Apple’s hidden flight tracker app(medium.com)
medium.com
Apple’s hidden flight tracker app
https://medium.com/macoclock/apples-hidden-flight-tracker-app-397982fcc0d
83 comments
Made me smile :D
The person who made this at Apple worked on this directly in front of me.
Thank you guys for keeping user delight at the forefront of everything. No one else does it like Apple.
Google has had this for maybe 10 years. Type a flight number in to google and get the exact same info.
I think the fact that this post was downvoted speaks a lot. Sorry bud. I, too, am a fan and believe that not many do it the way Apple does.
What is it saying, exactly? I'm listening but I don't hear anything.
We use this in our app, it's very US-heavy though I think. NSDataDetector can do a lot of cool stuff, very ugly API to use and is confusingly similar but not the same to what's available through dataDetectorTypes on a UITextView.
This appears to be the struct[0]
[0]: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uidatadetect...
[0]: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uidatadetect...
It’s actually a C enum.
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uidatadetect...
https://developer.apple.com/documentation/uikit/uidatadetect...
I feel like Apple has a hard time making all of the features of their products easily discoverable.
There is a cost to making features discoverable. The cost is visual complexity. Apple can present only one UI to every first time user. They need to make hard choices about what to keep and what to remove so that the most non-technical user does not feel overwhelmed. At the same time, they have to figure out subtle ways to gauge user intent and carefully make a feature discoverable such that only the user who might consider using it (a power user) discovers and acts on it, while not getting in the way of the average Joe. It’s more art than science and I watch this with fascination. Not many companies seem to have the attitude of being totally OK with hiding features that took time and money to make.
To me, it’s quite clear that Apple is OK with letting a hundred power users miss a hidden feature than having even one non-techie overwhelmed with choice anxiety (I am exaggerating the numbers surely).
To me, it’s quite clear that Apple is OK with letting a hundred power users miss a hidden feature than having even one non-techie overwhelmed with choice anxiety (I am exaggerating the numbers surely).
One thing that power users used to do, is explore the control panels and preferences for the system and the apps they use to see what features can be turned on.
One of the Youtubers, who had previously been a lifetime Windows user, complained that he loved using iMessage on his laptop, but it didn't receive his SMS messages like his phone does.
After getting a ton of comments suggesting that it was a feature you have to turn on in the preferences, his next video was him being amazed that the phone would not only forward him the SMS messages, but that the Mac would recognize SMS messages with two factor verification codes and offer to fill them into the proper place automatically.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8Xjz5v0jDw
One of the Youtubers, who had previously been a lifetime Windows user, complained that he loved using iMessage on his laptop, but it didn't receive his SMS messages like his phone does.
After getting a ton of comments suggesting that it was a feature you have to turn on in the preferences, his next video was him being amazed that the phone would not only forward him the SMS messages, but that the Mac would recognize SMS messages with two factor verification codes and offer to fill them into the proper place automatically.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8Xjz5v0jDw
It’s those little QoL upgrades which puts macOS/iOS etc. in a league of its own. The integration you get out of the box is what sells me on Apple stuff now. I think the average person doesn’t notice or care about these little things, and so windows does the job for them. I live in my computer though, so I notice everything.
Another thing is that those less prominently exposed features can be taken away from the few of their users without causing much uproar when they don’t catch on with a wider audience.
I’m sure it’s the exact opposite. Better to have hundreds if not thousands of non techies be comfortable than one power user have an extra feature.
I disagree, it was perfectly integrated into messages and spotlight. He discovered it as soon as it came up. The paradigm is "I have to have an app for that." Fwiw, for how poorly siri, spotlight, and shortcuts are utilized by end users Google has it even worse on Android.
I would go further and say discoverability seems to be a low or nonexistent priority industry-wide.
Just looking at iOS settings backs up this hypothesis.
This is a really cool feature, thanks for sharing! This also highlights the downside of iOS, so many features are hidden or hard to discover :(
I was shocked when I accidentally selected text out of an image. You’d think they’d make a bigger deal about cool changes
For that specific feature they did/do highlight it quite a bit:
- it was shown off at the keynote last year https://youtu.be/TfRMXk53wPY
- I believe the tips app will mention it to you
- they have support articles describing it https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT212630
- any text field you're in will let you scan text directly from the camera.
Granted, maybe they could go further to show people when they go into the photos app or something, but it's definitely a very highlighted feature relative to others.
