Kudos to the Apple Support video team. They are putting out a steady stream of useful how-to videos that are great for folks new to the platform, or new to a particular mechanism.
This is the latest, focusing on the brand new Safari Tab Groups in iOS 15, iPadOS 15.
This was interesting, a sort of focus group specifically set up to see if folks noticed the difference between older displays and the new iPhone 13 adaptive refresh ProMotion display.
I love the new display, but not sure I would have noticed the difference when 120Hz came into play. That said, it definitely makes for an overall better experience. Not something that would impact my purchase decision like, say, the 3x optical zoom or macro capability in the camera, something very easy to notice.
Lots of fascinating tidbits here, if teardowns are your thing. But deep down, all the way in Step 10:
Face ID works even when we disconnected the front sensor assembly. However, any display replacement knocks out Face ID. We tried transferring the sensors from the old display and porting over the Face ID hardware, but no dice. It looks like the display is serial-locked to the phone.
And:
TL;DR: Unless Apple revises this behavior in software, screen replacements outside Apple’s authorized repair lose all Face ID functionality.
Is this a security measure to prevent a replacement screen from overriding Face ID on a stolen or seized iPhone? I suspect we’ll never know the logic behind this decision until far down the road.
This is an informative video from 9to5Mac’s Jeff Benjamin. If you already know your way around shutting down and restarting your iPhone, jump to 2:20 in for a little used shutdown method that doesn’t require finger gymnastics, then rolling right into a force restart method you might not be aware of:
Press up volume, then down volume, then press and hold the power button, all in quick succession.
Go ahead and give it a try. You can cancel and, as you’d expect, you’ll need to type in your passcode, just as you would if you did the press and hold the up volume and power button at the same time.
Ferrari press release:
Amsterdam and Maranello, 27 September 2021. Exor N.V. (“Exor”), the leading diversified holding company controlled by the Agnelli family, and Ferrari N.V. (“Ferrari”) announce a long term, multi-year collaboration with Sir Jony Ive and Marc Newson at the creative collective LoveFrom.
Marc Newson and Sir Jony Ive:
“We have been friends with John for many years and are great admirers of his insight and vision. We are thrilled to be embarking on such an important, long term collaboration with Ferrari and more broadly Exor. As Ferrari owners and collectors, we could not be more excited about collaborating with this extraordinary company and in particular with the design team expertly led by Flavio Manzoni. We see some uniquely exciting opportunities working together which we believe will yield important and valuable work.”
Ferrari already makes beautiful vehicles. It’ll be interesting to see what Jony Ive and Mark Newson bring to the design.
One interesting side note of the emergence of LoveFrom is the lack of a web site. Yesterday’s Ferrari press release had me check to see if that changed. When I did a LoveFrom search, here’s the Siri recommended web site.
Go ahead and give it a click. Clever.
Kif Leswing, CNBC:
The newest version of the iPhone operating system, iOS 15, has new privacy features for people who pay for iCloud storage.
One of the handiest new features is the ability to create a temporary email address — an address that’s not linked to your identity but still forwards messages to your inbox.
And:
These burner emails are good for signing up in forms on the web that you might not want to share your main email address with, Apple said when it announced the feature in June. Users can spin up as many burner email addresses as they need and delete them when it’s convenient.
We posted about this back in the early beta days, thought it worth re-exploring now that iOS 15 is officially out.
Note that this is part of iCloud+, something you gain access to if you pay Apple for storage. Follow the headline link for the walkthrough.
Reuters:
The $20 billion plants – dubbed Fab 52 and Fab 62 – will bring the total number of Intel factories at its campus in Chandler, Arizona, to six. They will house Intel’s most advanced chipmaking technology and play a central role in the Santa Clara, California-based company’s effort to regain its lead in making the smallest, fastest chips by 2025, after having fallen behind rival Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd
Intel is betting heavily on this re-roll of its chipmaking process.
TSMC, in the meanwhile:
Intel rival TSMC has also purchased land to build its first U.S. campus in Phoenix, not far from Intel’s location, where TSMC plans up to six chip factories.
