Apps

From 9to5Toys.com:

A large majority of the deals we cover each day come from a variety of ‘Daily Deal’ websites or are so popular that they don’t even last 24 hours. We know you can’t be at your computer every second, so we’re going to round up the best deals each day to make sure you have a fair shot at the deals you want. Be sure to follow 9to5Toys.com so you never miss a deal... Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+.

2200mah Portable Back Up Charger for USB Devices $8 shipped

Game/App Deals: Pacific RIM: FREE, Street Fighter 2 Collection: $1, more

Other great deals we love:

New! Amazon announces the all-new Kindle Paperwhite e-reader, now available for preorder starting at $119
New! Western Digital fills out its NAS-optimized RED hard drive line with new 2.5 inch versions
New! Monster NCredible NErgy in-ear noise isolating headphones $25 shipped (Reg. $60)
New! eBook Freebie: 50 Ways to Protect Your Identity in a Digital Age… (Reg. $25)
New! 1 year magazine subscriptions: GQ & Wired: $5 each (up to $48 off)
New! VIZIO HDTVs (new and refurbished) 32″-70″ for $148–$1,299

Sharknado, you'll want to have this timeless classic on Bluray or DVD http://t.co/QhKo64gCNC

— 9to5Toys (@9to5toys) September 3, 2013

Review: The Just-Mobile UpStand, a functional iPad stand wrapped in a beautiful design
Roku 3 1080p streaming media player w/ private listening mode $85 Shipped (Reg. $100)
Save $50 on any new iPad 2 (starts at $349) or Retina iPad 4th gen (starts at $449) at Walmart
Game/App Deals: Amazon end of summer sale up to 80% off, Cut The Rope: FREE (first time EVER!), and more
Surf Sound Talk Waterproof Bluetooth Speaker & Handset For Cell Phones, Tablets, & PC’s
Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover for iPad Mini: $60 shipped (Reg. $80)
New Ultrathin multi-touch Bluetooth mice made to match your MacBook & Ultrabook
Sony & Samsung drop as much as $1500 off 4K Ultra HD TV sets
Logitech releases a limited edition ‘Tippsy the Elephant’ UE BOOM Bluetooth speaker exclusively at the Apple Store
Hipo waterproof Bluetooth shower speaker $35 shipped (Reg. $100)
NFL Sunday Ticket for $55 after early Madden 25 video game trade-in at Best Buy
Get an extra 1GB of Dropbox space for free

Apple updates iLife for iOS (iPhoto, iMovie, Garageband) with compatibility fixes

Mark Gurman Sep 3 2013 - 1:37 pm PT

6 Comments

Apple has updated its iLife suite of iOS apps, which includes iPhoto, iMovie and Garageband, with fixes related to compatibility and stability. With iOS 7’s launch right around the corner, perhaps these updates include improved compatibility with the revamped operating system. Apple has released compatibility updates for its App Store apps ahead of major iOS updates in the past. Thanks @preshit!

Shazam iOS app updated with Twitter previews and faster recognition on older iPhones

Ben Lovejoy Sep 2 2013 - 6:26 am PT

The latest version of music tagging and discovery app Shazam now offers instant previews when you tweet a track and offers faster song recognition on the iPhone 4 and 3GS.

○ Much faster recognition, especially on the iPhone 4 and 3GS.
○ Better recognition in difficult environments.
○ Now when you tweet, your followers can play previews right in Twitter through our Twitter Card.
○ Explore charts are more dynamic, showing you what’s hot in the last seven days.
○ New TV experiences (US only).

The update also mentions ‘new TV experiences,’ but Shazam hasn’t yet revealed any details. Shazam’s previous update added multi-track purchases. The free app is available for download on iTunes.

Apple inadvertently asking developers for iOS 7-optimized app icons

Mark Gurman Aug 30 2013 - 10:02 am PT

23 Comments

Ahead of Apple’s iOS 7 launch (presumably alongside the new iPhones in September), Apple seems to be asking developers to submit larger app icons. As part of iOS 7’s dramatic interface changes, the Home screen icons have been slightly enlarged compared to the iOS 6 icons.

For example, as shown in the image above, the non-iOS 7-optimized Netflix icon has a small white border compared to Apple’s icons.

In order to avoid this interface issue, developers will need to include larger icons in their applications. iOS 6 icons on the iPhone come in at 114 x 114 pixel resolutions, while iOS 7 icons are slightly larger at 120 x 120 pixel resolutions. For the iPad, iOS 6 icons are at resolutions of 144 x 144, and on iOS 7 they come in at a resolution of 152 x 152:

Glui review: Screenshotting for OS X made a delight, not a chore

Benjamin Mayo Aug 30 2013 - 9:36 am PT

6 Comments

Put plainly, Glui is a screenshot and annotation tool; a utilitarian application. It does not evoke charm, but it doesn’t really need to. What Glui does need to offer is a functional yet efficient workflow and, on this front, it delivers. In use, I never feel like the app is getting in my way.

The activation shortcuts are bound to Shift+Cmd+5 and Shift+Cmd+6 by default to match OS X’s native screenshot shortcuts. These actions select either a rectangular screen region or one window, respectively. With the region mode, the screen cursor changes to a crosshair (which shows x,y pixel coordinates) and the region is chosen by dragging your mouse to create a rectangle. With the window mode, the cursor changes to a camera icon and you simply click on the window you wish to capture.

Although the process is very similar to how OS X’s built-in screenshot features work, it is not identical. For instance, in Glui, window screen grabs do not include the accompanying drop shadow as they do in OS X’s implementation.

Apple updates iTunes Festival app w/ video streaming ahead of event kickoff this weekend

Mark Gurman Aug 30 2013 - 9:03 am PT

Ahead of this Sunday’s kickoff of Apple’s iTunes Festival concerts, Apple has updated its iTunes Festival iOS app with the ability to conduct video streaming. It is plausible that this video streaming feature will allow customers who are not attending the concerts to watch the events live. The Festival is also available to watch via Apple TV and iTunes. Yesterday, Apple started offering free songs from the Festival via its Apple Store iOS app.

Doctape claims to be most comprehensive iOS file-viewing app, 80+ file types supported

Ben Lovejoy Aug 30 2013 - 4:41 am PT

3 Comments

There’s no shortage of iOS file-viewer apps out there, but TechCrunch drew our attention to Doctape Viewer, a freemium app which claims to support more file formats and more cloud services than any other. The app enables you to view more than 80 different types of file, spanning office documents, images, audio, video and more.

While there’s a bunch of services allowing accessing files on the go, users are still suffering from the limited filetypes supported by their mobile devices. With the release of doctape Viewer, we’re opening our background conversion-services to work with about every existing service & app there is …
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9to5Toys Last Call: Bluetooth home/car adapter $15, MacBook Air 11″ Haswell $899, Cut The Rope goes free, more

Aug 29 2013 - 3:00 pm PT

From 9to5Toys.com:

SOLD OUT XtremeMac InCharge adds bluetooth audio to your home or car for $15

MacBook Air 11.6″ 1.3GHz i5 Haswell/128GB/4GB $899 shipped (Reg. $999)

Game/App Deals: Amazon end of summer sale up to 80% off, Cut The Rope: FREE (first time EVER!), and more

Adobe Lightroom 5 boxed copy $99. at B&H http://t.co/6HgNqegABe

— 9to5Toys (@9to5toys) August 29, 2013

Other great deals we love:

New! ~~Sharp AQUOS 40″ LED 1080P 60Hz HDTV $330 shipped (Reg. $450)~~
New! Surf Sound Talk Waterproof Bluetooth Speaker & Handset For Cell Phones, Tablets, & PC’s
New! ~~Coby 15.6″ Widescreen LCD Under-the-Cabinet Digital TV w/ DVD/CD Player $120 shipped~~
New! ~~Nook HD+ 9-inch 1080P 16GB tablet with Google Play (refurb): $110 shipped~~
New! Samsung Chromebook 11.6″ WiFi/2GB/16GB Flash (Refurb.) $170 Shipped (Reg. $250 new)

Western Digital My Book Thunderbolt Duo 4TB External RAID Hard Drive $350 shipped (Reg. $600)
Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD Wii U Limited Edition Bundle, pre-owned console deals, iOS freebies, more
Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover for iPad Mini: $60 shipped (Reg. $80)
OtterBox Defender iPhone 4/4S: $18 (Reg. $50)
New Ultrathin multi-touch Bluetooth mice made to match your MacBook & Ultrabook
ZooGue Protective Covers and Cases $3 + $1 shipping: iPhone, iPad, Samsung Galaxy
External Hard Drives: 1TB Seagate Expansion $50, 2TB Toshiba Canvio $110
Sony & Samsung drop as much as $1500 off 4K Ultra HD TV sets
Logitech releases a limited edition ‘Tippsy the Elephant’ UE BOOM Bluetooth speaker exclusively at the Apple Store
Hipo waterproof Bluetooth shower speaker $35 shipped (Reg. $100)
PNY StorEDGE 64GB/128GB shortened SD Cards add permanent storage to a MacBook, starts at $78 shipped
Bioshock 1&2 for Mac: $10 each
NFL Sunday Ticket for $55 after early Madden 25 video game trade-in at Best Buy
Duo Gamer controller for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch: $6 (Reg. $40)
Apple does rare iTunes ‘buy 1 get 2 free’ movie bundle sale (starting $10)
Bose QuietComfort 15 Acoustic Noise Cancelling Headphones $269 (Reg $299)

