Foreign media criticizes seven major shortcomings of Apple's iOS 7
With the release of the all-new iPhone 5s, Apple has, as expected, launched the all-new iOS 7 operating system. Compared to iOS 6, iOS 7's user interface design is very attractive, multitasking and sharing processes have been further simplified, and the fact that 60% of Apple users chose to upgrade to iOS 7 in the first week of its release is the greatest affirmation of this system. However, many users have also complained to us that iOS 7 still has strict hardware requirements for older devices, and there are also significant issues with battery life.
Recently, a well-known American tech media outlet compiled a list of "7 aspects that iOS 7 still needs to improve," the specific content of which is as follows:
1. Control Center
The Control Center is undoubtedly one of the most anticipated features by iOS users, as Apple finally allows users to more conveniently control commonly used options such as Wi-Fi switches, airplane mode, and Bluetooth in this generation of the operating system. However, there is no denying that this feature still has great room for improvement. For example, users still need to open settings to manually connect to a new network or pair devices via Bluetooth. Here, we suggest that Apple emulate the approach of Samsung Galaxy S4, where long-pressing these buttons allows users to access the corresponding menu options for operation.
In addition, Apple should give users the right to personalize the layout and buttons of the Control Center. For instance, users can add some of their frequently used app icons at the bottom, rather than being limited to Apple's pre-set flashlight, calculator, clock, and camera buttons.
2. Animation Effects
After using the iOS 7 system for just a few minutes, I discovered something I had never felt before: the numerous icon display, fade-in, and fade-out effects built into the system have significantly slowed down the system response speed. In iOS 7, Apple provides an option to turn off the new parallax dynamic wallpaper, but we believe the company should also provide an option to turn off these unnecessary flashy animation effects.
3. Default App Selection
Apple may never give users the option to choose default apps. For example, if you dislike the default map app because it doesn't provide public transportation options, iOS 7 will offer third-party apps like Waze or Google Maps and allow users to set them as the default map app in some programs. However, if users don't like the built-in Safari browser, Apple seems to leave no room for choice.
4. Offline Voice Input
If you're fond of using the voice dictation feature built into iOS 6, iOS 7 might disappoint you, as this feature hasn't changed in this version. During use, users first need to click the microphone button at the lower left corner of the keyboard, speak, and then wait for the Apple server to return the desired sentence. Therefore, if you happen to be in an area with poor signal, the time spent waiting for the Apple server to respond might drive you crazy. Personally, sometimes I'd rather type myself than continue waiting for unreliable server feedback. On the other hand, Android's offline voice dictation function is much more powerful; when the user finishes speaking, the screen almost immediately displays what the user wants to say.
5. Photos App
Upon opening the all-new built-in photos app in iOS 7, you'll find that the background when browsing pictures has turned pure white instead of the traditional black. However, if the user clicks on a picture to enter full-screen browsing mode, the picture's background color will still turn black. But I really can't understand why Apple made this extra effort. Fortunately, if the user enters full-screen browsing mode by clicking on any picture, they only need to swipe the picture to continue browsing it against a pure black background.
6. Notification Center
iOS 7 has thoroughly improved the notification center and divided it into three sections: Today, All, and Unread Notifications. Frankly speaking, the design of the Today view is quite good, but Apple uses too much space while displaying very little information. For example, the date, weather, and events of the day occupy more than half of the screen. Meanwhile, users are still confused about the functions of the All and Unread Notifications sections. Why can't Apple consolidate these three modules?
7. Sharing Options
If you hope to share in the Safari browser of iOS 7, you will only see two social network icons: Twitter and Facebook. In the photos app of iOS 7, there is an additional Flickr option. I understand Apple's reasons for not adding Google+ in iOS 7, but that doesn't mean users agree with this practice. I believe that iOS 7 should add more options to the sharing feature, such as LinkedIn and Pinterest. Considering that Apple recently integrated professional social networking LinkedIn into the officially released OS X Mavericks, we hope that iOS will at least bring the LinkedIn sharing option to its mobile operating platform in the next update. It's worth noting that Android, iOS's biggest competitor, provides users with a much broader range of sharing choices.
