Greetings.
After living with iOS 11 for a week, the biggest change to my regular routine is the new lock screen cover sheet. While I like one of the changes, over all, I am not finding it to be an improvement for me.
The one thing I really like is that on my iPhone 7, with raise to wake on, no matter what my phone is doing, if I pick it up, I hear the time. I don't have a watch, and I used to have to swipe around to check the time if I had other stuff going on. I really like this.
But unfortunately, other changes aren't so welcome.
I used to be able to quickly go back or forward 30 seconds in an iCatcher podcast from the lock screen. While I can swipe a timeline, this easy access is gone.
I am finding Lock screen notifications harder to manage. Not only is there the unnecessary hide and view messages buttons, I have to swipe through a bunch of audio player things to get there. I know in part it is muscle memory, but, this seemed easier before.
I am trying to get used to the cover sheet notifications being the same as the lock screen. But I still don't see an advantage to having the time, dates, and audio player controls on the notification screen. I liked having a screen dedicated to just notifications.
When my phone is locked, and face up, I no longer hear the text of an incoming alert, no matter whether it is from a text, email, news, or other source. In the past, lock screen alerts were read if my phone was face up, and only the tone heard if it was face down, but now, no matter the phone orientation, i just hear the tone, and the time. I have to check the phone to see the alert.
In a few more weeks, I expect to be habituated to the changes, and I am wary of falling into the "it is different, so it must be bad" knee jerk response set. Still, this just feels clunky and less efficient.
Comments
My thoughts
First of all, I don’t understand your issue regarding navigating a podcast. I use a different app for podcasts, but I still get buttons on the lock screen for rewind and fast forward, and they work the same as they did before.
That said, the media controls are more cluttered now, since Apple added playback destination information to the lock screen. Also, I have found that certain third-party apps, such as Tune In, do not show up consistently on the lock screen, meaning I have to go to Control Center to access playback controls for those apps.
For notifications, I always use touch navigation to access notifications on the lock screen, which I find to be faster than swiping. If media controls are on the screen, then the position of the first notification is different, but I can get used to that. The value here is that the date and time remain at the forefront on the lock screen, which makes checking the time while media is playing easier than before.
After some investigation, I have found that the View Notifications button on the lock screen is not behaving the way it should. At least on my iPad, the button only shows up if there are no older notifications to reveal, and it is invisible when there are older notifications. This effectively makes the button useless for me, because the only times I see it are the times it will do nothing. I emailed Apple Accessibility about it, and I was informed in a reply that Apple is already aware of the issue and is actively investigating it. That is not the reply I normally get from them, so I take it as a positive that the behavior will be changed in a future update.
I actually think merging the lock screen and notification center made sense, given how similar they were in functionality under iOS 10. It further makes sense in light of the iPhone X announcement, given how the device unlocks and the fact that it does not have a home button. Users flick up from the bottom edge of the screen to remove the lock screen, which is the opposite of the gesture for accessing the notification center, so the end result is intuitive.
The one big thing about the new cover sheet that annoys the heck out of me is that I cannot use my Apple Wireless Keyboard to navigate the screen. This is because pressing any key on the keyboard immediately dismisses the screen, either putting me in the passcode field or sending me back to whatever app I was last using. So, if I need to check my notifications, I must use the iPad touch screen directly, not the keyboard.
Overall, although I understand why Apple made the design choice they made here, it will definitely take some getting used to, and I’m not sure I like the changes overall either. Apple has changed how notifications work in every iOS release since notification center was first introduced, and the fact that the behavior changes every year is rather unsettling.
Lock Screen Podcast Options
Thanks for your comments. I agree.
In iOS 10, I had a 30 second rewind, then the playback timeline, followed by a 30 second fast forward. While I usually use a Bluetooth device with playback controls, sometimes, I don't. In those cases, I could quickly find and tap the 30 second rewind button to hear something I missed, or the 30 second fast forward to skip a commercial. These are gone in favour of the more cluttered controls including the device options as you noted.
I am not opposed to the merging of the two screens, but, I do miss the quick access I had. Perhaps I will find new and better ways to deal with things, but for now, it's not really a step forward.
I am looking forward to the refinements that will come with updates, and I am confident things will be better than ever.
View notifications button.
I’m wondering whether the strange behaviour of the view notifications button may be partially deliberate but not implemented fully. When focus is on a notification, a magic tap (two finger double tap) will reveal older notifications therefore rendering the view notifications button unnecessary with voice-over.
Speak notifications when phone is face up
Under voiceover settings, there is an option that says 'always speak notifications' or something along those lines. If you press that, voiceover should read the text of the notification as soon as it comes in.
But it doesn't
You're right, Pinkcupcake11, it *should* but it doesn't. I don't know if this is by design or not, but as several others have reported, regardless of that setting, notifications are not spoken on the lock screen.
I think that setting should be honored and work similar to the Caller ID setting in the phone app.
Speaking on Lock Screen
As noted above, yes, it should honour the setting for speaking lock screen notifications, but on my iPhone 7, it does not. Hopefully the comments to the accessibility people at Apple help get this sorted out soon.
Notification
I have notification to speek all ttime but does not work. Thhis is the worse iOS 11 in the history of apple.