Freebies:

Google Play Summer Party Hits from Katy Perry, Daft Punk, Beastie Boys, and more for free or $0.91
Get an extra 1GB of Dropbox space for free

Seagate Expansion 3TB Black Desktop USB 3.0 Hard Drive $100 Shipped (Reg. $160)… http://t.co/dbrzTYrGtb

— 9to5Toys (@9to5toys) August 26, 2013

Apple offering free iTunes Festival songs in Apple Store app as part of sales push

Jordan Kahn Aug 29 2013 - 8:21 am PT

Continuing with its new push to offer free content to users through its Apple Store app, Apple today started offering users a selection of free songs under a new banner promoting the upcoming iTunes Festival. The new section promoting the iTunes Festival is currently offering six free songs with the offer set to expire on October 31. You can access the free content by navigating to a specific store location within the app, but the free content is currently only available to those in the US.

The song downloads follow Apple offering free apps such as Color Zen and free iBook titles through the Apple Store iOS app as part of a new sales push that we reported first back in July. The new initiative offers free content downloads through the Apple Store app as a way to boost content sales and awareness about the company’s App Stores, iTunes content, and iBooks. Apple Store employees are also being encouraged to install the Apple Store app on iOS devices sold in the store.

Apple iTunes Festival is scheduled to take place during the month of September in London, and the events will be streamed to iOS devices, iTunes, and even an app on the Apple TV.

Parallels announces Parallels Desktop 9: performance improvements, enhanced Windows support, more

Scott Buscemi Aug 29 2013 - 7:24 am PT

7 Comments

[youtube=http://youtu.be/Copuyw_qQdA]

Right after releasing its new remote access application Access, Parallels has just announced Parallels Desktop 9 for the Mac. The updated application will support Mavericks and the upcoming Windows Blue/8.1 update and boasts many speed boosts.

Performance improvements with Parallels Desktop 9 are notable – “40 percent improvement in disk performance; virtual machine startup and shutdown are now up to 25 percent faster; and customers can suspend their virtual machines in up to 20 percent less time than before. 3D graphics and web-browsing were also made noticeably speedier with up to 15 percent improvements for both.”

The company has also brought Power Nap to Windows applications. They’ve also introduced synced cloud services between virtual machines, which means you only have one version on your computer and all virtual machines access the same cloud files.

Pricing

PD 7 or 8 customers will be able to grab this update for $49.99 starting today (download link will be sent immediately). The full version will be available September 5 and remains $79.99 with students paying just $39.99. In addition, the software will come with a free 6-month subscription to Parallels Access ($39.99 value).

We’ll have a complete review of Parallels Desktop 9 when the full version is released on September 5. Press release below:
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Review: DeskConnect beats Apple to AirDrop-like file sharing between iOS and Mac

Mike Beasley Aug 29 2013 - 7:00 am PT

9 Comments

From time to time, I find myself needing to send some files from my Mac to my iPhone, or from my phone to my computer. This is especially true with things like screenshots for reviews. In the past I have used Photo Streams or email to get the images from my phone to my Mac, but both of those are a little more annoying than they need to be.

Using a Photo Stream requires me to open iPhoto on my Mac, which means it will probably take forever just to grab a few images. For email I have to select all the images from my Camera Roll and either mail them five-at-a-time from the photos app, or copy them, switch to Mail, paste them into a message (which somehow bypasses the absurd five-image limit on in-line sharing in the Photos app) and then address the message to myself and wait for it to send, then wait for it to arrive on my computer.

There are also a ton of apps that allow you to connect to your phone through a web browser to transfer files, but those require the app to be running on your phone, and for the app to be in a specific mode to receive the files. It’s not seamless and it’s not as effective as it could be.

This is not a good workflow. That’s where DeskConnect comes in. DeskConnect is an pair of apps for iOS and Mac that avoids all of the unpleasantness of connecting the two devices and allows you to seamlessly send files from one to the other.

