I’m running the developer betas. My experience is that iOS 12 beta is very solid. I’ve not run into any issues that get in the way. Not crazy about the change to the camera icon in Messages (explained in this tweet), but that’s design, not a beta issue.
As always with beta software, make sure you have a solid backup (in iOS, make sure you archive the backup, so it doesn’t get overwritten) before you make the move.
Here’s the link to Apple’s beta program page.
[VIDEO] Have an iPad? This is a terrific walk through what’s coming in iOS 12, a chance to wrap your head around the new gestures before you are plunked square in the middle of them with time pressures and work to do. Per usual, the video is embedded in the main Loop post.
Apple:
iPhone users in the United States who call 911 will be able to automatically and securely share their location data with first responders beginning later this year with iOS 12, providing faster and more accurate information to help reduce emergency response times.
The way it works, prior to iOS 12:
To address this challenge, Apple launched HELO (Hybridized Emergency Location) in 2015, which estimates a mobile 911 caller’s location using cell towers and on-device data sources like GPS and WiFi Access Points.
And the new process:
Apple today announced it will also use emergency technology company RapidSOS’s Internet Protocol-based data pipeline to quickly and securely share HELO location data with 911 centers, improving response time when lives and property are at risk. RapidSOS’s system will deliver the emergency location data of iOS users by integrating with many 911 centers’ existing software, which rely on industry-standard protocols.
And:
The FCC requires carriers to locate callers to within 50 meters at least 80 percent of the time by 2021. iOS location services are capable of exceeding this requirement today, even in challenging, dense, urban environments. This new feature allows Apple to make these benefits available to local 911 centers now rather than years from now.
Not sure of the details, but sounds like a more direct, efficient process, yielding more accurate locations well ahead of the FCC required date.
From Reddit:
When I was using an Amazon Echo, my biggest complaint was that each third party “skill” has a specific voice command associated with it, and any deviation from that syntax would cause Alexa to not recognize what I was asking for (Haven’t used one in about a year, so this may have changed). I always found this frustrating in comparison to Siri, which can make sense of natural language. i.e. Siri can hear “get me directions to…” or “take me to…” or “how do I get to…” and either way it knows you want help with navigation. Apple made a big deal of this capability when Siri first launched.
But with Shortcuts, Siri behaves more like Alexa in that even though the trigger phrases are customized by the user (which is a one-up on the echo), Siri still requires the exact phrase every time.
And:
Remembering one or two custom phrases isn’t a big deal. But if this is the way Apple is going to open Siri up to third party apps, requiring users to remember dozens of specific trigger phrases (custom or not) is, I think, a step backwards for Siri.
First things first, there is a muddying of the waters at work here. The term Siri Shortcuts is associated with the coming Shortcuts app, which lets you build your own custom workflows which you can fire off as you like. You can assign a trigger phrase to a shortcut which, as the Reddit user points out, must be an exact match for Siri to fire it.
If you build a lot of these, you might run into a problem, but this is a problem with an easy solution. Apple maintains a list of all your trigger phrases, in Setting > Siri > My Shortcuts. [H/T Marcus Mendes]
Interesting point, though. I wonder if Siri will eventually be able to “machine learning” its way to an educated guess as to the shortcut you wanted if you are pretty close.
Quentin Carnicelli, Rogue Amoeba blog, posts this list of last updates from the indispensable MacRumors Buyer’s Guide:
- iMac Pro: 182 days ago
- iMac: 374 days ago
- MacBook: 374 days ago
- MacBook Air: 374 days ago
- MacBook Pro: 374 days ago
- Mac Pro: 436 days ago
- Mac Mini: 1337 days ago
And:
Worse, most of these counts are misleading, with the machines not seeing a true update in quite a bit longer. The Mac Mini hasn’t seen an update of any kind in almost 4 years (nor, for that matter, a price drop). The once-solid Mac Pro was replaced by the dead-end cylindrical version all the way back in 2013, which was then left to stagnate. I don’t even want to get started on the MacBook Pro’s questionable keyboard, or the MacBook’s sole port (USB-C which must also be used to provide power).
