My WWDC Wishlist

As we all know, there’s not a technology bandwagon I’m afraid to jump on, and the upcoming WWDC announcements from Apple are no different.

Tomorrow evening (London time) I’ll be tuning in to see what Tim Cook and friends announce and, inevitably, experience a mixture of excitement and disappointment associated with Apple announcements.

I don’t have a great track record when it comes to predicting Apple’s software upgrades, but for what it’s worth, here’s my very personal wish list:

Choose my own default apps

I’d love to be able to nominate Spotify as my default music app and ToDoist as my default task and reminders app. This is something Android users have been able to do since Burger King was a Prince, but Apple is very controlling when it comes to setting defaults. I wouldn’t mind, but I really dislike the Apple Music app and the reminders app just doesn’t have the functionality I need to keep on top of so many work and personal projects. So please, Apple, let me choose my own apps?

Organise the home screen more flexibly

Another one for the ‘Apple knows best pile’, but there’s no earthly reason why I shouldn’t able able to arrange my iOS home screen in a way that suits me. The fixed grid of app icons is stale and I’d like to see some on-screen widgets. I’ve read so many rumours about this, so I hope there’s some movement in this space.

A thorough polish for the Notes app

Although I primarily use Notion for my notes, it’s still handy to use the built-in Notes app for things like shopping lists and quick notes jotted with the Apple Pencil. For an app that’s seemingly so popular, why does it have to be som ugly and limited? I’d love to see the back of the paper texture (or at least a choice in the settings) and to be able to take notes and insert them in other apps like Mail.

An upgrade for Siri

I love Siri and use it now more than ever before. With the arrival of our Homepods (yes, we now have three of them at home and I’d never go back to Amazon Echo) we interact with Siri to control our lights, TV, music and timers. That said, she regularly activates randomly and frequently answers a completely different question to the one asked. Some additional smarts for Siri would be very welcome.

You see? I’m not asking for much. I’m sure there’ll be a ton of small changes to iOS and watchOS and iPadOS that I’ve never imagined. But taking care of the above would make me a very, very happy little nerd indeed.

(Photo by Nicolas Lafargue on Unsplash)