Apple’s iPad isn’t getting the same kind of love from consumers it enjoyed in its early days. Perhaps that’s a why Apple is now lavishing it with so much attention.
iOS 11, which enters public beta today, is a love letter to the tablet, giving it the kind of radical makeover no longer possible (or at least expected) through hardware redesign.
SEE ALSO:Future iPhones and iPads might have a special chip just for processing AII’ve owned an iPad since the very first model, used every iteration since, including the more powerful iPad Pros, and run every iOS on them since iOS 5. Nothing, however, prepared me for iOS 11 on an iPad Pro 10.5.
iOS 11 is more than just an update, it's a refashioning of Apple's mobile OS.Credit: lance ulanoff/mashableOn the one hand, iOS 11 unleashes the power too often hidden inside the iPad. On the other, it nudges the tablet platform hard in the direction of macOS. iOS 11 is by no means the same as that desktop and laptop platform, but it clearly occupies more of the middle ground between a hyper-modal touch-only interface and the mouse-driven, multitasking power of macOS.
Here's what I learned from using iOS 11 on the new iPad Pro. Keep in mind this is still beta software. It's buggy, and features could take different form or disappear altogether before the official release in the fall.
iOS 11 is also the first time that, in a single upgrade cycle, the mobile platform works differently on Apple’s mobile devices.
Apple’s new divergence is nowhere more evident than on the redesigned Dock.
The Dock -- the row of apps that are "permanently" on the bottom of the screen -- is no longer a fixed element that only appears as part of the home screen. I mean, it’s still on that screen, but now it’s a wide, app-height floating rectangle, and you can fill it with up to 12 app icons. All you do is drag and drop icons on and off the dock, but on the right side, the iPad reserves three spots that are either apps you recently used or Apple suggestions (sort of like Siri suggestions on the iPhone). I wish that Apple also let you swipe left or right on the dock to add an endless number of apps.
The iOS 11 iPad home screen is at once familiar and quite new.Credit: AppleThe Dock disappears when you launch an app, but it’s always waiting down below -- a swipe up from the bottom edge will bring it back into view. It’s not just there to whisk you back to a different app; instead it’s an app interchange.
The control panel is so different, but I like it.Credit: lance ulanoff/mashableIn addition to tapping on any app to reopen it, you can hold down on an app icon and drag it up on top of your other open app to open Split View. Split View is not new on the iPad Pro, but now you can increase the multi-tasking fun by one. Grab and drag another app from the dock and it will float on top of the other apps in what’s called Slide Over.
The new App Switcher and Control Panel occupy the same space.Credit: appleEven on a larger 10.5-inch iPad Pro display, things can get a little crowded. The Slide Over app partially covers the apps under it. You can flick it to the left or right side of the screen, but you may find, as I did, that, unless you are using three apps at once and opposed to switching back and forth among them, that you may like, as I do, to flick the Slide Over app to the right off screen. You bring it back by swiping in to the left from the right edge of the screen.
There is another gesture hidden under the new Dock. If you swipe up to reveal it but don't let go and instead continue swiping toward the top of the screen, you’ll access the redesigned App Switcher (also accessible via a double-press of the home button).
iOS 11 is ready to multitask with up to three apps. Things can get a little busy.Credit: appleThis new screen will show you all open apps as well as the ones that have been paired in a single window. That way, the Split View is maintained, which can give iOS 11 an unnecessarily modal feel. You can also dismiss any open app by holding down on any of them until an “x” appears on all of them and then select any “x” to close one of them. I do kind of miss the "swipe up to end an app" task.
It's easy to multi-task with up to three apps.Credit: lance ulanoff/mashableApp Switcher is also where the redesigned Control Panel lives. In iOS 11, it’s less of a panel than a tight collection of modules. I especially like the new volume and brightness controls, which, with their blockier designer, are now much easier to use.
All these Split Views, floating apps and the dock also unlock some powerful, drag-and-drop capabilities.
