30 percent of iOS users upgraded to iOS 7 in the first 16 hours, according to data from tracking company Mixpanel. As we fanboys love to do, compare with the Carrier-controlled Android ecosystem where you have to go back to last year’s Android 4.1 to find numbers close to that:
9to5Mac readers were of course way ahead of the game …
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Before iOS 7 it was rather inconvenient to block a phone number, and there was nothing built into iOS that would allow you do so. If you got phone calls from Telemarketers you can always register your number for free on the National Do Not Call Registry. If you wanted to block specific people, you had to contact your carrier to do so. For example, with AT&T, you can pay $4.99 per month per line to block up to 30 numbers with their Smart Limits. With Verizon Wireless, you are able to block up to five phone numbers per line with no charge. With Sprint you fill out a form on their website and it appears there is no additional fee.
Dealing with your carrier can be a rather tedious, and with the new iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch operating system, you no longer have to…
As we suspected when Apple added a warning to a pre-release version of iOS 7 that non-certified cables may not work reliably with iPhones, the launch version is actually blocking some of them from charging the phone. Certified cables contain a chip that allows them to authenticate.
We first spotted this in a Reddit post, and have since confirmed. The warning message itself is unchanged, but it’s no longer an empty threat – though as seen in comments, some non-certified cables are still working. Possibly ones that use cracked chips. The good news is that there is a workaround for others, but it’s not pretty …
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Alongside the official launches of both iTunes Radio and iOS 7 today, Apple has begun using the @iTunes Twitter account. While the account only has two tweets at the time of this writing, it appear that the page will be used for general purpose, iTunes related announcements.
https://twitter.com/iTunes/status/380400209110392833
As noticed by BusinessInsider, Apple’s release of iOS 7 today is causing havoc for the networks of several college campuses and other schools where a large number of iOS device users are attempting to download the new OS. Some schools, including Ohio University, is even urging students to delay upgrading to iOS 7 as the network experiences network problems due to the high amount of traffic.
Others having WiFi issues today include New York University, Michigan University, and Western Connecticut State University. Those three schools haven’t confirmed iOS 7 is the cause of network outages today, but students on Twitter have noted that iOS 7 is likely the culprit…
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Facebook announced on its blog today that it’s rolling out a new update for iOS 7 (alongside just about every other developer today) that brings a brand new iOS 7 style design to the app. On top of a lighter color palette and the new iOS 7 translucent top bar, you’ll also now be able to “swipe from left to right to get back to News Feed” after tapping a story.
There are some other tweaks included in the update as well. The iPhone app, for example, now includes a new tab style menu along the bottom of the screen. The new menu design is something Facebook has actually been testing with many users in recent months, although not with the new iOS 7 design included in today’s update. Facebook is hoping the new menu makes it “easier to switch from News Feed to your friend requests, messages or notifications.”
The new Facebook app for iOS has begun rolling out to the App Store. A video of the new design in action is below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnXggjgWC3U&feature=youtu.be
Control Center is one of iOS 7 brand new easy to use features that makes it very efficient to toggle on and off certain settings. To activate and get into Control Center, you swipe up from the bottom of the screen.
You are now able to quickly access Airplane Mode, Wifi, Bluetooth, Do Not Disturb Mode and Lock Rotation. You are also able to easily adjust the brightness of your display by adjusting the slider next to the suns. You also have controls for playing your music, with a volume slider below the controls. Below that you do have the option to AirDrop (only available on iPhone 5 or later, iPad fouth generation and newer, and iPod Touch fifth generation and newer) and AirPlay which allows you to wirelessly project the device’s display using an Apple TV or to project music to Bluetooth speakers or AirPlay speakers.
For quick easy access you now do have a flashlight. Even if your phone display goes to sleep, the flashlight still stays on, so make sure you actually do tap the flashlight again, to turn it off. You don’t need to have a Flashlight app anymore as it is built in. You do also have easy access to the Clock app, so you can set alarms, timers, or use the stop watch. You have access to the calculator app. You also have a new way to open up the Camera app.
For example, Control Center is great because now I do not have to unlock my iPhone, type in my password, go into Settings, turn on Bluetooth and have it connect again with my car system. Now I just swipe up to open up Control Center, tap on Bluetooth and it automatically pairs up with my car speakerphone.
However, not everybody might want to access Control Center from their lock screen. You can control where on your phone you want to be able to activate Control Center. For example, you can decide whether or not you want to be able to access control center on your lock screen, and while you are in apps. To set this up, go into settings.
Then press on Control Center.
You can then toggle to access Control Center on the Lock Screen on and off. Same thing with accessing it within apps.
Multitasking came out for the iOS devices with iOS 4. Multitasking is a way to manage all of the apps running on your iOS device.
