“One of the things we most looked forward to in iOS 8 was widgets,” Christina Bonnington writes for Wired. “Apple introduced widgets as a part of Notification Center, which you access with a downward swipe from the top of the screen. By giving third party apps access to this coveted space, users could quickly glean information about their day and more efficiently navigate their smartphone experience.”
“Except that it seems Apple is still undecided about what’s allowed in a widget, and what’s not,” Bonnington writes. “Apple rejected an update to the app Drafts this week because the buttons in the widget redirect the user back to the app in order to process or complete tasks. ”
If Apple does decide, uniformly, that such functionality isn’t allowed across its mobile platform, it’s going to severely limit the iOS 8 experience. However, it’s more likely that this is a growing pain,” Bonnington writes. “Apple’s app reviewers notoriously err on the side of caution when it comes to app approvals, so it’s likely these rejections are a result of evolving developer guidelines, increasingly complicated apps, and human error.”
Read more in the full article here.
This was a bad idea borrowed from Android, that never really had much use… and Apple let the fans ‘design’ the OS.
*sad trombone*
Put this one with the iTunes Social Network and move on.
I’ve found some widgets quite useful, like checking bus times in NYC and quick access to detailed weather data w/ the WeatherUnderground apps.
It’s new — let’s give it a little time to come into its own before we start tossing it in a mass grave with the likes of Ping and MobileMe.
Being able to access weather info (weather underground) and a calculator (pcalc) without unlocking my phone is quite useful. This is one feature I really like about iOS 8. However I do carefully choose what widgets to install because the notification screen could easily become to large with data to be useful.