Thursday, September 16, 2010

First glance at Apple iOS 4.2

Along with Wednesday’s announcement of AirPrint came the first iOS 4.2 beta release for registered members of Apple’s iOS developer program. iOS 4.2 is a bigger release than iOs 4.1: not only does bring the features of iOS 4 (and iOS 4.1) to the iPad, but it also unifies Apple’s mobile software platform across its devices including iPhone, iPad, iPod touch hand new Apple TV (with limitations). And it brings a couple of new features along with it.

AirPrint
One of the biggest new features touted by Apple CEO Steve Jobs during his annual September announcement was the ability to print wirelessly from the iPad. AirPrint will work one of two ways, either with a compatible printer from HP (and eventually printers from other manufacturers) or with printers shared via your Mac or PC.
The apps on the iPad need to support printing. You would need to download latest version of the apps. Pages and numbers will be updated with new iOS release to support print.


Safari, will have the print button under the Share icon to the right of the Bookmarks button; in Mail, where it lives under the Reply button; and in Photos, you need to have to tap the Share button before you get an option to select and print pictures. Tapping print in any of these brings up a popover that asks you to select a printer by searching your network, and a control for selecting the number of copies.

AirPlay
One of the other major features that is new in iOS 4.2 is support for AirPlay, a new-and-improved version of the AirTunes feature which is already in the current desktop version of iTunes.

With AirPlay, users are able to stream media—from an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch to any AirPlay-compatible device.
At the beginning, AirPlay will work with only AirPort Express units (for audio) and the new Apple TV (for audio and video), although Apple is licensing the technology to other vendors to allow them to sell AirPlay-compatible products—speakers, receivers, and the like. (iHome is one of the first companies to announce an AirPlay product.)

Whenever you’re listening to music in an AirPlay-enhanced app—for example, the built-in iPod app—under iOS 4.2, you’ll see an AirPlay button. Tap this button, and any AirPlay-compatible devices on the same local network appear in a popover menu. Tap a device, and your media is streamed directly to it.

Additional iOS 4.2 features

Settings now has a Notes section which allows to switch font to Chalkboard or Helvetica.

The iPad now has a software screen orientation lock when swiping to the right in the multitasking shelf. You can lock the screen in portrait or landscape orientations. The iPad has already a hardware button for orientation lock, this button will change to mute switch like the iPhone has. At the moment, you can also still hold down the volume down button for a couple seconds to mute the iPad, which is probably a redundant feature that should be excised.

Apple also added a brightness slider to the left of the media playback controls, which reduces the steps to go through settings to change brightness..

Safari iOS 4.2 brings a couple of additions to Apple’s Web browser. The pages icon in Safari’s toolbar will show you how many pages are currently open.
Best feature is that you can search page text through the search box, and tapping the new "on this page" button.

Users who have updated their iPhones or iPod touches to iOS 4 will be happy to see, most of iOS 4’s features make their way to the iPad.

In iOS 4.2, the iPad adds support for the same types of background tasks that were introduced in iOS 4 which makes the ipad finally a multitasking device.
It is exactly the same as on the iPhone and reachable by double clicking the ho,e button. The iPad will as well have the folders we appreciate on the iPhone, however because the screen is bigger, the folders can have 20 apps instead of 12 on the iPhone.

Mail and game center will be exactly ascon the iPhone.
Those with Microsoft Exchange accounts will be able to see event invitations in the iPad’s calendar application.

Macworld.com did a full test of the new iOS and can be found on their website.

- Posted using My iPad

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