iOS devices refer to any of Apple’s hardware that runs the iOS mobile operating system which include iPhones, iPads, and iPods. Historically, Apple releases a new iOS version once a year, the current version is iOS 10. Here is the complete list of iOS 10 compatible devices.
Universal Pictures has announced it’s set to give ‘Steve Jobs’, directed by Danny Boyle and starring Michael Fassbender, a release on digital services, Blu-ray, and DVD February 2.
Blu-ray and DVD bonuses include “Inside Jobs: The Making of Steve Jobs,” a documentary detailing the making of the film, as well as feature commentary by Danny Boyle, Aaron Sorkin, and editor Elliot Graham.
We’d expect the digital release to hit iTunes and other online video services, but for now Universal is only confirming there will be a “Digital HD UltraViolet” release alongside the Blu-ray and DVD on February 2.
With Hanukkah over and Christmas only a week away, there’s a pretty good chance that you’ve already completed most of your holiday shopping. But just in case you haven’t, I wanted to share a handful of last-minute gift picks that are great for Apple lovers, reasonably priced, and guaranteed to be in stock as of the time of posting.
These picks are all recent — 2015 releases — and hand-selected to be particularly worthwhile. Read on for the details…
Google has once more posted its annual Year in Search video, covering topics as diverse as the refugee crisis, the blue/gold dress, Cecil the lion, female engineers, the discovery of water on Mars, gay marriage, Star Wars and more. It also posted the top ten search terms for a range of categories, with Apple taking three out of the top four slots in consumer tech …
Google’s Project Fi service will now work on tablets including iPads and other compatible data-only devices besides phones. There are no extra fees to add devices to a Fi plan and data only costs $10 for every 1GB you use. That varies from many mainstream carrier plans with charge monthly rates for data access.
The Defender Series for iPad Pro packs in much of what you’d expect based on cases from the series for other Apple devices. For $129.95 (currently 25% off), you’ll find a polycarbonate protective shell with front bezel protection, a screen protector with full access to Touch ID, and a built-in stand with space to store an Apple Pencil.
Last week, I wrote an article called The Top 10 Android Features Apple’s iOS 10 Should Steal, and — surprise — it turned out to be somewhat controversial. Over 120 comments reflected a wide range of opinions on the future direction of Apple’s mobile operating system, with most commenters agreeing that iOS should take some inspiration from Android, but only for the specific features they personally liked. Unfortunately, in keeping with our increasingly polarized society, a few particularly caustic Apple fanboys decided to go crazy, personally attacking fellow commenters who liked the ideas, the author who dared to suggest them (“poor old me“), and the very concept of taking any ideas whatsoever from Android.
On one hand, I understand where the fanboys are coming from. Some people just love whatever Apple releases and does, no matter what. Others are so emotionally or financially invested in Apple that any suggestion of potential improvement is perceived as an attack on the company’s well-being. But it’s hard to sympathize with people who freak out when Apple’s described as anything less than perfect. Walt Mossberg called out “cultists” for this behavior in his article, “It’s Not a Church, It’s Just an Apple Store,” naming it the Doctrine of Insufficient Adulation. Demanding unyielding praise is nonsensical, and ultimately unhealthy for the Apple community as a whole. Simple statistics suggest that under 0.05% of our readers fall into cultist territory, but they’re abrasive enough to turn off the other 99.95% of readers we care about.
It’s important to understand that these hard-core fanboys aren’t just a tiny minority of all iOS users — they also have fringe views relative to the general population. Reasonable people can debate the precise numbers, but Android currently powers roughly 4/5 of the smartphones out there. It’s easy to credit aggressive Android device prices, but it’s clear that Android has features that appeal to people, too. From my perspective, it’s perfectly reasonable for iOS users to want some of Android’s features — especially if they don’t want to switch to Android devices. Yes, Apple’s a great company, and yes, iOS is a great platform, but they’re not perfect. Even if you don’t like Google, there’s room to learn (and borrow) from Android…
KGI’sMing-Chi Kuo is out with a set of research notes today highlighted by ‘iPad Air 3’ forecasts. Notably, the newest 9.7-inch Apple tablet is expected to be released in the 1st half of 2016, perhaps at the March event we’ve pinned to include the Apple Watch 2 with a possible appearance of the 4-inch iPhone 6c. The bad news is that like the iPad Pro, the new iPad Air 3 isn’t likely to have 3D Touch, which is a big part of the new iPhone 6s/Plus experience, according to the analyst… Expand Expanding Close
The iPads are not actually vertical – it’s just the angle of the shot …
I reviewed the Brydge Keyboard for the iPad Air/Air 2 back in March. At the time, I found it hard to choose between this and the ClamCase Pro, and for a while switched between them. However, the Brydge won the battle in the end, becoming my daily driver for my iPad Air 2.
Brydge has two models for the smaller iPad, one for the iPad mini 1/2/3 and a second version coming out next month for the iPad mini 4. Both have the same all-aluminum construction, the same matching colors (silver, space gray and gold), the same three-month battery life and weigh the same 300g.
