Today Spark launched a new Delegation feature for teams, which is available on both the Mac and iOS. Delegation enables team members to assign emails to one another, with optional due dates attached, and follow the progress of those emails over time. It’s a feature that addresses well the workflows a manager or executive may have with their assistant or other team members.
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Spark Launches Email Delegation Feature for Teams
A Remastered Version of Rolando Is Returning to the App Store April 4th as Rolando: Royal Edition
Rolando was one of the earliest break-out games on the App Store when it debuted in 2008. Millions of fans downloaded the game, which featured colorful round characters that you maneuvered through four worlds with the help of the iPhone’s accelerometer. However, as Federico highlighted in his story on app preservation last summer, the ngmoco-published title disappeared in 2017 when it wasn’t updated to support Apple’s 64-bit architecture.
Today though, Rolando’s developer, HandCircus, announced that Rolando is coming back on April 4th as Rolando: Royal Edition. According to a report by TouchArcade, the game is a remaster of the original title:
…beyond a beautiful overhaul with the brilliant 2.5D aesthetic of the game’s sequel, as well as the expected graphical polish to seamlessly fit into the 2019 App Store, HandCircus have actually overhauled a lot of the levels, interactions and mechanics across the game.
Today’s news comes close on the heels of the launch of GameClub, a startup that plans to bring unavailable classic iOS games back to the platform starting with Hook Champ. TouchArcade’s former Editor-In-Chief Eli Hodapp is GameClub’s VP of Business Development.
Federico’s closing commentary from last summer’s story sums up the state of game and app preservation and his hopes for the future well:
It doesn’t have to be this way. I want to believe that, over the next decade, Apple and third-party developers will learn to appreciate the history of the App Store. And that they will treat its back catalogue as something more than a nuisance with an expiration date. Because sometimes it can be useful, and perhaps even fun, to marvel at how far we’ve come by looking back at how it all began.
I couldn’t agree more. So many classic iOS games have fallen by the wayside and are now unplayable that it was heartening to see that HandCircus is bringing back Rolando and learn more about GameClub’s efforts. Two announcements isn’t a trend, but I hope it’s a sign that momentum is building behind preservation in the iOS game and the broader app industry. The time feels right to revisit these classics.
Rolando: Royal Edition is available to pre-order on the App Store for $1.99 and comes with iMessage stickers that are available today.
Apple Announces March 25th Event at the Steve Jobs Theater
Today Apple announced a special event at the Steve Jobs Theater for March 25, 2019, at 10:00 am Pacific time. Matthew Panzarino of TechCrunch posted an image of the press invitation to Twitter:
https://twitter.com/panzer/status/1105186663158800384
According to Panzarino’s tweet, the email invitation, which says simply ‘It’s show time,’ played a short film reel countdown animation, which suggests the event will be used to announce Apple’s much-anticipated video streaming service. In addition to a video service, there have been rumors that the company will use the event to announce a magazine service that will expand on its existing Apple News product.
Castro Launches Curated Podcast Collections and Instant Search to Improve Discovery
One of our favorite third-party podcast clients, Castro, was updated today with improvements aimed at offering a better discovery experience. Through curated podcast collections, new buttons to add podcasts to your library, and instant search, Castro’s development team has brought positive change in several connected areas.
Hands On with Sony’s PS4 Remote Play App for iOS
In a bit of unexpected gaming news, Sony has released PS4 Remote Play, an iOS app that allows PS4 owners to play the console’s games on an iPhone or iPad over WiFi. Although it’s a surprising development this late in the lifecycle of the PS4, it’s great to see Sony continuing to expand the ways its customers can enjoy the console.
Introducing the MacStories Shortcuts Archive, a Collection of 150 Custom Shortcuts for Apple’s Shortcuts App
After several months of work, I’m pleased to announce the MacStories Shortcuts Archive – the official repository for shortcuts I’ve created over the years (including when they used to be called “workflows”) and which have been updated, tested for the Shortcuts app, and collected in a single place.
You can find the archive at macstories.net/shortcuts. In this first version, the archive contains 150 shortcuts, but more will be posted over time. Each shortcut was created and tested by me and the MacStories team; all of them have been categorized, updated for the Shortcuts app, and marked up with inline comments to explain what they do.
