Apps

Fandango, the popular app for browsing movies and theater information, has been redesigned to fit iOS 7’s new interface aesthetic. The new design is simpler and has lots of white space. In addition to the fresh design, the app includes improved trailer playback in the main menu, more powerful search, and exclusive video content.

How to get your free iWork apps for Macs purchased after Oct. 1

Jordan Kahn Oct 24 2013 - 3:41 pm PT

When Apple unveiled its updated iWork suite during its iPad Air event earlier this week, it also confirmed that it would be making the apps free for all new Mac purchases. That means new Macs shipping with Mavericks would allow users to download Pages, Keynote, and Numbers– previously $20 each– for free from the Mac App Store. That offer also extends to Macs purchased on or after Oct. 1 and yesterday Apple made an Up-To-Date Program available on its website for those that purchased qualifying Mac.

Apple has instructions on its website for applying for the Up-To-Date Program, which requires users to enter their Mac’s serial number, purchase date, and provide Apple with “an electronic copy of a dated, itemized sales receipt indicating the marketing part number(s) of the qualifying product(s) purchased.” Apple will then send codes to customers within 24 hours of confirming the purchase that can be redeemed on the Mac App Store to download the apps.

For those that purchased between Oct. 1 and Oct. 22, you’ll have to apply to the program by Nov. 21. Purchases made after Oct. 22 will have 30 days to qualify.

Apple also says that the program is only for the United States (50 states and the District of Columbia) and Canada, but it’s unclear if it will have similar programs for customers in other countries.

Tweetbot 3 for iPhone arrives: gorgeous new design, same great features

Mark Gurman Oct 24 2013 - 3:03 pm PT

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For many years, Tweetbot from Tapbots has been my favorite Twitter app and definitely my most used app on iOS. The application includes several powerful features wrapped up in a quick, smooth interface. However, the design began to look dated with the launch of iOS 7, Apple’s revamped iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch operating system, last month. For several months, the Tapbots crew has been hard at work on a complete, end-to-end redesign of their flagship app, and it is available now via the App Store. Check out my complete review…

Are LinkedIn users largely disinterested in its new Intro service?

Zac Hall Oct 24 2013 - 10:36 am PT

Yesterday LinkedIn presented a new service called Intro that integrates LinkedIn contact information directly in your iPhone’s Mail app, but it looks like the social networking service is launching to a rather dismal reception.

According to a quick poll held by Polar, more than 80% of users answered negatively when asked if having email proxied was worth native LinkedIn headers.

Personally, I found the setup process especially unfriendly for the audience being served (it’s much more technical than downloading an app via the App Store). Of course, if you have no quibbles with LinkedIn mediating your email for the benefit of a little integration, you can try the service for yourself here.

Us?

This sounds like my worst nightmare “@MikeIsaac: linkedin basically integrating with the iPhone email app in a big way.”

— Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) October 23, 2013

Vine iOS app updated w/ ‘Time Travel’ editing features & ‘Sessions’ for saving drafts

Jordan Kahn Oct 24 2013 - 9:29 am PT

The updated Vine app is available on the App Store now.

Vine updated its iOS app today with a few new features that allow users to save and maintain multiple drafts of posts and edit their vines before posting.

The first new feature Vine is calling “Sessions.” These are essentially drafts of posts that you can save and access for future editing before posting:

Save any post and come back to it later –– work on up to ten posts at once. Simply tap the new icon in the bottom right corner of your camera to save a new session or open an existing one.