One of the beauties of the original is that you pretty much get a full-size MacBook keyboard for your iPad, with key sizes and spacing very close to that of a MacBook Air. They keys are slightly narrower and a touch closer together, but the typing experience is very similar. With the much smaller footprint of the iPad mini, however, I wondered how the BrydgeMini would compare …
Despite the $548M settlement reached earlier this month, Samsung has now asked the U.S. Supreme Court to hear an appeal of its patent battle with Apple, reports the WSJ. The company is arguing that lower courts misapplied the law concerning Apple’s design patents.
Specifically, Samsung is asking the court to review rulings concerning “design patents” that cover the look and feel of a product. At trial, Apple convinced the jury that basic design elements of certain Samsung smartphones—essentially a rectangle with rounded corners and a touch-screen grid made up of smaller icons—borrowed too closely from Apple’s iPhone design.
Samsung argues that lower courts made two mistakes …
There are a few new goodies for iOS developers shipping during the holiday season. Over the weekend, app analytics firm AppFigures released a cool new feature called ‘Sharable Review Cards’. Essentially, developers can curate their App Store reviews for some of their best feedback and quickly share a link to that comment for others to admire.
The cards take on the theme from the app icon, so each review card appearance matches the app it is about. In the example above, my app Bingo Machine uses a dark blue background tint, so the AppFigures Card uses the same blue for the review title. It’s a pretty cool feature for devs who want to positively promote their app on social media with actual customer testimonials.
There are also some new releases from Facebook’s Parse, the third-party cloud sync framework that Apple later aped with its own CloudKit service, with complete support for the newest Apple platforms, namely watchOS and tvOS.
Google’s Maps app for iPhone and iPad got a small but useful update on the App Store today. The latest version of the Google Maps iOS app now includes a couple of handy features.
First up, and undoubtedly the most useful for drivers is the up-to-date gas prices in the US and Canada. The feature was included in the Android version of Google’s app a couple of months ago and lets users check nearby gas stations to see which has the most affordable prices. You can find prices simply be searching for ‘gas’ or ‘gas stations’ in the search field and Google Maps will automatically bring up the nearest options and list pricing for those locations.
Business hours have been included in the app for some time, but today’s update also lets you check when is best to avoid/visit particular businesses. Like its online search and maps tools, the updated iPhone app brings the ability check popular visiting hours for local stores and outlets. Now you can see what you always knew about any business or retail location: It starts getting busy after lunch.
Google Maps version 4.13.0 is available to download from the App Store for free and requires users to be running iOS 7.0 or later and is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
Update: Kromtech has acknowledged the breach, stating that “analysis of our data storage system shows only one individual gained access performed by the security researcher himself.” It says that payment information is processed by a third-party company and is not stored by the company. “The only customer information we retain are name, products ordered, license information, public ip address and their user credentials such as product specific usernames, password hashes for the customer’s web admin account where they can manage subscriptions, support, and product licenses.”
As if conning people out of money for a piece of scamware that does nothing useful weren’t bad enough, a security researcher claims that extremely poor security has allowed him to access sensitive data for more than 13M MacKeeper accounts.
I have recently downloaded over 13 million sensitive account details related to MacKeeper, Zeobit, and/or Kromtech […] stuff like names, email addresses, usernames, password hashes, computer name, ip address, software license and activation codes, type of hardware (ex: “macbook pro”), type of subscriptions, phone numbers and computer serial numbers.
The data was accessed by white-hat researcher Chris Vickery, who previously exposed data breaches at MLB, ATP, Slipknot and a network of charter K-12 schools in California …
With Apple’s ambitious expansion program in China well underway, the company now appears to be seeking to boost its market share in the next growth market, India. CNET reports that Apple has almost halved the price of the iPhone 5s from 44,500 Rupees ($665) to 25,000 Rupees ($370).
The price cut appears to be a move by the Californian company to increase its penetration in India, the world’s third largest smartphone market after China and the USA, where the bulk of phones sold are sub-$300. As of quarter 3 of 2015, Apple is not even among the top 5 smartphone vendors in India, a market that IDC Research predicts will overtake the US by 2017.
Although India is a huge market for smartphones, it is currently quite a different market to China, suggesting that Apple needs a significantly different approach …
This week’s episode of The Logic Prosis the Holiday Gift Guide Edition. We will be looking at some of our favorite recording gear for Logic Pro X on the Mac and all your favorite iOS synth and sequencer apps. While some of the favorites remain, you’ll find some new and interesting gadgets in each of the main categories from mini MIDI controllers and repurposed U.S. coin picks to pocket synthesizers, Lightning mics, wireless interfaces and more: Expand Expanding Close
As announced earlier in the year, the BBC has now launched an official iPlayer app for the Apple TV. The app uses native a tvOS interface, closely resembling the normal iTunes Store films and TV shows interface. The app is free but requires a TV licence and is therefore only available to UK Apple TV owners.
