Siri gets smarter in Apple’s WatchOS 2

This past spring, Apple entered a product category where very few companies have had success; the smartwatch. With unique designs and a heavy focus on fitness the watch quickly developed a following. Sure it had its critics, but the watch proved to be a success. Now Apple plans on building on that success by releasing the first major software update for Apple Watch.

WatchOS 2 is a blend of fashion and functionality, allowing for more customization and greater productivity. If you were at all disappointed in the initial limitations of your Apple Watch, then this is the update you’ve been waiting for.

New Faces

There’s no denying some of the watch faces available on Apple Watch are beautiful. The time-lapse flowers which open before your eyes and the elegant jellyfish are still among my favourites. Apple has included a new mesmerizing addition; time-lapse.

These new faces show 24-hour time-lapse videos of locations around the globe, including Paris, Shanghai, New York and my favourite Mack Lake in California. When you move your watch to glance at the face, the time-lapse comes alive, as clouds move across the sky and day turns to night.

An interesting feature of time-lapse is the video will start with the sun at the same point in the sky as the user’s current location. If it’s nighttime where you are, the time-lapse reflects that.

If the six new time-lapse watch faces don’t satisfy Apple has given you another option, one that users have been asking for since launch. For the first time, you can now create your own custom watch face by accessing pictures on your iPhone.

For those who get bored easily, the new Photo Album option selects a new photo from your pictures every time you raise your wrist. Endless options.

While I love the fact you can now choose your own images, I was disappointed to notice you can’t change the style of clock or add complications to the watch face. Many different background images, but all with the same style of clock.

Complications

Those little nuggets of information such as date, temperature or weather are known as complications. In the previous version of WatchOS, Apple only offered a limited rage of complications. It has now opened the flood gate.

Third party app developers can now give the option to add complications to your watch face. For example of you have a flight booked with WestJet, the airline can give you the option of adding your flight time to your watch face so you get to the airport on time. The same can be done for sports scores and other information tied in with your favourite apps. Just how beneficial these are really will be up to the app developers.

More effective communication

Apple Watch focuses heavily on communications. All incoming text messages, email, phone calls and tweets are displayed on your watch. However responding to those messages has been hit and miss. While you can use Siri and voice dictation to respond to a text, you couldn’t do much with email, other than read them. That changes in WatchOS 2.

Now at the bottom of each email, you will be given the option to reply or reply all. You have a couple of different options for your response.

Apple watch Mike Yawney/CityNews

The first option is a pre-programmed response which you can customize within the Watch app on your iPhone. These can range from simple responses such as “yes” to Let me get back to you.” If you require a more complex response, you can use the voice dictation feature which works surprisingly well. The final option is to use emojis. Word of warning…if you choose to use an emoji, be prepared to scroll through a lengthy list. Since the small watch face can only show up to 12 emojis at a time, it will take you quite a while before you find the emoji you are looking for.

Not being able to respond to an email was one of my frustrations using Apple Watch. This is a welcome feature and one that allows me to be so much more productive, even when my iPhone isn’t by my side.

Digital Touch goes multi-colour
One of the most quirky features on Apple Watch was the ability to not only share your heart beat with other Watch wearers, but to send them doodles. This feature known as Digital Touch set the Apple Watch apart form the competition. However the feature was limited.

While you could draw whatever you wanted, you had to stick with one of 7 basic colour. Be prepared to go crazy! Apple has now introduced multi-colour Digital Touch. Now you can draw pictures using multiple colours.

After drawing with your first initial colour, you have the ability to select another colour and continue the drawing before sending the image. It makes a fun feature…even more fun.

Apple watch Mike Yawney/CityNews

More Friends
Instead of simply putting a contacts option on your Apple Watch, Apple created something called Friends. This is a shortcut to the people you communicate with the most. The only problem is, you could only have 12 friends.

WatchOS 2 allows you to add more friends. You can now create separate pages of friends, even categorize them into groups such as co-workers or school friends.

Other than being able to have more friends, Apple has now made it easier to add them to your Watch. Previously you had to add friends through the Watch app on your iPhone. The process is much more streamlined now, allowing you to do this directly on your watch.

Get more out of your apps
It’s hard to believe that a few months after launch there are already 10 thousand apps available for Apple Watch. The only issue is apps have never been able to make use of all the hardware available in the Apple Watch.