As if by magic, Apple released four new Mac ads yesterday, obviously a coincidence, but a good sign nonetheless.
Follow the money. We recently posted this article quoting numbers from Apple’s last holiday quarter:
Going purely by the numbers, clearly iOS should have Apple’s attention. But the Mac remains a vital part of Apple’s ecosystem. Given the WWDC announcement of the effort to port iOS apps to the Mac, and the new ad campaign, I have to feel a bit optimistic that Apple is turning their massive battleship back towards the Mac.
Rene Ritchie, iMore:
Developers can tap into the Continuity-derived user activity to make locations available within their apps. And they can use a new Intents API to let the system know, more expansively, the actions available in the app.
Once that’s done, Siri keeps track of what you do with them and when you do it, and tries to guess when you’ll do it next.
Rene clarifies this with examples:
For example, if you always order pizza before the game on Sunday, instead of having to go to the pizza app, pick your favorite, and place your order, it’ll have a banner waiting for you right on your Lock screen ready with your favorite order.
If you always text your child to say you’re on your way home from work, instead of having to go to messages, find the conversation with your child in the list, and tap to start a new message, a banner will be waiting for you, ready and able to send that message with a single tap.
Rene’s article is long and full of interesting detail. But the part that struck me was the way he distinguished between shortcuts you create yourself (using the Shortcuts app, rebranded from Workflow), and the voice triggers you create to label shortcuts (Hey Siri “Get pizza”), and the shortcuts Siri creates (driven by user activity reported by various apps) and suggests to you.
I’ve been using the iOS 12 beta for a week now. In that time, my Lock screen has offered to put my phone into Do Not Disturb when a Wallet pass, Open Table, and even simply iMessage indicated I might be having dinner or breakfast.
I hasn’t offered to let me order my usual Philz Mint Mojito, because I don’t have the Shortcuts enabled version of that app — yet! — but it has offered me directions to Philz after I used Maps for walking directions the first couple days of the conference.
Read Rene’s post to take advantage of his iOS 12 experience, wrap your head around what’s coming. Good stuff.
Watch the video embedded in this tweet:
https://twitter.com/nathangitter/status/1008397365018005504
To me, this really puts the augmented in augmented reality. This is a taste of what’s coming.
Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note, starts things off by talking through the Marzipan rumors and then Craig Federighi’s famous “No.” slide, followed by the details of the Marzipan announcement.
All good, but what I really liked was when Jean-Louis turned to the numbers:
By some measure, there are approximately 2.1M iOS apps in Apple’s App Store. By contrast, macOS apps number in the low thousands — a slightly misleading measure since some Mac apps are available independent of the regulated App Store. But with that caveat, iOS apps certainly outnumber macOS apps by at least an order of magnitude — a ratio that parallels the macOS vs iOS revenue and unit numbers.
He follows that with a slide that lists revenues for the 2017 Xmas quarter, AKA, 3Q2017:
And this conclusion:
The iOS-macOS UIKit bridge will pump new blood into the (relatively) anemic Mac app world. The arrangement will benefit everyone: iOS developers will find new customers on the Mac, customers who pay multiples of $10 vs single digits for iOS apps; Mac users will be given a wider choice of apps; and Apple gets a livelier macOS store.
Well said, Jean-Louis. Per usual.
John Vorhees, MacStories:
Now that people have had a chance to dig deeper into macOS Mojave, a number of smaller features have been discovered that didn’t get mentioned during the keynote on Monday and weren’t included in our initial overview of the updated OS that will be released in the fall. Here are a few of our favorite discoveries.
This is a short read, interesting all the way. My favorite nugget:
What Apple didn’t explain when it updated the Mac App Store is that macOS updates have been moved from the Mac App Store to System Preferences.
