iOS 26.5 Will Likely Bring End-to-End Encrypted RCS Messaging to Your iPhone


Apple pushed out the iOS 26.5 release candidate on Monday, more than a month after the company released the massive iOS 26.4 update, which included new emoji, video podcasts and more. The iOS 26.5 RC brings a few smaller — but impactful — changes to the iPhones of developers and beta testers, including end-to-end encrypted RCS messaging. 

The download page for the iOS 26.5 release candidate.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

Because this is an RC, I recommend downloading it only on a device other than your primary one. This isn’t the final version of iOS 26.5, so the update might be buggy and battery life may be shortened. It’s best to keep those problems on a secondary device.

Also, since this isn’t the final version of iOS 26.5, Apple could add more features to the update before it arrives on your iPhone.

Here are some features developers and beta testers can try now, and what could land on your iPhone when Apple releases iOS 26.5. Apple usually releases iOS updates about a week after releasing an RC, so it could release iOS 26.5 to the general public on May 11 or 12.

End-to-end encrypted RCS messaging returns

The iOS 26.5 RC brings end-to-end encrypted RCS messaging to your device — finally. When Apple brought RCS messaging to iPhones with iOS 18, one feature the messaging protocol was missing was end-to-end encryption, and iOS 26.5 will likely bring this privacy protection to your iPhone.

To find this setting, go to Settings > Apps > Messages > RCS Messaging and tap the slider next to End-to-End Encryption (Beta)

A screenshot showing the end-to-end encryption option in Messages on the iOS 26.5 beta.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

Apple writes in the feature’s description that it’s still in beta, and it works only on certain carriers and devices. Apple also writes that these encrypted messages will be labeled as such, so you should know when your messages do and don’t have this level of protection.

Apple included end-to-end encrypted RCS messaging in beta versions of iOS 26.4, but the tech giant didn’t include the feature in the final release.

Ads could arrive in Maps

If you open your Maps app after downloading the iOS 26.5 RC, you’ll see a new splash screen that announces the arrival of ads in the app. 

A screen discussing ads in the Maps app on iPhone.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

“Maps may show local ads based on your approximate location, current search terms, or view of the map while you search,” Apple says. “For your privacy, advertising information is not linked to your Apple Account.”

Apple announced Apple Business in March, allowing companies to connect with customers via some of Apple’s first-party apps, such as Mail and Wallet. Apple Business also lets companies place local ads in Maps. So you could start seeing ads in Maps for the coffee shop down the street from your home.

New sections and Suggested Places in Maps

The iOS 26.5 RC also brings new sections and a new Suggested Places menu to your Maps app. Once in the app, tap your Search bar like you’re going to look up a nearby cafe or restaurant. You’ll see the new sections under the search bar, and Suggested Places will appear below Recents.

Apple Maps showing the new Fast Food and Restaurants sections, as well as Suggested Places menu.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

New Pride Luminance wallpaper

The iOS 26.5 RC brings a new Pride wallpaper to your device to celebrate LGBTQ+ communities ahead of Pride Month. The new wallpaper, called Pride Luminance, features vertical stripes that shift each time you unlock your device.

The Pride Luminance wallpaper Apple introduced with iOS 26.5.

Apple/Screenshot by CNET

Monthly payments on annual subscriptions

The iOS 26.5 update will introduce a new way to pay for subscriptions in the App Store. Apple wrote online that starting with the upcoming iOS update, developers can offer monthly payments for 12-month subscriptions. 

“This new payment option allows you to offer subscribers more affordable options,” Apple wrote. 

This means if an app offers a yearly subscription at a discount, you could subscribe to that annual plan at the lower rate but pay for it month-to-month. However, Apple did write that if you cancel your subscription before your subscription ends, you’ll have to continue making payments until the end of your agreement. 

Live Activities on third-party accessories in the EU

According to 9to5Mac, the iOS 26.5 beta also lets third-party accessories display Live Activities updates sent from iPhones. However, this is only available on devices in the European Union.

Here are the full release notes for the iOS 26.5 RC:

This update includes the following enhancements:

  • End-to-end encrypted RCS messaging (beta) in Messages is available with supported carriers and will roll out over time. For more information visit: https://support.apple.com/109526.
  • Pride Luminance wallpaper that dynamically refracts a spectrum of colors, is available for download.
  • Suggested Places in Maps displays recommendations based on what’s trending nearby and your recent searches.

