Need a simpler way to answer the phone!

The iPhone 4s requires 1 of 2 things to answer a phone call, depedning on whether the phone is locked or not. If the phone is unlocked, I'm presented with a couple of buttons to accept or reject the call. If the phone is locked, I'm required to swipe a slider on the display to answer the call.

There are a couple of problems with these UI behaviors. First, if one has gloves or mittens on, the touch screen doesn't work and one has to take off one's gloves to use the display and answer a call. The second problems is that in many cases, swiping a slider requires two hands - one to hold the phone and one to swipe the slider. If the phone isn't locked, the situation is a bit better, since pressing a button on the display can be done one-handed, more easily than moving the slider. I could set auto-lock to "never" so the slider doesn't come show up, but this also keeps the display on and runs down the battery rather rapidly. So ideally, I need:

1. A way to use the Home button to answer calls. Our iPhones live in Otter Boxes and it takes intent to actually press this button. It's not easy to do it by accident.

-- OR --

2 A way to auto-dim the display after a set period of time without auto-locking the unit. This would be a 2nd best solution, since I'd much rather just push the Home button to answer calls.

Maybe there are some apps that can help with this. Any solutions will be appreciated.

Posted on Dec 7, 2011 3:58 PM

21 replies

fmouse Author

Level 1

3 points

Dec 8, 2011 10:28 AM in response to KiltedTim

KiltedTim wrote:

Maybe you should just go back to a flip phone...

Not an option.

fmouse Author

Level 1

3 points

Dec 8, 2011 10:34 AM in response to fmouse

The several suggestions I've received so far seem to have exhausted the options, so I'm mrking this post as answered, and consider the dialog closed. The last couple of posts were not in the least helpful.

fmouse Author

Level 1

3 points

Dec 8, 2011 10:41 AM in response to wjosten

wjosten wrote:

Hire someone to carry your phone & answer it. If it's someone you want to talk to, they can then give you the phone 😎.

Now there's a truly helpful answer! You wanna job??

Dec 8, 2011 11:14 AM in response to fmouse

I think the reason why the iPhone and Android touch phones doe't use a hardware button like the home button is to avoid accidentally answering while the phone is in a pocket or purse. The whole slide-to-answer feature was specifically chosen because it requires a very specific action that is unlikely to ever be duplicated by accident or unintentionally.

They do use other buttons for actions - to silence a call (press the power or volume button(s)), or dump it to voicemail (double click power button). But, those buttons are smaller, stiffer and much less likely to be unintentionally pressed, and even if so, the consequences are less negative then unintenionally answering a call (and thus disabling the caller from leaving a message).

It seems to be the same design thinking that went in to enabling flip phones to answer by simply opening them up (my motorola phones just connected the moment they were flipped open), since that too was an action that was highly unlikely to happen unintentionally.

It's just hard to design anything that takes every possible user and every possible desired function into consideration - always limitations to every device (you never had a 3+" screen on a flip phone, for example).

One other option - move south, where you never need gloves or mittens! 😁 (just, the older I get, that is becoming my preferred option for dealing with cold).

fmouse Author

Level 1

3 points

Dec 8, 2011 11:29 AM in response to Michael Black

Michael Black wrote:

I think the reason why the iPhone and Android touch phones doe't use a hardware button like the home button is to avoid accidentally answering while the phone is in a pocket or purse. The whole slide-to-answer feature was specifically chosen because it requires a very specific action that is unlikely to ever be duplicated by accident or unintentionally.

They do use other buttons for actions - to silence a call (press the power or volume button(s)), or dump it to voicemail (double click power button). But, those buttons are smaller, stiffer and much less likely to be unintentionally pressed, and even if so, the consequences are less negative then unintenionally answering a call (and thus disabling the caller from leaving a message).

It seems to be the same design thinking that went in to enabling flip phones to answer by simply opening them up (my motorola phones just connected the moment they were flipped open), since that too was an action that was highly unlikely to happen unintentionally.

Yeah, that's all true. It's easier to press the Home button by accident than to open a flip by accident, but how easy (or not) this may be depends on how you carry and use your iPhone. For some people it might not be a problem, and for some it certainly will. I'm not suggesting that the behavior I'd like to have be the only way to answer a call, or even the default way, just that it ought to be an option. My wife and I both find the slide inconvenient at times, and a step back in the functionality of the unit as a phone.

Michael Black wrote:

One other option - move south, where you never need gloves or mittens! 😁 (just, the older I get, that is becoming my preferred option for dealing with cold).

Well, as it happens, we live in central Texas - can't get a whole lot further south than that 🙂 Yes, we still need gloves or mittens here. High temperature yesterday was 37 degrees. Maybe we should consider southern California instead 😉

razmee209

Level 10

199,452 points

Dec 8, 2011 11:53 AM in response to fmouse

fmouse don't move to cali - this state is too broke. I'm suffering living in central cali. 😎

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Need a simpler way to answer the phone!