When I look at the Lock Screen in iOS 16, I see an Apple that’s gotten the message that we want to personalize our devices but isn’t willing to do what Android did and let everyone have at it.
Instead, it’s going to do this the Apple way. The company seems to be building a set of themes that allow users to express themselves by choosing from options and sets and styles rather than making decisions they’ll probably regret later.
Apple on Thursday provided more details about how it will let developers offer third-party payment providers in their apps distributed in South Korea.
Similar to what happened in the Netherlands, where Apple created a special entitlement for dating apps that offer alternative payment methods, developers who want to offer an alternative payment processing option in South Korea must use the StoreKit External Purchase Entitlement.
In iOS 15.1, Apple finally made it so sensor-based automations could be triggered based on air quality, humidity, or light level.
With the right sensors, this new capability can open up a world of possibilities, and if you have a lot of HomeKit accessories, you may have more sensors than you realize.
Although mental health conditions can be successfully treated at a low cost, studies have found a significant gap between individuals needing care and those able to access it. According to the WHO, to close this gap, three things need to happen: better understanding of mental health in order to reduce stigma; more effort placed on increasing access to high-quality treatments; and more research conducted to develop better treatments. Experts say that in addition to efforts by psychologists and psychiatrists, a new resource can be used to tackle all three of these needs—mental health apps on mobile devices.
Apple has launched a new campaign for developers in its App Store called Founders, which aims to put certain developers in the spotlight with editorial support across Europe, alongside celebrating the apps that are currently available from them.
The redesigned MacBook Air with the all-new M2 Apple silicon chip will be available for customers starting Friday, July 15, MacRumors has learned from a retail source.
[...]
With a launch planned for July 15, pre-orders can be expected to go live on Friday, July 8.
Immue has seen attackers abuse Apple’s new feature to mask their IPs and send thousands of bots to attack their customers. These private relay IPs are also whitelisted by Apple, giving adversaries uninhibited access to any website.
Apple Inc. didn’t use the most potent weapon in the management-side playbook—requiring workers to attend anti-union meetings—in recent organizing efforts in Maryland and Georgia, signaling a shift in strategy as the Biden administration seeks to crack down on the practice.
The results at the two stores couldn’t have been more different. In Atlanta, Apple exerted enough pressure that workers withdrew their election petition. In Towson, Md., the union prevailed by a wide margin in an election June 18.
I have not used any of the beta operating systems from Apple yet, but it certainly seems to me Apple, with the new iPhone lock screen, has gotten a good balance between allowing for customization while maintaining the iPhone brand.
Of course, Apple has years of perfecting this lock screen on the Apple Watch, so it was not surprising that it has done such a good job for the iPhone.
It will be very interesting, I believe, to find out what Apple has in stored for the iPad's lock screen next year.
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Thanks for reading.
“iOS 16 and iPadOS 16 will continue to support iPad as a home hub with no loss in functionality,” Apple spokesperson Catherine Franklin said in a statement to The Verge. While that seems promising on its face, there is a big asterisk. Apple is planning to introduce a new architecture to the new Home app in iPadOS 16, and the iPad won’t be supported as a home hub with that architecture.
Cut individual apps from the iOS apron strings and they can push updates as and when it suits them. Users get new features on a timely basis, Apple gets to take one more advantage away from Android, and changes to individual apps get the attention they deserve instead of being buried or completely ignored amid the excitement of 50 other announcements. Apple already does this with apps like Pages and iMovie, and it’s time it came to the rest if iOS’s native apps too.
Apple's new Community+ program is designed to recognize frequent contributors' "positive attitude, expertise, and curiosity" as they help other posters solve their technical problems.
Debuting quietly, the Apple Community+ Program is world-wide, and limited to select invitees. On a site for the program, the company does give guidelines on what they are looking for.
This week marks 15 years since the iPhone first went on sale and ushered in a new era: the age of the smartphone. To record a snapshot of that change, Associated Press photographers around the world captured images on their mobiles and reflected on the nature of iPhone photography
In 2022, the iPhone continues to extend beyond its svelte metal-and-glass chassis into the world around us. It's the backbone for products like the Apple Watch and AirPods, and will likely play a role in future Apple products like rumored AR glasses.
It also serves as the foundation for Apple's digital services, which have become an increasingly important factor to differentiate the iPhone from competing mobile devices. These services have evolved rapidly in recent years along with the iPhone.
The Apple Gift Card removes all that complexity, with one gift card eligible towards almost any Apple purchase, for physical or digital goods. Today’s rollout brings the Apple Gift Card to the biggest Europe regions.
Whether you have an infectious beat in your head you want to turn into a ringtone, you want to learn a little music theory, or you're a serious musician with studio ambitions, the tablet is surprisingly capable. It combines hardware power and useful apps that can aid in recording, editing, and exporting your music.
PDF Expert by Readdle has been a leading PDF utility since the early days of the App Store, offering the kind of pro-level features that are critical to users whose work depends on managing and editing PDFs. With today’s update to version 3, PDF Expert for Mac debuts a new look, optical character recognition support, new export formats, and changes to its business model across all platforms.
Unlike on the iPhone, Mac, and Apple Watch, there is no Apple Calculator app for the iPad. From the most popular to the most functional, this is a list of apps to fill that gap.
The new BoostCharge Pro three-in-one charger offers 15W fast charging for your iPhone 12 or 13 and 5W charging for your AirPods or AirPods Pro.
Redesigned for the recent M1 Pro MacBook Pro models, the signature vintage-inspired leather covers have been refreshed to carry Apple’s 14- and 16-inch machines with all of the expected premium designs in tow.
The BirdNET app, a free machine-learning powered tool that can identify over 3,000 birds by sound alone, generates reliable scientific data and makes it easier for people to contribute citizen-science data on birds by simply recording sounds.
History has repeatedly demonstrated that whenever people’s personal data is tracked and stored, there’s always a risk that it could be misused or abused. With the Supreme Court’s Friday overruling of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion, collected location data, text messages, search histories, emails and seemingly innocuous period and ovulation-tracking apps could be used to prosecute people who seek an abortion — or medical care for a miscarriage — as well as those who assist them.
The iPod introduced me to to many audio entertainment from podcasts to audiobooks, while the iPhone gave me back the joy of reading. From e-books to RSS to Instapaper to the various news apps that I've used over the years, I now always have something to read while I am waiting in lines, or lying in bed at the end of the day.
I wish I will have another 15 years with iPhones.
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The passkey is a modern replacement for passwords that rebuilds the security wall protecting standard account logins. Proximity—in the form of the device that stores your passkeys—is a powerful tool in reducing account hijacking and interception. Passkeys may seem scary and revolutionary, but they’re actually safer and, in some ways, a bit old-fashioned: they’re a bit of a throwback to a time when having access to a terminal provided proof you were authorized to use it.
I don’t mean to glibly suggest that Apple Health is a panacea for this dilemma. It’s certainly worth worrying about which third-party apps you grant access to your Health data, for one thing. And for another, data stored on-device is still accessible to law enforcement if they have possession of the device and can unlock it. But it’s a distinction worth noting. HealthKit was designed from the ground up to be cryptographically secure in this way.
DEVONtechnologies has released DEVONthink 3.8.4 with a long and varied list of additions and improvements for the document and information manager. A new preference allows you to decide whether viewed items are marked as read, a new filter pane finds multimedia documents, and several inspector panes receive new options.
Unread is a great way to follow and read RSS feeds on iPhone and iPad — and with Unread 3, it's better than ever thanks to the integration of an all-new sync service.
We love keyboards here at The Sweet Setup [...], especially mechanical keyboards, so today we’re going to walk through the basic things you need to know when shopping for mechanical keyboards. We’re also going to do brief reviews of a few Keychron keyboards that we think are great starter boards for Apple users who want to get into the mechanical keyboard world without giving up some of the quality-of-life features we’re used to.
Tending after houseplants might offer you a reprieve from digital screens, but plant apps can actually be helpful resources for foliage enthusiasts. You’ve probably Googled a plant question and found yourself on a gardening subreddit before, but did you know that there are excellent plant apps out there that can help you troubleshoot plant problems and identify new plants?
Apple says an antitrust bill aimed at cracking open the app-store market will make iPhones less secure — even though Congress and some large firms already have Apple-approved tools that let them bypass the App Store.
A company spokesperson said that all known accounts and certificates associated with the spyware have been revoked, so the malicious app can no longer be distributed outside of the App Store.
Users can learn how to play within a matter of seconds and often without instructions. And some hypercasual games don’t feel like games at all, instead tapping into the trend for autonomous sensory meridian response videos by asking players to paint virtual nails, pop virtual bubble wrap and slice virtual objects.
But the publishers and studios behind these apps are starting to add some elements of complexity—such as leaderboards, multiplayer formats and in-app purchases—to historically uncomplicated games, looking to retain players as the market saturates and landmark shifts in technology make it harder to monetize apps with advertising.
I hope the smartphone will not be an essential piece of equipment that we need to carry and use in order to get on our lives. But I do think this is a losing battle.
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Quickly, some housekeeping. First, this is not the official battery life estimate with which I will ultimately be updating the review. That will be based on multiple trials, and hopefully many that are not as... weird as what I did here. (That said, our battery life test is always a ballpark estimate, and I’ve never pretended it’s anything else. Never treat one review as your only data point, etc. etc.)
Second, while I did really want to kill this battery, I should emphasize that I always want my battery tests to reflect my personal workload — so while there are certainly intense things I could’ve done to kill the battery more quickly, I did take care here not to artificially run anything ridiculous and to stick with programs and tasks that I would actually do on a real day (albeit a more intense real day, in parts).
While M2 brings performance improvements compared to M1, it seems that this is not the case when it comes to storage speed. Tests done with the new M2 MacBook Pro reveal that its entry-level model has a slower SSD than the M1 model.
The freedom to be able to take your phone all over the world and not pop in another physical SIM card to stay tethered to the world is unparalleled. Thanks to eSIMs this reality has been around since 2017 on smartphones — but I only just discovered the joy of getting an eSIM connection on my iPhone when I recently traveled to Europe from the US.
A new HomePod is coming, according to Bloomberg‘s Mark Gurman. In his latest edition of the Power On newsletter, the journalist says Apple is readying a new smart speaker for next year, which will look and sound similar to the original version discontinued a year ago.
