With many amazing announcements coming from Apple yesterday I don't really know where to begin. I will highlight some of the more impressive topics starting with Apple Pay on the iMac.
Well ok not really how it works but it got a ton of laughs! This feature will use your iPhone to verify purchases online via the thumb print scanner of your iPhone. Nice added security for any online payments. Somehow typing in my credit card number to websites never felt good or safe to me so this gives me some extra security and peace of mind for my payments online. Next up is Apple TV.
Apple TV is by far one of the most used devices in my house. From the kid watching Mulan for the 30th time or getting a quick game of Crossy Road in its almost constantly on. Now Apple is fixing one of my biggest complaint in the fact of having to sign into various video streaming apps like ESPN or PBS now they will incorporate a single sign-on feature so all you have to do is sign in once and the others apps get sign in for you automatically. Another feature thats getting an upgrade is Siri voice commands. Now you can say "watch ESPN 2" and the ESPN 2 app will come up and auto play the live video saving a couple of extra steps you have to do now. Also you will be able to say "search YouTube for____" and Siri can now find your favorite videos on YouTube. And, what may seem small to some, is the "Dark mode". Instead of the almost blinding white background you can pick a black background for the home screen of the Apple TV. Now on to OS X or should I say MacOS.
MacOS is the new name for the overall operating system for Macs. Like iOS or tvOS, MacOS sounds more inline with the other operating systems Apple is using. And the new operating system for Mac will be called MacOS Sierra. They talked a lot about this new OS but the two things that stood out to me were the cloud storage of old data to give you a tone of space back on your hard drive. This feature is excellent because it solves two issues, me not knowing what I should take off my computer, and giving me much needed space on my hard drive. Thank you Apple for having answers for both! The other feature is "Universal clipboard". This allows you to copy something on your iOS device (iPhone, iPad) and paste it to your Mac! No more the days of emailing or texting something to my Mac. I will be able to just copy on my iPhone and past to my Mac! Very excited about this one if you couldn't tell.
iOS 10 will be bring a host of new features to the lock screen and to messaging along with a ton of other features that you will have to watch the over 2 hour video of to get all the juicy details from:
The advancements I will talk about for iOS 10 is the raise to wake and messages. In my experience with the iPhone 6s Plus is how incredibly fast the finger print reader works, almost to the extent of being annoying because I don't get to see my notification on the lock screen. Now with the upcoming "raise to wake" I will be able to just tilt my phone from the flat position to holding the phone in my hand at a normal 45 degree angle. When I do this I do not have to press any buttons and my notification will show up on the lock screen even my messages!
Messages is getting an all out feature punch to the face. Allowing text feed backgrounds to be customized for the message you send. To making your text bubble bounce or shake according to what you choose. They even added feature rich links so now instead of showing a weblink it will also pull in the image for that link. But check the video out (above) to see all the wacky but fun updates to messages.
Apple is allowing all people with developer account to download the iOS 10 and MacOS Sierra OS today and beta testing for the public in July. I for one am always excited to get new features added to my devices that enhance and make my life easier.
Oh and for all you interested, Swift coding for iPad is coming too! This is an amazing opportunity for everyone to learn how to code. I for one think everyone should learn the basics of coding to know how your devices communicate. This version has lesson for kids to learn how to code and considering most schools now have iPads this opens up a world of possibilities to have kids write amazing apps in school!
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