From TSMC’s announced plans:
The initial fab is relatively modest by industry standards, with a planned output of 20,000 wafers – each of which contains thousands of chips – every month using the company’s most sophisticated 5 nanometre semiconductor manufacturing technology.
Both of these will bring this part of the supply chain onto US shores, though materials that are used in the fabrication process, like silicon, germanium, etc., are still critical path.
Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac:
The iPad mini 6 launched this week to much fanfare, thanks to its radically modern redesign and latest-generation A15 processor.
However, as customers receive their new iPads, a prominent issue is being spotted again and again. Colloquially referred to as ‘jelly scrolling’, it seems that one side of the iPad mini display is refreshing slower than the other side, which appears as a noticeable wobble effect down the middle of the screen when content is moving quickly — like scrolling a web page.
Here’s video showing what this looks like in slo-mo:
Here is is slow-mo video of scrolling on the iPad Min i slowed down EVEN MORE in a frame-by-frame step through. Notice how the right moves up faster than the left.
— Dieter Bohn (@backlon) September 22, 2021
In normal usage you barely see it, but every now and then it become noticeable. In landscape it goes away entirely pic.twitter.com/iq9LGJzsDI
I see this on my iPad mini, though I didn’t notice it until I started reading about it. Of course, now I can’t not see it.
This doesn’t bother me, particularly, but I do hate to see this fly in the ointment of a terrific product launch. Since this issue involves the way video refresh is done, not clear if this is simply a software fix, like the Unlock with Apple Watch issue appears to be.
Here’s hoping.
Apple:
With the release of iOS 15, Apple Maps gets its biggest update ever with a city experience that offers rich details, driving routes with better navigation, immersive walking directions shown in augmented reality, and much more. The update, which expands on the new map that Apple spent years building from the ground up, is now available in London, Los Angeles, New York City, and the San Francisco Bay Area, with more cities to come.
And:
Apple Maps introduces a new way to navigate cities with a visually stunning 3D map that offers unprecedented detail for neighborhoods, commercial districts, marinas, buildings, and more. Now users can see elevation details across a city, new road labels, and hundreds of custom-designed landmarks like Coit Tower in San Francisco, Dodger Stadium in LA, the Statue of Liberty in NYC, and the Royal Albert Hall in London, with more to come. A beautiful nighttime mode with a moonlit glow activates at dusk.
And:
Later this year, it will be available in Philadelphia, San Diego, and Washington, D.C. Support for additional cities, including Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, will be available next year.
Follow the headline link, scroll through the images to get a sense of what this looks like (at least to folks who can access it).
With every new Apple rollout, there are issues that crop up. Sometimes, it’s an unfixable hardware issue (thinking butterfly keyboard failure here). Other times, it’s a bug, fixed by a subsequent system release.
From the headline-linked Apple support note:
Apple has identified an issue where Unlock with Apple Watch may not work with iPhone 13 devices. You might see “Unable to Communicate with Apple Watch” if you try to unlock your iPhone while wearing a face mask, or you might not be able to set up Unlock with Apple Watch.
Yup. I’m experiencing this issue. I see the “Unable to Communicate with Apple Watch” alert when I try to turn the feature on.
Fortunately, Apple follows this with:
This issue will be fixed in an upcoming software update.
Hoping the iPad mini jelly scrolling issue (I’ll get to that in a couple of posts) is just as fixable.
Matthew Panzarino, TechCrunch, got the chance to speak with Apple VP Kaiann Drance and Human Interface Team designer Johnnie Manzari about Cinematic Mode.
“We knew that bringing a high-quality depth of field to video would be magnitudes more challenging [than Portrait Mode],” says Drance. “Unlike photos, video is designed to move as the person filming, including hand shake. And that meant we would need even higher-quality depth data so Cinematic Mode could work across subjects, people, pets and objects, and we needed that depth data continuously to keep up with every frame. Rendering these autofocus changes in real time is a heavy computational workload.”
