Close ad
iPad

iOS 10 is a big update because it changes several long-standing habits

Filip Brož
140

New Notifications, Messages, Photos, Maps or removal of system applications. All this and much more is offered by the tenth version of the operating system for mobile devices from Apple. After three months of active use, we can state that there has never been a more stable and functional iOS. Apple took great care to ensure that all the new products it presented in June were fine-tuned to the last detail. On the other hand, some changes and improvements can be quite confusing at first.

If you use an iPhone 6S, iPhone SE, or if you will soon get a new "seven", you will notice a significant change at the first touch. Apple has added the Raise to Wake function to phones with the M9 coprocessor, thanks to which it is enough to take the phone in your hand or tilt it slightly and it will immediately turn on by itself, without the need to press any button. In addition, in iOS 10, Apple has completely reshaped years of habits of how iPhones and iPads are unlocked and what our first interaction with them is when we pick them up.

Owners of the latest iPhones with the faster Touch ID of the second generation often complained about too fast unlocking, when it was not even possible to record incoming notifications after placing a finger. This problem is solved on the one hand by the Raise to Wake function and on the other hand by the changed functioning of the locked screen in iOS 10. After almost ten years, the iconic unlocking by swiping the screen, which was usually followed by the ability to enter a numerical code, has completely disappeared.

But the numerical code is no longer in use today. Apple is - logically and sensibly - pushing the use of Touch ID as much as possible, so iPhones and iPads with iOS 10 rely mainly on your fingerprint for unlocking (this is also understandable because only four devices that support iOS 10 do not have Touch ID). Only if Touch ID does not recognize the fingerprint, it will offer you a code.

But that's not all. You can now stay on the locked screen even after unlocking. This means that you just put your finger to Touch ID and the small lock in the top bar in the middle will unlock. At that point, you can perform many more actions on the already unlocked "lock screen". In order to get to the main screen with icons, you not only need to put your finger to unlock, but also press the Home button. But you may not want to do this press right away, because the already unlocked lock screen can finally be used much more effectively in iOS 10.

Widgets and notifications

When you swipe from right to left on the lock screen, the camera will launch. Until now, it was "extended" from the lower right corner using an icon, but it has now acquired the gesture previously used to unlock the iPhone, as described above. If you flick to the other side, you'll come across widgets that Apple separated from notifications in iOS 10 and finally gave them more meaning.

Widgets in iOS 10 are very similar to the Android operating system. Individual "bubbles", which have become more rounded and given a touch of milky glass, can be rearranged and new ones added if the application supports them. Since widgets are now available truly instantly right from the lock screen, it adds a whole new dimension to using them, and within a few weeks you'll likely be embracing them far more than you ever did in iOS 9.

Thanks to widgets, you can have a quick overview of the weather, calendar, battery status, or you can easily play music or dial a favorite contact. All you have to do is pick up the iPhone, which will turn on by itself, and then just swipe your finger to the right. In addition, the aforementioned information is offered in system applications or widgets by both Apple and third-party developers, who often present even greater functionality. It is not a problem to manage your tasks from the widgets or to check the status of exhausted data with the operator.

Notifications, whose Notification Center you can still call up by swiping your finger from the top edge of the display, have undergone a similar transformation. After all, in the Notification Center you will find the same widgets as on the lock screen, and you can access the third one by swiping to the left on the main page, where previously only Spotlight was located. Widgets are in three places in iOS 10, but they offer exactly the same thing everywhere, which is perhaps a bit of a shame.

But back to the notifications, which have also rounded up and acquired the same shape as widgets, in addition, they are also able to adjust their size flexibly to the content. Each notification has an icon with the name of the application, the time of receipt and the content itself. The news does not end there: the biggest one is, however, closely linked to 3D Touch, which Apple began to significantly expand across the entire system.

At the same time, it is related to the unlockable lock screen, because if it is unlocked, it means that you can continue working with notifications straight away. Press harder to open a quick preview and easily respond to an incoming iMessage, for example. 3D Touch allows you to preview the entire conversation without having to go further into the system and open the Messages app.

