Dealing with phone calls or text messages

iOS may be capable of multitasking on newer devices, but the foundation of the operating system is still very much focused on presenting one application at a time. Even though applications can run in the background, there is still only one app visible on screen.

So what happens if the user gets a text message or phone call while in the process of using our application? It's extremely likely that a call from mom or dad is much more important than our app, even if we'd like to believe otherwise. We have to assume that at any given moment, the user could leave unexpectedly.

So how we design our interface to transition the user in and out of the application is key. If the user has spent minutes configuring our app a specific way, and that work is lost when they leave to answer a text message, they may find themselves extremely frustrated with this experience.

For this recipe, we'll discuss ways in which we can prepare for text messages, phone calls...