One more reason why I like Apple

[ERD50]

DW wanted me to send her my pic of our owl house with a squirrel's tail hanging out the entrance hole to the house. I looked for a while and couldn't find the pic in the Apple photos app.

So I ran a search for "squirrel" on the app. The app found several of my squirrel pics. Including the one that only shows the squirrel's tail. That's impressive - it recognized a squirrel by tail alone.

TIL (Today I Learned) Android/Google Photos does that too!

I didn't know that, I thought I had to tag them. Works great, very handy, thanks.

-ERD50

 

[Qs Laptop]

My youngest son convinced me to dump my Windows Mobile phone when he heard me grumbling yet again about it….

Goodness...isn't the most recent Windows phone at least 10 years old by now?

 

[GenXguy]

TIL (Today I Learned) Android/Google Photos does that too!

I didn't know that, I thought I had to tag them. Works great, very handy, thanks.

I saw a news story the other day where someone's phone supposedly identified a mushroom as edible, but it ended up being a different variety and poisoned the guy. He did manage survive after almost dying. It didn't specify the phone or app.

 

[Qs Laptop]

I'm sure iPhones are great, but some of you are making the mistake that some of these features are somehow unique to Apple.

-ERD50

Indeed. In fact, many of the most popular Apple iPhone features were first introduced on Android phones.

The attraction of Apple products is that they play nice with every other Apple product. They have seamless integration across the product line. This is a great selling point.

The downside is there a few choices and virtually no customization since everything they build is proprietary.

 

[meleana]

My in-laws visited over the holidays. On Jan 1 my German brother in-law was in his room watching a ski competition that is apparently a new year German tradition. He had an app on his iPhone that accessed his cable TV subscription. Two clicks on his screen and we were able to mirror the signal through our Apple TV 4K to our 50” plasma. He was ecstatic and I was reminded once again at how Apple has such a deep understanding of user interface. They are in a league by themselves.

We have a Samsung TV and IPHONES and we can do the same kind of thing with lots of apps. We have no cable or tv service and only stream.

 

[GenXguy]

I got my new iPhone today. It was very confusing to get around in compared to Android. There are still some things I need to figure out, but I'm getting there.

 

[Midpack]

I got my new iPhone today. It was very confusing to get around in compared to Android. There are still some things I need to figure out, but I'm getting there.

It will only take a few days IME. I am sure an iPhone user would need a few days to adjust to an Android phone too?

 

[Music Lover]

It will only take a few days IME. I am sure an iPhone user would need a few days to adjust to an Android phone too?

There will be a learning curve for both platforms but I don't think any one of them is any more difficult than the other.

 

[Getyoung]

I had PC equipment for many years at work, always updated and maintained by our IT department. Always were problems.

I had Apple products back then at home and never had any serious issues. Now retired, I only have Apple products, laptop, ipad, phone, watch, appleplay in the car. I am still amazed at the compatibility the Apple products have with each other.

A neighbour works at a national engineering firm, and they are converting over to Apple products. I read that a AI firm that is partnered with NASA are using Apple computers.

Apple has come a long way from the "desktop" publishing realm that they were initially famous for.

 

[Qs Laptop]

Apple has come a long way from the "desktop" publishing realm that they were initially famous for.

Yes. This reminds me of back in the mid-80's when we were using IBM PC's in our scientific labs because they would easily interface with the various measuring equipment. The MacIntosh had just come out and was derisively referred to as "the electronic crayon."

 

[saydiver]

We're primarily an Apple family, but both DH and I use Windows computers for gaming and DH also uses Windows for software not available on a Mac and for testing home automation projects he's working on, which need to run on both Windows and Macs.

 

[sparky08]

Indeed. In fact, many of the most popular Apple iPhone features were first introduced on Android phones.
.

That's the joke in our house. My wife or daughter will be excited about some new iPhone feature that's been on my Android phone for years. One of them was just talking about how smart Apple was to introduce USB-C connectors to the smartphone.

We live in a remote area where cell towers are far apart. There are phones that rate better than iPhones for connectivity in such areas. And I do notice that my Android stays connected to the network longer than iPhones. It's nice to have that range when biking away from town.

 

[Qs Laptop]

That's the joke in our house. My wife or daughter will be excited about some new iPhone feature that's been on my Android phone for years. One of them was just talking about how smart Apple was to introduce USB-C connectors to the smartphone.

Call Screening, probably my favorite pure phone feature, is when someone calls you and you don't recognize the name/number. You tap on Call Screening and your phone generates a message to the caller asking them to explain why they are calling. While this is happening you can see it being transcribed live on your phone screen. You can also see the response by the caller on your screen and then you can decide whether or not you want to pick up the phone. The transcript of the call is saved on your phone should you want to go back and look at it. I haven't "answered" a call from an unknown number on my cell phone for 5 years. Apple just recently got this feature.

The app drawer, a feature on Android phones for 15 years, finally came to Apple in 2023!

