Little Things The Other Way — Mountain Lion features that hint at new iOS features

[Apollo1111]

Ever since the Back to the Mac event, Apple has been bringing the best features of iOS to the Mac with OS X releases.

With Mountain Lion, I've noticed some of those iOS features have been improved as they've jumped to the Mac. It's reasonable to assume that many of these improvements will jump back the other direction and show up in future versions of iOS.

This thread can be a list of those little things — the things Mountain Lion does right and Apple will likely bring to iOS.

Below are a few things I've noticed so far.

Safari
- The unified search bar in Safari would work great in iOS.

Messages
- The iOS Messages app creates two separate threads for iMessages to a phone number and email address. (The short of it is that iMessages sent to your phone number only go to your iPhone, while iMessages sent to your Apple ID email address go to all your devices.) However, Messages on the Mac intelligently COMBINES conversations into a single thread when it knows they are all with the same contact. This is great because it works the way iMessages was intended — all your conversations with a person are in one place. I'm sure iOS will be able to combine message threads soon too.

Mail
- VIP smart mailboxes would be excellent in iOS, especially for the notification alert settings they enable.

What else?

 

[JohnDoe98]

Messages
- The iOS Messages app creates two separate threads for iMessages to a phone number and email address. (The short of it is that iMessages sent to your phone number only go to your iPhone, while iMessages sent to your Apple ID email address go to all your devices.) However, Messages on the Mac intelligently COMBINES conversations into a single thread when it knows they are all with the same contact. This is great because it works the way iMessages was intended — all your conversations with a person are in one place. I'm sure iOS will be able to combine message threads soon too.

If you combine the messages, how will the app know which account to send the next message to? Or are you suggesting it should send it to both? But then you will have a bunch of duplicates... Maybe I'm missing something but I don't see how to do this on an iPhone.

 

[Apollo1111]

This is part of a bigger discussion about iMessages between phone numbers and email addresses, the stuff happening on apple's servers, and the expected functionality of iMessages. It is probably a topic deserving of its own thread.

For a brief thought though, I think it could automatically default to the email address (Apple ID) if there is one, otherwise just reply to what the previous iMessage was sent from and giving the user the ability to change it in the To line. That seems to be how the Message app for the Mac does it.

 

[JohnDoe98]

This is part of a bigger discussion about iMessages between phone numbers and email addresses, the stuff happening on apple's servers, and the expected functionality of iMessages. It is probably a topic deserving of its own thread.

For a brief thought though, I think it could automatically default to the email address (Apple ID) if there is one, otherwise just reply to what the previous iMessage was sent from and giving the user the ability to change it in the To line. That seems to be how the Message app for the Mac does it.

Isn't that what the "send as SMS" option is for in the settings? Perhaps the reason to keep them separate is to let you know when you sent something as an SMS instead of an email msg? But then I guess they could just color code the messages in the combined conversation view that you recommend. If they can do unified inbox in mail, I guess they should be able to make a unified messages. Good catch!

 

[Apollo1111]

Isn't that what the "send as SMS" option is for in the settings? Perhaps the reason to keep them separate is to let you know when you sent something as an SMS instead of an email msg? But then I guess they could just color code the messages in the combined conversation view that you recommend.

I'm not speculating it would combine SMS or emails. I'm only talking about iMessages, which are associated with phone numbers or email address but both go through Apple's iMessage protocol.

 

[JUiCEJamie]

Safari
- The unified search bar in Safari would work great in iOS.

I'd really like that in iOS. Since I've got Mountain Lion, I've even decided to remove my Bookmarks Bar.
Something about how simple and button-less my Safari is at the minute looks really great!

It'd look pretty sweet on iOS too!

----------

Messages
- The iOS Messages app creates two separate threads for iMessages to a phone number and email address. (The short of it is that iMessages sent to your phone number only go to your iPhone, while iMessages sent to your Apple ID email address go to all your devices.) However, Messages on the Mac intelligently COMBINES conversations into a single thread when it knows they are all with the same contact. This is great because it works the way iMessages was intended — all your conversations with a person are in one place. I'm sure iOS will be able to combine message threads soon too.

