Apple quietly purchased Dryft, a startup that develops keyboard apps, according to a new report from TechCrunch. The site says that the acquisition happened sometime last year, but the financial terms of the deal are still not known.
Dryft, who TechCrunch notes was a finalist in its 2013 Disrupt startup battlefield competition, gained notoriety for its custom mobile keyboard that would only appear when the user placed their fingers on their device's display.
Twitter on Wednesday issued a second update to its live-broadcasting app on iOS, Periscope for iPhone. The new build brings an additional three new features along with a few enhancements and bug fixes making your experience more pleasing than before.
In addition to easier blocking and major scrolling improvements, a new Follower Mode can be now turned on before starting a broadcast to limit comments to only viewers that you follow.
Apple today released the iOS 8.3 software update for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. The software contains dozens of fixes and brings out a handful of feature enhancements related to Messages, Siri, the much enhanced emoji keyboard and more. Oddly, a subtle change to how Quick Reply and Notification Center handle messages with previews disabled aren't mentioned in release notes.
That's something I was alerted to by Twitter user @ericcamazin. Without a doubt, you'll find these changes much welcomed.
As a reminder to developer, Apple published on its developer portal today that starting June 1, 2015, all app updates submitted to the App Store will have to include 64-bit support and be built with the iOS 8 SDK. While the move probably won't affect active developers who are already in compliance, smaller developer who haven't updated their apps for iOS 8 or 64-bit devices yet will have some catching up to do, and it's only good for us users.
Customers who don't opt to pre-order an Apple Watch this Friday could run into inventory problems when trying to order the Apple Watch at launch. German-based Apple blog Macerkopf.de has discovered what looks like shipping dates for the wearable, which appeared on Apple's German and U.K web stores, and some models show up to 6 week lead times for select models.
Apple's human-interface chief Alan Dye sat down with Wired to discuss the process of making each of the Apple Watch's customizable faces, yet another glimpse of the attention to detail Apple's always been famous for. For starters, the company spent weeks photographing jellyfish, butterflies and flowers in incredible detail for Watch faces.
In one example given, the company had a designer spending countless hours capturing a photo of a jellyfish in its design studio.
In addition to releasing OS X 10.10.3 to the public this morning, Apple has also rolled out iOS 8.3. The update, which developers and members of Apple's public beta program have been testing since February, includes a number of new features and improvements.
Among those new features is support for Wireless CarPlay, which allows folks with vehicles or head units that support the feature to use CarPlay without dealing with cables. There is also new, more diverse emojis, additional language support in Siri, Safari fixes and more.
As promised earlier this morning, Apple has now released the OS X 10.10.3 Yosemite software update for public consumption. It comes with the long-expected Photos app replacing iPhoto as the default consumer photo-management solution on Macs.
Other new features in the 1.52-gigabyte update include 300 new emoji with racially diverse designs, improvements to Wi-Fi networking, bug fixes, performance improvements and more. The software is available via the Mac App Store's Updates tab.
In addition to a bunch of high-profile reviews of the Apple Watch and first unboxing videos of the device's packaging, major outlets have also produced videos which highlight specific features of the wrist-worn device, such as health and fitness tracking, notifications, design and more.
Reading detailed reviews takes time so you may want to check out these videos first and save longform write-ups for weekend reading.
Following the initial wave of major Apple Watch reviews which hit the web earlier this morning, we're now being treated to first unboxing videos, starting with one posted by French website Metronews which depicts unboxing of the 42mm stainless steel Apple Watch model with Milanese Loop. We also have another one from Japan, with more to come throughout the day.
Apple is set to start taking pre-orders for its Watch this Friday ahead of the big April 24 reveal and first reviews of the wearable device are now available from big media and Apple's favorite bloggers.
The vast majority of reviewers praise the device's functionality, design and advanced software features.
However, the consensus out there seems to be that the Watch is not essential to one's life. This is actually a far better outcome compared to early reviews of the iPhone and iPad which blasted these devices as unnecessary, limited and unappealing.
Here are some choice quotes from Watch reviews.
Get your Macs ready for a major software refresh as Apple gears up to release the OS X Yosemite 10.10.3 software update with the long-awaited Photos for Mac app and other improvements.
Associated Press, which ran a review of Photos for Mac earlier this morning and first reported that the software update is due today, praised the software's professional-level and advanced fine-tuning tools such as granular color correction.
“Apple’s new Photos app for Mac computers, available Wednesday as a free software update, makes it easy to organize and edit your pictures,” the news organization wrote.