iOS Concept: Swipe Actions on Icons

Posted by silellak on January 3, 2013 12:00 pm 2

So yesterday I made a post about the new Swipe Actions in Nova Launcher for Android. I even made a fun little video of how I personally configured a few of my icons:

On the way to work this morning, I pondered why Apple couldn't introduce a similar native concept to the iOS springboard. Now, unfortunately, my artistic skills are very limited, so you'll just have to watch the above clip and then imagine similar functionality in iOS.

Obviously, iOS' implementation would be slightly different. Apple being Apple and iOS being iOS, I would not expect these actions to be user-configurable. Instead, third-party developers would be allowed to implement one (and to make it simple, we'll say only one) action that can occur when swiping up on an icon. Rather than take you into the app, however, I envision a pop-up dialog similar to the Facebook/Twitter "widgets" we currently have in Notification Center:

Iosfacebookwidget_medium

So, obviously the functionality is there - Apple just needs to let third-party developers tap into it.

Some ideas on how it could be implemented, off the top of my head:

  • Facebook/Twitter/Tweetbot/Google+/Instagram/etc.: Swipe up to post (with picture)
  • Foursquare: Swipe up to check-in
  • Messages (and other third-party IMing apps): Swipe up to reply to last notification
  • Evernote: Swipe up to create a new note
  • Pocket: Swipe up to add a URL in the clipboard to your Pocket
  • Mail: Swipe up to compose a new message
  • Phone: Swipe up to check voicemail
  • Dropbox: Swipe up to jump into automatic photo upload

Advantages to this approach:

  1. Less taps/swipes to get to common functionality
  2. Some Widget-like functionality without homescreen (or Notification Center) clutter

Disadvantages (because nothing is perfect):

  1. Apps that don't implement this functionality may confuse casual users (did it register my swipe or is it broken or oh God what is happening someone help)
  2. Reliant on third-party developers to implement in clever/logical ways

Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts!