Siri on iPad: The first step to true mobile multitasking
If you ask any one of my fellow editors who also follow any of my social media accounts, you’d learn that I have been spewing out a number of anti-Apple statuses and tweets over the past few weeks. The iPhone 5 is, in my opinion, a flop, and iOS 6 is essentially the same iOS that was released more than five years ago.
However, there is one addition to the iPad’s version iOS 6 that I think is a very revolutionary move – even if it doesn’t seem like it at first. That addition is Siri.
Historically, Siri has taken over the entire screen of the device using it, meaning that you couldn’t continue doing whatever it was that you were doing with your iDevice before Siri took over. That’s not the case on the iPad’s version of Siri. In fact, you can do most of what you were already doing while simultaneously using Siri – in other words, true multitasking.
I have never thought that any mobile operating system’s multitasking was real multitasking. I could switch from app to app, of course, but I couldn’t view two apps at the same time, which meant that looking something up from a magazine from iBooks would force me to close that app, open up Safari, search what I was looking for, and finally get back to reading.
Siri, to be frank, doesn’t truly help iOS’ lackluster multitasking. You still can’t scroll through the app you’re using when she comes up, but you can view it – which is why I think it’s so revolutionary.
Because now, you can look stuff up while you read about it, you can set alarms and other things while reading about them, too – you can do so much more now that Siri is just a popup versus a completely separate app. For instance, in the picture above, I didn’t feel like searching Pride of Detroit for the Lions v. Titans score, so I just asked Siri while I read a headline about Stafford’s millionth injury. After she told me the disappointing score, I simply tapped on the article and went into reading about his injured hamstring.
Compared to how iOS 5 utilized Siri, this is truly revolutionary. Granted, it may not match the level of multitasking we’re used to on traditional desktop operating systems – and Siri is still far away from being a search engine and hand replacement – but in my opinion, this is the first step towards that for mobile systems.
If you’ve used Siri on your iPad, what are your thoughts on it?