Once upon a time, all-day battery on Apple laptops 'just' meant a single work day. But now, all-day battery meant just that: all day, 24 hours. Progress!
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Apple today changed the subscription management interface on the iPhone and iPad, introducing a refreshed look that adds spacing between each subscription and it makes it clearer which subscriptions are active and inactive.
While it’s increasing the price from $4.99 to $5.99 / month in the US and Canada, student users in the UK can expect a similar jump from £4.99 to £5.99 / month.
Apple employees can use their company benefits to travel out-of-state to receive medical care, the company confirmed on Friday. The benefit has been available to employees for over 10 years, the company said.
Apple Inc (AAPL.O)accepts the outcome of a vote by Maryland store workers to become its first U.S. employees to join a union and is ready to bargain with them, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday.
[...]
In a statement, David Sullivan, the union's eastern territory vice president, said the members "look forward to bargaining with Apple and obtaining a strong first contract that makes positive changes for Apple workers and the customers they are proud to serve."
So, I've had some sort of medical emergency, and the clinic that I was visiting called me up and asked me to go the hopsital immediately the other evening. Two rounds of tests later, I am now resting at home, and I think the doctors are satisfied that things are relatively okay, for now.
I am cautiously declaring that things are... back to normal? Things are never back to normal, I guess.
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I have a medical issue that I need to take care right now. This site will not be updated for a few days.
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Thanks for reading.
After two months, the iWork suite is being updated from version 12.0 to 12.1. With that, Pages, Numbers, and Keynote are receiving general improvements and new functions so iPhone, iPad, and Mac users can take advantage of them.
Sure, not everybody needs Mail Merge, but for those who do, having it built in and no longer requiring you jump through a series of hoops is a huge relief. Next time I have to send out my personalized bookplates, I’ll be glad to be able to let Pages do the heavy lifting.
Elton John is using his music to inspire inclusivity everywhere — including fitness!
On Tuesday, Apple's Fitness+ announced new music for its Apple Spotlight series by diverse musicians like John, Katy Perry, Prince and Daft Punk. The series dedicates an entire workout playlist to each artist.
WatchTube is a new app that, as the name suggests, lets you watch just about any YouTube video on the Apple Watch. And the best part is, it works as intended.
The new 4 button switch gives simple one-touch control of HomeKit scenes and multiple smart lights and other devices.
Participants in the Metaverse Standards Forum include many of the biggest companies working in the space, from chip makers to gaming companies, as well as established standards-setting bodies like the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the group said in an statement announcing its creation on Tuesday.
Conspicuously missing from the member list for now however is Apple, which analysts expect to become a dominant player in the metaverse race once it introduces a mixed reality headset this year or next.
I doubt whatever Apple is creating is anything closed to what these companies call a metaverse.
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Realistically, however, what’s important is that if you’re having problems, you can turn off iCloud Private Relay first, and if that doesn’t resolve the issue, turn off Limit IP Address Tracking. If even that’s not enough, turn off Hide IP Address for Safari or Mail.
Otherwise, just leave them all on and enjoy whatever level of additional privacy they provide.
Unfortunately, Feedback Assistant and Radar are tools for Apple, and their needs serve Apple and only Apple. They are a complete waste of time for outside developers. I maintain that they are a black hole into which I pour time, effort, sample code, and (often useless) sysdiagnoses. I get nothing in return.
It works very simply. Just open up a photo or screenshot in the Photos app and look for the blue “i” icon underneath. If it has a little sparkly ring around it, then iOS has found something in the photo it can identify using machine learning. Tap the icon, then click “Look Up” and it’ll try and dredge up some useful information.
Ulysses 27 has just been released with a powerful new feature that users of the writing editor app will very much appreciate – the ability to add Tables on the iPhone, iPad, or Mac.
The engineer explains that he came up with the “magnifying text loupe” idea to let users know where exactly they were pointing the text cursor, which was crucial to having copy and paste. However, even with that classic virtual magnifying glass, the cursor ended up moving between characters after the user lifted their finger off the screen due to natural flickering.
Kocienda had to develop a “touch history log” just for text editing. This way, after taking the finger off the screen, the system automatically detected the position of the user’s finger milliseconds after the last touch, so that the cursor remained where the user really wanted it.
"I am proud of them," Biden told reporters on Monday. "Workers have a right to determine under what condition they are going to work or not work."
[...]
"I am proud of them," Biden told reporters on Monday. "Workers have a right to determine under what condition they are going to work or not work."
This afternoon, Safari on my Mac suddenly couldn't reach DuckDuckGo nor Google websites. I switch to Firefox, and all's well. I switch to Edge, and all's well too.
Okay, so something went wrong with Private Relay (still in beta), I guess?
So I launch System Preference, and was about to stop Private Relay, when I was suddenly alerted that one of my work website was returning HTTP 500 error.
Oh dear. Coincidence?
Long story short, it turned out the common theme is likely because Cloudflare, a popular CDN service, is having problem. And both the website and Private Relay were both affected.
But while Cloudflare was still saying they are investigating the issue, Apple's Private Relay is back up and running.
So, what did I learn today? Apple's Private Relay is probably using Cloudflare. And Apple probably has multiple different CDN services that it can swap in and out on a moment's notice. And I am older by another day.
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Thanks for reading.
Townscaper is a small game, with big ambitions. A city builder in which players can simply add or remove a block from the game world. With this limited toolset, you can craft everything from idyllic seaside towns to a horizon spanning metropolis. A procedural generation engine running under the hood caters to the unique topographies players establish and refines the world with each new action taken. But how is it capable of expanding, and rebuilding the world with such consistency? While also introducing fun and novel ideas for players to discover on their own.
For this case study we’re going to explain the different level generation systems that power Townscaper and the AI principles they derive from. Plus I sat down with the game’s creator Oskar Stalberg to gain a stronger understanding of how it all works and his aspirations in designing the game. In order to truly understand Townscaper, we’ll be taking a journey through Stalberg’s career and his previous work. Because the secrets to the game’s success are hiding in plain sight, in everything else that he has built to date.
This is one of the most significant WWDC announcements for enterprise and it’s good to see that Apple has been thoughtful in deciding which features to add or update since most of them tackle areas that were difficult, time consuming, resource intensive, or tedious. Apple is not just addressing enterprise customer needs, but demonstrating that it understands those needs.
Not publishing one sentence per line, no. Write like this for your eyes only. HTML or Markdown combine separate lines into one paragraph.
Why is it so useful?
I'm still having quite a few flu-like symptoms, while the ART results are still returning negative. And I am having strange dreams: discovering a lot of things I forgot to do at work.
This is no fun.
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Thanks for reading.
The vote means workers at the Towson, Md., store plan to join the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) once a contract is ratified. Saturday evening’s initial tally was 65-33, and the official count was pending.
[...]
Billy Jarboe, a Towson Apple employee and union organizer, said that Apple’s campaign to undermine the organizing effort “definitely shook people,” but that most union backers stayed strong.
Read-later apps are a convenient way to bookmark digital content that you want to return to. Such apps can save articles, Twitter threads, and even entire websites so that you can revisit them.
This can come in handy when you don’t immediately have spare time to browse, but you’ll have a moment later to catch up on current affairs — say during your commute. As a bonus, they allow you to access content when you don't have an internet connection. We're highlighting five tried-and-tested read-later apps that we strongly recommend, presented in alphabetical order.
We need to act now to prevent this distraction and cool the fever-pitch hype. Scientists and engineers should focus on building models that meet people’s needs for different tasks, and that can be evaluated on that basis, rather than claiming they’re creating über consciousness. Similarly, we urge the media to focus on holding power to account, rather than falling for the bedazzlement of seemingly magical AI systems, hyped by corporations that benefit from misleading the public as to what these products actually are.
Happy Father's Day, and thanks for reading.
In celebration of Juneteenth, Mance is revisiting a series of digital drawings created on iPad Pro titled “The Ancestors’ Juneteenth,” in which she places historical Black figures in present-day settings to reflect on Black people’s journey from the 19th to the 21st century. In these illustrations, Mance draws ink on paper before she snaps an image in Adobe Scan on her iPad Pro. In Procreate, Adobe Photoshop, and Adobe Fresco, she colors her scanned image non-photo blue, simulating the process of creating comics, while using Apple Pencil to add layers of color — a workflow she previously completed using a light table and analog tools.
Under most scenarios, the 35 total watts will be split evenly between the two connected devices, with the exception being when one of the devices has relatively low power requirements, such as an Apple Watch or AirPods case.
The miniature dual-port power adapter that Apple showed off at its recent developers conference is now available. The USB-C charger provides up to 35W and is compatible with a wide variety of devices.
By bringing languages from all over the world onto one platform, Duolingo creates more than just a way to broaden your linguistic capabilities -- it's also about broadening your horizons. The upbeat way that the company does this, with bright colors and interesting graphics, draws the eye. The encouragement makes Duolingo users feel as though they're making progress.
Although that rat's nest of old chargers in your bedside table is aesthetically salient (and awful), it's apparently not a big contributor to this ballyhooed e-waste problem. According to the 2020 Global E-Waste Monitor, chargers represent some 0.1 percent of the 53.6 million metric tons of tech garbage produced each year.
As usual, the EU is spending a lot of time and effort on something that is not that big of a problem in the grand scheme of things. Really, the Eurocrats probably produced more waste—both e- and analog—during its decade-long pursuit of plenipotentiaries, multi-language reports and brochures, PowerPoint presentations, and flights to and from Brussels every few quarters trying to tackle this mechanical menace.
Well, I've had the flu. Not the Covid kind-of flu, according to the ART testing results. Just a 'regular' flu. This may explain why I was feeling so tired the whole week?
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Thanks for reading.
In the bluntest terms: Apple could have engineered Stage Manager to work on non-M1 iPads, it just didn’t want to degrade the overall experience in any way to make that happen. This isn’t necessarily nefarious plotting on Apple’s part, but rather, the standard way Apple makes business decisions. From Apple’s perspective, it’s a total win.
Ahead of the 14-inch MacBook Pro release, Apple has updated macOS Monterey with a small revision specifically for the Apple Silicon M2 processor.
