My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement • Hacker News Board

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#241

Post by bobbylarrybobby » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:25 PM UTC

avnigo wrote: post #36

I had a feeling this was gonna be about 3D Touch just from seeing the title. It was definitely one of my favorite features, and Force Touch isn't a drop-in replacement. With 3D Touch anywhere on the keyboard, you could apply pressure to start moving the caret (text cursor) around, but what was even more useful was being able to apply a little bit more pressure to start selecting text with incredible precision . With…

As long as you want to select entire words, just double tap and drag -- same as desktop to do word-based selection. And even if you don't want to do word-based selection, double tap is a good way to start selection and have the selection carets close to where you want them that you can easily manually adjust.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#242

Post by failTide » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:26 PM UTC

bombcar wrote: post #195

voqv wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I will probably soon add an old 3D Touch iphone to my small Human Machine Interface hall of fame along with the old click wheel iPod Classic. They probably removed it because nobody was using it and they couldn't figure out how to teach people, while spending extra $ to add it into phones.

These features really need games added, where the only real requirement to play is learn the new feature. Some say it's why minesweeper et al were added to Windows, so people could learn how to use the mouse.

That game really does build up mouse skills. I remember playing it when I was 5 and having no idea what the rules were - I just liked to click all the fun little boxes with the cool numbers and bombs.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#243

Post by wowokay » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:28 PM UTC

failTide wrote: post #239

xt00 wrote: post #209

Maybe I’m in the minority here but I really did not like the feature and many people I tried to explain the feature to were confused that it existed.. “no no don’t tap the screen, you need to PUSH on the screen to make it do the action”.. and I would get a look like “huh?? Push on the screen? Why what’s that gonna do..” people saying pushing hard on the screen is intuitive seemed to live in a different bubble of peop…

so I'm relatively anti-phone and have been for a while. There was a period of time where I didn't have a smartphone for a few years. When I started using an iPhone again, I realized I couldn't figure out how the heck to delete apps. It was kind of infuriating. I eventually had to look it up online, but the answer wasn't the top one. After reading enough answers I realized the 3d touch was the reason, and that I was t…

This is interesting, it was always intuitive for me, like most VR controls. It's interesting to hear that it wasn't intuitive for others.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#244

Post by flappyeagle » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:29 PM UTC

failTide wrote: post #239

xt00 wrote: post #209

Maybe I’m in the minority here but I really did not like the feature and many people I tried to explain the feature to were confused that it existed.. “no no don’t tap the screen, you need to PUSH on the screen to make it do the action”.. and I would get a look like “huh?? Push on the screen? Why what’s that gonna do..” people saying pushing hard on the screen is intuitive seemed to live in a different bubble of peop…

so I'm relatively anti-phone and have been for a while. There was a period of time where I didn't have a smartphone for a few years. When I started using an iPhone again, I realized I couldn't figure out how the heck to delete apps. It was kind of infuriating. I eventually had to look it up online, but the answer wasn't the top one. After reading enough answers I realized the 3d touch was the reason, and that I was t…

You never needed to Force Touch an icon to delete. It has been long press since the first iPhone.

But your confusion is an example of the main problem. It’s hard to discover and easily confused with long press (if you try to Force Touch and don’t apply enough pressure eventually you’re going to leave your finger there long enough to activate long press)

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#245

Post by scoot » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:31 PM UTC

skoskie wrote: post #234

scoot wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't the same though, since trying to move the cursor down moves your finger off the touch screen. You can only move it down one line at most, and not reliable.

It's speed sensitive. I just tested in the notes app and was able to move down 6 lines moving slowly or 10 lines moving quickly.

You must have a device with 3D touch. That's physically impossible with a new iPhone using the space bar.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#246

Post by ec109685 » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:33 PM UTC

h1ms3lf wrote: post #221

I don’t understand this post, the force touch is still there at least in the pro version of the latest iPhone, don’t know about the other models. Also the feature to position your courser is still there, just press harder on the space key, Apple confined it to that key/area

It’s not force touch, it’s long touch now.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#247

Post by js-fella » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:35 PM UTC

I really liked this 3D touch. Especially the 3D touch trackpad feature, but I loved the 3D touch on the left side of the screen and gesturing to the right to trigger multitasking window. It was like the gesturing interactions the iPhone X brought but before the iPhone X. Pretty sweet feature and I liked it much more than using the home button

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#248

Post by TylerE » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:36 PM UTC

notamy wrote: post #200

wyager wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another one - you can't use the swipe keyboard to type phrases apple thinks are "naughty", such as "white woman" or "kill myself". iOS will always change one of the two words, e.g. changing "white" to "while" or "kill" to "hill".

It's really fascinating -- on my phone (iOS 15.5), "white people" was correct to "white purple," "black people" was corrected to "blank people" (wtf Apple???), but "Asian people" went through just fine. I wonder if it has to do with something like specific ethnicity vs. broad categorisations used for bigotry. Dunno.

Words starting with a capital are treated as names and not spellchecked by most systems.

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#249

Post by MasterScrat » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:37 PM UTC

avnigo wrote: post #36

I had a feeling this was gonna be about 3D Touch just from seeing the title. It was definitely one of my favorite features, and Force Touch isn't a drop-in replacement. With 3D Touch anywhere on the keyboard, you could apply pressure to start moving the caret (text cursor) around, but what was even more useful was being able to apply a little bit more pressure to start selecting text with incredible precision . With…

Interesting how this comment simply summarizes the post, adding no extra information.

There's probably a way to make a lot of HN points just running a summarization model and posting the result as comment

Re: My favorite iPhone feature was removed, long live its subpar replacement

#250

Post by happyopossum » Fri, Aug 05, 2022, 3:38 PM UTC

avnigo wrote: post #36

I had a feeling this was gonna be about 3D Touch just from seeing the title. It was definitely one of my favorite features, and Force Touch isn't a drop-in replacement. With 3D Touch anywhere on the keyboard, you could apply pressure to start moving the caret (text cursor) around, but what was even more useful was being able to apply a little bit more pressure to start selecting text with incredible precision . With…

> Force Touch

Force Touch was the same tech as 3D Touch, first introduced on the watch. It was rebranded for the iPhone when the pressure sensitivity stuff was added.

It's current replacement is Haptic Touch.