Filed under: iPhone
iPhone gripes
Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens are all well and good for Austrian nannies, but we ill-tempered TUAWians have had our fill of iPhone inconveniences. We're mad as hell and we're not going to take it any more. Here is our abbreviated list of iPhone quirks that tick us off. We know you've got your list too (as do the 300-odd commenters at Engadget) and we encourage you to add your issues in to the comments.
- Why isn't iPhone Safari learning to auto-fill my user names?
- Why can't I start a search in YouTube, pop over to check the weather, come back and find the results of my search? Instead, the search terminates and the search field clears.
- Why isn't there a front-page address book app?
- Why can't I get consistent EDGE reception? I live in a major metropolitan area, damn it.
- Why can't I just get disk access without having to resort to extreme hackery?
- Why can't I SMS more than one person at a time?
- Why can't I receive a call while surfing the web like the Sidekick does?
- Why can't I just edit an outgoing e-mail address without having to go back and type it all in again?
- Why can't I maintain individual calendars instead of having them all lumped together?
- Sure, we can meebo, but why is there no built-in iChat?
- I hate paying thirty bucks a month for a voice plan that I don't use. I wish I could cancel the voice plan and keep the data plan but AT&T says I can't.
- Where's Flash? I want Adobe to fix the OS X Flash plugin, and then I want it on my iPhone. We admit that the existing Flash for OS X, if moved to the iPhone, would be an unmitigated disaster; it would drain your battery in about 3 minutes while causing the iPhone to burn its way through your pocket, melting the ground beneath you and sinking rapidly into Earth's molten core. One Flash video on my MBP causes Safari to spike to 70% CPU and kicks my fans into overdrive... that sort of unoptimized code on a handheld platform is a recipe for pain.
- When my screen gets all smudgy, why can't I just clean it on my shirt? I hate carrying around the iPhone wipie-cloth all the time. (Chartier claims his T-shirt works just fine). Chris U gets the best results from t-shirts made of hemp. You can also use shield lens care cloths from Hilco and other photography-quality lens-cleaning cloths.
- Why does AT&T keep sending me balance updates for my prepaid plan every few minutes, even when I haven't used the phone for anything? When I make a call or text? Fine. Send me an updated balance. But when the iPhone is just sitting there? Puh-lease!
- Why can't I delete the last-taken photo immediately from the camera interface without having to go to the photos section? That snapshot button is so super-sensitive, I keep taking pictures I didn't mean to.
- I hate having to navigate over to settings all the time. Why can't I just access the settings for a program (e.g. e-mail) from inside the program itself like I can with Weather and Stocks?
- The email account UI is positively dreadful. Tap 2/3 times to get into one inbox, then 2/3 times back out, then 2/3 times back into another one is for the birds. I hate the email UI and would love the chance to kick a responsible party in the pants for it.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
Zoli said 9:07PM on 7-10-2007
And how about the fact that you can't search for a contact! when making a call?
It works for SMS, why not phone?
I hate scrolling through 1500 contacts every time i need to find someone!
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xaos said 9:12PM on 7-10-2007
if you're that miserable return the damn phone and get a Treo, Blackberry or Sidekick...I love mine, 1G quirks and all.
It's still a pretty damn good device, with plenty of room to grow.
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James Hare said 9:13PM on 7-10-2007
While I can appreciate your complaints about Apple's software, the complaints about AT&T service don't really fit here. Apple has very little control over AT&T's service. The best hope would be enough pissed iPhone fans complained to AT&T that they might work on their system.
Other than that, most of the complaints (as you've made clear with some) can easily be explained by first generation hardware and software. It always is difficult to be an early adopter.
I use an HTC Blue Angel smartphone. I'd trade you my gripes for yours any day.
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Bob said 10:14PM on 7-10-2007
Safari doesn't autofill so that in the event you lose your phone your life isn't open to whomever finds your phone.
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gascar888 said 9:18PM on 7-10-2007
I'm pretty sure that you can get calls while surfing the web, I'm certain that I've recieved a call while surfing and the apple ad on tv shows the guy answering a call while using safari. Maybe you can only get calls when using wi-fi?
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James said 9:22PM on 7-10-2007
• Why isn't iPhone Safari learning to auto-fill my user names?
For security purposes. Rather an inconvenience than a thief logging into your bank account, no?
• Why can't I start a search in YouTube, pop over to check the weather, come back and find the results of my search? Instead, the search terminates and the search field clears.
So the phone can direct bandwidth to your current task.
• Why isn't there a front-page address book app?
Because they need to add this in a software update.
• Why can't I get consistent EDGE reception? I live in a major metropolitan area, damn it.
Because you don't live in Los Angeles.
• Why can't I just get disk access without having to resort to extreme hackery?