And:
“We didn’t have an idea [for Cinematic Mode]. We were just curious — what is it about filmmaking that’s been timeless? And that kind of leads down this interesting road and then we started to learn more and talk more … with people across the company that can help us solve these problems.”
That second quote offers an interesting insight into how features like this are born. Sometimes new features are the result of trying to solve a specific problem in a clever way. Cinematic Mode was more born from an exploration into an existing process, trying to bring an existing solution from the complex, expensive, hardware heavy filmmaking world to the iPhone.
Nice writeup by Panzarino. Don’t miss the section “Testing Cinematic Mode” with the embedded demo reel. Don’t just watch the demo reel. It needs the context of Matthew’s descriptions to give a true sense of what Cinematic Mode is and isn’t. Great read.
One of the highlights of April’s M1-revealing Apple event was the Mission Impossible scene, with an Apple exec running on the roof of Apple Park, then breaking into HQ (for a refresher, watch the first video embedded below).
For a reveal on how the stunt was done (yup, there was actual running on the roof of Apple Park), watch the second video. Pretty great.
If you are curious about Apple TV+’s latest series, Foundation, this review by Liz Shannon Miller, Collider, is an excellent place to start. There are spoilers here, but nothing you wouldn’t get in the briefest conversation about the show, or the book series (a revered trilogy, with add-ons over time, by Isaac Asimov).
One turn of phrase that stuck out to me:
the downright sumptuous adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s long-thought-impossible-to-adapt novel series is, essentially, a dream come true for him and his fellow fans of hard science fiction.
Sumptuous and long-thought-impossible-to-adapt are key here. And, so far, looks like the show runners have succeeded in bringing the impossible to the small screen.
Thanks to Bare Bones Software for sponsoring The Loop this week. New! BBEdit 14 is still the power tool for text and also offers a new Notes capability plus greatly expanded language support! I’ve been using BBEdit for over 20 years and it’s still one of my favorite apps on my computer.
This week, Dave and I talk about the iPad and iPad mini reviews that I posted this week. We examine what I liked about both products, how they differ, and which one is best for you. We also talk about some of the iPhone 13 reviews that came out, as well as the Apple Watch.
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Follow the headline link, pick your iPhone model, then pick your iPhone color.
With those selected, start choosing case colors to see how they’ll look on your new iPhone 13.
Another great iPhone 13 Pro camera review, filled with images to give you a sense of the reach of the newest high end iPhone lenses/modes.
If the camera is driving you to consider an iPhone 13 Pro, this is a great review to make your way through.
The only caveat:
But there’s been one thing that has been bothering me in the week I’ve been testing the iPhone 13 Pros’ cameras. Something so frustrating that, for the first time in a decade, I’m not upgrading to the best iPhone camera that Apple has to offer… at launch. Not until Apple fixes it, at least. And a fix is coming, Apple confirmed to Input.
Here’s the issue:
If you have your iPhone 13 Pro camera set to the 1x wide camera and place an object or a subject within 14 centimeters (5.5 inches) of it, the viewfinder will maintain the 1x framing/composition but use the ultrawide’s close-range autofocusing in tandem. You can literally see the viewfinder flicker/pop and “switch” to this hybrid viewfinder.
Here’s a pair of videos (here and here) showing this flicker/pop effect in action. I get the annoyance, and I appreciate knowing the cause.
Apple’s response:
A new setting will be added in a software update this fall to turn off automatic camera switching when shooting at close distances for macro photography and video.
Perfect.
Austin Mann:
From macro shots of tiny ants to massive landscapes by helicopter, we’ve put the iPhone 13 Pro camera through the paces and I’m excited to share the results with you.
Just start scrolling. I love these shots, especially those shot with the iPhone 13 Pro’s Ultra Wide macro. More than anything else, that macro capability is the part of the iPhone 13 Pro I’m most looking forward to. Mine is arriving tomorrow.
Kudos to Apple Support for its recent run of “How To” videos. This video is full of useful information, perfect for folks relatively new to Apple Watch.