To me, this is a step towards iOS. Can’t help but wonder if we’ll see a unified core framework for the basic App Store and software updating functionality. Looking forward to playing with Marzipan.
Yesterday we shared Apple’s gorgeous new iOS 12 preview page.
Today we’re posting a few Mojave specific posts, so seems right to start off with Apple’s official Mojave preview page.
I wonder if the two pages were built by two different teams. As you scroll through both pages, do you notice a difference between them? Here’s why I ask.
To me, the main difference is animation. As you make your way through the iOS 12 preview page, the images all come alive (they are short videos). Though there is some animation on the Mojave page, it’s doesn’t have the same liveliness. To see this for yourself, scroll down to the FaceTime section of each page.
Another difference? The iOS 12 images are all on a white background, the Mojave images are on a dark background (no doubt to showcase dark mode).
No complaints here. Both are graphically stunning. But I do think the iOS 12 page is more effective, does a better job of drawing you in. Just my 2 cents.
Kudos to the team that pulled this page together. It is graphically interesting, full of eye candy, but it also does a wonderful job showing off the incredible new tech of iOS 12. Worth your time.
This TidBITS post is a good read. Even if you already know how to do this, good to walk through the interface to see what’s changed since the last time you dug into this.
Chance Miller, 9to5Mac:
With WWDC every year comes new beta versions of all of Apple’s operating systems. This year, we got iOS 12, macOS 10.14 Mojave, watchOS 5, and tvOS 12. All are currently available to developers and are meant for testing purposes. After all, they are betas and are buggy.
With beta releases come a handful of issues. Devices typically run warmer than expected and suffer from shortened battery life, as Apple typically doesn’t really optimize performance until later betas.
And:
Furthermore, you’ll likely run into app compatibility issues across all of the latest betas. The purpose of the beta period, again, is for developers to test their applications and services on the latest versions of macOS, iOS, watchOS, and tvOS. This means apps aren’t optimized and might not run properly on the beta.
That last is the biggest bugaboo for me. I can live with occasional crashes or quirky behavior, and the current slate of betas seem exceptionally stable. But for certain apps, compatibility is critical. If I move to a beta and a key app just doesn’t work, I’ve wasted a lot of time since I’d be forced to restore from a backup to get back to where I was before I took the leap.
If you are considering a backup, check out this Mojave compatibility Reddit thread. Be sure to read the comments, lots more issues revealed there.
If you depend on a 3rd party device, like a specialized trackball with programmable buttons, say, do a bit of research to see if the device still works in the beta.
I am more likely to take the leap with my phone, since that does seem stable enough with all my key apps. With Mojave, I’ve still got a bit more research to do, since I use so many specialized apps.
Obviously, make sure you have solid, reliable backups. For your iPhone, make sure you do an archived backup, which will ensure that your backup will not be overwritten by a backup of the beta, just in case you have to restore your phone back to 11.4.
And finally, keep in mind that embracing a beta is a choice. If you make it, don’t complain about things not working right. That’s the world you are entering. Stuff will break. But it will (in the vast majority of cases) get fixed, and performance will no doubt get much better as debug builds are replaced by performance builds. Report the bugs you encounter so the folks doing the heavy lifting can follow up.
[VIDEO] Jeff Benjamin, 9to5Mac, does a fantastic job digging through iOS 12 to show off what’s new. If you have to pick one video to wrap your head around iOS 12’s new chewy goodness, this is the best one I’ve yet come across. As usual, the video is embedded in the main Loop post.
One standout from the video occurs very near the beginning, when Jeff runs a GeekBench benchmark test on two identical phones, one running iOS 11.4 and another running the first beta of iOS 12. iOS 12 shows some clear speed improvements.
I’ve been watching a number of videos testing this delta from iOS 11.4 to iOS 12 and most of the performance improvements Apple promised show up in all of them in one form or another. One video, dedicated exclusively to the iPhone 5S, clearly shows Apple has paid attention to older devices, making sure those speedups carry a good way back in the product line.