Previously, when you double tap the home button, you would get a small tray on the bottom of the screen filled with apps running. To close the apps, you would have to tap and hold on one of them until it wiggles and jiggles, and then once it is wiggling and jiggling you would tap on the red minus button in the upper left hand corner of the app.
Now, with iOS 7 that is no longer the case. When you double tap the home button, it takes you out of the app you were in, and it shows you a fullscreen thumbnail preview of the app you were most recently in, as well the rest of your recent applications.
If you want to see the rest of your open apps, you would just swipe left to right or right to left to see them all.
The home screen even appears as a fullscreen thumbnail view. To get into any of your open apps, simply tap on the app in the switcher to bring it up.
If you want to close an app, just swipe up on any application preview. You cannot close all of the apps at one, just like before. However, if you swipe up with two fingers, it will close out two apps at a time.
This new method of multitasking is similar to the popular jailbreaking tweak Auxo. For those of you who used this jailbreak tweak, this is going to be very similar, except for the fact that there will not be a way to close all the apps at once, as well as there will not be a media control, or any setting controls. Instead, you will find these in Control Center.
iOS 7, Apple’s brand-new take on their mobile operating system, has been released to the public and is now available as an over-the-air update or through iTunes.
Below you’ll find a full walkthrough of many of the new features and changes throughout the overhauled OS, including a look at the built-in apps that received the biggest changes.
Before you can dive into everything that iOS 7 has to offer, you’ll need to update your device. You can find full directions for updating in our how-to from yesterday. Once you’re updated, check out all of the shiny new additions to the OS:
The Digg iOS client has been updated today to version 5.2.1 and with it comes full support for iOS 7 in addition to the usual performance enhancements and bug fixes.
While the design of the app hasn’t been dramatically overhauled like many others, the update brings a few new features made possible by iOS 7. Among them is support for Apple’s new Dynamic Type and Background App Refresh features.
Digg version 5.2.1 is available for iPhone and iPad on the App Store now.
◆ Full iOS 7 support, including Dynamic Type & Background App Refresh.
◆ Performance enhancements & bug fixes.
Less than a day until the launch of Apple’s iOS 7, Barnes and Noble has warned users of its Nook for iOS application of some potential incompatibilities with the new operating system. The potential issues can be seen in the copy of the email above. Barnes and Noble will prompt users when there is an update available to fix and address these issues. The company also warns that not all users will have incompatibility problems, and it is unclear which users will be the ones seeing the issues.
A beautiful new weather app called Perfect Weather for iOS launched this morning. Perfect Weather is designed for iOS 7, as it plays off of the updated color palette and uses the new weather icons introduced in iOS 7 Weather. However, Perfect Weather is a lot more in depth and informative than the default Weather app.
Upon opening Perfect Weather you can easily see the different locations in which you saved and view the weather for each. You can quickly add more locations by pressing the Edit button. To switch between the different locations just tap on the card with the city you want. Perfect Weather is able to retrieve weather data from the United States and parts of Canada. Tapping on the lighting bolts on the left hand side allows you to quickly see if there are any severe weather alerts.
Pulling down on the white tab shows you the week view of the weather and gives you a minute-by-minute guide of the weather in an easy-to-interpret line graph. Hovering your finger on the graph shows you the time, the temperature, and the weather (sunny, partly cloudy, cloudy, raining). This feature is useful because in determining how to prepare for the day ahead.
In this view it is very easy to see when the high temperature and and when the low temperature will occur throughout the day.
Swiping right to left on the temperature chart brings you to the current conditions view, where you’ll find information such as what the temperature feels like, humidity, pressure, visibility, wind, sunrise, sunset, and dew point.
You are also able to open a split view which lets you see a live satellite view and the forecast at the same time. By pressing the play button in the lower left hand corner, you can see the the rain and cloud patterns twenty minutes prior to the current time. You are able to switch between rain and cloud patterns by pressing the icon in the lower right hand corner. Adjusting the slider changes the transparency of the satellite view overlay on top of the map.
Perfect Weather looks pretty, but no where in the app is there a guide or tutorial to show you how to interpret the satellite data. I’m not exactly sure how to interpret it, which limits its usefulness to me.
Overall, Perfect Weather does fit in with iOS 7 because it blends in stylistically and feels like a native iOS 7 app. It easily shows you the 7-day forecast and detailed current conditions. The temperature chart gives a unique perspective of the weather. Navigating Perfect Weather is very intuitive and feels natural. If you are looking for a more comprehensive alternative to the stock weather app on iOS 7, Perfect Weather is just the app you need at $2.99.
