Apps

‘Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft’ for iPad launches in select countries

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 16, 2018

Back in March, Blizzard launched its digital card trading game 'Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft' on the Mac, and as promised, it has brought the game to iOS. The title soft-launched for iPad last night, and is now available in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand App Stores.

Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, for those unfamiliar with it, is a strategy card game set in the 'Warcraft' universe. Players compete in 1-on-1 battles—either against the computer or other users via Battle.net—in an effort to grow the size and power of their card collections...

TextExpander updated for iOS 7, adds a bunch of snippet management features

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2018

If you're going to do serious typing on your iPhone and iPad, why not save yourself precious time by having short abbreviations automatically expanded into long snippets (i.e. have 'idb' auto-expand to 'iDownloadBlog')?

Although iOS 7 lets you create shortcuts in Settings > General > Keyboard that'll automatically expand into words and phrases as you type, the basic implementation of the feature leaves a lot to be desired.

Enter Smile Software's TextExpander, a tool that gets this job done better than any other software. Available for iOS since last summer, the app contains advanced features like clipboard integration, macros and fill-in snippets. And thanks to the official SDK, third-party apps can implement TextExpander functionality to use your commonly-used strings of text.

On Wednesday, Smile updated the iOS snippet expansion utility with iOS 7-friendly design and a host of group and snippet management improvements. The app is now available in the App Store free of charge for existing customers and I've included additional tidbits right after the break...

ProCamera 7 gains TIFF and high-res Instagram support, printing, Vimeo sharing and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 2, 2014

ProCamera by German developer Cocologics GmbH has been featured on our 10 Best Photography Apps of 2013 list, you rated it one of the Best Apps of 2013 and it's been consistently featured throughout our ongoing iPhone photography series.

Small wonder, given ProCamera combines photo and video recording, advanced editing and sharing into a single app laden with rich controls, more than 76 pro-grade filters and effects, a dedicated Lightbox (like in Camera+), full-res photo preview and lots more.

Cocologics has pushed a major new ProCamera 7 update this morning, adding numerous nice-to-haves while implementing some nice new features like high-resolution Instagram uploads, support for the lossless TIFF file format, in-app printing, an improved Lightbox and Night mode, Vimeo sharing, Open-in functionality and lots more.

The new ProCamera 7 version 5.3 is now live in the App Store and available free to existing users. We have a few promo codes to spare so read on for the full reveal...

Fantastical 2 for iPad: the best calendar app is now available on iPad

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated March 16, 2018

I'd probably be wasting my time if I spent more than a few words introducing Fantastical, an app that most of us here at iDB use on a daily basis, and which we recently ranked as one of the best calendar apps for iPhone. And it's not just us!

Up until today, you could only use Fantastical on your Mac or your iPhone, but things are changing as Flexibits just released Fantastical 2 for iPad, now available in the App Store...

Day One update brings new publishing feature to iPad

Cody Lee ∙ Updated February 18, 2018

Great news for all of you Day One users out there. The popular journaling app has updated its iOS client to version 1.14 this morning with iPad publishing, new photo features, and a slew of bug fixes and other improvements.

As you may recall, last month developers Bloom Built added the ability to publish journal entries to the web on the iPhone, essentially turning the app into a personal blogging platform. And now it's available on the iPad as well...

New Comedy Central app puts all shows in one place

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2018

Comedy Central has several free apps in the App Store, each dedicated to its own show, like The Daily Show Headlines, The Colbert Report and Tosh 2.0, to name a few.

In the commendable effort to reduce user confusion and increase engagement, the comedy channel owned by MTV Networks Entertainment Group has released a new iOS app simply named Comedy Central that consolidates all their shows into one place.

The dedicated streaming app is now available to download free of charge in the App Store. Wait, you haven't heard the coolest thing: you can stream episodes of select shows free of charge, no cable subscription required whatsoever, with some caveats...

BBM updated with stickers, large file transfers and image sharing in multi-person chats

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 1, 2014

The Canadian smartphone maker BlackBerry is launching a new version of its BBM instant messaging software for iOS, Android and BlackBerry.

As previously reported, this BBM edition enables popular stickers and includes a couple feature additions, such as the ability to share images with multiple parties in multi-person chats and send larger files to others.

Various sticker packs can be purchased from the new BBM Shop, with some stickers like the legacy BBM emoticons offered free of charge. It's interesting that BlackBerry partnered with brands on themed sticker packs like CosCat, Gilbert’s Tales, Bubble Bot and many more.

The new BBM 2.1 will be launching in the App Store later today...

Stitcher Radio for Podcasts 6 is out with complete redesign

Cody Lee ∙ Updated July 1, 2014

For folks who like to listen to podcasts on the go, there are a number of app choices out there. We've covered several of them over the years, including Apple's native Podcast app, Instacast and Castro, and today we're adding another one to the list: Stitcher Radio for Podcasts.

Now, the Stitcher Radio app obviously isn't new, but it might as well be after this weekend's 6.0 update. The client has been virtually rebuilt from the ground up with a new front page, simplified navigation and redesigned player controls. Keep reading for the full change log...

Shazam revamps content pages, introduces scrollable lyrics, enhanced Rdio support and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 28, 2014

Friday, music discovery engine Shazam has refreshed its iOS apps with some fine new features, starting with a brand new track page design and a new look and feel for video, album, track reviews, artist bios and other pages.

"Many" (but not all) song lyrics will now scroll in time with the music, a handy feature if you're singing along a song trying to remember the lyrics.

Shazam last December added the ability to listen for songs and television shows in the background, tagging them automatically.

Background listening can negatively impact your battery so you'll be delighted to learn that the new Shazam 7.5 apps are more power friendly "so you don’t need to worry about your battery life while it’s running."

Both the free, ad-supported Shazam and the paid Shazam Encore have been updated with these changes...

iCab Mobile 8.0: rewritten for iOS 7, QR codes, multi-user support and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ March 28, 2014

Remember iCab Mobile, an excellent browser by German developer Alexander Clauss? It was one of the first third-party web browsers to grace the App Store back in 2010 and continues to be packed with advanced features you won't find in other iPhone browsers.

I'm talking about stuff like Dropbox integration, the ability to upload and download files, sync settings via iCloud, great implementation of tabbed browsing, full screen mode and configurable multi-touch gestures, to name a few.

Alexander has just announced eighth major iteration of iCab Mobile, now available for $1.99 in the App Store for the iPhone and iPad. Here's what's new and why you should care...

Yahoo News Digest gains background downloads, improved notifications and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2018

Yahoo is celebrating the 25th anniversary of the web this week and it's been marking the occasion by refreshing its key products. Yesterday, the company pushed a new version of the Weather iOS app with new animations, pull-to-refresh for cover images and more.

Today, Yahoo's news-reading product with summarization technology got refreshed, too. News Digest version 1.1.1 is now available in the App Store, bringing with it background downloads of new content, new notification messages and more...

‘Threes’ developers publish gigantic work log in response to clones

Cody Lee ∙ March 28, 2014

Clones of popular games are a common sight in the App Store. They're a way for not-so-creative developers to make a quick buck by riding the coattails of hit titles and trends—the recent flurry of Flappy Bird copycats is a great example of this phenomenon.

But while we had a good laugh at some of the ridiculous FB clones, like 'Flappy Beard Hipster Quest,' it's not so funny for developers. In fact, the creators of the hit game 'Threes' recently took to their blog to vent their frustration with the growing list of ripoffs...