Well this thread has certainly educated me on some of the finer points of Face ID. In the back of my mind, I assumed that Apple had probably thought of most of these issues and put in some appropriate options, so, that's on me.
By the way, Touch ID doesn't automatically go to to the Home screen when you click the Home button. You have to click the button AND rest your finger on the Home button a moment - two actions, even if we manage to combine them into a single sequence. First the click to wake the device, then the finger-rest to scan your finger and unlock.
True, but the two actions are so seamless that they might as well be one action. I remember back in the day, the first iteration of Touch ID, the pause to wait for authentication was considerable. When the second generation of Touch ID arrived on the iPhone 6, there were reactions that it was TOO fast: that folks wanting to just glance at the lock screen could not do so without unlocking (this was before raise-to-wake).
Face ID has a variety of options/modes. There's Raise to Wake - lift the iPhone and the display wakes, after which the device unlocks. If it's off, then it's tap to wake/press Side button to wake and invoke Face ID (this adds a layer of intention to the unlock sequence). Either way, if it's not already awake, it's not going to unlock. Why the separate swipe-up? I think it's another way to ensure intention - if accidentally unlocked, it doesn't automatically reveal that which is hidden behind the Lock Screen.
Agree strongly with the swipe-up: I think it's a must. I just learned about it yesterday, and I was glad to see it was there!
Do I understand from your phrasing that if you have raise-to-wake turned off, then you can tap the (turned-off) screen and that will wake the phone? That is a game-changer (that is, in the game inside my mind, where the feature didn't exist, even if it did in real life, lol). That means that from a UX perspective, Face ID can be
exactly like Touch ID: lift phone, touch screen with your thumb, [insert magic here], phone unlocks. And those that want an experience with less friction can turn on raise-to-wake or other options.
But you want real control? Turn off any kind of biometric system and type in the passcode. Biometrics are intended to make unlocking easier. They do not make the device more secure or more controlled. It's a compromise intended, in part, to encourage more people to lock their devices - easier to unlock, more likely to allow it to be locked. One might say this whole discussion is just a matter of "How much easier should it be?" You want it a little bit harder? Be my guest, it's your iPhone.
I agree here. All security and control is a trade-off with convenience, I'd guess. I just felt that the trade-off was minimal with Touch ID. I can get just enough convenience to have a long password without really changing the interaction of the phone (add a quarter-second pause on the home button to unlock, and my thumb is already there anyway).
With the information I've gotten on this thread, I see that the Face ID implementation is not as far away from Touch ID as I thought it was (pending your clarification on tapping the sleeping screen to wake instead of having to press the side button). I DO still get the feeling that Touch ID is still more convenient in one last way: Apple Pay. That becomes a more complex operation, making authentication truly two steps instead of one (I will continue to count "press-and-rest" as one user action, even though the phone considers it two separate actions).
But we're now way down the list. If you said to me (and this is what I thought Apple WAS saying to me), that you could have more screen real estate if you swap Touch ID for Face ID (as I had then conceived it), learn a new set of user interactions to replace the home button, and had a slightly less convenient Apple Pay, then I would have said no. Which I did. But if you told me that Face ID could be made to essentially work like Touch ID as far as my muscular interaction, then I would probably say yes!
But in the end, we choose our phones for a variety of reasons and often make compromises in order to have specific features. iPhone SE is a very nice phone, which I recommend quite frequently. However, it's not my personal choice. I prefer a phone with a "telephoto" camera as well as wide angle. I also dislike the display area lost to the bottom bezel/Home button - I'm very attached to the extra display space delivered by the iPhone X and its newer cousins - same overall size as the SE, bigger display area. Even if I was less enthusiastic about Face ID than I am, I'd choose an iPhone X (or 12 Pro) over an SE any day of the week.
It's interesting what trade-offs we're individually willing to make. I remember back when the iPhone 5S came out, alongside the iPhone 5c. The value proposition was obvious: you could have either the improved chip (64 bits!), Touch ID, and significantly improved camera, or you could have the 5c's styling. At the time I chose the latter: I was not a fan of the "hand feel" of the 5 series, and I felt it was TOO light if anything. The 5c was and remains my favorite iPhone. I figured (rightly) that I could wait a couple of years before 64 bit were crucial to me, and (wrongly) that in two years those technologies would filter down to the 5c in the form of a 6c or some such, and I'd upgrade then. No dice, lol. I ended up with an SE 2016. Anyway I chose the 5c and I felt it was a good choice.
In this case I also know the value proposition: I could keep Touch ID, which I love, and have a truly significant reduction in price (much larger than the 5S-to-5c difference); or I could have the full screen, the 5G (which I don't care about but someday might), and the better camera. Unlike a few years ago, a specific trade-off is coming back to hit me now a little: I wish I had the better camera, I'm so close to feeling OK leaving my DSLR behind when I feel like it. Besides that and the slightly disappointing battery life, the SE is wonderful. Sometimes you guess right, sometimes you guess wrong. In either case, 2007 is a speck in the rear-view mirror, and I can't even see 2005 any more.
