Jailbreak Tweak Aims To Bring iPhone 6s 3D Touch-Style Functionality To Older Hardware [Video]

One of the great things about the introduction of any new iPhone hardware, as well as the availability of a new major version of iOS, is the excitement that is inevitably injected into the jailbreak community. We’ve already see a demonstration video that shows off a functioning untethered iOS 9 jailbreak. Now, thanks to Greek developer Elias Limneos, jailbreak fans have a 3D Touch inspired tweak to look forward to in the near future.

3D Touch is one of the defining features of Apple’s iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus. The new method of interaction aims to exist as the next-generation of multi-touch within iPhone hardware by introducing an entirely new way to interact with iPhone. For the first time ever, Apple’s iPhone is capable of sensing just how much force is applied to the display on three different levels, and will be capable of providing a new set of menus and actions based on that level of force. Limneos’ jailbreak tweak, which is currently in development, aims to emulate this as best as possible on older hardware.

3D touch

The package itself will be released onto Cydia under the Touch 3D name. Because Apple’s 3D Touch requires the capabilities of the iPhone 6s with new sensors mounted in the display, Touch 3D will not be a “true” clone of the feature. Because it can’t be as older phones don’t have the necessary hardware technology to pull off the exact thing.

This jailbreak tweak is a best attempt at emulation given the limitations of older hardware by using long tap-and-hold gestures that are available in the iOS SDK. As is standard practice for developers looking to drum up some interest in their packages, a video of the initial demo of Touch 3D has been released.

Like a lot of popular tweaks that require gestures and varying methods of invocation, Touch 3D will likely implement the powerful Activator library, developed and maintained by Ryan Petrich. Limneos has already included contextual menu support for the native Phone, Camera, and Settings applications, which will introduce an array of menus and features when a long press gesture is detected on the application icon directly from the home screen. The package is a little way off being complete, but given the quality of Elias’ previous work we can’t wait for this one to land in Cydia and support iOS 8 and above on older devices.

Check out the video and see for yourself. Do you see the value in attempting to emulate 3D Touch in older, non-supported hardware?

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