But even if you are a seasoned Apple Watch veteran, give it a look, if only for the run through of all the various features that you might have forgotten how to access, or whose mechanics might have changed/expanded in the last few releases.
One tiny thing I found interesting is at 18 seconds in. If you press the bottom of the Apple Watch, preparing to drag up to bring up Control Center, a translucent shutter pops into view (the top of Control Center). I am so used to pressing and dragging up in a single motion, I had never noticed that particular animation before. A mild detail, but I appreciate the value of having it pop up, perfect for accidental discovery.
Props to Zoe Schiffer for this headline.
From the post:
Tim Cook sent an email to Apple employees Tuesday evening about an all-hands meeting that leaked to The Verge last week. He said the company is doing “everything in our power to identify those who leaked” and noted that “people who leak confidential information do not belong” at Apple.
Follow the headline link to read the entire leaked thing.
Apple TV+ is focusing on its Science Fiction lineup, with the highly anticipated Foundation series, the Tom Hanks movie Finch, and the newest addition, an alien invasion series called (naturally) Invasion.
Of all the trailers Apple has put out, this one might be my favorite. It gives a strong sense of what’s coming without revealing too much. The production values look excellent and, most of all, the suspense ratchets up as you go. This brief glimpse is compelling.
Invasion premieres with 3 episodes on October 22nd. I will be watching.
Mark Spoonauer, Tom’s Guide:
We run every phone we review through the Tom’s Guide battery test, which involves continuous web surfing over 5G cellular at 150 nits of screen brightness. And these are the results compared to the iPhone 12 series.
Follow the headline link for the details and a longer list, but here are the iPhone 13 vs iPhone 12 series numbers (hours:minutes):
Guessing you won’t drive your iPhone’s as hard as the Tom’s Guide folks did, so your battery life might be even better.
This is some breathtaking footage. Make sure you watch in full screen, at the highest resolution your setup will support.
Follow the headline link for an updating list of links.
One video that was missed (at least as of this posting) was this excellent, detailed, video review by Rene Ritchie, which I’ve embedded below. It covers all the iPhone 13 series, including the mini, and touched on a few points I personally found very interesting. A fire hose of detail.
If you’ve only got a quick sec, check out the trailer below. It’ll give you a sense of the new show, which premieres a week from tomorrow.
If you have a bit more time, follow the headline link for an interview with Jon Stewart, specifically focused on the new show, from The Hollywood Reporter.
Louise Guillot, Politico:
The European Commission is set to present a legislative proposal on Thursday to force manufacturers to use a common charger for electronic devices, according to a Commission official closely involved in the file.
The proposal will require all manufacturers to harmonize the charging points on devices — using a USB-C charging point — and to make their software protocol for fast charging interoperable between brands and devices.
And:
Manufacturers will also be required to stop selling a charger with every new smartphone, instead giving consumers the choice to use their old charger.
From Reuters’ original reporting on this legislation last month:
Half of chargers sold with mobile phones in the European Union in 2018 had a USB micro-B connector while 29% had a USB C connector and 21% a Lightning connector, a Commission impact assessment study in 2019 found.
The goal, as I’ve seen it reported, is to force all manufactures to adopt USB-C for devices sold in the EU. Keep an eye on this story. If this goes forward, Apple would have until mid-2024 to have the change in place.
When Apple held its event announcing the new products earlier this month, I knew that the iPad mini was the star of the show. It is incredibly versatile, mighty and will be a hit across many customer categories.
I’ve used an iPad mini since Apple first added it to the product lineup. Of course, one of its main features is the smaller size, giving it a unique place among the iPad models. What makes this new model different is the sheer power it brings while maintaining its small form factor.
I always traveled with an iPad mini. It was perfect for taking on a plane, answering emails while on the road, getting some work done, and relaxing and watching a show or movie in the airport, plane, or hotel. It’s just a great all-around device.
In August, I purchased an iPad mini for my fiancé’s birthday—she loved using her old one for gigadatcasino.ltd so much, but it was years old and needed to be updated. Luckily, we were within the buying time limit, and Apple swapped it out for a new one, which should arrive this week.
