Apple unveils iOS 18 with new home screen & Control Center

https://9to5mac.com/2024/06/10/ios-18-new-features-launch-release-date/

by anujbans • 2 years ago

27 56 2 years ago

9to5mac.com

cube2222• 2 years ago

Surprisingly, they're adding RCS Messaging support!

Didn't expect that.

Jtsummers• 2 years ago

They announced that last year, it's not really surprising anymore.

talldayo• 2 years ago

Not super surprising, they announced it months ago when the EU's antitrust pressure was maxed-out: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/apple-announces-rcs-...

throw0101d• 2 years ago

EU's antitrust pressure

Or regulations in China:

* https://www.miit.gov.cn/gzcy/yjzj/art/2023/art_2d5a7969581b4...

* https://old.reddit.com/r/UniversalProfile/comments/153rrwl/c...

* https://9to5google.com/2024/02/16/iphone-rcs-china/

* https://www.macrumors.com/2024/02/20/apple-rcs-message-compl...

cjk25• 2 years ago

Nice but the thing they said that interested me was iMessage via satellite. Now that is impressive for a minor feature.

Someone1234• 2 years ago

They didn't talk at all about costs which is odd for such a feature.

cjk25• 2 years ago

I think it's free (for now) like the emergency SOS. Well not free, you pay for it when you buy the phone.

01100011• 2 years ago

That sounds like a feature that will have major, lifesaving impacts for 0.01% of users but will not matter at all to most folks(cue the replies from the 10 HN users who need to tell me how important this is to them).

Also, wasn't this already announced?

It's a cool feature. I'm just not sure how impactful it will be. You could argue it's important in less connected areas of the world but are folks there using iPhones or are they using a cheap phone provided by Facebook or something?

cjk25• 2 years ago

I hang around in the middle of nowhere in dangerous and stupid places a lot for days. It'd be nice to bounce the odd message to family to inform them that I'm not dead.

generalizations2• 2 years ago

Most people exist in the long tail of some distribution or another. The more features that exist which stay out of most people's way, but solve a problem on some long tail, the more the iPhone ecosystem will feel tailored to everyone.

I think super basic SMS or SOS of some kind was announced? Full imessage support is new.

kubectl_h• 2 years ago

Plenty of people live, travel or recreate in places in the US with non-existent cell reception. Rivers, lakes, mountains etc are full of cell dead spots.

labcomputer• 2 years ago

impacts for 0.01% of users but will not matter at all to most folks(cue the replies from the 10 HN users who need to tell me how important this is to them).

It seems like this impacts the millions of people who visit the National Parks in the US?

There is essentially no cellular service anywhere in the parks because the Park Service thinks people should put down their phones and enjoy nature. Wifi is only for guests of the in-park hotels, and is barely adequate for sending short text messages. I actually can't remember that last time I saw a payphone, but they are everywhere in the parks (and people use them) because of the lack of cellular coverage.

Also, wasn't this already announced?

You're thinking of emergency SOS. This is for chatting to your friends.

tshaddox2• 2 years ago

That sounds like a feature that will have major, lifesaving impacts for 0.01% of users but will not matter at all to most folks

Apple's "Emergency SOS" feature launched back in November 2022 (in the U.S., on iPhone 14 and up).

Normal texting via satellite will be subtle, perhaps, but it will be one of those things where we will look back and thing "huh, wasn't that weird when we could message people almost everywhere instead of everywhere?"

notatoad2• 2 years ago

major, lifesaving impacts for 0.01% of users

people who drive through areas where there's no cell coverage is certainly a larger demographic than 0.01%. having coverage to contact a friend or family member if you get in an accident or your car breaks down on 100% of your route instead of 99% of your route would be a big peace of mind upgrade for me.

loughnane• 2 years ago

I've dumbed down my phones main screen so much to turn it into less of a distraction machine that I just don't care.

spike021• 2 years ago

I've also simplified my home screen more than it used to be in the beginning. With the App Library page and the global search feature I never need much just right there as an app icon.

DANmode• 2 years ago

With the App Library page

...a very cheeky "Welcome to 2007", from Android-land! =D

bitmasher9• 2 years ago

The biggest single thing I found for reducing screen time is to set the screen to grayscale. It just makes everything so less engaging

polynomial• 2 years ago

Did not even realize that was an option!

mcslambley• 2 years ago

I moved from Android to iOS last year and am excited to see many of the features I had mourned losing now available in iOS.

behnamoh• 2 years ago

Apple is like a bully who is not gonna stop unless a bigger bully (EU) forces him to. I'm glad about RCS addition, it was long over due.

Toutouxc4• 2 years ago

Game Mode is coming to iPhone, minimizing background activity to ensure the highest frame rates.

This might just be me, but this thing doesn’t feel very Apple-like to me. I always liked how a MacBook would run exactly the same whether connected to the wall or on battery power. There were no modes, no management, no battery strategies to choose from like on Windows, the machine was just powerful when needed and efficient when idle.