Even better, they’re all free to download and you can modify them to suit your needs.
Spark Adds Rich Text Formatting for Email: Lists, Text Colors, and Highlighting
Today in an update to its iOS and Mac apps, the email client Spark has introduced new rich text formatting options to enable greater flexibility in styling your messages.
Spark already included the expected bold, italics, and underline options, and its macOS version previously allowed creating bulleted or numbered lists, but those list options have now come to iOS as well. Additionally, both Mac and iOS users can now change the color of text in their emails, as well as add highlighting to text.
Rich text support is a particularly important feature for an email app, so I’m glad to see it come to Spark. While I likely won’t start sending messages with different colored fonts, it’s nice having the variety of options Spark provides here. Lists in particular were something I’ve missed having in the past, and I like the idea of employing highlights to call out anything of special importance in an email. I’ve historically used bold for that purpose, but highlighting definitely does an even better job of standing out.
Spark’s latest update is available now as a free download for iOS, and the Mac update is coming soon.
Apple’s Month-Long Celebration of International Women’s Day
A week from tomorrow is International Women’s Day. To mark the day, Apple has announced a series of events throughout the month of March.
In the US, Apple is partnering with Girls Can Code to bring programming to more girls and young women. The program includes Swift training for club leaders and will use the company’s Everyone Can Code Curriculum to make the programming language available nationwide to 90,000 girls. Apple’s Lisa Jackson:
“Women have earned the opportunity to have our ideas shape the future,” said Lisa Jackson, Apple’s vice president of Environment, Policy and Social Initiatives. “We’re excited to support Girls Who Code as they empower girls to be the developers and tech innovators of tomorrow.”
In addition, Apple retail stores in Singapore, Kyoto, Hong Kong, London, Milan, Paris, Dubai, San Francisco, Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles will host a special ‘Made by Women’ series featuring artists, scientists, entrepreneurs, musicians, developers, photographers, and others.
On the App Store, Apple will run special features all month long. Every March App of the Day will feature apps by women, and on Fridays the App Store will go behind the scenes with stories of the women behind apps and efforts being made to bring women into the tech industry. On March 8th, there will also be a special collection of games featuring Captain Marvel that coincides with the release of the film.
Apple Music will include special editorial and playlist content featuring women and Beats 1 will have a 24-hour takeover highlighting the work of women musicians. Apple’s movie, TV, books, and podcast storefronts will include content made by and featuring women too. Finally, on March 8th, Apple Watch users who complete a 1.6 kilometer walk, run, or wheelchair workout will receive a special Activity award and stickers for Messages.
Apple Answers Two-Factor Authentication Questions Raised by Developers
A week ago, Apple sent an email to developers announcing that it would require two-factor authentication for all developer accounts beginning February 27, 2019. The message linked to an Apple two-factor authentication support page that applies to all Apple IDs. The trouble was, the support page didn’t answer many of the developer-specific questions that were immediately raised.
The concern I’ve heard voiced most often by developers is whether someone who uses one Apple ID to log into their developer account would be able to do so using an Apple device that is logged in using a different Apple ID. Today, Apple published a new support page answering this and many other questions. Specifically with respect to the two-Apple ID scenario, Apple’s FAQ-style support page says:
Will I need a trusted device dedicated to my Apple Developer account if I enable two-factor authentication?
No. You’ll need to use a trusted device to enable two-factor authentication for the first time. However, you can use the same trusted device for multiple Apple IDs that are enabled for two-factor authentication. Additionally, if you do not have access to your trusted device, you can get your verification code via SMS or phone call. When possible, you should use a trusted device to increase security and streamline the process.
The document covers many other situations as well including:
- How to check if you have two-factor authentication enabled
- Configuring an iOS device or Mac to accept authentication codes for multiple Apple IDs
- Enabling multiple trusted phone numbers that can receive authentication codes
The support page concludes with a link to a contact form for Apple’s developer team to raise any other circumstances that prevent a developer from enabling two-factor authentication.
Although it would have been better if this level of detail was published when Apple’s initial email went out to developers last week, the company has clearly heard the concerns raised by the developer community and has put together a thorough explanation that should address most situations. By answering the most common questions, Apple Developer Relations will hopefully be freed up to deal with any outlier issues that aren’t addressed in its support documentation.