Apps

Apple pulls popular ‘Weed Firm’ game from the App Store

Apple has pulled the popular, and somewhat controversial, game 'Weed Firm' from the App Store this week. The game landed on iOS just a few weeks ago, and had climbed its way to the top of the App Store's 'Top Free' list in several countries.

For those unfamiliar with the game, the game centers around a marijuana business, started by an expelled botany student who inherits a growing operation and expands it. Players control all aspects of the business, including selling cannabis...

Fantastical 2 for iPhone and iPad gains improved week view layout and bug fixes

Flexibits's Fantastical 2 for iOS has received a maintenance update this morning bringing several bug fixes, alongside a useful improvement to how the overlapping calendar events are handled.

Bringing the app up to version 2.0.7, the team has made changes to how it handles many overlapping events by improving your week view layout to fit more content while making the individual entries legible.

Today's update is available for both the iPhone and iPad edition of Fantastical and is now live in the App Store, free for existing users...

Bricks – Arcade Game review: a brick breaking game with a twist

The brick-breaking genre is decades old. Breakout was one of Atari’s early runaway hits in the mid 1970s. It spawned generations of clones and homages (Did you know that, if you type “Atari Breakout” into a Google image search, you can play the game with the image results?).

Bricks is a version of the brick-breaking genre that bucks tradition and leaves you with a completely new love of the arcade classic. Your iPhone is the paddle and the wall surrounds you in this new take on an old favorite. We’ve got a review of Bricks – Arcade Game for you below…

Start your morning off right with WhatAlarm [sponsored]

The folks at B&G present WhatAlarm, the alarm clock app that helps you get going in the morning by reading you the news, your reminders, appointments, weather conditions, as well as your horoscope.

WhatAlarm not only aims at waking you up but also telling you what your day looks like so you know ahead of getting out of bed. After opening the app to stop the alarm, WhatAlarm will kindly greet you and inform you about the weather for the day. Then it will read your reminders, the main news headlines, your horoscope, and finally will play your favorite radio station until you stop the app...

Facebook launches new audio recognition feature

The social networking behemoth, Facebook, has launched a brand new feature today which can identify TV shows, movies and music playing in the background.

Resembling content-matching services like Shazam and Sound Hound, this new capability is a staggered release via an updated App Store app on iPhone and a Google Play app on Android, according to multiple reports and Facebook itself.

Read on for the full reveal...

Apple updates WWDC app with 2014 conference schedule, confirms June 2 keynote

Apple's free WWDC app for iOS has been updated with relevant 2014 conference schedule and related content ahead of its upcoming developer-only event.

The 5-day Worldwide Developers Conference kicks off with a keynote on June 2 and will give us previews of iOS 8 code-named Okemo and OS X 10.10, code-named Syrah after a wine.

Version 2.0 of the WWDC app for the iPhone and iPad includes a brand new icon, a revamped design with an aesthetically pleasing orange theme and, more importantly, content support for the upcoming event. If you're not attending WWDC, the app is a nice way to follow the announcements as they happen, watch session videos uploaded throughout the week, browse floor plans and more...

Day One for Mac updated with search and tag refinements, more

My favorite journaling app for iOS and OS X, Day One, has received a nice update today on the Mac side, bringing a couple improvements to the already well-rounded experience, along with a host of bug fixes.

The 2012 Mac App of the Year, Day One version 1.9.4 will now show your most recent entry location in the Map view by default. Your tags are now included in Momento text entry imports and there's a "greatly improved search" for multi-byte characters, including Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Emoji and so forth.

This update is of course free for existing users. Day One for OS X is $9.99 in the Mac App Store...

Google Maps gains faster Street View transitions

Google last night issued a minor but welcomed update to its free Google Maps for iOS app. In addition to some bug fixes, version 3.1 now offers "smoother, faster transitions when you move through Street View."

The latest update arrives two weeks after the Internet giant issued a major 3.0 update, bringing the much-needed offline mode to Google Maps in addition to lane guidance, Uber integration, Voice Search, pins and more...

New ‘Notifyr’ app pushes your iPhone notifications to your Mac

A new iPhone app has surfaced in the App Store that offers a fairly unique feature: the ability to push notifications to your Mac. It's called Notifyr, and it utilizes a companion OS X client and Bluetooth LE tech to automatically send your iOS notifications to your desktop.

The whole thing is fairly easy to set up. After you've downloaded both the iOS app and the Mac client, you'll follow the usual bluetooth pairing procedure. And once that's done, you should start seeing all of your iOS notifications pop up in your Mac's Notification Center...

Southwest Airlines app now supports mobile boarding passes in 28 airports

Southwest Airlines posted an update for its official iOS client last night, bringing the app to version 2.4. The update includes a handful of improvements, such as faster access to tools like Checkin and Mobile Boarding Pass options.

Speaking of mobile boarding passes, the 2.4 update also adds support for the popular feature to a total of 28 airports. Previously, Southwest's mobile boarding passes could only be used in Austin, but now they're available nationwide...

Amazon Cloud Drive Photos updated with new album view, photo sorting and more

Amazon updated its Cloud Drive Photos iOS client this afternoon, bringing the app to version 3.1. The update brings about a new album view, as well as a new sorting feature, upload status indicator and various other improvements.

The new album view will allow Cloud Drive users to quickly scroll through their albums with large cover photos. And the new sorting feature brings the ability for users to sort their photos by either oldest to newest, or newest to oldest...

Kik messenger app gains handy new ‘new people’ section

Kik users will be happy to hear that the cross-platform messenger has updated its iOS client today, bringing the app to version 7.2. The update brings about a handful of new improvements, such as a new block and report feature and the ability to send stickers faster.

But easily the biggest change in 7.2 is the new 'new people' section. This allows you to easily manage your conversations with people who aren't in your contacts, and it blurs out photos and other content files from them until you decide that you'd like to view them...