With the ability to reach search by swiping down from any home screen page, the swipe-right search page is entirely redundant and obstructive. I return to my first page of icons by swiping right until it rubber-bands upon arrival. It's simple, straightforward, and effective.
With suggestions disabled, it is now a useless blank page, with search features that can be more easily accessed by swiping down on any home screen page. I believe Apple's intention was to make its spotlight features more visible to the user, however for those of us who know to swipe down to access search, the swipe-right search page serves no viable purpose and is only an annoyance.
if there were like some sort of magic button you could press that would magically make that page appear
You're right, there should be a toggle switch for it. There are legitimate reasons why the home button is not ideal for returning to that page:
- It takes longer.
Physically moving your thumb to the home button, pressing it, waiting for the page animation to complete and settle to a readable state, takes longer than simply swiping right with the finger that is already positioned on the screen.
- It wears out the home button faster.
Pressing the home button is a mechanical process, requiring the physical movement of precious metals coming in contact, completing a circuit, and sending a signal. This requires those metals to bend. All buttons you have ever used, such as the ones in your keyboard, mouse, and your phone, are rated with an expected key-press life. That means there is a specific number of times you can press a button before it is expected to fail. I have personally known at least three different people that have had their iPhone home buttons simply stop working, no longer responding to presses, because they had worn the contacts out by using up their key-press life. Think of it like text messages on your phone plan: You can send "x" amount of messages (button presses) except you do not get to refill. Wouldn't you want to make every button press purposeful to maximize the life of your $1,000+ iPhone, and avoid needless button presses and wear-&-tear when you can more easily and quickly swipe to where you want to go?
As mentioned before, for those who are aware of swipe-down search, there is absolutely
no advantage offered by the swipe-right search page, which
is only an inconvenience. There absolutely should be an option to disable the page.
