Category: I-phone

It seems like this must have been in the works for a while already, but Entertainment Weekly is reporting that the inimitable Mythbusters (Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman) will be hosting a one-hour special on the life and achievements of Steve Jobs. iGenius: How Steve Jobs Changed the World will include interviews with key figures from Jobs’s past, including the legendary inspiration for Jobs & Wozniak’s first explorations into phone phreaking, John “Captain Crunch” Draper.

Considering that Savage’s unofficial motto is “I reject your reality and substitute my own” (originally a line from the low-budget fantasy thriller The Dungeonmaster), he and his taciturn partner are well suited to honor the reality-distorting Apple co-founder. The show, a co-production with NBC’s Peacock Productions arm, will air on the Discovery family of cable networks on October 16.

‘Mythbusters’ Savage & Hyneman to host Steve Jobs retrospective on Discovery originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 20:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mobile devices like the iPad, the iPhone, and the iPod touch have one unfortunate trait in common — they’re very easy for someone to steal. With the great demand for the iPad 2, you will want to keep it locked away somewhere or take it with you everywhere just to keep thieving hands off of the device. Now Griffin Technology has announced the TechSafe Locking Case + Cable Lock for the iPad 2 (US$79.99), a way of locking your iPad to a desk or table to make it much more difficult for it to be stolen.

Design

Compared to some of the beautiful cases I’ve had the pleasure to review, the TechSafe Locking Case is very plain. But it looks and feels sturdy, and that’s what you want when you’re using the case and the included cable lock to keep your iPad 2 from walking away.

The case slides apart for easy installation of the iPad 2, with the top frame sliding off of the bottom frame. You drop the iPad 2 into the bottom piece, then slide the top frame back on. The result is a very solid case. On the back of the bottom piece are two rectangular bumps. These not only add an area to help you grip the iPad 2, but each has a small indentation that can be used to expose a fold-out stand. One of the stands props the iPad 2 up vertically in landscape orientation for watching movies, while the other is useful when typing on the iPad.

The lock is the niftiest part of the setup. Griffin’s TechSafe Cable Lock design makes it possible to secure laptops like the MacBook Air that don’t have a Kensington lock port. To do this, Griffin created a hardened steel “LockBlade” that slides into the small opening in the hinge area between the screen and keyboard of the MacBook Air. The included cable lock has a hook on it that fits into a hole in the steel LockBlade, securing the laptop to the cable and to a large, immovable piece of furniture.

On the Locking Case, the LockBlade slides into a slot on the case. That keeps the case from sliding open and connects it to the cable lock. It’s a smart way to reuse the Cable Lock technology on a different type of equipment, and it wouldn’t be out of the question for Griffin to even extend this to a Locking Case for iPhone 4/4S and iPod touch. In situations where you want to keep those items from walking away, a case like that could come in very handy.

Functionality

The TechSafe case is very well made. All of the pieces in this puzzle need to fit together perfectly, and the case slides onto and off of the iPad 2 easily. If you have another case that you love to use with your iPad 2, but you’d like to secure your iPad in a hotel or conference room while you’re eating dinner or partying with friends, just slip off the other case, slide the iPad 2 into the TechSafe, slide in the LockBlade, and clip on the combination lock.

The stands are very usable and well placed on the case, and I found the “bumps” on the back of the case to be perfect for getting a good grip while carrying the iPad 2 around.

Now, my one concern. Although this is a security case and it’s a pretty good one, it would take a determined thief with the right tools only a few seconds to get the iPad out. What tools? A small pocket tool like a Leatherman with a built-in saw would rip right through the plastic, making it a cinch to pull out the LockBlade and walk off with the iPad. However, in most situations a thief may overlook anything that has a lock attached to it simply because it takes time to work on it. This deterrence factor will probably help you more than the plastic than the case is made out of.

I do recommend that buyers look at one more piece of equipment that Griffin has developed to work with the cable lock and case — the $19.99 Locking Security Clamp can help you in those situations where you can’t find a suitable piece of furniture to lock your iPad to.

Conclusion

Griffin’s TechSafe case and the cable lock are the right product at the right time. For those who need a way to secure an iPad to a table or other piece of furniture, it’s a reasonably-priced solution and a heck of a lot less expensive than replacing an iPad.

