7 ms·

My favorite unintuitive iOS feature is “shake to undo”

jameshart 7y ago
For some reason this always accidentally triggers when I’m using the ‘Mail’ app. After opening an email, it offers me the opportunity to ‘Undo Read’. It means ‘leave the email you just read marked as unread for now’, but somehow instead the displayed confirmation modal implies that iOS can reach into my brain and take back the information imparted by the email.
- runj__ 7y ago
  Perhaps you are always unknowingly shaking with anger whenever you read emails?
theshrike79 7y ago
Has anyone ever used that on purpose?
- Y-bar 7y ago
  Yes, often, it is such an odd manoeuvre that it is hard to forget, like dragging an ejectable to the trash. But I feel like I look stupid. And it does not always work. There has to be a better way.
  - hackmiester 7y ago
    > it does not always work. Just keep shaking until you see the popup appear. The phone also "thumps" (with the vibration motor) to let you know it felt what you were trying to do. Disclaimer: I am not trying to posit that this is a better way.
- Brendinooo 7y ago
  I do! I don't like that it happens accidentally more than it should, but otherwise it's fine.
smcl 7y ago
Ha, yep I feel like an absolute idiot doing that in public. My genuinely favourite hidden/unintuitive feature is the force-touch on the on-screen keyboard to see a little cursor you can scroll around the text field you are using. I hate that it's so unintuitive, but it's incredibly useful
- rickycook 7y ago
  and i hate that they removed it in the latest generation! i know you can do the hold down on space instead, and i know that you can then tap with a second finger, but there’s so much more you could do much quicker with the force touch keyboard!
  - Angelwings93 7y ago
    You can also do it by holding down the caret :)
- gjhr 7y ago
  On many Android keyboards you can hold and drag on the space bar to do the same. You can also drag back on backspace to delete whole words/sentences. Similarly unintuitive though, I only know about it because I saw someone else mention it on the Internet.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - pmontra 7y ago
    I enable the arrow keys row on SwiftKey and move with them. Phones are so tall nowadays that a few extra pixels in the keyboard mean nothing.
  - taejo 7y ago
    For me personally it's a coin toss whether it moves the cursor or inserts a space.
  - shawnz 7y ago
jedieaston 7y ago
They replaced/depreciated it in iOS 13 with some crazy three finger swipe thing that for the life of me I can’t remember, so I still shake my iPad or just hold down backspace. They need to rebuild their software development team.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  These are PM/Design flaws, not software dev flaws.
- wlesieutre 7y ago
  The standardized 3 finger swipe thing is great on iPad
- gumby 7y ago
  I think you mean “shake them up”
lonelappde 7y ago
iOS 13 just added a delightful feature where long press on a web browser link it opens on Safari, even if you are in Firefox, and even if you are in private browsing. It pops up a split screen window that has no close-window button. The only way to close the pop up window is to exit your browser and go Home, and then go to Safari to clean up.
- newscracker 7y ago
  I too found that annoying. If I understand correctly what you’re referring to, if you notice closely, there is a “Hide Preview” on the top right of that Safari popup. Tap that once and you’ll be back to just seeing a nice menu of what to do with the link and no more opening the link in a Safari popup.
scrooched_moose 7y ago
I was out with a group of friends last night and had an interesting conversation when no one else realized you can search iMessages. From the main Messages window, swipe down and previously hidden search bar appears. There's no indication this is an option or it exists. As far as I know it's been there since at least iOS 9.0 (probably longer) and 6 people hadn't found it yet.
- MiroF 7y ago
  This is a common iOS design pattern now. I'm sure there are lots of search bars you are missing.
  - jandrese 7y ago
    The visual cue that one exists is, let me check my notes, oh here it is "go fuck yourself." The #1 thing that drives me crazy with phone UI is the huge amount of hidden functionality that you'll only ever discover if you find an article online or just randomly tap and swipe everything in the app until things happen. And then you have to remember that all in your head because there are no reminders anywhere about the functionality. And what do they do with all of the space they save by not having indicators? Absolutely nothing at all. Tons of whitespace is added to the app so you are always scrolling around anyway.
  - overgard 7y ago
    I've been using an iPhone since 2010 and I had no idea

For some reason this always accidentally triggers when I’m using the ‘Mail’ app. After opening an email, it offers me the opportunity to ‘Undo Read’. It means ‘leave the email you just read marked as unread for now’, but somehow instead the displayed confirmation modal implies that iOS can reach into my brain and take back the information imparted by the email.

runj__ 7y ago
Perhaps you are always unknowingly shaking with anger whenever you read emails?

theshrike79 7y ago

Has anyone ever used that on purpose?

