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We've been through a lot with iOS in recent years. In iOS 7, a radical system overhaul was waiting for us, which continued a year later in iOS 8. However, we also experienced desperate situations full of crashes and errors with it. But with this year's iOS 9, all nightmares come to an end: the "nine" after years brings stability and certainty that switching immediately is the right choice.

At first glance, iOS 9 can really be indistinguishable from iOS 8. The only thing that can catch your eye right away on the lock screen is the font change. The transition to San Francisco is a pleasant visual change that you won't even notice after a while. Only when you start playing more with your iPhone or iPad will you gradually come across major or minor innovations that appear in iOS 9.

On the surface, Apple left everything as it was (and worked), improving mainly the so-called under the hood. None of the mentioned news means a revolution, on the contrary, phones with Android or even Windows have been able to do most of the functions for a long time, but it is definitely not a bad thing that Apple now has them too. In addition, its implementation is sometimes even better and only positive for the user.maxi

There is power in the little things

We will stop at the various smaller gadgets first. iOS 9 is particularly characterized by improvements in the stability and operation of the entire system, but while the user does not notice these aspects (and takes the fact that the phone will not fall at any moment for granted), the small innovations in the nine system are what will make everyday work easier with an iPhone.

The best new feature in iOS 9 is the back button, which, paradoxically, is visually the smallest, but at the same time extremely effective. If in the new system you move from one application to another via a button, link or notification, a button will appear on the left instead of the operator in the top row Back to: and the name of the application from which you came to the current one.

On the one hand, it improves orientation, but above all, you can easily go back to where you were by clicking on the top panel. Open a link in Safari from Mail and want to go back to the email? You no longer need to double-press the Home button to activate the app switcher, but return with a single click. Easy and effective. After a few minutes, you'll get used to the Back button and feel like it was, or should have been, in iOS a long time ago.

After all, even the aforementioned application switcher underwent a rather significant change in iOS 9, which we could only understand with the arrival of the new iPhone 6S. The entire interface was modified just for them and their new 3D Touch display. Large tabs with previews of applications are now displayed, which are flipped through like a deck of cards, but a bit of a problem is that on the other hand, than it was before.

Habit is an iron shirt, so it will probably take you a while to get used to having to scroll left and not right after double-pressing the Home button. The change in direction is due to 3D Touch, because on it you can call up the application switcher by holding your finger at the left edge of the display (no need to press the Home button twice) - then the opposite direction makes sense.

Large cards are useful when you just need to copy something from another application. Thanks to the large preview, you can see the complete content and do not necessarily have to move to the application and open it. At the same time, the panel with contacts disappeared from the upper part of the switch, which, however, will hardly be missed by anyone. He didn't make much sense there.

In the Notification Center, it is nice that you can sort notifications by day and not just by application, but the button to delete all notifications is still missing. In this way, you will not avoid clicking on several small crosses if you do not clear the notifications regularly. Otherwise, Apple significantly improved notifications as such in iOS 9, as it opened them up to third-party developers. Therefore, it will be possible to reply not only to system Messages, but also to tweets or messages on Facebook from the top banner. It's just enough for the developers to implement this option.

The last little thing, which can solve many unfortunate moments, however, is the new keyboard. At first glance, it remains the same in iOS 9, but it can now display not only capital letters, but also lowercase letters. So there is no more conjecture whether Shift is currently active or not. As soon as you type a capital letter, you see capital letters; lowercase letters are displayed when you continue. It can solve a lot of problems for some, but for others it will be rather distracting years later. This is also why this news can be turned off. The same is the case with displaying a preview of a letter when you click on it.

Stability and efficiency in the first place

During the year, Apple engineers did not focus only on the above-mentioned small gadgets. They paid a lot of attention to the efficiency, stability and operation of the entire system. So in iOS 9, Apple promises you can get up to an hour of extra battery life from the same hardware as before. Although an extra hour is rather wishful thinking, in certain cases the new system can offer up to several dozen extra minutes.

Especially if you mainly use basic applications from Apple, the increase in battery life is true. The developers in Cupertino were able to optimize their own applications as much as possible, so they are more energy-efficient. In addition, you can now check how much an application "eats" in Settings, where more detailed statistics are available. You can see what percentage of battery each app is using and also how much it takes when it's active in the background. Thanks to this, you can optimize your workflow and eliminate demanding applications.

For extreme cases, Apple introduced a special Low Power Mode. This is automatically offered when the battery in the iPhone or iPad drops to 20%. If you activate it, the brightness will immediately be reduced to 35 percent, background sync will be limited and even the processing power of the device will be reduced. Apple claims that thanks to this you can get up to three hours longer battery life. Although this is an exaggeration and at 20 percent you will be waiting for dozens of extra minutes, but if you know that you will definitely need your iPhone in the near future, for example for an important phone call, and the battery is running low, you will welcome Low Power Mode.

In addition, it is possible to activate the energy saving mode manually. So you can save, for example, as soon as you take the phone out of the charger, if you know that you will be without electricity for a long time. However, you have to expect that the system will run slower, applications will take longer to load, and the biggest limitation may be low brightness in the end. But it's good to know that this option is in iOS 9.

Proactive Siri not so active here

Improved Siri, one of the strengths of the new iOS 9, is unfortunately something that we will only partially enjoy in the Czech Republic. Although Apple has significantly worked on its voice assistance and it is now more efficient and capable than ever before, but due to the absence of Czech support, it can only be used to a limited extent in our country.

