Apps

Apple shares examples of Siri’s third-party app integration on iOS 10

Following first hands-on demonstrations of Siri's app integration that select developers gave to The Wall Street Journal's Nathan Olivarez-Giles last week, Apple on Thursday published an article of its own to share more details regarding Siri integrations for payments, messaging apps and more.

As a quick backgrounder, Siri on iOS 10 will work with your apps thanks to Apple's new SiriKit framework which was designed to help developers integrate Siri functionality into their own apps.

Plex can now record free over-the-air and cable broadcasts using HDHomeRun devices

Available today as a beta release for Plex Pass subscribers, a new DVR feature allows Plex users to record both free over-the-air shows and cable broadcasts using their own digital antenna and HDHomeRun devices from Silicon Dust. As a bonus, it also supports non-DRM CableCARD channels on the HDHomeRun PRIME network attached digital tuner. This is a great feature addition that will put more television into your Plex-powered media center.

Plex is available for the iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and Apple TV, as well as for the Mac, Windows, Linux and a host of other media-streamers and other devices and platforms.

Google brings full RAW support and new face-editing tools to Snapseed for iOS

Google has brought full RAW support to Snapseed, allowing people who are serious about their iPhone photography to edit images saved in the professional RAW file format on their iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. As its name suggests, RAW stores original image data as captured by the camera's sensor, without any post-processing. Snapseed 2.9 for iOS also includes user interface improvements, bug fixes, a new face-editing tools and other improvements.

Instagram gains pinch-zoom on photos and videos, a new button to improve low-light shots

Instagram today announced that users of its free of charge iPhone app can now use the familiar pinch-zoom gesture to zoom in on photos—and videos—found in their feed and elsewhere in the app. I've long craved for this feature: in fact, I've been using iOS's system-wide Zoom feature to get a closer look at photos in the Instagram app that interest me. Just yesterday, Instagram pushed another update which brings out a new low-light button for its built-in camera.

How to create your own Geofilters for Snapchat

Snapchat's Geofilters, special overlays that communicate the “where and when” of a Snap, can be quite useful—you can apply one to a Snap before sending it to a friend, or add it to your Story.

Today, Snapchat released a brand new web tool that lets you make custom On-Demand Geofilters using your own graphics or pre-made templates costing as little as $5 for a party in a small geographic area, no image editing software required.

You can customize your own Geofilters with the color palate and the text of your choosing. Once published, guests see your Geofilter when they post Snaps during your event. In this brief step-by-step tutorial, we're going to guide you through the process of creating your own Geofilter using Snapchat's new browser-based web tool.

Snapchat’s sweet new update makes a handful of things a tad easier

A brand new version of Snapchat is now available in the App Store on your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. It's a point update but don't let that fool you as it makes a handful of things a bit easier. For starters, you can now finally preview a person's public Stories without adding them as a friend. Before today, you had to add a contact as your friend to view their Stories so just this nice improvement alone could go a long way toward helping us discover new accounts and content on Snapchat a bit more easily than before.

Jessica Alba has boarded “Planet of the Apps” as a mentor and executive producer

“Planet of the Apps”, an unscripted television show about apps and their creators co-produced by Apple and Propagate Content’s Ben Silverman and Howard Owens, has added actress/model Jessica Alba to the list of its mentors and advisers, The Variety reports. Actress Gwyneth Paltrow and Internet personality and entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk also joined the project recently, in addition to musician will.i.am.

Instagram’s popular Explore tab now recommends Stories from people you could follow

Today, Instagram's Explore tab will start showing some users a bar of Stories from accounts they could follow, TechCrunch reported yesterday, saying these algorithmically personalized suggestions will roll out to everyone soon. Stories recommendations are based on who you follow and the topics you care about, making it easy to add someone new to your Home feed’s Stories section.

Papa John’s now lets you order pizzas, drinks and desserts right from your Apple TV

Tuesday, Papa John's launched a brand new application allowing owners of the fourth-generation Apple TV to order pizza from the comfort of their couch, straight from their Apple TV. In becoming the first restaurant to bring food ordering to the Apple TV, Papa John's said that all orders placed using the new app will have an automatic 25 percent discount applied to them. Users must sign into their existing Papa John's account to automatically provide payment information and access their favorite meals.

How to opt out of WhatsApp-Facebook account data sharing

As you may have heard, WhatsApp is starting to share some of users' account data with Facebook (things like your registered phone number and the last time you used the service) to improve targeted advertising and friend suggestions on Facebook and better fight spam on WhatsApp. Thankfully, you can easily opt out, right when the prompt goes up, or within 30 days of accepting the new terms, here's how.