Vine is also including new editing features that it’s calling “Time Travel”. These features allow users to “remove, reorganize or replace any shot within a post at any time.” Now, when shooting a video you’ll see a new green bar that allows you to organize shots as well as a new “Edit” button when in preview mode.

https://vine.co/v/hpMLHZea65u

BlackBerry Messenger for iOS updated with bug fixes for iOS 7.0.3

Mark Gurman Oct 23 2013 - 7:22 pm PT

Today, BlackBerry has updated its BBM app for iPhone and iPod touch with bug fixes, performance improvements, and some minor interface tweaks. Notably, the update also includes a fix for a font-related bug for users running the recently released iOS 7.0.3. BBM officially began rolling out on iOS and Android earlier this week. The update is available on the App Store and comes on the same day that BlackBerry announced 10 million users of BBM on non-BlackBerry devices.

9to5Toys Last Call: Sony Class 10 SD cards 60% off, Samsung 840 Pro/Kingston HyperX SSDs, 12-mo Xbox LIVE $40, more

Oct 23 2013 - 3:00 pm PT

Be sure to follow 9to5Toys to keep up with the best gear and deals on the web: Twitter, RSS Feed, Facebook, Google+.

Today’s can’t miss deals:

Sony speedy Class 10 SD Cards 60% off at Amazon: 16GB: $10, 32GB: $18, 64GB: $34

Solid State Drives: Samsung 840 Pro Series 256GB $195 (Reg. $270), Kingston HyperX 120GB $80 shipped (Reg. $130)

$50 iTunes gift card for $40: Save 20% on future app, music, movie, book purchases

Other great deals from today:

New! 50% off Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 14, ~~12-month Xbox LIVE gold membership $40~~, iOS freebies, more
New! Amazon increases free shipping order threshold to $35, Prime becomes even more valuable in run up to holidays
New! Powerbag Instant Messenger bag w/ built-in 6000mAh charging system: $30 + $5 shipping (Reg. $100)
New! Apple iPad 2 64GB WiFi + 3G (black or white) $430 shipped
New! This Week In Entertainment: DJ Khaled, Katy Perry, The Internship, The Conjuring, more
New! Samsung 32GB Google Nexus 10 WiFi Android tablet $350 shipped (Reg. $499)

The best deals that are still alive:

Get a free Sonos wireless bridge ($49 value) w/ the purchase of any Sonos Play wireless streaming speaker
Klipsch Image ONE Premium on-ear headphones with Mic and Apple controls $60 shipped (Reg. $150)
Synology DS213+ DiskStation 2-Bay (Diskless) NAS $299, 4TB Seagate NAS drives $180, 2TB WD Red $99
Neat Scanners 50% off (refurb): mobile $90 shipped (Reg. $180 new), desktop $275 (Reg. $369 new)
Roku 3 1080p streaming media player w/ private listening mode $85 Shipped (Reg. $100)
Microlab Bluetooth Wireless Portable Stereo Speaker $38 shipped (Reg. $50)
The best Apple-certified (MFi) Lightning cables in various lengths, colors, and styles

Mac software bundles:

The SuperStacked Mac Bundle: Over $3,000 Worth Of Premium Developer & Designer Tools – $45 today, but price increases everyday it’s on sale.

New product announcements & reviews:

Pyle Audio releases new mini Hi-Speed HD sports camera
Synology introduces new, faster SOHO NAS w/ hot-swappable drives for $330

Mac App Store bug allows iWork trial users to update the entire suite for free (Update: Aperture, too)

Mike Beasley Oct 23 2013 - 2:36 pm PT

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Users who have previously downloaded the free 30-day iWork trial and kept it on their systems found themselves able to update to the latest version of Apple’s productivity suite for free yesterday due to what is apparently a bug with the way the store finds copies of the software purchased through other sources.

Since the Mac App Store now detects boxed copies of iWork and allows them to be updated to the Mac App Store version, it seems the trial versions of Pages, Numbers, and Keynote are perceived by the App Store as being a full purchased copy. This allows users to install yesterday’s updated apps without having to pay anything.

LinkedIn debuts Intro with iOS Mail integration

Zac Hall Oct 23 2013 - 1:10 pm PT

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77sh3jwB7pQ]

LinkedIn announced new software today called LinkedIn Intro, and it’s available for fans of the professional social networking site to try out now.

