I upgraded the iTunes application on my laptop, my iPhone to
OS 11 and my Apple Watch to WatchOS 4 yesterday.
Upgrading iTunes
The biggest thing to watch out for in the iTunes upgrade is
that apps are no longer handled through iTunes. iTunes is now
for media content only. That's going to take some getting used
to. Also, sort of iTunes related, you can now restore your your
ringtones directly on the phone. This is a huge benefit also to
the AppleCare people who support iTunes — in the past, users
had to call into AppleCare to have them unlocked.
Upgrading to iOS 11
My upgrade to iOS 11 went very smoothly, and I have not
experienced the slowness that others have. This may be, in
part, because I'm an Apple Music subscriber, which has
eliminated the need to have music downloaded directly to the
unit. The result is substantially fewer files stored on the
phone, which means I have more than half of my space
available. My surmise (read: I might be talking out of
my tailpipe here) is that the relatively low number of objects
(photos, music files, etc.) and the large percentage of unused
space gave the OS plenty of room to index relatively few
objects.
I've seen a few nice changes to the interface. I'm sure there
are more I haven't yet discovered. Perhaps the most obvious of
these is that they've taken the UI for Apple Music and applied
it through their entire ecosystem, giving a uniform look to the
other iOS apps (that is, the other Apple apps). Also, the control
center has been revamped — swipe up from the bottom to check it
out. Other smaller touches: Screenshots now produce a miniaturized
image of the screenshot at the bottom left of the screen — more
than just a nice little reinforcement that you got the screenshot;
touching the miniaturized image drops you straight into editing
tools, and even lets you delete the 'shot. And speaking of images,
iOS 11's Photos app now displays animated gifs, and includes the
capability to create an Apple Watch face directly from the menu,
just like you can with wallpapers for your device. Another nice
touch is in the Activity app — you can look in the history of
your workouts now and see a graph of your heart rate (heart rate
was a topic of discussion at the unveiling).
Apple has also introduced a new safety feature on the phone.
If you connect your iPhone to your car's audio system (I do this
via Bluetooth), the phone will now restrict what data you get back
from Siri, will intercept texts you receive and reply that you're
driving, and will make you attest that you're not driving if you
attempt to access the device. I believe this can be overridden
someplace in settings, but I haven't looked into how yet.
Apple has also made a few subtle statements with the new OS
release. For example, the Contacts app icon now depicts silhouettes
of male and female figures (before it was a silhouette of a person
— I never really assigned it a gender). Another example is in the
wallpapers included with the new system there are several still
wallpapers which feature solid lines in multiple colors that appear
similar to, though not quite reproducing, the pride flag.
iOS 11 is a much bigger deal for iPad. The change in the control
center is far more pronounced on the iPad than it is on the iPhone.
My iPad Air 2 has a couple of years on it, but I really don't use
it for a whole lot. So I'm uncertain how the upgrade will impact
my use.
Upgrading to WatchOS 4
The upgrade seemed to take forever. I chalk this up to a
combination of demand and the fact that I was upgrading a first
generation Apple Watch.
WatchOS 4 comes with a few new faces, but some other nice
enhancements — starting with the lock screen: the numbers and keys
are larger and easier to read.
But I'm annoyed with another enhancement — when I play music
on my iPhone, the watch shows that the phone is playing music. (Tap
the crown to close that to get back to your watch face.) Hint: I
don't need that information. Really. I listen to music all day
long. I'd rather not have to close the stupid music app every time
I look at my watch. To fix this, open the Apple
Watch app on your phone and navigate to General,
then scroll down to Wake Screen. Toggle "Auto-launch
Audio apps" to OFF. Now when you play music, the
iTunes app won't automatically launch, and you'll see your watch
face when you raise your wrist.
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