You just can’t lose with Adobe Fresco. It's free. It’s truly fun. It’s so satisfying to use it's practically therapeutic. It’s also a serious tool that helps you be productive, if you need it to be. Using the app is like having a marvelous toy box and discovering new treasures every time you open it. Enjoy yourself, get your creative work done, and accept Adobe’s evocative invitation to “get in touch with your canvas.”
A new layout style groups weather forecasts into easily consumable cards, there’s a handy dual-pane radar option to compare map views, enhanced storm tracking features, new secret locations, and more.
The popular iPhone photography app Camera+ 2 is getting a major update today. Improvements include an all-new editor that’s powered by machine learning for a faster and more intuitive experience. There’s also a new UltraRes 48 megapixel upscaling feature and a shift to a subscription model for new features.
One thing that we are not aware: where Apple is bringing Stage Manager to next year. And that's when the M1/M2 chips are really needed.
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With the new iMessage update, iPhone users will have up to 15 minutes after sending a message to edit or delete. Simpson Tuegel shares an example of how a perpetrator can send dangerous content to a victim, and then edit within those 15 minutes to hide their abuse. It’s also important to note that within those 15 minutes, the sender can edit the message multiple times. She also shares it’s unfair to rely on victims to screenshot these messages within a time frame.
Interested in some professional learning this summer? Do you own an iPad? Apple is hosting a series of free, virtual, hands-on professional learning experiences on iPad starting this week.
Apple Camp will take place each week from June 20 through August 31, with a new two-hour format for families. Participants in Apple Camp will be able to create a digital comic book about protecting and celebrating the planet through the “Art Lab: Comic Book Adventure With Your Family” session.
Camo, an app that lets you use an iOS, Android, or iPadOS device as a webcam for your computer, is introducing a new feature that could be very interesting for streamers and those who take every Zoom meeting very seriously. The app now includes the ability to create overlays and add them to your video stream, letting you include info such as your social media handles or name and pronouns anywhere your video appears.
With the Action Bar, Evernote users have quick access to search and shortcuts to create a new note, task, sketch, and capture a photo. Note List, as the name suggests, shows a list of your latest notes, while Task List does the same for the tasks you have added to the app.
Its service lets you track up to 82 micronutrients, log meals, set fasting timers, and has a massive database of food with accurate nutrition data.
It’s important to note that early this year, Apple started letting developers from the Small Business Program transfer their apps. A few months later, now the company is expanding this feature for those apps that use iCloud.
Place names are non-trivial, and many of them have captured a large amount of hateful and just plain ignorant behavior. That's why you can't just automatically build up a list of "this place was called this at this time". It needs people in the loop to make thoughtful decisions about how to handle the more interesting ones.
If Apple can only do one major re-thinking about how things work this beta season, and if I get to vote, I'd vote on re-thinking through editing of iMessages.
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Apple claims that viewers "around the world" can "watch all MLS, Leagues Cup, and select MLS NEXT Pro and MLS NEXT matches in one place—without any local broadcast blackouts or the need for a traditional pay TV bundle."
[...]
A blog post on Apple's newsroom site seems to suggest that while the service will be exclusive to the Apple TV app, it will be billed separately from Apple's catch-all Apple TV+ streaming service. That said, a limited number of MLS and League Cup matches will be available for free to Apple TV+ subscribers.
The deal, the terms of which have not been disclosed but is reportedly in the range of $2.5 billion over the entire contract, is also another significant migration of live sports from TV to a streaming platform. [...]
Soccer has been seen as a prime target for streaming services. The sport lacks the broad appeal in the U.S. of other major professional leagues, but it does have a passionate fan base that is younger than those for other events.
Apple will pay MLS a minimum of $250 million per year in each of the next 10 years. If the number of people who subscribe to the MLS streaming service crosses a certain threshold, Apple will begin sharing subscription revenue with the league. The specific number of subscribers needed to cross that threshold and the exact cut of revenue Apple would share with MLS have not been made public.
[...]
The real significance of this deal for the big leagues across the pond is that Apple has finally taken the plunge. European football clubs got rich off the back of battles for eyeballs in their domestic markets between their big traditional broadcaster and whatever new cable or satellite network entered their market 30 years ago. But peace has broken out on those fronts across the continent, leaving the EPL and all the other leagues batting their eyelids at the FAANGs — Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google – to come in and start throwing money around.
Did you know that with macOS Ventura, Clarus the Dogcow has at long last returned home? Recently, while doing something else, I accidentally hit Cmd+Shift+P which opened the Page Setup dialog. I was greeted, surprisingly, with a new high-resolution version of the classic Clarus icon that I’d never seen before. I looked at it briefly, and then closed the dialog and went back to whatever I was doing before. I had assumed that becuase I’d been in a 3rd-party app at the time, that the Clarus icon was just some easter egg the developer had left. But a little while later, I got to thinking. What were the chances that someone went to the trouble of customizing the Page Setup dialog, of all things, just for an easter egg? Zero, it turns out. That dialog shows Clarus on the page preview in every app.
In addition to the rather dull options for portrait or landscape printing, the ImageWriter’s Page Setup gave you checkboxes for more exciting options. And Clarus would do tricks when you selected these other options.
Apple today announced that the new 13-inch MacBook Pro equipped with the M2 chip will be available to order worldwide starting Friday, June 17 at 5 a.m. Pacific Time. Apple said deliveries to customers and in-store availability will begin Friday, June 24.
To earn the award, Apple Watch users will need to complete a yoga workout that lasts for 20 minutes or more on June 21.
iA Writer 6 brings the most important update since the launch of the product 12 years ago with the Markdown feature. This clean, simple, and distraction-free writing app now features a brand new wikilink feature, making it easier to connect, browse, and rediscover your writing.
Firefox has started to roll out Total Cookie Protection, a browser feature that competes with Safari's privacy systems by restricting how cookies are used and cutting down cross-site tracking.
Meditation app Simple Habit’s founder, Yunha Kim, is launching a new app today called Sleep Reset to help you improve your sleep. The app aims to bring users the same treatment they would otherwise receive in sleep clinics — such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Insomnia (CBT-I) — to mobile devices.
PATs authenticate an HTTP request automatically in the background. Web users won't notice a thing, and cloud providers such as Cloudflare and Fastly are already incorporating the technology.
As of this week, Apple will begin shipping repaired iPhone 12 models in a new brown box that is 100% plastic free and created with bleach-free paper certified by the Forest Stewardship Council, according to a company memo obtained by MacRumors. Until now, all repaired iPhones shipped in a white box.
The company is now testing the free version in Canada, where users are able to access Photoshop on the web through a free Adobe account. Adobe describes the service as “freemium” and eventually plans to gate off some features that will be exclusive to paying subscribers. Enough tools will be freely available to perform what Adobe considers to be Photoshop’s core functions.
Celia Castleman and Kelly Cox designed the app, which they named The Drop, to share exclusively human breast milk. The Drop allows parents who are overproducing, or have time to pump more milk, to distribute their excess to parents who are in need.
Breastmilk will always be in supply, the founders said. They wanted to elevate a form of feeding that isn’t reliant on factories or subject to shift due to crises.
I am sort of happy that Apple doesn't seem to be adding sports content into Apple TV+ (except for some 'trial' episodes) so Apple may continue to keep the price of Apple TV+ low.
But then, I wonder: will Apple also keep the price of sports content low? Will Apple price sports content at different levels in different countries? (Does anyone outside of North America want to pay for MLS?) Will there be sports bundling of MLB and MLS and whatever else Apple is pursuing? Or a new tier for Apple One?
Someone is definitely working full time with Numbers documents over at Apple, I would think.
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Thanks for reading.
“It started when we were working on the watch,” he said. “And because the watch was such a personal device, and you’re wearing it, we thought that there is a huge opportunity to maybe give people information about their health, and the more we started pulling on threads, we decided that not only is there an opportunity — there’s a responsibility to do more in the health space.”
Williams said that the impact of that felt responsibility is what has resulted in the many health features Apple has introduced in the years since the Watch’s introduction, both on the Watch and across its platforms. Ultimately, Williams said, Apple has two “fundamental tenets” that undergird its approach to introducing new health-related products and services: that they be “deeply grounded in science,” and that “privacy is at the core of everything” Apple does.
“On the Mac, there are so many different ways to work. Some people use spaces, some people are in and out of Mission Control. Some people are command tab people, some people like to create a mess, some people clean up their messes and some people use minimization. I mean, there’s no wrong answer here, there are a lot of valid ways to work on the Mac.”
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“There were many of us who use the Mac every day who really wanted this kind of focused experience that gave us that balance. So we were on the Mac side, picking this idea up and saying we think that’s in reach, we want to make this happen. And separately on the iPad side we were thinking about [it]. And believe it or not two independent teams who are brainstorming and designing converge on almost the identical idea.”
With the release of version 5.4 for Mac and 7.4 for iOS, Lightroom now enables you to edit videos using the same controls that are used for photos. You can trim videos, adjust color and exposure, and apply presets optimized for video.
At the heart of the matter are concerns that the U.S. tech giant's rules obstruct third-party apps from accessing data used for targeted advertising, while not limiting Apple’s ability to obtain that same data.
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“ATT does not prevent companies from advertising or restrict their use of the first-party data they obtain from users with their consent,” an Apple spokesperson said. "These rules apply equally to all developers — including Apple — and we have received strong support from regulators and privacy advocates for this feature.”
Since the Mac OCSP appocalypse, which occurred on the day that macOS 11 Big Sur was released, we've now seen two major updates — macOS 12 Monterey and macOS 13 Ventura — that have both failed to fulfill Apple promise for an opt out preference.
“I had done a lot of voiceover work and jingle work in Sydney before,” she said. “The client was looking for a female voiceover artist working in the north east of the United States and so I went to the audition and got the job.”
She added, “I recorded 50 hours of script to create a voice system that was based on my speaking voice,” she said.
I've never installed nor use any beta software from Apple... since the very first Mac OS X public beta. Which do mean that I have not used Stage Manager on either macOS nor iPadOS yet. Which do mean I have no idea what I am about to say...
But, why wasn't the Stage Manager's shelf part of the Dock?
