Benjamin Mayo

An amusing tidbit this morning highlights a potential flaw in Apple Park’s all-glass design. Bloomberg reports that some employees who might not have been paying 100% attention to where they are walking have accidentally walked into the clear glass internal walls of the pods that make up Apple Park. As a remedy, employees stuck Post-It notes to the walls to make them easier to see. However, these had to be removed because ‘they detracted from the building’s design’.

Whilst there are some markings on these panes, it seems employees haven’t quite adjusted to their new campus. Apple is still in the process of moving employees over to the new campus; at last count, it had permission to move in workers to 5 out of the 12 Apple Park sections.

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Apple has informed developers today that all new apps submitted to the App Store from April 2018 must support the iPhone X’s Super Retina display. This means developers of new apps must ensure they accommodate the notch and go edge-to-edge on the 5.8-inch OLED screen.

Apple has not set a deadline for when updates to existing apps must support iPhone X natively. From April, all new apps must also be built against the iOS 11 SDK.

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KGI continues to double-down on its claims on what the 2018 iPhone lineup will comprise. The 6.1-inch LCD iPhone will apparently resemble the iPhone X with a similar full-screen design, but at a more accessible price for customers; the analyst expects this new iPhone to be priced to replace iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, as cheap as $699.

The LCD 6.1-inch iPhone will use slightly less premium components, such as an aluminium frame instead of stainless steel. Nevertheless, given that it looks like a top-end iPhone in style, KGI believes the lower entry point will make it Apple’s most popular 2018 device and see total sales around 100 million units.

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HomePod’s strand of Siri has its limitations, but its music features are pretty robust. You can actually use the Shazam song identification features on HomePod, you just need to know the right request phrase for Siri.

The HomePod uses its microphones to listen to the environment and Shazam will try to find a match for the song. You can then get the HomePod to play the song straight from Apple Music. Here’s how to use Shazam on HomePod …

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iFixit has now posted its teardown of the HomePod, shining light on exactly what is beneath the seamless fabric mesh. The company says that the HomePod is built like a tank, so whilst it only scores 1/10 on the repairability scale it is made to last. It was apparently one of the hardest ever projects, with iFixit even resorting to a hacksaw at one stage.

The teardown reveals how the Siri waveform is formed on the top of the speaker; an LED matrix sits just below the surface with the light blurred by a diffuser. You also get to see Apple’s custom tweeters, including a special mechanism of powering them; the gold screw posts conduct electricity through the unit.

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The HomePod launched on Friday and people continue to praise its sound quality. A user on the r/audiophiles subreddit conducted an extensive set of measurements, testing frequency response, distortion and much more.

The review is a very in-depth and dense exploration of how the HomePod sounds, with favourable comparisons to higher-end real speakers. The results are certainly impressing people with the necessary technical understanding. Even Apple’s Phil Schiller liked it.

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You will need:

• Apple TV
• HomePod

Apple doesn’t advertise HomePod as a TV speaker in any of its marketing, but it’s a question we’ve gotten a lot over the past couple weeks. With AirPlay, it’s very possible to connect HomePod to Apple TV and use it as your TV speaker … with some caveats and drawbacks to consider.

For some people, it may make sense to do it. I think for many it won’t. However, there are some tips and tricks to make using HomePod with Apple TV a better experience …

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The HomePod launches this Friday in the US, UK and Australia. Customers are now getting Apple Store shipment notifications for their units right on time for Feb 9 deliveries.

The Apple Store is now sold out of initial HomePod stock but retailers like Best Buy may have HomePods if you are desperate to get one on launch day.

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As promised, Apple has included a new screen in the iOS 11.3 beta 2 settings called Battery Health (Beta) available on all iPhones since iPhone 6. This view includes information about the maximum capacity of the battery in the device, and describes whether the battery has degraded to the point where it can no longer offer peak performance.

