Open Radar

 
Summary:
It was excited when I realized that the alertTitle finally offers a solution to the repeated app name in Notification Center. Prior to iOS 8.2, you'd see the name of the app once, then every individual notification would be preceded by the name of the app. Fortunately, alertTitle fixes that—it displays above each notification in Notification Center, rather than the app name. The alertTitle is also used for the Apple Watch short look, which works out well.

The problem is, this information is completely omitted on the iOS lock screen, where most people will see their notifications. That means that the information either has to be included in the notification body itself, or it has to be more of a summary of what the notification body says. The alertTitle documentation does an OK job of explaining that, but doesn't address its usage in iOS at all.

Adding to the confusion, notifications from some Apple apps like Mail actually use the same title on the lock screen and in notification center. The name of the app doesn't appear on the lock screen at all. This seems far better to me—the icon is already there to identify the app, and the app name still appears once in Notification Center if there's any confusion.

In short:

1. If alertTitle is meant to include information that's still useful even when alertBody is right below it, then it should be displayed on the iOS lock screen.
2. If alertTitle is meant to simply repeat information that's in alertBody, there's not much reason for it to appear in Notification Center.
3. Either way, a name like alertSummary seems far more clear for the way it's used, though I suppose it's too late to change that now.
4. Usage should be consistent across all apps, instead of treating some apps like Mail differently.

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Present a UILocalNotification where alertTitle is set
2. View the notification on the iOS lock screen.
3. View the notification in iOS's Notification Center.

Expected Results:
Both places should show the same information. More specifically, I expected the first, bold line of text to be the alertTitle.

Actual Results:
The alertTitle is displayed in Notification Center, but not on the lock screen. On the lock screen the app name appears instead of the title. In Notification Center, the app name appears in addition to the title, above the individual notifications.

Version:
iOS 8.2

Configuration:
iPhone 6