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Perhaps these updates are more like “filling gaps” releases, but in any case, there’s a lot here that suggests Apple isn’t simply trying to look to what’s next but to fix what’s come before and level the playing field across all its platforms.
Access is being described as open for a "limited time," but without mentioning when it will become unavailable outside the Apple TV+ subscription once again.
The 15A 120V outlet is built to fit in a standard electrical plug with a ground and is small enough to be stacked in a two-outlet wall socket. The Kasa Smart Wifi Plug Slim can be controlled from the Kasa Smart app or Apple HomeKit.
San Francisco-based startup Rune Labs on Monday said it has received clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to use the Apple Watch to monitor tremors and other common symptoms in patients with Parkinson’s disease.
The outcome that was announced yesterday (with Apple making its latest rule change public the day before) absolutely validates my previous feeling that the ACM decision was weak and it didn't really take much for Apple to comply with it. It was always clear that the real issue was the 30%. That problem is not tackled by a deal under which Match Group and others pay Apple 27% instead of 30%, as the 3% difference--which is eaten up by payment providers--doesn't make it a prudent and profitable choice for developers to implement and promote an alternative payment system.
It's only Monday, and I'm already tired. I'm getting older at 60 seconds per minute, and, sometimes, I'm not liking it. :-)
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“From a Design Team perspective, our goal was to create something that felt almost more editorial, and to give the user the ability to create a Lock Screen that really… ends up looking like a great magazine cover or film poster but doing it in a way that’s hopefully really simple to create, very fun, and even with a lot of automation there,” said Dye.
That "magazine look" is achieved through a collection of new controls and customizations that bring together the revamped time, widgets, photos, and deep technology that both identifies good Lock Screen images and can meld them with elements in new ways.
As Apple has gotten all its operating-system ducks in a row, its platforms have felt more and more like a matched set. That’s never been more true than with the updates announced at Monday’s WWDC keynote, which were less about five standalone pieces of software than a single experience that spans all of them whenever possible.
Whether you are starting a windowsill herb garden, buying some indoor plants, or planting a garden in your yard, these apps will help you figure out how to care for your plants and remind you to care for them.
"With this concession, Apple will meet the requirements that the Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) set under European and Dutch competition rules," the regulator said in a statement.
As he talked to LaMDA about religion, Lemoine, who studied cognitive and computer science in college, noticed the chatbot talking about its rights and personhood, and decided to press further. In another exchange, the AI was able to change Lemoine’s mind about Isaac Asimov’s third law of robotics.
Lemoine worked with a collaborator to present evidence to Google that LaMDA was sentient. But Google vice president Blaise Aguera y Arcas and Jen Gennai, head of Responsible Innovation, looked into his claims and dismissed them. So Lemoine, who was placed on paid administrative leave by Google on Monday, decided to go public.
What if Apple is really serious about making the lock screen looking like a magazine cover... on iPadOS? What if Apple is spending more time on iPadOS to create magazine-cover-like text snippets on both the left and right side of the lock screen for widgets and notifications? Maybe that's why Apple need more time to work on this, and that's why we don't get the new customizable lock screen on iPadOS this year?
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For more than a decade, the answer from automakers has been to stuff their cars with sprawling and sometimes complex infotainment systems featured on mammoth touchscreens that stretch across dashboards—in the case of one Mercedes-Benz model, more than 4.5 feet across. While using those while driving is “not necessarily optimal,” says McGehee, director of the National Advanced Driving Simulator at the University of Iowa, it likely beats the alternative of people pecking at tiny widgets on a cell phone screen while driving.
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No matter how CarPlay comes out, what is certain is that touchscreens are here to stay, and knobs and switches are on their way out. But they “come with a special responsibility” for tech developers, McGehee says. “You have to do thorough testing in driving environments, and complex simulations so that you can understand the limits of human vision and cognition.” Maybe it’s cynical or maybe it’s realistic: The world is a distracting place—how can we make it as safe as it can be?
At this point, it’s clear that there’s a basic implementation of the new lock screen on the iPad. It works with new wallpapers, it can merge the background photo with the time, and it even lets users change the font and colors. However, multiple features are broken, especially widgets – which don’t work at all.
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It seems that Apple didn’t have enough time to get the new lock screen ready for the iPad, but they’re working on it. Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll see lock screen customizations coming to iPadOS 16, even in a future beta. Apple will probably hold the feature for iPadOS 17, just as they have done with home screen widgets and App Library in the past.
In the letter, Cook said Apple continues to support efforts at the federal level to establish strong privacy protections for consumers. Cook added that Apple is encouraged by the draft proposals that Senate leaders have produced and reiterated Apple’s belief that privacy is a fundamental human right. Cook said that while Apple fights to protect user privacy, “only Congress can provide strong privacy protections for all Americans.”
Apple today announced further changes to its App Store rules for dating apps in the Netherlands in an attempt to comply with requirements put in place by the Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM).
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Though Apple is making these changes, the company says that it does not believe these updates are “in the best interest” of user privacy or data security, and it is continuing to appeal the original ACM order.
Had the iPadOS diverged so much from iOS that the new lock-screen customization stuff on iPhone cannot be available on the iPad this year? It is hard for me to imagine any technical differences between the two platforms.
Of course, lack of imagination on my part is not... well... unimaginable. I'm still looking at iPads as just big iPhone. :-)
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Lost in the excitement about Apple finally breaking the iOS multitasking paradigm and introducing overlapping windows and support for external displays with Stage Manager was something that will probably have an even greater impact on users. Apple’s referring to it by the catch-all title of “Desktop-Class Apps”, but it’s a collection of feature updates and app updates in iPadOS 16 that should make using an iPad for productivity, especially with a keyboard and trackpad, a lot better.
Apple has introduced three iOS 16 accessibility features that might sound like small things, but one 9to5Mac reader says they will make a big difference to his independence.
Apple has released new versions of its operating systems to developers, with a public beta slated for July 2022 and a release likely in September or October of this year. Unfortunately, some of your older devices won’t get the chance to experience these upgrades. Apple is cutting out a lot of older models this year, and many of the sparkly new features require the latest and most powerful devices.
The first beta of iOS 16 was made available to developers earlier this week, and we now know more about several of its new features, including the customizable lock screen and new iMessage features. In addition, Apple will now let users uninstall the Find My, Health, and Clock apps with the update.
The company is working on a larger MacBook Air with a 15-inch screen for release as early as next spring, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plans aren’t public. This would mark the first model of that size in the MacBook Air’s 14-year history.
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Apple has also begun work on a new 12-inch laptop and is considering launching it at the end of 2023 or in early 2024. If Apple moves forward with the release, it would represent the company’s smallest laptop since it discontinued the 12-inch MacBook in 2019.
Because PACMAN requires a hardware device, a hacker has to have physical access to a Mac, which limits how a PACMAN can be executed. But as a technological demonstration, PACMAN shows that pointer authentication isn’t completely foolproof and developers shouldn’t completely rely on it.
Apple on Thursday released the macOS Big Sur 11.6.7 update. According to the release notes, the update “fixes an issue where Mail and apps, such as Microsoft Outlook, cannot open attachments if the app required to open the file is already running.”
Apple just released the Apple TV+ Friday Night Baseball schedule for July. The best part is that the Major League Baseball games will remain available to watch for free for another month.
The app lets you schedule recurring tasks to launch an app, run a script, execute a command, or, in macOSMonterey, invoke a Shortcut. This is a mix of options anyone can benefit from up through the most technically proficient. Creating recurring jobs in macOS and modifying entries can be a bear. Having a simple interface is a dream come true.
Released Wednesday, Strava Trail Routes are an interactive portion of the app’s map that shows trail networks all over the world to help users choose the route that’s right for them.
While Apple was transitioning to Intel in 2006, I worked on a team that was toying with a feature code-named “shrinkydink” (sometimes referred to as “always-on exposé”). It was a radical new way to manage apps and windows and effectively made the existing Exposé irrelevant as well as the Dock as a way of managing running apps and windows.
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At WWDC 2022, I was very excited to see Apple announce a new feature for macOS and iPad called Stage Manager. It’s a radical new way to manage windows and likely makes much of Exposé and the Dock functionality irrelevant. Sound familiar? Well, it turns out it looks familiar too!
Apple’s ban on cloud gaming services in the App Store, and its insistence that all iOS browser apps must use its own WebKit browser engine, have both been declared to be anticompetitive by the UK competition watchdog.
In a press release, both unions framed the move as a positive step toward consolidating worker power across the country. “CWA has a national plan that will lead to density and collective power for Apple Retail workers,” said Lynne Fox, international president of Workers United. “It is counterproductive for Unions to go after ‘hot shops’ to the detriment of the collective good of the campaign.”
So, according to rumors, Apple is making all sorts of laptops at all sorts of screen sizes, from 12-inch to 16-inch.
Also, according to rumors, Apple is getting rid of the iPhone mini, and only do two sizes: regular and max.
Okay, got it.
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The Apple Watch is already a comprehensive fitness tracker, but it lacks the more specific tools found on dedicated running watches. Even Garmin's entry-level watches like the Forerunner 55 have cadence alerts, pace guidance and training plans. The new features in WatchOS 9 will help the Apple Watch catch up in this regard, possibly making it more appealing to runners.
Apple is also improving its sleep analysis by bringing Sleep Stages to its smartwatches. As the name implies, Sleep Stages will tell you how much time you spent in REM, core and deep sleep, giving Apple Watch wearers a more comprehensive picture of their sleep. Fitness trackers from Fitbit, Samsung and other companies have been offering this feature for years, while Apple has focused only on sleep duration and respiratory rate, until this point.
Apple has partnered with Mastercard, which interacts with the vendors and offers a white-label BNPL product called Installments, which Apple is using. Goldman Sachs, which issues the Apple Card, is also involved as the technical issuer of the loans, and the official BIN sponsor, the company said. But Apple is not using Goldman's credit decisions or its balance sheet for issuing the loans.
The behind-the-scene structure of Apple's new loan product, and the fact that it is handling loan decisions, credit checks, and lending reveals that the iPhone giant is seeking to bring the framework and infrastructure for its financial services in-house as much as possible.
Apple’s move to consolidate financial services under one — albeit separate — roof indicates a potentially harder push into finances in the future. It also signals a wider goal of keeping users in its ecosystem. With Apple offering access to its Card and new Pay Later service from within Apple Pay, you’re virtually locked into owning and holding onto your iPhone to easily use most of its features.