Apple has announced that iOS 7 will be available tomorrow, September 18th. Before installing the update, it is recommended that you have a backup of your data. This how-to is going to walk you through backing up your iOS 6 device and transitioning it over to iOS 7:
Touch ID is far, far more important than most people have realised – the core message behind a Quora post by the CEO of a card payment service. We can expect to learn far more “in the next few months, and that’s likely to eventually include both Touch ID Macs and use of the fingerprint system for mobile payments.
In the torrent of the billions of words already written about Touch ID very, very few people have really understood just how revolutionary this really is. Apple not only has developed one of the most accurate mass produced biometric security devices, they have also solved critical problems with how the data from this device will be encrypted, stored and secured.
Brian Roemmele, CEO of 1st American Card Service, said that Apple’s attempt to solve the problem of how to develop a truly secure access system goes all the way back to a patent application in 2008, but it was only through the A7 chip – specifically created by ARM with mobile payment security in mind – that the company finally had a gold-standard solution. And its applications will go far beyond iPhone unlock and iTunes purchases …
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Ahead of the iPhone 5s’s launch later this week, Apple has put up a notice for developers to start submitting 64-bit compatible App Store apps. One of the iPhone 5s’s marquee features is a new 64-bit A7 processor that improves gaming and speed performance across the system and apps. Apple’s notice to developers:
Poor old Siri doesn’t seem to get much love from many users. When I recently mentioned it as the reason I upgraded from the iPhone 4 to the 4S, quite a few disparaging comments were made about the service. Our finding this weekend that Apple now considers Siri good enough to lose the beta tag caused Gizmodo to wonder who actually uses it.
I thought its reclassification as a fully-fledged iOS feature would be a good time to persuade those who’ve abandoned the assistant to give Siri another chance …
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While the first version of iOS 7 will arrive for end-users next week, Apple is already well into testing for iterative updates to the revamped operating system. According to web analytics for 9to5Mac, Apple employees seem to already be testing iOS 7.0.1, iOS 7.0.2, and iOS 7.1. While we cannot absolutely confirm that these tests are occurring inside Apple, it seems likely based on the cities in which these operating systems are being tested. Apple’s headquarters is in Cupertino, California, and we are seeing these views from these unreleased operating systems from both Cupertino and surrounding areas.
Based on Apple’s past release history, iOS 7.0.1 and iOS 7.0.2 are designed as successive bug fix updates, while iOS 7.1 could bring either new functionality or support for new hardware. Apple typically releases bug fixes updates within a few weeks following a major iOS launch, so it is somewhat unsurprising to see Apple employees already testing the new versions. Based on Apple preparing new models of iPad hardware for the later this fall, perhaps the iOS 7.1 update is designed to launch on that new hardware. We previously reported that the new iPads will run a successive update to iOS 7.0. Perhaps backing this up is that all signs of iOS 7.1 testing in our analytics have been conducted on iPads.
With the iPhone 4S launch nearly two years ago, Apple introduced the Siri voice control system to its customers. At launch, Siri was a gimmicky feature at best, being released with bugs, a highly-computerized voice, sluggish content loading, and unreliable servers. In addition, Siri of 2011 was short on user compatibility, only launching with knowledge of English, French, and German. Apple certainly did not deny the early issues with Siri: the company launched the product in “beta,” a tag that has remained on the software ever since.
Since 2011, Apple has been slowly improving the service. In early 2012, Siri gained support for Japanese, and with iOS 6 in late 2012, the service added support for several new languages and capabilities. With iOS 7, Siri has been given a redesigned user-interface, new functionality, and all-new voices. Many of the server errors and lengthy processing time issues that riddled the product in its early days have now disappeared; and it seems that Apple agrees. With the upcoming launch of iOS 7, it appears that Apple will finally be taking Siri out of “beta.”
Late this past week, Apple updated its Siri webpages to drop all references to the product being in beta. Prior to this past week, the bottom of the Siri informational page read:
Click for a larger view.
Apple announced on Tuesday that iOS 7 will be publicly available on September 18th. The revamped OS moves completely away from the realistic designs of the past six generations, dropping almost all “artificial shadows” (as Apple SVP Craig Federighi called them), gloss, and even button borders. Instead, the Jony Ive-inspired interface features an entirely rethought design language that focuses heavily on large icons, lightweight fonts, whitespace, transparency, and conservative use of color.
We previously took a look at what some of Apple’s own in-house apps could look like when redesigned for iOS 7. During Apple’s September 10th event, Federighi flashed up a slide displaying the upcoming iOS 7 updates for many third-party applications. None of the apps were labeled, but we’ve tracked down names for most of them.
The apps featured are:
Developer Readdle has officially released the latest version of its popular Calendars app, which appears to be replacing the paid Calendars+ app that it rolled out back in May. Calendars 5 for iPhone and iPad introduces a new interface that focuses on upcoming events and a new look and feel designed specifically for iOS 7. It also adds new features including additional view modes, full offline support, natural language input for quickly creating events (much like Fantastical), and a new powerful task manager that syncs with iOS reminders.
