Apps

What’s on your Home screen: Sebastien Page

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated January 24, 2018

"Show me your Home screen and I'll tell you who you are."

Indeed, the Home screen is a very personal place that reflects who we are and how we use our devices. The way we organize apps and folders can tell a whole lot about our personality, and so does our specific choice of apps.

I've been asked twice this week to share a screenshot of my Home screen set up, so I figured I might as well share with all of you and explain the rational behind the placement of icons and the overall layout, and of course, the specific apps I use.

Health Tracking, Hopscotch, Boom, and other apps to check out this weekend

Cody Lee ∙ Updated May 17, 2018

In this edition of Apps of the Week, we've rounded up some fantastic titles for you to check out this weekend. The list includes a new app called Health Tracking by Gyroscope, a new iPhone version of the popular learn-to-code app Hopscotch, and two new games that you won't want to miss!

Getting your point across, artfully, with PointOut

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 13, 2016

PointOut for iPhone, an exciting image annotation app, is celebrating its first birthday with a feature-packed update that surfaced yesterday on the App Store.

As its name hints, this app lets you point out things on your photos and iOS screenshots with pointers such as arrows, dots, circles, lifelike loupes, precision glasses, different canvas layouts, focus areas and more.

These tolls make it super easy to highlight or enlarge specific details on your photos in a manner that'll make an impact on your audience.

In its latest update, PointOut has gained some new pointers with draggable text labels for making even greater impact, a flat magnifying glass for those who couldn't stand the skeuomorphic ones, full support for non-standard iOS keyboards and more.

Having been using this app for months, I've grown to like it quite a lot. This quick review should give you an idea why I deem PointOut a unique iOS annotation app.

Opera VPN offers a free and unlimited VPN service

Andrew O'Hara ∙ Updated October 16, 2018

VPNs can afford a lot of benefits to users. They route your data through special servers that can help you access content that is only available in certain regions, bypass firewalls that block content like iDownloadBlog or music streaming services, and protect yourself on public networks. They grant these features, usually in exchange for a monthly fee. The new Opera VPN app brings all of this and more, for free. However, it isn't without compromises.

Action-puzzler King Rabbit goes free as Apple’s App of the Week

Cody Lee ∙ May 12, 2016

Apple on Thursday updated its App of the Week promotion with the game King Rabbit. This means that for the next 7 days, you'll be able to download the popular action-puzzler for both iPhone and iPad for free—a modest savings of $1.

For those unfamiliar with the title, King Rabbit is a puzzle-action crossover. Players are tasked with helping King Rabbit rescue his bunny citizens from devious enemies using keys, potions, bombs and other items they find along the way.

iOS 9 adoption is stalling amid slowing iPhone sales

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 12, 2016

Last time we checked, iOS adoption rates stood at 84 percent of iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices that were detected as running iOS 9. Moreover, eleven percent of hardware was on iOS 8 and the remaining five percent of devices used iOS 7 or older editions of Apple's mobile operating system.

These stats were valid as of a little more than two weeks ago. The new numbers Apple just posted to its App Store dashboard for developers, however, paint a not-so-rosy picture for iOS 9 adoption.

According to App Store device logs, the latest set of figures has not changed the slightest bit, or has not changed enough to move the needle versus two weeks ago.

App Store review times shortened to 2 days

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated March 19, 2019

Apple's oft-criticized review process for app submissions, which normally takes about a week or more, now takes as little as two days, according to developers who reported seeing dramatically faster App Store review times on submissions.

AppReviewTimes.com, a website that tracks average App Store review times using crowdsourced data, has confirmed that Apple's review process now takes an average of two days to approve an app, based on 332 reviews in the last 14 days.

Periscope for iPhone now lets you search videos and broadcast live from DJI drones

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 12, 2016

Periscope, a Twitter-owned app that lets anyone start a live video broadcast from their iPhone, today received a pretty substantial update on the App Store. Bumped to version 1.4, Periscope for iPhone now lets you search videos and broadcast live to the service from a compatible DJI drone.

In addition, the team shared a preview of their full beyond 24 hours approach that will be available in the coming weeks.

Microsoft to sunset Sunrise Calendar on August 31, here are a few viable alternatives

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 9, 2018

If you rely on the excellent cross-platform Sunrise Calendar to keep up with your schedule, Microsoft has some bad news for you: your favorite calendar app is breaking up with you as the Windows maker announced plans to shut down Sunrise on August 31. For those wondering, Microsoft bought this popular calendar app in February of 2015.

Fortunately, Sunrise alternatives are plentiful.

These fine MacPaw apps are currently half price

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 12, 2016

Celebrating yesterday's launch of Gemini 2, its duplicate file finder application, Ukrainian developer MacPaw is now offering a special 50 percent off store-wide discount on all their paid-for Mac applications, valid through May 17, 2016.

If you've been on the lookout for deep discounts on quality apps such as Hider 2, which lets you keep sensitive information and private files from prying eyes, CleanMyMac and CleanMyPC for optimizing the inner workings of your Mac and Windows PC or the aforementioned Gemini 2, this is it.

Google Translate app gains offline mode, instant camera translation from Chinese and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 12, 2016

Google's native Translate application for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad received a major update yesterday in the App Store, bringing version number to 5.0 and introducing some rather interesting advances. For starters, Google Translate now works without an Internet connection, allowing you to translate words, phrases and sentences in 52 of the 103 supported languages when there is no cellular or Wi-Fi connection available.

The instant camera translation feature, called Word Lens, now works with Chinese: it reads both to and from English, both Simplified and Traditional Chinese. This feature is ideal for traveling: you just point your camera at, say, a restaurant sign in a foreign language and witness the appropriate translation appear like magic in live video feed.

Google launches iPhone keyboard that lets you search and send GIFs, emojis and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ May 12, 2016

As promised, Google this morning launched its first software keyboard for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, called Gboard. Available free on the App Store, it integrates the power of Google Search, supports gesture-based typing, lets you send GIFs, emoticons and more. “No more app switching; just search and send, right from your keyboard,” said Google.