Apple’s World Wide Developer’s Conference ended just over a week ago, and during the conference we saw some new stuff about iOS 8, the latest version of Apple’s mobile operating system. Apple likes to be really secretive about new hardware, but it has to be a little more open about software because third-party app developers have to be in on the loop in order to ship iOS 8 software along with the actual OS. Because of this, we saw a lot of stuff about iOS 8 during WWDC. After I got the lowdown from the excellent TechHive.com, I’ve compiled a list of my top three picks.
1. Actionable Notifications
I’m guessing you’ve been here: You’re in Safari, reading some article online. Suddenly, you get a text message, and a banner pops up at the top of the screen. You read the text and decide to respond to it right then, so you tap the banner. iOS then takes you out of Safari and into Messages; then after you reply, you have to switch back to Safari. Most of us take this for granted: that’s just how iOS has always worked. But with actionable notifications, you can swipe down on that notification and a keyboard pops up. You haven’t switched apps, this is just an overlay over whatever you’re currently doing. After typing your reply, the overlay disappears, and you’re right back to Safari. Nifty, huh? (I’m not sure if I described that very well, so here’s a picture from TechHive/MacWorld if you’re confused.)
Google has recently made a big deal of the “OK Google” line. On certain Android phones, you just say those words and the Android virtual assistant pops up, no button pushing required. As of iOS 8, the iPhone will have a similar feature. As long as the phone is plugged in (as a battery life consideration), saying “Hey Siri” will activate, well, Siri. I think this is a cool idea, especially if your phone is charging on the table across the room, and you want to have it, say, play some music.
Continuity is a feature that will tie your iPhone, iPad, and Mac closer together than ever before. There are lots of different parts of Continuity, but I’ll only mention a few here. One feature is called Handoff, which allows you to, for example, push an email draft from your iPhone to your Mac. This is great if you decide you’d rather use a real keyboard for that email. Sure, you could have just emailed it to yourself, but that’s a pain. Continuity will also allow you to accept phone calls and send SMS on your Mac or iPad, basically routing things through your iPhone.
Staring at Phones 
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