Jason Snell, Macworld:
Start by considering exactly what Federighi said on stage at WWDC: “We love the Mac, and we love macOS because it’s explicitly created to the unique ergonomics of Mac hardware, like the ergonomics of the keyboard and trackpad, the flexibility in displays and storage, and because of the power it exposes, it makes the Mac able to accomplish almost anything.”
And:
I’m not sure I can entirely conceive of iOS never having a tool like the Terminal—if only because it feels inevitable that app development will one day be possible on iOS—but I can accept that the wild-west feel of macOS, where you can arbitrarily install, compile, and write software, is unlikely to ever be reflected on iOS.
And:
Apple itself sells a keyboard for the iPad Pro, and even allows users to move their fingers like they’re using a trackpad when editing text. The iPhone and iMac Pro are about as far as two devices can get from one another, but the MacBook and the iPad Pro are not.
To me, there’s still a huge chasm between any Mac and any iOS device. The Mac was built to serve a cursor, a specific location on the screen that has a focus. There are windows that you can drag around, a file system designed for rapid file/folder moves and copies, searches and sorts.
On the flip side, iOS devices are built for the dynamic nature of touch. All areas of the screen are equal citizens when it comes to touch. There’s no nudging things to the side without specifically reaching for them. No arrow keys to move a text cursor back and forth, or move an object from side to side.
Though I do see Jason’s point, the differences between a MacBook and a keyboard enabled iPad Pro are less than that of the iPhone and iMac Pro, to me they are still worlds apart.
All that said, Jason’t article is a terrific read, worth your time, thoughtful as always. I look forward to next year’s WWDC when we see a truly informed Marzipan, when Apple delivers a framework specifically designed to bridge the macOS iOS chasm.
[VIDEO] Jeff Benjamin, 9to5Mac, on what you can do with AirPlay 2:
- Quickly see what’s playing in every room on every speaker
- Play the same song, in sync, in every room
- Play different songs on different speakers
- Use Siri to play different songs in different rooms
- Stream to rooms without grouping speakers
Take the time to watch Jeff’s excellent video, embedded in the main Loop post. It starts with the basics of setting up a stereo pair, but then comes the good stuff, as he dives into the details of AirPlay 2. Absolutely worth the watch.
First things first, take a minute to read Apple’s official press release with all the details on iOS 11.4.
With that in mind, this from this Juli Clover MacRumors post:
Apple says the update also successfully fixes an issue that caused iMessages to appear out of order on some devices, a frustrating bug that’s been around for quite some time and has been the subject of many complaints.
This is the big one, to me. So much Messages oddness, hoping this does indeed fix Messages.
Related note: Take a look at Joseph Keller’s iMore post, How to turn on Messages in iCloud.
All this is working fine for me. So far, so good!
Thoughtful post from Jason Snell for Tom’s Guide, with some interesting suggestions for iOS 12.
One section focuses on Notification Center:
Notification Center on iOS is kind of a mess. It’s time for an overhaul. App notifications should be grouped together, with more opportunities to act on notifications directly from the notifications list. Clearing all notifications should be an obvious feature, and one that’s available even on devices without 3D Touch.
I’d add this: Consider requiring a longer tap to jump from a notification to the app tied to that notification.
Why? I frequently find myself going to tap on something toward the top of the screen and, just as I’m about to make contact, a notification appears and I end up tapping the notification instead, launching myself out of my app. If a bit of a long press was required to respond to a notification, my simple tap would be ignored by the notification and I could dismiss it and return to my tap-happiness.
This happens to me periodically, both on iOS and macOS. Lasts through restarts, eventually goes away all on its own. Read all the way to the end (it’s short) for the thing that solved this for Glenn. Tucking that away in my brain for the next time it happens.
Jacob Kastrenakes, The Verge:
If you use two-factor authentication to secure your accounts, you’re probably used to this process: type in your password, wait for a text messaged code to arrive, memorize the code, and then type it back into the login prompt. It’s a bit of a pain.
