iOS

Tip: ask Siri to remind you about things you’re looking at in your apps

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated April 10, 2019

Siri's Proactive features let you do so much more, and in a more intelligent fashion than ever before. In addition to suggesting apps, people, locations and more when you use Spotlight Search, iOS also lets you ask Siri to actually create context-aware reminders for what you’re looking at on the screen of your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad.

Asking to be reminded about things you’re looking at in apps like Safari, Mail and Notes that you want to follow up on later can be a tremendous productivity boost.

The feature is a great time-saver when you cannot currently deal with what you're doing right now, and would like to get reminded about it at a later stage, but are too lazy to create a reminder yourself. Here's how it works.

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How to import your old Health and Activity data into your new iPhone

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated April 10, 2019

Moving over your existing Health and Activity data from your old iPhone to a new one can be a tricky business unless you know exactly what you're doing. The problem stems from the fact that Health and Activity data is not stored in regular iTunes backups, which are unencrypted by default, unless you remember to turn on encryption manually. It's a security precaution to prevent malicious users with access to your computer to mine your sensitive medical data from unencrypted iTunes backups.

The approach also poses a major challenge to folks who log their fitness and health data in Apple's Health and Activity apps. Surely you don't want to start from scratch and lose all the Health and Activity data that you'e amassed in the past year or so.

As it turns out, there is a way—actually, two ways—to preserve your complete Health and Activity data logs when you switch to a new iPhone.

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Twitterrific update with iOS 9 and iPad multitasking support, new features and improvements

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 23, 2015

Twitterrific 5, The Iconfactory's freemium Twitter client for iOS and OS X platforms, has received its iOS 9-focused update this morning.

The app is now fully optimized for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices running iOS 9 and supports new Slide Over and Split View multitasking modes on compatible iPads. If you own an iPad Air 2 or an iPad mini 4, you can now run Twitterrific and another app side-by-side in iOS 9's new Split View mode.

This is a great feature as you can now pin Twitterrific on the right and configure it to use Safari as your browser instead of in-app. In addition to iOS 9-specific support, this edition of Twitterrific includes other changes and improvements listed further below.

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Why iOS 9’s Facedown detection doesn’t work on iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, iPad and iPod touch

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated December 9, 2022

Facedown detection stands as one of the underrated features in iOS 9's rich arsenal of power-saving tactics designed to help extend your run time by up to an additional hour.

Facedown detection avoids turning the display on when a notification comes in and your phone is put facedown. But as it turns out, Facedown detection doesn't work on all devices compatible with iOS 9 and there is a good explanation for that  why.

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Shazam update brings support for iOS 9’s enhanced Spotlight Search and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 21, 2015

Shazam, the popular music and media identification software, has rolled out a brand new 9.0 update to its iPhone and iPad application in the App Store, bringing out support for Spotlight Search on iOS 9, improved Bluetooth listening and other tidbits.

Shazam songs and artists can now be searched from the Home screen on iOS 9 and tapping a Shazam result takes you directly into that content within Shazam's mobile app.

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New in iOS 9: a more detailed upload indicator in stock Photos app

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated December 9, 2022

Apple's streamlined Photos app for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad has not gained major new features in iOS 9, unlike Photos for Mac whose upcoming OS X El Capitan release contains several new features that didn't make it into the inaugural version of Photos for OS X last fall.

But there's one tiny refinement in iOS 9's Photos app that I think will delight people like myself who rely on iCloud to keep their photos and videos synchronized across their devices: a more detailed upload progress indicator.

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XcodeGhost: a new malware infecting many popular iOS apps

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 19, 2015

A few dozen iPhone and iPad applications, most of them developed for China, have been infected with XcodeGhost, a malware that collects information on the devices and uploads that data to remote servers.

Among them is WeChat, one of the most popular instant messaging applications in the world.

Rather than exploit an iOS vulnerability, the malware in question sneaks its way into apps indirectly, by targeting Apple's official compilers used to create legitimate apps. The malware was found to inject its malicious code into a Mach-O object file that was repackaged into some versions of Xcode, Apple’s official tool for developing iOS and OS X apps.

These Trojanized Xcode installers were then uploaded to Baidu’s cloud file sharing service used by Chinese app developers, explains Palo Alto Networks. The malicious code then inserts itself into any iOS app compiled with the infected Xcode without the developers’ knowledge.

It's not Apple's fault, really: this would have never happened had these developers downloaded Xcode files directly from Apple. Baidu has since removed all of the infected files from its servers and some of the infected apps have since removed the malware code in their latest builds.

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How to only show the days you completed dedicated workouts with Activity app

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated December 9, 2022

Folks who track their workouts with the Apple Watch or a third-party fitness accessory tend to analyze their logged history in the iPhone's Activity app in order to gain a valuable insight into when they have—and more importantly, have not—met their personal goals.

Realizing you're consistently failing to hit your set workout goal on weekends, for example, is the first step toward changing your routine, working out more and leading a healthier life overall.

Though largely unchanged from its iOS 8 counterpart, Activity on iOS 9 has gained a useful, somewhat hidden toggle for switching between displaying Move, Exercise and Stand rings and highlighting the days you completed dedicated workouts.

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New in iOS 9: two-column landscape layout in Notification Center on iPads

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 18, 2015

iOS 9 packs in a whole bunch of nice-to-haves and small refinements that haven't even made it into the official release notes.

Among other things, the operating system introduces a more streamlined Notification Center view in landscape mode which Apple designed to take advantage of the larger screen real estate on iPads.

The enhanced look is based on a two-column layout to allow the simultaneous display of your Today view in one column and your Notification Center widgets and app notifications in the other, so you don't have to switch manually between them.

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