Griffin TechSafe Locking Case + Cable Lock keeps your iPad 2 secure originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 08 Oct 2011 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The iOS-based payment system, Square, is blowing up lately, just like we figured it would way back when. The company already handles up to US$2 billion in payments per year, according to the AP, and is used by 750,000 merchants. That “per year” is a little weird to say, especially considering the company has only been around for a little over a year. In short, Square’s experiencing phenomenal growth, and merchants everywhere are already depending on the company to see through billions of dollars in revenue. That’s pretty unprecedented, even in this crazy fast-moving world of iOS apps.

And that’s not all. Square is also lowering the barrier of entry to the program, allowing even new merchants to have their money deposited in the bank as quickly as possible. Previously, merchants had a limit of $1000 that could be processed per day, but those limits are apparently now gone for all merchants, so everyone who sends a payment through Square will get it as soon as the company can send it out.

That means we’ll see even more money going through the system. I’ve already used Square a few times with various merchants I’ve dealt with — early on, those were the folks at Macworld who were more than ready to depend on an iPhone-based processing system, but since then, I’ve seen it running everywhere from a local theater to a flea market merchant processing credit card payments. Square’s growth is really impressive, and if all the indications are true, it’s only beginning.

Square already processing $2 billion in payments originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I spotted this great piece of graffiti art on the streets of Hollywood while heading home last night, and thought you TUAW readers would enjoy it. Unfortunately, I have no idea who actually put this up — there wasn’t any tag or signature on it, and it was just on a wall otherwise covered with various other pieces and posters.

But in a way, that made it even better — just one person’s anonymous sentiment that echoes what so many of us feel. And I can tell you that the excellent detail and stark spray of the whole thing (if you can’t tell, the whole picture was about eight feet tall, and really stood out on the corner) was pretty awesome to see. Thanks, LA artist, and thank you to the late great Steve Jobs as well.

Spotted in Los Angeles: Thank you, Steve originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 08 Oct 2011 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The iPhone 4S hasn’t even launched yet, but it’s already the fastest-selling Apple product in history, at least if you go by the preorders. That doesn’t mean customers have abandoned Apple’s older phones, though. Analyst T. Michael Walkley of Canaccord Genuity did some digging, and after checking around the US carriers he found that sales of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 3GS haven’t slowed down even in the face of the new iPhone 4S’s debut (hat tip to AppleInsider for their coverage of his analysis). In years past Apple has seen sales slumps in the quarter preceding the launch of new iPhone models, but even though the iPhone 4S launched later in the year than its predecessors, iPhone sales remained robust.

Walkley and other analysts have repeatedly found that old iPhones continually outsell new Android phones. Though it’s well over two years old now, the iPhone 3GS continues to be second only to the iPhone 4 in US sales. Even though it’s no longer a phone I’d recommend to new users, the 3GS is likely to remain popular given that it’s now available for free with a two-year contract.

iPhone 4 and 3GS still selling strong originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Since the iPhone 4S features the same A5 processor as the iPad 2, owners of Apple’s current-gen tablet have wondered if it’s possible that Siri, Apple’s new voice assistant, might be offered on the iPad 2. While my colleague Erica Sadun’s answer to that is “Don’t hold your breath,” I only agree with her up to a point: I don’t think there are any technical hurdles whatsoever to running Siri on an iPad 2, and the fact that the device doesn’t currently feature voice controls is meaningless. I think Siri will come to the iPad 2 eventually — certainly not right away, but possibly within the next six months.

Voice Control as it now exists on the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 doesn’t function on the iPad or iPad 2, but there’s a reason for that: the existing commands would be essentially useless on those devices. The pre-Siri version of Voice Control allows you to use voice commands to control music playback, dial phone numbers or initiate FaceTime calls, and ask the device for information about the current time or currently playing song. That’s about all Voice Control does. Those functions are all useful features on a device that spends much of its time in your pocket, but on an iPad they make very little sense.

On the other hand, Siri’s commands would be immensely useful on the iPad. The same things Apple showed off at the “Let’s talk iPhone” event, like setting up Reminders and Calendar events or looking up information on Wikipedia or Wolfram Alpha, would be very handy to have — so handy that I don’t see why Apple wouldn’t offer them. Apple has long been a company that designs products its own workers want to use, and it’s hard to imagine that no one in Cupertino has thought about how Siri could vastly expand the power and capability of the iPad 2.

Since the iPad 2 has both a microphone and the same A5 as the iPhone 4S, there shouldn’t be any technical reason why Siri wouldn’t function well on that device. Some have speculated that the iPhone 4S has 1 GB of RAM to the iPad 2’s 512 MB (a claim that will have to wait for an iFixit teardown before it can be proven or disproven), but my TUAW colleagues don’t believe that Siri’s functions should be so RAM-intensive that they require such massive amounts of memory.

In fact, we’ve done some digging into Siri and found that most of the actual work of understanding voice commands gets offloaded to external servers. In essence, the iPhone 4S and its built-in processing functions determine what you said, while Apple’s servers translate that into what you meant and send that information back to your iPhone. The pre-processing that takes place on the device itself may be too taxing for an A4 processor, but the iPad 2’s A5 should theoretically be able to handle it just fine. Perhaps even better — Apple has a habit of underclocking CPUs for the iPhone in the interest of power management, so the iPad 2’s A5 is likely to outperform that of the iPhone 4S for many functions.

The fact that Apple hasn’t yet said one way or another whether Siri will come to devices other than the iPhone 4S also doesn’t mean much. The iPhone 4, 3GS, and newer iPod touch models had an exclusive on multitasking for almost exactly six months before iOS 4.2 debuted and brought that feature to the iPad, and the same thing may end up being true for Siri.

Here’s what I think is the most likely scenario: Siri will remain an iPhone 4S exclusive at least until the third tier of international rollouts completes in December. In fact, Apple will probably wait until after the end of the holiday quarter and bring Siri to the iPad 2 in the first quarter of 2012. Not only will this give market incentive for people to buy the iPhone 4S by having Siri as a device-exclusive feature during the holiday period, it’ll also give Apple’s servers and Siri’s algorithms time to adjust and scale to the number of inquiries it’ll receive.

Once Siri’s beta period ends and international rollouts for the iPhone 4S are reasonably complete, that’s the perfect time to bring Siri to the iPad 2 in a dot-update to iOS 5. By that time Siri and its supporting infrastructure will be more mature and able to handle the extra load of adding support for one more device type, and it should also help alleviate the typical post-holiday quarter sales slump.

As for the other devices in Apple’s iOS stable, like the iPod touch, iPhone 4, and iPhone 3GS, I don’t expect them to ever see support for Siri. Siri’s developers have already confirmed that many compromises were required to get the service running on the iPhone 3GS, and it’s probably the same story for iOS devices with an A4 processor. The 2012 model iPod touch will likely be updated to an A5 processor, however, so we might see Siri support for next year’s iPod touch.

For the time being, Siri remains an iPhone 4S exclusive and one we have yet to test for ourselves. We look forward to putting this innovative feature under our interrogation lights once the iPhone 4S is released on October 14.

Why Siri should (and probably will) come to iPad 2 originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 08 Oct 2011 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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While iOS 5 includes a new feature that allows for initial setup of an AirPort device from an iPad or iPhone, any future tweaking of settings still has to be done from a Mac or PC. However, Twitter user Sonny Dickson found references to an AirPort Utility app in iOS 5’s Settings app. Without going into too much NDA-licious detail, I’ll just say that I’ve independently confirmed what he’s found, although the relevant link currently goes nowhere and does nothing.

iOS 5 will go live to the public on October 12, and it’s highly probable this AirPort Utility app will as well. Its release will address one of the last remaining feature gaps that has prevented “normal” users from going PC-free with iOS devices. Once the app comes out, we’ll take a look at it and report on what we find.

[via MacStories]

AirPort Utility app for iOS about to debut originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jeff Rock happened to notice a push notification on his iPhone after installing Shazam. He checked it and it turned out to be an advertisement that had popped up. Since it didn’t seem like expected behavior (push notification of an advert?), Jeff tweeted the Shazam folks to ask about it. Instead of a) Apologizing and trying to sort it out, b) Taking him seriously and helping troubleshoot, or c) Ignoring him entirely, they chose d) Tell Jeff it was clearly his fault.

Not so fast there, Shazam…missing the point he was trying to make, they told him that he must have turned notification on himself and needed to turn them off. Let me just point out that his complaint was not that he received A notification, it was that he received an AD as a notification. Telling them so got him the reply that he had clearly opted-in to notification at some point.

Jeff, trying to be more clear, quoted back chapter and verse from the iOS Program Standard Agreement that this particular “feature” was violating. This got a different response at least; now they say they’ll “look into it”.

For Jeff in particular, I can see how this would be extra frustrating. He’s a developer himself, co-founder of Mobelux who built the app that is now the official iOS Tumblr client. It seems the number of “Can you believe I got rejected for that!?” incidents is in decline, but with the number of apps that still get rejected for small reasons, it is odd this particular violation happened to make it through the approval process.

