TV OS

Let’s start with TV OS a much-neglected technology by Apple but used by quite a number of people I know due to its ease of use and how much better it is than a cable box. Yes I know people me being one of them who liked using apple TV’s instead of the cable boxes cause of how much faster and quicker I could get to my content. There are quite a number of additions Apple could make with this.

Stand By Widgets

Amazon and google have introduced new screens to their home technologies, in the form of an echo show that doubles as a family hub, while google has shown off their new nest hub. Currently Apple doesn’t have that, but having an Apple TV go into “stand by” and showing instead widgets with a shared calendar of upcoming family events via a calendar or to do list for today would be very helpful if we could have upcoming information that is shared between the whole family within a television or even set to be stand by on an iPad while it’s in standby mode.

Multiple users on a workout

Ok so you can share workouts with SharePlay, but you can’t have multiple watches connected to the same Apple TV to share in the workouts you do at home, I always found it weird how on apple workouts there are 3 people working out but you can’t have 3 people working out together at home. This is something my wife and I couldn’t figure out during our covid work outs, and it still persists to this day.

Having a “group” workout with multiple rings and updates going could really gamify the workout that would push people to do more workout groups together like with how some gyms are becoming.

Family Sharing Notifications

I think one of the features that has me like “why haven’t they done this yet” is shared notifications through the family. Like if you’re a parent on the way home from the grocery store, maybe the kid is watching the TV and then the ETA kicks in and says how long before said parent is home? We already get notifications of when someone trips a camera on the Apple TV but why not ETA updates and mini maps or even weather updates pop up.

iOS Updates

Multi-Function Action Button

I know the action button is a new thing, I just wish apple brought more usability to it with multi uses besides setting one action to it. What if you could single press to do one thing and a double press to do another or even single long press? Give me different actions.

Apple Wallet Receipts

This is one thing I am surprised that isn’t supported yet within Apple Wallet and Apple Pay and Pay Later. There needs to be a bigger emphasis on tracking with receipts and what is being purchased and if there was some way to export the information. I find that Apple Wallet is still in a very limited state currently and could be expanded on.

Giving the ability for users to save and export receipts will help cut back on trees, also with how Apple Pay is used why isn’t there more information about the shop on the pay information or even how many points you got when you purchased whatever.

Multi Pen Support

Something that kind of leaves me shocked is why we can’t use our iPad pencil with iphones or switching vice versa? Why can’t we switch like our airpods do with the smart switching with the audio but for the pens.

MacOS Updates

Standby Mode

As with Apple TV, why isn’t there the ability to have the family calendar up on the screen. I really don’t get why we can’t have apps that show certain things on a screensaver such as weather forecasts or upcoming events like the standby mode on iPad and iOS currently do.

Another tool that would be good to have for stand by with the Mac is a “Home” widget for turning on and messing wit your smart home. Maybe we don’t need to log into our accounts constantly but having preset information and home automations ready could make the Mac be more passive and not needing to be actively getting into it.

Parental Controls

I think MacOS should have bigger parenting controls, more real time updates into what someone is trying to get into. More customizations cause there really is a problem when TV is G, PG, NC 17. Include more items like filters for content like maybe you don’t want your kid watching something containing certain things or blocking tv under certain categories, maybe documentaries are good but reality tv is not.

Maybe even having location updates ready when you have a kid that decides to take a trip somewhere they aren’t supposed to be. Such as if a kid goes with friends to the movies and then they up outside the city there should be a notification for safe zones within your place of living.

And finally, one of the biggest complaints I have seen with parental controls is that parents need to be able to control more of the phone with focus modes. Having “downtime” or “app limits” isn’t enough. There needs to be an off time for night, a mode for during school, and a mode for after school. The focus modes should be more customizable for parents to limit apps during certain times and others during other times.

In Closing

With the advent of the next update, I feel there are quite a few features that can be used for the future. After much debate and thought, the next update needs to focus more on the interconnectivity with our other devices and quick information instead of being dependent on needing to open our device and log in. The addition of these features focus less on the niche of the products such as a “thumbs up” or a “avatar” look and more on how can we make some features better for the most users possible and not just the select few with very niche use cases.