Last month, the well-connected blogger Mark Gurman reported that Apple was likely to introduce a split-screen multitasking feature for iPad on iOS 8. The company did not mention the feature at its WWDC keynote, however, leaving many to wonder if the functionality is still coming. According to a pair of tweets from iOS developer Steven Troughton-Smith, it definitely appears possible…
In a move designed to appease privacy watchers and further protect your privacy, Apple has made it that much harder for pesky marketeers to identify your device (and consequentially you as a user) or track your location as you go about your business. As discovered by Swiss programmer Frederic Jacobs, iOS 8 randomizes your device's MAC address while scanning for networks.
A MAC address serves as a unique identifier assigned to network interfaces for communications on the physical network segment. By randomizing your device's MAC address each time it scans for nearby Wi-Fi hotspots, iOS 8 effectively disguises any trace of the real device. Here's hoping this becomes an industry standard. Jump past the fold to learn more about this nifty feature...
The world's top camera on Flickr will get a lot better when iOS 8 drops this Fall. As Apple executives outlined during the WWDC keynote talk, the stock Camera application in iOS 8 introduces a new shooting mode: time-lapse photography.
This lets you leave your iPhone automatically taking pictures every few seconds over a predetermined amount of time. iOS 8 then stitches the individual frames together to form gorgeous time-lapse videos.
Time-lapse photography is great for shooting changes that occur over longer periods of time, such as the clouds moving across the sky, skyscrapers being built, blossoming flowers, sunset/sunrise scenes and more. Here's an example time-lapse video shot using an iPhone 5s running a beta of iOS 8...
Mark Gurman has established himself as the most reliable Apple blogger out there so we were confused seeing his sources fail him so badly in predicting announcements Apple should've made at WWDC.
For instance, he called for new hardware at WWDC, but Apple's developers conference focused - rather predictably, I should add - on software.
Gurman also said Apple would give OS X a larger presence at the five-day event whereas the company didn't discriminate between iOS 8 and Yosemite.
Most importantly, he made several claims concerning Apple taking iOS 8 Maps to the next level by adding public transit directions, a car finding feature, more points of interests, better labels and so forth. In reality, the Cupertino firm only briefly mentioned that it's updated iOS 8 Maps in China with vector graphics. So, what's going on here?
Since Apple seeded the inaugural beta of iOS 8 last week, we've been asked seemingly hundreds of times if the upgrade is worth giving up a jailbreak. As we all know, once you update past iOS 7.0.6 you lose the ability to jailbreak, and there's no way to downgrade.
Now, we already touched on this subject during last week's episode of Let's Talk Jailbreak, but given how popular the topic has been, we wanted to cover it in a post. It's not exactly the easiest question to answer, but I'm going to do my best to break down your options...
It seems to be a recurring topic every year when Apple unveils a new version of iOS: did iOS 5 just kill jailbreaking? Will jailbreaking survive iOS 6? What’s left to jailbreakers with iOS 7? Did iOS 8 just make jailbreaking irrelevant?
These are some legitimate questions to ask, especially in regards to the fact that Apple, as you would expect, always adds new features to iOS, making jailbreaking a little less appealing. At least that's how it looks on paper, because in reality, it’s not so clear.
A few major online publications have already chimed in about how iOS 8 is making jailbreaking pointless, usually with no real understanding of what jailbreaking truly is about. So I thought it’d be a good idea to lay down some balanced thoughts about iOS 8 and the future of jailbreaking...
Apple introduced several user-facing features in iOS 8 earlier this week, but it appears that there could be more than meets the eye. iOS developer Hamza Sood has tweeted two screenshots that show iOS 8 internal settings for customizing Control Center. In particular, there are toggle switches for adding, removing or reordering the app shortcuts and toggles in Control Center. There is even an option to record the screen from the swipe-up menu…
In addition to the makers of some of the most popular Android soft-keyboards like Swype, Fleksy and SwiftKey - which have all confirmed building downloadable keyboards for iOS 8 - two more companies have now jumped on the bandwagon: KeyPoint and Whirlscape, the respective makers of the Adaptxt and Minuum Android keyboards.
As a result, users will be able to pick among at least five different keyboards in the App Store when iOS 8 launches this Fall, in addition to Apple's normal stock keyboard and the new and much improved QuickType one with adaptive suggestions...
As folks continue to comb through the recently released iOS 8 beta, a new feature has been discovered in mobile Safari. When the updated browser detects a credit card field within a webpage, it offers to let the user scan their card with their device's camera.
Scanning your credit card automatically enters its information in the appropriate text fields, saving you from having to enter it manually. It takes just a moment, and it doesn't appear that websites will have to do anything special to enable the new feature...
Just a few hours ago, Philips tweeted a concept image of a prototype Notification Center widget that could be used for controlling its Hue lineup of iOS connected bulbs and lights. As it stands, this functionality is provided through the Philips Hue app for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. But this extension concept reveals that users could have more convenient access to an off button and different lighting settings without launching the app.
Notification Center widgets are a new feature in iOS 8 that Apple announced at its WWDC keynote earlier this week. Developers are able to build extensions that provide systemwide functionality through widgets in Today view, something that has been possible through jailbreaking for several years. In fact, there is already a jailbreak tweak called HueHueHue for controlling Philips Hue lights through Control Center. This prototype is a similar concept…
A year ago, PayPal CISO Michael Barrett spelled doom for existing verification methods based on passwords and expressed hope that the then unreleased iPhone 5s would kill the password once and for all. As it turned out, Apple limited the handset's fingerprint scanner to iTunes purchases and user authentication on the Lock screen.
But with the iOS 8 SDK now official, Apple has opened up Touch ID to developers and PayPal is first out of the gate with the official confirmation that it is working on integrating Touch ID authentication into its mobile apps...
Here's another nice-to-have in iOS 8: you can finally add photos to your documents in the Notes app.
This is yet another small but very appreciated improvement in a long list of useful enhancements that haven't gotten any air time during Apple's keynote, or even deserved a mention on Apple's iOS 8 webpage for that matter.
Earlier in the day, I told you about a new Today summary and 10-day forecast in the stock iOS 8 Weather app, the ability to hide images in the Photos app and Apple's use of the power-sipping M7 chip and motion sensors for accurate indoor positioning in iOS 8...