Apple didn’t dominate the tech world until it’d been in operation for roughly 20 years. “Overnight sensations” like Facebook and Twitter actually needed a couple years to take off. Even Luke didn’t turn into a proper Jedi until the third movie. Yes, mastery doesn’t come easily—unless you read this guide. We’ll show you the power-user secrets you need to wring the coolest and most cutting-edge functionality from your iDevices.
You can’t delete Apple’s stock apps, but you can stash them in their own folder on the last home screen.
Tired of swiping all over the place to find the apps you need? Organize them into folders for quicker access. Tap and hold an icon to get ’em wobbling, then drag one icon onto another one to create a folder containing both. Next, drag-n-drop in whatever other apps you want to join the party. iOS will give your folder a name based on the type of apps you drag together, but you can easily change those generic labels if you want. Folders for types of apps (games, cameras, social media) make sense, but you can also sort apps into groups that you use together or devise separate folders for work-related apps and stuff you use when you’re off the clock.
Set a custom tone so that your boss/spouse/kid/significant other stands out from the crowd.
To set a custom text tone, bring up a contact’s listing and tap Edit. Scroll down, and you’ll see an option to set a text tone for that contact. It works great for singling out a few people from all the rest of the alert noises your phone makes. Unfortunately, you’re limited to the 23 options (plus “none”) offered by Apple, so you can’t create your own text tones to identify contacts.
Your most recent apps appear first, but swiping to the left displays more.
Multitasking is one of iOS 4’s biggest innovations. Put it to good use by double-tapping the Home button when you want to switch to another app. With the task bar activated, side-scroll through the list of recent apps and tap the one you want. It’s faster than scrolling through multiple home pages to find apps, and iOS saves the state of your app when you switch, which means you can go right back to whatever you were doing before without having to wait for everything to load from scratch.
Now you can move the party from room to room.
AirPlay lets you send audio and video direct from your device without any cables or docks. It works within the apps you already use, and you can move between AirPlay devices mid-stream. To use it, tap the AirPlay icon in your app. From the pop-up menu, select a device on your network to stream to. You can send video to your Apple TV or audio to an AirPort Express hooked up to speakers, as well as AirPlay-capable devices from Pioneer, Bowers & Wilkins, iHome, and many others.