- it was shown off at the keynote last year https://youtu.be/TfRMXk53wPY
- I believe the tips app will mention it to you
- they have support articles describing it https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT212630
- any text field you're in will let you scan text directly from the camera.
Granted, maybe they could go further to show people when they go into the photos app or something, but it's definitely a very highlighted feature relative to others.
It's pretty amazing how Apple does incredible stuff on the down-low, without lots of marketing.
Their Google-street-view-like feature is just an unobtrusive link that says "look around" or something like that in their maps app on the iphone. Never mind that this is a massive amount of work, and that they're in the process of mapping all of Europe, and I assume the US.
Their Google-street-view-like feature is just an unobtrusive link that says "look around" or something like that in their maps app on the iphone. Never mind that this is a massive amount of work, and that they're in the process of mapping all of Europe, and I assume the US.
Apple likes end users to discover stuff like that on their own. They hyped it up a ton at the WWDC keynote before it came out, but only a small % of mostly developers see that. Part of their philosophy is to delight users along the way and maybe finding things like that is delightsome?
They rarely throw "check out the new features!" dialogs on upgrades. (Sometimes they do, but it's rare relative to the # of new features.)
They rarely throw "check out the new features!" dialogs on upgrades. (Sometimes they do, but it's rare relative to the # of new features.)
This is one of these things that has kept me an Apple user all these years. It's been a core part of their software philosophy for a very long time. One of the first of these moments was when on early Mac OS X versions where you could drag and drop almost anything into anything, and it would consume it in some way. For example, dropping an image into any text box would either render it as an embedded image, paste it as a hyperlink, or paste the filename, depending on the context. And these things applied to so many different metadata and media formats that everything just moves around easily. There's always been so many little great features that you just discover through the process of using the software.
They had it as a flagship feature one year, and I was notified in-app after upgrading.
It’s also in the Tips app, which is great to go through from time to time!
It’s also in the Tips app, which is great to go through from time to time!
Hilariously, bringing up search on iPadOS (tap on empty desktop space) shows Tips in its best-guesses, but typing “tips” into search hides it.
I hate that feature. It breaks double tap to zoom for me at the most frustrating times. I am yet to need to copy text from an image. Funnily enough I think this should be less discoverable.
I've actually found myself using this feature a lot, probably almost daily.
BTW, you can switch it off globally easily - it's in language/region settings on both iOS and Mac.
BTW, you can switch it off globally easily - it's in language/region settings on both iOS and Mac.
It was a pretty big part of the keynote where they announced it, I think it’s just that they don’t really do in-product promos for new features in iOS.
It is a big feature on macOS and I remember them announcing it. I use it sometimes, though I do wish it worked in Chromium-based browsers and supported Cyrillic alphabet.
Google Pixels show new features with each Android update. I think Apple should do something similar.
They generally do, via the Tips app. You may have uninstalled it.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/tips/id1069509450
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/tips/id1069509450
I’m in Europe, running iOS 15.4.1 and it does not work for me. Tried 5-6 flights to SFO, and none of them worked.
I am in US, running iOS 15.5 and I tried US flights as well as international flights but it still doesn’t work for me.. so not sure if there is some privacy setting blocking it or if some feature we need to enable.
Worked for me with KL flight numbers, but only a few and they were all enroute to or from the US at the time of searching. So that may have something to do with it?
Edit: KL605 to SFO worked while typing (it's in the air now), KL1125 to Copenhagen did not work while typing but did show up after pressing search (it's in the air now). Similar for KL713 to Paramaribo worked after pressing search, while it's still on the ground.
Edit: KL605 to SFO worked while typing (it's in the air now), KL1125 to Copenhagen did not work while typing but did show up after pressing search (it's in the air now). Similar for KL713 to Paramaribo worked after pressing search, while it's still on the ground.
I think it barely works outside of the US, but this is usual with most of the quick actions in Spotlight. Its kinda crazy all the extra options you get on Spotlight once you land in the USA.
Same in Brazil. Maybe it only works with flights in US.
It’s been reliably working for European flights for me for years. shrug
Does work for me for Turkish airline operators (I tried TK and PC)
I’ll probably never do it, so I’ll throw it out here as an idea:
A journey-constrained social network. E.g. if you frequently travel between New York and Paris, you’ll be allowed to join the JFK-CDG group, then you can talk about travel deals, where to go in each city (as you’re likely from there or going there, and it’s a fair exchange with the other groups), what’s cheaper or worth buying as a gift from one place back to the other, etc.
