“Apple’s introduction of a dedicated ‘tvOS’ platform for the fourth generation of its Apple TV has led to an explosion in the number of apps being developed for the set-top box smart device,” John Archer writes for Forbes. “There’s no doubt that it presents Apple TV users with significant challenges when it comes to browsing all the Apple TV apps out there. So it’s good to discover that Apple has started to roll out a new feature that should make it much easier to sort the wheat from the chaff in the Apple TV app world.”
“That new feature is web previews,” Archer writes.
“Admittedly it doesn’t sound very exciting when you just state it like that,” Archer writes, “but what it means is that people in the market for a new Apple TV app or two can now explore Apple TV’s app world via iTunes on their laptop or desktop computers rather than having to go through the rigmarole of firing up their Apple TV box, switching on their televisions, and trying to wrestle with an Apple TV interface that’s far less useful for app browsing than a computer screen.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Now, just let us get/buy Apple TV apps via our iPhones, iPads, Macs, and iPod touches that are simply there on our Apple TV(s) the next time we use them. Oh, and give us the ability organize our Apple TV apps via our our iPhones, iPads, Macs, and iPod touches, the same way we organize our Apple Watch apps.
I’d like the iOS remote app to mirror the tvOS interface.
On a separate note it would also be cool to be able to run carplay actually on your iOS device so that if you don’t have a compatible car (and don’t feel the need to buy a new car), you can just mount your phone and use that. It would surely be far safer.
The CarPlay thing just makes sense. I mount my phone in the car, and a simplified CarPlay interface would be nice!
I love my Apple TV and its interface and simplicity. Folders are the key to less scrolling. My only movement is my thumb on the remote…eats the lunch of a Dish or Direct TV remote.
I do sometimes in the dark get the remote upside down and accidentally hit the siri button, but it is effortless. I think Jobs said once that people watch TV to relax turn their brain off, not on. The NBA app is extremely useful, to see standings and highlights.
The coolest thing about AppleTV is iCloud photos. My wife and I share on iCloud and at the end of the day we can see our latest pics and videos from our phones…so very much better on a TV screen…navigation is fairly intuitive…movies take a second to start playing, though. Even live photos work, but it looks more like an old animated gif.
Got to say MDN’s take gets to the heart of the matter. Each device needs to interact that much better with the others and preferably seamlessly. Its not a single OS thats important its far more about how they interact and that doesn’t have to be one and the same thing.
I like to play my music via my AppleTV but am finding this not as easy to navigate with my AppleTV 4. Scrolling through lists when browsing my music no longer accelerates by holding the button so it takes forever to navigate thousands of songs. Am I missing something? Siri helps when I know what I want but browsing is snail like.