I immediately noticed that this iPad mini is more than just a travel device. iPad mini is incredibly powerful in every way and can appeal to a whole new set of customers.
My iPad mini has 256GB of storage, the A15 Bionic chip, an 8.3-inch Liquid Retina display, a 12MP Wide camera, a 12MP Ultra Wide front camera, 5G, USB-C, and support for the second-generation Apple Pencil.
Unlike the other iPad models, the iPad mini does not come with a keyboard cover option, which means it’s meant to be a handheld device. For me, that is a critical difference in how Apple is positioning the mini for its customers.
To be clear, you can connect a Bluetooth keyboard to the iPad mini if you want, but there is no option to purchase a Smart Keyboard or Magic Keyboard like there is for other iPads.
Now, consider the people who can use a handheld device like the iPad mini with its advanced hardware.
The aviation industry uses iPad mini, so its pilots no longer have to carry around a bag with flight data information. Interior designers can take a mini to jobs and use Augmented Reality and various creative apps onsite. Creative pros can use the Apple Pencil whenever inspiration strikes, and you can capture movies and photos for projects you may be working on. These are just a few of the options open to people with the iPad mini.
All of this in a device that is a bit larger than a paperback novel (you remember those, right?)
In my review of the iPad, I mentioned that you should think about your options when considering whether or not to upgrade storage. My advice for the iPad mini is the opposite—get the 256GB storage.
If you look at the types of tasks you will be doing with the iPad mini, having as much storage as you can get is essential. You don’t want to be capturing a video clip and suddenly run out of space. Yes, you can offload your video when you get home, but you need the space when inspiration hits you.
iPad mini comes with the A15 Bionic chip, which is the most advanced chip on the market. It has a 6-core design with two cores used for high-performance tasks and four high-efficiency cores for everyday tasks. The new 5-core GPU gives an 80 percent increase in performance—this is what will make photo and video editing a breeze on this device.
Speaking of video, the iPad mini can now shoot 4K HD video with the 12MP rear camera. This only enhances what pro users can do with the iPad mini.
Like iPad, iPad mini now supports Center Stage using the 12MP Ultra Wide front camera. Center Stage automatically keeps you in the center of the camera frame. If you move to the left or right, the camera will compensate for that movement. If someone else walks into the frame, Center Stage will zoom out to put both people in the frame. It’s a great feature these days when more of us are doing work or school remotely.
USB-C allows the iPad mini to connect to devices like cameras and hard drives, again further enhancing what pro users can do with this device.
I know that many people use the Apple Pencil to draw, illustrate, and do other creative endeavors far beyond my capabilities. However, Apple Pencil can also be used for other tasks like taking notes and marking up documents, which is more my speed. Scribble also allows you to use handwriting in any text field, which is convenient if you already have the pencil in your hand.
iPad mini uses Touch ID integrated into the power button on top of the device. This is the only iPad where I used two finger IDs, one on each hand, to unlock it. I used the mini as much in landscape as I did portrait, so having two fingers made a lot of sense to open it quickly.
The only consideration to buy or not buy the iPad mini is the screen size. iPad mini has all the power in CPU, GPU, cameras, display, and connectivity that you would ever want. Ironically, the screen size will be a deal-breaker for some and the best feature of all for others.
I think the iPad mini is a star product that will appeal to the same markets as it did previously, but the power behind this new product will bring a lot more customers into the fold. At $499, you get the full iPad experience in a more portable form factor.
iPadOS 15 packs a lot of new features, but a few stood out to me. These features made using my iPad better, more efficient, and more productive. That’s what I’ll be focusing on here.
The most outstanding feature improvement in iPadOS 15 has to be multitasking. I’ve loved the ability to use multitasking on the iPad, but it always seemed like a hassle to get it working for me. Sometimes it was downright frustrating, but not anymore.
Now, when you open an app that supports multitasking, three dots appear on the top of the screen. You tap it to reveal the multitasking menu and choose Split View, Slide Over, or full screen. Then you select the app you want, and you are now using two apps.
