Month: January 2013

Twitter launches Vine, a 6-second video sharing iPhone app

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 12, 2018

The popular micro-blogging service, Twitter, Thursday launched a brand new iPhone and iPod touch app called Vine. Twitter also officially confirmed it has acquired the startup behind Vine. Little wonder that it's hailing the new software as "the best way to see and share life in motion".

In a nutshell, the app lets you capture and share 6-second looping videos in a simple manner and share them with your friends and family. It supports the iPhone 3GS and higher and iOS 5 or later, is optimized for the iPhone 5 and can be downloaded from the App Store right now, free of charge. Go past the fold for more info...

Stanford’s free iOS developer’s class returns to iTunes U

Mike Schnier ∙ Updated May 1, 2017

Want to get started coding apps for iOS? Stanford University is relaunching their class 'Coding Together: Developing Apps for iPhone and iPad', with new material for iOS 6. We previously reported on the class in 2011. Since enrollment in the class is free on iTunes U and on Piazza, all you really need to participate is enough familiarity programming in C to get you through a couple first-year computer science credits. Over the course of the program, the class will teach students to program in Objective C.

The class is short, running from January 22nd to March 28th. While the class has already started, you can still sign up for enrollment on iTunes U and on Piazza as late as February 1st. You can also peek at the free lectures on iTunes if you are curious...

Indie biopic ‘jOBS’ hits theaters April 19 (video)

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 24, 2013

As previously reported, 'jOBS' biopic will debut tomorrow as the closing-night film of the Sundance Film Festival in Part City and now word has reached us that the flick, which depicts Steve in his early years (1971-2000), will be premiering in theaters nationwide on Friday, April 19. The indie project stars Ashton Kutcher, who portrays Apple's late co-founder Steve Jobs, and his fellow actor Josh Gad, who plays another Apple co-founder, Steve Wozniak. An exclusive clip from the movie can be seen right after the break...

Samsung’s iPad mini contender caught naked in the wild

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 24, 2013

As expected, Apple's $329 iPad mini has taken off in a big way and is now arguably the company's best-selling iPad. Apple experienced supply constraints of the device throughout the holiday quarter and it immediately sold out upon its arrival to China last week. Cook in a conference call following earnings report attributed the 22 percent year-over-year iPad growth to strong sales of the lower-margin tablet.

Samsung, on the other hand, has been swarming the market with mobile devices of all shapes and sizes. The strategy has earned the South Korean company a distant #2 spot in tablet sales as it tries to keep pace with Apple. The firm is apparently working on an eight-inch Note device designed to challenge the iPad mini and now an image has leaked revealing a sleek form factor encased in a plastic enclosure...

Apple CEO praises employees for their ‘incredible hard work and focus’

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 24, 2013

Following up on yesterday's record fiscal 2013 first-quarter earnings release (which, unsurprisingly, has failed to impress Wall Street), Apple CEO Tim Cook issued an email to employees last night. The internal communiqué congratulates employees on their performance as Cook thanks everyone on their "incredible hard work and focus" that has resulted in 75 million iDevice sales during the holiday quarter.

He also announced Apple will be holding a Town Hall meeting today at 10am Pacific time and invited employees to submit questions via AppleWeb. Cook, like his predecessor Steve Jobs, holds Q&A sessions with employees following quarterly earnings to discuss business, strategy and the future. We'll be keeping a close eye on today's meeting to fill you in with interesting tidbits throughout the day...

Our future connected homes

Jim Gresham ∙ Updated April 10, 2018

At CES, many new companies sprouted in the Connected Home category, the goal of which is to enable ordinary consumers to install connected devices without the hassle of professional appointments and labor charges. I see it as the home upgrade for dummies, a concept I can stand behind. Below, I take a quick glance at several connected home items from CES, all of which are easily installable and operate via iOS...

‘PDF Printer for Safari’ adds support for Maps, soon for any app

Mike Schnier ∙ Updated February 25, 2013

PDF Printer for Safari was a jailbreak tweak originally designed to allow users to 'print' from safari to PDF documents in order to neatly archive websites, but it seems the tweak has grown beyond its name.

The latest version of PDF Printer for Safari adds PrintKit integration, which is the native printing library on iOS. This library means 'printed' documents will save faster, users can now delete pages from the PDF on the fly, and the PDF Printer now works with the stock Maps app in iOS 5...

Apple wins patent for new automatically adjusting screen brightness technology

Oliver Haslam ∙ January 24, 2013

It's well known that Apple likes to throw as many patent applications at the wall as possible, with the belief that at least some will stick. The latest to receive the seal of approval from the powers that be is patent number US8358273, or "Portable media device with power-managed display," as its friends know it.

The patent features a new technology that will control the screen brightness of a piece of equipment such as an iPhone or iPad based on the type of content being displayed. Currently, devices set the screen brightness based on the amount of ambient light. Apple's recently approved patent changes all that.

As far as screen brightness technology goes, this is actually rather interesting...

Apple expanding LTE support to 36 new carriers next week

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 18, 2016

During Apple's quarterly earnings call yesterday, Tim Cook announced that Apple would be adding 36 additional carriers to the list of compatible LTE providers for its iPhones and iPads next week.

The good news is, Cook says these carriers will be in countries that are not currently supporting LTE. So for those of you who have a 4G iPhone or iPad and don't currently get LTE, be on the lookout...

The Daily Recap – Jan 23, 2013 edition

Jeff Benjamin ∙ January 23, 2013

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bv3hEdEnrYg

Welcome to The Daily Recap for January 16th, 2013. Watch our video for a quick look at some of the top stories from the day in less than two minutes. If you missed out on any of today's big news, this is a great way for you to get caught up fast.

For your convenience, you'll also find links to all of the stories listed in today's recap inside...

Catch big airs with the ESPN X Games app

Jim Gresham ∙ Updated January 22, 2018

What is the best part of winter? Winter X games! I am a huge X games fan, particularly the Winter X competition, and the best way to keep up with the details is the free iPhone and iPad apps. In true ESPN fashion, the app just updated last week and the games start tomorrow. So, consider this your public service announcement...

Tim Cook addresses rumors on part order cuts and bigger/cheaper iPhones

Cody Lee ∙ January 23, 2013

Towards the end of Apple's earnings call earlier today, Tim Cook and CFO Peter Oppenheimer fielded a number of questions from analysts. And of course, many of them took the opportunity to question the two on the validity of recent rumors.

The Wall Street Journal's 'Apple cutting iPhone 5 part orders' story, the recent 4.8-inch iPhone meme, and the ongoing budget iPhone rumor were all brought up during the Q&A session. And Tim Cook (sort of) addressed each one...