Device evolution (part 2) – Apple impressions

Part 1 left off with a promise; impressions of the iPhone 6s as a first time Apple consumer (who is more or less dependent on dictation and bilingual).

What I will call "Apple dictation" is a pleasure to use! It's use can extend to almost every aspect of "writing life". If you have access to another keyboard, switching over to that language will give you access to dictate in that language. My Danish pronunciation is by no means at a native level. Yet, when I've switched over to the Danish keyboard and turned on dictation, the system has very little trouble understanding me. I've dictated emails and text messages in both languages. The discovery of the bilingual capability happened quite by accident, but it was worth the money spent to discover this little gem. The dictation is also very directional. This means that when my darling Meyers Parrot decides to be boisterous, it doesn't interfere with the dictation near as much as it tends to when I'm using Dragon NaturallySpeaking with a headset.

Exception: When you train Siri for a language (Hey Siri), she has a one track mind.

That is the other feature that I am very much enjoying. Hey Siri is listening in the background all the time.

For the most part, Apple's interface is intuitive, though it did take some getting used to. I like the wheel/click effect for setting dates and times. However, I had to get used to the fact that when the phone is hung up the screen is white; when the line is open the screen is black with more choices. To me the colors for those two actions should be reversed. This momentary confusion led to some unintentional calls.

You can print Pages documents using a PC. Log in to iCloud. The document will be converted to a PDF before printing. However, you cannot use Dragon while logged into the web-based (iCloud) version of Pages on a PC.

I also "inherited" an iPad Mini 2, which is great if I find myself needing the screen real estate. However, my small hands gravitate toward the iPhone 6s more often than not.