What is going on, everybody?
It is, Mike, welcome back to Tech 24/7 TV.
Glad that you're back with me today because we're going to
talk about six tips.
They're going to make you more productive on your iPads.
We could change the way that you work with your iPad.
And let's get into it.
My first tip is going to be per app text sizing.
Now, maybe you were like me.
You know you're getting old.
Your eyesight is not as good as it used to be or maybe they're
just some apps where that text inside of that app could just
be a little bit bigger, a little bit more crisp.
Now, Per-App Text Sizing works in both iOS and iPad OS 15,
so you'll need to make sure that your app has been updated
to take advantage of the newest frameworks from Apple.
Now all of my devices, I have my system text turned all the
way down to the smallest possible size because I'm
really optimizing for information density.
Meaning that when I'm looking at a web page or an app,
I really want as much information on the screen as
possible without having to shift around the image or the
content at all.
Now my example, I use Todoist which supports iPadOS 15,
and for me, the text size is just a little bit too small.
And so I have to do it now.
With this feature, I can pop in a control center, click on the
text size widget.
In there, I'm presented with two options.
I can either change the text size globally for all
the apps, or I can actually do it on a per-app basis by
swiping over to the left.
There, you'll see that there's a toggle by which I can drag up
and drag down, which will take the system text, changing the
app specifically while preserving all the other tech
sizes that I have either globally or individual apps.
Now there are two different ways to find this.
First, you can enable a toggle in control center so you can
quickly change it system wide or in the basis, which is
something I just showed you.
Or you can go into settings, then accessibility and actually
change it there for many apps at the same time that anything
that you can change.
Full text button shapes and off labels.
Transparency, contrast and motion parameters, either on an
individual basis or globally.
For all the apps, this will work on both your iPhone
and iPad, and it's a great addition if you are someone
maybe has low vision accessibility issues or if
you're like me and you're just getting old and your eyesight
is not what it used to be.
Now, next of talk about changes to the dock,
which improve app density.
Now, when I'm using my iPad Pro, I'm most certainly
in a different productivity mode than I am when I'm using
my iPad Mini.
Now, since the iPad Mini is so small and the screen is
so crisp, anything that is in the dock to me is going to be
what I would consider prime real estate.
Meaning that I don't want anything showing in the dock
that isn't necessarily relevant.
Now you saw here I have a minimized dock on this and I
don't have my recent app shown to me.
That's actually going to be one of the critical things that
make this usable on this device.
I chose to disable "Show auggested and Recent Apps" in
the dock of my iPad Mini, allowing for the dock to be
dedicated for apps to what I want to be there.
And the only time that doesn't apply is when the device
detects another iOS device, or Mac that you are signed into
and it opens up for handoff between the two devices.
You'll see a little icon that appears depending on the app
you're trying to hand off, and that works automatically
that unfortunately, you cannot turn off a lot of changes.
You're going to go to settings, navigate the home
screen dock and then disable show suggested in recent
apps in dock.
Now, as a bonus, you can even turn off show app
library and dock.
But for me, that's not really worth it because if you
disable it, you have to swipe until you get to that very last
page of your apps.
So I don't necessarily like turning that off, but if you
wanted something a little bit cleaner, you could disable
that as well.
Now this next feature I want to show you is a way to eliminate
background noises and distractions.
And to be clear, I am not referencing focus modes.
If you're anything like me, you might have trouble focusing
when it's time to do meaningful work because of the environment
that you're in.
Well, new in iPadOS 15 is the ability to play
background sounds, and that will play either over audio or
video and help eliminate distractions
in your environment.
Now I'm using this in conjunction with focus mode to
really accelerate my productivity to the next level
as a way to eliminate environmental distractions
wherever I find myself.
Now, what that looks like is whenever I turn on my planning
focus mode, I have a personal automation that runs,
that plays background sounds that sound like rain and
whenever I exit the focus mode, that background
sound automatically stops.
Now I'm using this in conjunction with shortcuts,
so I will put the steps on the screen.
But I also will have them down in the video description
below for you.
You can find the configuration by navigating the settings,
accessibility and then audio and visual.
There you can choose between ocean rain stream,
bright noise, dark noise or a balance of all of them.
Now, as I said in the beginning, you can actually
have this playing either by itself or on top of any media
that you choose to, and you can have it stop when your
iPad is locked.
Now, once you have it set up, let's head over to
the Shortcuts app.
Click on the Plus button to create a new shortcut and
name your shortcut.
However you want to from the search bar, let's type in
background and select set background sound.
Now you should see the action turn background sounds on in
the shortcut action pane on the left hand side.
Tap on turn and then change it to toggle.
Then click on done in the top right hand corner.
Next, we're going to automate the shortcut, so whenever you
enter into a focus mode, it will automatically turn on
or turn off that background sound for you so you don't
worry about turning it on and turning it off every time that
you want to.
Still within shortcuts, look at the left hand navigation bar
and tap on automation.
Tap on the Plus button and then select
Create Personal Automation.
Now, when you create a personal automation, that is
something that only runs on your device, if you have an
iPhone and iPad, you'd have to set the automation separately
on both devices.
Now this brings up a series of triggers that you can choose
from swipe all the way to the bottom and find the focus mode
that you want to customize on this next screen, you want to
make sure that you have turn on and when turning off are both
checkmark hit next tap add action type shortcut in the
action search bar.
Now select Run Shortcut.
Type in the name of a new shortcut that you created and
then tap next.