There is a clear attempt to connect iOS 11 actions more closely with intention. When you start looking at images in Photos, are you really there just to browse or are you planning to share something? iOS 11 is designed for that next step.
Hold down on an app icon to see what you were working on recently.Credit: appleI opened Photos, selected a single photo and then, using iOS 11’s new multi-select function, held one finger on my first photo and tapped on additional photo thumbnails. Each one appears to move behind the original so that I was soon holding four photos under one finger. Keeping my finger on the screen, I used my thumb to sweep up from the bottom of the screen and reveal the dock. Then I dragged the photos onto the mail app, which popped open on my draft email, where I dropped the photos.
Select a bunch of photos at once and then drag them over.Credit: lance ulanoff/mashableIt’s an impressive, if slightly complicated act, but I’m still impressed that this works on an iPad. Most of the drag and drop features work best among Apple’s native apps. I could not, for, example drag and drop an image from Photos to a tweet draft.
Drag and drop on point.Credit: lance ulanoff/mashableNative apps also support a peek function for most recent files. You just hold down on, say, the new Files app icon and a recent file appears. It’s not just a static thumbnail. I could hold my finger down on the file image and drag it to the iMessage icon, which opened a new message in the app with the file image ready to be sent.
The Files app by the way, is iOS's first file management tool. It’s a central place where you can view many of the files you’ve opened or are working on. There’s a folder and sub-folder structure and you can sort files by Name, Date, Size and Tags. Tags are like Google’s Label systems: They’re not boxes, but a more open way to organize disparate files. At any time, you can grab multiple files in Files and drag them to one of the tags.
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I’m a little confused about Apple’s default Tags. There are seven colors (listed at the top) and, below that, Tags for Work, Home, and Important. Even though I can reorder the Tag list and delete Tags, I can’t edit the names or add new ones. [Apple followed up and told me there is a way to edit and create new tags through the edit button (upper right part of the screen) and by tapping and holding on on a file. Not exactly obvious, but it works.]
Files will not only let you browse files on your iPad and other iOS devices (under the same iCloud account), but it can integrate third-party cloud storage platforms like Box and Google Drive. I just wish that the integration was a bit stronger. When I open one of those cloud platforms within Files, I get a popup that does not seem entirely connected to the rest of the Files system.[Apple says integration is not complete and that it will be much different on the final iOS 11 build when partners update their apps.]
In many ways, Files feels like a Version One attempt at something Microsoft mastered with Windows Explorer and Apple with its own File manager in macOS ages ago.
Remember when Apple’s Notes was just this lightweight app for type-driven note taking? Apple’s been enhancing it for years, but it really grows with iOS 11. Notes can now scan documents, search written text, and support inline art and tables.
For scanning, Notes uses the camera and some impressive AI to identify a rectangular document, remove distortions and bring it directly into Notes as an annotatable document.
This document is being scanned by iOS 11 Notes on an iPad Pro.Credit: Lance Ulanoff/MashableMy written scrawl pretty much over-matched Notes in iOS 11. I’d say it got about 50% of what I wrote. That may improve with subsequent betas, but it would help if I could write legibly.
Apple’s iOS 11 is packed full of other changes that carry over to the iPhone. There’s the fully redesigned, card-based App Store, a more natural-sounding Siri (she did sound better), Wi-Fi password sharing (over AirDrop and totally encrypted) and QuickType, which lets you switch to the shift option on any key by sweeping up on the virtual key. It’s useful if you’re using the iPad Pro as a tablet, but not at all when using the iPad Pro 10.5 with the physical Smart Keyboard.
There’s the awkwardness of a transitional phase and, owing to its beta state, some bugginess, but, overall, iOS 11 is a major leap forward for Apple’s mobile platform and, especially for the iPad. It’s going to change the way people look at Apple’s seven-year-old tablet.
With iOS 11, the iPad fully transcends the criticism that it's just a giant iPhone. It’s a super-thin and light, large-screen device with software that now ably bridges the gap between the in-your-pocket ease of the iPhone and the power and flexibility of the Mac.
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