Those are a few of the new features developers and public beta testers can try now with the iOS 26.5 RC. There could be more betas before the OS is released to the public, so there’s plenty of time for Apple to change these features and add others. Apple wrote in a blog post that it will release iOS 26.5 to the general public in May, but didn’t give an exact date.

For more iOS news, here’s everything you should know about iOS 26.4 and iOS 26.3. You can also check out our iOS 26 cheat sheet.

Watch this: What iPhone Users Actually Want From the New Google-Powered Siri





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Python Variables – Table of Content

Python Variable 

A name that is used to refer to the memory location in a programming language is called a variable. Python Variables are also termed storage containers in other words. Variables in python are ‘statically typed’ meaning a user does not need to create variables while coding. The variables get declared themselves whenever a value is assigned to them. There are 4 main types of variables: integer, long integer, string, and float. Hence, we cannot have any type of command which can create a variable.

The main use of variables in python is to store values as a reserved memory container. In this article, we will understand what variables actually are, how identifier naming is done while working with the variables, declaration of a variable in python, identifying objects using variables, different types of variable names and their types such as local variable, global variable, object reference and how to finally delete a variable once created.

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Identifier Naming

Variables in python are just an example of an identifier that will recognize the literals which are being used in the program. They work according to a set of rules which are mentioned below:

  • The name of an identifier is always case-sensitive. For example, ‘WelcomeToHKR’ and ‘WelcometoHKR’ are not the same.
  • The identifier’s initial character should either be an alphabet or an underscore(_)
  • The alphabet following the initial alphabet
  • The identifiers cannot have special characters in them including white spaces.
  • The name of the identifier need not be the same as the keyword defined in the programming language.
  • Some examples to correct identifiers are: x301, _x, x_0, etc.
  • Some examples of incorrect identifiers are 2y, 1%r, =34, etc.

Declaring a Variable in Python

As we have discussed, there is no need to create a variable unless there needs to be a value assigned to it. One more thing which is very important to note is that variables need not be declared in a specific type. The type of variable can even be changed after the user declares them. We use the equals (=) operator to assign a value to the variable.

Let us take an example of python code below to understand how we can declare variables in python:

a = 10

b = "HKR"

print(a)

print(b)

Output:

10

HKR

The user can also re-declare the variable after creating it. Check out the python code below:

Number = 10

print("Before declaring the variable: ", Number)

Number = 12

 
print("After re-declaring the variable:", Number)

Output:

Before declaring the variable:  10

After re-declaring the variable: 12

Object Identification Using Variables

Every variable created in python is unique. It is not possible to have two same variables for 2 different objects. There is a built-in function in python id() which identifies the id of the variable meaning whether it’s defined already or it’s new.

Let us take an example of python code below and understand how object identification is done in Python using variables:

x = 10 

y = x  

print(id(x))  

print(id(y))  

x = 50  

print(id(x))

Output:

9756512

9756512

9757792

Here in the code above, the user has assigned y = x, where both x and y are pointing to the same object. With the use of id() function, it will also return the same number.

Hence, we will re-assign x to 50; then it is termed as a new object identifier and will have a new changed output.

Variable Names

We have already discussed how variables work with programming languages and how we can declare them along with assigning value to them. The names of variables may be of any length having a lowercase (a to z), an uppercase (A to Z), any digits from 0 to 9, or an underscore (_).

Let us take an example below and see how variable names can work in python.

Name = "Y" 

name = "X"  

naMe = "Z"  

NAME = "M"  

n_a_m_e = "L"  

_name = "N"  

n_a_m_e = "L"

name_ = "O"  

_name_ = "P"  

na56me = "R"  

  

print(Name,name,naMe,NAME,n_a_m_e, NAME, _name, n_a_m_e, name_,_name, na56me)  

Output:

Y X Z M L M N L O N R

As we can see in the example above, the user has declared some valid variable names such as naMe, _name, etc. But this procedure might create confusion when one reads the code so therefore this is not mostly recommended. The user should try making the variable name a little descriptive hence making the code more readable.

