Posts in news

Everyme Launches Web App for Group Messaging, Improves iPhone App

Released in April exclusively on the iPhone, Everyme offered a new take on private messaging with groups by combining a clean design with a featured called “Magic Stories”, which allowed the app to automatically fetch important updates from other social networks, and bring them into Everyme. From my review:

Everyme is a private “network” of people, organized in circles, connected to other services. The distinction between “communication” and “sharing” will also define Everyme as a private network, or a messaging service going forward. Unlike most messaging solutions, Everyme could improve its “magic” aggregation and cross-service data collection to simplify organization for its users; unlike most social networks, Everyme could, say, think of something like Xobni’s contact history to provide better, more informative stats about the people you care about. It is an interesting scenario, and I look forward to Everyme’s next steps; today, I don’t think Everyme can be compared to Path — as some are already doing — as the focus is clearly on group messaging, whereas Path has taken a more elegant, Facebook-like approach with its digital journal.

Today, Everyme begins its expansion onto other platforms and connected services by releasing an Android app, web access, and an improved iPhone app with support for Instagram, better communication within groups, and more. I have been able to test the new Everyme for iPhone, and while I am still looking forward to a native iPad version (most of my iMessages these days are sent from the iPad), I have enjoyed the changes brought to version 1.5.

The most visible change in Everyme 1.5 is support for photo uploads with Instagram-like filters. Similarly to how Path for iPhone lets you preview filtered photos as you take them, Everyme 1.5 puts a filter bar at the top of the screen, enabling you to see how a picture will look like with Vintage, Hipster, Pro, Adams, or Sepia effects applied. I didn’t find Everyme’s filters to be as attractive and fun to use as Instagram’s, but I do think they are better than Path’s somewhat curious choices. Photo uploads are generally faster in Everyme 1.5, and because not everyone will want to add yet another filter-based photo sharing tool to their workflows, the team added support for Instagram into the app. With an additional login option in the Settings, Everyme can now look for activity in your Instagram account, and populate your Circles with Magic Stories coming from Instagram as well.

Other minor, yet welcome improvements have found their way into Everyme 1.5. When you share links, for instance, the app now embeds summaries inline to give others an idea of what they are about to click on (Everyme features a built-in browser for webpages); users can now create and edit their own bios, and comments are displayed inline within the news feed. Comments can be deleted with a swipe, and, speaking of gestures, Everyme 1.5 also comes with pull-to-refresh to update circles and stories. Overall, Everyme 1.5 appeared to be faster than version 1.0 in my tests, and I was happy to see a new “export data” option to request an export of all your data you shared on Everyme, and get it delivered via email.

Today, Everyme is also launching a web app to communicate with your Circles. Sporting a clean design similar to the iPhone app, the web app features a sidebar on the left listing all your circles, with unobtrusive notification badges for unread stories and messages; you can manage your profile and your Circles, share stories and upload pictures from your computer, and, overall, enjoy the basic Everyme experience from any modern web browser, which should come in handy for those times when an iPhone isn’t available, or to sift through multiple conversations at once with the convenience of a larger display. I haven’t been able to test the web app on the iPad’s Mobile Safari yet, but I assume it makes for a decent temporary solution until the Everyme team comes out with a native tablet client.

Everyme 1.5 is available for free on the App Store.

Apple To Reject Mac Apps With “Hotkey Functionality” Starting June 1? [Updated]

According to TUAW, Apple will start rejecting Mac apps with “hotkey functionality” starting June 1, when the deadline for Sandboxing will become active for Mac App Store developers.

Apparently, Apple will allow hotkey apps that are already in the Mac App Store before June to offer only bug fixes. New apps and any apps that add features (i.e. non-bugfix releases) will not be allowed to support hotkeys.

TUAW has been told that Apple will be rejecting all apps with hotkey functionality starting June 1, regardless of whether the new features are hotkey related or not. Basically, if you’re developing one of those apps, an app that assumes you can still add hotkeys, don’t bother submitting it to the Mac App Store.

