5 iPhone iOS4 tips & tricks

So iPhone iOS4 has been out for a couple of days and so far I have really enjoyed it. There are a couple of really cool features, so I thought I would do a quick list of 5 of the coolest tricks I have found so far:

• Turn on SMS character count
  This is something we have all missed previously on the iPhone, and now it’s finally here. Before we never knew when the 160 character limit was being reached and when the bill arrived at the end of the month, there would be loads of SMS’s sent. To turn on the SMS character count, simply go to Settings -> Messages-> And turn Character Count ON. The character count will now show when composing an SMS, but only appears after about 25-50 characters.
• Camera Zoom
  The camera speed in iOS4 has been greatly improved, and taking a photo now is such a pleasure. One of the new features on iOS4 is that they have included a zoom functionality. To get this working, simply tap anywhere in the camera view finder when you have the camera open, and a zoom bar will appear at the bottom. Bearing in mind that the iPhone 3 & 3GS camera’s are not the greatest  in the world, when zooming in, the images become pixellated
• Multi Tasking (App switching)
  For me this is probably the best feature in the new OS. Most of the apps are being updated to allow you to run them in the “background”. While this doesn’t consume any battery or degrade performance, this is extremely useful with apps like Twitter for iPhone (Tweetie). The app stays open in the same place you left off and can send tweets in the background when you return to the home screen. Another app that uses this functionality is Skype, which means you can still receive calls when not in the actual app. To get the Multi-Tasking to work, double-click the home button, and it will bring up a list of all the open apps. To exit an app, hold your finger on one of the open apps, until they start “jiggling”. This will bring up a “No-Entry” sign on the top left of the app, which you tap to exit the app.
• Folders
  Another awesome feature of the new OS. Simply put, you can now have loads more apps on your phone, by categorising them in different groups. To create a folder simply drag one app into another, and folder will be created. You can edit the name of the folder(up to 13 characters). You can then drag other apps into the folder as well.
• iBooks
  With the advent of iOS4 you can now make full use of the iBooks app which is offered on the iPad. But the coolest thing for me, is that with the latest release of iBooks 1.1, you can also read PDFs. To make use of this functionality, you just need to drag a PDF document into iTunes (you also need 9.2), which will add it into the Books folder. You can then drag this into your iPhone once it is connected which will sync it to the device. Once you are in the iBooks app on the phone, there is a PDF button at the top, which will display all the synced PDF’s which you can now read as normal books on the iPhone. I also came across a really cool site called http://www.ebookee.com which has loads of magazines and books in PDF format

These are just some of the cool new features, and I’m sure there are loads more I haven’t listed here. Be sure to leave a comment below with your favorite.