Attaching something as risky as BNPL to Apple’s brand puts Pay Later at odds with the company’s goal of providing customers with technology and services they can generally feel good about.
With Apple’s forthcoming updates, passkeys are a reality, ready for developers to start offing the password with extreme prejudice. In its WWDC keynote, Apple gave passkeys some time in the spotlight, explaining just how much more secure of an option they are when it comes to authentication. The message is clear: passwords just aren’t sufficient for the connected world we now live in and the sooner they go into the dustbin, the better for everyone.
But trying to get people to take their drugs regularly is a major problem in healthcare, and around half of the people prescribed medications for chronic conditions don’t take them as instructed. That non-adherence costs the healthcare system hundreds of billions of dollars a year because people get sicker when they don’t take their meds properly. And even though the tool doesn’t have everything on experts’ wish lists for the ideal drug app, a tech company like Apple entering the ring could be a helpful development.
Below is a list of all the available stock Widgets that Apple has included in the first iOS 16 beta, divided into those which can be added above or below the digital clock.
iOS already lets audio apps run in the background, but so far this has been limited to things like regular voice messages or even an audio call. With the Push to Talk API, audio messages are sent and played in real time, even in the background.
Aimed firmly at professionals in the real estate, hospitality, architecture, and interior design industries, Apple says RoomPlan will “help your app quickly create simplified parametric 3D scans of a room” to streamline conceptual planning.
Apple giveth, and Apple taketh away. The company announced a raft of exciting new software features at its WWDC keynote on Monday, but promptly followed this up with a startlingly long list of devices that wouldn’t be able to get them. And now we learn that the intriguing new updates to HomeKit and the Home app are balanced by the caveat that iPads will no longer be able to serve as home hubs.
According to the company, Stage Manager is limited to M1 chips mainly due to iPadOS 16’s new fast memory swap feature, which Stage Manager uses extensively. This lets apps convert storage into RAM (effectively), and each app can ask for up to 16GB of memory. Since Stage Manager enables you to have up to eight apps going at once — and because each app could ask for 16GB of memory — it demands a lot of resources. As such, the new window management feature needs M1 for smooth performance.
Habit tracking apps on iOS and iPadOS can be specialized or versatile and can involve health or custom habits. Here are some of the best options to create a routine.
It pains me to admit this, but I’ve covered Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference for more than a quarter of a century. I’ve seen it go from a sleepy conference in San Jose to an electrically charged event in San Francisco to a can’t-get-a-ticket event back in San Jose. And, like everyone else, I participated in WWDC remotely for the past two years via session videos posted on Apple’s developer site.
The lesson here is that WWDC is nothing if not changeable. Apple changes with the times, and so does its relationship with outside developers. But having spent a day on the Apple Park campus as a part of the company’s reimagined WWDC this year, I can say this: I don’t think we’re ever returning to the old WWDC, and I think that’s the right decision.
Part of the problem is the sheer magnitude of devices that ultimately become e-waste, of which chargers make up a small fraction. “[11,000 metric tons] might sound like a lot, but it’s very tiny,” says Josh Lepawsky, a professor at Memorial University of Newfoundland who researches e-waste. “In terms of this being presented as a solution — even a partial solution to e-waste — I think is a stretch,” Lepawsky says.
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In one scenario, if standardizing chargers brings manufacturing costs down because it increases efficiency, there’s a risk that lower prices might encourage people to buy more chargers. Maybe they’ll want to buy one for each room, Behdad posits — and that could become more e-waste.
When we order takeout from a neighborhood restaurant, we are less and less likely to call the restaurant directly. Instead, we might order through Uber Eats or DoorDash, which take a cut of the sale and charge us a delivery fee. When summer hits and we go online to find new swimsuits and stock up on sunscreen, we might go to Amazon, which now relies, for the majority of its retail sales, on independent vendors that use its e-commerce platform. Even when we try to buy directly from the manufacturer, internet-empowered middlemen still play a big role. The 2000s wave of direct-to-consumer companies, for example, ended up paying massive amounts to Facebook and others for the targeted ads they depended on to reach new customers.
This isn’t what was supposed to happen. The internet, people such as Bill Gates insisted, would be a disruptive force that shifted power into the hands of makers and consumers. In his 1995 book, The Road Ahead, the Microsoft co-founder predicted that the internet would become “the universal middleman,” and that “often the only humans involved in a transaction will be the actual buyer and seller.” In other words, why pay a middleman to help you find what you needed when you could find it yourself?
I am definitely in a privilege position, having a good-enough income that I can now afford some of Apple's products. (Not the Mac Pro though. Not the XDR. And definitely not the iCar.) But I am not sure what is the attractiveness of the six-weeks buy-now-pay-later scheme. Besides, if one is holding on to a credit card, one can already buy-now-pay-later in a couple of weeks (on average) already, so this is just a few more weeks that one could have waited and save up first.
(Disclaimer: When I was younger and not earning as much, I did use my credit card's zero-interest 12-month installment plan before.)
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When I picked one up for the first time, I felt reassured. It was noticeably lighter (a tenth of a pound, or about 50 grams) than the M1 Air I pick up all the time. It’s also quite thin, though instead of the classic wedge design, Apple has kept it a consistent 0.44 inches (1.13cm) thick—thicker than the thin end of the wedge but thinner than the thick edge.
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I lament the loss of more fun colors for these laptops, but I have to admit that Midnight looks great to me. I miss the days of a truly black Apple laptop, and while Midnight isn’t quite that, it’s very close. It’s a striking look in a way that Space Gray just isn’t—because Space Gray is just Silver dialed back a few notches. Midnight will never be mistaken for Silver or Space Gray.
Humans are different from end users, because we forget words, make typos, and accidentally hit send on an important email before it’s ready. Humans also have individual personalities and strong opinions about typefaces, and we’d like it if the devices we carry around 24/7 reflected that a little more. Historically, Apple has preferred to keep a tight grip on every aspect of its devices, from how they look to the way humans are allowed to interact with them. This year’s WWDC gave us a glimpse of Apple softening that grasp just a little to acknowledge the humans on the other side of its product pipelines. It’s a welcome development, but don’t be mistaken — Apple isn’t handing over too much control.
This morning’s keynote was the first Apple event I can remember that was held outside. In a clearing in the trees just next to the Apple Spaceship, the company sat out perhaps a thousand canvas beach chairs in front of a large stage with a big monolithic video screen and a fancy sound system. The sun smiled down. Dragonflies and hummingbirds danced through the air above the crowd. Robins flew by higher up.
macOS will detect your iPhone as a camera and microphone, period, so every camera app should work. While Apple only showed off FaceTime and mentioned Zoom, Teams, and Webex during the big WWDC 2022 keynote, developers shouldn’t need to do anything to their apps for them to work.
Then there’s Desk View, which provides an image of what’s on your desk, as if it was being viewed from an overhead camera. Desk View always uses the ultrawide camera because it needs that wide field of view to look all the way down to your desk surface. (If you’re not using Center Stage, your face will be captured by the wide camera while Desk View is captured by the ultrawide. If you are using Center Stage, then both views will be calculated simultaneously from the ultrawide camera.)
Desk View is an odd one. It’s actually an app called Desk View that displays that faux overhead view, calculated by rotating and de-skewing the output from the ultrawide camera. The reason it’s an app is so that you can use screen-sharing mode in video conferencing apps to capture the Desk View window and share it when you want to. (There’s also a Desk View API that means that video apps should be able to use Desk View as a camera directly if they want to.)
The hero changes to iMessage in iOS 16 are the addition of edit button and undo send features. However, there’s also another enhancement that Apple didn’t mention on stage: the dreaded Tapback spam in SMS group chats has been resolved.
Apple is now using a very similar strategy to the hacky workaround that Google rolled out earlier this year to tackle the same problem for Android users receiving Tapback messages from iPhone users.
If you get a FaceTime call on your iPhone while you’re out of the house, you can answer it on the go and then swap over to the larger screen of a Mac when you return home. Or you can answer a call on your Mac and transfer over to an iPhone or iPad for a more portable FaceTime experience.
Where the Clock app surprises and delights is around timers. If you set a timer, the countdown is automatically added to the Menu Bar at the top of your Mac. Clicking it opens the Clock app, and the countdown continues even if you quit the Clock app. I can see this new built-in feature being very useful for managing tasks and time while working on the Mac.
All of the frameworks discovered by 9to5Mac are used by different components of iOS, including the Lock Screen. Additionally, and most notably, there are multiple references to an always-on display within the Springboard — which is what manages the Lock Screen (and home screen) of iPhone. Apple Watch does not use Springboard.
“I fear deeply the loss of privacy,” he told TIME executive editor John Simons Tuesday at the TIME100 Summit. “If we begin to feel that we’re being surveilled all the time, our behavior changes. We begin to do less. We begin to think about things less. We begin to modify how we think. In a world like that where we’re restraining ourselves, it changes society in a major way.”
Cook went on to say that it’s difficult to argue that people shouldn’t own their own private data. “It’s tough to say that a company, or anyone for that matter, should be able to step in and on an uninformed basis vacuum up your data,” he said. “That’s a large concern of mine.”
When the draft of the Supreme Court’s decision on Roe v. Wade was leaked to the public in early May, Elizabeth C. McLaughlin kicked off a social media storm. The founder of the Gaia Leadership Project, a company that trains women leaders and entrepreneurs, tweeted: “If you are using an online period tracker or tracking your cycles through your phone, get off it and delete your data. Now.” It had never occured to many women, until then, that their data could be weaponized against them. But experts that spoke to WIRED say that fertility and period-tracking apps—along with the myriad other data trails that users leave behind—could be a rich source of data for law enforcement looking to punish women if abortion is outlawed or criminalized.
The just-launched Belkin SoundForm Immerse Bluetooth earbuds offer more than just great sound. They have active noise cancellation, and also work with Apple’s Find My network so they can be located with an iPhone.
Apple's Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) has been switched over to a unified document instead of platform-specific guidance. Apple says it's much simpler to explore commonality between platforms while still preserving relevant details about each.
