Unwanted notifications

[jtara]

I generally turn alerts off for apps. I don't want to be pestered. To tell you the truth, I haven't gotten a lot of unwanted alerts (until now), and I know that Apple is pretty strict - for example, I know alerts aren't supposed to be promotional or contain advertising, and I think most app authors have stuck to that.

But, still, I turn them off...

So, along comes iOS 5 and "notifications" as opposed to "alerts". And the new N.Y. Times app. And then I get the notification that they got Gadaffi. So, I go "cool, I'll leave notifications on for N.Y. Times."

Then I get some notification about the World Series.

Not so cool. I. Don't. Care.

Unfortunately, there's no way in N.Y. Times to specify WHAT you'd like to get notifications about. They decided that everybody cares about the World Series.

So, I turned off notifications for N.Y. Times. Or so I thought.

Then I get a notification about U.S. pulling out of Iraq. At the end of the year. Ho-hum. But I thought I turned notifications off?

Configuration of notifications is VERY confusing! I had assumed that setting "notification center" OFF for an app would make notifications go away. It's very prominent at the top of the configuration screen. Looks very "global" to me. Want it all to go away? Tap me! But apparently not. Set Notification Center OFF, and now the app appears in the list under "not in notification center". But I'm not sure that it does anything more than that! (Since I still got notifications.)

So, now, I've ALSO set "alert style" to "none". Waiting to see if I get more notifications. Perhaps that Mayor Bloomberg got a hangnail tussling with the Wall Street protesters.

OK, wait a minute. Could it be....

Alert Style = None - you won't get any slide-down notifications when they arrive (or on lock screen?)

Alert Style = Banners - you will get slide-down notifications when they arrive.

Alert Style = Alert - you will get old-style pop-up notifications

Notification center = on/off. Controls whether notifications are copied to the swipe-down notification-center, where you can view them at any time after they arrive.

Then there is ALSO "View in Lock Screen", ack! Just noticed that, hiding-out "below the fold".

So, to turn it ALL off, you have to?

1. Turn OFF "notification center"
2. turn OFF "view in lock screen"
3. Set Alert Style = NONE

I find it awfully confusing, especially the use of terms with such similar meanings. Notification. Alert. Can mean the same thing. OK, "banners" are something else. One of these things is not like the others... Unfortunately, two of them ARE, but one is really a subset of the other...

I'm a programmer, and I sure can't figure it out.

Which suggests that a programmer probably designed it... Programmers should be kept away from human interface design.

 

[Rubo Draco]

I also have New York Times app installed and I never get the ads you mention... Have you tried disabling:
Settings / Locations Services / System Services / Location-based iAds

The thing that made me lol was the fact that this is the first time I see the Reader option in Safari!

there's an old saying in Mexico... few words to the good understander

 

[jtara]

I also have New York Times app installed and I never get the ads you mention...

Oh, no, there were no ads in notifications. I know that Apple strictly forbids, that, so I'm not worried about getting ads.

It's just that there's no way for ME to decide WHAT kinds of notifications they send me. I'd like to turn off "sports", for example.

 

[ohio.emt]

Oh, no, there were no ads in notifications. I know that Apple strictly forbids, that, so I'm not worried about getting ads.

It's just that there's no way for ME to decide WHAT kinds of notifications they send me. I'd like to turn off "sports", for example.

Send some feedback to N.Y. Times about them putting the option in a future build. Some apps like facebook allow you to choose what you want alerted on. What you have at the bottom of your first post is correct.

So, to turn it ALL off, you have to?

1. Turn OFF "notification center"
2. turn OFF "view in lock screen"
3. Set Alert Style = NONE

 

[Tinmania]

Sure enough I had the very same issue with NY times. I too thought when I selected to have it not appear in Notification Center that I would never see a notification from it ever again. Not so, there it was on my lock screen. So I set all of its options to off or the equivelent.

Now I have to go through everything in not in notification center section, app by app. Ugh.