WatchOS 2.0 finally allows developers to tap into all the key hardware inside Apple Watch including the Taptic engine, accelerometer, heart rate monitor, speaker and microphone.

This is a welcome addition. How frustrating is it that third party fitness apps never had access to your heart rate data, or apps such as Shazam couldn’t use the watch’s built-in mic, rather it relied on the iPhone’s microphone.

Since apps can now built to run directly on Apple Watch, and not in a tethered mode, many apps run quicker and more efficiently.

On top of all this, you will be able to do more with your watch, even if you leave your iPhone at home. Apple Watch can connect to known WiFi networks (networks your iPhone has connected to in the past) to bring in data and allow for FaceTime audio calls and WiFi calling! Keep in mind, your carrier will have to support WiFi calling. Rogers in Canada is rumoured to allow Wifi calling this fall but as of this time it is not yet available.

Smarter Siri
Just as we saw in like in iOS 9, Siri gains more power with this latest software update.

Now users can ask Siri to do specific tasks. At the gym I was able to tell her to start an elliptical workout instead of going through the menus and manually starting it with the built-in fitness app. I will admit however it’s awkward talking to Siri at the gym…

Apple watch Mike Yawney/CityNews

This also works for replying to email or initiating FaceTime calls.

My favourite new command to Siri is launching Apple Music. I can tell Siri to play specific songs or launch “Beats 1” and within seconds the live-streaming radio station begins to play on my iPhone. Unfortunately Siri doesn’t recognize other radio station within Apple Music. If you want to change to another station you’ll have to manually do that on your iPhone.

Fitness Boost
Apple Watch is known for monitoring your movements throughout the day to help you achieve your fitness goals. You set your calorie goal and your watch tells you how close you are to hitting that goal. The only problem was, if you didn’t use the built0in fitness app, the calories you burned during that spin class or that 10k run didn’t count.

Apple has lifted the restrictions on third party exercise apps. Now all data collected join these apps go towards your fitness goals.

While the built-in fitness app was pretty good, it didn’t have all themeless and whistles of other exercise apps like Strava and Nike +. NO one likes to be forced into using a certain app, especially when they already have a favourite.

Time Travel

This feature gives you a sneak peek at what your day will bring without opening up individual apps on your Apple Watch.

While turning the digital crown, complications on your watch face change to reflect upcoming events in your day or even temperature changes outside. This feature only works on certain watch faces and is fairly limited in use as of launch.

Apple watch Mike Yawney/CityNews

Nightstand mode

Connecting your Apple Watch to the charger typically puts your watch to sleep, only giving you a glimpse of the time before asking for your unlock code when you move the watch. The latest operating system update makes your watch useful, even while charging.

Once your watch is connected to the charger and placed on its side, it automatically goes into nightstand mode. If you press the digital crown sort side button the watch face will illuminate showing you the time, date and time the alarm is set to go off. When the alarm goes off you can press the digital crown to snooze or press the side button to shut it off.

I happen to sleep with my iPhone next to my bed as I use it as my alarm clock. I am accustomed to grabbing my phone to turn off my alarm, so I didn’t make much use of this feature. When I did try it out, I found the digital crown and side buttons were so close together (not to mention I was half asleep) that I didn’t always push the button in intended on pushing. While it’s a neat feature, it isn’t one I used regularly.

Increased Security

A big concern with Apple Watch owners was thew risk of theft or loss. Other than a PIN number to keep people out, there wasn’t much security built-in to deter people from swiping your watch.

Apple has now introduced an activation lock in WatchOS 2. Once enabled a user will have to enter the correct Apple ID and password in order to pair it with a second iPhone. This at least gives you peace of mind, knowing it’s not much use out of your hands.

The Bottom Line

While I have enjoyed wearing an Apple Watch right from the start, it was hard not to question why Apple didn’t add certain features. The more I used it, the more things I realized I couldn’t do with it. WatchOS 2 fixes many of those problems.

Users can now customize their watch faces, Siri becomes more useful and apps can finally access watch hardware such as the accelerometer and heart rate monitor. Not only does the user experience improve, so will the apps once developers fine tune their software to make use of this update.

WatchOS 2 is exactly what Apple Watch needed. Sure it doesn’t address everything owners have been asking for, but it fills in a number of gaps, making it even more useful and perform even better. This is without the update Apple Watch owners have been waiting for.

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