The obvious result is hidden under non-obvious action, and pointing that out isn't being misleading, quite the opposite. And you managed to equate the "offering a clear choice" present in the actual comment into "offering the option" as in not making it technically impossible. They're not equal.

> It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.'

-- You Know Who

And that's not "offering" the plans, is it? When I ask you if you want a piece of chewing gum, I'm offering you a piece of chewing gum. If I have some chewing gum in my pocket and it's possible for someone -- not everybody, just someone -- to overpower me, that's not quite the same as offering. And yes, that's an extreme example, Apple isn't hiding the option on a planet full of killer robots in another galaxy. But it's also not quite "offering" it.

You can? On my phone, deep pressing on the 'block' in Control Center containing the Wi-Fi icon gets me to a submenu, which adds text labels to the existing toggles and adds two more toggles (AirDrop and Personal Hotspot). However, pressing the Wi-Fi button from that submenu seems to have the same effect as outside of it, and deep pressing it (as well as long pressing it) has no effect.

edit: but you can definitely turn them off through the Settings app.

As I said elsewhere, I repeated the GP's claim without testing it myself, assuming good faith on his part. After testing I found it wasn't true. Unfortunately I can't edit my original comment now, so I've been apologizing throughout the thread.

I can't, it's complete bullshit as I don't even have any devices paired. The long press is useless, it does nothing.

I understood. What I meant by "option" in that context (and I updated the post to clarify this) is something like a popup when I turn off my WiFi in the control center that says: "Your wifi will automatically turn back on when you leave this location," followed by an "Ok" button and a "Do not turn it back on" button.

When the user is presented with the current control center button that turns the WiFi symbol from blue to gray, the user has a reasonable expectation (actually, I'd say more than that in this case) that it means "off." That's the point of the original article. As a completely general rule, if your UI is does something that may reasonably be misinterpreted, it is your responsibility to inform the user of that. You could take the principle almost as a definition of good usability.

> I think you completely missed that you can indeed actually turn them off via 3D touch

My iPhone SE doesn't have 3D touch, or if it does, I have no idea what it is.

So as far as I know, no, I don't have that option.

As I said, long-press on non 3D touch devices opens the same box.

This is patently false (I have just done the very thing you said, then confirmed that the wifi was in fact still on).

I think this whole argument just lends more support to the idea that Apple is being deceptive with this UI.

It's not false that a long press on a non-3D touch device opens the same box as using 3D touch on a device that supports it.

However, after all the feedback here I did some testing and it appears the GP was wrong: The submenu obtained by 3D touch/long-press doesn't actually turn WiFi off. My apologies for repeating his claim without backing it up.

3D touch and long-press are such awful places to bury any sort of functionality. There are no visual cues, no material cues, and the only way you'd know about those things are to watch Apple keynotes.

How hard would it have been to emulate what they did with f.lux, I mean Night Shift and say "Bluetooth, off until 5am (tap for more options)" or "Wi-Fi, off at this location (tap for more options)"

Not to mention that 3D Touch isn’t available on all currently sold models.

There's nothing magical about 3D touch. Assuming you have iOS 10 or greater, you can achieve the same results on older devices with a long press on the screen. The only thing I've found 3D touch to handle differently between newer and older devices is moving icons on the springboard.

Which I’ve long held is a wedge they use to force the obsoletion of otherwise suitable devices.

no you can't - or please step-by-step explain how you achieve this

After all the feedback here I did some testing and it appears the GP was wrong: The submenu obtained by 3D touch/long-press doesn't actually turn WiFi off. My apologies for repeating his claim without backing it up.

Apple changed the behaviour of something that people have been using since the first smartphone (before, even), without indicating that to the user. Saying that the option is there when it's poorly-discoverable doesn't really counter the GP's point.

I think there is a valid point that while this is changing what is happening under the hood, the behaviour is effectively identical for the vast majority of users, and arguably improved for most use cases (most non-technical users wouldn't understand that that switch would stop airdrop working, and even as an extremely technical user I have accidentally forgotten to switch my WiFi back on after needing to temporarily disconnect, and have ended up using a fair bit of 4G data. Luckily I have a lot of included data on my plan, but for some they might have to pay extra).

You can still switch off the radios if you want in settings.

Honestly I don't think it's effectively identical for the vast majority of users.

Every single time I've wanted to turn off Wifi and Bluetooth, it's because I know I'm going to struggle to get my battery to last till I can charge it again. I'm going to be out and on the move, so Wifi has no value to me except as a battery drain.

In fact, I struggle to think of any other ordinary use for disabling Wifi and Bluetooth. The real exceptions are like (I have this one now) I don't have ADSL at home but I haven't been bothered to turn off the modem or my mate who's paranoid of being stalked by companies. But those are exceptional. I wouldn't write a feature to deal with them. Except to keep the battery going, who turns wifi off?

It sounds like I've lost a real feature and I don't know how to get it back any more. If I want to be able to send and receive data but I want my phone to last all day[], what can I do?

[]: NB. The only reason I want my phone to last all day is because I want to use it. Consequently, saying "my phone lasts all day no problem" isn't an answer. You probably don't use your phone like I do.

> It sounds like I've lost a real feature and I don't know how to get it back

This. We can’t turn off BlueTooth/WiFi from the swipe-up screen anymore. Full stop.