Basically, LinkedIn Intro connects your Apple Mail inbox, whether it’s iCloud, Yahoo!, AOL, or Gmail, to your LinkedIn account and contacts without requiring a new mail app.
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Popular universal IM app IM+ Pro redesigned for iOS 7, adds sync & typing status

Sarah Guarino Oct 23 2013 - 8:56 am PT

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IM + Pro 7,a feature-rich messenger app, has been redesigned to reflect iOS 7’s user-interface style. Today’s update also adds several new features and become a universal app for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

It allows users free texting, sending photos, videos and voice messages. It supports a dozen IM services including Skype, Facebook, Twitter DM, AIM, iChat, ICQ, MSN, LiveMessenger, Jabber, Yahoo, Google Talk, and MySpace. It supports Group Chats in Skype, AIM, ICQ and Neighbors.

New features include setting up multiple accounts per service, typing notifications, iCloud sync and beep mobile-to-mobile messenger alerts. If you forget your iOS device at home, you are always able to log on from a computer using their website. IM + Pro 7 is available in the App Store for $4.99.

Opinion: What is really driving Apple’s new-found fondness for ‘free’?

Ben Lovejoy Oct 23 2013 - 7:44 am PT

54 Comments

Photo: abc.e

Apple surprised many yesterday by making the update to OS X 10.9 Mavericks free, rather than the $20 it cost to upgrade to the previous release, Mountain Lion. The company also surprised some (though not us) by doing the same for its previously chargeable iWork apps.

There’s been a lot of commentary today about this being an attack on Microsoft, and I do indeed think there’s likely to have been a fair amount of sweating in the corner offices at Redmond as they watched yesterday’s keynote. But Microsoft execs aren’t the only ones I’d expect to see wearing worried expressions today: I suspect the same is true across at Mountain View.

Before we get to Google, let’s start with Microsoft …
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Evernote app updated with customized homescreen layout, mapping & improved saved searches

Ben Lovejoy Oct 23 2013 - 5:39 am PT

The popular Evernote productivity app was updated yesterday to offer the ability to customize the homescreen, view notes on a map and improvements to saved searches.

Premium users can now change the order of the homescreen buttons, or remove altogether the ones you never use. Just hit the Edit button at the bottom of the screen. Users can also view notes in a map view or by tapping on the name of a location (handy for notes on particular places, probably less so for unrelated notes you happened to take in the back of a cab somewhere) and create and remove saves searches directly from the search results.

If you haven’t yet tried Evernote, check out our in-depth guide. Evernote 7.1 is available on iTunes as a free app, with in-app upgrade to get premium features.

Microsoft offers free iPhone app for its subscription-based Dynamics CRM enterprise service

Ben Lovejoy Oct 23 2013 - 4:23 am PT

Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM, a subscription-based customer relationship management tool aimed at small & medium enterprises, is now available on the iPhone via a new app.

The cloud-based service aims to help businesses identify and manage sales opportunities, and track progress from opportunity to sale. The iPhone app provides users with the information needed to prepare for a sales appointment, and allows on-the-spot updating of notes, tasks, contacts, accounts, leads and opportunities.

The service costs £28.70 per user per month.

Receive desktop push notifications for any RSS feed with Pronto Push & Mavericks

Scott Buscemi Oct 22 2013 - 9:13 pm PT

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As part of the new OS X Mavericks, websites can now send push notifications to your computer. Back in June, we featured the first public website that took advantage of the native push notification feature. Today, the same developer, Connor LaCombe, released Pronto Push, a new service that allows you to receive push notifications for any RSS feed.

Rather than waiting for your favorite websites’ developers to add the push notification feature, you can sign up for Pronto Push, type in the websites you’d like to receive notifications for, and immediately receive a push notification when a new post has been added. There’s no software to install, and managing your subscriptions is done through a simple web interface. You can even manage multiple Macs under one account.