I use this feature a lot in my daily work, and it makes things so much easier.
I’m as surprised as anyone that I would say Widgets are among my top new features. However, having the ability to place widgets on my Home Screen has changed things for me.
I have a lot of the information I’m looking for in a widget right in front of me, so I don’t have to go looking. Upcoming Calendar events, weather, and even pictures are among the widgets on my iPad. Interestingly, I’ve looked at more photos in my library since installing that widget than I ever have before. Sometimes, it is nice to reminisce.
I was glad to see App Library come to iPad. I never liked scrolling through pages of apps, so I would always use search. Now, I have the home page with my main apps and then the App Library. That’s it.
App Library is set up so my top used apps are available with a single tap, so I swipe to the App Library and tap the app I want. It’s faster than using search. When I need a lesser-used app, I swipe to App Library and then search.
Having my apps set up like this saves me time and is a much better experience.
Focus is an interesting new feature that gives you control over what happens on your iPad while in a particular mode. I mainly use Focus for sleep, so I don’t get interrupted when I’m trying to get some rest, but there are plenty of other ways to take advantage of Focus modes.
Turning on a Focus mode allows you to, well, focus on the job at hand. Focus enables you to draw boundaries around what is allowed and what isn’t. You can control notifications, the visible apps, and the people who can contact you while in a Focus mode.
Focus isn’t just for work; you can have a personal focus set up too. You can block work notifications for an hour or so, allowing you to focus on your personal tasks.
Apple is all about privacy and security, so it’s no surprise that a couple of my favorite new features are about privacy. The first is Mail Privacy Protection, which stops people or companies from knowing whether or not you’ve even opened an email from them. Some emails contain tracking pixels or use remote content to track you to build a profile of your habits and learn your location.
Mail Privacy Protection protects you from this type of behavior. Apple sends all remote content downloaded through multiple proxy servers, preventing the offending email from ever knowing your IP address or location. Apple assigns a random IP address only from your region.
The last two privacy features I like are part of iCloud+.
iCloud Private Relay allows you to browse the internet more securely. Traffic leaving your device is encrypted, so nobody can intercept and read what you are doing. Requests are sent through two separate relays, so your identity and your browsing are secure and private.
Hide My Email is another fantastic feature that allows you to set up alias email accounts to sign-up for services. All of those emails are delivered to your iCloud account, so you can get the correspondence you want, but you don’t have to give your actual email to a service if you don’t want to. When you are done, delete the alias, and the sender can no longer contact you.
There are many other great features in iPadOS 15 that may make your iPad experience great, but these are the ones that stood out to me.
Apple’s iPad could be the most underrated product in its lineup, but with the latest update, the company gives its entry-level users all the power and features they need to get the job done.
I’ve been using one of the new iPads for almost a week. This iPad comes with 256GB of storage, a 10.2-inch Retina display, the A13 Bionic chip with Neural Engine, a 12MP Ultra Wide front camera, an 8MP rear camera, support for the first-generation Apple Pencil, and 4G LTE cellular.
The new iPad model remains a testament to Apple’s commitment to meshing high-powered performance with user-friendly features. It’s a versatile choice for educators, novices to the iPad ecosystem, or even professionals whose daily work depends on reliable tech. The inclusion of the A13 Bionic chip with Neural Engine ensures that it remains a formidable contender, holding its own against the top-selling Android tablets and Chromebooks, despite being a product from 2019. This chip’s capabilities are not to be underestimated; it’s engineered to handle over a million apps available on the App Store seamlessly. For anyone who equates this kind of processing power with online gaming platforms, the iPad’s performance could be likened to the robustness of the 코인카지노 사이트, where swift, smooth, and uninterrupted service is a given, ensuring a premium user experience.
I am currently running the same setup on my iPad as I do on my iPad Pro M1, and everything is working just fine. Of course, I love other features on the pro, but the iPad is very capable of doing my daily work routine.
