14 DAY TRIAL // Whenever a sync conflict occurs, MobileMe pops a dialog prompting users to tell the cloud which version of a file is right. Not iCloud, according to pundit John Gruber.
Speaking on The Talk Show with Dan Benjamin, Gruber detailed what he believed was iCloud’s way of dealing with sync conflicts.
“In iCloud, I believe you will never be presented with [a sync conflict] dialog, no matter how much has changed in one of the instances while it was ‘offline’,” Gruber tells Benjamin, according to a transcript by MacStories.
“The server-side iCloud, when there seemingly is a conflict, will make a decision and it will decide which one is the best (in Apple's terms the ‘truth’). That is what Steve Jobs means when he says ‘The Truth is in the Cloud’," he explains.
“iTunes will decide which one is right and that's it. iCloud will push that right one to any device that has this account that has a different version,” adds Gruber.
But what happens when iCloud decides wrong? After all, the algorithms based on which iCloud makes a choice can’t always be 100 percent correct.
Well, according to Gruber, it’s only then that iCloud nags the user about a conflict.
“But, here's the trick what happens if it's not the right one,” he says. “On the server side, it will remember all of the other ones, almost like versioning.”
He provides an example saying, “There will be some sort of interface like ‘go and look at your contacts’.”
“There will be some sort of way to say ‘show me previous versions and let me pick the one that is right’. You pick it and push it back up into the cloud and tell it ‘that's the truth’ and Apple will push it out,” Gruber concludes.
iCloud is set to debut this fall alongside iOS 5, the next major version of Apple's mobile operating system powering iPhones, iPads, and iPod touch players.
Part of iCloud's functionality is currently available in iTunes in the Cloud beta released June 07, 2011 for both Mac and Windows users.