While TUAW doesn’t specifically mention any Mac app that would be subject to this new restriction, it is safe to assume that by “hotkey functionality” they mean desktop applications that allow users to set up keyboard shortcuts to activate other apps or system locations (such as Apptivate), or an app’s specific functionality (such as Alfred’s hotkey to show a search box, or OmniFocus’ hotkey-based Quick Entry panel).

I spoke to various developers of Mac apps with system-wide hotkey functionality, and they were unaware of the changes that Apple may begin to enforce on June 1. Currently, there is no mention of such specific change in the Mac App Store Review Guidelines (or Sandboxing FAQs), and the APIs used by the developers I contacted aren’t deprecated in the latest Mountain Lion Developer Preview, updated yesterday. Some developers told me Apple may have rejected some apps that registered hotkeys without a user’s explicit consent, but according to TUAW the issue is different, and related to the kind of control and experience that Apple wants on the Mac App Store, rather than technical limitations or APIs.

Initially pushed back from November 2011 to March 2012, and then again to June 1, 2012, Sandboxing for Mac apps has found a considerable amount of skepticism in the Apple developer community, as it would pose a threat to existing Mac apps that would have to rework their functionalities around the limitations of sandboxing.

As I wrote in February:

Sandboxing is a new technology in OS X Lion that limits the functionalities of Mac App Store applications to a list of “entitlements” that cover various areas of the operating system an app can access, such as networking, printing, or a user’s files. A sandboxed application would be unable to harm the system outside of its operational scope (managed by the entitlements), and this has caused some concerns as apps would lose access to the Mac’s entire filesystem, which is required by some functionalities of certain applications that aren’t necessary malicious or “compromised”. Similarly, inter-app communication would be a technical issue with sandboxing, as apps like TextExpander, Keyboard Maestro and CoverSutra — utilities that perform actions in the background without asking for user’s interaction in some cases (user-initiated actions can override the sandbox) — couldn’t get past the sandboxing requirement for the Mac App Store.

In the past months, a number of notable Mac developers have voiced their concerns in regards to sandboxing: Daniel Jalkut of Red Sweater Software wrote that “to increase adoption, Apple should expand the current list of entitlements until it covers every reasonable behavior that users expect from Mac apps”; following his decision to stop selling Clipstart on the Mac App Store, Riverfold’s Manton Reece noted how, rather than playing “catch-up” with Apple to work around the list of entitlements for sandboxed apps, he’d prefer to keep selling his apps on his own website – something that the upcoming Mountain Lion will keep supporting thanks to GateKeeper.

Over at TUAW, Erica Sadun says we should say goodbye to “hotkeys, macro programs, end-user customization”. While I can’t confirm the kind of apps and “hotkey functionalities” that Apple has apparently already rejected or will start rejecting in two weeks (I’ve only seen some discussions about clipboard managers and keyboard shortcuts on the Mac Dev Forums), it would surely be unfortunate to lose software like Alfred, Apptivate, or Keyboard Maestro (just to name a few) to an updated Mac App Store policy. Erica Sadun refers to these hotkey-enabled apps as ”all those great little hotkey shortcuts that used to let us bring an app to the forefront and do something”.

That sandboxing would be a technical issue for apps based on AppleScript technologies is nothing new; however, Apple also specifically asked developers to get in touch with the company if technical issues were preventing them from sandboxing an app, suggesting that the company was actively working on getting developers of existing great Mac software on board with sandboxing, without limitations. This week, the Pixelmator team updated their application with support for sandboxing; other developers of “power-user” applications like Keyboard Maestro, however, still haven’t found a proper way to work around sandboxing entitlements, going as far as writing “Keyboard Maestro requires access to other applications to perform your macros and so is not, and cannot, be sandboxed” on the app’s Mac App Store page.