Initial setup has to be completed with Safari 7, but after that clicking on notifications will open the related post in your default browser. Notifications come through immediately, so there’s no delay between when a new RSS item is added and when you receive the notification. You can also receive instantaneous Facebook notifications (since the native ones are usually delayed or don’t even appear).

Pronto Push is free and requires Mavericks.

Apple TV update brings new iMovie Theater channel

Jordan Kahn Oct 22 2013 - 5:42 pm PT

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When Apple updated its iLife suite on iOS and OS X today during its iPad event, it announced a new feature for iMovie called “iMovie Theater” designed to allow users to share content to iCloud and then watch the clips, movies or trailers easily on any Apple device. Apple mentioned that would also include the Apple TV and has now added a new “iMovie Theater” channel in a quiet update to Apple TV.

The new iMovie Theater channel is accessible after installing a software update on Apple TVs and you can access your shared content by signing into the same Apple ID used for your iCloud account on your other Apple devices with iMovie.

The iMovie apps are available for free to users who purchase new devices and to everyone else for $4.99 and $14.99 on the App Stores.

Xcode 5.0.1 released with Mavericks SDK and new build / debug features [update: new versions of OS X Server and Remote Desktop]

Scott Buscemi Oct 22 2013 - 4:30 pm PT

Xcode has been updated to version 5.0.1, bringing with it the OS X 10.9 SDK and several new features for developers to use. The app is free in the Mac App Store.

Developers can now use the “Debug Gauge” to see how much power their apps use in realtime. In addition, to go along with the new version of OS X Server ($19.99) that was released today, “continuous integration bots build and test your iOS and OS X apps on OS X Server.”

What’s New in Version 5.0.1

Includes SDKs for OS X 10.9 Mavericks, OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, and iOS 7.

New features for OS X Mavericks:

• Continuous integration bots build and test your iOS and OS X apps on OS X Server.
• Source Control menu creates new remote Git repositories on Mac servers.
• Debug Gauge for energy use displays a live graph of your app’s power consumption.

The $79.99 Apple Remote Desktop app was also updated to version 3.7 today, with Mavericks support as the main addition:

What’s New in Version 3.7

This update is recommended for Apple Remote Desktop users and addresses several issues related to overall reliability, usability and compatibility. This update also provides:

– Support for OS X Mavericks
– Automatic copy and paste between local and remote computers
– Improved support for Mac systems with multiple displays and multiple IP addresses
– Enhanced multi-observe with gesture support for swiping between screens

Apple releases redesigned Podcasts, Find my iPhone, and iTunes Trailers apps (Update: Keynote Remote now free, not updated)

Michael Steeber Oct 22 2013 - 3:53 pm PT

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Along with updates to iWork and iLife today, Apple has overhauled their Podcasts, Find my iPhone, and iTunes Trailers apps to fall in line with the design paradigms of iOS 7. Along with new icons, all three apps have been completely redesigned, with user interfaces that closely resemble Apple’s other iOS 7 apps. While Find my iPhone and iTunes Trailers don’t include new features, Podcasts has received updates to the search tab, Top Charts section, and more. Here’s what the new icons for all three apps look like:

Apple’s new iLife & iWork apps for iOS 7 now available on App Store w/ 64-bit support & new features

Jordan Kahn Oct 22 2013 - 3:44 pm PT

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After announcing earlier today at it is releasing new versions of iWork and iLife for both Mac OS X and iOS, the updated versions of iMovie, Keynote, Numbers, Pages, GarageBand, and iPhoto are now all available on the App Store for iPhone and iPad.

