Being primarily a user of Apple products over the last 5 years, I've mostly been happy with the way they've performed. That being said, there are some things about their products and services that have been bugging me. Things I wish they would change.
Default Apps in iOS:
We have this choice in a desktop operating system. If I can click on a link in OS X and have it open in Firefox or Chrome instead of Safari, why don't I have that choice in iOS? The only exception to this seems to be that Google apps can open links in other Google apps like Chrome, but this is not the norm, and we obviously aren't using Google apps all the time on an iOS device. It's not just the browser though. Apple Maps is the default mapping application. Why? I suppose they would rather have people using their maps instead of Google's, but the simple fact is Google Maps is the mapping app of choice by a large percentage of their users. It's not just that everything links to Apple Maps, but Siri also uses Apple Maps for anything location based. The only exception is that you can currently choose your map application by asking for directions "via transit", but that is hokey and still requires you to select from a list. Not only that, but that feature is most likely going away once Apple starts offering transit directions in its map app, as much as we may not want that.
Disable Built-In Apps
There are several built-in iOS apps that just plain don't get used by a lot of people (Newsstand, Passbook, Compass, Stocks). These apps often just get pushed out of the way as much as possible, so why should we even have to deal with them? Give us an option in settings to disable those so we can just get rid of the icons. Maybe it sounds petty, but it will help us keep our home screens organized. It should also be noted here that newer versions of Android have the ability to disable built in apps through the app settings.
Customizable Control Center
Control Center was probably the best change that iOS 7 brought us, but the way it is today should really should be a work in progress if it isn't. There are several functions in Control Center that are only used by a few people, so I would like to see it much more customization for each user's needs. Personally, I don't use Airplane Mode a lot, I don't need to turn Bluetooth off and on very much, I basically never turn on Do Not Disturb manually, and I basically don't use the stopwatch or calculator. For my own personal use, I would like buttons for mobile hotspot and turning cellular data on or off when I am trying to save some battery. Apple should be aware that we don't all use our iPhones the same way and therefore having options for different buttons will serve some of us better. And yes, Android users, I am aware that Android phones typically have more customization options in your notification pulldown menu.
Fix iCloud
My experience with iCloud has not been great. I've used it for document syncing, backing up device data, syncing app data between devices, iTunes Match, and iMessage. None of these services have proved to be reliable on a consistent basis. First of all, I have restored from a backup on many occasions. I don't recall a single time where I restored from an iCloud backup where it actually completed before I had to sync with iTunes to finish re-installing my apps. Because of this, I generally back up in iTunes in addition to the iCloud backup just in case of any problems. Then there's iTunes Match. If you try to download a playlist from iTunes Match, it better not be a long one, or it may continuously keep trying in the background and drain your battery. If you turn on the setting to only allow downloading over WiFi, don't count on it working that way all of the time. I've found if you queue up a playlist to download while on WiFi and then leave your WiFi network, that it will often continue downloading over your mobile data. Not what you want when you are on a limited data plan. This last time around, I let my iTunes Match subscription lapse and now use Google Music instead (for free). Then there's data syncing. I've tried several podcast apps that sync playback data between devices through iCloud (or at least try to). You can pretty much expect problems doing this. So many times have I played through a podcast, only to have it show up on another device as unplayed. It's so bad that I recently moved to the Pocket Casts app, which syncs with their own server and works between iOS and Android, and has far fewer syncing problems. I've also tried document syncing between the iWork apps to have it not work as expected. To this day, I have a Keynote presentation that will show up on my iOS devices and on icloud.com in a browser, but does not show up in Keynote on my Mac. Why this file never shows up for my Mac is a mystery. And last of all, there's iMessage. First there's the many outages Apple has had with iMessage. Yes, I'm aware there is always texting as a fallback, but if they're going to provide this service, people are going to become dependent on it. I did a restore from backup recently on my iPhone that got iMessages working on my iPad and Mac again, but I've lost that syncing ability more than once. Once it is gone, it's generally pretty hard to get it back without restoring from a backup.
Also, I know Apple has icloud.com so Windows users can edit iWork documents in the cloud, but why do they block Android users from using it?
Fix iTunes
Can we just be honest about iTunes? No matter how much you may love Apple products, you have to agree that iTunes completely sucks, and has for quite a few years. iTunes today is bloated, slow, and arguably more complicated to use than it ever has been. To be fair, Apple is trying to have it do a lot of different things such as accessing the store, managing music, movies, tv shows, podcasts, ringtones, books, apps, and playing media all in one piece of software. But, since it has become a bloated mess, Apple really needs to clean up that mess. I don't have the answers as far as how to do that, maybe it's something along the line of having separate applications for some functions (like how the Mac allows iPhoto to manage photos on devices).
Live At-A-Glance Data
Android has widgets. Windows Phone has live tiles. What does Apple offer as an equivalent? Nothing. Some apps try to work around this with push notifications, and I've even seen a few weather apps get around this by having the icon number badge show the current temperature. In a way this highlights a bigger problem with iOS where virtually any action has to be done inside of an app. It seems like it should be time for iOS to move beyond just having a grid of icons on the home screen, and make it more useful than it has been.
Siri and Third Party Apps
It bothers me that Siri can perform a lot of functions with Apple's built in apps, but has virtually no support for third party apps. The most you can do is to tell Siri to launch an app. There is the work-around solution of asking for directions via transit that allows you to choose a mapping application, but you can't select it through voice, and it most likely will go away once Apple Maps starts offering transit directions. As far as looking up information with Siri, you can only use the sources that Apple has designated. Not really ideal if you generally like using Google as an information source. There's also the issue that Siri just isn't all that accurate. Sure it's better with iOS 7, but still not accurate enough that I can depend on using it in situations where texting isn't reasonable. I really only find Siri useful for setting reminders and appointments, and even then I end up having to cancel them at times because of inaccuracies. I've basically given up on trying to make Siri do anything else. For a company that generally prides itself in simplifying the experience for the user, Siri simply doesn't do that.
It's Not All Bad
After reading this, I could see people asking why I would even use Apple products if I have this many frustrations with them. I think there are plenty of things they are doing well. I like the Mac, and the usability improvements they make with each new version OS X. I've been pretty happy with OS X Mavericks in general and hope that my 5 year old Macbook Pro can still get another update or two. For iOS, its shortcomings have become more prevalent as I have owned a Nexus 7 tablet currently running Android 4.4 and some of the additional features that make Android feel closer to being a normal computer. That being said, my iOS devices are generally more responsive than my Nexus 7. My experience in general with Android devices is that they may start off feeling stable and fast, but like older Windows machines they often become slower over time, even to the point of having to wait on them for several minutes. Some of it may be that I generally have about 200 apps on any device at one time, but I feel like the operating system should be able to manage that to some degree so the user isn't having to kill apps and depend on third party utilities to free up RAM. Right now my preferred choice for a mobile operating system is iOS, but if Android can resolve some of the stability and resource management issues I've seen, who knows what the future may hold?
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