Shazam violates Developer Agreement, blames Jeff Rock originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 08 Oct 2011 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Andy Lees, President of Microsoft’s Windows Phone division, believes the time is now for Windows Phone 7 to gain some ground on its competiton. Lees see Android as chaotic with too many choices, and the Apple iPhone 4S as a missed opportunity because it offers only a minor improvement in hardware and software.

The latest Mango version of Windows Phone, Lees points out, has a hardware standard that limits fragmentation and a fresh, new UI that sets it apart from Android and iOS. Lees is optimistic about Windows Phone and analysts are, too. Though Windows Phone now trails most mobile platforms with only 2% market share, Gartner research group predicts Windows Phone will expand and eventually grab 20% market share by 2015.

Microsoft exec says Windows phone is cure for iPhone monotony originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve seen quite a bit of squabbling over the subscription and in-app purchase for content rules on the App Store in the past, but generally, things have tended to go Apple’s way. Most companies, especially those who really depend on the iOS audience for buying their content, are eventually willing to put up with Apple’s 30% cut of any content prices sold through an App Store app. But that’s not the case with Audible, sellers of fine audiobooks for your iPhone and iPod touch — the company has pulled the option to buy content directly through the app in the iOS version’s latest update.

iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad users can still shop through the mobile store via Safari — there’s even a link inside the app that will open up the online store in your device’s browser. So essentially, Audible’s just working around Apple’s restrictions here.

Which make Apple’s restrictions look a little silly, but the goal of course is to get that cut off of all content bought in the App Store. It’s a shame Audible’s customers have to deal with that extra inconvenience, though.

Audible removing in-app purchases according to Apple’s rules originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Sony Pictures has successfully bid for the rights to turn Walter Isaacson’s authorized biography of Steve Jobs into a motion picture. Deadline reports the deal is worth between one to three million dollars and headed by producer Mark Gordon. Deadline suspects bidding had already been taking place for film rights, but recent events have intensified interest.

Sony Pictures is responsible for the Oscar-winning film The Social Network, a semi-biographical account of Mark Zuckerberg’s creation of Facebook. Even though Sony Pictures has apparently secured film rights, any film version of Steve Jobs is likely to be years away from seeing release in theatres, which may slightly help alleviate the turmoil some of us might feel at the news of this film coming so soon after his death.

Pirates of Silicon Valley, another semi-biographical film portraying a young Steve Jobs, debuted on TNT in 1999. Needless to say, there’s a lot of Steve Jobs’s life that movie couldn’t have covered. As long as the film version of Steve Jobs is handled tastefully and with dignity (and isn’t released while all of our emotions are still raw), it’s got my support.

Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs will be released October 24.

Sony Pictures acquires rights to Steve Jobs biopic originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Sat, 08 Oct 2011 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I won’t lament on how it took ages for Facebook to come to the iPad, but with the program’s release earlier today, users finally get an interface tailored especially to the iPad.

If you’re up to speed on the ongoing changes to Facebook’s web interface, then the iPad app will look familiar. As with the website, you’re presented with a split screen with Facebook chat on the right and statuses on the left. Top stories appear first with recent stories beneath. However, tapping the blue box in the upper-left corner doesn’t allow you to toggle a particular top story off your feed like the Facebook website does. And, it’s pretty buggy for an app that’s been in development for awhile. Casually scrolling through my news feed caused the app to crash several times.

Along the top, you can update your status, add a photo or check in. Above that are the familiar icons for checking friend requests, messages and notifications. The notifications appear in the chat sidebar.

Swipe from left to right and you’ll see the normal rail that’s runs down the left side of Facebook’s page, showing favorites, groups, pages, apps and more. However, you don’t see the new list feature, which I really like. Modeled on Google+‘s circles, the lists allow you to filter your news feed to only show certain people. I’m disappointed that this feature isn’t on the iPad and hope a future update implements it.

Only the apps that are compatible with the iPad are shown here, so if you’re hoping to answer your Cityville notifications from the iPad, it’s not available. You don’t even see those notifications on your news feed. If you try to access an app that requires Flash, you’ll get an error message stating that the application has not configured its mobile URL or it could not be verified.

Although Mashable reported that games are available in full-screen mode, when I tried out Words With Friends, it kicked me to the App Store to download the app. Same as with Lexulous, another word game. If you already have these apps installed, then the Facebook app will switch you to that particular game’s app.