When it comes to navigation, the guidelines have been given a massive revamp. That includes the ability to browse through components, principles, and more. Large sections will now include a visual index, and individual pages will feature links to related resources.
While the concept of “merging […] platform-specific guidance” is not comforting to those of us who believe in the right guidance for individual platforms, it is useful for Apple to avoid redundancy.
The idea behind the Git-based Xcode Cloud is to give developers in the Apple ecosystem a bespoke CI/CD solution that is tightly integrated with the rest of Apple’s ecosystem of developer tools. The service is built right into the Xcode IDE, for example, but also features integrations with TestFlight and App Store Connect, as well as XCTest for creating unit and UI tests. It also integrates with the major Git repositories like GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket.
The European Union (EU) has reached an agreement that will make USB-C charging no longer just a convenience but a requirement for iPhones and all other mobile phones by the fall of 2024. The plan extends to additional consumer electronics using wired charging, including digital cameras, tablets, and, at a later date, laptops.
Okay, so there are quite a few people who are saying that the Midnight MacBook Air is the blue laptop (under certain lighting condition), but no matter how hard I squint my eyes, I cannot see the blueness in Apple's web pages.
Maybe I need the XDR Display.
My first blue computer is the famous iMac Bondi Blue. And then, there's the blue iPod mini. And now, I'm using the blue iPhone 12 mini. Otherwise, all the other computers are all different shades of black. I think I want more colorful devices in my future.
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I wish Apple has released Continuity Camera back at the beginning of these strange times.
However, there is a pretty neat feature of Microsoft Teams. I can join a meeting on both my Mac and my iPhone, the former for sharing screen, and the latter for the camera and microphone. And Teams will merge these two logins to a single presence in the meeting. A different kind of continuity, given that Microsoft is no longer a major player in the platform-owner game.
Teams is pretty bad in other areas, though, so this is not an endorsement. :-)
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The new 2022 model has been designed around the more powerful M2 processor, and its design comes closer to that of the 14-inch MacBook Pro, with a more squared-off look than the traditional wedge shape. It features MagSafe charging, two Thunderbolt USB 4 ports, and a headphone jack. It’s 11mm thick and comes in at 2.7 pounds. It will be available in silver, space grey, and new “starlight” gold and “midnight” blue colors. One nice touch is that each model includes a braided MagSafe cable that matches the colorway.
The new version adds the more robust new M2 chips, supports up to 24GB of unified memory and promises up to 20 hours of battery life. The M2 chip offers an eight-core CPU and a 10-core GPU for more performance compared to the M1 model. The 13-inch MacBook Pro can be configured with up to 2TB of storage. It will be available in July.
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The 2022 13-inch MacBook remains mostly unchanged from the previous iteration. It even still includes the Touch Bar, which was removed from the updated 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros.
With the M2, Apple noted that it focused on power efficiency in designing the chip. The company is using a 5 nm technology to build the chip, which features an 8-core CPU and 10-core GPU, for a total of 20 billion transistors. The memory controller offers 100GB/sec of unified memory bandwidth — 50% more than M1 — and can support up to 24 GB of memory.
Ventura's headlining feature is a new multitasking interface called Stage Manager. It's being billed as a way to fight window clutter on a busy desktop—enter Stage Manager mode, and one of your windows floats to the center of the screen, pushing your other windows into a compressed navigation column on the left of the screen. Click a different app window on the left, and it will fly to the center of the screen, knocking the app you were using before into the navigation column.
Spotlight also gets some handy quality-of-life updates, adding the ability to Quick Look search results directly from the Spotlight window, and the ability to run Shortcuts from within Spotlight. Safari picks up the ability to share groups of tabs with other users, letting all users add and remove tabs. The browser is also adding a FIDO-compliant security technology called PassKeys, which aim to replace passwords with cryptographically generated keys that sync between devices using iCloud Keychain. Sites that support PassKeys can be opened using TouchID or FaceID.
The company is adding even more functionality to Continuity, its technology to help its devices work together. A Mac running macOS Ventura can recognize an iPhone automatically, and run the iPhone camera when it's nearby.
The iPhone doesn't even need to be turned on or selected in the macOS Finder. The feature, called Continuity Camera, requires a Mac and iPhone or iPad with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth turned on. Additionally, both devices have to be signed in to the same Apple ID with two-factor authentication enabled.
Are you the kind of person who’d hesitate to charge gadgets from a public charger — like the ones coming to the seat of your plane? Apple’s first beta of the just-announced macOS 13 Ventura includes a feature seemingly designed to address tampering fears. It’ll make USB-C and Thunderbolt accessories explicitly ask for your permission before they can communicate with MacBooks powered by Apple’s M1 or M2 chips.
The new System Settings app looks more similar to the Settings app on the iPhone and iPad, with settings placed in a sidebar for easy access.
System Preferences had been the app’s name for over 20 years, but System Settings is the new name going forward.
At its WWDC 2022 event, Apple just demonstrated how Safari in macOS Ventura will support “passkeys,” a sign-in standard that’s built with cross-platform support to enable logins that don’t use passwords at all. Apple isn’t alone in this effort either, as last month Google and Microsoft joined with Apple to announce their new step forward for a long-in-development plot to kill passwords once and for all.
iOS 16 brings more personalization options to the lock screen, like a "depth effect" where you can make a selected photo appear in front of the time. You can also press and hold to customize the lock screen and swipe to try out different styles, like black-and-white and other color filters, and font and color options for the text and time.
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The lock screen also supports widgets now. Apple demoed moving the lock screen's selected photo down to make space for widgets, like calendar and weather. A block can hold multiple widgets, with Apple briefly mentioning a widget kit for developers.
At any time you can tap Customize to edit a Lock Screen or tap the blue + icon to create a new one.
It’s not exactly clear how many Lock Screens you can make, but so far I’ve created 21 😅.
The new features come with a couple of caveats. The first is that they have a strict time limit. You'll only have 15 minutes to edit or unsend a message — after that, it can't be altered.
Apple also notes that older versions of iOS will not respond to unsend requests. In those cases, recipients on older versions of the OS will be able to see messages even if they are deleted on the sender's end.
When you try to paste text or something else from your clipboard with iOS 16, the app asks for your permission first. If you deny it, that app will not have access to your clipboard. With this new feature, Apple wants to prevent apps from reading sensitive data from the user’s clipboard without the user’s knowledge.
Safety Check can help users manage app access and passwords and inform them who has their passwords and information. It’ll help people in abusive relationships more easily cut ties to an abusive partner across devices. They can do this by reviewing and revoking access for certain people. That includes apps like Find My, location, data, contacts, and more. You can also use the Emergency Reset feature, which immediately resets access for all people and apps at once across devices synced with your iCloud account. That feature can also be used to review your security settings.
iOS 16 will finally allow you to unlock your iPhone in landscape. On the iOS 16 features page, Apple says that select iPhone models will support the ability to unlock Face ID in landscape.
With iOS 16, Apple will bring support for opt-in web notification support later in 2023, allowing users to receive notifications from websites through Safari.
Apple has designs to reinvent the driving experience with a new generation of CarPlay app, one that more deeply melds the forms and functionality between your vehicle's infotainment system and your iPhone. The company is remaining tight lipped about what exactly this reimagined version of the app will be able to do — those announcements will reportedly be teased out later next year — but hinted that they would effectively make your phone the "core" of the in-cabin systems.
On both the iPad and macOS, Stage Manager supports freely resizable, overlapping windows. We'll need to see how this works in practice, but it could be an improvement over the iPad's occasionally clunky split-screen multitasking modes. Apple is also using Stage Manager to bring full external display support to the iPad for the first time, rather than the half-hearted display mirroring feature that iPads have used up until now. You can use up to four apps per screen with Stage Manager—four on the iPad's screen and four on the external display if you have one.
The bad news for iPad multitasking fans is that Stage Manager and external display support have high hardware requirements. They require an iPad Pro or iPad Air with an M1 chip, which means that only the latest generation of high-end iPads will be able to take advantage of the feature at all.
Apple is finally bringing its first-party Weather app to iPad as part of iPadOS 16. Finally. The first iPad launched in 2010, and it hasn’t had the official Weather app that whole time.
The company shared a few screenshots at WWDC 2022, and if you’re familiar with the app on iPhone, it will look pretty familiar.
New running form data such as stride length, ground contact time and vertical oscillation can be added as metrics in Workout Views. These appear in the Fitness app summary and in the iPhone’s Health app, where you can see trends over time and learn from patterns. Or at least that’s the theory—it’s hard for most people to change their running form without active coaching. We’ll see how these metrics compare with those from other systems that rely on foot or waist sensors.
The Workout app also remembers frequently used routes, and you can race against your best or last result and get alerts during a workout for being ahead or behind your pace, or if going off-route. A new pacer feature lets you choose a distance and goal for the time in which you want to complete a run, and calculates the pace required to achieve the goal. During the workout, you can follow pace alerts and related metrics.
The Apple Watch heart rhythm monitor already runs in the background to flag any irregularities that could be signs of atrial fibrillation. Now, users will get a weekly alert about the amount of time they spend in atrial fibrillation. They can also look in the Health app to see a breakdown of how other factors like sleep and exercise might be interacting with the heart rhythm. Users will be able to share a readout of their atrial fibrillation history with their doctors.
The Medications feature, available on both the Apple Watch and iPhone in the Health app, will allow users to manage their medications, vitamins and supplements. They can use the camera to scan a pill bottle to import information, and set up schedules and receive alerts to take their medications on time.
Apple’s watchOS 9 update introduces several new watch face options, including Lunar, Playtime, Metropolitan, and Astronomy, in addition to revamping several of the existing watch faces.
The Freeform app offers a digital whiteboard to work collaboratively in real-time via FaceTime. Users can add images, notes, scribbles, documents, web links, PDFs, and more.
Perhaps the most useful will be an undo send feature, which will let you call back an email within 10 seconds of hitting the send button. It’s a feature that I’m a big fan of in Gmail, and I’ve used it more than I care to admit to save myself from sharing an embarrassing typo.
A “remind me” feature will let you set a time for an email to come back to the top of your inbox. I already use Gmail’s similar snooze button quite often to earmark emails for the weekend. A new scheduled send feature that allows you to specify exactly when an email should go out. And Mail will even tell you when it thinks you’ve forgotten to include an attachment.
