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Debunk: Job listing doesn’t indicate Apple TV getting a camera

Ben Lovejoy Mar 12 2014 - 7:56 am PT

1 Comment

A claim that “Apple job listings suggest cameras coming to Apple TV” and that this is “hinting at motion controls” appears to be reading way too much into some standard wording used many times by Apple in the past.

The Apple TV is one of the few products in Apple’s lineup that doesn’t include an integrated camera, but that may change with future versions of the hardware, according to new job listings from the company, potentially paving the way for gesture-based motion controls in the living room.

The text in question, which appears in a number of job ads like this one, is this:

The Camera Software team provides the capture and camera foundation across all of Apple’s innovative products, including iPhone, iPad, AppleTV, iPod, iTunes, and Mac OS

Well, let’s see …

First, this is nothing new. Apple has used the exact same wording in job ads at least as long ago as last September.

Second, this is an ad for a software, not hardware, role. Not a single one of the hardware team ads mentions Apple TV. The software team likely works on everything photo-related, which on Apple TV would include Photo Stream and Airplay.

Third, you’ll note that the standard wording used includes iTunes. Again, because iTunes needs software support for the camera to read gift certificates. Or perhaps iTunes is getting its own hardware camera too …

None of this is to say it’s impossible (though it would perhaps be more likely for a full-on Apple television rather than the existing Apple TV box), merely that the job listings tell us nothing.

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MyPhotostream: Photo Stream for Mac without iPhoto’s baggage

Zac Hall Jan 27 2014 - 11:53 am PT

16 Comments

MyPhotostream is a simple, standalone Mac app for viewing your pictures from Photo Stream without having to open the mammoth of an app that iPhoto has become.

This app removes a major point of friction for me, and I’m guessing I’m not alone. Open iPhoto and it’s loading your image library, checking location data, updating Photo Stream and Shared Photo Streams, and who knows what else. If you’re viewing iPhoto in full-screen (as it best appears in my opinion) and you have a camera or iOS device connected, it will pull you back to a desktop view and take over the screen with a modal import prompt (even if auto-import is disabled); it’s a mess.

MyPhotostream digs your Photo Stream photos out of the mess and presents them in a simple, customizable grid view.
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Apple updates Keynote with new transitions, fixes issues with iMovie on OS X

Mark Gurman Jan 23 2014 - 1:44 pm PT

2 Comments

It’s software update Thursday for Apple. In addition to redesigning many elements of iWork for iCloud and tweaking Podcasts on iOS, Apple has pushed out a slew of software updates to its applications for OS X…

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Using your own iPhone at work? Watch that it doesn’t get wiped when you leave …

Ben Lovejoy Jan 22 2014 - 3:57 am PT

29 Comments

Employees who use their own electronic devices at work under a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) arrangement may have unwittingly authorised their employer to remotely wipe their device when they leave the company, reports the WSJ.

In early October, Michael Irvin stood up to leave a New York City restaurant when he glanced at his iPhone and noticed it was powering off. When he turned it back on again, all of his information—email programs, contacts, family photos, apps and music he had downloaded—had vanished […]

It wasn’t a malfunction. The device had been wiped clean by AlphaCare of New York, the client he had been working for full-time since April. Mr. Irvin received an email from his AlphaCare address that day confirming the phone had been remotely erased.

A survey found that 21 percent of companies perform a remote wipe of employee-owned devices registered on the company network, with employees ostensibly agreeing to this when they connect to the company network.

Many employers have a pro forma user agreement that pops up when employees connect to an email or network server via a personal device, he added. But even if these documents explicitly state that the company may perform remote wipes, workers often don’t take the time to read it before clicking the “I agree” button.

The legality of the practice has reportedly not yet been tested in court.

In principle, an iCloud or iTunes backup should allow wiped iPhones to be restored, but you may want to pay a little more attention to the small-print next time one of those corporate messages pops up on your screen, to find out what it is you’ve been agreeing to …

Update: Several readers have pointed out that the remote wipe would be performed via the company’s Exchange servers, so removing the Exchange account the day before you leave would be a good precaution.

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The worst password of all is no longer ‘password’ according to hacked accounts chart

Ben Lovejoy Jan 20 2014 - 4:27 am PT

16 Comments

You might have thought that it would be hard to come up with a worse password than ‘password,’ but according to a chart compiled by SplashData from hacked accounts, it has been edged out by ‘123456’.

