3d touch

Feature Request is a new regular 9to5Google series where authors offer their opinion on how to improve popular hardware or software products.

I think most of us who have used it are aware that Android Wear isn’t exactly a complete platform yet. It feels a little beta-ish. And that’s okay for now. One of the best things about Google’s software efforts is that we get to go along for the ride as it publicly experiments and launches new features. It’s not a case of waiting for months, or years, for it to secretly ‘perfect’ its product before telling us we’re ready for it.

Android Wear is still young enough that there’s plenty Google could change without upsetting the apple cart too much. One feature I think should be implemented soon (this year if possible) is a Force Touch-like technology. In other words: Android Wear should have a deeply engrained system to take advantage of pressure-sensitive touchscreen displays…

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Update: Just like the multiple account support that disappeared mere hours after it appeared, this awesome 3D Touch feature is now gone.

Instagram for iOS has had 3D Touch features for quite a while, but it looks like the Instagram team wanted to experiment with bringing some of these to Android as well. While the latest version for Android obviously doesn’t take advantage of force sensitive hardware (which doesn’t really exist of this side of the mobile space anyway), it does add a nifty new pop up for quickly liking, commenting, and sharing posts…

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A few weeks ago we noticed that Google has started testing pre-release versions of Chrome through Apple’s TestFlight beta distribution service, and today the version in testing then has been released to everyone through the App Store. The latest version of Chrome for iOS takes advantage of Apple’s new pressure sensitive iPhone 6s displays and offers even more hardware keyboard shortcuts that will benefit iPad users.
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Google has quietly launched a Chrome beta for iOS through TestFlight, the beta distribution service Apple acquired last year and integrated into its own developer services. Google has yet to make an official announcement for the beta release, but users can already sign-up and download the beta when visiting Google’s Chrome beta download page on iOS.
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Synaptics has today announced the ClearPad 3700 force-sensing touchscreen controller, which the company hopes will be packed inside many a 2016 flagship Android smartphone. This comes just about a month after Apple’s September 9th event, at which the Cupertino company announced the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, both packing “3D Touch” as a headline feature…
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Apple is very rarely the first to introduce new features for features’ sake. The Apple Watch launched an entire year after the first Android Wear devices were unveiled. Touch ID came to the iPhone years after fingerprint sensors were seen on Android phones, and the company was one of the last smartphone manufacturers to offer a larger-screened phone with the release of the iPhone 6 Plus.  The examples of Apple being late to the game — although some would argue, the first to do things right — are endless. But this isn’t one of those cases. While Samsung dabbles with edged screens, Apple has today introduced what I think is a game-changing new experience for developers to play with. And play they will.

I’m not an Apple fanboy at all. In fact, I own one Apple smartphone — the iPhone 6 — at the moment, alongside five or six different Android phones. The Nexus 6 is usually my daily driver, and I (kind of, sort of) use Android Wear as my smartwatch OS of choice. I’ve never owned an Apple Watch nor an Apple TV, I didn’t even own an iPhone until the iPhone 5, and I have only been in possession of an iPad for maybe 6 months — the first generation iPad mini — before I found myself never using it at all and decided to sell it on eBay. All of this said, at least one of the improvements Apple brought to the iPhone line today has very much impressed me.

And not only do I think it’s cool, but it sets the iPhone line apart from anything that Android makers offer in 2015…
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