Doesn’t have to be flight specific as the journey method.
A journey-constrained social network. E.g. if you frequently travel between New York and Paris, you’ll be allowed to join the JFK-CDG group, then you can talk about travel deals, where to go in each city (as you’re likely from there or going there, and it’s a fair exchange with the other groups), what’s cheaper or worth buying as a gift from one place back to the other, etc.
Doesn’t have to be flight specific as the journey method.
Me and a partner actually have an MVP built out for this. Its kind of stagnate right now, but this specifically does this:
Define areas of interest. Create tour routes. Geo-specific content (You can post audio, links, etc, to a particular point of interest.
When you arrive within the designated (content poster defined) area, and are within a certain range of the POI - the content can be auto played, such as the audio description of a view point, landmark etc.
It will do way finding and pathing...
We have a working MVP on android, but like I said its currently dormant.
One feature that is useful to emergency responders is the ability to provide geo-cache locations, so when the scouts for firefighters are scoping a best route to address front-line wild fire, they can mark a point where they leave an equipment cache, take a photo of it and share the route with firefighters.
We have a digital LED wayfinding strip in the brim of a hat - so you have the way finding light compass to tell you the way.
We have a patent on the hat...
Define areas of interest. Create tour routes. Geo-specific content (You can post audio, links, etc, to a particular point of interest.
When you arrive within the designated (content poster defined) area, and are within a certain range of the POI - the content can be auto played, such as the audio description of a view point, landmark etc.
It will do way finding and pathing...
We have a working MVP on android, but like I said its currently dormant.
One feature that is useful to emergency responders is the ability to provide geo-cache locations, so when the scouts for firefighters are scoping a best route to address front-line wild fire, they can mark a point where they leave an equipment cache, take a photo of it and share the route with firefighters.
We have a digital LED wayfinding strip in the brim of a hat - so you have the way finding light compass to tell you the way.
We have a patent on the hat...
There's this Jetlovers thing that connects to Foursquare/Swarm and logs your flights, provided you check in at every airport. You can follow people to see their recent flights in your news feed. Your idea feels like it belongs there.
There used to be dopplr.com which went into this direction.
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/dopplr
https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/dopplr
Leaving aside other problems (are there really enough travelers for pairs other than the most traveled airports?), how could you ever verify this?
Are you in the middle of the ocean moving at 600mph towards <destination>?
A: Obviously spoofable
B: GP said the intent was for "frequent travelers", i.e. I'm assuming one-off travelers are intended not to be allowed. Having to verify multiple trips before you can get in sounds like a horrible user experience.
B: GP said the intent was for "frequent travelers", i.e. I'm assuming one-off travelers are intended not to be allowed. Having to verify multiple trips before you can get in sounds like a horrible user experience.
That determination would need to be done client side and is therefore vulnerable to spoofing
Flyertalk has something akin to this, but as forum threads. I’d be interested to see it on a broader level though!
There is one of these for sports scores too and it drives me crazy that there’s not an easy way to use it directly.
For instance, I like to keep up with my colleges sports teams, but I don’t need the live tracker stuff (if I wanted that I’d watch the game on tv). But I’d love to have a Home Screen button that would bring up the “app” for “Georgia Tech baseball score” or “Georgia Tech basketball score” to quickly see what’s going on what I’m in between meetings at work or out doing something with the family.
No ads, no frills, it’d be gloriously simple and I assume there is some way to do it but I could not find it.
For instance, I like to keep up with my colleges sports teams, but I don’t need the live tracker stuff (if I wanted that I’d watch the game on tv). But I’d love to have a Home Screen button that would bring up the “app” for “Georgia Tech baseball score” or “Georgia Tech basketball score” to quickly see what’s going on what I’m in between meetings at work or out doing something with the family.
No ads, no frills, it’d be gloriously simple and I assume there is some way to do it but I could not find it.
http://plaintextsports.com has become one of my favorite websites for every single reason you just went off about
Thank you! (I made plaintextsports!)
On my to-do list is making a personalized page where you can select exactly which teams you want to follow, something closer to what dpeck wants, but I've been having trouble finding the time...
