Talking Tech for June 17 2014

Catching up on the WWDC (World Wide Developers Conference) 2014 1st week in Jun

 

A bit late, but I wanted to still go through the main items for the beta’s of iOS 8 and OS X 10.10 called Yosemite.

 

OS X.

 

1. 10.10 called Yosemite.

2. New transparent theme with dark theme.

3. Notifications Centre with iOS like today view.  Widgets available from the Mac App Store for Stocks etc.

4. Spotlight now appears in the middle of the screen, and search’s not only on the Mac but on the internet as well.

5. Safari stream lined with most controls hidden allowing a larger viewing area of a webpage.

6. Can send large files using Mail via iCloud or as a link to non iCloud users.

7. If you have an iPhone: Messages can now send/receive SMS messages.  Short audio clips can also now be recorded.

8. iCloud drive to share documents between all devices using iCloud.

9. Make/receive iPhone calls on your Mac.

10. Handoff: What ever you are working on your Mac, hand it off to another device or if you have started something on your iPhone, finish it off on your Mac.

11. Easily connect to personal hotspot on your iPhone.

 

iOS 8

 

1. Photos now accessible on all devices.

2. Add Audio or video to a Message plus add current location. Can also lift phone to your ear to reply to an audio message.

3. Access recently contacted people from the App Switcher.

4. Predictive word suggestions when using the on-screen keyboard.

5. Ability to use a 3rd keyboard such as Fleksy when available.

6. Family sharing for up to 6 people with Music, iBooks and apps.

7. Access to iCloud drive.

8. Handoff with Mac.

9. All Health Apps will now be able to talk to each other.

10 Enhancements to Spotlight.

11. Improvements to enterprise functionality.

12 Extended functionality to apps including access to touch id.  In addition, developers will be able to have videos of their apps in the App Store plus give users test drive versions.

13. Home kit will allow various home smart appliances to talk together.

14. New modern programming language called Swift with 4.000 new API’s.

15. The Clock app icon now has the time on it, including seconds.

16. Double tap and hold on an individual email and swipe to the left will send the email to the Trash

17. When touching on the Dock, VoceOver will say Dock then the name of the app: e.g. Dock Safari.

18. Can check Battery app specific usage in Settings, General, Usage, Battery.

19. In Notifications Centre, only two tabs now: Today and Notification tabs.

20. iBooks now comes pre-installed rather than having to download it to a new device.

21. Airplay no loner requires a wi-fi connection to play to an Apple TV.

22. Manage AppID from iCloud in Settings.

 

 

Siri

 

1. Can now say “hay Siri” if ;plugged in to power to activate Siri without touching the device.  Option controlled by the new Voice Activation toggle in  Settings Siri

2. Siri can now listen to a song and tell you what it is.

3. Siri will take  you to the iTunes store to [purchase a song after it has identified it.

 

Accessibility

1. Enhancements to System Zoom.

2. New Grey scale feature for low vision folks.

3. VoiceOver now has a Braille input keyboard plus access to the Alex voice usually found on OS X: only available on the iPhone 5s and the most recent iPad.  You can toggle audio ducking on/off via the rotor.  New Braille page turning option toggle.  New typing mode selection of standard, touch and direct.

4. Use touch id to exit guided access.

5. Speak screen.

6. Besides captioning, now supports video description (which assuming is audio description).