To the redesigned screen with proactive However, we will also get Siri here. If you swipe left from the main screen, you'll find suggestions for contacts and apps based on your habits. For example, in the morning you'll find Messages if Siri detects that you regularly write messages after waking up, and in the evening you'll find your partner's contact if you usually talk to them at this time. In the United States, users also get suggestions from Maps and the new News app, but it's not yet available outside America at all.

In short, it's no longer just about the fact that you assign tasks to the phone and it fulfills them, but also about the fact that the phone itself, in this case Siri, offers you what you most likely want to do at that moment. So when you connect your favorite headphones, Siri can automatically offer you to launch Apple Music (or another player) and the like. However, it should be noted that although the development of Siri is sympathetic, Google, for example, is still further along with its Now. On the one hand, it supports the Czech language and thanks to the fact that it collects data about users, it can offer much more accurate suggestions.

There is still a search box above the new suggestions screen. You can directly access it by swiping down on the main screen. New in iOS 9 is the ability to search across all apps (that support it), making searching much more efficient. Easily find what you're looking for, wherever it is on your iPhone.

Finally a multifunctional iPad

While the innovations mentioned so far work universally on iPhones and iPads, we also find functions in iOS 9 that are exclusive to Apple tablets. And they are absolutely essential. Thanks to the latest system, iPads become multifunctional tools with increased productivity. This is the new multitasking, which now in iOS 9 really gets its meaning - multiple tasks at once.

The trio of modes, where you can display more than one application on the iPad screen and work with both, takes the use of both small and large tablets to a completely different level. At the same time, it is not only a primarily "consumer" device, and the overall efficiency of work on the iPad increases; for many, it is absolutely sufficient instead of a computer.

Apple offers three new multitasking modes. Split-screen allows you to run two applications side by side, in which you can work simultaneously. You have Safari open, you swipe from the right edge of the display and choose from the menu which application you want to open next to it. This is great for surfing the web, for example, while checking your mail, messages and more. Once iOS 9 third-party developers adapt, any app will be able to display this way. Everyone will surely find their use. However, split-screen only works on the iPad Air 2, iPad mini 4 and, in the future, the iPad Pro.

By briefly dragging your finger from the right edge of the display, you can also invoke Slide-Over, when you will once again display a second application next to the existing one, but only roughly in the size we know from iPhones. This view is used, for example, to quickly check your mail or to unsubscribe from an incoming message. In addition, it also works on the first iPad Air and iPad mini from the second generation. In this mode, however, the original application is inactive, so it's really just a quick reply to a tweet or writing a short note.

Thanks to the third mode, you can combine content consumption with work. When you are watching a video in the system player (others are not supported yet) and press the Home button, the video will shrink and appear in the corner of the screen. You can then move the video around the screen at will and launch other applications behind it while the video is still playing. You can now watch your favorite videos on the iPad and use other applications at the same time. Like Slide-Over, Picture-in-Picture mode has been working since iPad Air and iPad mini 2.

The keyboard on iPads has also been improved. For one thing, it's easier to reach the formatting buttons that appear in the row above the letters, and when you slide two fingers over the keyboard, it turns into a touchpad. Then it is much easier to move the cursor in the text. The new iPhone 3S also offers the same function thanks to 6D Touch.

Notes on steroids

In iOS 9, Apple touched on some core apps, but Notes received the most care. After years of being really just a very simple notepad, Notes is becoming a very interesting app that can go toe-to-toe with established brands like Evernote. Although it still has a long way to go in terms of functionality, it will surely be enough for many users.

Notes kept its simplicity but finally added some features that users have been clamoring for. It is now possible to draw, add images, links, format or create a shopping list in the application, from which you can then tick off. The management of the notes themselves is also better, and since synchronization is running via iCloud, you always have everything immediately on all devices.

In OS X El Capitan, Notes received the same update, so they finally make sense for more than just the occasional short note. Evernote is far too complicated a product for my needs, and the simplicity of Notes suits me just fine.

System Maps got city public transport timetables in iOS 9, but it only works in selected cities and we definitely can't look forward to them in the Czech Republic. Google Maps still beats the apple ones in this regard. A very interesting novelty in the new system is the News application, a kind of Apple alternative to Flipboard.

The problem, however, is that this news aggregator, thanks to which Apple wants to offer users the best possible experience of reading their favorite newspapers and magazines, works only in the United States. In News, publishers have the opportunity to customize articles directly for a special and visually interesting application interface, and only time will tell if Apple has a chance to succeed in this market.

One more new app from Apple can be turned on in iOS 9. Just like on Mac, in iOS you can access your storage and browse files directly through the iCloud Drive application. With Safari, it is worth mentioning the support for ad blockers, which we will cover in the following days on Jablíčkář, and the Wi-Fi Assist function is interesting. This ensures that in the event of a weak or non-functional signal on the connected Wi-Fi, the iPhone or iPad will disconnect from the network and switch to a mobile connection. And if you'd like to create a new passcode lock in iOS 9, don't worry, six digits are now required, not just four.

Clear choice

Whether you were most impressed by the news under the hood in iOS 9, i.e. optimized performance and improved endurance, or little things that make everyday work more pleasant, or finally proper multitasking for iPad, one thing is certain – everyone should switch to iOS 9 now. Last year's experience with iOS 8 does encourage you to wait, but the nine is really a system that has been debugged since the first version, which will definitely not spoil your iPhones and iPads, but on the contrary will pleasantly improve them.

According to Apple, more than half of users have already switched to iOS 9 after a few days, or rather it is running on more than half of active devices, which is a confirmation that the engineers in Cupertino have done a really good job this year. We can only hope that this will be the case in the future.

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