recommended APIs to be responsive to changes in available vertical screen space. For now, they could pitch this in the context of shrinking screen space in response to on-screen notification banners, but, come October, apps that do the right thing would automatically be responsive to, say, a new device with 176 more pixels."
In theory this would work and Apple would not have to let out a peep about a larger screen iPhone 5.