BioShock Infinite and SimCity arrive for Mac gamers starting today

Jordan Kahn Aug 29 2013 - 5:54 am PT

7 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvrnUcB8ZJc]

A couple of big new games are landing today for Mac users. We told you about BioShock Infinite earlier this month, the third instalment in the popular 2K/Irrational Games series that originally launched in March to rave reviews on consoles. Mac gaming heavyweights Aspyr have been working on porting the game to Mac since its initial release, and today the game is finally going on sale through Aspyr’s GameAgent store and other retailers. Aspyr sent over a beta of the title last week, and we’ve had nothing but positive first impressions from our time with the game since. The other big Mac title launching today, SimCity, might have had some major issues in its beta, but we’re happy to report you won’t run into similar performance problems with BioShock Infinite.

As usual, the title will support SteamPlay, allowing users to purchase the game once and play on both PC and Mac through Steam. It’s also available on the Mac App Store. However, Aspyr’s own distribution service, GameAgent, is offering some pretty enticing pre-order bonuses if you pick up the title through them…
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Flickr eyes Instagram with updated iOS app offering live filters and powerful editing

Ben Lovejoy Aug 29 2013 - 4:43 am PT

Flickr appears to be making a play for the Instagram market with the latest update to its free iOS app adding new filters with live previews and instant editing tools which include the ability to crop photos, adjust colors and add vignettes.

It’s a little late to the party, with Instagram having already expanded into video in a big way after witnessing the popularity of Vine, and of course filters and square crops are built into the revamped Camera app in iOS 7 …
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Mailbox updated to version 1.5 with cloud searching, per-account signatures, and more

Mike Beasley Aug 28 2013 - 6:29 pm PT

4 Comments

Mailbox, the iOS email app recently acquired by Dropbox, was updated with a few new features today. Among the new additions is Gmail cloud search which allows you to search messages stored on the server but not downloaded to your phone. The ability to set an individual signature for each account—a much-requested feature—was also added, along with an option to open links in Google Chrome.

The update is available now to all users for free.

What’s New in Version 1.5.0

– Cloud Search (now search every message in your Gmail account)
– Account-specific signatures
– Open links in Chrome
– Performance improvements and bug fixes

Facebook releases new SDK to bring 3D iOS & Android Unity games to its 260 million gamers

Jordan Kahn Aug 28 2013 - 1:51 pm PT

2 Comments

After Unity announced in March that it was beginning to work with Facebook to help bring web games using the engine to the social network, Facebook announced today that it’s releasing a new SDK to bring 3D Unity games from Android, iOS, and the web to Facebook. The cross-platform SDK will also allow developers to easier integrate Facebook sharing and game invite features directly into their unity games across mobile devices and the web.

Facebook has a relevant and engaged audience of gamers that mobile developers can reach by publishing their games on Facebook, and the SDK makes bringing a mobile game to web as simple as writing one line of code. By filling out a few fields in the developer app and giving us the URL of your game object, you can bring your mobile game to a whole new audience of avid gamers on Facebook.

The SDK will also let Unity developers implement native dialogs for inviting friends, requests, and sharing through Facebook, and the company will be “helping more people find and play Unity games on Facebook by driving discovery of the Unity player with a custom install flow for the Unity plug-in.”

Facebook noted that a few games, including Cmune’s UberStrike, Madfinger’s Shadowgun:Deadzone, and Nival’s King’s Bounty: Legions, are already utilizing the new SDK.

The Facebook SDK for Unity is available here.

Twitter for iOS updated: new conversation view in timeline, notification enhancements

Mark Gurman Aug 28 2013 - 11:38 am PT

Twitter has updated its iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch application with a redesigned timeline and conversation view. The new conversation view inputs a blue line to indicate a conversation between people on Twitter that you follow.

Conversations have a new look! They’re easier to find and fun to join.

• A blue line indicates a conversation between people you follow
• The first Tweet in the conversation now appears above the most recent reply
• Tap to see all of the replies

This release also includes various other improvements:
• New notification settings
• Bug fixes for direct messages, login verification and mor

User can also now more easily tap to see replies to a tweet and instantly Reply, Retweet, or Favorite a Tweet. The Twitter website and Android apps are seeing a complementing update:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnRmayAuB4M

Twitter also says that improved notifications and bug fixes are included in the update. The update is version 5.10 and it is available for free on the App Store.

Google Maps for iOS adds ability to share locations to Google+

Jordan Kahn Aug 28 2013 - 11:03 am PT

Google updated its Google Maps app today for iPhone and iPad with one new feature on top of the usual bug fixes. With version 2.2.0, users can now share their locations directly to Google+ from within the Google Maps iOS app. Tapping the the share button will now provide a “Google +” option and users can also select specific circles to share with before posting. Previously users could only mail, message, or copy a location to the clipboard.

