Apple

Readdle updates Documents with background music, e-book reader, iPhone add-ons and more

Back in February, Ukrainian developer Readdle gave its Documents for iOS app a thorough makeover, adding features like a much polished iPad interface with iOS 7-friendly styling, in-app integration with other Readdle apps, a brand new file manager and much more.

Available today, the free Readdle Documents 5.1 download expands on the app's features set with further improvements.

If you import audio files into Documents, the app now lets you play music in the background so you can, say, read a PDF document as the music plays. Speaking of PDFs, the new Documents at last includes a full-featured e-book reader...

Apple reaches deal to build third solar farm in North Carolina

The Hickory Daily Record is reporting that Apple has recached a deal with the city council of Claremont, North Carolina to purchase land for a new solar panel farm. This will be the company's third solar farm in the Maiden area.

According to the report, Apple will be annexing 100-acres for the new array and will be making an initial investment of $55 million. The solar farm will generate 17.5 megawatts of power for its massive North Carolina data center...

Apple celebrates diversity and equality in new ‘Pride’ video

At the end of June, San Francisco held its 44th annual Pride parade where people from all around the world marched to show their support of the LGBT community. Several tech companies, including Apple, participated in the event.

CEO Tim Cook, Environment Director Lisa Jackson and thousands of other employees were in attendance, and Apple tonight posted a video of the parade. Dubbed 'Pride,' the clip celebrates the iPad-maker's commitment to equality...

iOS 8 beta 3 enables M7 support and caffeine-tracking in Health app

As we continue to sift through the beta 3 of iOS 8, we've come across another notable change in the firmware. In today's update, Apple adds both Caffeine-tracking and M7-supported step-counting to the already feature-packed Health app.

Developers with the latest iOS 8 beta installed on their iPhone 5s will notice that they can now input their daily Caffeine intake. They can also now track their steps without a third party app or accessory using the 5s' built-in M7 processor...

T-Mobile’s back-to-school due Wednesday with $100 rebate on combined iPhone/iPad purchase

After taking a heat over the accusations by the United States Federal Trade Commission that it placed unauthorized charges on phone bills for years, T-Mobile is back in the news with some positive headlines.

As noted by the TMoNews blog, the Deutsche Telekom-owned carrier will soon start treating its customers to a $100 rebate when buying an iPhone and iPad together, as part of its back-to-school promotion that launches on July 9...

Major Target promo offers gift cards with select iPad, iPhone and iPod touch purchases

American retailing company Target has launched a new sale offering free gift cards with the purchase of an iPad Air, iPad mini with Retina display, iPhone 5s, iPhone 5c and the iPod touch media player. If you're in the market for an iPad Air or iPad mini with Retina display, the retailer will treat you to a $100 gift card.

Furthermore, Apple's latest iPhones are on sale, too, and now come with a $20 gift card. As for the iPod touch, buying a 32-gigabyte version will net you a $30 gift card...

EasyJet deploys iBeacon support to select airports

iBeacon, an indoor micro-positioning service by Apple, is among the technologies in their ascendancy. Like Passsbook, iBeacons are being slowly but surely rolled out by the ever-growing number of retailers, merchants, theme parks, sporting venues, festivals and so forth.

A number of capable turnkey systems for easy iBeacon deployment exist today and the tiny transmitters are dirt cheap, removing an important barrier to iBeacon adoption.

You can now put European airline easyJet on your list of iBeacon-friendly businesses.

The British airline carrier based at London Luton Airport is operating domestic and international scheduled services on over 600 routes in 32 countries and now customers can download its freshly-updated iPhone app and opt in to receive in-app iBeacon notifications at select locations “to enhance the in airport experience”...

WSJ: iWatch due in Fall, Tim Cook actively looking to add fresh faces to Apple’s board

Tim Cook's recasting of Apple is in full bloom as the CEO pushes executives to be more collaborative while broadening the firm's legendary laser focus, as per a new report by The Wall Street Journal. The story also mentions that Cook is very much looking to add new directors to Apple's eight-person board.

That's hardly a surprise given that six board members are aged 63 or older. It's also worth mentioning that Cook has inherited the board from Apple's late co-founder Steve Jobs so these people may not be necessarily 100 percent loyal to Cook in the long run.

Moreover, people familiar with the Apple's plans told WSJ that the firm will introduce its rumored iWatch with "advanced sensors to track a user’s fitness and health" alongside new iPhones in the Fall, matching up with previous reports...

Google Play Music now supports gapless playback, playlist downloading and more

Google's Play Music client for the iPhone and iPod touch recently picked up some useful new capabilities such as the ability to filter Downloaded Only tracks, edit playlists on the go, Shuffle Artist and more. Today, Google has pushed another update making the application even more useful than before.

The new Google Play Music version 1.3.0.2190 includes a few bug fixes and improvements, as well as three new features. For starters, you can at last enjoy albums such as Pink Floyd's "The Wall" precisely the way they were meant to be heard - with gapless playback...

New Apple TV, Find My iPhone and Find My Friends betas also available

As Apple seeds a third beta of both iOS 8 (build 12A4318c) and OS X Yosemite Developer Preview (build 14A283j) to developers, we're dutifully updating our articles with a running list of changes.

In the meantime, new betas of the accompanying Apple TV firmware - as well as Find My iPhone and Find My Friends betas - are now available to Apple's registered iOS developers through the company's Dev Center...

Apple releases OS X Yosemite Developer Preview 3

In addition to seeding the third beta of iOS 8 this morning, Apple has also released the third Developer Preview of its new OS X Yosemite operating system. The update comes three weeks after Preview 2, and over a month after Apple announced Yosemite at WWDC.

The update is labeled as build 14A283o and can be downloaded via an update in the Mac App Store, or as a full download from Apple’s online developer center. It does not, however, appear to be out in Apple’s recently-launched public Yosemite Beta Seed program yet…

Apple seeds iOS 8 beta 3 to developers: here is what’s new

Nearly three weeks after releasing the second beta of iOS 8, Apple has this morning seeded the third beta of iOS 8 to developers. The beta is labeled as build 12a4318c, and is available for compatible iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices.

If you're a registered iOS developer, you can grab the new beta from either the online dev portal as a standalone download, or via your device's OTA (over-the-air) update mechanism. You'll find all the details on beta 3 after the break...