The far more secure ‘12345678’ (33 percent more secure!) retains its position as number three, while a new entry in sixth place goes as far as ‘123456789’. Sadly, ‘letmein’, a password I always felt deserving of classic status, dropped seven places to achieve a mediocre ranking of 14.

Apple introduced iCloud Keychain as part of Mavericks and iOS 7.0.3, and if you’re not already using it, you can read our how-to guide. If you’re using older versions of OS X or iOS, we also ran a how-to guide on using a password manager to have unique, secure passwords for each website.

Via re/code

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AOL announces iCloud email support returning to its Alto webmail service

Zac Hall Dec 23 2013 - 11:29 am PT

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Earlier this year AOL announced it would no longer be supporting iCloud email accounts with its Alto webmail service after December 2nd. Today, however, the Alto team informed users it had reversed that decision and apologized for the confusion of its decision. Alto also promised it would not be pulling support for iCloud email in the future, but offered no details on why the initial decision then reversal were made. Full email below:
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Dropbox-owned Mailbox email app finally gets iCloud, Yahoo Mail support

Mark Gurman Dec 17 2013 - 11:22 am PT

5 Comments

Mailbox, the popular email application owned by Dropbox, has finally received one of its most requested features: support for email accounts using Apple’s iCloud email service. Also in the mix with today’s update is support for Yahoo Mail. The app is yet to hit the App Store, but the company tells us that the app is propagating out to users today via the App Store. (Update: it’s live)

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Report profiles Apple’s pioneering clean energy projects in North Carolina [photos]

Jordan Kahn Nov 18 2013 - 10:12 am PT

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GigaOM today published a lengthy piece on the state of the solar and fuel cell farm installations that Apple has been building in North Carolina in recent years.

After a visit to the 100-acre, 20 megawatt (MW) solar farm, 10MW fuel cell farm, and another 20 MW solar panel farm situated close to Apple’s North Carolina iCloud data center, the report gives a pretty in-depth look into Apple’s operations, from how its fuel cells work right down to the sheep that eat the grass on its solar farm:

The solar farm across from the data center has over 50,000 panels on 100 acres, and it took about a year to build the entire thing….Each solar panel on Apple’s farms has a microcontroller on its back, and the panels are attached to long, large trackers (the steel poles in the picture). During the day, the computers automatically and gradually tilt the solar panels so that the face of the panels follow the sun throughout the day. The above picture was taken in the late morning, so by the end of the day, the panels will have completely rotated to face where I was standing. The trackers used are single-axis trackers, which basically means they are less complex and less expensive than more precise dual-axis trackers.

You can see in the above picture that the grass is neatly maintained. Apple manages the grass under the panels in a variety of ways, but one of those is a little more unusual. Apple works with a company that ropes in sheep that eat the grass on a portion of the solar farm; when the sheep finish grazing on one spot, they’re moved to the next.

The site decided to take a look into Apple’s decision to take renewable energy into its own hands just as North Carolina utility Duke Energy is requesting that the state allow it to sell clean energy to large corporate customers. Google is one of the large companies interested in purchasing clean energy from the utility, but the hundreds of millions Apple has invested into its own renewable energy efforts have so far made it self-sufficient. The report notes Apple’s two solar farms, along with its fuel cell farm, are producing more than it needs to power its data center by around 10MW:

Apple’s second 20 MW solar panel farm, which is about 15 miles away from the data center near the town of Conover, North Carolina, is also up and running. All told, the three facilities are creating 50 MW of power, which is about 10 MW more than what Apple’s data center uses. Because of state laws, the energy is being pumped into the power grid, and Apple then uses the energy it needs from the grid. But this setup also means Apple doesn’t need large batteries, or other forms of energy storage, to keep the power going when the sun goes down and its solar panels stop producing electricity.

The full feature on GigaOM is worth checking out if you’re interested in Apple’s renewable energy projects.

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LastPass password manager iOS app gets simplified UI & family logins

Ben Lovejoy Nov 5 2013 - 4:35 am PT

15 Comments

The popular free password manager app LastPass has been given a revamped user-interface across iOS app, Android app and browser add-on, aimed at both a cleaner look and greater ease of use.

Paid users also get access to a new Shared Family Folder, allowing up to five users to get shared access to joint logins. The LastPass blog highlights the new features in version 3.0 as:

• Revamped user experience and user interface
• Field icon menus for easy access to logins and LastPass tools
• A Shared Family Folder for up to 5 users
• Expanded Shared Folder features for LastPass Enterprise
• A revamped LastPass for Applications
• Secure Note history, to track changes to your notes

LastPass is a free download, and we have a detailed tutorial on how to use it.