Y-bar 7y ago
Yes, often, it is such an odd manoeuvre that it is hard to forget, like dragging an ejectable to the trash. But I feel like I look stupid. And it does not always work. There has to be a better way.
- hackmiester 7y ago
  > it does not always work. Just keep shaking until you see the popup appear. The phone also "thumps" (with the vibration motor) to let you know it felt what you were trying to do. Disclaimer: I am not trying to posit that this is a better way.
Brendinooo 7y ago
I do! I don't like that it happens accidentally more than it should, but otherwise it's fine.

smcl 7y ago

Ha, yep I feel like an absolute idiot doing that in public. My genuinely favourite hidden/unintuitive feature is the force-touch on the on-screen keyboard to see a little cursor you can scroll around the text field you are using. I hate that it's so unintuitive, but it's incredibly useful

rickycook 7y ago
and i hate that they removed it in the latest generation! i know you can do the hold down on space instead, and i know that you can then tap with a second finger, but there’s so much more you could do much quicker with the force touch keyboard!
- Angelwings93 7y ago
  You can also do it by holding down the caret :)
gjhr 7y ago
On many Android keyboards you can hold and drag on the space bar to do the same. You can also drag back on backspace to delete whole words/sentences. Similarly unintuitive though, I only know about it because I saw someone else mention it on the Internet.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- pmontra 7y ago
  I enable the arrow keys row on SwiftKey and move with them. Phones are so tall nowadays that a few extra pixels in the keyboard mean nothing.
- taejo 7y ago
  For me personally it's a coin toss whether it moves the cursor or inserts a space.
- shawnz 7y ago

jedieaston 7y ago

They replaced/depreciated it in iOS 13 with some crazy three finger swipe thing that for the life of me I can’t remember, so I still shake my iPad or just hold down backspace. They need to rebuild their software development team.

lonelappde 7y ago
These are PM/Design flaws, not software dev flaws.
wlesieutre 7y ago
The standardized 3 finger swipe thing is great on iPad
gumby 7y ago
I think you mean “shake them up”

lonelappde 7y ago

iOS 13 just added a delightful feature where long press on a web browser link it opens on Safari, even if you are in Firefox, and even if you are in private browsing. It pops up a split screen window that has no close-window button. The only way to close the pop up window is to exit your browser and go Home, and then go to Safari to clean up.

newscracker 7y ago
I too found that annoying. If I understand correctly what you’re referring to, if you notice closely, there is a “Hide Preview” on the top right of that Safari popup. Tap that once and you’ll be back to just seeing a nice menu of what to do with the link and no more opening the link in a Safari popup.

scrooched_moose 7y ago

I was out with a group of friends last night and had an interesting conversation when no one else realized you can search iMessages. From the main Messages window, swipe down and previously hidden search bar appears. There's no indication this is an option or it exists. As far as I know it's been there since at least iOS 9.0 (probably longer) and 6 people hadn't found it yet.

MiroF 7y ago
This is a common iOS design pattern now. I'm sure there are lots of search bars you are missing.
- jandrese 7y ago
  The visual cue that one exists is, let me check my notes, oh here it is "go fuck yourself." The #1 thing that drives me crazy with phone UI is the huge amount of hidden functionality that you'll only ever discover if you find an article online or just randomly tap and swipe everything in the app until things happen. And then you have to remember that all in your head because there are no reminders anywhere about the functionality. And what do they do with all of the space they save by not having indicators? Absolutely nothing at all. Tons of whitespace is added to the app so you are always scrolling around anyway.
- overgard 7y ago
  I've been using an iPhone since 2010 and I had no idea