Here it is: the one and only real button on the front of this phone. Push it to summon the Home screen, which is your gateway to everything the iPhone can do. (Details on the Home screen appear on The Home Screen.)
Having a Home button is a wonderful thing. It means you can never get lost. No matter how deeply you burrow into the iPhone software, no matter how far off track you find yourself, one push of the Home button takes you all the way back to the beginning.
Sounds simple, but remember that the iPhone doesn't have an actual Back button or End button. The Home button is the only way out of some screens.
In the iPhone 3.0 software, the Home button has become more saddled with functions than ever. It's become Apple's only way to provide shortcuts for common functions; that's what you get when you design a phone that only has one button. Some functions you trigger with two button presses; some by holding down the Home button for a moment. Here's the rundown.
Pressing the Home button once wakes the phone if it's in Standby mode. That's sometimes easier than finding the Sleep switch on the top edge.
If you press the Home button twice quickly, it can perform one of four other functions. To specify which of these four functions you prefer, see General; in the meantime, here are your options:
Search. Two quick pushes on the Home button can open up the new Spotlight (global search) feature described on Spotlight: Global Search. Honestly, though, you're better off using the two-slow-presses shortcut instead so that you can dedicate the two-quick-press thing to one of the other common features (read on).
Opens your speed-dial list. Two quick pushes on the Home button can take you directly to your Favorites list (Dialing from the Phone App). That's a great shortcut, because it lets you jump from any software program on the iPhone to the phone-calling list without having to go Home first.
Start up the camera. If you use the iPhone's camera a lot, you may prefer to dedicate the double-Home-button-press to starting up the Camera mode (Chapter 6).
Opens your iPod. Two quick pushes on the Home button can, instead, take you directly to your iPod screen (Chapter 5). Once again, Apple is assuming that you might want a shortcut to such a frequently used part of the iPhone.
Tip
The Home button is also part of the force quit sequence—a good troubleshooting technique when a particular program seems to be acting up. See Reset: Six Degrees of Desperation.
The Home button has one final trick: If you hold it down for about 3 seconds, you open up the delicious new voice control feature. Here, you can dial by speaking a name or number, or control the music playback. Details are on Voice Dialing (iPhone 3GS).
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