During today’s “Time Flies” media event, Apple announced the release of its mobile iOS 14 and iPadOS operating systems. The new operating systems, which were released today, offers the following major features and fixes:
- Improved Home Screen customization: Via the App Library, you can remove software from your Home Screens but retain the data. Just swipe to the App Library, and you’ll see all of your available apps in handy categories.
- Widgets: Widgets can now be placed on your Home Screens.
- Smart Stack Widget: This allows you to see information from the apps most relevant to you at particular times of the day.
- Picture in Picture Mode: Both FaceTime video calls and videos from supported apps can move into a small window. The window can then be moved around to different corners of the screen and resized as needed.
- Message Pinning: Important messages can now be pinned to the top of an app or group chat.
- Group Chat: A new @mention feature allows you to mute a group chat, and send you a notification when you’re specifically mentioned. Users can also customize group chats with an image or emoji, and each person has their own icon at the top of a conversation to make it clear who was last texting.
- Translate app: Apple has also introduced a new Translate app in iOS 14, allowing you to quickly and easily converse with people even when you don’t speak the same language. The app includes the ability to limit your translation to on-device usage, helping protect your privacy when you translate.
- Privacy Protection Improvements: New options help limit what information is shared with app developers and other parties. New options limit access to photos and precise location data, and apps now have to get your permission before tracking you across websites. Also, when an app is using your device’s camera or microphone, icons on the Home Screen alert you to that. Finally, a new section of each product page on the App Store offers a summary of privacy practices before you download an app.
- Clipboard Improvements: iOS 14 offers notifications that let you known when an app is reading the data stored there.
As usual, you can snag the update via the System Preferences -> General – Software Update feature. If you’ve had a chance to try out iOS 14 or iPadOS 14 and have any feedback to offer, please let us know about your experience in the comments.
Via The Mac Observer