The iPhone is designed around the idea of having no interaction with the file system. You want a philosophy the iPhone doesn't support.
• Why can't I SMS more than one person at a time?
Because they need to add this in a software update.
• Why can't I receive a call while surfing the web like the Sidekick does?
You can, just not while accessing data using EDGE. Blame AT&T.
• Why can't I just edit an outgoing e-mail address without having to go back and type it all in again?
Because they need to add this in a software update.
• Why can't I maintain individual calendars instead of having them all lumped together?
Because they need to add this in a software update. I think fancier calendar support/integration has some Leopard dependencies.
• Sure, we can meebo, but why is there no built-in iChat?
It would be nice to add it, but the web clients are looking really nice as well (beejive, etc.). With the web clients you're 9/10 of the way there, so a built in IM client would be nice, but not necessary.
• I hate paying thirty bucks a month for a voice plan that I don't use. I wish I could cancel the voice plan and keep the data plan but AT&T says I can't.
You bought a phone, what did you expect?
• Where's Flash? I want Adobe to fix the OS X Flash plugin, and then I want it on my iPhone. We admit that the existing Flash for OS X, if moved to the iPhone, would be an unmitigated disaster; it would drain your battery in about 3 minutes while causing the iPhone to burn its way through your pocket, melting the ground beneath you and sinking rapidly into Earth's molten core. One Flash video on my MBP causes Safari to spike to 70% CPU and kicks my fans into overdrive... that sort of unoptimized code on a handheld platform is a recipe for pain.
Yes someone needs to sort it out, but you give the very reason why there is no Flash.
• When my screen gets all smudgy, why can't I just clean it on my shirt? I hate carrying around the iPhone wipie-cloth all the time. (Chartier claims his T-shirt works just fine). Chris U gets the best results from t-shirts made of hemp. You can also use shield lens care cloths from Hilco and other photography-quality lens-cleaning cloths.
Cotton T-shirts work fine. What kind of shirt are you wearing? Can this shirt clean other phone screens but not the iPhone's?
• Why does AT&T keep sending me balance updates for my prepaid plan every few minutes, even when I haven't used the phone for anything? When I make a call or text? Fine. Send me an updated balance. But when the iPhone is just sitting there? Puh-lease!
Isn't using the iPhone with a pre-paid account a semi-hack?
• Why can't I delete the last-taken photo immediately from the camera interface without having to go to the photos section? That snapshot button is so super-sensitive, I keep taking pictures I didn't mean to.
Because they need to add this in a software update.
• I hate having to navigate over to settings all the time. Why can't I just access the settings for a program (e.g. e-mail) from inside the program itself like I can with Weather and Stocks?
Because they need to add this in a software update.
• The email account UI is positively dreadful. Tap 2/3 times to get into one inbox, then 2/3 times back out, then 2/3 times back into another one is for the birds. I hate the email UI and would love the chance to kick a responsible party in the pants for it.
They need to add a "universal" inbox like the official OS X mailbox client: it would solve all of this. That said, I can't see a more efficient way to navigate between the separate accounts.
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Victor Agreda Jr said 9:30PM on 7-10-2007
Clearly there were reasons why Leopard was supposed to coincide with iPhone launch.
Some of the UI issues are annoying, but correctable.
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dpfefferbaum said 9:32PM on 7-10-2007
I have a serious non-UI gripe: the headphone jack on my iphone is so sharp it has cut my finger three times while I was reaching into my pocket. After repeatedly re-opening the cut, I'm now using a small rubber plug from another 1/8 in. jack to keep my finger in one piece and blood off my keyboard.
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Kirk Jenkins said 10:42PM on 7-10-2007
iCal integration stinks! There is no way to dial a number from within an appointment or include a contact. Otherwise my iPhone ROCKs!!
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icruise said 9:34PM on 7-10-2007
Some legitimate complaints. However, my own experience doesn't bear out the idea that you can't receive phone calls while surfing via EDGE. I've tested this multiple times, and every time I receive calls (and yes, I'm sure I'm on EDGE and not wifi, and yes I'm sure that I'm actively downloading a web site at the time the calls came in). I've started a poll over at the MacNN forums about this issue, so we'll see what the users say. I'm not really sure what to make of this issue, except to say that it seems to work for me.
http://forums.macnn.com/103/ipod-iphone-and-apple-tv/341720/lets-settle-once-all-can-you/
Also, with regard to James' comments above:
"The iPhone is designed around the idea of having no interaction with the file system. You want a philosophy the iPhone doesn't support."
Erica is talking about enabling disk access (allowing you to store files on the iPhone's internal memory, just like with iPods) not about accessing the iPhone's file system.
