Apple

U.S. Patent Office rejects Apple patent Samsung was found to infringe

Cody Lee ∙ August 8, 2014

Apple and Samsung may have called a truce in patent litigation overseas, but here in the United States, they're still locked in a heated battle. The two firms are wrapping up post-trial hearings from their 2012 meeting, and they've just begun post-trial activities for this year's lawsuit.

This week a significant development has occurred, which could have a major impact in the ongoing fight. The US Patent Office has rejected several claims of one of the patents Apple asserted against Samsung in their most recent infringement trial, saying certain parts aren't valid...

Several productivity apps on sale for a limited time

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 17, 2019

Apple is highlighting a number of popular productivity apps in its App Store right now, which have recently seen significant discounts. The promo can be found in the iTunes Store, under a special new section entitled "Amazing Productivity Apps Limited-Time Prices."

Here you'll find several top tier apps like Fantastical 2,which has made our Top Calendar Apps list multiple times, for bottom tier prices. There's also Clear To Do List, Notablity, 1Password and many more. We've put together a list of the apps and their discounts below...

Apple releases iTunes 11.3.1 with podcast-related bug fixes

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

Apple has this afternoon pushed out a new version of its iTunes app, bringing the music management software to version 11.3.1. The update is more of a maintenance release, and doesn't include any major new features or changes.

It does however, offer up a fix for a persistent problem where subscribed podcasts may have stopped updating with new episodes, as well as an issue where iTunes would become unresponsive while browsing through podcast episodes...

Apple researching Siri for Mac, patent filing hints

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 7, 2014

Rumors of Apple's supposed intent to port its iOS digital personal assistant, Siri, over to the Mac have persisted for years, and intensified lately. Back in November 2012, for example, 9to5Mac claimed that Siri would be baked into OS X Mavericks.

Mavericks is here without Siri and the feature is nowhere to be seen in Yosemite, which looms on the horizon. Of course, the Mac's Dictation feature, powered by Nuance, doesn't count as it's simply speech-to-text with no real intelligence.

That being said, it would seem that the Cupertino firm has been quietly researching ways of enabling Siri on the Mac. Case in point: a newly discovered patent application filed back in February of this year which details how Siri for Mac might function, what features it could include and how it should improve your desktop productivity...

Beats by Dr. Dre products get featured on Online Apple Store

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 19, 2018

After officially welcoming Beats to the family last week, Apple has now given the Beats by Dr. Dre range its own dedicated section on the Online Apple Store.

Found under the new 'Beats by Dr. Dre' section found under the Accessories link, the Beats sub-section has even gotten a prominent placement on the navigation bar at the top, joining other sections such as 'All Accessories,' 'Apple Accessories,' 'Exclusives,' 'Now Trending,' and 'Gift Cards'.

The online store seems to be carrying the complete range of the popular Beats by Dr. Dre line of accessories and headphones...

Peter Molyneux’s newest God game is now available for iOS

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 7, 2014

Arguably the most famous game designer of all time, Peter Molyneux left Bullfrog to form Lionhead Studios in 1997. Ever since, he's been (mostly) churning out one hit game after another. His latest project: a God sim called Godus.

After a recent soft-launch, it's now available worldwide as a free-to-play download for the iPhone and iPad. Designed by Molyneux himself and developed for mobile by DeNA Corp., Godus started as a Kickstarter project.

The game can be considered an unofficial sequel to Curiosity, an experimental Molyneux-designed game which forced people to frantically tap away at a cube in order to discover what's inside. Godus takes a different route. Featuring cartoonish graphics, it invites you to rule over a living, breathing world and lets you shape, mold and sculpt every inch of the landscape to your liking, among other features...

Yosemite’s QuickTime cleans up iOS status bar when screencasting so you don’t have to

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 7, 2014

The vast majority of Apple bloggers who grab screenshots of iPhone and iPad applications don't seem to be ashamed by the low or no cellular signal strength showing right in their status bar, or incomplete Wi-Fi or - worse of all - low battery.