According to Apple’s notice from February, developers of existing apps on the Mac App Store that are not sandboxed may still submit bug fix updates without sandboxing their apps. In theory, this should mean that apps like Alfred or Shortcuts (with hotkey functionality) or Keyboard Maestro (for general incompatibility) should stay on the Mac App Store as long as their developers don’t include new features, but only bug fixes for existing customers. But what’s going to happen when developers of hotkey-enabled apps or already-approved macro programs like KM will decide to update their apps with new features?

Just like in February, the future of sandboxing and Mac App Store apps is uncertain, but it’s looking worse if Apple really has decided to ban hotkey functionality – a common trait of keyboard-based software, such as Mac apps – from the Mac App Store. With the WWDC ‘12 scheduled to kick off 10 days after the proposed sandboxing deadline, here’s to hoping Apple will, once again, be more flexible, and offer third-party developers new ways to work around sandboxing – the Mac App Store deserves all kinds of OS X software, from simple single-purpose utilities, to more complex, power user-oriented applications.

Update: Throughout the day, several developers I spoke to confirmed my earlier reports that the APIs to implement global hotkeys and keyboard shortcuts haven’t been deprecated (not even in Mountain Lion), and aren’t going away any time soon. Two developers I spoke to, in particular, confirmed that recent updates to their Mac apps with “hotkey functionality” were approved without issues by Apple.

Furthermore, developers confirmed they couldn’t find any new mention of hotkey-related entitlements in today’s updated documentation for Gatekeeper and Sandboxing. So while more “complex” utilities like Keyboard Maestro and TextExpander may still have to find a way to work around Sandboxing, other apps that incorporate hotkey functionality – like OmniFocus, Alfred, or just about any app that offers a systemwide shortcut – should still be fine for the Mac App Store.

Lex Friedman at Macworld confirmed with his own sources that a ban for general “hotkey functionality” isn’t coming to the Mac App Store, writing that “so long as developers use Apple’s officially supported APIs to register systemwide global hotkeys, their apps will remain eligible for inclusion in the Mac App Store”.

Sparrow 1.6 for Mac Now Available, Adds POP Support, “True Unified Inbox”

The Sparrow team has been busy rolling out updates for its iPhone app, but a new version of their popular Mac email client is available today on the Mac App Store, and it adds a series of long-requested features and fixes. If you’re still running a POP account, for instance, Sparrow 1.6 will finally let you configure it – this is a functionality “Sparrow switchers” have been asking since day one, but it took the team a while to properly implement it alongside support for Gmail and regular IMAP. If you’re still rocking a Hotmail account via POP and have been looking for ways to get those emails into Sparrow, now’s the time to update.

Version 1.6, however, comes with other improvements and fixes to enhance the performances and overall stability of the app, as well as usability in some areas. A minor yet welcome change in my Sparrow workflow, for instance, is the new “Empty Spam” button that allows me to flush undesired messages with a single click.

Another small change, but a new “Inbox Zero” message now greets you when nothing else is awaiting reply in your inbox. It’s the little things.

Also in Sparrow 1.6, there is a “true unified inbox” that lets you navigate all your drafts, starred messages, and sent emails directly from your unified account. Among the other changes, the tab key in the composer view now lets you toggle down from ‘To’, ‘Subject’ to ‘From’; hitting Esc on Quick Reply will save a draft; and a new Shift-cmd-option-M shortcut toggles the Extended Sidebar (so you can easily switch to a Twitter-like layout with profile pictures and icons instead of labels).

Make sure to check out the Sparrow blog for a full list of fixes and improvements in 1.6. Sparrow for Mac continues to be a staff favorite here at MacStories for its clever combination of social features, intuitive gestures, and customization options, and for this update, the Sparrow team kindly donated 20 promo codes to MacStories readers. You can get Sparrow for Mac at $9.99 on the Mac App Store, or you can enter our giveaway and try to win one of the 20 copies up for grabs. Details below.

