iOS8 three finger swipe bug

By Bill Malyszka, 20 September, 2014

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Hi,

I upgraded my iPad 4 to iOS8 and have a weird bug. All my three finger swipes are reversed. Is this intentional or a bug? I now three finger swipe left to go left one screen as opposed to right like in iOS7. Or if I am on the Home screen, I have to three finger swipe up to go to the next screen to the right. This is off in scrolling within apps - everything is reversed or off.

Anyone else seeing this?

...b

Options

Comments

By Zack on Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - 21:25

I think what's happening is that your screen orientation is reversed from the usual. I don't see this here, it's the same as it always was. Try unlocking the orientation and turning your device around.

By Missy Hoppe on Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - 21:25

I wonder if there's a link or something on Apple's web site documenting VO changes. I mean, is there any chance that this, and possibly a few of the other bugs are just design changes that Apple neglected to make us aware of? Then again, it could very well just be a bug. Just kind of thinking aloud, so to speak. I haven't let IOS8 anywhere near my IPhone 5S yet, but my mom updated her 4th generation IPad, so if she doesn't mind, I might take a peek at IOS8 on there next time I visit with her. If I find out anything about the scrolling, or anything else worthwhile, I'll be sure to let everyone know.

By dvdmth on Wednesday, September 24, 2014 - 21:25

For me, all three-finger swipes are working precisely the way they are supposed to, the same way they worked under iOS 7, whether I have the iPad Air in landscape or portrait mode.

Having said that, when I first got the iPad last December, I did have some difficulty with three-finger swipes while in landscape mode, where I had to do the swipe in the portrait direction to get it to work. I don't know if I was doing it wrong, since I was a new iOS user at the time, or if I somehow managed to get VoiceOver confused regarding the iPad orientation. Over time, the issue I had in landscape mode went away, and it's been several months since the last time I had the issue.

As suggested above, try changing the orientation to see if that helps. Also try performing the gestures at different angles, in case you're doing it at a slight angle which is confusing VoiceOver.

Interestingly, I still have the problem several updates later and very specifically as described above. The one orientation that works is with the home button to the right in landscape mode. If it is to the left or in portrait mode, then every time I three finger swipe it goes the wrong direction or opens Spotlight. I am going to "restore" my iPad and see if that helps as it is finally driving me nuts enough to do something about it.

Cheers,

...b

By Infoblind on Wednesday, December 24, 2014 - 21:25

Bill, I'm still having these issues with 3-finger swiping and orientation. I had them on iPad 4 and now on my new iPad Air 2, so it's definitely a problem with iOS 8. I tried restoring and the issues were still there before I added any apps or content to the device.

Are you still having this issue?It affects spotlight, control center and notifications, too.

By Bill Malyszka on Saturday, January 24, 2015 - 21:25

Hi,

I just upgraded to 8.1.3 and it seems to be fixed. I narrowed the issue down to having Zoom on at the same time as VoiceOver. Turning off Zoom fixed everything. You can't have them both enabled at the same time.

You'll notice in the notes a reference to "multi-touch gestures for iPad multitasking" had a bug that 8.1.3 fixes. I think this is it as I did not have the trouble on my iPhone 5s using Zoom and VoiceOver at the same time.

I shared this replicable issue with Apple Accessibility about a month ago and it is fixed. Kudos to them!

...b

Yes, that did work! Now hopefully they will fix the bug so I can use Voiceover and Zoom at the same time! Thanks.

By Bill Malyszka on Tuesday, February 24, 2015 - 21:25

Regrettably, I thought it was fixed in 8.1.3 but the problem is still there on the iPad 4 with VoiceOver and Zoom running concurrently. I sure wish they would squash this bug.

...b

Well, iOS 8.2 is here, and we're still unable to use voiceover and zoom together on iPad. Major bug that I guess will never be fixed. But hey, we've got a watch, so... Wonder if it's bugs will take a year to be fixed.