This is the required hidden gems questions for iOS 6.
Here are the rules:
- One feature per answer
- Also include how you use the feature or why it is useful
- Must be an under-documented feature. No "flag pole" features like VIP's in Mail.
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7I have made this CW and let's see how the community reacts to this. Not only are CW surveys not required - they work best when people can collaborate on one useful answer as opposed to a beauty contest where certain things get voted up or down for criteria that are vague at best. (e.g. "flag pole" to me certainly isn't the same to you. The whole idea of "under-documented" is so relative and a moment in time as Apple writes KB articles and all the details come out here, in reviews, and in training as people explore the OS.)– bmike ♦Commented Sep 19, 2012 at 19:04
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2On devices with a magnetometer, tapping the location button in Maps a second time will make the view rotate with your device. (Posting this here for whoever starts following bmike's suggestion to use)– ughoavgfhwCommented Sep 20, 2012 at 0:27
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3"Required" question. lol– Jason SalazCommented Sep 20, 2012 at 7:48
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2Rather than add a bunch of answers - here is one of many good articles written to survey the little things in iOS 6. iOS 6 Features I Didn’t Know About by Chad Williams– bmike ♦Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 16:39
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2@ughoavgfhw That's not a new feature in iOS 6.– Mark E. HaaseCommented Sep 21, 2012 at 0:32
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44 Answers
Alarms can now make use of songs not just built in tones. Edit your alarm and select sound and then pick a song.
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5The only problem I find with this new feature is there's no way to disable the vibrations for alarms if they're enabled is settings. I'd prefer my phone to start playing the tune and not jump around on my nightstand while still vibrate when a message arrives or another alert is displayed.– Michal MCommented Sep 21, 2012 at 14:43
Tap and hold the "New Message" button inside Mail to open the Drafts folder.
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4In iOS < 6, this used to bring back just the most recent saved draft. This is much better.– chrishCommented Sep 26, 2012 at 17:44
Receiving iMessages sent to your phone number on multiple devices.
I know this has been raved about but it is tricky to configure and took me a while to figure out.
Steps to get this working:
- Disable and then re-enable iMessage on your phone (this triggers the registration process with Apple servers). Done in Settings -> Messages
- Open Messages in Settings on other iOS devices and disable and then re-enable. This will add your phone number to the list. You need to then select it (a tick mark appears next to it). You will now receive messages on this device. There is also a section to choose to send from an address or number lower on the screen.
- On OS X devices (10.8.2), open Messages and choose Preferences (from Messages menu) and then choose Accounts. You will now see your number and can select to receive messages on that device.
When you do this, you will get notifications on the other devices confirming that is enabled.
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If I have other iOS 5 device (iPad 1), will it get iMessage that is sent to my phone number? Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 2:36
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2@EnricoSusatyo That's a negative. Being able to consolidate messages received to a phone number is a new feature specific to iOS 6. Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 5:06
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3I'm not sure why I see so many people saying that it's tricky to get this new iMessage functionality working. I upgraded my equipment to iOS 6 and upon the first boot I was prompted to use my phone number as my primary iMessage identifier on all my devices, including iPad. There were no extra steps.– user11633Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 23:09
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1@AlainKing I got it as soon as it was available for download.– user11633Commented Sep 21, 2012 at 17:33
iOS 6 Features I Didn’t Know About by Chad Williams via bmike♦
Metallic sliders across the OS now have a subtle reflection effect that is created with the accelerometer.
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5As far as I can tell, only the iPhone/iPod Music app has this feature. Commented Sep 29, 2012 at 15:47
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2With the recent iOS 6.1 update, this effect is also applied on the lock screen volume slider, but still not the multitasking tray slider. Commented Jan 29, 2013 at 9:52
Do not disturb
You can use the Do Not Disturb setting while your iOS device is locked to silence calls, alerts, and notifications.
The setting is located at Settings > Notifications > Do Not Disturb.
Also very handy as it will silence a call but if the same person rings back within three minutes it wont silence it.
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1That cool. How do you setup the time range? I only see an on/off switch? Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 17:24
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Searching for an app in Spotlight reveals which folder the app is located in.
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Not all the time; I've had hit-or-miss luck with this, sometimes it just shows "Top Hit" for search queries. Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 5:07
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@Veil If it's a top hit, it should be listed below with the folder too. Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 22:13
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@ughoavgfhw Just confirmed with a few different app searches, and it doesn't always happen, but when it does, it only shows as a "Top Hit", but nothing else. Commented Sep 21, 2012 at 1:41
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hmm, I can't get it not to work... also, very cool feature. There were many times I'd 'lost' an app on the phone. I could search for and find it, but I still didn't know where it was.– JoshPCommented Sep 26, 2012 at 15:41
Uploading images on Safari makes it easier to share images on websites that don't have apps.
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The Settings icon no longer has RAZOR BLADE EDGES!
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8That's a feature. Now the gear could actually be working, without the top spikes that are too narrow.– bot47Commented Sep 22, 2012 at 16:27
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2According to the initial question you should state "how this is useful". Is this something useful? ;-) Commented Sep 28, 2012 at 8:24
Newly downloaded apps have a "new" label on the home screen.
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Opt Out of Advertising Tracking
Settings > General > About > Advertising allows you to turn off ad tracking. Details in the photo below.
Dictionary in the Cloud
Now, iCloud syncs your weird words across all of your devices without giving suggestions.
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3Do you have to enable this? Is there a setting to turn it off or clear/edit the list of saved words? Commented Sep 25, 2012 at 23:47
New emojis in the emojis keyboard!
