iPhone For Dummies

Edward C. Baig is the former Personal Technology columnist at USA Today and current contributing writer at AARP. He makes frequent appearances on TV, radio, and podcasts and is the author of Macs For Dummies. Bob “Dr. Mac” LeVitus has written or cowritten over 90 popular computer books, including macOS Monterey For Dummies and GarageBand For Dummies. He has also written for the Houston Chronicle and Mac Observer for over twenty years.

Introduction 1

About This Book 1

Foolish Assumptions 2

Icons Used in This Book 2

Beyond the Book 3

Where to Go from Here 3

Part 1: Meet Your Iphone 5

Chapter 1: Unveiling the iPhone 7

The Big Picture 8

The iPhone as a phone and a digital camera or camcorder 9

The iPhone as an iPod 10

The iPhone as an internet communications device 11

Technical specifications 11

A Quick Tour Outside 12

On the sides 12

On the bottom 13

On the front 14

On the back 16

Status bar 16

Home Sweet Home Screen 18

The first Home screen 19

The second Home screen 20

The dock (all Home screens) 22

Chapter 2: iPhone Basic Training 23

Activating the iPhone 24

Turning the iPhone On and Off 25

Pointing a finger at Touch ID 26

Facing up to Face ID 28

Continuing the setup 29

Locking the iPhone 30

Mastering the Multitouch Interface 31

Discovering the special-use keys 32

One-handed keyboard 34

The incredible, intelligent, and virtual iPhone keyboard 35

Anticipating what comes next 35

Correcting mistakes 38

Choosing an alternative keyboard 38

Cutting, copying, pasting, and replacing 39

Multitasking 41

Navigating beyond the Home Screen 42

Organizing Icons into Folders 44

Visiting the App Library 44

Watching Widgets 45

Proactive Searching 46

Notifications and Today View 48

Chapter 3: Synchronicity: Getting Stuff to and from Your iPhone 51

A Brief iCloud Primer 52

The Kitchen Sync 54

First things first: About iPhone backups 55

Sync prep 101 57

Syncing Your Data with iTunes or Finder 62

Syncing contacts 63

Syncing calendars 63

Advanced syncing 64

Synchronizing Your Media 64

Music, movies, TV shows, and podcasts 65

Photos 68

Manual Syncing 69

Chapter 4: Understanding the Phone-damentals 71

Making a Call 72

Adding contacts 72

Setting up favorites 74

Viewing the Recents list 76

Dialing with the keypad 77

Accessing voicemail visually 77

Recording a greeting 80

Voice dialing 80

Receiving a Call 80

Accepting the call 81

Announcing the caller 81

Rejecting the call 81

Replying with a text message 82

Blocking callers 83

Silencing unknown callers 83

Avoiding disturbances 84

Choosing a ringtone 85

While on a Call 86

Juggling calls 87

Making conference calls 87

Handing off calls 89

Seeing Is Believing with FaceTime 89

Part 2: The Pda Iphone 95

Chapter 5: Taking Control of Your iPhone .97

Controlling Control Center 98

Summoning Siri 101

Figuring out what to ask 103

Siri shortcuts 104

Using dictation 105

Correcting mistakes 105

Making Siri smarter 105

Typing to Siri 106

Chapter 6: Texting 1, 2, 3: Messages and Notes 107

Getting the iMessage 107

You send me: Sending text messages 109

Alert: You’ve got messages 110

Being a golden receiver: Reading and replying to text messages 110

MMS: Like SMS with media 113

Massive multimedia effects 114

Group messaging has never been better 118

Taking Note of Notes 119

Chapter 7: Twelve Indispensable Apps and Utilities 121

Working with the Calendar 121

Year view 122

Month view 122

Day view 122

Week view 124

List view 124

Adding Calendar Entries 125

Displaying multiple calendars 128

Responding to meeting invitations 129

Subscribing to calendars 129

Sharing a family calendar 129

Calculate This 130

Punching the Clock 131

World clock 131

Alarm clock 132

Stopwatch 133

Timer 133

Voicing Memos 134

Making a recording 134

Listening to recordings 134

Trimming recordings 135

Adding a title to a recording 135

Reminding me 138

It’s a Wallet 141

Dropping in on AirDrop 143

Controlling Lights, Locks, and More 144

Using the iPhone in the Car 144

Unlocking the Car 145

Measuring Things 145

Translating Text or Speech 146

Keeping in Good Health 147

Part 3: The Multimedia Iphone 149

Chapter 8: Music to Your Ears: Audio on Your iPhone 151

Introducing Your iPhone’s Music Player 152

It’s music, just not your music 153

My Music Is Your Music 156

A library without library cards 156

Play it again, list 158

Share and share alike 160

Taking Control of Your Tunes 162

Customizing Your Audio Experience 164

Setting preferences 164

Setting a sleep timer 165

Using your voice to control your music 166

Listening to Podcasts with the Podcasts App 167

Shopping with the iTunes Store App 169

Chapter 9: “Smile”: Taking Pictures with Your iPhone 171

Taking Your Best Shot 171

Making Photos Come to Life 174

Keeping Things in Focus 174

From the front to the rear — and back 176

Firing up the flash 176

Night mode 177

Using zoom 177

Two (or three) rear cameras are better than one 178

Shooting closeups (iPhone 13 Pros only) 179

Applying filters 180

Binging on burst shooting 181

Using the self-timer 183

Tracking Down Your Pictures 183

