Inside iOS 10: Multilingual typing eases autocorrect woes

Posted:
in iPhone
One subtly important improvement in iOS 10 is support for multilingual typing, letting people use several languages in the same sentence without unwanted autocorrections.




To make the option work, users should make sure desired languages are enabled in iOS 10's new Dictionary menu under Settings, then add the correct keyboards under General > Keyboards. Once this is done, Apple's QuickType should both accept multiple languages and offer appropriate word suggestions.

In iOS 9, the only way to switch between languages on the fly is manually selecting them in the same way you'd switch to emoji. Aside from being inconvenient, it also ignores the fact that even monolingual typists will sometimes use expressions from other languages.

QuickType's other main upgrade in iOS 10 is "Siri intelligence," used to make contextual suggestions that go beyond single words. Someone asking "Where are you?" in Messages, for example, will prompt iOS to offer up your current location.

iOS 10 is already out as a developer beta, which will be followed by a cleaner public beta in July. The software's final release date is sometime this fall, most likely in September in advance of new iPhones.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 17
    Thank goodness. I get Spanish corrections way too often 
  • Reply 2 of 17
    aylkaylk Posts: 54member
    I hope Siri learns this trick soon.
    SylvainL
  • Reply 3 of 17
    Now if they can only fix autocorrect so that it doesn't "fix" uncommon English words that are correctly spelled. Between this and the "emojify" function in IOS 10 it's like they're trying their hardest to penalize anyone who communicates at anything higher than a 3rd grade level.
  • Reply 4 of 17
    xmhillxxmhillx Posts: 112member
    I went "yes!!!!!!" When I saw this in the Keynote.

    i wrote to Apple, giving them feedback about making this exact feature. I wonder if they took that idea to heart or if they'd already had it in the works.
    Either way. Fuck yeah. This will be so helpful between English and Spanish. I use both super often. Often times I'll start typing without noticing I'm in the wrong language until I'm a sentence and a half in.
    It's pretty significant for me; more so than the iMessage stuff and fluff. 
    lostkiwiCheereosBandit
  • Reply 5 of 17
    wonkothesanewonkothesane Posts: 1,741member
    Great! I have been waiting for this feature. 
  • Reply 6 of 17
    damonfdamonf Posts: 230member
    iOS 10 is already out as a developer beta, which will be followed by a cleaner public beta in July. The software's final release date is sometime this fall, most likely in September in advance of new iPhones.

    Dear AppleInsider editors: Ok, we get it.  iOS 10 is coming in the fall, public beta in July.  Can you please stop mentioning this as the last paragraph of every iOS 10 article?  Who doesn't know this by now?  It's been Apple's pattern for years and years (particularly the final fall release).  As surely as the sun rises in the east and the sky is blue.  Enough already.

    edited June 2016
  • Reply 7 of 17
    xmhillx said:
    I went "yes!!!!!!" When I saw this in the Keynote.

    i wrote to Apple, giving them feedback about making this exact feature. I wonder if they took that idea to heart or if they'd already had it in the works.
    Either way. Fuck yeah. This will be so helpful between English and Spanish. I use both super often. Often times I'll start typing without noticing I'm in the wrong language until I'm a sentence and a half in.
    It's pretty significant for me; more so than the iMessage stuff and fluff. 
    Nah. They didn't get the idea from you...
  • Reply 8 of 17
    The only setting that needs to be set to activate multilingual typing is the dictionary. Additional keyboards are not necessary unless you want to dictate in other languages or faster access to special characters. 
  • Reply 9 of 17
    xmhillxxmhillx Posts: 112member
    xmhillx said:
    I went "yes!!!!!!" When I saw this in the Keynote.

    i wrote to Apple, giving them feedback about making this exact feature. I wonder if they took that idea to heart or if they'd already had it in the works.
    Either way. Fuck yeah. This will be so helpful between English and Spanish. I use both super often. Often times I'll start typing without noticing I'm in the wrong language until I'm a sentence and a half in.
    It's pretty significant for me; more so than the iMessage stuff and fluff. 
    Nah. They didn't get the idea from you...
    Damn, did it exist before Apple?
  • Reply 10 of 17
    xmhillxxmhillx Posts: 112member
    The only setting that needs to be set to activate multilingual typing is the dictionary. Additional keyboards are not necessary unless you want to dictate in other languages or faster access to special characters. 
    Can you elaborate?

    I have American English and Spanish (Spain) keyboards, and I have American English, Apple Dictionary, and Spanish-English dictionaries downloaded in the manage screen for dictionary.

