Why is a UITabBar considered Modal?

Reading the Apple documentation on the UITabBar states,

The most common use of a tab bar is to implement a modal interface where tapping an item changes the selection.

With my definition of Modal being:

A modal view is one that has to be dismissed before you can do anything else.

But that's not always the use case. I could be interacting with the content view of the UITabBar's first item/button, and that could allow 开发者_如何学JAVAme to reach another view.

OR, I could select another item/button from the UITabBar and reach yet another view.

So how is that considered Modal? (Or is my use case not Modal, and they are just saying, in general, its used Modally?)

I think "modal" here means different "modes".