Saturday 22 September 2012

iOS 6 review

iOS 6 review

Lots of new features and enhancements, here are my highlights;

Mail improvements. This is my number one most awesome thing; I really love this; you now have a VIP inbox (which syncs with what you set as VIP on your Mac), you can then go into notification centre and change the notifications for all the accounts and VIP separately. So I've now turned off all notifications (a part from badges) for all accounts apart from VIP. And I've turned on the full notifications for VIP messages. This way I now only get notified when I've got important e-mail, and all spam and other email goes through without notification. But I still get the badge indicating I have new email, and I check them as and when I want to. Also mail now has a cool pull down to refresh facility - and the way Apple has implemented this is partially cool. Another fabulous feature is that you can press to insert video or images - which right from inside the message you can add lots of images or videos. Another nice feature is that holding down the new mail / compose message button will allow you to choose a draft message to continue writing.

iOS 6 Maps / Apple Maps. This has come under a major bit of criticism for mistakes and issues and to generally not being as good as Google Maps. I actually prefer the way that Apple Maps looks and the app in general works a lot better. There is integration in Siri with maps now which is great, and also the turn by turn directions is fantastic, I've only tried it out for some short journeys but it works really really well. Also the 3D flight over is absolutely beautiful and much more fun than street view as you can go wherever you want at any angle and it renders in real time, rather than the slow loading / delay of Google Street view. Not having Google street view is a shame though. 3D flyover is absolutely stunning (where it is available) - I've only found it in Vegas and London at the moment… You can get GoogleMaps back by doing a web click and adding it to your home page, but unfortunately it does not have street view.

Do not disturb (DnD) functionality is great - the phone will continue to be connected to the internet, accept you can put it on DnD to stop notifications, phone calls, and message. You can set it so favourite/starred contacts can still make calls to you, and best of all you can schedule DnD to come on each day between say 23.00 and 7.00 which is excellent.

The new Clock app for iPad. This is just absolutely awesome, it's beautiful. There is a world clock, alarm clock and timer. How the alarm clock is implemented is really great, and you can schedule in the alarm to come on everyday or every weekday. And because this allows you to schedule and repeat the alarms I discovered you can do this on the iPhone too! (I don't know whether this was possible before, but I'm glad I know about it now at least!)

Enhanced Facebook and Twitter integration. Now you can tweet and Facebook post from the notification centre, brilliant! There is also a much better share / action button littered everywhere around iOS, where you can create a Tweet or Facebook Post from the content, and within that little share box you can choose the Twitter account to post on, and who to send it to within Facebook. I wonder if we'll get a Google+ share option ;-)

YouTube app has gone… It's okay because Google have released their own YouTube app for the iPhone, but they haven't yet released the iPad version yet, this is a we bit disappointing!

New apps and app enhancements including FindMyPhone (new), Podcasts (new), iTunes U (new), PassBook (new), App Store, iTunes, iPod, FindMyPhone is just like the iCloud facility - solid. Podcasts is a great little app, the animated tape player when you are listening to audio podcasts is stunning. I haven't really used iTunes U, but its got a cool catalog. I haven't used PassBook yet. The App Store has been enhanced, and is much better - now you remain in the app when you request them to be installed, and new apps now get a "new" label on them when you haven't used them yet. It looks like iTunes and iPod have been improved too, though I haven't used them much yet to give an opinion.

Siri enhancements. It now has movie reviews and information, local business information (finally), Restaurant information and booking, it can also open applications now (about time!) and has maps integration (about time). I've had mixed results in accuracy around the new information so I am reserving judgement at the moment. But the new features are appreciated. It can also post to Twitter and Facebook, though I haven't tested that yet.

iMessage and FaceTime phone number integration across all devices. So now you can add your phone number to your iPad and Mac as well as to your iPhone in both iMessage and FaceTime. This means all messages appear in the same stream (as your phone number) and you can place and receive FaceTime calls on all your devices via your mobile number, brilliant!

New emoticons on Emoji, yes!