Absolutely. Happens a lot. And this describes the process pretty well. Android has a fix:
In the new update, Messages will detect if you’re receiving a two-factor authentication code. When it does, it’ll add an option to the notification to copy the code, saving a step.
This is a step in the right direction. When a two-factor text is received, a copy button appears at the same time. Tap it, then paste it into the prompt.
It’d be nice to see this in iOS. But even better, it’d be nice to avoid the codes in the first place. The purpose of the codes is to prove that you have access to a verifying device. The codes themselves exist purely to give you a way to “move” the verification from the second device back to the original.
But iOS already does such an excellent job communicating between devices. I can copy on my iPhone, paste on my Mac, for example. And if the code is coming in on the same device that made the request, well that’s even easier.
What I’m suggesting is that Apple/Google work to create a verification service that eliminates all the friction. If I request a code on my Mac, popup a verification text message on my iPhone and, worst case, just make me tap “Yep” on an alert to verify the code, or “Nope” to let them know I didn’t make the request.
No reason for me to copy/paste or type in a number. Tap “Yep” and I’m in. Let the verification handshake happen in the background. Any reason this can’t be done?
[VIDEO] Last week, I tweeted about the process of grabbing multiple app icons, all in one stack, dragging them from one page to another.
Jeff Benjamin, 9to5Mac, did me one better, building an excellent how-to video (embedded in the main Loop post) that shows this technique, along with a bunch of related techniques. You might know most of these, but there’s this one bit you might not know. Check the recurring theme in Jeff’s video where he holds a stack with one hand, then uses the other hand to slide pages, rather than dragging the stack to the edge of the screen to force the page change. Jeff’s way is so much faster.
If nothing else, pass the link along to your iOS newbie friends.
Mitchel Broussard, MacRumors:
eBay today announced a new update for its iOS and Android apps, aimed at further simplifying the item listing process. The headlining feature of the update is a new barcode scanner, allowing sellers to quickly scan the box of an item (if they still have it), select a condition, and click “list your item.”
The barcode scanner will automatically populate the listing with all of the requisite details (images, description, suggested starting price), and the process can be finished “within seconds,” according to eBay. If you don’t have the item barcode you can still search for it by typing in a description, which should populate the listing at around the same rate as the barcode scanner.
Great idea.
This detailed tutorial really puts Workflow through its paces. If you’ve not yet spent quality time with the iOS Workflow app, this is a wonderful way to get started. Nice job by iMore’s Matthew Cassinelli.
Christian Zibreg, iDownloadBlog, does a really nice job walking through the process of using the iOS Markup tools to sign PDF documents. Terrifically useful.
Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note:
In 2008, for $278M, Apple acquires Palo Alto Semiconductor, a semiconductor design company. Less than a year after the iPhone starts shipping, the intent is clear: instead of buying off-the-shelf ARM chips, Apple wants to design its own processors for future iPhones.
And:
Compared to modest first-year iPhone sales, spending $278M to acquire Palo Alto Semiconductor looks out of proportion. And, of course, let’s not forget a context where Intel reigns supreme having just “captured” the Mac. As always, references to Apple’s “well-known” arrogance are at the ready: Who do these guys think they are, what do they know about microprocessor design and manufacturing?
This is a great read. There’s insight into Apple’s path from 68K to PowerPC, the PowerPC to Intel, with lots of links and backup detail. And then Jean-Louis moves on to the possibility of iOS running on an ARM-based Mac, with both the good and the bad implications.
UPDATE: I originally wrote about the possibility for a speed increase for the Xcode iOS simulator. I started a Twitter thread asking about this and the response was pretty much no, that the code will be native either way (currently x86 code, if ported, it’ll be native ARM code, only difference would be if the ARM processor was significantly faster than the original x86 processor.)
