Apple has announced that the next version of its mobile and tablet operating system, iOS 6, is coming later this year - in the "fall". And although it had been rumoured to work only on devices that were two years old, the company says it will be available for the iPhone 3GS and above - including iPod touch and iPad 2 and new iPad support. Sadly, the original iPad will miss out.

Apple says the new operating system will come with more than 200 new features, with six of them on display during Apple's WWDC 2012 event in San Francisco.

An all-new maps facility will introduce turn-by-turn navigation. There's a stack of new Siri features, with better support for the UK. Facebook integration will be introduced in the same vein as the current Twitter support. Shared Photo Streams will be possible.

And the Cupertino giant will be adding a completely fresh function in Passbook, a zone that stores all your passes/tickets in one place.

"iOS 6 continues the rapid pace of innovation that is helping Apple reinvent the phone and create the iPad category, delivering the best mobile experience available on any device," said Scott Forstall, Apple's senior vice-president of iOS Software.

"We can’t wait for hundreds of millions of iOS users to experience the incredible new features in iOS 6 including the new Maps app, expanded Siri support, deep Facebook integration, Shared Photo Streams and the innovative new Passbook app."

As previously mentioned, iOS 6 will be available in the autumn for iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, the new iPad, iPad 2 and iPod touch (fourth generation). Some of these may not get all of the features, however. And there's no indication as to why it will work on iPhone 3GS but not the original iPad.