Michael

 

[Lukeyy19]

Is there not a NY Times option within the iPhone's settings where you can change options, possibly including this, some apps have this ability, I'm from the UK though, so don't have the NY times app to look, just trying to be of assistance.

 

[ohio.emt]

Is there not a NY Times option within the iPhone's settings where you can change options, possibly including this, some apps have this ability, I'm from the UK though, so don't have the NY times app to look, just trying to be of assistance.

Not that I saw, the AP mobile app is the same you can't select categories you get what they want to push.

 

[Mrs.Geek]

Try going to Settings>NY Times (or whatever the app is called) and check to see if there's an option there for push notifications you can turn off. I believe the notification center settings just control what shows up in the notification center, not what apps can push notifications.

 

[gentlefury]

Firstly the notifications tab in the settings has always been notifications. The only difference now is how it notifies you and the persistence of the notification shade/lock screen. As for getting notifications from apps you don't want to get them from, go into settings/notifications and turn off the ones you don't want.

 

[donnaw]

Which suggests that a programmer probably designed it... Programmers should be kept away from human interface design.

LOL. Having worked with programmers for 25 years I can say that truer words were never spoken! Took me forever to figure out that programmer/dev brains 'just work differently'.

 

[Scott90]

Honestly, I don't see how this could confuse you. There is an option to remove/add an app to NC. Then you also have the option to select what type of notification you want: none, alert, banner. They must be different things, why would they have two options that accomplish the same? So, you can get a banner without a notification popping up in NC. You can have an app go directly to NC without being notified otherwise, you can have a visual notification that also goes to NC, and you can have no notification and no mention in NC altogether.

It makes perfect sense to me. And I'm a programmer, too.

 

[thelatinist]

I think perhaps the issue is that there used to be a single switch to turn off all notifications. To me, it would make more sense to have a notifications on/of slider at the top, and notification center slider and notification type selector below that would appear only while notifications are on.

 

[srl7741]

I like the new system but it needs work which has been posted about above. I'm finding they don't work at all (iPad2).

I have several active or on and don't get any notices. I'm not even getting email notices which is odd.

The settings are identicle on my iPhone and they work fine. I've gone over the settings several times making sure things are set correct and still notta

 

[Tinmania]

Honestly, I don't see how this could confuse you. There is an option to remove/add an app to NC. Then you also have the option to select what type of notification you want: none, alert, banner. They must be different things, why would they have two options that accomplish the same? So, you can get a banner without a notification popping up in NC. You can have an app go directly to NC without being notified otherwise, you can have a visual notification that also goes to NC, and you can have no notification and no mention in NC altogether.

It makes perfect sense to me. And I'm a programmer, too.

I'm a programmer too and find it from perfect. Heck, there is no way to simply turn all notifications off as we had before.

Moreover, we have several additional steps to clear notifications for individual apps. Temporarily turning off all notifications, which I used to do at least weekly on my i4, is now a time consuming chore--for what was once a very quick process.

While I prefer having notifications at least be accessible via notification center I do not like that they do not clear out as effortlessly as they should. So now I can see having a "cleanup notification center" as being a daily job. Oh and this too is a chore as there is no "clear all."

While I am at it, there should be a way to make us aware that there are pending notifications that might need attention. Simply sliding up and out of sight with no visual cue that they are up there is to me not the most elegant solution. I would like to have an option that would do "something" to the title bar to make it apparent I need to check notification center. There are plenty of ways to do this, as evidenced by the jailbreak tweaks.



Michael

 

[thelatinist]

I have to add that, even after turning off notification center and setting notification type to none, you still get notifications on the lock screen. It makes no sense at all.

 

[saberahul]

Oh, no, there were no ads in notifications. I know that Apple strictly forbids, that, so I'm not worried about getting ads.

It's just that there's no way for ME to decide WHAT kinds of notifications they send me. I'd like to turn off "sports", for example.