All devices upgrading to iOS 11.3 start with performance management disabled. It will be enabled by the system when the device first experiences an unexpected shutdown. However, users can go into Settings -> Battery -> Battery Health and disable it. See how (as well as all the different states) after the break …

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In a rather embarrassing screw up, some developers are receiving Search Ad Basic report emails featuring details for apps that aren’t theirs. This includes information that is usually confidential such as number of installs from the ad campaign as well as how much was spent.

There doesn’t seem to be any kind of systemic Apple ID hack; it just looks like a buggy email daemon is sending out the wrong information to different people.

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Businesses that predominantly use hardware, software and services from Apple and Cisco may be able to qualify for ‘enhanced’ cyber crime insurance from insurance company Allianz SE. Apple CEO Tim Cook said that Apple is thrilled that ‘insurance industry leaders recognize that Apple products provide superior cyber protection’.

The companies will provide guidance on improving digital security and allow firms to claim ‘enhanced’ cyber insurance if certified Apple and Cisco products are used, including potential discounts on deductibles.

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Update: Australia launch day stock has also sold out. Most US stores no longer offer in-store pickup availability.

Apple’s HomePod smart speaker (Apple, Best Buy) launches this Friday in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia. Preorders have been available on Apple’s Online Store for more than a week and we are now starting to see launch stock twinkle.

In the UK, Apple has now sold out of launch-day deliveries of HomePod in Space Gray and White, with new orders estimated to be shipped by the 13th. US and Australia stores are still reporting 9 Feb availability as of this morning.

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Since iPhone 7, Apple has shared baseband chip orders for iPhones with Qualcomm and Intel. For the 2018 iPhones, KGI reports that Apple is set to rely on Intel as the exclusive supplier, amidst Apple’s ongoing legal battles with Qualcomm.

KGI says Intel can meet Apple’s technical requirements and offers more competitive prices.

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App Review appears to be more strictly enforcing rules regarding the use of Apple intellectual property in third party apps, which now includes emoji. Developers are reporting that their apps are now getting rejected for using the Apple emoji icon set in screenshots, other marketing and parts of the user interface (such as using emoji in place of custom iconography).

As described to Sam Eckert, apps cannot use emoji outside of places where a user would have typed it in to comply with the new rules. Apps must replace usage of Apple emoji with custom icons, or nothing at all, if they want their app to be approved.

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Apple will soon announce a new Activity Challenge for Apple Watch users, celebrating February as Heart Month. In this latest activity challenge, users must complete their exercise ring for seven days in a row, from February 8th to February 14th.

In addition to the new heart-shaped medal, Apple is rewarding users who achieve the challenge with animated iMessage stickers. See them below. The challenge will go live on the 8th February.

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There was a big furore in October when the community discovered that the redesigned Calculator app in iOS 11.0 had a semi-serious bug; people noticed that if you typed 1 + 2 + 3 quickly, it would give the incorrect answer. The real problem here was that the fade animation on the operand buttons (+, – etc) would block user interaction until it completed. This meant that if you typed quickly, the second press of the + button when typing 1 + 2 + 3 would be ignored, but really this happened with any combination of inputs that pressed the operands quickly.

In iOS 11.2, Apple ‘fixed’ this issue. They removed the animation altogether making state changes instantaneous. It quelled complaints, but obviously was not what was originally designed. In iOS 11.3, Apple will rollout the true fix – the animations are back, and do not block user interaction. Video below …

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[Update: Bloomberg adds additional details including iOS & macOS cross platform apps still on track, new parental features are coming, tvOS and watchOS won’t be affected, and more.]

Axios is reporting that Craig Federighi instructed the software division to put aside some major iOS projects in order to focus on performance and reliability issues for iOS 12. The publication says a refresh of the Home screen and other features have been shelved to dedicate more resources to bug fixing, smaller tweaks and platform finesse.

There will be some new features in iOS 12 including augmented reality improvements, health features and improved parental controls, reports Axios. Bigger changes, including a refresh of the Home screen, have been delayed to next year.

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