Taylor Swift revealed today, her 26th birthday, via Twitter that an exclusive 1989 World Tour documentary will hit Apple Music on Dec. 20. The special is exclusive to Apple Music subscribers and is an example of the kind of exclusive content that Apple wants to bring in for its Music service. It won’t be available for purchase though other channels, at least not initially. The concert will include a number of big artists, as well. A trailer for the documentary can be seen below. Expand Expanding Close
Three years ago, Apple released the original Lightning to SD Card Camera Reader, a larger, faster, and more expensive version of a Camera Connection Kit component it had previously developed for Dock Connector iPads. When I tested it back in 2012, I noted that the reader was working 3 times faster than its predecessor when used with the then-current iPad (4th-Gen), and 50% faster with the original iPad mini. Since then, iPads have only gotten faster, while the Reader has stayed unchanged.
This week, Apple subtly replaced the accessory with the Lightning to SD Card Camera Reader (USB 3), which carries the same $29 price and arrives in a nearly identical box. As the parentheses suggest, the new Lightning to SD Card Camera Reader is capable of running at USB 3 speeds if the connected iPad supports USB 3 — for now, only the iPad Pro does — but it’s backward-compatible with earlier USB 2 iPads, and thanks to iOS 9.2, both old and new Readers now work with iPhones. If you have an iPad Pro, or plan to get a new Apple device in the future, the new version should be a no-brainer purchase over its predecessor, though other options (such as Eye-Fi’s excellent wireless SD cards, reviewed here) can eliminate the need for card readers altogether, even if they operate at slower speeds…
Earlier this week, I wrote about the surprisingly good Motorola Moto G (2nd Gen) phone I was testing at our publisher’s request, and though I wouldn’t switch from iOS to Android, the experience made plain that even a sub-$100 Android phone is competent enough today to serve as a more capable alternative to a $199 iPod touch. I’ve since been testing the $180 Moto G (3rd Gen), which is still less expensive than the lowest-end iOS device, but is faster than its predecessor, and includes still cameras rivaling Apple’s flagship iPhone 6s models. Contrary to Apple’s marketing, Android devices aren’t all bad, and $100-$200 options from major manufacturers are now delivering much better overall value than Apple’s sub-$200 devices.
Google has spent the last few years really closing Android’s overall user experience gap with iOS, while adding and polishing some features that are either Android-exclusive — or markedly better on Android than iOS. So just like Google borrowed elements of iOS to improve Android, Apple should be doing the same. Here are the top 10 features I’d pick for iOS 10 to clone…
Update: The feature now appears to have propagated correctly, as the codename identifier is no longer visible. The app now correctly lists ‘Apple TV: Yes’ in the description for universal apps that support Apple TV.
Apple is rolling out a way to see if an app in the App Store also has an Apple TV version. From this morning, App Store listings have included ‘SF.UniversalAppleTV’ labels. If present, it means that the app in question also has a universal Apple TV app available in the tvOS App Store.
Evidently, the feature is not fully baked and is in the process of rolling out. The label is clearly an internal identifier not meant to seen by the public. When the feature is fully rolled out, expect it the left column to simply say ‘Apple TV’ which matches the language used for Apple Watch compatibility.
AT&T is offering a buy one, get one free deal currently on many of its popular smartphones, and while it’s not listed likely due to Apple, we’ve learned that iPhone 6s is actually eligible.
You won’t find any mention of iPhones in AT&T’s advertising for the deal— in fact, it’s promoting the Samsung Galaxy S6 as the standout device for the deal— but we’ve confirmed with AT&T reps that iPhone 6s is also included and eligible for customers to include in the offer. Expand Expanding Close
Just barely in time for Christmas, Tesla updated its online store to add new apparel and accessories, including new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus leather cases/wallets. If you have a Tesla enthusiast on your Christmas list, this might be your best last-minute shot for a holiday gift. Expand Expanding Close
After years of featuring the same, arguably stale design, Apple has redesigned the Apple ID web portal with a friendlier, modern look. The updated website now features product imagery including a girl wearing an Apple Watch Sport while using an iPhone and a MacBook can be seen with the logo illuminated in the background. The previous landing page featured app icons for iCloud, the App Store, iBooks, and other services that use Apple IDs, which were updated from iOS 6 to iOS 7 while the layout remained the same.
A memo from Mercedes-Benz USA to its dealer network has revealed the car company’s plans for supporting CarPlay. The memo was leaked to C450 AMGand contains a mix of good news and bad.
The good news is that it will be available for quite a range of models, starting from those produced this month, and will be automatically included at no extra cost for many models equipped with the company’s COMAND Navigation system. The bad news is that it will be an extra cost option for CLA, GLA and B-Class models; the necessary COMAND packages on other models aren’t cheap; and – very disappointingly – it won’t play nicely with COMAND.
The customer will not be able to use the Mercedes-Benz headunit functions at the same time as CarPlay. For example, use of the Spotify app cannot be done simultaneously with COMAND Navigation.
Details of the deals for the full range of supported models can be found below …