The iPad comes in two storage configurations—64GB and 256GB. Many people will default to paying up for more storage because running out of space is a big fear. That fear is a real consideration in some cases, depending on what you’re doing with the iPad. However, I recommend thinking about what you plan to do with the iPad before blindly paying up for extra storage.
On my iPad, I am currently using about 40GB of the 256GB available. That includes all my photos and about 3GB of music (I always have some music downloaded for trips).
I store most of my files on iCloud where I have a 2TB account. Using iCloud for my storage makes sense to me for many reasons, including accessing the files from any of my other devices and having the ability to offload files from my devices.
My point is that there are other viable options for storage other than purchasing physical space. Be aware of what you will be using the iPad for and make the smartest choice for you.
Having support for the first-generation Apple Pencil is huge for the iPad and its target market. Imagine what educators can do with their students when they have an iPad and Apple Pencil at their disposal. It opens the possibilities so much for what they can teach.
Just have a look at this one article in June to see how educators are utilizing the iPad to teach students.
Not only does iPad come with a 10.2-inch Retina display, but now it also includes True Tone. This feature has been around in Apple products for a while now, and I like it. True Tone adjusts the display to the room’s color temperature, giving you a better viewing experience. It’s tough to explain, but once you see it, you’ll appreciate it.
The one feature I didn’t expect in the new iPad is Center Stage, but it makes perfect sense after thinking about it. Center Stage uses the 12MP front camera to keep you in the center of the camera frame automatically. If you move to the left or right, the camera will compensate for that movement. If someone else walks into the frame, Center Stage will zoom out to put both people in the frame. It’s a great feature these days when more of us are doing work or school remotely.
The rear 8MP camera supports 1080p HD video recording and, of course, taking pictures. You can also use it for Augmented Reality, used by gamers, interior design apps, and many other applications.
I like having a keyboard for my iPads. It’s a must-have for me, but that’s because of the type of work I do on my iPad—a lot of writing. Apple does have a Smart Keyboard that is compatible with the iPad, and it’s pretty good.
I often sit outside typing with the iPad on my lap, and the Smart Keyboard doesn’t always work so well in that circumstance. The angle of the iPad display is off a bit, making it hard to see what I’m doing. However, if I were a normal person and used the Smart Keyboard on a desk or table, it would work perfectly. If I could change one thing, it would be to have the option to purchase a Magic Keyboard for iPad because it is the absolute best.
This iPad uses the traditional form factor, meaning that it has a physical Home button on the bottom of the display. It does not use Face ID or the integrated Touch ID in the power button as the new iPad mini does. For many people, this is a plus because they like the Home button. It doesn’t matter to me because I’ve used all three ways to unlock my devices, and in my experience, it’s just what you become familiar with using.
There are more powerful iPad models in Apple’s lineup. iPad models that use 5G, USB-C, faster chips, support for a newer Apple Pencil, and more storage space. However, all of those cost more money and are targeted to a different audience.
The updated iPad makes it the perfect device for its target market at an affordable price, starting at $329. It allows people to use robust apps to create, learn, and work using a device that is powerful, easy to transport, and packed with features.
iPadOS 15 packs a lot of new features, but a few stood out to me. These features made using my iPad better, more efficient, and more productive. That’s what I’ll be focusing on here.
The most outstanding feature improvement in iPadOS 15 has to be multitasking. I’ve loved the ability to use multitasking on the iPad, but it always seemed like a hassle to get it working for me. Sometimes it was downright frustrating, but not anymore.
Now, when you open an app that supports multitasking, three dots appear on the top of the screen. You tap it to reveal the multitasking menu and choose Split View, Slide Over, or full screen. Then you select the app you want, and you are now using two apps.
I use this feature a lot in my daily work, and it makes things so much easier.
I’m as surprised as anyone that I would say Widgets are among my top new features. However, having the ability to place widgets on my Home Screen has changed things for me.
I have a lot of the information I’m looking for in a widget right in front of me, so I don’t have to go looking. Upcoming Calendar events, weather, and even pictures are among the widgets on my iPad. Interestingly, I’ve looked at more photos in my library since installing that widget than I ever have before. Sometimes, it is nice to reminisce.
