AppleInsider Staff
Small changes and enhancements can be found in Apple's newly released second beta of iOS 8, including the addition of the QuickType keyboard for iPad, and a change that makes the Podcasts app a native app that cannot be uninstalled.
Upon installing iOS 8 beta 2, developers will discover that Apple's official Podcasts application is now built in to the operating system. Accordingly, it cannot be uninstalled.
Apple made this same change with the iBooks app in iOS 8 beta 1. Now, both applications — Â which were previously available as free downloads on the iOS App Store — will come as part of the default iOS experience.
The new beta also introduces Apple's new QuickType keyboard on iPad, after being available on iPhone in the first beta. QuickType presents three recommended words above the keyboard as a user types, and the system will intelligently learn a user's preferred words as they use iOS 8 over time.
In another welcome change, Apple has made the Safari browser block ads that automatically redirect users to the App Store without any interaction. For months now, some advertisers have taken advantage of this and immediately taken users from the browser to the App Store without any input.
In another change to Safari, users can quickly add a site to Shared Links, or save a bookmark by tapping and holding on the Bookmarks button in the browser.
And finally in a minor tweak, the camera and voice buttons in the iOS 8 Messages app have been changed from blue to gray.
iOS 8 beta 2 also comes with a number of bug fixes. For example, the new release ensures that the screen brightness slider in Settings now works, and also prevents crashes when adding a third-party keyboard.
Andrew Orr
Amber Neely
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
27 Comments
can't wait to see it when it is ready to, looking forward to IOS 8 and Yosemite
Great. More bloatware on my phone. I wish that Apple'd make apps like Podcasts, Newsstand, Game Center, Compass, Passbook, Notes & Reminder available as seperate apps in the App Store. As it stands now I have a seperate folder called "Useless Aps" where I put these because I rarely, if ever, use them.
Update from beta 1 to beta 2 not possible over the air on my 5s. :/
[quote name="Lord Amhran" url="/t/180754/ios-8-beta-2-comes-with-native-podcasts-app-brings-quicktype-keyboard-to-ipad-more#post_2551520"]Great. More bloatware on my phone. I wish that Apple'd make apps like Podcasts, Newsstand, Game Center, Compass, Passbook, Notes & Reminder available as seperate apps in the App Store. As it stands now I have a seperate folder called "Useless Aps" where I put these because I rarely, if ever, use them.[/quote]Everyone would prefer various apps on there device to be able to be removed, or at least a switch for icon off(like safari and App Store has). Simply like windows and Samsung they have apps that are useless but always there.
It wouldn't be too much of a problem if the Podcast app wasn't such an unmitigated pile of .... Podcasts worked just fine when they were integrated into the Music app, ever since then it's been atrocious. Now it's a native app, does this mean that when you press play after it's gone into sleep mode that it'll re-start the podcast where it left off or will it still randomly decide to occasionally play a random music track ?