Tom Warren, The Verge:
For the longest time, pressing the home button on an iPad or iPhone was the fail-safe way to take you back to Apple’s grid of iOS apps. That changed with the all-screen iPhone X. A swipe up from the bottom is the new home gesture (which also unlocks the device) on Apple’s flagship phone, but that same gesture brings up the dock on the iPad. If, like me, you switch between the two devices fairly regularly throughout the day, then it takes a few minutes to adjust your muscle memory each time you switch.
An interesting issue. Same issue with Control Center.
To me, this is a migration issue, as iOS deals with the move from hardware with Home buttons to those without, the move from no Face ID to iOS devices with.
Spend a minute scrolling through the animated GIFs in Tom’s article. The confusion is clear.
Lory Gil, iMore:
Siri’s voice pitch and natural language has improved significantly over the years. But, just like humans, she can sometimes mispronounce a name. You can teach her how to pronounce names correctly. Here’s how.
If you’ve never gone through this exercise, this is well worth your time, a tip updated to the latest and greatest version of iOS.
Forbes:
Cellebrite, a Petah Tikva, Israel-based vendor that’s become the U.S. government’s company of choice when it comes to unlocking mobile devices, is this month telling customers its engineers currently have the ability to get around the security of devices running iOS 11. That includes the iPhone X, a model that Forbes has learned was successfully raided for data by the Department for Homeland Security back in November 2017, most likely with Cellebrite technology.
As the Forbes article points out, this prose is on the Cellebrite media datasheet:
Devices supported for Advanced Unlocking and Extraction Services include:
Apple iOS devices and operating systems, including iPhone, iPad, iPad mini, iPad Pro and iPod touch, running iOS 5 to iOS 11
Google Android devices, including Samsung Galaxy and Galaxy Note devices; and other popular devices from Alcatel, Google Nexus, HTC, Huawei, LG, Motorola, ZTE, and more.
If true, that Forbes headline seems a fair statement.
The HomePod is self-balancing, algorithmically adjusting its sound for the environment in which it’s placed.
Me? I like the sound. Have not yet felt the need to tweak it. But I do like a challenge. I came across this article from OSXDaily, which walks you through the process of tweaking your EQ for iOS.
I fired up some music, then went to Settings > Music and tapped EQ. There are 23 different canned EQ settings to choose from. The article recommends Late Night to maximize volume on your iPhone. Give that a try if you listen to music out of your iPhone speakers frequently.
Thought I’d try to AirPlay that EQ to HomePod.
With the music still playing, I went to Control Center, tapped the upper-right corner of the music player (bringing up AirPlay), and selected my HomePod. The music played, but when I tapped the various EQ settings, no change.
I went to iTunes on my Mac, launched System Preferences > Sound and tapped my HomePod. Back in iTunes, I tapped the EQ column in the current song (if you don’t see an EQ column, go to View > Show View Options and tap the Equalizer checkbox). No dice. Changing EQ does not impact HomePod.
This is me noodling, not at all a complaint. I love the HomePod sound. The EQ question comes up often enough, I thought I’d dig in, make sure I understood what was going on. Please return to your regularly scheduled programming.
John Gruber:
iOS 11 finally added a long-awaited feature for those of us who care about typographic details: smart punctuation. You can turn this on in Settings → General → Keyboards. When enabled, quotes and apostrophes (like “this” and ‘this’) are automatically turned into their proper counterparts (like “this” and ‘this’), two hyphens in a row (–) are turned into a proper em-dash (—), etc.
I say “finally” because MacOS has had the feature in the standard text editing system for many years, and I can’t think of a good reason why it wasn’t in iOS years ago.
And:
In some recent update to iOS (I think 11.2.5, but it might have been an earlier 11.2.x update), smart punctuation stopped working in Messages — and as far as I can tell, only Messages. Why? My best guess: unintended consequences when sending SMS messages.
I’m kind of shocked that it took this long for smart punctuation (which has been around in the Mac universe forever) to come to iOS. And that take it out, put it back in again Messages story is an interesting wrinkle.