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- Jun 12, 2011
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- Melbourne, Australia and Ubud, Bali, Indonesia
- Your Mac's Specs
- 2021 M1 MacBook Pro 14" macOS 14.4.1, Mid 2010MacBook 13" iPhone 13 Pro max, iPad 6, Apple Watch SE.
I am not an early adopter to the degree of installing beta versions of iOS/iPadOS or macOS versions as a rule. Perhaps it is just the boredom of being in partial lockdown and now voluntarily in 14 days home isolation. Sadly, yesterday we became primary contacts for 3 people who although vaccinated have delivered positive COVID-19 results.
So, I decided to download and instal iPadOS 15.6 on the device least important to me, my iPad.
First thing I noticed, App Library on the Dock. Now I know iOS App Library has not been all that popular amongst users and members of these forums but I love it in iOS and have gone on record as hoping it would be introduced in iPadOS. I found once I got the hang of it apps were easier to find than by visually scanning half a dozen Home pages.
Split Screen View was the next thing I noticed. There are three little dots at the top, middle of any open app window. Tapping them opens a tiny panel with three view options; Full Screen, Slide Over and Split View. Each open app gets the three dots at the top giving you individual control. Uses of these three options become quickly apparent when you try them so I will not try to explain their actions here, let me just say it is so much easier and intuitive than the old swipe actions that I'm sure you will find yourself using it a lot more.
iPadOS Safari does not look that much different to the previous version at first glance but check it out in System Preferences and you will find new options such as two Tab Display options; Seperate Tab Bar and Compact Tab Bar which to me appears the same as iPadOS 14. There is no floating address bar at the bottom of the sceen as touted as an option for iOS Safari but that may come in the finished product. Then at the bottom of the Safari Preferences is Advanced Settings, I did not have the courage to experiment with this. Lastly there is Tab Groups. This is a game changer for me. You can create and edit Tab Groups such as Mac Related Forums which this site is now a part of. This really has the potential to change the way people use iOS/iPadOS Safari dramatically.
Photos also has some additional features; Shared with You, Memories and Richer Info which provides comprehensive meta data about other people's photos, like their camera settings, locations and the people in them.
Notes has now got Tags and a Tag Browser. Add a tag like #Cooking or multiple tags to a note like #Christmas and #Cooking and to facilitate the use of this feature Apple has made it easy to add tags to existing notes. eg Drag a Note onto a tag in the Tag Browser or add a tag in the existing text.and it's done The best addition I think is Quick Notes. This is a small floating note that can be brought up with a swipe, from Control Centre or Apple Pencil from any open window to copy a picture, address, phone number, URL or make a drawing whatever and it gets saved into a folder of it's own in Notes called, you guessed it, Quick Notes.
Lastly there's Maps, really I have been hoping for a better Apple Maps app for a while and just maybe they've finally created it. All I can say is you have to try this. from the moment I opened it I could see that not only was it easier on the eye but more detailed than ever before and considering I'm in Bali that's saying something.
So please understand this is not a full summary of the upcoming changes, just this public beta version and just the things that jumped out at me immediately. For a fuller explanation and coverage of all the changes for iPadOS and iOS here is a pretty comprehensive page. iPadOS 15: Everything We Know | MacRumors
So, I decided to download and instal iPadOS 15.6 on the device least important to me, my iPad.
First thing I noticed, App Library on the Dock. Now I know iOS App Library has not been all that popular amongst users and members of these forums but I love it in iOS and have gone on record as hoping it would be introduced in iPadOS. I found once I got the hang of it apps were easier to find than by visually scanning half a dozen Home pages.
Split Screen View was the next thing I noticed. There are three little dots at the top, middle of any open app window. Tapping them opens a tiny panel with three view options; Full Screen, Slide Over and Split View. Each open app gets the three dots at the top giving you individual control. Uses of these three options become quickly apparent when you try them so I will not try to explain their actions here, let me just say it is so much easier and intuitive than the old swipe actions that I'm sure you will find yourself using it a lot more.
iPadOS Safari does not look that much different to the previous version at first glance but check it out in System Preferences and you will find new options such as two Tab Display options; Seperate Tab Bar and Compact Tab Bar which to me appears the same as iPadOS 14. There is no floating address bar at the bottom of the sceen as touted as an option for iOS Safari but that may come in the finished product. Then at the bottom of the Safari Preferences is Advanced Settings, I did not have the courage to experiment with this. Lastly there is Tab Groups. This is a game changer for me. You can create and edit Tab Groups such as Mac Related Forums which this site is now a part of. This really has the potential to change the way people use iOS/iPadOS Safari dramatically.
Photos also has some additional features; Shared with You, Memories and Richer Info which provides comprehensive meta data about other people's photos, like their camera settings, locations and the people in them.
Notes has now got Tags and a Tag Browser. Add a tag like #Cooking or multiple tags to a note like #Christmas and #Cooking and to facilitate the use of this feature Apple has made it easy to add tags to existing notes. eg Drag a Note onto a tag in the Tag Browser or add a tag in the existing text.and it's done The best addition I think is Quick Notes. This is a small floating note that can be brought up with a swipe, from Control Centre or Apple Pencil from any open window to copy a picture, address, phone number, URL or make a drawing whatever and it gets saved into a folder of it's own in Notes called, you guessed it, Quick Notes.
Lastly there's Maps, really I have been hoping for a better Apple Maps app for a while and just maybe they've finally created it. All I can say is you have to try this. from the moment I opened it I could see that not only was it easier on the eye but more detailed than ever before and considering I'm in Bali that's saying something.
So please understand this is not a full summary of the upcoming changes, just this public beta version and just the things that jumped out at me immediately. For a fuller explanation and coverage of all the changes for iPadOS and iOS here is a pretty comprehensive page. iPadOS 15: Everything We Know | MacRumors