And who could blame them?

Touching up the images to have the status bar show full cellular/Wi-Fi signal and 100 percent battery takes time and a great deal of effort to get it right.

I've seen folks like MacStories editor Federico Viticci obsess over the issue and even write scripts and devise complex workflows in order to correct the messed up status bar on their iOS screenshots. Having been constantly pressed for time, I'm not that particular about my screenshots.

Luckily, QuickTime in Yosemite includes a nifty little feature which automatically cleans up the status bar when capturing an iOS device's screen, so your screencasts look professional...

Autodesk’s SketchBook apps go free for the first time in Apple’s Free App of the Week promo

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 30, 2018

For the first time ever since debuting on the App Store back in the summer of 2013, a pair of excellent drawing and painting apps for the iPhone and iPad by Autodesk have gone free.

Both SketchBook Mobile — a professional-grade painting and drawing application designed for the iPhone and iPod touch — and SketchBook Pro for iPad— an authentic, natural drawing experience based on the same paint engine as its desktop counterpart — are available free of charge, for a limited time, courtesy of Apple's weekly Free App of the Week promo on the App Store.

That's a cool $7 saving right off the bat as SketchBook Pro normally sells for $4.99 and SketchBook Mobile is regularly $1.99...

Google Shopping Express 2.0: deliveries in more cities, enhanced search, new products and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 7, 2014

Following a June update, the Internet giant today released a major new version of its Shopping Express application for the iPhone and iPad.

The official iOS client of Google’s same-day delivery service, version 2.0, now live in the App Store, brings same-day and overnight delivery to more cities while introducing several enhancements to the built-in search feature.

You can now use the app to buy wine, beer and spirits and have them delivered to your doorstep, if you live in San Francisco or the San Francisco Peninsula. And people who shop at Costco can now purchase their Costco membership and shop Costco in the same session...

FX Photo Studio 6.0 for iPhone brings iOS 7 overhaul, new filters and sharing options and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 13, 2018

FX Photo Studio by MacPhun used to be my go-to iPhone photography tool, but I was forced to switch to other apps because it looked like the team had ceased further development (last update was in February of last year).

I'm glad I was wrong about that. As of today, the iPhone edition has been resurrected. Basically everything has changed and MacPhun bills it as "the biggest update in its four-year history".

Now available in the App Store as a free update for existing users, the new FX Photo Studio 6.0 of course sports an iOS 7-friendly user interface along with a brand new engine and tons of other new features.

All of the hallmarks of FX Photo Studio have been preserved and enhanced in this update, including great filters, special editing tools and sharing features...

Apple awarded new patent on wireless charging

Cody Lee ∙ August 7, 2014

We don't know if the upcoming iPhone 6 is going to feature wireless charging technology or not, but we do know that Apple is working on it. The Cupertino company has been awarded multiple patents on wire-free charging tech over the years, and today we're adding a new one to the stack.

The USPTO granted Apple the rights to a new invention this week based on NFMR (or near-field magnetic resonance) technology. NFMR is different from the inductive charging tech used by most manufacturers these days, as it's capable of wirelessly charging devices up to one meter away...

Foursquare revamps mobile app around Yelp-like features and focus on location discovery

Christian Zibreg ∙ August 6, 2014

Foursquare, the popular location-based social networking service, recently announced plans to remove social features and check-ins from its original mobile client.

Thus, Swarm was born.

By striping the mobile client off unnecessary features, the logic went, Foursquare aimed to provide its users with a lightweight app that would have a strong focus on location discovery.

After announcing the redesigned new app and showing off a new logo two weeks ago, the new Forusquare 8.0 for iPhone is now available in the App Store. It "learns what you like and leads you to places you love," as per the blurb, and is a lot like Yelp now.

Jump past the break for the full info...