That is a restriction of the app... not the notification built into the iPhone. I believe News360 allows you to decide on which topic you'd like to be notified on...

 

[Tinmania]

I have to add that, even after turning off notification center and setting notification type to none, you still get notifications on the lock screen. It makes no sense at all.

Oh yes that is another thing that must be turned off. I mean I set it to be not in notification center, set alert style to "none," and set sound to "off." So even with all that "off" if View in Lock Screen is not off it will indeed show the alert, which was set to "none," on the lock screen. I can't imagine ever wanting that scenario (i.e., If I am not getting any notification whatsoever from an app when I am actively using my iPhone I surely don't want it when my iPhone is not being used).

And that is also one more thing that needs to be turned off if you want to turn all notifications off. One more thing brings the total steps to turn off each app up to four. For each and every app. Lovely.



Michael

 

[thelatinist]

This would be really easy to fix, too. Just have a single toggle at the top which, if switched to Off would disable and hide all other notification options.

 

[Tinmania]

This would be really easy to fix, too. Just have a single toggle at the top which, if switched to Off would disable and hide all other notification options.

Well they would not have to look far for that fix: it has been present in EVERY version of iOS prior to 5.0.



Michael

 

[donnaw]

Honestly, I don't see how this could confuse you. There is an option to remove/add an app to NC. Then you also have the option to select what type of notification you want: none, alert, banner. They must be different things, why would they have two options that accomplish the same? So, you can get a banner without a notification popping up in NC. You can have an app go directly to NC without being notified otherwise, you can have a visual notification that also goes to NC, and you can have no notification and no mention in NC altogether.

It makes perfect sense to me. And I'm a programmer, too.

To be honest, I think that is the point the OP is making about letting programmers design UIs. When the top slider per app says 'Notification Center' with an on/off switch it is certainly intuitive that that one switch governs everything about that app. Apparently it doesn't. I have set mine to off and still get the sound alerts for email resulting in a grumpy husband when my iPad was in the bedroom and a emails came in overnight.

I have been developing UIs for over 20 years and I think it should have a 'governing' switch. Turn it on and you get the options, turn it off and all options should be greyed out. I don't think it's intuitive for people to disassociate NC with Alerts since the Alerts are located in the NC settings and Alerts are a type of notification.

However, I do thank you for explaining the current setup. At least now I know how to use it, even if it doesn't make sense to me.

 

[Thetonyk123]

Send some feedback to N.Y. Times about them putting the option in a future build. Some apps like facebook allow you to choose what you want alerted on. What you have at the bottom of your first post is correct.

So, to turn it ALL off, you have to?

1. Turn OFF "notification center"
2. turn OFF "view in lock screen"
3. Set Alert Style = NONE

Yes this blocked the notifications on mine thanks

 

[Jordan921]

Your problem is with the app developer and not with iOS notification center.

 

[Tinmania]

Your problem is with the app developer and not with iOS notification center.

I think you didn't read the same OP as I did.

To me the app was a side-issue about why he or she needed to turn off a notification. The real point was about how that simple action was more confusing than it should be.



Michael

 

[Jordan921]

I think you didn't read the same OP as I did.

To me the app was a side-issue about why he or she needed to turn off a notification. The real point was about how that simple action was more confusing than it should be.



Michael

I read what he said. First it was him complaining about what notifications he wanted from the NY Times app. If he were to only want news notifications from NY Times app and not Sports notifications that is something he would have to contact the app developer about.

Second he wanted to turn off all notifications from NY Times app. Simple if he didn't want any notifications from the app just go into settings and into the app and turn it off simple.

 

[Tinmania]

I read what he said. First it was him complaining about what notifications he wanted from the NY Times app. If he were to only want news notifications from NY Times app and not Sports notifications that is something he would have to contact the app developer about.

Second he wanted to turn off all notifications from NY Times app. Simple if he didn't want any notifications from the app just go into settings and into the app and turn it off simple.

I'm thinking you still don't get it. <shrug>



Michael