New with iOS 16 is an iCloud Shared Photo Library, where members of a family can choose which images to share — or have their iPhones automatically add ones to a shared library.
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It's limited to the people in a user's Family Sharing group. Once set up, any user in that family can manually select an image and move it to the shared library. However, it can also be set up so that when users take a photo and members of the shared library are nearby, they will all immediately get the images.
Apple is calling the new feature “Duplicate detection” and it works as expected. Using on-device machine learning on iOS 16 and macOS Ventura, your device will now easily detect and aggregate all duplicate photos in your library under the Utilities section in Photos.
Apple is adding a new feature to iOS 16 to make the Hidden and Recently Deleted albums in Photos much more private. Starting with iOS 16, those albums will now be locked by default, and you’ll be able to unlock them using Face ID, Touch ID, or a passcode.
Metal 3 will include support for MetalFX Upscaling. Your Mac will render smaller frames that are less compute-intensive. MetalFX will upscale the visuals and apply temporal anti-aliasing. The idea is to deliver better and more efficient gaming performance with higher frame rates than might be possible from pure hardware-driven rendering.
During WWDC, Apple showed off a new Mac running Resident Evil Village and No Man's Sky. Both games will be coming to Macs using the Apple silicon later this year. A MacBook Air will run Resident Evil Village 1080p well, and a Mac Studio can play at 4K, according to Masaru Ijuin, Capcom's advanced technical research division manager.
During the WWDC 2022 opening keynote on Monday, Apple highlighted how iOS 16 enhances the gaming experience with updates to the Metal API and a redesigned Game Center. In addition, iOS 16 adds support for even more game controllers, including Nintendo’s Joy-Cons and Pro Controller.
[...]
9to5Mac has also found out that the support for third-party controllers in iOS is now based on “mobile assets,” which means that Apple can add support for even more controllers over-the-air without having to ship a new version of iOS.
iOS 16 also allows you to mark a particular artist as a favorite. “Keep track of the artists you care about most with new music notifications and improved recommendations,” Apple explains. This new favorite option can be found on the profile of an artist in the Music app.
Unfortunately the codes do not reveal any other details about this unreleased HomePod, but they do make it clear that iOS 16 is ready to support a new HomePod model.
Last week, Apple announced the finalists for the 2022 Apple Design Awards: 36 apps and games in six categories: Inclusivity, Delight and Fun, Interaction, Social Impact, Visuals and Graphics, and Innovation.
Today, the company announced two winners (one app and one game) in each category for a total of twelve 2022 Apple Design Award winners.
The BNPL space has exploded for offering small loans on a purchase-by-purchase basis — suggesting the bleak idea that many people can’t afford everyday purchases like groceries without splitting the bill into installments. For all the convenience of a frictionless splurge, there’s a dark side.
Complications on iPhone's lock screen! (Okay, Apple is calling them widgets, too.) I am so happy with this new feature.
Looking at my current Today's View, I will only need two widgets: batteries, and Pedometer++. Looking at screenshots, it appears batteries widget is already available from Apple, though I have no idea how good it is. (Can it display all the batteries, including AirPods and MagSafe battery pack?) And I am quite confident that the developer of Pedometer++ will have something good when the new iOS is live. So, I'm felling good.
I am just a bit disappointed there are no blue MacBook Air laptops. Since I am not in a hurry to buy one, and given current supply problems Apple is having, we may have to wait for a while anyway, maybe I will wait and see if Apple will do another purple-iPhone-like thing and give us additional color options next year? However, just looking at Apple's website, the Midnight option looks great too.
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Located next to the Apple Park campus, Apple describes the Developer Center as a “world-class facility designed for our community to meet, collaborate with, and learn from our engineers, designers, and experts.” The center includes dedicated developer lab areas, pods, briefing centers, a state-of-the-art studio/theater, and more.
Koala Sampler, an MPC-style app built for iOS and Android by Elf Audio, has received a feature which separates stems and lets users make tracks with them instantly.
The feature, dubbed ‘Split Stems’, uses AI technology to identify the different components of a track, and then provides each solo’d stem to the best of its ability.
The “right to repair” legislation, which still needs to be signed into law by the governor, is believed to be the first of its kind in the United States. It follows a year-long campaign by tech and environmental activists, who accused manufacturers of intentionally restricting the ability to repair their products – a strategy known as planned obsolescence.
As I am typing this, there are three more hours to go before the start of WWDC... and one more hour to go before my usual bedtime.
Now that Apple keynotes have gone virtual (mostly), I do wish the company can start to rotate the start time so that others in the various time zones can also watch live without sacrificing sleep.
But I guess Apple is still a very California company at heart, and Apple still want to have live physical audience (how else are you going to demo XDR displays and Reality glasses?), so I am not holding my breath.
Have a good WWDC day. I can't wait to watch the keynote video when I wake up.
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The company has enlisted Hollywood directors such as Jon Favreau to develop video content for a headset that it is expected to ship next year, according to three people familiar with that work. Mr. Favreau, an executive producer of “Prehistoric Planet” on Apple TV+, is working to bring that show’s dinosaurs to life on the headset, which looks like a pair of ski goggles and aims to offer virtual- and augmented-reality experiences, these people said.
Separately, at its annual conference for developers on Monday, Apple plans to unveil software tools that would allow apps to add new camera and voice functionality, laying the groundwork for a hands-free interface that customers will eventually be able to navigate on the headset, according to two people familiar with the project and documents reviewed by The New York Times.
Little is known about Apple’s new product, but Vrvana’s “pass through” video system is expected to be a key feature. The idea is to turn the enclosed world of VR headsets inside-out, enabling the device to allow users to also see the physical world around them overlaid with digital images.
“We re-spun everything to merge AR and VR, for the first time, in a single device,” said Nepveu, who declined to discuss his work while at Apple before leaving last year.
I love iMovie Trailers and have made at least a dozen over the years, and everyone loves them. Give it a try — it is easy and the results are usually breathtaking.
If you're looking for a keyboard case that offers some protection and an excellent typing experience, the Brydge Air MAX+ is a fantastic option. It does add a little more bulk, but I think it's well worth the added weight.
But, while the system is very much a plug-and-play affair, I’ve identified five pitfalls to avoid if you’re going to get the most out of Apple's CarPlay.
Sometimes this means going against the grain and passing up the opportunity for wireless convenience, while other tips will help you focus on the road and spend less time rummaging through menus to find your favourite apps.
Lehrich said Apple's lobbying has so far seemed to be the most persuasive to lawmakers with lingering concerns about the legislation, in part because it's maintained a greater sense of credibility in Washington than some of its peers.
"When Facebook or Amazon make baseless sky-is-falling attacks, there's little to say besides, 'that's just patently false,'" Lehrich said in an email. "When Apple makes esoteric arguments about serious security risks of sideloading, you need compelling substantive pushback to allay lawmakers' concerns."
As reported by the New York Times, the Apple headset will look like ski goggles. I wonder: can I wear the Apple headset over my regular glasses? Or are the headset so thin that I can wear my regular glasses over it?
But if the Apple headset is anything like a pair of regular ski goggles, then this will be another upcoming Apple product that I will not be buying, along with the iCar. (No, I still do not have my driving license yet. At this age, I doubt I will ever learn driving.)
Of course, Apple may still surprise us. It may very well turn out that the headset also corrects bad eyesights, and I no longer need regular glasses...
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Every year, in the lead-up to Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference, young people from around the globe use Swift Playgrounds to showcase their coding skills. This year, as part of the Swift Student Challenge, they include submissions from first-time participants Jones Mays II, Angelina Tsuboi, and Josh Tint.
All three teens are harnessing the power of coding to create apps that help solve problems in their communities — and are among more than 350 students from 40 countries and regions who have been selected as 2022 challenge winners.
The internet we have today is the one we unknowingly asked for over the past decade and change: Since the introduction of the Facebook like in 2009, we’ve been inputting countless likes, retweets, views, and various other nudges to prompt algorithmically-driven platforms to give us more of what we want. Or, at least, what we think we want. Somehow, we’ve arrived at the current chaotic hellscape of online content, where there’s more of it than ever, but it’s just as difficult—if not more laborious—to sift through it all and find the good stuff. So it makes sense that Pocket, which launched as the humble bookmarking service we know today in 2012, has endured as a place for netizens to stow their favored links and discover new ones. What’s less obvious is how the platform has managed to do so while remaining remarkably…enjoyable?
Reports of multiple color options are likely “exaggerated,” according to Gurman, who says he is not expecting much more than the typical MacBook Air colors, but the gold color could be more of a champagne. He also says that it will be available in his “favorite iMac color,” a shade of blue.
When I first got a sneak peek of the Tempo Move last year, I was stoked. Here was a $495 smart gym that would not only fit into my tiny apartment but also wouldn’t look out of place. It used the iPhone’s TrueDepth camera tech to track your movements, the classes were great, and the design was so clever I was gobsmacked. And, if it weren’t for annoying connectivity issues, the Tempo Move might’ve been my favorite connected fitness gadget that I’ve tested in the past year.
New analysis indicates it’s gotten harder to get an app to the top of the App Store, in terms of downloads, over the past several years. According to new data from app intelligence firm Sensor Tower, the number of downloads needed for an app to break into the No. 1 position on Apple’s iPhone App Store in the U.S. has climbed by 37% since 2019. [...]
But to be clear, downloads alone don’t move an app to the top of the charts. It’s only one of several factors that Apple’s ranking algorithm takes into account for managing its Top Charts.
Apple 's App Store is showing signs of slowing growth, which could hurt the stock in the near future, Morgan Stanley said. "While we are bullish on the longer-term App Store and Services outlook, a deceleration in App Store growth (and monetization) could be a near-term headwind to results," wrote analyst Katy Huberty in a note to clients Friday.
I would like a blue MacBook Air.
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It’s a hardware company first and foremost, and its custom-designed silicon now sits at the center of its “control the whole computing stack” strategy. But it could be argued that Apple’s software strategy now matters more than ever. It’s what keeps customers “locked in” to Apple hardware. It includes Apple’s fast-growing, multi-billion dollar services business. Every time Apple makes a tweak to its App Store, whether it’s limiting advertising tracking tech in iOS or evolving its content moderation policies, the company’s decisions are scrutinized—because its software just has that much influence over our lives.