    I've never been able to multi language type. What do you mean "setting that needs to be set to activate multilingual typing is the dictionary"?
  • Reply 11 of 17
    SylvainLSylvainL Posts: 28member
    This is exactly what I was waiting for. 


  • Reply 12 of 17
    freediverxfreediverx Posts: 1,424member
    I can't seem to get this to work. Is it supposed to do predictive search and autocorrect for all installed languages/keyboards?
  • Reply 13 of 17
    I wish they added a HINGLISH (Hindi plus English) dictionary too!! Comeon Apple, its high time you catered to Indian users if you want success in India.
  • Reply 14 of 17
    I believe that what CheereosBandit meant is that one can use the english keyboard and access all characters (including characters that are not used in english) by pressing and holding keys. For example, to access the "ñ" press and hold the "n". Similar thing for the accented vowels. Personally, even though I'm aware of this keyboard feature, I still switch keyboard languages when I'm typing in one language or another. I too thought that one was going to have easy access to all characters in a pair of languages without having to switch keybards. But the auto-correction feature is a step in the right direction.
  • Reply 15 of 17
    xmhillxxmhillx Posts: 112member
    I believe that what CheereosBandit meant is that one can use the english keyboard and access all characters (including characters that are not used in english) by pressing and holding keys. For example, to access the "ñ" press and hold the "n". Similar thing for the accented vowels. Personally, even though I'm aware of this keyboard feature, I still switch keyboard languages when I'm typing in one language or another. I too thought that one was going to have easy access to all characters in a pair of languages without having to switch keybards. But the auto-correction feature is a step in the right direction.
    I think he's actually confused or isn't being clear with his statement. He's saying "multilingual typing" to mean long pressing to access special characters in other languages; that's incorrect, as multilingual typing for Apple means autocorrect detects which language you're typing in and corrects it accordingly, without having to switch keyboards.

    I thought maybe he meant that within iOS 10 Public Beta, you don't have to turn on some setting other than selecting the dictionary languages you want to use with multi-lingual autocorrect. Or that in iOS 9 all you had to do was turn on different dictionaries. I was like "oh really?! How did I miss that?"

    But multilingual typing and long pressing for special characters are two different things. He thinks they're the same thing, so he's confused and then confused me. 

    I don't see the benefit of having access to special characters more quickly? In Spanish, for example, the autocorrect puts the special characters where they need to be. I don't have to long press to get any of them, it's done automatically. 

    Multilingual typing is talking about autocorrect that works with 2 (or more?) languages seamlessly, without needing to press the "world icon" next to the microphone and switch between languages in order to detect and correct your language. This is announced to be coming in iOS 10, and not available in iOS 9. CheeriosBandit alluded to it being available in iOS 9 today. He never responded to my question, but I think I figured it out eventually.
  • Reply 16 of 17
    xmhillx said:
    I went "yes!!!!!!" When I saw this in the Keynote.

    i wrote to Apple, giving them feedback about making this exact feature. I wonder if they took that idea to heart or if they'd already had it in the works.
    Either way. Fuck yeah. This will be so helpful between English and Spanish. I use both super often. Often times I'll start typing without noticing I'm in the wrong language until I'm a sentence and a half in.
    It's pretty significant for me; more so than the iMessage stuff and fluff. 
    Nah. They didn't get the idea from you...
    Maybe neither from me even I tried hard for several years as I wondered how so powerful computer can have problem recognize language of text. This solution is probably even better but as I guess it is useless for us, countries outside sacred markets that do not get QuickType suggestions. Rendering iOS 10 uninteresting leaving VoIP call SDK only important feature.
  • Reply 17 of 17
    sphericspheric Posts: 2,689member
    frantisek said:
    xmhillx said:
    I went "yes!!!!!!" When I saw this in the Keynote.

    i wrote to Apple, giving them feedback about making this exact feature. I wonder if they took that idea to heart or if they'd already had it in the works.
    Either way. Fuck yeah. This will be so helpful between English and Spanish. I use both super often. Often times I'll start typing without noticing I'm in the wrong language until I'm a sentence and a half in.
    It's pretty significant for me; more so than the iMessage stuff and fluff. 
    Nah. They didn't get the idea from you...
    Maybe neither from me even I tried hard for several years as I wondered how so powerful computer can have problem recognize language of text. This solution is probably even better but as I guess it is useless for us, countries outside sacred markets that do not get QuickType suggestions. Rendering iOS 10 uninteresting leaving VoIP call SDK only important feature.
    There's plenty else in iOS 10 to make it worthwhile. 

    In any case, can't blame them for supporting the most widespread languages first - I switch between English and German constantly, and am so happy with this feature. 

    What language(s) are you using that aren't supported yet?
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