Apple has at long last announced the dates for this year's World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC). The event will be held from June 8th to June 12th, 2009, at Moscone West in San Francisco. The company is specifically promoting hands-on learning with "iPhone OS" (as opposed to the nomenclature previously used of "OS X") and Mac OS X.

It's also worth noting that it's the iPhone taking center stage on the company's WWDC Web site (see the image below), and that iPhone Software 3.0 will be released either around these dates or later in the year. Snow Leopard, the next iteration of Mac OS X, is also expected later this year.

The WWDC is Apple's annual conference for Mac, and now iPhone, developers. Operated by Apple itself, the WWDC features learning tracts and sessions presented by Apple's own engineers. In recent years, the event has also been used as a second platform from Macworld Expo for keynote announcements from Apple CEO Steve Jobs.

It is not yet known if Mr. Jobs will have returned to work at Apple by the time WWDC takes place, but those dates are at the end of the six-month leave of absence he announced before Macworld.

With Apple having pulled out of Macworld altogether, WWDC is positioned to become the preeminent keynote platform for the company, and all eyes are likely to be trained on the event, with or without Mr. Jobs's presence.

From Apple's WWDC announcement