Choosing albums 184

Viewing all your photos 185

Making memories 186

Categorizing your pics 189

Adding captions and gathering information 190

Searching for pictures 191

Sharing your photos 192

Admiring Your Pictures 194

Maneuvering and manipulating photos 194

Launching slideshows 195

Storing pictures in the (i)Cloud 197

Editing and Deleting Photos 198

Livening Up Live Photos 201

Leveraging Live Text 203

More (Not So) Stupid Picture Tricks 203

Chapter 10: Starring in a Blockbuster: Video on Your iPhone 207

Finding Stuff to Watch 208

Playing Video 209

Shooting Video 213

Going slow 218

Going fast 218

Going cinematic (iPhone 13s only) 219

Capturing stereo 219

Editing what you shot 220

Editing cinematic video 220

Sharing video 221

Watching video on TV 222

Augmented reality 222

Restricting video and other usage 223

Part 4: The Internet Iphone 225

Chapter 11: Going on a Mobile Safari 227

Surfin’ Dude 227

Exploring the browser 227

Blasting off into cyberspace 228

I Can See Clearly Now 230

Opening multiple web pages at a time .231

Starting up the start page 232

Keeping tabs of tabs 233

Looking at lovable links 235

Book(mark) ’em, Danno 236

Altering bookmarks 238

Viewing open pages on other devices 239

Letting history repeat itself 239

Launching a mobile search mission 240

Saving web pictures 240

Reading clutter-free web pages 241

Translate web pages 242

Private Browsing 242

Sign in with Apple 243

Smart Safari Settings 243

Chapter 12: The Email Must Get Through 247

Prep Work: Setting Up Your Accounts 248

Setting up your account 248

Setting up an email account with the big guys 248

Setting up an account with another provider 249

Setting up corporate email 250

See Me, Read Me, File Me, Delete Me: Working with Messages 251

Reading messages 252

Filtering mail 253

Managing messages 253

Threading messages 257

Searching emails 258

Darling, You Send Me (Email) 261

Makin’ messages 261

Settings for sending email 271

Setting your message and account settings 273

Chapter 13: Tracking with Maps, Compass, Stocks, Weather, and Files 277

Maps Are Where It’s At 277

Finding your current location with Maps 278

Finding a person, place, or thing 279

Views, zooms, and pans 280

Timesaving map tools: Contacts, Recents, Guides, and Favorites 282

Smart map tricks 284

Contemplating the Compass 289

Taking Stock with Stocks 289

Adding and deleting stocks, funds, and indexes 290

Details, details, details 291

Charting a course 291

Weather Watching 292

Keeping Track of Documents with Files 293

Part 5: The Undiscovered Iphone 295

Chapter 14: Setting You Straight on Settings 297

Sky-High Settings 298

All about you 298

Airplane mode 299

Wi-Fi 300

Bluetooth 301

Cellular 303

Emergency SOS 305

Report, Sound, and Appearance Settings 305

Notifications 305

Control Center 306

Focus/Do Not Disturb 307

Privacy 308

Sounds 309

Happy Home button (iPhone 7, 8, and SE models) 310

Brightening up your day 311

Auto-lock 311

Home Screen 312

Wallpaper 312

In General 313

About About 313

Software update 313

Storage 313

Background App Refresh 314

Siri & Search 314

AirPlay & Handoff 314

Picture-in-Picture 315

CarPlay 315

VPN & Device Management 315

Battery 316

Touch ID/Face ID & Passcode 317

App Store 318

Wallet & Apple Pay 319

Screen Time 319

Date & Time 321

Keyboard 321

Fonts 322

Language & Region 322

Dictionary 323

Accessibility 323

Reset 326

Phoning in More Settings 327

Promoting harmony through Family Sharing 327

Sorting and displaying contacts 327

Nothing phone-y about these settings 328

Find My 329

Chapter 15: Apps-O-Lutely! 331

Finding Apps 332

Browsing for apps 332

Finding more information about an app 333

Downloading an app 334

App Library 334

Updating an app 335

Deleting and Organizing Your Apps 336

Deleting an app 336

Organizing your apps 337

App clips 339

Apple’s Arcade 340

Books, Newspapers, and Magazines 340

Books app 341

Newspapers and magazines 342

Chapter 16: When Good iPhones Go Bad 345

iPhone Issues 346

But first 346

Recharge your iPhone 347

Restart your iPhone 348

Reset (force restart) your iPhone 348

Remove your content 349

Reset your settings and content 350

Restore your iPhone 350

Renew your iPhone with Recovery mode 351

Problems with Calling or Networks 353

Sync, Computer, or iTunes Issues 354

More Help on the Apple Website 355

If Nothing We Suggest Helps 356

Dude, Where’s My Stuff? 358

Part 6: The Part of Tens 359

Chapter 17: Ten Appetizing Apps 361

Shazam 361

Action Movie FX 363

Halide Mark II Pro Camera 364

Evernote 364

Words with Friends 2 365

IMDb 366

Libby 366

Waze 367

BeCasso 369

Clubhouse 369

Chapter 18: Ten Helpful Hints, Tips, and Shortcuts 371

Use QuickPath for Speed and Accuracy 371

Autocorrect Is Your Friend 372

Assault on Batteries 373

Tricks with Links and Phone Numbers 375

Share the Love . and the Links 376

Choose a Home Page for Safari 376

Like a Time Machine for iPhone Backups 377

Create Ringtones for Free in GarageBand 378

Getting Apps Out of the Multitasking Screen 380

Taking a Snapshot of the Screen 381

Index 383