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IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

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Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#31
post #23

While Google & co were still sorting out the Honeycomb mess I got an iPad and here are my day to day gripes about iOS, most of which apply to both iPhone and iPad : 1) Turn by Turn Navigation - can't really think of living without it or paying for it. I've used it on Android quite extensively and it really is a solid product. For mere 29Mb and even with spotty rural data connectivity I got through 750 miles of naviga…

I totally agree with most of this list but I just wanted to let you know that the iPhone does indeed include an alarm clock, and many other time-related utilities, as part of the Clock app. I don't have my iPad here with me, but if I recall correctly this and a couple of other useful apps are inexplicably absent on the iPad.

The iPad does not have Clock, Weather, Stocks, Calculator, Voice Memos or Compass.

However, the iPhone does not have Photo Booth.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#32
Really? That's the best he can come up with? I've got a long list of low hanging fruit for Apple. I'd write them all out if I wasn't on my phone right now.

- Quick access to brightness. Add to notification center

- Quick access to airplane mode. Add to notification center

- Timestamps on Messages all the time

- Show current date without having to see calendar app. Put it in the notification center

- Real-time suggestions when you type, not this after-the-fact BS

- Clear all notifications

- Unlock phone without being forced to view notification. Happens all the time with events

- Rotate video. Damn orientation lock always ruin my videos

- A better system than bookmarks in the Maps app. Folders? I like to load up my map with bookmarks before a trip. 

- Turn by turn navigation

- Offline maps

- Custom routes in Maps

- Better way to view/select alternate routes in Maps

- Formatted email signatures

- Non-ugly Tweet popup

- Fix bugs in new weather app. Keeps giving me forecast for PAST dates

- Do something with the empty space in the global search screen (home key). 

- Bigger screen, but not too big

- Text in notes in calendar events are not selectable.

- Notification when address book is accessed without contact selector popup

- Make iTunes music home sharing actually work. Play music from my iTunes library on my phone when I'm at home. Play music from my iPhone library when I'm out. 

- Add gmail-style reply/reply all toggle to Mail

- Better way to view conversations in Mail. Too much back button

- Cross app communication. Intents, Contracts, whatever.

- There's got to be something better that double clicking the homepage for multi-tasking

- Better spell check. Option to turn off Ebonics/lolcat mode that was added in later versions of iOS. Typing in iOS 1-3 with auto-correct was flawless. More difficult in 4. Typing in iOS 5 is pretty much broken. "Im" doesn't suggest "I'm" any more. When I type "u", I want "I". I don't want a teenie bopper version of "you"

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#33

Really? That's the best he can come up with? I've got a long list of low hanging fruit for Apple. I'd write them all out if I wasn't on my phone right now. - Quick access to brightness. Add to notification center - Quick access to airplane mode. Add to notification center - Timestamps on Messages all the time - Show current date without having to see calendar app. Put it in the notification center - Real-time suggest…

> There's got to be something better that double clicking the homepage for multi-tasking

Slide up from the bottom of the screen (i.e mirror of notifications). It's so obvious, and comes with immediate cancellability of a potentially spurious move (not that I get much for notifications) if the animation is tied to the finger position (again, like notification center). The current implementation literally begs for it since notification center was introduced and it's not like it would need some insane amount of development.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#34
iPhone should have home screen gestures. Define your own shortcuts - e.g., draw a C to open Calculator or M for Music. Diagonal downward swipe to turn down brightness, diagonal upward to turn it up. Inverted V to toggle airplane mode, etc.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#35
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's opt-in, is it not? Phones are very personal devices, and if you don't want yours to be that way, then don't use the feature. Honestly, the biggest reason I want it is for things that apps aren't allowed to access anyway: a global control on the Springboard to disable WiFi, or change screen brightness, for instance.

Apple has never been a company that believes in opt-in. Rightly or wrongly (and, to be fair, usually rightly), it's a company that believes you having the choice to do something it thinks is dumb is a bad idea.

Counter-point: the iPad multi-tasking gestures, which are disabled by default.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#36
post #33

Really? That's the best he can come up with? I've got a long list of low hanging fruit for Apple. I'd write them all out if I wasn't on my phone right now. - Quick access to brightness. Add to notification center - Quick access to airplane mode. Add to notification center - Timestamps on Messages all the time - Show current date without having to see calendar app. Put it in the notification center - Real-time suggest…

> There's got to be something better that double clicking the homepage for multi-tasking Slide up from the bottom of the screen (i.e mirror of notifications). It's so obvious, and comes with immediate cancellability of a potentially spurious move (not that I get much for notifications) if the animation is tied to the finger position (again, like notification center). The current implementation literally begs for it s…

What do you think of the current slide-up-with-four-fingers gesture?

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#37
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's got to be something better that double clicking the homepage for multi-tasking Slide up from the bottom of the screen (i.e mirror of notifications). It's so obvious, and comes with immediate cancellability of a potentially spurious move (not that I get much for notifications) if the animation is tied to the finger position (again, like notification center). The current implementation literally begs for it s…

What do you think of the current slide-up-with-four-fingers gesture?

Impractical on a phone.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#38
post #33

Really? That's the best he can come up with? I've got a long list of low hanging fruit for Apple. I'd write them all out if I wasn't on my phone right now. - Quick access to brightness. Add to notification center - Quick access to airplane mode. Add to notification center - Timestamps on Messages all the time - Show current date without having to see calendar app. Put it in the notification center - Real-time suggest…

> There's got to be something better that double clicking the homepage for multi-tasking Slide up from the bottom of the screen (i.e mirror of notifications). It's so obvious, and comes with immediate cancellability of a potentially spurious move (not that I get much for notifications) if the animation is tied to the finger position (again, like notification center). The current implementation literally begs for it s…

It would probably get inadvertently triggered all the time at the bottom if it was that simple. It's bad enough having the entire top of the screen be a bad-touch zone.

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#39
One of my most used third party apps has become Firefox Home, flawed and feature poor as it is. Browser sync is a can't live without it once you've tasted it feature and seems like a no brainer to add now that everyone is on icloud. Most people think of navigation as Android's biggest advantage over iOS but Chrome sync in ICS seems bigger to me.

Inverting desktop to phone sync, remote desktop seems like an even bigger killer feature that no one's really done right yet.

Facetime w/o wi-fi seems like a no brainer.

Swiping between emails and tabs would be nice.

Swiping emails in list to mark as read/unread ala Byline would be great.

ID browser as ... desktop safari ala Atomic and a few others would be nice.

Some sort of gesture or hack to make all hover based nested menus not close instantly.

An ad blocker (again avail in Atomic or Sleipnir) would be godly but Apple seems very unlikely to implement a large scale one. Honestly the only adds I really want to block are the pop ups "Did you know the website for the article you want to be reading right now made an app! Click 99% of the pixels in this window to further delay consumption of the content you came here for."

Re: IOS Low-Hanging Fruit

#40
post #2

It seems to me that intents/contracts is the biggest low hanging fruit and being able to embed info in your icon (the way calendar does) is the biggest low-hanging fruit. Removing google dependencies matters to apple not users.

This is why Google does not copy many of the iPhone's features https://www.google.com/search?tbo=p&tbm=pts&sclient=... (link to patent search)
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