iOS

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-DcUASffHU]

Computer Bild, Europe’s best-selling computer magazine, has had its PR accreditation pulled after posting a video of one of its journalists bending an iPhone 6 Plus.

The german PR department of the company reacts in a disturbing way: Instead of answering the questions about why the iPhone 6 Plus is so sensitive, a manager called Computer Bild and told us, that Computer Bild will not get any testing devices and no invites to official events any more …

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Update: We have received this unconfirmed message from a reader who attended the event, seemingly indicating a January launch for the Apple Watch — the earliest of Apple’s quoted ‘early 2015’ timeline.

At Colette, when we entered inside there was a guy from Apple who took our name, email and said to choose an apple watch model we’re interested in. After that he said that we’re gonna receive an email from them 2 weeks before the launch. Later he said that we’ll be receiving it in late December. So… the  Watch in early January

The mysterious invitation was indeed for the Apple Watch. Apple has already confirmed it will not be revealing any more information (via Engadget) about the product at this demo area, such as pricing or availability. The device is also — unsurprisingly — locked behind glass running the same UI video loop that was shown at Apple’s media event on September 9th.

<a href="http://instagram.com/p/tj_lH9Fr0x/">via Instagram</a>

For the public, the Apple Watch demo units are all shielded by their glass cases. Select members of press attending the ‘show’ can try on the Watch, albeit the screen is still just playing a mocked-up video of the user interface. Apple execs and celebrities are in attendance, such as Jony Ive and Marc Newson and members of the fashion industry like Sarah Andelman, Colette’s CEO and Vogue’s editor Anna Wintour.

A 9to5Mac reader caught a brief video of one of the display units, showing the Apple Watch Home Screen, embedded below.

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According to newly surfaced screenshots of a modified version of the recently released iOS 8.1 beta, it appears that the upcoming iPad line will have some amount of Apple Pay capability and a Touch ID sensor to match. Additionally, screenshots of a hidden Passbook settings page have surfaced showing what it might look like when adding a credit card for use with Apple Pay.

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Update: Apple says all is good.

It was less than an hour ago that we told you about a newly-discovered bug within iOS that could potentially delete your iWork files. But now, according to a variety of internet reports, Apple’s month of misadventure continues as iCloud is currently experiencing an outage of some kind. Most notably, it seems as if many are being prompted over and over to enter their iCloud credentials within iOS. Apple has acknowledged the outage on its system status page:

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Apple is having a bad month. Sure, the company launched two new iPhones, introduced the world to their first wearable device, and debuted a brand-new NFC payment system, but for everything that went right something somewhere also seems to have gone horribly wrong.

It started with a heavily-promoted live stream that failed within minutes, then moved to a massive, probably overblown “scandal” over bent iPhones. There was also the sudden discovery of a critical flaw that prevented a key iOS 8 feature from being available at launch paired with the subsequent botched update that was supposed to fix the problem but instead left owners of the latest iPhones potentially stranded without cell service for well over 24 hours.

And that’s not even counting the highly-publicized scandal in which a number of celebrity iCloud accounts were allegedly compromised due to Apple’s insufficient security measures on certain functions. Oh, and let’s not forget about that U2 album nobody wanted but everybody got anyway.

The last thing Apple really needs is one more big problem mucking up its image this month. Unfortunately, that seems to be exactly what the folks at Cupertino are getting today, as a newly-discovered bug in the iOS “reset settings” function runs the risk of permanently deleting all of the iWork documents stored in your iCloud account.

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Apple has just released iOS 8.1 beta 1 on its developer center. The update has a build number of 12B401. As we reportedly earlier, the company is also working on iOS 8.2 and 8.3 for release in the future. The release is available for all iOS 8-compatible devices, including the Apple TV.

We’ll keep this article updated with any new changes discovered in the beta.

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iHealth, maker of various iPhone connected healthcare accessories, today announced that its iOS apps are being updated with HealthKit integration. That means that the users of the company’s Wireless Blood Pressure Monitors, Blood Glucose Meters, Wireless Scale, and other health tracking accessories will be able to sync data with the new iOS 8 Health app.
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Starting with iOS 5 in 2011, Apple has released a major new iOS version each fall and a notable follow-up update early in the following year. For example, iOS 6 launched in September 2012 and was updated to iOS 6.1 in January, and iOS 7, which was launched in September 2013, was updated to iOS 7.1 with CarPlay and interface improvements in March 2014. But starting with the recently released iOS 8, it appears that Apple has a different development schedule for 2015 and perhaps beyond. According to sources, Apple is already hard at work on three major follow-up versions to iOS 8: iOS 8.1, iOS 8.2, and iOS 8.3.

iOS 8.2 visits to 9to5Mac

We’ve confirmed that these major new versions are in development via two means. First, a developer of a major hardware-connected iOS application has shared with us their analytics, and this data indicates that all three versions are in testing by Apple employees in or around Cupertino, California. Second, and much closer to home, our own Google Analytics for 9to5Mac.com show that iOS users are visiting our website via iOS 8.1, iOS 8.2, and iOS 8.3 devices. iOS 8.1 hits to 9to5Mac.com started appearing even months before iOS 8.0 launched, but 8.2 and 8.3 visits only started picking up following iOS 8’s release in mid-September.

iOS 8.3 visits to 9to5Mac

While Apple works on several iOS features and enhancements over the course of several years, it typically only begins wholly testing major new releases close to the ship dates of the preceding release. Apple working on three significant follow-ups to iOS 8 is a shift from the usual development cycle, one which would normally indicate Apple to be working on just iOS 8.1 as well as iOS 9.0. It’s possible that iOS 9 is also in the works, and of course Apple is always working on nominal bug fix (x.x.1 or .2 or .3) updates, but the fact that 8.1, 8.2, and 8.3 are all in simultaneous development raises some interesting possibilities:

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On its website, French fashions retailer Colette is teasing a ‘one day only experience’, taking place at its stores on September 30th. The event runs from store open to 7 pm local time (via MacGeneration). Other details are unknown.