What’s New in Version 2.2.0

● Share your favorite places with friends via Google+
● Bug fixes

Parallels’ new iPad app ‘Access’ makes your Mac apps feel like native iOS apps [Review]

Scott Buscemi Aug 27 2013 - 6:05 pm PT

18 Comments

Parallels Access App Switcher

For years, there have been iPad applications that allow remote access to your Mac from anywhere in the world. Parallels Mobile, for example, was launched back in 2011 and allowed you to view your Mac and Windows virtual machines on your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad (and later discontinued). But these apps have always been a huge turn-off for the majority of users, since OS X isn’t built for touch screens. Trying to press small buttons, editing text, scrolling through pages and other flukes have made it impossible to use your Mac from an iOS device for an extended amount of time.

But now, Parallels has solved all of these problems and more with the new Parallels Access, their new service that makes it a breeze to connect to your Mac from an iPad and access all of your files and applications in a way that makes all of your apps feel like iOS apps – it “applifies” your Windows/Mac apps.

Apple broke PlexConnect Apple TV hack with this morning’s update

Jordan Kahn Aug 27 2013 - 2:26 pm PT

7 Comments

UPDATE: Workaround now available to restore access

Thanks to an easy DNS hack called PlexConnect, non-jailbroken Apple TV users have been able to unofficially run the popular media server Plex on the second and third gen Apple TV since we first told you about it back in June. The hack, which required users to run an app on their Mac or PC that masquerades as the Trailers app, appears to be blocked in the latest Apple TV update pushed out this morning.

Earlier today Apple rolled out an update to the Apple TV that introduced new apps for Vevo, The Weather Channel, Smithsonian, Disney Channel, and Disney XD. The update didn’t require users to initiate a firmware update, so many users are reporting waking up to the PlexConnect app no longer working through the Trailers hack. A growing number of users on the Plex forums confirmed that PlexConnect is unable to connect following this morning’s update.

It’s unclear if Apple is intentionally blocking the popular Plex hack or whether its possibly a result of tweaks to the Trailers app delivered with the update. Plex isn’t the only app that takes advantage of the hack. We reported earlier this year that a Russian subscription TV service was using a similar method.

New norm? iTunes Store purchasing issue affecting 20% of users this morning [update: back up]

Scott Buscemi Aug 27 2013 - 9:27 am PT

Screen Shot 2013-08-27 at 9.17.57 AM

Apple has updated its System Status page to show that 20% of users have been unable to make purchases since 6am this morning. Sadly, this outage is starting to become the norm as just last week the iTunes Store and other iCloud services were experiencing issues for certain users. In addition, Apple released new versions of iOS 7, iTunes 11, and iTunes 11.1 beta to fix issues with iTunes in the Cloud that would not display purchases properly for some users.

Last week, Apple also sent out a botched update to Find my iPhone that left non-developers unable to log in to the app for several hours.

Downtime and server issues are to be expected with any large system – even Google.com went offline for just two minutes a couple of weeks ago – but there seems to be a growing amount of downtime reported on the System Status page. Nevertheless, it is good to see Apple being transparent with the issues.

We’ll update this page once the iTunes Store becomes fully functional again.

Update: The iTunes Store issues were resolved at 9:26 AM this morning, three and half hours after the problems began.

Ebay updates ‘Fashion’ & ‘Motors’ apps w/ iPad support, adds interactive maps to StubHub

Jordan Kahn Aug 27 2013 - 9:23 am PT

Ebay has updated some of its mobile apps today with new features and support for additional devices. Its Motors and Fashion apps, which provide dedicated experiences for browsing vehicles and fashion products on eBay, today get support for iPad. The Motors app also gets a redesign for iPad, improved search, and updated layouts on both iPhone and iPad.

Ebay also updated its StubHub iOS apps today with new interactive maps for the upcoming pro and college football and basketball seasons. You can now “filter listings by section on 1,800+ maps and see the view from your section on more than 400 maps.”

The updated StubHub, eBay Motors, and eBay Fashion apps are available for free on the App Store now.

Google launches app for iOS to set up Chromecast, manage settings

Mark Gurman Aug 27 2013 - 6:27 am PT

Google has released a new application for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch to make it easier for users to setup and manage the Chromecast TV device.

• Set up your Chromecast to work with your Wi-Fi network
• Manage your Chromecast settings (such as changing your device name, Wi-Fi password, etc.)

The application is free on the App Store. The Google Chromecast is a device that plugs into a TV set via an HDMI port and allows users to stream content, such as YouTube and Netflix, from devices like computers, tablets, and smartphones.

Update: Chromecast is currently available at Best Buy for $35 including the 3 months of Netflix (value $27)