Learn iOS 8 essentials quickly and get more out of your iPad or iPhone!

iOS 8: A Take Control Crash Course

Josh Centers

Quickly learn the aspects of iOS 8 that are most important to you—whether you want to start enjoying iOS 8’s new features, master changes in key Apple apps, or get a refresher in core iOS topics like managing notifications, choosing useful apps, and controlling your privacy.

This product has been discontinued.

Read on the Web: Because it’s part of our Crash Course series, you can read this book on the Web for free, though buying a copy provides a better reading experience and supports our authors. Thanks for being a mensch!

In this iOS 8 Crash Course, you’ll quickly master new (and old) features in iOS. Guided by TidBITS Managing Editor Josh Centers, you’ll get an overview of iOS 8’s new capabilities along with directions for putting them to use right away. In addition to explaining system features like Siri, Spotlight, and Notification Center, Josh helps you explore the new Health app, plus discover what’s different in iOS 8’s most-changed apps: Camera, Phone, Photos, Mail, Messages, and Safari.

Additional special topics cover accessibility, privacy, important apps to try, managing data usage, and improving battery life.

Inter-title Continuity! This book skims over the Continuity features that tie Macs and iOS devices together. For deeper Continuity directions, read Joe Kissell’s Digital Sharing for Apple Users: A Take Control Crash Course (notice the bundle deals at left).

You’ll find answers to questions like these:

  • How do I install a third-party keyboard, like Smile’s TextExpander?
  • How do I use iCloud Photo Sharing in Share sheets?
  • What do I tap to send a voice message in Messages?
  • Should I turn on iCloud Photo Library?
  • What do I ask Siri in order to identify currently playing music?
  • If I share my location in a group chat, is it shared with the chat or the people?
  • How does the 2-minute delete feature work for media in Messages?
  • How do I get quick access to Evernote and other apps in Notification Center?
  • Where did the search field and toolbar go in Safari?
  • How do I connect 1Password and Instapaper with Safari?
  • Which feature should I turn on to make buttons easier to see?
  • How do I hook apps into Apple’s new Health app?
  • Which apps are hogging my battery?
  • How do I tell Siri who my mother is so I can call her by saying “Call Mom”?
  • In Family Sharing, what should I expect from the Ask to Buy feature?
  • How do I find those cool Flyover tours in Maps?
  • How do I tell my iPhone to stop tracking my location?
  • How can I enable/disable the Zoom screen magnifier quickly?
  • How do I minimize an email message that I’m writing so I can check something else in Mail and then come back to it easily?

Crash course? As part of our new Crash Course series, this book splits the first-rate content you expect from us into short chunks so you can dip in and read quickly. Because so many Take Control readers provide tech support to others, each concise chapter has sharing buttons and practical tweet-tips, making it easy to freely share a few pages with Facebook friends, Twitter followers, and others who really need the information. Take Control Crash Courses have a modern, magazine-like layout in PDF while retaining a reflowable design in the EPUB and Mobipocket.

Josh Centers

About Josh Centers

Josh Centers is is a Business Journalist at TextExpander, editor-in-chief of Unprepared, and founder of Apple Buying Advice. He has been featured in USA Today, Macworld, Scientific American, the Washington Post, Boing Boing, the Wirecutter, and other publications, as well as on Comedy Central, HuffPost Live, and Voice of America. Josh lives in Tennessee with his wife and children.

What devices will iOS 8 run on?

The minimum hardware requirements for running iOS 8 are the iPad 2, iPhone 4S, and fifth-generation iPod touch.

  • Read Me First
  • Introduction
  • What’s New in iOS 8
  • What to Check after Installing iOS 8
  • Explore the Lock Screen
  • Take Control of the iOS 8 Control Center
  • Home Screen, Sweet iOS 8 Home Screen
  • Switching Apps in iOS 8
  • Spotlight on iOS 8 Spotlight
  • Pull Down the iOS 8 Notification Center
  • Speaking to Siri
  • Commanding Keyboards in iOS 8
  • All in the Family Sharing
  • An Introduction to iCloud
  • iOS 8: For Your Health
  • There’s an App (Store) for That
  • iOS 8 Camera Basics
  • Get to Know Photos in iOS 8
  • Setting up and Using Mail in iOS 8
  • What’s New in iOS 8 Mail?
  • Mapping in iOS 8
  • Sending a Message in iOS 8
  • Tips for Messages in iOS 8
  • Phoning It In
  • Going on Safari
  • Apps to Try in iOS
  • A Look at Apple’s Apps
  • Managing Share Sheets in iOS 8
  • Guarding Your Privacy in iOS 8
  • Accessibility in iOS 8
  • Managing Data Usage in iOS 8
  • Improving Battery Life iOS 8
  • iPhone 6 Quirks
  • About This Book
  • November 13, 2014 -- We put a lot of work into this title at the end of October, in order to release it as fully covering iOS 8.1 as we could — and to zap out typos. Thus, at the moment, we have no particular plans to update this ebook! We'll look again at the situation in early/mid 2015, just in case Apple has made changes that we want to include.

    You may also like…