The invite image sort of resembles the Apple Watch home screen, so maybe this is some sort of special demonstration of the upcoming product. There is a possibility that Colette will sell the device in its store when the Watch is released ‘early next year’. Although this would make sense due to the connection with fashion, it would still be weird for the company to demo the product in public when it is still many months off release.

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A supposed screenshot of a notice (via TechWeb) sent to Apple retail employees suggests that Apple is readying a China iPhone 6 (and 6 Plus) launch for October 10th. As stated on the Chinese site (translated):

It is important that the person broke new iPhone prototype store shelves will be put on Oct. 7, and should be officially on sale in October 10. A few days ago the Ministry of Industry Minister Miao Wei once said in an interview, iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus has entered the final stage of the audit, which means the phones will soon be landing in mainland China.

This is shortly after China’s national week-long holiday. Independently, the Chinese press have also reported the same October 10th date for the iPhone 6 debut. Last week, regulators stated that the phone was nearing final approval, causing black market iPhone 6 prices to plummet.

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Now that Apple is 8.0.2 rolled out and we’re all relatively stable with a Healthkit-enabled OS, Apple is giving us a new section of the App Store for health-related apps. 

Experience an entirely new approach to wellness where your fitness app can talk to your calorie tracker, your doctor can be automatically notified of updates to your health data, and great apps work together for a healthier you. This handpicked collection highlights the best fitness, nutrition, and medical apps customized for iOS 8.

Red prices on pink background?  They must have moved that Maps launch and iOS 8.0.1 guy over to design. 
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A few days ago Apple published a new privacy page on its website that detailed the various measures it has put in place to protect Mac and iOS users’ personal data. One of those features, which is new in iOS 8, is the automatic randomization of MAC addresses when the device is searching for a Wi-Fi network. This makes it much more difficult to track a device by seeing which Wi-Fi networks have spotted its unique identifier.

A new two-part study by AirTight Networks into how well this security feature works has turned up some interesting results, including several conditions that will stop the phone from randomizing a MAC address. Part one of the study breaks down what exactly needs to happen in order to start this function…

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When Apple introduced iOS 7 with an overhauled design for the iPhone and iPad software, it replaced the weather widget showing current temperature and weekly forecast introduced with iOS 5 with a text summary of the day’s weather conditions. This weather summary includes an icon for the current weather condition as well as a text description like ‘mostly cloudy’, but it tends to give you the high and low temperatures of the day and not the current temperature like Apple’s former weather widget.

Luckily, iOS 8 allows developers to create third-party widgets including – you guessed it – weather widgets with current temperature and forecast. Since iOS 8 was released last week, I’ve been trying a variety of apps with included weather widgets, and below I’ll share with you what I’ve discovered so far.

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This holster case from Toronto-based LD West seems completely ridiculous at first glance, but it starts to make a lot more sense when you realize your oversized iPhone 6 or 6 Plus might no longer fit in your pants pocket. Strapping my phone to my side with what looks like an over-the-shoulder gun holster doesn’t exactly vibe with my usually minimalistic approach to iPhone cases. But it turns out the product is much more than just the gimmick I thought it was.
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After a series of botched updates, which meant HealthKit apps could not launch alongside iOS 8’s release, Apple has finally started allowing apps that integrate with the Health app into the App Store. The first of many is FitPort, which acts as a replacement dashboard for Health information, with all data being synced back into the Health database.

On opening the app, the Health permissions screen opens which asks users to individually enable access to health statistics. This allows users to be very selective about what information they share with third-party apps. Users have to explicitly enable read and write capabilities for every health data type the app wants to integrate. Just like asking for location access, this sheet is presented by the OS, meaning all apps benefit from this level of privacy.

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Apple has finally released iOS 8.0.2 to address the issues discovered in yesterday’s 8.0.2 update on the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. The new release includes all of the HealthKit and keyboard fixes, among others, as well as the ability to actually make phone calls and connect to a cellular data network.

Apple said yesterday that the update was coming “in a few days” and instructed users to downgrade to version 8.0 while awaiting the fix. The new update is rolling out now and can be found in the over-the-air software updater built into iOS.

Apple told CNBC that “less than 40,000 devices” were affected by the buggy release. The change log is below:

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Last month Instagram launched a new video shooting app for iPhone and iPad that combines effects like time-lapse and cinema stabilization called Hyperlapse. Today Instagram is introducing what they call the “selfielapse” by adding support for shooting Hyperlapse videos with the front facing camera on your device using the same features previously only available on the back camera…

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