The mentioned intertwining with 3D Touch is important because if you don't have this technology (which is still the vast majority of users who can install iOS 10), the experience of the new notifications in iOS 10 is hardly half-baked. A stronger press also works for notifications received during normal operation, not only on the locked screen, and the ability to view, for example, a conversation from Messages just as another layer above the currently opened application, quickly reply, and then immediately return to the original work, is very effective.

However, if you don't have 3D Touch, you have to flick the notification bubble to the left and then click on show. The result is then the same as when you use the aforementioned 6D Touch on the iPhone 7S and 3, but not nearly as convincing. However, it is also proof that Apple is still counting on 3D Touch, even if third-party developers may not have adopted it as much as it had hoped. Now it will be even more desirable for developers not to be afraid and deploy 3D Touch, even if in the case of notifications it is more about implementing a quick preview, 3D Touch will then work automatically. It will be disappointing if the benefits are limited to just a few default apps.

Upgraded Control Center

After unlocking your phone - when you can already have a lot of things sorted out in iOS 10, as mentioned above - you will traditionally find yourself on the main page with icons that have remained unchanged. You will only come across the changes in the Control Center, which again slides out from the bottom of the display, but now offers more tabs, which you can switch between by swiping your finger left or right. The main, middle card remains the same with the buttons for controlling Wi-Fi, rotation lock, brightness, etc., the only thing new is Night Mode control and the possibility to use 3D Touch again.

With a stronger press, you can activate three different flashlight modes: bright light, medium light or dim light. With the stopwatch, you can quickly turn on a one-minute, five-minute, twenty-minute or one-hour countdown. The calculator can copy the last calculated result for you via 3D Touch, and you can start different modes faster in the camera. Unfortunately, for functions such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, a more detailed menu is still missing after a stronger press.

Especially avid music listeners will be interested in a new card that has settled to the right of the main one and brings control buttons for music. On the card you can see not only what is currently playing, but you can also choose the output device. Control buttons got their own card mainly for more efficient management, which is convenient. Additionally, iOS 10 remembers where you left Control Center, so if you frequently access it just to control your music, you'll always find yourself in that tab.

Aimed at a younger target group

At June's WWDC, Apple devoted a lot of space to completely redesigned Messages. Apple developers were greatly inspired by competing communication platforms such as Facebook Messenger or Snapchat, which are increasingly popular. Therefore, in iOS 10, your iMessage conversation does not have to be static and without effects, as it was before. Here, Apple is clearly targeting the younger generations, who are used to supplementing their messages with various effects from Messenger and Snapchat.

You can now paint or write on the photos taken or use various animations and other effects. When you hold down the button while sending an iMessage, you will be offered several options to send the message: as a bubble, loudly, softly, or as invisible ink. For some, it may seem childish at first glance, but Apple knows very well what works on Facebook or Snapchat.

If it wasn't enough for you that the bubble with the message arrives at the recipient with, for example, a bang effect, you can supplement it with full-screen flying balloons, confetti, laser, fireworks or a comet. For a more intimate experience, you can send a heartbeat or a kiss, which we know from Watch. In iOS 10, you can also instantly react directly to individual message bubbles, with a heart, thumbs up or down, exclamation marks or question marks. There are so many options for interaction. In addition, the system keyboard can itself replace the text with more playful emojis. And last but not least, handwritten messages can also be sent, which is even better on the iPhone than on the watch.

Finally, the sending of classic photos has also been improved, where a live preview appears in the panel instead of the keyboard, in which you can immediately take a photo and send it, as well as the last photo taken from the library. To bring up a full-fledged camera or open the entire library, you need to press the inconspicuous arrow on the left.

However, Apple went further with the development - and once again took inspiration from Messenger. As a significant novelty, the App Store for iMessage appears, from which you can download various applications that are integrated directly into Apple's communication platform. As expected, apps can add various GIFs, emoticons and images to your conversation, but using them can be much more effective.

