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Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

wired.com

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Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#161

Post by matthewfcarlson »

eigencoder wrote: post #49
Cider9986 wrote: post #6

Mobile Device Management (MDM) is the only effective way to restrict idevices. All you need is a macbook and Apple Configurator. You can remove safari, blacklist or whitelist websites, block installing apps, block deleting apps. It's really customizable. Edit: expanded acronym.

I've used MDM to make my iPhone dumb. It's great! I wish there was an easy way to publish my configuration so others could use it / adapt it, but it's a little involved because you have to wipe your phone the first time you set it up with configurator.

I’m curious about this, what did you do to make it dumb?

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#162

Post by matthewfcarlson »

judge2020 wrote: post #116
laweijfmvo wrote: post #103

I discovered and tried to use this feature to turn an older iPhone into a dumb phone for myself, but hit several blockers 1. It’s incredibly slow to transition in and out of the mode, as mentioned in the article, which made setting it up (constant tweaks) very painful 2. For messages and calls, you were limited to select contacts only. So I couldn’t just text/call a number when I needed to. They may have polished the…

now that it has received attention, Apple might just throw another engineer at it :)

Eh I’ve filed a few bugs a few years ago and they seem to have been ignored. I tried it for a while and it crashed my phone frequently. My gut says it’s a hack, hence the performance issues.

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#163

Post by rescbr »

judge2020 wrote: post #118
sbayg wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MDM is the worst part of iOS. It undermines all of apple’s security claims, basically making iOS windows. Devices should not be able to be remotely controlled.

MDM enables enterprises to control how the phones they own behave. If anything it makes it more secure, if an enterprise were to only allow allowlisted apps to run on it. The only issue is BYOD via MDM (when it's not via "Work Profile"), which is somewhat scary from a user perspective, especially from how hard it is to tell what permissions they might be able to spring on you at any time.

I assume they can spy on anything, that's why I refuse to do any kind of BYOD that requires MDM enrollment. It's also one IT mistake away from wiping out my personal data from my own property.

Company's Outlook, Teams, MS Authenticator and Slack on my personal phone? Ehhhh fine.

The second IT requires a profile it's the second I'm uninstalling anything company related from my phone. They can give me a company phone, or I will only access work related things from their laptop.

Happened twice to me, one time I got a company phone, the other, computer only.

And then some colleagues even paid out-of-pocket to upgrade their Android phones once IT dictated their OS were out of support. No way.

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#164

Post by mc3301 »

qup wrote: post #101
nielsbot wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

curious kind of discipline you have in mind.

When kids break the rules about screen time, there are consequences. Not Dad fiddling with the settings, but instead Dad teaching a lesson about respecting the rules, and doing what you said you would do (children agree to obey the time limits in order to have access to the device). How Dad should teach the lesson varies by family and by child.

Is it okay if Mom teaches the lessons about respecting the rules?

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#165

Post by [deleted] »

binkHN wrote: post #146
Cider9986 wrote: post #6

Mobile Device Management (MDM) is the only effective way to restrict idevices. All you need is a macbook and Apple Configurator. You can remove safari, blacklist or whitelist websites, block installing apps, block deleting apps. It's really customizable. Edit: expanded acronym.

> All you need is a macbook Is it really not possible to do this with a non-Apple machine?

[deleted]

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#166

Post by sneak »

eigencoder wrote: post #49
Cider9986 wrote: post #6

Mobile Device Management (MDM) is the only effective way to restrict idevices. All you need is a macbook and Apple Configurator. You can remove safari, blacklist or whitelist websites, block installing apps, block deleting apps. It's really customizable. Edit: expanded acronym.

I've used MDM to make my iPhone dumb. It's great! I wish there was an easy way to publish my configuration so others could use it / adapt it, but it's a little involved because you have to wipe your phone the first time you set it up with configurator.

Supervised devices cannot be backed up and restored to supervised devices. You can only backup/restore to an unsupervised target. If you want supervision, you have to abandon your backup.

It sucks.

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#167

Post by frollogaston »

jerlam wrote: post #136
littlecranky67 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it is not just simplified, it lets you chose which apps to show in that "simplified" view. For the elderly, that removes a lot of clutter and ways to shot yourself in the foot.

The article doesn't emphasize it, but Assisted Access also adds back the home/back button, like older iPhones and Androids. There is no more swipe-up motion that I see my parents struggle with because they did it too slow or started from slightly too high on the screen. I completely understand why Apple and Google removed the buttons (gotta maximize that screen real estate), but the affordance for an obvious home/res…

I'm young and able-bodied, still have trouble swiping up. Especially after Liquid Glass glassed my phone.

Re: Buried Apple feature turns an iPhone into the perfect kids' dumb phone

#169

Post by anal_reactor »

jerlam wrote: post #136
littlecranky67 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it is not just simplified, it lets you chose which apps to show in that "simplified" view. For the elderly, that removes a lot of clutter and ways to shot yourself in the foot.

The article doesn't emphasize it, but Assisted Access also adds back the home/back button, like older iPhones and Androids. There is no more swipe-up motion that I see my parents struggle with because they did it too slow or started from slightly too high on the screen. I completely understand why Apple and Google removed the buttons (gotta maximize that screen real estate), but the affordance for an obvious home/res…

> I completely understand why Apple and Google removed the buttons

It was more of design decision than practical one. My phone has a taller screen than 16:9 so when I watch videos there are black bars on the sides anyway - although my previous phone had aspect ratio perfectly matching the cinema one, making movies truly full-screen (minus rounded corners and the front camera). When I'm doing literally anything else, the buttons are displayed on the bottom of the screen. Some of my friends use gestures and actually that does give them extra screen space, but IMO gestures are less convenient and totally not worth it.

But when you show this on a demo it does look neat, especially with a game.

Give me back physical buttons please.

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