While Apple was only able to go through a few new features of each app during its iPad event this morning, the iTunes release notes have a long list of new features listed for each app. Below you’ll find release notes detailing what’s new for each of the iWork and iLife suites for iOS.
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Aperture updated to version 3.5 with support for iCloud photo sharing, SmugMug integration, and more

Michael Steeber Oct 22 2013 - 2:45 pm PT

Along with a slew of other updates today, Apple has just released version 3.5 of Aperture, with notable support for iCloud photo sharing, multiple contributors to Photo Streams, and the ability to post videos to shared streams. The “Places” feature inside of Aperture has also switched to use Apple Maps, instead of relying on Google’s mapping data like it did previously. SmugMug integration has also been added, allowing those who use the service to publish and sync galleries of their photos. A full change log for Aperture is listed below. You can grab the app for $79.99 in the App Store.

Pixelmator 3.0 FX released: adds layer styles, ‘Liquify’ warping tools, Mac Pro and Mavericks optimizations

Benjamin Mayo Oct 22 2013 - 2:37 pm PT

Today, the team behind Pixelmator has released the latest version of their app, version 3.0 FX. As before, the app is available on the Mac App Store for $29.99. The update brings a slew of changes to the already popular image editor, especially considering version 2.2 was only released a few weeks ago. 9to5Mac has had access to a preview copy of the update for a few days … so read on for a full walkthrough of the changes.

The headline feature for Pixelmator 3.0 is the addition of layer styles. Layer styles apply effects such as strokes, fills, shadows and reflections to the entire layer in very few clicks. More importantly, these changes are non-destructive — they affect the layer, not the canvas pixels themselves. This means layer effects can be undone and manipulated without changing the underlying image data. In fact, layer styles can even be copied to the clipboard and duplicated across layers.

OS X Mavericks is out, walkthrough: iBooks, Maps, and more

Mike Beasley Oct 22 2013 - 11:53 am PT

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Today Apple released version 10.9 of Mac OS X, codenamed “Mavericks.” The new OS includes several new features and enhancements over the previous version, “Mountain Lion.” The update is available for free for all compatible Macs from the App Store

Below you’ll find a closer look at some of the new features in 10.9.

Tim Cook at iPad event: 64% of iOS devices on iOS 7, 20 million iTunes Radio listeners, 1 billion songs played, 1 million apps

Jordan Kahn Oct 22 2013 - 10:10 am PT

Keeping with tradition, Tim Cook kicked off Apple’s iPad event today by giving us an update on some of the company’s core businesses and accomplishments since last checking in. Below is a roundup of the numbers and stats that Cook shared on stage today during the event including updates on the new iPhones, iOS 7 adoption, iTunes Radio, and the App Store:

iPhone & iOS 7:

– 9 million iPhones launch weekend, biggest iPhone launch ever

– iOS 7 200 million devices in five days-

-64% of devices currently running iOS 7

iTunes Radio:

– iTunes radio, 20 million listeners, 1 billion songs

App Store:

-1 million apps on App Store

-60 app billion downloads

-$13B earned by developers (up from 11 billion in July)

iPad:

-170 million iPads sold

-475k iPad apps (up from 375k in July)

Spotify iOS app updated with iOS 7 compatibility & UI tweaks

Jordan Kahn Oct 22 2013 - 6:18 am PT

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While the majority of popular apps have already released updates to incorporate support for iOS 7, Spotify is a little bit late to the game with its iOS 7 support update hitting the App Store today. The release notes on iTunes don’t mention many changes other than compatibility with iOS 7, but you will see a few UI tweaks that make the app fit more in with Apple’s new, flatter OS. Buttons and other UI elements seem to have been given the flat treatment, and you’ll also notice that the sidebar and media controls have been streamlined as well.

Version 0.8.0 of Spotify for iPhone and iPad is available now on the App Store.

What’s New in Version 0.8.0

• New: Now compatible with iOS 7.
• Fixed: Some bugs that were irritating us.
• Fictitious: This app cries at weddings.

HMV’s presumed PR stunt succeeds as iOS app is approved then pulled

Ben Lovejoy Oct 22 2013 - 5:40 am PT