Apple awarded patent for snap-on iPhone game controller with support for head-to-head gaming

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 27, 2015

As first discovered by AppleInsider, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) this morning awarded Apple a patent for a snap-on gaming accessory for the iPhone which imagines physical button controls such as miniature joysticks, action buttons and directional D-pads positioned at left and right of the screen.

The patent No. 8,939,838 titled “Accessory for playing games with a portable electronic device” even envisions added extras such as an additional multitouch display, cameras, microphones and speakers to elevate the experience.

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Let’s Talk iOS 066: One crappy battery life

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated October 19, 2018

Episode 66: Sebastien and Cody discuss Apple Watch battery life, Microsoft's latests moves in the tech industry, Google's perplexing position, more MacBook Air 12" leaks, and we talk about several awesome new apps.

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Thinkful, a service that will teach you how to code iOS apps. For 10% off, go to www.thinkful.com/ios.

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Colors puts 1,000 photo filters at your fingertips

Lory Gil ∙ January 27, 2015

The trends of digital photography, especially mobile photography, ebb and flow like the changing interests of a teenager. One day, toy camera filters are all the rage and the next day, the #nofilter hashtag can be seen on everyone’s social networking page.

Colors – 1000 Filters within Color Camera is a filter app with a huge variety of color options for you to choose from. It looks like crazy color filters are the new hotness for this season’s social photographs.

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Twitter adds group direct messaging, 30-second video recording

Jake Smith ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

Twitter has rolled out a big update to its iOS app, adding group direct messaging and the ability to shoot video directly within the app.

The new direct messaging tool changes up the feature that's been around since 2008. It's a move to make messaging a larger part of the platform. The group function lets you start conversations with any of your followers, and they don’t all need to follow one another in order to chat. You can create a group by simply tapping a few names.

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Pandora’s iOS revamp launches with Thumb History, new mini player and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 26, 2015

The iPhone edition of Pandora Radio, a music streaming service with more than 75 million listeners each month, has just received a visual makeover. The company previewed it almost two months ago, though the iPad edition hasn't been refreshed today.

Version 5.7 of Pandora Radio sports a cleaned-up appearance with fancy new transitions and animations. In addition to the facelift, the iPhone app also includes enhanced station personalization capabilities, improved artist discovery, greater use of thumbing and much more.

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iCloud.com’s Photos web app gets image zoom function and sharing via email

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 26, 2015

German enthusiast blog iFun.de has spotted a pair of useful additions concerning the Photos web app on iCloud.com.

Two new features, which were added over the weekend, let you zoom in on an image via a new slider in the toolbar and send photos as email attachments directly from the web UI.

Previously, sharing via email was a tedious multi-step process where you had to download a photo to your computer before attaching it to an email message using a third-party desktop email application or a webmail service.

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uHealth wants to help you improve your focus and attention

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated February 9, 2018

We're an ADHD nation. Smartphones, apps, instant messages, and everything else is definitely not helping us keep focused on things for more than just a few minutes. However, one app in the App Store is trying to change that. Based on a pretty impressive eye-tracking technology, uHealth wants to help you improve your focus and attention through short brain training exercises.

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Tweetbot for Mac returns to Mac App Store

Jake Smith ∙ January 26, 2015

Tapbots, the maker of popular third-party Twitter application Tweebot, has brought back the application to the Mac App Store after pulling it over the weekend.

"We've worked with Twitter to resolve Tweetbot for Mac authentication issues," Tapbots said in a tweet on Monday. "The app should be back on the Mac App Store soon." 

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Google’s wireless service will reportedly switch between carriers for best connection

Jake Smith ∙ January 26, 2015

The Wall Street Journal reports Google's upcoming and rumored wireless service won't rely on one single carrier, and instead will switch between networks to give customers the best wireless signal.

The service will feature new technology that would hunt through cellular connections provided by Sprint and T-Mobile and Wi-Fi hotspots, picking whichever offers the best signal to route calls, texts and data, the newspaper's sources said. 

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Second Yosemite update looms: Wi-Fi fixes, iCloud Drive in Time Machine and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 26, 2015

Despite all the talk of a problematic decline in software quality, Apple is feeling your pain and isn't standing still.

Currently in testing, a second update to OS X Yosemite is due later this week. First of all, Mac OS X 10.10.2 apparently squashes that annoying bug which manifests itself annoyingly as intermittent Wi-Fi issues.

Another one resolves a bug preventing your Mac from reconnecting to a Wi-Fi network after waking from sleep, causing you to manually disable and re-enable Wi-Fi, which gets old fast.

Next, iCloud Drive should be now accessible directly in Time Machine, including the ability to track changes to files and documents.

Moreover, 10.10.2 prevents the so-called ‘Thunderstrike’ hardware exploit which targets Macs equipped with high-bandwidth Thunderbolt ports and also includes other important fixes.

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