watchOS 10.1 Brings Double Tap to the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2

watchOS 10.1 Brings Double Tap to the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2

Apple recently released watchOS 10.1, with support for the much-ballyhooed double-tap gesture that selects the primary action in many apps without requiring that you touch the screen! It’s available only on the new Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2, where you activate it by raising your wrist and tapping your thumb and index finger together twice. On the main Apple Watch screen, a double tap opens the Smart Stack of widgets you would otherwise get by turning the Digital Crown, and subsequent double taps advance through the widgets. A double tap also activates the primary action in many apps, such as answering and ending phone calls, playing and pausing media, viewing and scrolling through messages, ending timers, stopping and resuming the stopwatch, snoozing an alarm, responding to reminders from the Workout app, and performing the primary action from notifications. Whenever you double tap, you’ll see this icon  at the top of the screen. If you have a supported Apple Watch model, give it a try!

(Featured image by Adam Engst, article image by Apple)

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Social Media: Apple’s promised double-tap gesture is now available in watchOS 10.1 for those with an Apple Watch Series 9 or Apple Watch Ultra 2. Give it a try to perform the primary action in a watchOS app without touching the screen.

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The “Hey” Part of “Hey Siri” Is Now Optional

The “Hey” Part of “Hey Siri” Is Now Optional

If you use Siri, particularly on a HomePod, you’re probably accustomed to saying “Hey Siri” as the trigger phrase before your requests. In Apple’s new operating systems for 2023, you can now choose to invoke Siri using the traditional “Hey Siri” or just “Siri” (at least in Australia, Canada, the UK, and the US). You might appreciate being able to stop saying “Hey” every time, or you might find that using just “Siri” generates incorrect activations. (And if someone in your family’s name sounds like Siri, you may want to turn the feature off entirely!) There are four places to look:

●     iOS 17 and iPadOS 17: Settings > Siri & Search > Listen For

●     macOS 14 Sonoma: System Settings > Siri & Spotlight > Listen For

●     watchOS 10: Watch app > My Watch > Siri > Listen For

●     HomePod Software 17: Home app > long-press HomePod > Accessory Settings > Listen For “Siri” or “Hey Siri”

(Featured image based on an original by Apple)

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Social Media: In Apple’s new operating systems for 2023, you can choose to invoke Siri with just “Siri” or the old “Hey Siri”—or turn the feature off entirely. We explain where to find the feature for each of your Apple devices.

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In Your Face App Guarantees That You Notice Appointment Alerts

In Your Face App Guarantees That You Notice Appointment Alerts

It’s easy to get caught up in what you’re doing and miss an alert for a Zoom meeting or a reminder to leave for an appointment. The Mac app In Your Face ensures that will never happen again by taking over the entire screen for notifications and requiring that you click a button to dismiss or snooze it. It can also play sounds repeatedly, lets you pick which calendars and reminder lists to use, gives you single-click access to videoconference links in events, and shows ongoing and upcoming events in the menu bar. In Your Face costs $1.99 per month or $19.99 per year, or it’s available in the $9.99 per month Setapp bundle of over 230 Mac apps.

(Featured image by Blue Banana Software)

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Social Media: Are you often late to online meetings or in-person appointments because you were too focused on your work to notice the time? The In Your Face app ensures you’ll never miss an important meeting again.

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