YES! It'd be nice if Apple would let you combine Jabber/AOL/im support in iMessage/Messages, because the current AOL aim app is awful!

 

[hafr]

Messages
- The iOS Messages app creates two separate threads for iMessages to a phone number and email address. (The short of it is that iMessages sent to your phone number only go to your iPhone, while iMessages sent to your Apple ID email address go to all your devices.) However, Messages on the Mac intelligently COMBINES conversations into a single thread when it knows they are all with the same contact. This is great because it works the way iMessages was intended — all your conversations with a person are in one place. I'm sure iOS will be able to combine message threads soon too.

I think you mean to say that this is how it's most likely supposed to work...

I've got a friend whose phone seem to switch Caller ID by itself, so I'm getting two threads from him on the computer - one from the phone number and one from the e-mail (they're saved under the same contact in the Phone Book app). We've ruled out him switching it himself, he has restored the phone, all earlier threads deleted and new ones started to ensure consistency (so that you don't accidentally answer in the "wrong" thread) and so on...

Still, it's less buggy than Messages in iOS which also creates multiple threads not only based on the different Caller IDs, but also whether they're sent from the computer or an iOS device.

Apple isn't even close to having a finished product here, and I must say it's getting very embarrassing for them by now...

 

[Apollo1111]

This talk about iMessages is a tangent that should be continued here https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1325190/

In the meantime, what other features have you all found in Mountain Lion that might work their way back to iOS?

 

[kirky29]

Notes with pictures!

 

[FSMBP]

Another feature:

I bet they will add a "On/Off" Switch for the entire Notification Center like they have in Mountain Lion with "Do Not Disturb".

Often times in meetings, or when I try to sleep, I would like my phone to make noise for a phone-call but have it mute notifications from Mail, Words with Friends etc...Currently, you have go to into Notification Center and manually switch every app. But I bet there will be a "Do Not Disturb" in iOS 6.

 

[Chundles]

Another feature:

I bet they will add a "On/Off" Switch for the entire Notification Center like they have in Mountain Lion with "Do Not Disturb".

Often times in meetings, or when I try to sleep, I would like my phone to make noise for a phone-call but have it mute notifications from Mail, Words with Friends etc...Currently, you have go to into Notification Center and manually switch every app. But I bet there will be a "Do Not Disturb" in iOS 6.

Ooooh yeah, would be great not to have the damn email buzzing and boinging all night.

 

[Knosrac]

Sharing Button + API

 

[Embio]

Knosrac:

YES!!!

 

[Soundflunky]

Another feature:

I bet they will add a "On/Off" Switch for the entire Notification Center like they have in Mountain Lion with "Do Not Disturb".

Often times in meetings, or when I try to sleep, I would like my phone to make noise for a phone-call but have it mute notifications from Mail, Words with Friends etc...Currently, you have go to into Notification Center and manually switch every app. But I bet there will be a "Do Not Disturb" in iOS 6.

Some kind of notification indicator like the menu bar thing would be nice too.

 

[Aidoneus]

Most likely wishful thinking, but Gatekeeper on iOS would be nice.

 

[Ddyracer]

Most likely wishful thinking, but Gatekeeper on iOS would be nice.

Don't you think ios is locked down enough?

Gatekeeper is just another thing for me to uncheck in ML. Not that it's bad, it's great if you get apps just from the mac app store but it caters more to the average user.

 

[treichert]

Don't you think ios is locked down enough?

Gatekeeper is just another thing for me to uncheck in ML. Not that it's bad, it's great if you get apps just from the mac app store but it caters more to the average user.

Gatekeeper on iOS would mean the excat opposite of Gatekeeper on iOS - it would make the OS more open if the user wishes.

On OS X it is really unobstrusive and there is absolutely no need to uncheck that box as you can easily rightclick the app and choose "Open" and it will never bother you again for that app. Also many apps are already signed and even more apps will be signed with a developer ID so Gatekeeper won't bother you at all with these kinds of apps.