Mature Adults Tech Training
Navigating the iPhone X
Welcome to your new iPhone: Navigating Apple’s iPhone X
I’d like to introduce you to the ‘touches’ necessary to
properly navigate the iPhone X.
Many of you are transitioning to Apple’s latest iPhone model and find accessing features such as the Control Center or Notification challenging.
Podcast Transcription Below
Let’s get started…Follow me as I hold my iPhone X in the “portrait” mode, meaning the phone is vertical as I hold it. Remember the HOME button – take a look and see that the Home button is no longer on the front of your iPhone X.
When your phone is dark (black), it is said to be asleep; to wake it up, simply tap the phone’s face.
Our first motion wakes up the iPhone, taking you to the Lock screen where you may … or may not have a picture (we’ll talk more about enjoying personal photos on your iPhone Start and Home screens in another episode).
Here we go – holding your phone either with one or 2 hands, notice the bright white line at the bottom of the awake start screen…appears to be an inch-plus in length.
I. Swipe up with a single finger; you may see the instructions “Swipe up to Open?”
II. If you are holding the iPhone X approximate to your face, your phone will unlock; if the phone is not where it can recognize your face for the facial recognition feature, you will be prompted to enter your Personal Identification Number or PIN. This second motion: the swipe up, provides you access to your start screen or the login feature.
III. As you have done with previous models of the Apple iPhone, the third navigational motion is to swipe your finger from right to left advancing the HOME screen (where all the icons are found). As you add apps to your iPhone, more home screens will appear; the more apps you download from the App Store, the greater number of screens are on the device. Notice the little, tiny white dots above the dock at the bottom of the home screen of your iPhone…those dots indicate the number or presence of multiple pages or screens.
IV. After advancing the start screen away from its beginning position, swipe up just like you did to “log in” to the device. This fourth motion returns you to the first icon-filled screen. In previous iPhone models this was accomplished by tapping the Home button on the bottom-front of iPhones 3-8.
Now We Have Covered Four Motions
At this point, we have 4 motions:
1) tap to wake;
2) swipe up for facial recognition or to login using your PIN number;
3) swipe right to left to advance screens;
4) swipe up to return to the first or primary, icon-filled home screen.
Similar to previous models of the Apple iPhone, there is a Search screen or Recent screen when you swipe from left to right when situated at the first Home screen.
On the Apple X, like previous models, swiping from left to right provides you access to useful information such as the battery life percentage and graphic. If you are using an Apple Watch, the battery life (also percentage and graphic) will also display.
Additionally, found on this “very first” of the home screens, you’ll find something new in the last 2 years or so…”widgets”.
Which are iPhone app-summaries providing you quick access to News, Weather, Calendar, Reminders, and other valuable iPhone tools (We’ll devote an entire episode to the Home Screen Widgets and configuring them).
While the battery information and the data provided by the widgets are useful and often reviewed, the greatest feature of this very first screen is the Search bar at the top of the very first of home screens which is accessed by tapping in the Search bar, found at the top of the very first screen as well as the cache of recently used apps.
Eight of your most recently accessed apps will be shown under the search bar.
V. Search your iPhone for Contacts, Websites, Reminders, Music, Notes, Mail, Messages…and even more quickly using this Search feature found, again, on the “very first” of home screens, found to the left of the primary or 1st position start screen. This marks our 5th motion or navigation of the device.
Let’s keep going!
VI. From an unlocked home screen, swipe downward from the top of the iPhone…this will provide you access to app notifications received. Find app notifications such as email, weather, Facebook, home-automation tools, and many more.
This stroke marks the 6th iPhone X navigation to master: easy-peazy!
Accessing the Control Center
Another swipe stroke on the Apple iPhone X requires that you swipe from the upper-right corner of the iPhone in a left-downward or diagonal motion. Let me repeat that…from the upper-right corner of the iPhone, swipe in left-downward motion—left diagonal.
Voila! The Control Center – complete with your Flashlight, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity controls, Camera, Calculator and more.
Do not discount the importance and the value of the Control Center – it is more valuable today than ever before… as you can customize the settings giving you quick access to tools you will use almost every day, tools including the Flashlight, the Calculator, the Camera, Airplane Mode, Display Brightness, Voice Recorder and more.
The Control Center is available on older models of the Apple iPhone, just accessed from the bottom of the phone, beginning atop the Home Button and a swipe up. You can access the Control Center both from a locked and unlocked iPhone. I have just shown you how to access the Control Center from an unlocked screen…to access the Control Center from a locked iPhone, tap the iPhone to wake it up…the same tap we did in the very first stroke.
Follow me and let’s see what else we can do from a locked phone!
Lock your iPhone 9if it is unlocked or you see icons.) Let the iPhone go dark, which simply means the device is asleep.
Tap anywhere on the iPhone X screen, which wakes it up…and where you see either an Apple-supplied image or a digital picture you have selected.
Look in the lower-left corner – you will see the Flashlight.
Press the Flashlight icon just a little more than a tap…and you should feel a slight vibration, called haptics or touch. Realize the flashlight is on! Be careful not to let it shine in anyone’s eyes. Turn off the flashlight using the same motion…press the Flashlight logo long enough to feel the slight vibration. You will find the Flashlight very useful – but be very sensitive to those around you, especially in dark places like restaurants.
From the very same position (a locked phone), let’s access our Camera with 2 easy touches!
Accessing the Camera
Tap the phone to wake it up…look in the lower right corner (of the locked, but awake phone) and see the Camera icon. Just like the flashlight in our previous example, press the Camera icon long enough to get a slight vibration; longer than a tap! Now you have access to a ready-to-shoot live camera, useful for a quick pic like a pet or event. Press the camera shutter to take the photograph. Swipe up to login to your iPhone or tap the lock button (upper-right outside below the right corner of the outside of the phone). Now you can access the digital picture in the Photos App or you can access any of the apps on the device.
Power Button
Beyond the swipes and taps, the iPhone X hardware is identical to iPhone models 6, 7, and 8. The power button is on the right side of the iPhone, just below the corner. Press the power button to lock your iPhone. Press and hold the power button to access Siri, Apple’s voice assistant (more about Siri in future Episodes of Mature Adults Tech Training Podcast).
Volume and Mute Buttons
On the left side of the iPhone, opposite the Lock Button, are the Volume Up/Down buttons AND the Mute Button. Manage iPhone sound volume using the appropriate Volume Up and Volume Down button. Also, to turn the iPhone X OFF, press and hold both the Volume Up (or Volume Down) AND the Lock Buttons at the same time.
Don’t forget the Mute Button, just above the Volume Up/Down buttons on the left-side of the iPhone X. Slide the Mute Button so that you see a red line indicating the device has been muted. At the appropriate time, unmute the device by sliding the Mute Button, hiding the red line, indicating the phone’s sound-related features will be audible.
Please hear me when I say…you must touch these devices to learn how to use them!
The more often you access the home screen from the lock screen, the swipe-up motion will become more natural and less intentional. The more often you access the Search screen (the very-first screen) and the widgets (using the left to right swipe) and the information found on those containers of information, the easier it will become to access these iPhone features.
Many of these navigational strokes are hold-overs from previous iPhone models. You will, I promise, get used to accessing the iPhone features and the swipes necessary to get you to very useful Apple features.
Join us at Mature Adults Tech Training in one of our many mobile device skills classes!
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