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2Jack Wolfskin obviously paid more to Apple than Lacoste :-)– nohillside ♦Commented Sep 25, 2012 at 18:26
Add images and video to emails from within the Mail app
Tap in the body of an email you're writing and you'll get the standard "Select | Select All | Paste" options, but tap the right arrow and you get a new one: Insert Photo or Video.
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Data Detectors finally separate a phone extension [416.555.5555 x101] and provide a button prompt to "DIAL [EXTENSION]" after the initial number is dialed.
Previously it would simply 'dial' all of the numbers lumped together [4165555555101].
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How do you indicate that a number contains an extension? Commented Sep 25, 2012 at 23:50
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I've only tested it a bit but a space then x### seems to work. I suspect it will pick up a few other methods too. But tried with 'ex' instead of x and it didn't work. Commented Sep 26, 2012 at 2:59
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I'm a bit confused; how do you "dial" a space on the phone keypad? Commented Sep 26, 2012 at 10:16
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2It's not about dialing, it's about having a phone number in a contact, web page, or email where iOS' data detector turns it into a clickable link. Commented Sep 26, 2012 at 14:30
15-second forward & rewind buttons in lock screen during podcast playback
Which replace previous and next track buttons in iOS 5 and prior.
Regular songs still have next & previous track buttons. It used to be too easy to accidentally push next or previous track while trying to pause a long podcast, causing you to completely lose your place. This change both solves that problem and offers a very handy quick-rewind option.
Landscape maps
Maps.app on iPhone now supports landscape orientation.
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1I doubt it, but the question asks for "under-documented" features, not undocumented ones. Most of the answers to this question are documented somewhere. Commented Sep 28, 2012 at 18:57
Pull to refresh in Mail.app
Mail now has pull to refresh (like Twitter, Facebook, etc.). This is also now a standard control that third party developers can use. So far I've only seen this new "native" pull to refresh in Lumatics City Maps but I'm sure it'll be everywhere soon enough.
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Signature by mail account
You can now set a signature per mail account. Before it was a signature for all accounts set on iOS.
Set signatures in Settings > Mail, Contacts and Calendar > Signature.
Browser history:
Hold down the back/forward button to see a list of pages you can select to go back to.
(This was previously only available on the iPad, but has now been added to the iPhone and iPod touch.)
iPad App Store screenshots can now be clicked and seen in full screen "slideshow" mode.
They're definitely not Retina resolution, but still a much better indication what the app looks like on the screen.
App Store experience redesign. Most notably, when you install or update an application the App Store App no longer closes but instead show the download/installation progress inside the store (below the icon).
Acknowledging (swiping) a Missed Call through its Notification in a Locked Screen will now remove it from the Notifications.
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Btput 'answering' you mean 'acknowledging the notificatioon', correct? Commented Sep 26, 2012 at 3:00
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If by 'acknowledging the notification' you mean swiping on it, and, therefore, calling back, yes. Commented Sep 26, 2012 at 7:15
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Panorama Panning Direction
Don't like the default left to right panning direction in Camera.app's new Panorama function? Just tap the arrow and it will change from right to left!
When the app quits, the direction defaults back to left to right.
Just happened to hit the arrow yesterday by accident and saw the change. A nice feature, but for the life of me I can't figure out why it is there, other than to help the dyslexic among us (and I am one of them, so no flames, please)!
The clock app on iPad 3. I had no idea it was coming...
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8Well this was just mentioned in the long list of features during the update. Commented Sep 20, 2012 at 0:03
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Yes, but for me it got buried under the noise about maps/youtube/siri/etc.– RoddyCommented Sep 20, 2012 at 7:50
A web inspector for mobile Safari.
Goto Settings > Safari > Advanced and turn on web inspector, then open Safari on your Mac and you can use the web inspector on the Mac to inspect the web page opened on mobile Safari.
Auto-correct now considers your keyboard shortcuts when giving you suggestions and correcting your typing. In iOS 5, if you had a keyboard shortcut defined, you had to type it in exactly in order to get the substitution. iOS 6 now guesses that you meant to enter one of your shortcuts, and offers the substitution straight up even if you were going to misspell the shortcut.
Delete Messages in Gmail
Some email providers support archiving emails (most well known: Gmail). Now you have the option to archive or delete a message.
Tap-hold the delete button to access the menu options "Delete Message" and "Archieve Message".
Update: According to @Phong this does not work with Gmail.
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1I tested this and it doesn't work for Gmail. If turn off "Archive Mail" under account properties, then tapping-and-holding only gives you the option to delete. If you turn it on, then tapping-and-holding gives you both options, but both do the same thing (archiving). You would expect it to work with Gmail since All Mail now has a distinctive "Archive" icon, but Apple likely only tested this with iCloud Mail.– user11633Commented Sep 25, 2012 at 17:56
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4@Phong Oh wow, that's disappointing. :( I got this tip from lifehacker. I'll add this info about Gmail. Thanks for the update!– gentmattCommented Sep 25, 2012 at 18:31
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1I know, I was so disappointed when I found out (I think I saw it on Lifehacker also) :(– user11633Commented Sep 25, 2012 at 18:39
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1With iOS 7, this feature finally works with Gmail!– user11633Commented Sep 18, 2013 at 20:45
Rotate maps
In the new maps app, use two fingers to rotate the map. Now you can orient the map exactly in a way that makes sense. It even remembers the rotation if you rotate your device.
And even better, if you activate the compass, and then move away from your position, it remembers the rotation (previously when you moved away, it rotated back to north being up, which was very annoying).
You don't have to enter your password any longer when updating an app you've already bought and installed.
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@carbonr You press update, it starts updating. That's pretty much it. Commented Oct 30, 2012 at 9:57