Browsing a photo album takes advantage of the iPad’s bigger screen and easy navigation. It incorporates some, but not all, of the Photos app’s gestures. You can’t use multitouch to enter an album, but you can pinch a photo to exit it. You can add photos to Facebook using the iPad’s camera or media already loaded on it. It supports HD video and AirPlay for streaming out to a compatible device.

Facebook for iPad doesn’t break any new ground, but it does provide a proper interface for the social network that should have been on the device from day one. The free download is available now.

Daily iPad App: Facebook originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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There are a few sales going around this weekend — most of them are in tribute to the late, great Steve Jobs.

• Steph Thirion’s Eliss is free in tribute to Jobs and his life.
• RPG puzzler Crystal Soul is also free.
• Line-drawing air combat title Pigs in Trees is free for a day.
• The official Jaws game is free as well, to celebrate the release of its sequel.
• And so is Chicken Escape and its iPad counterpart. That’s a lot of free apps!
• Gameloft is having a Columbus Day sale, with Modern Combat 2, 9mm, The Settlers, Sacred Odyssey, and Final Fantasy-alike Eternal Legacy all on sale for just 99 cents. Their HD versions are on sale as well, so some great deals there.
• All of Arianesoft’s apps are on sale this weekend, including the Minecraft-inspired puzzler Terracraft.
• Trainz Simulator on the iPad is just 99 cents, a must-have for any train fans.
• And Anomaly Warzone Earth (and its HD version) is still on sale at just 99 cents. If you haven’t picked that one up yet, you’re crazy. The iPad game especially is amazing.

Once again, there’s plenty of good stuff out there to play this weekend.

iOS apps on sale and free this weekend originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You may be familiar with the well-respected TestFlight beta distribution service. Now, HockeyApp has arrived on the scene to give TestFlight a little competition. TUAW sat down with its developer to discover what the service might mean to you.

Like TestFlight, HockeyApp offers a core beta over-the-air distribution service. This includes managing testers, invitations, and beta recruitment. But the service goes beyond that. HockeyApp also adds advanced crash tracking to the mix.

As a developer, the first part of fixing any problem is discovering what that problem is. HockeyApp helps you collect, manage, and understand crash reports so you can better improve your apps.

HockeyApp includes an open-source framework that you embed into your applications. It allows your apps to collect crash reports — both during the beta period and after App Store deployment.

HockeyApp automatically symbolicates the crash reports and it groups similar crashes together, giving you a higher level overview of problem areas within your apps.

Symbolication enables you to associate program symbols with crash reports collected by the HockeyApp framework and by App Store. Instead of the hexadecimal addresses normally supplied by the crash report, symbolication translates information from the app’s .dSYM files to meaningful labels.

Integrating the framework allows you to know exactly in which classes and methods, and at which line number your apps crashed. The website provides a complete reporting solution. That’s where you can view statistics and analyze your crashes.

Plans start at $25 a month, supporting up to 5 developers and 25 apps at a time. Premium plans grow from there for more heavy-duty development operations. If you’re a small independent developer (up to 2 developers, up to 5 apps), you can take advantage of HockeyApp’s limited time $10/month Indie Plan.

Remember this: iTunes Connect collects just a fraction of your app’s crashes. HockeyApp’s developer promises his service will help you localize where your crashes are happening, so you can improve your app’s reliability. Better reliability means better App Store ratings, and better ratings mean better overall sales.

Want to learn more? Visit the HockeyApp feature overview page.

DevJuice: HockeyApp improves crash reports, beta testing originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It seems like this must have been in the works for a while already, but Entertainment Weekly is reporting that the inimitable Mythbusters (Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman) will be hosting a one-hour special on the life and achievements of Steve Jobs. iGenius: How Steve Jobs Changed the World will include interviews with key figures from Jobs’s past, including the legendary inspiration for Jobs & Wozniak’s first explorations into phone phreaking, John “Captain Crunch” Draper.

Considering that Savage’s unofficial motto is “I reject your reality and substitute my own” (originally a line from the low-budget fantasy thriller The Dungeonmaster), he and his taciturn partner are well suited to honor the reality-distorting Apple co-founder. The show, a co-production with NBC’s Peacock Productions arm, will air on the Discovery family of cable networks on October 16.

‘Mythbusters’ Savage & Hyneman to host Steve Jobs retrospective on Discovery originally appeared on TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Mon, 10 Oct 2011 20:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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