Category: Email

How to add a photo or video to an email on the iPhone (iOS 6)

 

How to insert a photo or video into an email message in iOS 6 on your iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad

iOS 6 is now officially available for downloading to your favourite iOS device, and for the most part it’s a worthy upgrade to Apple’s mobile operating system.

I’m still a little peeved by the elimination of the Google-powered Maps app, especially the super-convenient Street View option which, for now, remains a Google exclusive.

But what Apple takes away on the one hand, they also give with the other. Case in point: Inserting photos and videos into emails.

In past revisions of iOS, adding a photo or video to an email required you to know that you wanted to include one first – before composing your message. You needed to start in the Photos app, and then select the appropriate photos or video from your collection and then choose to share them via email.

The files would “fly” into a new email window and you could begin the somewhat tedious task of trying to arrange your text around these inline elements.

It wasn’t a bad system if all you wanted was to blast off a few pics to a friend, but if you actually wanted to describe a situation using multiple photos, with text in between, it lacked the kind of flexibility that other email systems offer.

But with iOS 6, all this has changed – and for the better.

Now, when you want to include photos or video, you don’t have to pre-plan.

Simply start composing a new email, then, when you get to the spot where you want to insert your file, simply tap-and-hold on the screen – the same way you would if you were going to copy/paste some text, and look at the dialog box that pops up.

You’ll notice that there is a small arrow to the right of the displayed options. Tap that arrow once, and you’ll see the brand new “Insert Photo or Video” option.

Tapping it takes you straight to your Photos app, where you can select your item (just one – no multi-select is available). Once chosen, the item gets dropped into your message, exactly where you tapped.

MobileMe users: Your iOS 5 (iCloud) upgrade could be tricky

I’ve never been a MobileMe user. So when I upgraded to iOS 5 the other day, I happily went along with the instructions on how to create a free account and never gave the experience another thought.

But that was decidedly not the case for one of our mobile developers here at Sympatico.ca. Chris Tsang has been a MobileMe guy for, well, a *really* long time. But this loyalty to Apple’s much-criticized product nearly had him tearing his hair out when he upgraded to iOS 5.

Let his experience be a cautionary tale (and a darn good explanation of what *not* to do) for all you MobileMe folks out there, especially if you want to use iCloud…

 

After downloading the ios 5 update, my iphone 4 was ready for me to setup.  You’ll get to a screen that asks you for your Apple ID. If you previously had a mobileme account you need to make sure that you enter in your mobileme email instead of your AppleID used for iTunes purchases. If you enter in your AppleID you’ll find that you won’t be able to use icloud services with your precious mobileme email. If you go to iCloud settings and attempt to slide email to on, it will ask you if you want to create a free .me account which won’t make sense because you already have one.

To fix this, I had to erase all content and settings and start over.  Once I got to the Apple ID screen again, enter your mobileme email address and then continue with the setup.  Once you are finished with the setup you will see notice another unpleasant surprise in that you will notice that all of your apps are now missing.  Don’t freak out just yet. You aren’t done yet.

The next step is to go to Settings>Store and then tap on your Apple ID at the bottom. Sign out and then sign back in with the account that you use for store purchases (your Apple ID that you have been using).  Once you have done that you need to sync with iTunes once more and all your apps will come back.

This is actually an important step to transition from mobileme to icloud. In fact, if you don’t follow this process, you won’t be able to complete the iCloud setup on your Mac.

After doing all this you will be able to get access to all your previously purchased apps again and use the new iCloud services.

 

Got all that?

Thanks Chris!