Safari iCloud tabs is a nice feature where you can view the tabs you are viewing on any other iOS or OSX devices

Overall I'm very happy with the new iOS 6, it's a major step forward and overall much slicker, some great new features, and some cool new apps, yes I like it. And actually I quite like the new Apple Maps now - thank you to Sarah, Jon and Dave for encouragement that it might actually be quite good.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Thursday 20 September 2012

How to get iMessage to use your mobile number

It's the old turn it on and off again that makes it work (after upgrading to iOS6 and latest OSX it did not automatically pick up my mobile, it was only giving my email as a recipient).

On the iPhone under iMessage settings, unselect your email/appleId, then add your AppleId. On entering settings on OSX my mobile suddenly appeared as a possible recipient.

Still not appearing on the iPad, so in settings I toggled iMessage off and then back on to re-activate it. Lowe and behold my number then appeared as a possible recipient. I think doing this also updated FaceTime to use my mobile on the iPad too, I still need to check if OSX FaceTime has updated too...


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Friday 14 September 2012

How did my iPhone predictions go?

- All your standard enhancements; faster processor, more memory, better rear facing camera (higher megapixel, faster shutter response, enhanced flash), better front facing camera -> Pretty much all this happened 1/1
- New look and redesign, judging by leaks back will be metallic and coloured black or white. Sleek unibody design? -> Yep, got that one right 2/2
- larger screen, rumours are it will be the same width but longer and have a 4-4.5 inch diagonal, I would be pleased for the size increase but if its larger and keeps the same number of pixels it won't be as good a retina display, if extra pixels are added with the increased height, then how will existing apps work, will they all have to be re-written for the new screen resolution, I guess we will here about this soon in order for us to update our apps -> Yep this happened 3/3
- Smaller dock connector, I've said this for a while, and leaked photos suggest this might be included. -> Yep my prediction finally came true... 4/4
- Movement of the earplugs port to the bottom, according to rumours -> Oh dear I predicted this right... 5/5
- NFC payments enabled (want) -> Unsurprisingly this didn't happen :-( 5/6
- 4G data connectivity -> Yep 4G/LTE happened 6/7
- 128 GB space is unlikely as the iPad hasn't got that size yet -> Nope this didn't happen either 6/8
- There are rumours it'll be called the "new iPhone", noooo! -> Thankfully they kept the numeric nomenclature, phew! 6/9

So how did I do; 6/9 correct or 67% not bad :-)

iPhone 5 iWant

So what is new on the iPhone 5?

  1. Larger screen - not sure how existing apps are going to render on the new aspect ratio? We'll see. So viewing of widescreen videos without a black bar, and an extra row of apps on the home screen.
  2. New processor - New A6 chip is meant to make the iPhone twice as fast, and for an already quick phone, this is great!
  3. 4G/LTE - Great ... but not so much as the UK doesn't have a 4G network yet, but when it does this will be great.
  4. Thinner and lighter - Always good - though I read the lightness makes it feel less solid ... 
  5. Better camera - Camera optics are enhanced, higher resolution, increased facial recognition (so better focus?) and new panoramic view which is great
  6. Better iSight camera (front facing camera) - can now take 720p FaceTime chats
  7. Larger battery - so battery life improved (but still not as good as 4 apparently, but can't be worse than 4S?)
  8. New dock connector (Lightening) - new dock connector, though it's not clear what the advantage is other than being able to plug in either way round. Unfortunately you'll now need to buy new connectors and accessories ...
  9. Moved earphone port - I think this may be a disadvantage - e.g. when you've got it rested in the cup holder in the car, we'll see...
  10. New look design - Not only is the screen bigger, but the look has been re-designed - not revolutionary, but now has a cool aluminium back panel.
  11. iOS 6 - Further Twitter & Facebook integration, new maps, new 3D fly over, new turn-by-turn directions, PassBook and enhancements to Siri (Open apps, post to Facebook, integration with Movie reviews, restaurant booking and sports scores - though these are probably US only...)
  12. New earphones (EarPods) - New redesigned earphones called "EarPods".
Though not revolutionary, and all this information had been pretty much leaked, I was not disappointed. The larger screen and increased speed are major pulls. However I am probably going to wait for the iPhone 5S, maybe I'll save my money for the new new iPad (iPad 4).