Thanks to third-party applications, it will be easy to use a translator directly in Messages, send links to favorite movies or even pay. Developers are now shipping one app after another, and it remains to be seen what potential the App Store holds for iMessage. But it's definitely big. The developer base is a big strength of Apple and we can already see dozens, maybe hundreds of apps in the App Store for iMessage. We will bring experience from their use in the next article, for now there was not enough space to test them.

Photos or likeness with Google Photos purely random

Apple was inspired not only by Messenger, but also by Google Photos. In iOS 10, you'll find a completely redesigned Photos app that offers a number of user-friendly improvements. First and foremost, Photos is smarter because it's learned to do a lot more sorting and searching, including face recognition. In Albums, you will find the People folder, where you have photos of your friends in one place.

A new Memories tab has appeared directly in the bottom bar, where the application presents you with automatically created "memories" albums. For example, you will come across the albums "Amsterdam 2016", "The best of the last two weeks", etc. The photos will then create a short film for you in each album, made up of the collected photos. You can choose what music plays in the background and how fast the browsing should be.

In addition to the photos and videos themselves, each Memory also contains a map and a list of people who are in the album. If you don't like the offered Memory, you can delete it or add it to your favorites.

Of course, you will find the same functions on the Mac, where the updated Photos will arrive in a week with the new macOS Sierra. It's obvious that Apple copied from the competition in many ways, but that's not surprising. Users want exactly such functions. They don't want to delay making any albums. Many will welcome it when Fotky itself offers them a collection of vacation shots, which they can then pleasantly reminisce about thanks to the film. The user only needs to take pictures and take pictures, the smart software will take care of the rest.

Apple also continues to work on better keyword searches. It's not perfect yet, but try searching for things like "car" or "sky". You will usually find the right results there, and it is, after all, the direction Apple is taking in many other products, where machine learning and smart algorithms come into play. Moreover, in this respect, Apple tries to differentiate itself from Google and wants to to guarantee users the maximum possible privacy despite the scanning of their data.

Focused on travel

Apple Maps took a huge step forward in iOS 10, which is still more than desirable, although now Apple Maps is not nearly as much of a fiasco as it was in its early days. At the beginning of August, Apple to its Maps added complete data on Prague public transport. The capital thus became the third European city in which Maps reports the availability of data on public transport and the possibility of starting navigation using trains, trams, buses or the metro. In iOS 10, there is also a redesigned graphical interface and many useful improvements.

For example, you can add points of interest during your navigation and route planning. Thanks to this, you will get an overview of gas stations, refreshments or accommodation. The function of automatically saving the place where you parked your car is also handy, which can really come in handy wherever you park.

In the Czech Republic, the experience from Apple Maps will never be as perfect as, for example, in the United States, but the constant improvement in presenting information about the state of traffic, closures or accidents already provides a relatively good experience for the Czech traveler as well. Connecting Maps to services like Uber is the future, where you can find your favorite restaurant, book a place in it and order a ride within a single application.

In recent months, we can watch an extremely interesting battle between Apple and Google, whose maps the iPhone manufacturer abandoned years ago in favor of its own. Very regular updates for both map systems show how much businesses care about this part of the ecosystem. In many ways, Apple is still catching up with Google, but its Maps are increasingly proactive and try to take a slightly different path in some ways. In iOS 10, Apple Maps are just a hair better and we can look forward to further development.

Sleep overview and minor improvements

In addition to major changes, iOS 10 is traditionally full of many smaller improvements. For example, Večerka is a novelty in the Clock system application, which, based on the set alarm clock, will notify you in time when you should go to bed, so that you get the required number of hours of sleep. Someone who likes to get stuck in front of the TV, for example, may find a similar notification useful.

In addition, Večerka can transfer simple sleep data to the Health application, but it only uses your manual settings for falling asleep and waking up, so you won't get very relevant data. It is better to use other devices or applications that also work with Health to measure and analyze sleep. In addition, in iOS 10 you will also get several new sounds that the alarm clock can use to wake you up.