On my to-do list is making a personalized page where you can select exactly which teams you want to follow, something closer to what dpeck wants, but I've been having trouble finding the time...
This would be awesome! I love plaintext sports and the minimalist aesthetics of it.
Curious, it seems college baseball scores are generally not as easy to find as others. Do they tend to be behind more restrictive APIs, or is it more just that there’s so little interest in it vs MLB?
Curious, it seems college baseball scores are generally not as easy to find as others. Do they tend to be behind more restrictive APIs, or is it more just that there’s so little interest in it vs MLB?
For college football and basketball I just use some JSON endpoints that the ncaa.com frontend hits, and they're actually very good. Literally all I had to do to support Women's basketball in addition to Men's was change "men" to "women" in the url. I haven't checked the data for baseball, but I'm sure it's more than adequate. That being said, I personally don't have any interest in college baseball, and I don't think it has a huge following, so I'm not going to invest any time into it, especially when there are higher profile leagues that I still haven't added yet (specifically, all of European football).
completely understand that, and you’re right on the small following. I like the high energy (for baseball that is) offensive heavy style of play, but I know I’m an outlier vs the MLB fan base size.
Great site and wish you much continued success with it!
Great site and wish you much continued success with it!
Oh hey! We talked over Twitter once about the site a few weeks ago, had no clue you were on HN :)
I wonder if there is a a way you could do it with a man Apple Shortcut or a web page linked as an icon on your Home Screen. Maybe a URL that searches spotlight.
I figured there had to be, and that there might be a way to figure it out with connecting up developer tools from mobile Safari but I never pursued that path so might be completely wrong.
Similarly, someone texted me—technically, iMessages—shipment tracking numbers the other day. Two tracking numbers in three messages.
Message 1: 123456789012
Message 2: Tracking number.
Message 3: 2nd tracking, 210987654321
If I press and hold on the first tracking number, the menu of options is contact-info focused—call, WhatsApp, Add to Contacts, etc. If I do the same on the second number I get an option to Track Shipment. But I can paste both numbers into Spotlight and directly get tracking info. So I'm not certain why one tracking number behaves one way and a second another way.
Message 1: 123456789012
Message 2: Tracking number.
Message 3: 2nd tracking, 210987654321
If I press and hold on the first tracking number, the menu of options is contact-info focused—call, WhatsApp, Add to Contacts, etc. If I do the same on the second number I get an option to Track Shipment. But I can paste both numbers into Spotlight and directly get tracking info. So I'm not certain why one tracking number behaves one way and a second another way.
Huh. is that a US thing only? Doesn't seem to show up for me. Currently in Cyprus, normally based in UK.
I've found that prepending "Flight" i.e. "Flight LH173" works when it doesn't detect the flight number by itself
Not US-only, I use it in Canada and Europe frequently.
Doesn't work with every flight number. Not sure what the criteria is.
My guess is that it works for certain airlines. I tried the three next flights fromthe local airport. Some of those are just one letter and three numbers. That makes it pretty hard to make assuption regarding the meaning of the code, without having a reference.
It's likely expecting IATA style flight numbers, which would all be two letters (or a letter/number) airline code, followed by some amount of numbers.
Seems a bit random -- QF1 works, QFA1 doesn't. SQ208 doesn't work, SIA208 does. But SQ21 works and SIA21 doesn't, so it's not even consistent within airlines. Might be related to whether or not the flight is currently active.
Ah, that is interesting, so it's taking both IATA and ICAO, but not consistently.
It actually is not that useful because you cant base any actions off of it. Eg: “tell me if this flight is delayed etc”
Thank you. I couldn't read the Medium at all since it forces you to have a subscription. I thought HN would have a rule against paywalled articles.
> Are paywalls ok?
It's ok to post stories from sites with paywalls that have workarounds.
In comments, it's ok to ask how to read an article and to help other users do so. But please don't post complaints about paywalls. Those are off topic. More here.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html
It's ok to post stories from sites with paywalls that have workarounds.
In comments, it's ok to ask how to read an article and to help other users do so. But please don't post complaints about paywalls. Those are off topic. More here.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsfaq.html
I wonder what other iOS features are buried in the OS that I don't know about...
I don't know if this is something new or I just am noticing it for the first time, but if I'm in an app for a site that sends an SMS code during login, taping the text entry field after the SMS is received extracts the code and offers to fill it.
This is a lot more readable than the medium site. Thanks.
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