Swipe typing was an Android feature in 2010. (Swipe typing is one finger tracing of the letters you are spelling when you type, essentially you are drawing a continuous line connecting the letters as you type.) Apple got it in 2019.

There are more but these are a few of my favorites. I'm sure Apple has done plenty of innovating and came out with features before Android but this seems to have been done in the very early days of smartphones. Lately, I'd say Android is the innovator.

 

[aja8888]

Call Screening, probably my favorite pure phone feature, is when someone calls you and you don't recognize the name/number. You tap on Call Screening and your phone generates a message to the caller asking them to explain why they are calling. While this is happening you can see it being transcribed live on your phone screen. You can also see the response by the caller on your screen and then you can decide whether or not you want to pick up the phone. The transcript of the call is saved on your phone should you want to go back and look at it. I haven't "answered" a call from an unknown number on my cell phone for 5 years. Apple just recently got this feature.

The app drawer, a feature on Android phones for 15 years, finally came to Apple in 2023!

Swipe typing was an Android feature in 2010. (Swipe typing is one finger tracing of the letters you are spelling when you type, essentially you are drawing a continuous line connecting the letters as you type.) Apple got it in 2019.

There are more but these are a few of my favorites. I'm sure Apple has done plenty of innovating and came out with features before Android but this seems to have been done in the very early days of smartphones. Lately, I'd say Android is the innovator.

Call screening is great! I use it all the time on my Moto G Power.

 

[Qs Laptop]

Call screening is great! I use it all the time on my Moto G Power.

Like me, you probably use one of the default Google voices. I've got mine set to the Australian woman. So when someone calls they get "Sheila"! LOL.

I understand the Samsung users can have their own voice be the voice that calls screens people.

 

[statsman]

I got my new iPhone today. It was very confusing to get around in compared to Android. There are still some things I need to figure out, but I'm getting there.

It shouldn't take too long to learn the new system. But be aware some people have made the switch (iOS <--> Android) and ended up switching back.

My DW and I were both Windows users for our careers (plus Unix for myself) and Android for our Samsung smartphones and her Fire tablets. In February 2023, we both switched to iPhone 13s. It took a bit of time to learn about Apple after decades of not using their systems. But it has turned out quite well. During last summer, I purchased an iPad Pro 11", and it's great.

 

[GenXguy]

It shouldn't take too long to learn the new system. But be aware some people have made the switch (iOS <--> Android) and ended up switching back.

My plan was never to switch. I wouldn't have gotten the small refurb 2020 model of iPhone SE 2nd generation if that was my plan. I just wanted access to some specific apps that were only available on iPhone.

I did put my Tello/T-Mobile SIM in it temporarily. LTE worked right off the bat, but the calling never rang or connected. I found out VoLTE was disabled by default. I enabled that, and it worked for calling. But I returned the SIM to my Android phone. I already have a backup Android that works with the SIM, so now I have a second backup phone that works with it. lol

Anyway, I've never had an iPhone before, so in addition to the apps I could run on it, I thought it would be interesting to get familiar with it. I don't particularly like the home button fingerprint reader on this model, which takes more pressure to respond to than my Android on-screen button, and it has too little viewable screen with wasted space above and below. It wouldn't have been my choice among iPhones as a primary phone but suits my purpose. A larger model without this home button would be better.

 

[explanade]

Apple adopted USB-C this year because of an EU mandate.

They did the reversible charging plug years before USB-C with Lightning.

As far as which one copied from which, Android phones were originally going to be Blackberry clones, with hardware keyboards and using buttons to move the cursor around on screen.

They pivoted to the multi touch screen UI after iPhone came out and instantly defined the UI paradigm for smart phones.

 

[mpeirce]

Apple adopted USB-C this year because of an EU mandate.

They did the reversible charging plug years before USB-C with Lightning.

One theory I've heard is that Apple was holding out until they could remove the connector completely and rely on wireless for charging on the iPhone. That was before the EU mandate forced their hand.

At that point they'd probably add a USB C connector to the Pro line anyway.


Notice that while the iPhone 15 currently supports USB 2.0, the iPhone 15 Pro supports USB 3.2 gen 2 which supports Thunderbolt over the USB C connector. That give transfer speeds up to 10 Gbps. Nice and fast for transfers - which is important for people who shoot 4K ProRes video and need to transfer it off the phone.

I also noticed that when I plugged mine into my 5K Studio display it worked just fine. Pretty cool.

 

[mpeirce]

As far as which one copied from which, Android phones were originally going to be Blackberry clones, with hardware keyboards and using buttons to move the cursor around on screen.

They pivoted to the multi touch screen UI after iPhone came out and instantly defined the UI paradigm for smart phones.

Both sides copy from each other. That's best for everyone.

As to Apple "copying" USB C. Apple was involved with the original specification of USB C. USB C borrows a lot from their Lighting connector. Lighting came out before USB C was ready and allowed Apple to have a smaller connector on their phone that didn't have a "wrong way" to plug it in sooner.