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Hawkeye said 9:35PM on 7-10-2007
I just have 2 issues:
1. I cannot turn off EDGE when I am traveling overseas. I still want the phone and WiFi but I would love to turn off EDGE to prevent high data roaming rates. All of my BlackBerrys did this. I just with the iPhone to do it as well.
2. I don't like how iTunes "optimizes" photos for the iPhone when it moves them onto the device. This prevents the ability to transfer high resolution images such as subway and transit maps, detailed photos for all sorts of things. Please Apple, let me decide the quality of the photo or image I want to transfer to my iPhone or at the very least give me an option to turn off "optimization."
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djscott said 9:38PM on 7-10-2007
Love my iPhone, but I, too, would like some answers to the following:
- Why won't .Mac accept my password? I've tried several times, most
recently at my local Apple store (they couldn't figure it out either).
- Safari opens Web pages with fonts sizes so small they are
unreadable. I manually zoom in using the two-finger technique and
when I navigate to the next page, the page is displayed with the
original small font size! Compare this to increasing font size on the
Mac and subsequent pages retain the larger font size. Again, Apple store folk were sympathetic but couldn't help.
- What's with the lack of preferences? There's little one can do to customize the installed apps.
- Sync is set to manual, but the iPhone wakes up, rings/vibrates every 15 minutes or so for no apparent reason. So annoying I can't keep it linked to my PB unless I want to sync.
That said, I'm still 96% happy and amazed with my iPhone!
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Brian Slick said 9:42PM on 7-10-2007
Why can't I just edit an outgoing e-mail address without having to go back and type it all in again?
Tap and hold in area of typo, wait for magnifier to pop up, roll finger to place cursor in desired spot, let go, edit. Am I missing something?
My running list of plusses and minuses:
http://clingingtoideas.blogspot.com/
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Don said 9:46PM on 7-10-2007
Why doesn't my phone EVER ring except when I surf the web? Why do I never receive email unless I manually check even though the phone is set to check every 15 minutes? Why do I go from 5 bars to no bars in a New York minute with a tower 300 yards away? Why does my phone not keep time when set to automatic and somehow reset every time a missed call flag is set or some other network event happens?
I want Angelina - I'm sure how much longer I can sleep with Rosie....
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fog city dave said 9:50PM on 7-10-2007
That's funny.. I cut my finger the other day getting the iPhone out of my pocket. I didn't think it was the phone, but now I know it was. I'm going to have to start putting it into my pocket upside down :-)
I too am looking forward to upcoming software updates from Apple, and I also believe that a lot of these issues will arrive a bit later with Leopard, but I am absolutely thrilled and awed by this device all the same. I'm starting to think Apple has access to top secret alien technology.
Nokia, Motorola, Palm and Microsoft should be embarrassed.
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James C. said 9:55PM on 7-10-2007
While i don't own an iPhone, i can see where some of the complaints come from. After thinking about it, AT&T is probably the reason that you dont have an iChat client on the iPhone. AT&T would rather you spend your money sending text messages. If you have iChat on your phone your going to send an IM to someone that is online, where as you might send them a text message if you dont have that option. It also seems that you ought to at least give apple a chance to release a software update and fix a few things. You can't expect them to create a state of the art device and think of absoltely everything. That is unrealistic. That is why there is the ability to update things without having to wait for the next gen phone. But most people would have to admit that apple did a pretty good job on its first try.
James
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Matt said 9:56PM on 7-10-2007
There are other issues with Flash support. Think about the user interaction within Safari that would be necessary. Most flash objects things like sliders, drag and drop, etc. that would need to move independent of the main browser window. How is this going to be possible? They will have to somehow lock onto the flash object to enable interaction then release control back to the browser. Not to mention enabling sound and many other things.
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Skeuomorph said 10:02PM on 7-10-2007
Q) The email account UI is positively dreadful. Tap 2/3 times to get into one inbox, then 2/3 times back out, then 2/3 times back into another one is for the birds. I hate the email UI and would love the chance to kick a responsible party in the pants for it.
A) They need to add a "universal" inbox like the official OS X mailbox client: it would solve all of this. That said, I can't see a more efficient way to navigate between the separate accounts.
Followup: I love that the boxes are separate. The iPhone will check the box you navigate into with priority over the ones you don't navigate into, which is a good thing. Also, I use my business account for business (obviously), a Gmail account for spam (site registrations, etc), and a POP3 account for personal mail. I *love* that these all have separate inboxes and separate message counts.
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Zoli said 10:08PM on 7-10-2007
Oh yeah, another thing..... What happened to lyrics in the ipod!?
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aph3x said 10:09PM on 7-10-2007
Ok - people saying the chat client doesn't exist because of at&t is crap. They happily have YahooIM installed on other phones without a problem.
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