Apple is set to announce a slew of new operating system updates during WWDC on Monday, but it seems the biggest changes may be coming to iPadOS. A new report from Mark Gurman suggests that Apple will make the iPad more laptop-like with new multitasking upgrades.
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The redesigned multitasking interface would make it easier to see what apps are open and switch between tasks. Windows would be movable and resizable similar to macOS, unlike the existing solution which places two windows side-by-side with fixed positions.
Apple is planning to make employee schedules at retail locations more flexible in an attempt to improve working conditions, reports Bloomberg. The changes come as employees in some Apple stores have been working toward unionization.
Going forward, Apple will make sure that there are at least 12 hours in between each shift an employee must take on, up from the current 10 hour minimum. Employees will not have to work past 8:00 p.m. for more than three days a week unless they choose to work late shifts.
In the commercial, out Thursday, Styles grooves to his own Harry’s House opener “Music for a Sushi Restaurant” in the same animated style as the Apple ads that notably ran nonstop on TV screens in the early 2000s to trumpet the iPod — complete with the iconic neon colors and trippy visuals. But this time around, the wire-free and Jet-free “Silhouettes” spot is highlighting the third generation of AirPods, featuring immersive Spatial Audio technology.
Every so often I run into a tool that looks on the surface to be pretty average but once I start digging in, I realize there is so much more than meets the eye. That's exactly what Craft was to me at first. It seemed as if it was nothing more than a fancy note-taking tool with a swell interface that was probably a bit more confusing than need be.
But then something sort of magical happened -- I started using the app. Once I understood just how Craft could be used, I realized Craft was so much more than a note-taking tool.
Solidly developer-focused in scope, the app serves files from a local directory to an automatically generated URL, making these files available to any device on your local network. While there are sure to be more inventive use cases for such a utility, its general purpose is for testing simple websites built on the Web’s greatest primitive: HTML.
Why turn to a pop-up bar? It speeds the time from selection to outcome, making it an intuitive drag-and-click operation instead of requiring menu navigation or copying and pasting into an app or Web site. For actions you perform many times a day, you’re shaving off friction and time.
As shared by some developers on Twitter, they have just received their awards for winning this year’s Swift Student Challenge. Those who have been selected by the company are getting a free year of Apple Developer Program membership, as well as an exclusive sweater and black beanie with WWDC branding and the Apple logo in yellow.
There were also fan theories about Walt being the killer because of his use of a non-iPhone in an Apple TV+ series, for which Miller revealed they had to get special permission.
“We had to get special permission to use a non-iPhone, which we did use with Walt,” Miller said. “We had Walt use a generic phone as a way to, again, mislead the audience into thinking maybe Walt was the killer because he was the only one that didn’t use an iPhone. That theory that Rian Johnson had put out there, it was true that [Apple] didn’t like having villains use Apple products in shows and movies. We thought we should definitely use this to our advantage.”
Square announced today that it is signing on to support Apple’s new Tap to Pay on iPhone feature. The feature, which was announced by Apple in February, allows businesses to use an iPhone to accept contactless payments without the need for any additional hardware.
Other option is to wait for Apple to „unlock” the technology for every carrier even without the agreement. Rough estimate given by Apple representative was 2 to 3 years of waiting time. Small provider at the meeting accused Apple of misusing their power, to which iPhone-maker argued: „It is not power misuse, we are just more precise, and we will not be satisfied with half quality.”
Let's hope Apple's revamp of iPad's multitasking interface will not be as bad as Apple's revamp of Safari's interface last year. :-)
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The App Store prevented 1.6 million risky and untrustworthy apps from defrauding users in 2021, according to new fraud analysis data shared today by Apple. Apple says that the App Store stopped “nearly $1.5 billion in fraudulent transactions” during the year.
Apple rejected more than 34,000 apps for hidden features, and more than 157,000 that were spam or copycat apps. 343,000 apps were rejected for various privacy violations. Over 800,000 fraudulent developer accounts were terminated.
So I realize that wishing real hard in the direction of Apple Park isn’t going to change a single thing that will be announced Monday. That won’t stop me from hoping that at least some of my dreams might come true, though.
The issue, which first came to light last month, meant that downloading the Apple Music app would see its icon take a spot in the Dock, often replacing whatever was already there if there was no space available. It didn't help matters that only third-party apps were kicked out of the dock and that, predictably, caused uproar — with some suggesting that this was an intentional move on Apple's part. Apple subsequently confirmed to iMore that that wasn't the case and that a fix was being worked on.
Apple announced the playlist of 'Songs That Built The UK' on Thursday and it is bursting with UK bangers.
From trailblazers to pop powerhouses, the list features the best of the best, and makes the perfect soundtrack to see you through the long weekend.
While traditional word processors have always been a popular choice, we now have apps more tailored to large and complex writing projects, and one of the premier examples is Ulysses.
The iPad mini is a great form factor as light and portable tablet, but in order to comfortably take it anywhere with you it really needs some kind of protection in the form of a case. That is where the ingenious BookBook design by Twelve South transforms your glass tablet into a rugged, portable, highly functional and protective leather-bound book (at least on the outside).
Diablo Immortal, a massive multiplayer online action roleplay game, is now available for both iOS and Android. Some regions got early access, but the game is now available in most parts of the world.
We’re on the heels of WWDC 2022 as Apple unveils a new schedule of community events for developers attending the keynote next week. There’s a variety of in-person and virtual events, meant for developers to learn and connect with one another.
“We expect that still images will exceed the image quality of single-lens reflex cameras within the next few years," said Terushi Shimizu, President and CEO of Sony Semiconductor Solutions (SSS). This statement comes as pro photographers (and video makers) make increasing use of iPhones for professional work — but also as machine vision intelligence reaches a tipping point to enable enterprise and industrial applications.
In his new position, effective immediately, Paz will oversee Apple Music’s global Latin business and the Latin music business partnerships teams, working with established and up and coming artists, majors, indies, media partners, creative agencies and other industry players. Paz will be based in Miami, where Apple has been growing its presence.
Why did Apple even bother inviting people onto its Park for WWDC? One obvious answer: new hardware that requires physical hands-on in order to be appreciated. The obvious hardware: Reality headset.
But, of course, Apple may have just invited developers as a trial run for a truly hybrid WWDC that, most likely, has to replace the physical event that the company has been putting on for so many years.
As for the media? Surely it doesn't hurt to talk to even more people about all the security and privacy in the new operating systems, and to demonstrate why Apple is right and the regulators are misguided.
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I'm using Miximum to play tracks from Apple Music's playlists, and I've just added a new condition -- genre does not contain "spoken words" -- to all my smart playlists.
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With less than a week to go until the event, Apple has now revealed which apps are the finalists that will compete for the award in the following categories: Inclusivity, Delight and Fun, Interaction, Social Impact, Visuals and Graphics, and Innovation.
Launched on Tuesday, the WWDC 2022 Digital Lounges are being billed as a way for attendees to talk to "Apple engineers and designers throughout the week," as a way for Apple to make the virtual conference more interactive to participants.
The Apple employees will host "text-based Q&As, session watch parties with the presenters, community icebreakers, and more" in each of the lounges.
We’re just under one week away from WWDC 2022 kicking off and Apple has continued its tradition of augmented reality Easter eggs as it has listed the keynote on its Events landing page. The latest AR surprise features a virtual card pack you can open to reveal special developer Memoji.
“Activation Lock,” a message displayed across the iPhone’s screen read. “This iPhone is linked to an Apple ID. Enter the Apple ID and password that were used to set up this iPhone.”
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Now, an underground group is offering people a way to strip that lock from certain iPhones with its pay-for-hacking service. iOS security experts suspect it is being used to remove protections from stolen iPhones. The hacking group called Checkm8.info offering the service, which lifts its name from a popular free-to-use jailbreak, insists its tool cannot be used by thieves.
The new djay 4.0 update is now available in the App Store and promises to give DJs the ability to run full analog turntables and mixers using nothing more than their iPhone.
The case leaves the front of the remote totally open, so it may not be the best option if you’re looking for something to protect the device from spills or falls. It makes up for that in style, though — removing the solid brown backing reveals a discreet pocket where you can place an AirTag.
With the absolute wealth of AAA and indie games available through streaming services, the iPad you already have is perfectly ready to fill the role of a Steam Deck or Nintendo Switch in your life — and with a much better screen and battery life to boot!
So, what better way to relive those old PS2 games that required a loud, disk-spinning console and a giant, heavy TV of questionable picture quality… than on a thin, light, quiet, futuristic device like the iPad Pro? Or... whichever model you have.
You'll just need a few things to get started – namely a supported gamepad, and of course, money to buy those games with, some of which are pretty expensive in the App Store. Because certain game publishers know how much nostalgia means to many of us, and how much we're willing to pay in order to feel some things. And they're not ashamed to exploit it! But then again… it works, right? Can't really hold it against you, Square Enix. Well, maybe a little.
As pointed out by my former Macworld colleague Jim Dalrymple, Apple has taken to inserting ads into its “ad-free” on-demand radio stations. Yes, they’re ads for other Apple Music radio shows, but does it matter? The fact remains that if you listen to an Apple Music streaming radio station like Classic Rock or Alternative, you will eventually hear a 40-second ad for Zane Lowe or Strombo or other pre-recorded Apple Music radio episodes. What was once an ad-free music experience is now punctuated by… promo copy.
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Jim’s complaints rang true to me because I recently complained about discovering another new Apple Music marketing technique: inserting promotional interviews inside Apple’s curated playlists.
Since Apple and Amazon first dipped their toes into the film and television business, there’s been an understanding among people who make movies and TV shows that these companies — with their massive clout and resources — could dominate Hollywood if only they wanted to.
Do they want to?
Apple Museum of Poland is now open, boasting to be the “biggest and most complete” collection in the world. With over 1,600 exhibits, the museum is the result of years of dedication from Polish collector and architect Jacek Lupina and spans the company’s 46-year history.
Oh, yes, there is definitely a Spoken Words track in my playlist. Apple: this is unacceptable.
(No, I have not heard this track. Yet. Who knows when the shuffle algorithm will throw this track at me.)
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