Now, before clicking Save, make sure that you disable "Ask
before running" because if you don't, every time you go to
run the shortcut, what's going to happen is that your iPad
will ask you that you'll need to confirm yes or no whether
you want to run the shortcut before doing so.
This is so annoying.
Hopefully, Apple fixes this in some future version
of iPad OS.
Clicked on in.
What you want to do is verify that the shortcut is working.
You can do that simply by going into focus mode and enabling
the shortcut that you customize there.
And once you do that, you should hear the
background sounds play.
And if you stop that focus mode, it should stop the
background sounds as well.
Now you should remember that if you enabled the background
sound to play over media, that media does include
any media, so it could be audio or visual.
So if you happen to be in a focus mode, watching YouTube or
watching Hulu, whatever the case is,
it will play their background sound underneath that audio
or video, so you want to keep that in mind.
Now, if you have any other questions about focus modes,
let me know down in the comments below because I was
considering redoing my Focus video at the beginning of
summer and be more than happy to address any questions that
you have in a future.
VIDEO.
New in iOS and iPadOS 15 are could be enhanced services if
you're using an iPad that has 5G like Pro 2021 or even the
iPad Mini, but also if you have an iPhone 12 or an iPhone 13
this would apply to you as well.
Now, with these enhanced services, you can
backup your device over 5G, perform a device update,
make and receive FaceTime HD calls, in addition to
downloading higher quality audio and video content over
the 5G slower network while using your device.
And if you have an iPad Pro 2021, you can connect your
device to the 5G network in your device.
Will actually prioritize 5G over Wi-Fi when you have it on
stable Wi-Fi connection.
Now, if you're thinking to yourself, Mike, I would
never spend the money to get a 5G connection on my iPad
Pro iPad Mini.
I certainly understand that, but what I would suggest is
that you would least watch my video where I talk about the
benefits of having 5G on an iPad iPad Mini iPad Pro here
only get the cart above now to find that you're going to
navigate in the settings here and click on cellular data,
and then you're going to see other data options.
Your tap on data in the first selection and then change it
to 5G on.
This means that your device will choose 5G
whenever it's available.
Go back one screen, choose cellular options with
you right below it, and then choose Allow more data on 5G.
Apple did a lot of optimization in iOS and iPadOS 15 for 5G,
really taking the heavy lifting away from developers,
allowing them to worry about how their functions and not
necessarily about the radio transport options or how it
works on either wireless or the other network.
Now you might see a slight dip in better performance,
depending on what 5G coverage looks like for you
at your house.
I like where I live.
5G coverage is actually pretty abysmal where I live, but in
and around my community, it's actually very good.
So I don't mind turning it on and having that hit because
when I'm out and about, having the fastest, most secure
connection is what I am prioritizing now.
Next up is be quick note, and this is a feature that's
new in iPad OS and Mac OS Monterey that allows you to
swipe up from the bottom right hand corner to quickly
capture notes, content, etc.
into the Notes app without actually having the
Notes app open.
Additionally, if you're taking notes while using Safari,
you can highlight content from the website and then drag them
into your quick note or by using the contextual menu.
Now, I use this feature all the time to collect information
related to research for my day job where I work in I.T. for an
enterprise software company.
It makes the collection process super straightforward because I
can title my quick note based on my search terms.
Or I could just add the search term into my note as well,
and I can add photos and handwritten text into
the note itself.
Now, as a bonus, in iPadOS 15.2, which you can
configure the swipe up function from the bottom left hand or
the bottom right hand corner to identify what that
behavior is.
And if you're familiar with it right now, if you swipe up from
the bottom left, it's going to take a screenshot.
If you swipe up from the bottom right, it does open
quick notes, depending on when you are watching this video.
This feature might not be available yet, but it isn't.
15 that to beta, so you should see it before the end of 2021
or maybe early 2022 at the very latest.
Now, my sixth and final productivity tip for you
is a doozy.
This is about multitasking.
Now we all know iPadOS 15 redefined the
multitasking menu.
Now, if you want to multitask, there are three glyphs at the
top of every screen that allows you to choose how you want to
multitask and with what app.
Also new in iPadOS 15 is the ability to split screen apps by
using a shortcut.
Now, I don't know about you, but I split screen same apps
very frequently, depending on what my action is.
I am often using apps, let's say like Todoist and my
calendar every morning before I do my review.
What to do.
Now this is a real time saver because I can actually also tie
it to focus mode so whenever I enable my focus mode, not only
is it going to turn on the background sounds that we
talked about a few minutes ago, but it's also
going to automatically open these apps in split screen.
And it's not just a 50 50 split view.
You can change them to be three quarter, one quarter,
one quarter, three quarter 50 50.
It doesn't matter.
There's a lot of configuration options there, but it is a real
time saver, especially if you always have these actions done
while you're doing certain activities.
That, in addition to another feature coming in iPadOS 15.2
is the ability when you choose to do a Split View app, you can
actually select which side of the pane you want a split
view app, just like you can on the Mac, and then you can
swap them interchangeably.
Lot of neat tricks.
Now, I don't know about you, but I hope that you found
something valuable in today's video.
And if you have, let me know in the comments below what you
were able to take away from this video and hopefully
incorporate it into your own workflow.
Now, if you want to be one of the first to watch my iPad mini
accessory video when it comes out, which I promise it
is coming out, I'm just waiting for a few more things,
make sure you are subscribed.
Turn on notifications so you can be one of the first people
to watch that.
My name is Mike.
This is Tech 24/7 TV, folks.
I will talk to you in the next one.