Calendars 5 is available now on the App Store for an introductory price of $4.99 and Readdle’s free Calendar app also remains available.
A full list of what’s new in Calendars 5 is below:
What’s new:
1. Natural language event processing.
It’s the most natural way to enter an event. Everybody can understand and use it. But you can create events in Day view by tapping and holding, some might find that faster and more natural. Just try it yourself since we support it as well.
2. Clean UI focused on YOUR events.
There are no colorful bars or buttons in the elements of Calendars+5. The only elements in color on the screen are your events or buttons that need your attention. iOS 7 design philosophy is in its essence.
3. All complexity is hidden.
When you create an event in iOS calendar you see a 12-fields-dialog that confuses and disorients you. In Calendars+5 you have a single field to start with. The rest will unfold as you need it.
4. No compromises, you have ‘Day, Week, Month and List’ views of your events.
Depending on the situation you might need to see a different perspective of your schedule. We designed the best possible representation of your Day, Week and Month for the small iPhone screen.
5. Integrated task manager – syncs with iOS reminders.
Tasks and events should live in the same application while you may want to see all your tasks in your calendar when needed. At the same time a task manager should be first-class product and support everything you might ever need to successfully control your undertakings. I think we’ve done just that. And yes, you can sync your iOS reminders with the task manager in Calendars
6. Great for power users.
I know that till now I’ve been advocating for a perfect calendar for an ordinary person. But I hate compromises and I wanted to provide a remarkable tool for power users too, especially since our CEO is exactly this kind of person. Appointments, locations, notes and calendars with 10 000 events are something that you can easily manage with Calendars+ 5.
Moreover, you can create and events like “Do something every second month of the year on weekdays of the 1st, 2nd and last week”. Calendars+ 5 is the only iOS application that allows you to create custom recurring events.
7. First-class iPad app.
Calendars+ 5 is the first smart calendar for the iPad, since all other great calendar applications are for the iPhone only. I don’t get it because the iPad’s large screen is great for viewing your Weekly or Monthly schedule and enables richer interaction with events.
8. Transparent information sync between iPhone and iPad.
Your tasks and events are synced seamlessly in the background between all your devices. It just works, period.
Photo: cnet.com
We mentioned last week that an Apple TV software update would allow owners to stream content from a friend’s Apple TV box elsewhere, and AllThingsD now has a little more info on how this will work.
The new software will allow people who have purchased content from Apple’s iTunes store to play that stuff on other people’s TVs, via its Airplay system.
The key part is that they will be able to tell an Apple TV box they don’t own to stream the media they do own, directly from the cloud. That’s a change from the current system, which requires users to download stuff to their iPhones and iPads and fling it to the TV from there. It also echoes the way Google’s new Chromecast device works …
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[youtube=http://youtu.be/OU-5XZNh38w]
The iOS 7 GM brings with it a slew of new ringtones that have replaced all of the default sounds for the device. All of the older ringtones are still available in a “Classic” ringtone.
Of note, Apple has even replaced the default ringtone with a new sound called “Opening” (at the end of the video above.
There are also new text tones:
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Following today’s iPhone and iOS Apple media event, Apple has provided developers with the Golden Master (GM) build of iOS 7. The build is available for iPhone 4 and later, iPad mini, iPad 2 and later, and the 5th-generation iPod touch.
According to Nowhereelse.fr, this is a photo of the iPhone 5S user guide. The pamphlet shows an iPhone with a gray ring around the round home button, which matches previous descriptions of the iPhone 5S’ fingerprint sensor. The guide refers to this button as a “Home Button/Touch ID sensor”. This suggests that Apple will brand the 5S’ fingerprint sensor clearly as a means of identification.
This corroborates with 9to5Mac’s reporting. We have said on multiple occasions that the fingerprint sensor will likely only be used as a means of unlock. In our roundup, we describe how the system will work:
To unlock the iPhone with the fingerprint reader, an iPhone 5S user simply clicks and holds their finger/thumb down on the sensor for a few seconds. It is unlikely that the sensor login and passcode could be used in tandem. There will be a preference in the iPhone’s Settings app to disable the sensor.
This description of the process pairs nicely with the branding ‘Touch ID’, as it literally describes what happens; unlocking will be activated by a touch-and-hold of your finger on the Home Button.
It should also be noted that this guide matches the leaked user guides for the iPhone 5C, with the same color-matched wallpaper design.
Apple will formally announce the iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C at its September event, scheduled for 10 AM PST. Banners at Apple’s Town Hall, the venue for the announcements, went up yesterday.