But we still have to stay with the sounds. A new tone appeared when locking the device and the keyboard. You'll notice the changes right away, but you'll probably get used to it just as quickly, it's not a radical change, but the sounds are still what you'd expect in the given situation. It is much more important in iOS 10, the option to delete system apps, which users have been calling for for a long time.

For example, Tips, Compass or Find Friends can disappear from your desktop (or a separate folder, where traditionally all unused system applications were clustered). It is not possible to delete all of them, because other functions in iOS are linked to them (essential ones such as Photos, Messages, Camera, Safari or Clock must remain), but you can delete up to twenty of them in total. They can now be uploaded from the App Store. In iOS 10, you will no longer come across separate Game Center applications, the game environment remains only integrated in games.

System Mail has also received improvements, especially from the point of view of filtering and searching. It can now group messages by thread. This makes it easier to navigate long conversations. Quick filtering is also new, for example you can display only unread messages or just an attachment with one tap, and all this without a lengthy search. Safari, on the other hand, can open an unlimited number of tabs.

When turning on/off individual applications or when unlocking the iPhone, you will certainly notice a completely new animation that is clear not even for a second. It is about quickly zooming in or zooming out of the given application. Again, just a slight cosmetic change that characterizes the arrival of a new system.

Perhaps the biggest change of all, however, was the Music application, in which Apple, after an often embarrassing first year, partly remodelled the functioning of its music streaming service Apple Music. We have already written about the fact that these are clearly changes for the better.

Smart home in one place

Speaking of uninstalling apps, there's a brand new one to mention. In iOS 10, Apple deploys the Home app, which houses the future of our ever-smarter homes. Within a single application, it will be possible to control the entire smart home, from lights to garage doors to thermostats. An increasing number of accessories and products with support for the HomeKit protocol are beginning to flow onto the market, which you can use with the new Home application.

Proof that Apple (and 100% not only) sees the future in the smart home is confirmed by the fact that the Home application has also been allocated a separate tab in the Control Center. As mentioned above, in addition to the main control buttons and the music card, if you use Home, you will find one more card, to the left of the main one, where you can very quickly turn on the lights or close the blinds.

HomeKit has been around for a while, with iOS 10 now fully supporting it, so it's just up to third-party manufacturers to release as many compatible products as possible. In our country, their availability is not yet as we would like, but the situation is definitely improving.

Speed ​​and stability

We've been testing the developer version of iOS 10 since its early days, and surprisingly, even in the early stages, we've seen very few errors and bugs. The last beta versions were already maximally stable, and in the last, practically final version, everything is already fully debugged. Installing the very first sharp version of iOS 10, which was released today, should most likely not bring any significant problems. On the contrary, it is one of the most stable iOS ever. Third-party developers have also worked on compatibility, and at the moment dozens of updates are heading to the App Store.

Thanks to iOS 10, the first generation of Touch ID on older devices also got a noticeable acceleration and better functioning, which for us was actually one of the most pleasant new features of the iPhone 6 Plus. Evidently, it is not only a matter of hardware, but the fingerprint reader can also be improved in terms of software.

Finally, we should also mention the smallest news, which, however, complete the entire experience of iOS 10. It is now possible to edit Live Photos, Safari can open two windows in Split View on the iPad, and multiple users can work in Notes at the same time. The new mobile operating system can transcribe voicemail messages into text, and the icing on the cake is the full availability of the Siri voice assistant for developers, where everything will only be revealed in the coming months. However, it is still not so interesting for the Czech user.

You can download iOS 10 starting today for iPhone 5 and later, iPad 4 and later, iPad mini 2 and iPod touch 6th generation, and owners of the latest devices in particular should have nothing to worry about. A stable system awaits them with a lot of changes that concern even the most experienced habits.

Source
Discussion
Topics: , , , , , , , , ,

Related



Most read články

.