The multi-keywords can be created as:

Pascal Case – In this, the first word is capitalized along with the word or abbreviation in the middle of the word. For example: WelcomeToHKR, HowAreYou, etc.

Snake Case – The words are separated using underscore(_) in the snake case. For example Welcome_To_HKR, How_Are_You, etc.

Camel Case – Mostly like the pascal case, each word in the middle will begin with a capital letter. For example: welcomeToHKR, howAreYou, etc.

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Python Variable Types

There are two types of variables in python: Local variable and Global variable.

Let us understand more about these and understand them in depth.

1. Local Variables: These types of variables are always defined inside the function. Their scope is also limited to the function only. Check out the example below of how we can make use of local variables in a python code:

def add():  

    x = 10  

    y = 20  

    z = x + y  

    print("The sum of numbers is:", z)  

add()

Output:

The sum of numbers is: 30

As we can clearly see in the code above, the user declared a function as add() to assign it to variables within the function. The variables will be called local variables as they will have scope inside the function only. If the user tries to declare them outside of the function, he will get a code error called NameError: name ‘x’ is not defined

2. Global Variables: These types of variables can be used both inside as well as outside the function. Their scope lies in the complete program. In case it is not mentioned in the code, the global variables are by default declared outside the function. In case the user forgets to mention the variable type, it will be local by default. Check out the example below of how we can make use of global variables in a python code:

a = 10  

  

def mainFunction():  

    global a  

    print(a)  

    a="Welcome To HKR Training"  

    print(a)    

mainFunction()  

print(a) 

Output:

10

Welcome To HKR Training

Welcome To HKR Training

As we can see in the code above, the user has declared a global variable a and a value is assigned to it. Then the user defines a function and it accesses the pre-declared variable inside the function by making use of the global keyword.

Variable type in Python

The data types in a programming language basically states the operations that are to be performed on the given data.  As we know that python works for objects in the programming, variables work as the objects only for the data types.

Here is a list of few data types that work with python variables:

  • Numeric
  • Sequence
  • Boolean
  • Set
  • Dictionary

assigned to different values.

Let us consider an example below and see how we can use various data types with variables:

var1 = 12345

print("Numeric data is : ", var1)

String = 'Welcome to HKR'

print("Topic is Python Variables")

print(String)

print(type(True))

print(type(False))

set = set("HKR Trainings")

print("\nSet with the use of String: ")

print(set)  

Dict1 = {1: 'HKR', 2: 'Welcomes', 3: 'You'}

print("\nDictionary with the use of Integer Keys: ")

print(Dict1)

 

Output:

Numeric data is :  12345

Topic is Python Variables

Welcome to HKR

<class 'bool'>

<class 'bool'>

Set with the use of String: 

{'g', 'a', 'r', 'R', 'i', 'n', 'T', ' ', 's', 'X', 'H'}

Dictionary with the use of Integer Keys: 

{1: 'HKR', 2: 'Welcomes', 3: 'You'}

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Object Reference

a=10

b=a

If we take the example above, we understand that the code creates an object to represent the value 10. Then, it is creating the variable in case it does not exist. It is made as a reference to this new object having a value of 10. In the second line, there is a creation of another variable b however it isn’t assigned with a but is made in reference to that object that an actually does.

Multiple Assignment

In python, a user is allowed to assign a single value to multiple variables. The user can perform multiple assignments in two different ways. It is done either by assigning one value to different variables or can also be done by having different variables assigned to different values.

Let us see an example below of how we can assign single value to multiple variables:

a=b=c=10    

print(a)    

print(b)    

print(c)

Output:

10

10

10

Now let us see another example of how we can assign multiple values to multiple variables:

a, b, c = 10, 20, "WelcomeToHKR"

print(a)

print(b)

print(c)

Output:

10

20

WelcomeToHKR

As the variables appear, the values will be assigned in the same manner only.

Deleting a Variable

A variable can be deleted using the ‘del’ keyword.  

Let us see an example of how we can delete a variable using python:

a = 10  

print(a)  

del a  

print(a)

Output:

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "./prog.py", line 4, in

NameError: name 'a' is not defined

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Conclusion

Through this article, we have understood what a variable is, how we can declare a variable inside a function and how we can assign a value to the variable. The article will help you clear all your doubts about python variables along with the basic rules that variables come up with.

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