The ABC has just released a major refresh of the iview mobile apps and website. The broadcaster and publisher has detailed the changes in this release:
Dedicated Show Screens
We’ve received a lot of feedback in recent times regarding the difficulty people had with locating all the relevant episodes and information about a show. We’ve taken this on board and are introducing show pages in iview. These new show pages bring together all of the available series, episodes, extras, cast and guest information in the one place, making it easier for you to browse and search for specific shows.
The new show page will group all available series and episodes of that show in the one space, with extras more easily distinguished. You’ll be able to easily jump between multiple series, if available, see all the episodes available to watch, and how much you’ve watched of each episode.
We’ll also be providing more information about the show itself, such as host, guests, cast and related links.
Refreshed Design
iview has been refreshed with an updated look and feel that brings it more in line with other popular ABC services such as ABC News and ABC Listen.
Improved Program Search
We have simplified and improved search to include only show results, rather than the confusing list of episodes that were provided before. We have also added the ability to recognise common misspellings for our popular programs.
Faster iview
The iview website and mobile apps have been completely rebuilt to make them faster and more reliable. This will also greatly improve our ability to add improvements and new features in coming months.
Improved Accessibility
As part of the refresh, we have taken steps to improve accessibility of iview across web and mobile with support for voiceover and expanding text sizes. There are more improvements in this area coming soon.
No more Flash
As announced in March 2018, the ABC iview development team has been working hard to bring HTML5 (DRM) streaming onto the iview website, which removes the need for the Adobe Flash Player plugin. This is an upgrade that has required extensive changes to our video processing workflow and delivery pipelines, as well as the website itself. The new website will no longer require you to download, install or allow Flash in order to watch your favourite shows.