On Thursday night last week, Apple released the iPhone 2.2 update. I’ve had it installed and have been playing with it over the weekend and thus far no issues. The official list of new features is as follows:
Â
Â
Enhancements to Maps
Â
- Google Street View
- public transit and walking directions
- display street address of dropped pins
- share location via email
Â
Enhancements to Mail
Â
- resolved isolated issues with scheduled fetching of mail
- improved formatting of wide HTML email
- Improved stability and performance of Safari
Â
Podcasts are now available for download in iTunes
Decrease call-setups and call drops
Improved sound quality of visual voicemail
Pressing the Home button from any Home screen takes you to the first Home screen
Preference to turn off auto-correction in the Keyboard settings.
I’m really impressed and happy with the additions to the Maps app. Apple did a great job in implementing Google Maps Street View. Here’s how it works:
You can access Google Maps Street View (in areas where it’s available) by either using the Drop Pin feature or search for an existing Address/Contact. If Street View is available, the little orange guy/icon on the left of the address will be highlighted so that you can tap it. Once you tap it, the iPhone will go into a 360° Interactive Street View. You can use your finger to navigate around and see the area. It’s really pretty cool!
Â
Â
You can also get directions now using public transit and walking directions! This is really handy in places like New York City. I’ll never forget years ago following a set of directions that had me walk all the way around the block avoiding one way streets, arggghhh!
Â
Â
It’s also cool to be able to download podcasts now directly to your iPhone via the iTunes Wi-Fi store. One less reason to have to connect your iPhone to your computer to do a sync. So go ahead and check out an episode or two from my Adobe Creative Suite Video Podcast 🙂
Â
Although these are cool features, the one that I’ll probably use the most is one of the smallest ones. Now when you’ve scrolled to a second, third, forth, etc. Home screen, you can tap the Home button to get back to the first Home screen without having to go back, back, back. I have 6 home screens so this will come in extremely handy. The iPhone Software Update 2.2 is now available through iTunes. Just plug your iPhone in and it should prompt you to do the download/install.
Terry — How do you get your great screen shots?
Hi Joe,
Not that I’m Terry, but you hold down the home button and the on/off button at the same time.
regards Fredrik
That easy scroll back to the main home screen from other home screens is my favorite new feature, too. Funny how much difference such a little thing can make.
Hey Terry,
I haven’t downloaded 2.2 for my Touch but I have heard that the Street View is not active for iPod Touch users. Bummer.
Jeff
Jeff,
Because of the laws around revenue recognition and the way Apple recognizes sales of iPods (as they happen), they can’t add “new features” without a charge. So I guess Apple felt that this wasn’t a significant enough of a feature to offer for iPod touch users for $$. It will probably get wrapped into a larger update that would be worth charging for.
Hi Terry!
That sounds and looks like a really cool enhancement what Apple have done with the iPhone Software Update, I’m glad you are enjoying it!
I just wanted to ask you if I may what software you use to capture screenshots of whatever is on your Mac?
I’ve been using Snapz Pro X to do mine and I’m not all that happy with it because there seems to be a little noise in the ‘Still’ screen captures, and I can’t seem to get it to capture the Mouse Cursor.
I’ve heard about others such as ScreenFlow, but does it also capture ‘still’ images as well as video?
I’m really enjoying Adobe Photoshop CS4 by the way, I’m so glad I bought a new Mac so I could get to try it!
Happy Holidays!
Paul,
I use Snapz Pro X to stills/screenshots. I use iShowU, iShowU Pro HD and Screenflow for recording my screen. Happy Holidays to you too!