Year: 2016

How to adjust iPhone Home button “clicks”

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 20, 2023

The iPhone 7 came with a shiny new Home button to take advantage of built-in pressure sensors and an enhanced Taptic Engine to detect and simulate clicks. Because the button no longer uses any moving parts, you’re less likely to break it. A new “Meet the new Home button” section in the iOS installer allows you to “make your iPhone experience even more personal by choosing the click that’s right for you”.

Of course, you can select between three degrees of haptic feedback that simulate clicks at any time using the stock Settings app, here's how.

Two new “Made by Google” smartphones to be unveiled on October 4

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 22, 2016

Google earlier this week posted a video on YouTube that strongly hints at plans to launch a pair of brand new smartphones at a media event scheduled for October 4. According to web reports, Google will no longer market its own phones under the Nexus brand and is instead going to advertise them as Pixel-branded phones, indicating a break from the past six years of flagship Nexus devices. The Pixel is Google's Chromebook notebook with a Retina-class display which has been selling since 2013.

Facebook Messenger gains iOS 10 integration on the Lock screen and in Phone app

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 22, 2016

Facebook just pushed a major update to its Messenger software in the App Store. On iPhones with iOS 10, the app now takes advantage of Apple's new CallKit framework to make audio (VoIP) calls from Messenger look and behave like normal cellular calls with full support for Lock screen and Phone integration.

Bumped to version 89.0, the app now shows incoming VoIP calls from Messenger contacts right on your Lock screen complete with fullscreen contact images, standard controls like the Mute, Keypad, Speaker, Add Call and Video buttons and more.

Snapchat rolls out Sticker Search

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 22, 2016

Snapchat recently rolled out a minor refresh to its iPhone application in the App Store, bumping version number to 9.39.3.0 and bringing out a new Sticker Search feature. As the feature's name suggests, this lets you find precisely the sticker you want simply by typing its description. A previous Snapchat update introduced a few tweaks, including support for caption styling with the new bold, underline and italic options.

Google’s Allo messaging app hits the App Store and it logs all your chats

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 22, 2016

At the annual I/O developer conference in April 2016, Google previewed two new mobile apps: a one-to-one video calling app called Duo, which released in mid-August, and a messaging software called Allo, which surfaced on the App Store this morning as a free download.

It sports features commonly found in messaging apps and includes a built-in Assistant, Google's conversational artificial intelligence helper, an Incognito mode and more.

While Google originally promised Allo would only store messages transiently and in non-identifiable form, the firm's had a change of heart as Allo logs all chats by default.

How to enable “Hey Siri” on Mac

Timothy Reavis ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

Five years after its introduction in 2011, Siri finally made its debut on Mac with the release of macOS Sierra. Featuring much of the functionality that Siri contains on iOS, such as being able to check the weather forecast or set a reminder, Siri for macOS also has some exclusive abilities, such as handling documents in the file system and being able to pin results to Notification Center.

One feature that macOS's Siri didn't port from its mobile counterpart, however, is the ability to activate Apple's digital assistant hands-free with the "Hey Siri" command. Fortunately, there's a viable workaround available that enables users to invoke Siri in macOS with their voice to give commands from across the room.

CloudMagic email client rebranded as Newton, gets more premium features

Anthony Bouchard ∙ September 22, 2016

As far the Mail app on iPhone and iPad is concerned, it's pretty solid for day to day email activities, but third-party startups are coming up with great ways to improve the email experience. Now that you can remove stock apps from iOS 10, it's a great opportunity to try a new third-party email app on your device.

Enter Newton, a familiar email client, formerly known as CloudMagic, that brings a number of premium features to the world of email on all of your devices.

Delete messages from the Lock screen & Notification Center with MadridDelete

Anthony Bouchard ∙ September 22, 2016

MadridDelete is a new free jailbreak tweak that lets you easily delete SMS and iMessages from either the Lock screen or Notification Center, rather than having to be in the Messages app.

Although you can typically clear notifications and mark messages as read from these places, you have never actually been able to delete a message from the Lock screen or Notification Center until now.

Some great ultra-thin cases for iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

Have a new iPhone 7 or 7 Plus? The first thing you're going to want to do—unless you don't care about scratches or abrasions—is find a case for it. And if you're like me, you don't want some big bulky case. You want something ultra-thin that won't get in the way.

So we've put together a list of several great ultra-thin cases for both the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus. These obviously aren't the only available cases for Apple's new handsets, but we picked these specifically based on personal experience, user feedback, features and pricing.

Tip: use Messages low quality image mode to conserve precious cellular data

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 21, 2016

Apple's Messages app provides an optional iOS-only mode which cuts down your cellular data consumption to a bare minimum when sending image attachments. I don't know about you, but I worry about sharing high-resolution images when cellular data is on. In my experience, most normals are oblivious to the fact that sending a single shot-on-iPhone photograph through iMessage burns through one to five megabytes of data, sometimes even more.

In low quality mode, Messages uses only 100KB per image attachment. Another way to think about it: you can send 30 to 50 images for the same amount of data required to share a full-resolution attachment in Messages. In this brief tutorial, we'll teach you how to tell Messages to send lower quality images in order to optimize your cellular data consumption and prevent unwanted overage fees.

How to hide Stories on Instagram

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated March 3, 2021

Instagram recently unveiled a new feature called Stories which allows you to shoot, annotate, and share photos and short videos outside of your normal feed. By default, all of your followers can see the Stories your post. Likewise, you can see all the Stories the people you follow are posting. This is where it sometimes gets overwhelming.

I follow a lot of random people on Instagram because I appreciate the quality of the photos they share on their feeds. However, I care very little for their Stories, which are typically more about their personal lives than sharing beautiful shots. In this case, I'd rather not see their Stories at all.

There are also some people who follow me with whom I don't want to share my Stories, so I am opting to hide my Stories from these people.

In this post we will learn how you can hide your story from select people, but also how you can prevent other people's stories from filling up your screen.

First betas of watchOS 3.1, tvOS 10.0.1 and macOS Sierra 10.12.1 now available

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

In addition to iOS 10.1, Apple on Wednesday released the first betas of watchOS 3.1, tvOS 10.0.1 and macOS Sierra 10.12.1. Registered developers can grab the new software from Apple's online developer portal, or via their respective over-the-air update methods.