Robocat, a Danish software studio co-founded by Michael Flarup and Willi Wu, has been building unique digital products out of Copenhagen for the last 3 years. They’ve created several weather-related apps like Outside, Ultraviolet, Thermo and Haze, which was featured by Apple as Editor’s Choice a few weeks ago.

Today, Robocat launched a Kickstarter project based on weather — but this time as hardware, not software. It’s called Thermodo. Thermodo is a tiny electrical thermometer that lets you measure the temperature in the exact location where you are by using a piece of hardware that connects to the headphone jack on your mobile device. It’s for iPhone, iPad, Android & more. They’re looking to get $35,000 in 33 days to pay for the further development of Thermodo.

Thermodo consists of a passive temperature sensor built into a standard 4 pole audio jack enclosed by a sturdy housing. This allows your mobile device to read Thermodo’s temperature straight from the audio input. Thermodo sends an audio signal through the temperature sensor. This sensor will then attenuate the signal amplitude depending on the actual temperature. This attenuation can now be detected on the microphone input and through software we calculate the corresponding temperature. Easy peasy! We call this the Thermodo Principle™. Simply plug Thermodo into your device and start the companion app or any other Thermodo enabled apps of your choice. The temperature reading takes place instantly. Thermodo is powered by your device. No external power is required, it can even run in the background while you do important stuff.

You can measure the temperature indoors as well as outdoors. Track the temperature and see how it rises after you turned on the radiator or check how the temperature drops during a summer night. No network connection required. Thermodo comes with a neat little keyring so you’ll always have it with you.

Video and more after the break. (more…)

Passbook is one of the newest features of iOS: it’s brand new to iOS 6, and while many apps have yet to support it, there are a few that are working now. I have decided to take one of these apps for a spin to show you how Passbook really works.

The official Target app was updated yesterday to support Passbook, as announced by the company in a press release.

Now, many people know about Passbook, but when they first open it, the app simply redirects to a section on the App Store (when it’s working) without actually explaining how to fill this new digital wallet. Target has chosen to allow customers who receive Target Mobile Coupons to easily send, store, and access coupons in Passbook. (more…)

Apple hasn’t forgotten about the iPod or iTunes, announcing Wednesday a new iPod touch and a new iPod nano.

After the iPhone’s introduction, Tim Cook brought on Eddy Cue to talk about iTunes, introducing it as the #1 music store in the world, with over 200 million customers using iTunes, worldwide availability in 63 countries, and over 26 million songs available. “Two thirds of our downloads come from iOS,” Cue said on stage, while showing off brand new iTunes and App Store designs on the iPad, then on the iPhone 5. Launching September 19th, the visual refresh brings better performance when browsing through the store, and also includes the ability to preview music browsing and share store links with friends.

Apple also showcased an updated iTunes application for OS X, which features a new edge-to-edge design that looks similar to the iPad’s refreshed music app as of iOS 5. Album art flows across the display — clicking on an album expands album info as opening a folders does on iOS. iTunes also brings popovers that present a drop down of upcoming songs, and improved search results as you filter through music in your library. Cue also showed off a brand new mini-player design, which unlike previous designs, shows album artwork and gives the option to manage playlists and see upcoming songs as well.

More and updates past the break!

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Rumors of a 7″ iPad have been rampant for months, but this week they’ve really picked up steam as stories at the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg have all but confirmed it. But despite everyone calling it “the iPad Mini”, I remain unconvinced. A 7″ iPad has never made sense to me for one reason and one reason alone: interface. (more…)

Yesterday we posted a review of Everyme, a new social app that aims at allowing users to communicate with friends and family through Circles. Everyme wants to help people keep in touch with friends, co-workers, family members, or high-school friends they actually care about. The developers want its users to be able to easily share with a private group of people, without all of the manual effort it takes in the way that Google+ does it. They are leveraging data from Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and the address book.

Everyme wants to give one lucky MacStories reader a way to keep in touch with their Circles. To enter, simply follow the rules below and if you haven’t downloaded Everyme yet, give it a whirl after reading our review. Check out the giveaway rules below.

Giveaway

Thanks to Everyme, we’re able to give away to one lucky MacStories reader a shiny new black 8GB iPod touch. Contestants must be a US citizen (we’re not shipping outside the US).

To enter the giveaway, tweet the following message before 11.59 AM PDT (April  13th):

Win an iPod touch on MacStories: http://mcstr.net/HxJ3WP

We will search Twitter.com for tweets and retweets and randomly pick up the winners.

Make sure to follow @macstoriesnet on Twitter so we can get in touch with you once the giveaway is over. If you want to increase your odds of winning, you can also leave a comment to this post.

Winners will be announced on Saturday (April 14th).

UPDATE! The winner of a black 8GB iPod touch is Emily Caffrey. Congrats!

Square-Enix has released one of its most popular titles for iPhone today – Chrono Trigger. The heavily popular classic 16-bit jRPG from the Super Nintendo days adds the Dimensional Vortex and Lost Sanctum areas from the Nintendo DS remake for its iPhone release.

So how popular is Square-Enix’s Chrono Trigger? Well, IGN named it the #2 SNES game of all time, behind A Link to the Past. The iPhone port features touch-controlled menus, eight language options and “optimized” graphics for the iPhone. (more…)

Long story short: An Apple employee at the Apple Store in Palo Alto, California, spills the beans on how they track customers in their stores. Employees armed with iPod touches get notified when customers enter the stores with their location-aware iPhones (for services like in-store pickup or an appointment), or when customers request help using in-store iPads. All the employee has to do is select a customer in a queue, get their position on an in-store map, and voilà! An an employee walks up to the customer and assists them.

While new Apple Store customers may be dazed by the busy store’s atmosphere and integration with technology, experienced shoppers can take advantage of a unique shopping experience tailored for the customer.

We’re basically seeing the map-side of Apple’s in-store toys like Concierge, Scout, iQueue, etc. This isn’t new technology, but as geeks it’s nice to get behind the scenes sometimes.

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With the white iPod touch announced, it’s about time Apple time showed off their shiny new “phone without the phone”, giving the likes of Game Center, FaceTime, and iMessage well deserved close-ups in a brand new shell. Picture perfect in every frame, the new white iPod touch will be a hot gift for anyone who wants to stay connected with their friends with free iMessaging or take advantage of all the great apps that iOS has to offer. Thin and lightweight with a respectable video camera for quick home movies, I certainly miss its portability and thinness now that I have an iPhone. Share the fun this holiday season with an iPod touch, too-tight jeans, and a catchy tune that’ll have you dancing and bobbing in your office chair. Apple’s latest commercial can enjoyed on YouTube, or past the break!

[via Macgasm]

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