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iPhone 6S New Feature: Force Touch
New submitter WarJolt writes: Apple is adding Force Touch to their iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus. I'm not sure if Force Touch enough to convince an Android user like myself to switch, but there are definitely some interesting possibilities for app developers. A challenge for App developers will be to make apps compatible with both Force Touch iPhones and non-force touch iPhones. (Here's the Bloomberg report Forbes draws from.)
Android has pressure sensitive styluses. Which have also been available for iOS for years. This is Force Touch, which as it's name implies is about measuring the force of finger touches. Android doesn't have it.
Hey janitors that run this site, don't link to Wikipedia or anything to tell us what "force touch" is.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
This is Force Touch, which as it's name implies is about measuring the force of finger touches.
For what its worth, (and probably not much) I have a new macbook pro with the force touchpad. I've never actually used it. Not once. Not ever. I tried it on the demo unit in the store to see what the fuss was... but I count it as a total gimmick.
I really only ever use the tap-to-click; so I don't even click the touchpad, nevermind force-click it.
the only thing i can think of that would get me to switch to ios over android would be if they came out of the box with the ability to sideload apps without jailbreaking
It has this. Just enroll the device as a developer device, and compile the code, or enroll it as a corporate device, if you want to use precompiled code you trust but that Apple won't allow into the App store because Apple doesn't trust it.
If you mean thing like side-loading just random crap, like if I were a private detective hired by your wife, and had 60 seconds of access to your iPhone, I could sideload some serious backdoor onto your phone to enable me to monitor your texts, phone calls, email, Facebook, and so on ... I'm pretty sure no one wants someone else to be able to load that kind of crap on their phones, but if you can do it, they can do it, too.
Your force touch trackpad does not "click" (no traditional hinge movement). The taptic engine behind the track pad simulates the click feeling for click depth without the surface depressing.
So, every time you do or have "clicked" your track pad, you have used the force touch feature.
Secondly, force touch on the Apple Watch works beautifully and will be useful on the iPhone too. Different use cases. Contextual menus in iOS apps will be a great addition.
No, it really doesn't.
Look at the teardown of the MBPr's trackpad - it doesn't physically have a clickable button any more. It is 100% exclusively totally (just for redundancy) controlled via haptic feedback.
It does not physically click. Not even a little bit.
It is a flat plate with no moving parts that has a haptic feedback device fixed to it.
You have finally realized that your touchscreen controller actually provides a pressure strength and are able to hype it up like it's revolutionary.
Not even if we realize the limitations of pressure sensing of a standard capacitive controller and add additional sensors to make the detection less granular is this something new. I don't know how long Synaptics (touchpad manufacturer) have had their capacitive+force sensor combination available but it is at least two years, but even ignoring that the idea and implementation isn't anything new.
Bah.
Err, no.
Apple's implementation of force touch on the Macbook Pro trackpad (where it is current used, not counting this rumour that it will be on the iPhone) uses a set of strain gauges to measure the applied pressure. It doesn't use the touchscreen controller.
You might want to actually look up how it works before trying to score a "sick burn" (is that what the kids call it these days?) from your armchair quarterback position.
I also don't see where Apple are hyping it up to make it seem like a revolution. They are advertising that the MBPr and MB have it, but I fail to see how their advertising materials claim it's revolutionary. Unless you think the term "whole new way to experience a trackpad" means that, and not "this trackpad works differently than the old ones due to the numerous new ways you can use it due to the force sensors"
Apple is frequently guilty of hyperbole when it comes to advertising, but on the force touch it's pretty understated. Did you just assume they would claim it was a revolution that had never been seen before? Given that you don't understand how Apple's implementation works I have to assume you've done zero research on it. Google (a popular search engine) can tell you quite a lot about it if you're interested.
WACOM you say? Yes they do them for iOS.
http://uk.pcmag.com/tablets/13...
And there are several other companies that also do pressure sensitive styluses for iOS.