BlackBerry has started the rollout of BlackBerry 10.2 OS, the new release of its BlackBerry 10 OS that brings a number of changes and improvements.
The OS update will be available for the BlackBerry Z10, Q10 and Q5 smartphones, starting this week in Africa, Asia Pacific, Canada, Middle East and Europe, while users in Latin America will get the update in November. BlackBerry has not mentioned a specific release date for the US but it has said that US users will get the update this winter.
The BlackBerry 10.2 OS features a new Priority Hub for important conversations that learns from the user's behaviour and puts critical messages at the top of the inbox. It also brings a new attachment view that helps users organise files and documents across their messaging accounts and within specific message threads.
BlackBerry has also updated the 'BBM Video' video chat service with 'Natural Sound', to make conversations between BlackBerry 10 smartphones sound more natural and realistic.
The BlackBerry 10.2 OS also offers actionable toast notifications for BBM, SMS and E-mail messages. The notifications offer message previews in any open app. Users can respond to the BBM or SMS messages without leaving the app with a single swipe. It also brings better lock screen notifications that offer more information than just the count of new messages. Users can scroll over the notification icons on the lockscreen to display the sender and subject line.
The BlackBerry touch keyboard has also been updated with improved audio feedback with distinct tones for specific keys like backspace, and shift.
BlackBerry 10.2 also enhances sharing helping users reduce the number of steps and amount of time it takes to share files, photos, or documents. Touching "share" in any app now provides suggestions on who and how to share files based on the user's past behaviour.
The BlackBerry 10.2 OS update also brings Copy and paste enhancements offering more precise cursor control, fir easy text and a pop up menu offering editing options and direct sharing with BBM, Facebook and Twitter, for quick copy, paste and share.
Besides these new features, the BlackBerry 10.2 OS update also brings a better Calendar, Docs to Go, a new BlackBerry Hub icon, and camera enhancements, among other changes.
The BlackBerry 10.2 OS update can be downloaded over the air, and while users will get an alert in the notifications section of the BlackBerry Hub prompting them to update, they can also go to the System Settings menu and check if the update is available by selecting Software Updates.