I was glad to see App Library come to iPad. I never liked scrolling through pages of apps, so I would always use search. Now, I have the home page with my main apps and then the App Library. That’s it.
App Library is set up so my top used apps are available with a single tap, so I swipe to the App Library and tap the app I want. It’s faster than using search. When I need a lesser-used app, I swipe to App Library and then search.
Having my apps set up like this saves me time and is a much better experience.
Focus is an interesting new feature that gives you control over what happens on your iPad while in a particular mode. I mainly use Focus for sleep, so I don’t get interrupted when I’m trying to get some rest, but there are plenty of other ways to take advantage of Focus modes.
Turning on a Focus mode allows you to, well, focus on the job at hand. Focus enables you to draw boundaries around what is allowed and what isn’t. You can control notifications, the visible apps, and the people who can contact you while in a Focus mode.
Focus isn’t just for work; you can have a personal focus set up too. You can block work notifications for an hour or so, allowing you to focus on your personal tasks.
Apple is all about privacy and security, so it’s no surprise that a couple of my favorite new features are about privacy. The first is Mail Privacy Protection, which stops people or companies from knowing whether or not you’ve even opened an email from them. Some emails contain tracking pixels or use remote content to track you to build a profile of your habits and learn your location.
Mail Privacy Protection protects you from this type of behavior. Apple sends all remote content downloaded through multiple proxy servers, preventing the offending email from ever knowing your IP address or location. Apple assigns a random IP address only from your region.
The last two privacy features I like are part of iCloud+.
iCloud Private Relay allows you to browse the internet more securely. Traffic leaving your device is encrypted, so nobody can intercept and read what you are doing. Requests are sent through two separate relays, so your identity and your browsing are secure and private.
Hide My Email is another fantastic feature that allows you to set up alias email accounts to sign-up for services. All of those emails are delivered to your iCloud account, so you can get the correspondence you want, but you don’t have to give your actual email to a service if you don’t want to. When you are done, delete the alias, and the sender can no longer contact you.
There are many other great features in iPadOS 15 that may make your iPad experience great, but these are the ones that stood out to me.
New! BBEdit 14 is still the power tool for text and also offers a new Notes capability plus greatly expanded language support! I’ve been using BBEdit for over 20 years and it’s still one of my favorite apps on my computer.
Jason Snell shared an excerpt from a forthcoming update to his book “Take Control of Photos”. Lots of detail/pictures in the excerpt, including:
To see what Apple has to say about the particular item in question, tap on the small circle in the photo, or (on an iPhone or iPad) on the Look Up option in the Info window. You’ll be presented with a floating window that describes what Photos thinks the object is, with web links for more information. Among the results that you might see are book covers, art, landmarks, plants, flowers, and even pet breeds.
And:
In an attempt to add an extra layer of context to items in your library, the new version of Photos offers even more machine-learning-based image analysis features. The info icon in the toolbar will become adorned with a couple of sparkly stars to indicate that your photo contains items identified by Apple’s new image-analysis system.
And:
One of the banner features of iOS 15 and macOS Monterey is Live Text, which lets you select text that is present in images, whether it’s text in a screenshot or on a picture of a sign or a menu or a t-shirt. And of course, it works in Photos.
To select text in an image, just imagine that you’re selecting text in a text document. On a Mac, you’ll see that when you move the pointer over the text in your image, it turns into a text-selection cursor. On an iPhone or iPad, tap and hold on text to select it and bring up text-selection controls.
I’ve been playing with Live Text all morning. In the iPhone Camera app, yellow brackets will appear around any recognized text, and a Live Text icon will appear in the bottom-right of the frame. Tap the Live Text icon and you’ll be able to copy the text, etc. Very cool.
Great writeup by Jason Snell. Here’s a link to his book. Though the new edition is not yet up (it’s in copyedit, should go live in a few weeks), folks who buy the book now will get the update for free.