iOS4.1 Tips, Tricks and How Tos

 

Over the last week or so, we have seen a few tips, tricks and how tos for iOS4.1. Many of these are to improve the user experience. Some are just for help with various features. 

Here are  a few tips to help you enjoy 4.1 a little more:

Home Button: The Home button is very interesting, believe it or not. Of course it doesn't seem like much, but it offers a lot of functionality for just one button:

 

Home Button Trick 1: If you are on the first page of your Home Screen, you can press the Home button to take you into the spotlight search. Ever since iOS4, the Spotlight search has been many times more useful. It searches throughout your phone and will even offer an internet and Wikipedia search. Thanks for 4.1, 3G users will notice that it's much faster than it was in iOS4.

 

 

 

Home Button Trick 2: If you are on any page other than the first page of your Home Screen (for example, if you are on page eight) you can simply press your home button once to quickly take you back to page one. This is much easier than seven or eight thumb swipes.

 

 

Change Home Button Settings: Because of the 3G's inability to multitask, clicking the Home button twice simply takes users to their "Favorites."

However, you can change the double-click setting: Go to Settings>General>Home Button

From there you can assign that double-click to anything such as: Home, Search, Phone Favorites (Default), Camera and iPod.

 

iPhone Home Button Trick 4: If you are currently listening to music or Podcasts, you can double-click on the home button to bring up iPod controls without having to launch the iPod App itself.

 

 

iPhone Home Button Trick 5: If your device is locked, and you have music or Podcasts playing, you can double-click to bring up the iPod controls without having to unlock your iPod. Very convenient when on the move.

 

 
 

 

Browser Tricks:

 

Scroll to Top: Ever scroll far down a website, and realize that you need to scroll all the way back up the page to get to your URL bar? If you've scrolled down a long way, it can take a few seconds to get yourself back to the top of the page.

 

Here's an easy solution: Touch the top bar (where your battery icon and time appear) this will automatically scroll all the way back up the page. This also works with some Apps.

 

 

 

Domain Resolution: This can make navigation in the mobile browser a bit easier. You don't need to type in "www" or ".com" to navigate to a website. You can simply type in something like CNN or NewYorkTimes in your URL bar. Your browser will know what you mean and direct you to CNN.com or NYTimes.com.

 

   

 

 

 

 

 

Domain Suffix:  If you hold down the ".com" key while entering a URL, you will see additional suffixes pop up. 

 

 

 

 

iOS Tricks:

 

Alternate Characters: If you press and hold a letter, you will get options for alternate characters.

 
 

 

 

 

Reset: We don't recommend doing this one very often, but it may come in handy if you experience freezes or other issues with your phone. Hold down your Home button first and then press and hold your Sleep button. Keep them both held, and you will eventually see the shutdown screen. Don't shut it down, just keep holding the buttons until the phone powers itself off. You can now turn your iPhone back on. We recommend this only if you are having some issues with your device, such as inaccurate representation of battery life or a lockup.

 

 

 

 

Screenshot: This time press and hold your Sleep button. Now just press the home button once, and you should see a flash and hear the sound of a camera shutter. If you check your pictures, the screenshot you just took should be the most recent in your collection.

 

 

Bring the Delete email option back into iOS4.1: With iOS4.1 the option to delete email is nowhere to be found. 

We now have this:   

Instead of this:       

 

They took it away! No. They didn't…it's just hiding. Here's how to find it:

1) Go to Settings: 

 

 

 

 

2) Then "Mail, Contacts, Calendars"

 

 

 

3) Now click on your email account. You will see a toggle with "Archive Messages" turned on. Simply switch that off. Now you can start deleting email again.

 

 

 

Conserve Battery:  This one is more geared towards the devices that can multitask, especially the iPhone 4. It's very easy, too.

Simply click on the Home Button twice to bring up your Multitask Dock. In it you will see all the Apps that are currently running in the background. You can close any of the ones you aren't using by holding down until they do the "Jiggle" and hitting the little X. This may not seem like a huge deal, but when you have anything that uses location features or something that uses a perpetual connection like Skype, it can kill your battery fast. Especially if you are making regular use of the phone such as calling and checking email all while those Apps are running in the background.

 

How to make a FaceTime call on an iPod Touch 4G: FaceTime is available on the iPod Touch 4G. However, you don't have a phone App or a way to just dial a number to get in touch with another FaceTime user. 

It may seem a little less straightforward than making a phone call and hitting a button that reads "FaceTime," but it's very simple. Here's how you do it:

 

First things first:

- As you may know, FaceTime only works over wifi. That means that both parties must have a wifi connection and their device (Whether it's an iPhone or iPod Touch) must be connected to the internet over a wireless network.

- You must also have an Apple ID. If you don't have one yet, you must create one. Your Apple ID is the same ID you use to log into iTunes and make purchases.

1) Launch FaceTime on your device:

2) Sign in with your Apple ID.

3) Choose your current region in the location screen.

4) You will also need to enter the email address that others should contact you on through FaceTime. If it's your first time, you should check your email for a confirmation message. Know that if you already use your iPod Touch's email App to check your email, the confirmation is automatic, because it's already registered with Apple.

Now You're ready to go! You've signed in and created your account. It's time to make a call.

5) Now you must choose someone from your contacts (make sure they have also set up their FaceTime account)

6)  When you see that person in your contacts, if your FaceTime settings are on, you will see the FaceTime icon near their contact information, as shown below:

Know that for your contacts, you can add their email address for those who are on an iPod Touch and you can add the phone number for those who are on an iPhone 4.  

5) Now have fun talking face-to-face. Check out settings such as portrait and landscape, switch cameras, show dad his new grandson, or your boyfriend your new haircut, you get the idea.