Apps

Meet Wink, a new instant camera and ephemeral messaging app from Viber

Messaging platform Viber on Monday rolled out a brand new application in the App Store. Wink, as it's called, is an instant camera app that was designed for sending photo and video messages that disappear after they have been viewed, joining a seemingly growing selection of ephemeral messaging apps like Snapchat, Telegram and more.

As part of Wink's launch, Viber for iPhone was updated earlier this morning with support for Wink messaging.

Viber revamps share menu, rolls out new media settings & support for Wink messages

Viber for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad was updated this morning in the App Store with support for auto-disappearing Wink messages while introducing a redesigned share menu, more detailed information in group chats, the ability to select how long your media is stored for and a few design enhancements to the app's introduction screens.

Viber, now owned by Japan's Rakuten, has received a steady stream of updates as of recently.

The service offers a nicely done watchOS 2 app for your wrist that lets you read and respond to messages with dictation, canned replies and stickers.

How to make a profile video in Facebook’s iOS app

Facebook recently began allowing users to set a short video as their profile picture on the service. Users can now take or upload a video of up to seven seconds to use as their profile video. These profile videos appear at the top of your profile, just like static profile pictures, but you can currently add a profile video only from the iPhone.

If you feel your Facebook profile is too static, here's how to spice it up with a profile video in Facebook's iOS app.

Facebook is rolling out Live Photos support

When Apple introduced Live Photos at its September 2015 iPhone 6s event it also announced an SDK allowing third-parties to implement support for them, while specifically saying that Live Photos would be coming to Facebook before year-end.

Following Tumblr's iOS app which was first to implement support for Live Photos, Facebook today started rolling out the ability to upload and view Live Photos from within their iOS app, TechCrunch reports.

Readdle’s Scanner Pro receives iPad Pro support and other enhancements in new update

Scanner Pro, a $0.99 document scanner for the iPhone and iPad by Ukrainian developer Readdle, was updated this morning in the App Store with several productivity-enhancing improvements and support for the iPad Pro.

You can now move and merge your scans, copy and paste pages within a document or between multiple documents, upload scanned documents to Box and much more.

Advanced iPad Pro and Apple Pencil support now available in Astropad’s iPad app

Astropad, an awesome app by former Apple engineers that basically turns the screen of your iOS device into a graphics tablet for the Mac, has received an important update this morning with expanded support for Apple's new 12.9-inch iPad Pro and the Apple Pencil. Coupled with the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil, Astropad is now truly a Wacom Cintiq replacement that’s wireless.

“We’ve spent significant time with iPad Pro and we’ve rethought, tweaked and tuned Astropad to make the most of this powerful device,” developers tell me via email.

Wild Weather: when a weather app meets beautiful illustrations

There are full-featured weather apps that have Doppler radar, live storm trackers, and all the bleeps and blips you can think of. They give you up-to-the-minute conditions so you are always ready for the slightest movement of clouds.

And, then there is Wild Weather, which is about as minimalist as you can get, when it comes to features, but looks so good that you just want to keep checking the temperature every few minutes, anyway.

Beam is a media-focused Reddit client that’s worth checking out

I'm not what I would consider a typical Reddit user. I don't belong to any Subreddits, I don't think I've ever posted anything, and I've only voted on a handful of articles. I really just use the site's FrontPage as a source of news, cute puppy pictures and the occasional funny video.

As you can imagine, most iOS Reddit clients—like Alien Blue—are overkill for my needs, so a few months ago I set out to find an app with a specific focus on media and browsing. I believe I found that app in "Beam for reddit," so I figured I'd take a few moments to share it with you.

Skitch for iOS, Clearly and Evernote for Pebble to be discontinued on January 22

Evernote earlier in the week announced discontinuing Skitch for iOS, Windows, Windows Touch and Android. Skitch is a free app for annotating and marking up photos and documents. On OS X, Evernote will continue to offer and support Skitch, a free download in the Mac App Store.

In addition, the company also plans on winding down Clearly, a browser extension for simplifying online articles to make them more readable, as well as Evernote for Pebble.

Skitch, Evernote for Pebble and Clearly will be provided in the App Store by January 22, 2016, after which they will no longer be available for download.

Eleven 3D Touch shortcuts in Messages for iPhone

There's no question that 3D Touch really does make the iPhone's Multi-Touch user interface multidimensional. By varying the degree of pressure applied to the screen of your iPhone, you can preview emails, websites, locations, messages and a variety of other items in Apple's stock apps.

We have already covered new 3D Touch shortcuts in iBooks and today we're taking a closer look at arguably the most-oft used iPhone app—Messages. In Messages, you can Peek and Pop most of the file types to your heart's content without needing to jump between multiple apps, which can save a lot of time.

In this tutorial, we're going to lay out 3D Touch basics in Messages before moving on to all of the items you can preview in your conversations.

Adobe Post, Grayout, Swingdo, and more apps to check out this weekend

I know most of you are probably still reeling from the Star Wars VII launch this weekend (I am literally writing this article while sitting in line, waiting to see it), but the world still continues and the App Store is still open. If you aren't spending every waking moment watching the sequel to the most popular sci-fi movie in the world (or if you are sitting in line, wondering if there is anything new to play with while you wait), we've got a list of apps and games that you should check out.

Scribblenauts Unlimited now available on iOS

The hit puzzle adventure game Scribblenauts Unlimited has just launched in the App Store for iPhone and iPad. Join Maxwell and his cohorts as they traverse complex landscapes and summon the most unusual items they can imagine.

Scribblenauts Unlimited first appeared on Nintendo's 3DS and Wii U in 2012. Because of the open-world style exploration, it moved over to PC where it gained popularity on Steam. This iOS (and Android, if you're interested) version is the first time the game has been released on a new mobile platform since its launch.