Now we have both High power and Low power modes on MacBooks and we’re getting “gaming mode” on iPhone? Like, can’t the latest flagship phone just tell? This thing can decide whether to show me my boarding pass, if I’m driving home or to work, but I need to put it in “gaming mode” manually?

tomjakubowski• 2 years ago

I always liked how a MacBook would run exactly the same whether connected to the wall or on battery power. There were no modes, no management, no battery strategies to choose from like on Windows

macOS has had power management settings for years and years - used to be branded "Energy Saver"

Toutouxc4• 2 years ago

I’m almost sure that the first actual energy saving (i.e. affecting the CPU) mode was introduced in 2021 with Monterey.

egypturnash2• 2 years ago

Mac’s have had “game mode” for a while already. https://support.apple.com/en-us/105118

It turns on pretty much automatically but you can turn it off.

mvdtnz2• 2 years ago

When I plug in my work MacBook Pro it is noticeable faster and the screen brightens. There are definitely some kinds of battery modes.

UniverseHacker• 2 years ago

Modern Apple Silicon macbooks have an optional "Low Power Mode" that reduces CPU speed and screen brightness and can be set to apply under different conditions as desired, such as battery only.

mason55• 2 years ago

but I need to put it in “gaming mode” manually?

No, I don't think so. I'm pretty sure the point is that the phone does it automatically when you're playing a full screen game.

cassianoleal• 2 years ago

That's how it works on macOS, so I also expect iOS to do the same.

tshaddox2• 2 years ago

I always liked how a MacBook would run exactly the same whether connected to the wall or on battery power.

Is this true of Apple Silicon Macs? From my memory, Intel Macs did the normal Intel frequency scaling stuff, but perhaps I've got that wrong.

Toutouxc4• 2 years ago

Yes, but at least on my last Intel MacBook (2013) this didn’t depend on the battery source.

nicce• 2 years ago

There is manual low power mode, which slows the machine.

But if you don't not enable it, you don't see the difference.

CoryAlexMartin• 2 years ago

I wish they would provide useful customization features, such as adjusting the drop shadow on the app names that appear under the icons. Look at those images in the article; the "News" text is way less legible because it's over the highlight of the dog's ear. This has been an issue for years.

egypturnash2• 2 years ago

Finally. Icons don’t have to be stuck in the top left corner of the screen.

Not that this will ever be available on the 6s I’m still using.

ClassyJacket2• 2 years ago

How did it take them 17 years to figure out how to not shove icons into one corner??

obelos2• 2 years ago

Many of these look like solid feature updates, but I'm waiting to hear about a native keyboard that doesn't pick the dumbest, most context-free possible word from the smear of letters I've fat-fingered into it.

Scoundreller2• 2 years ago

Can it get “it’s” vs “its” predictively correct more than 50% of the time?

That would be a huge improvement.

crazygringo• 2 years ago

I do wonder when we're finally going to get LLM-level accuracy applied to text input (both keyboard and dictation).

Not to try to do anything predictive, but just to get words right when it would be clear to any human what the intended word would be in context, both gramatically as well as in subject matter.

I have to assume you could do this pretty well with a vastly smaller model that would run on an iPhone.

I mean, dictation on my iPhone is vastly better than it was 10 years ago -- it's usable for a lot of stuff that it simply wasn't usable for previously (dictating brainstorming ideas while lying on the couch, for example). But it still makes a lot of mistakes and just skips far too many words it can't seem to figure out.

jpalawaga• 2 years ago

This has been the bane of my existence since switching from android. Even using the google keyboard doesn't seem to help. I have no idea how the text input is so bad on iphone--maybe it's my own fault for not being familiar with the device (though i generally don't have his issue moving between pixel devices).

obelos2• 2 years ago

It's so bad I often wonder if I've done something to inadvertently screw up whatever vector database is used to weight the guesses on my particular phone. It's just hard to imagine having this bad of a user experience of a fundamental function be widespread.

cjk25• 2 years ago

The most annoying thing for me is the lack of completion of swear words. This results in lots of gucking and shut.

Modified3019• 2 years ago

My favorite peeve is when I want to place the text caret at some point, and instead iOS refuses to do anything other than autoselect a whole word, forcing me to select somewhere far away first, then finally long press where I want.

I really fucking wish I could turn off auto selection.

I only use this damned thing because work pays for it.

generalizations2• 2 years ago

Press space on the onscreen keyboard for ~2 secs and you can move the caret like a cursor. Not many people know that trick, but it totally solves what you're describing.

function_seven• 2 years ago

Still waiting on the ability to set a custom alert tone for group messages. I'm in a couple that occasionally will just go off. The alert is the standard one that also sounds for regular (direct to me) messages, so I either have to mute that group chat for an hour—and hope it settles down within that timeframe—or mute it entirely, and risk forgetting to unmute it later.

If I could just set the alert to something different and minimal, I'd let it run. Bonus if the alert could be one thing for the first message sent, and a simpler thing for the ongoing chatter.

mvdtnz2• 2 years ago

Congratulations to iPhone users on the ability to "place app icons anywhere", a true innovation.

ClassyJacket2• 2 years ago

Took them seventeen years to figure out the technology

dvfjsdhgfv• 2 years ago

It's funny to observe the trends over the year. An Apple event is just meh. A single entry on the OpenAI blog cause excitement, hundreds of comments and speculations.

sirolimus• 2 years ago

Cydia had this 10 years ago xD

Apple unveils iOS 18 with new home screen & Control Center

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