When iOS 4.3 was still in Beta, a few videos started showing up online that show off the new multitasking gestures – some of which actually do look like a great idea. Unfortunately it never showed up in the final version. Immediately rumours started popping up about Apple possibly doing away with the physical home button on the iPad, something anybody who has spent time with a Galaxy Tab would know is a bad idea. The new gestures are as follows:
- Switch between open apps: Sweep four fingers left or right
- Reveal Taskbar: Sweep four fingers upward
- Home Screen: Pinch four or fingers or across the screen
While these “features” do not seem major, it does seem to feel natural with the large iPad screen. I switched it on, and it does feel like it should actually ship with the iPad.
So how do you do it? Well first off, you need a Mac to activate it, and $5 to spend on Xcode. Yeah, that sucks, but at least you do not need to jailbreak your iPad. So fire up Appstore on your Mac, search for XCode and then install it. Then run Xcode, connect your iPad (be it iPad 1 or iPad 2), then enable development mode. You will get warnings about not being registered as a developer, which you can ignore.
If you did all this you will find the new “Multitasking Gestures” switch under Settings. Switch in on, and then start swiping with all your fingers!
It should be mentioned that you can enable this for free by jailbreaking the device, but I am not giving advice in that regard. Also, Apple will probably enable this in a future version of iOS, so you can also just wait…