Sparrow for Mac Giveaway

To enter the giveaway, tweet the following message before 11.59 AM PDT (May  18th, tomorrow):

Win a copy of Sparrow for Mac on MacStories: http://mcstr.net/Jktamq

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 (May 19th). Good luck!

Simple: Online And Mobile Banking With Style

New services providing financial management usually evoke doubtful feelings within us, as we tend to rely on big, long-time running companies with a good reputation rather than small competitors new to the game. More or less exactly two years ago, in May 2010, Alex Payne joined and co-founded a company called BankSimple with the imagination of a bank without fees, caring for support and responsible money treatment — plus a love for good design and usability concerning its user-end products. It already sounded like an ambitious goal the day he published his announcement post.

Two years later, his company, Simple, has grown into a still small, innovative and transparent financial service for US-residents who own a social security number, a computer, and an iPhone. It’s a combination of “classic” credit card payment and modern online banking. Read more

Sparrow 1.2 for iPhone Brings Landscape Support, Labels Management

Sparrow 1.1 brought minor enhancements to the best alternative email client for iPhone, including a built-in browser and a Send & Archive option. Sparrow 1.2, released today, adds much-requested support for landscape mode to an email app that, in this new version, also lets you manage email labels and folders.

I have been testing Sparrow 1.2, and while I am no fan of landscape mode on iOS (I never use such functionality on the iPhone), I recognize how some users are going to perform some serious typing for their email replies thanks to Sparrow 1.2. The whole compose interface has been updated to take advantage of the different orientation.

Two features that I have been enjoying in Sparrow 1.2 are proper label/folder management, and improved navigation between messages. The latter brings a nicer, cleaner design to the message “preview” you get when pulling a message up to reveal the next one. Folder/label management, on the other hand, now lets Sparrow directly create, edit, and delete labels or folders without leaving the app to use a web interface or desktop client.

I have tested the feature with Gmail (both regular and Google Apps accounts) and iCloud, and I was pleased to see Sparrow differentiated visually between labels (for Gmail) and folders (for iCloud mail). Because label management has been implemented in the mid panel – the one Sparrow uses to list an account’s mailboxes – you won’t be able to swipe-to-delete; instead, management has been assigned to a new “Edit” button that shows up in the Folders or Labels sections of a single account.

Meanwhile, the Sparrow team has also confirmed that Apple won’t allow them to implement push notifications through the VoIP framework, as they did in early betas of the app. Sparrow will have to build notification support on the server’s side, and the developers confirm this will require a yearly subscription for Sparrow users willing to use push notifications. Previously, the Sparrow developers said push support would be coming “with or without Apple”.

With proper label management, landscape mode, localization in 9 additional languages, and bug fixes, Sparrow for iPhone continues its march towards becoming the best email client for iPhone. You can find Sparrow 1.2 on the App Store today.

Apple Starts Changing “iPad WiFi + 4G” Name To “WiFi + Cellular”

As noted by 9to5mac, Apple has started changing the “iPad WiFi + 4G” name to “iPad WiFi + Cellular” in some countries. Currently, the change is live on several international versions of Apple.com, including the US, UK, Australia, Canada, and Hong Kong. Other countries, such as Italy or France, still report the new iPad as “iPad WiFi + 4G” in the Tech Specs page of the product in what appears to be a gradual update of the device’s name. On the websites where the change has already taken effect, a version cached by Google shows the old “WiFi + 4G” product name.

The new iPad, available in almost 90 countries, comes with “4G” networking capabilities, albeit only in some countries, and on selected carriers with support for LTE. Because of Apple’s initial marketing of the device as “4G” regardless of country availability, the company came under scrutiny from Australian and UK regulators, who claimed Apple was falsely advertising the iPad as “4G” and misleading customers without properly specifying such feature was dependent on carrier support.

In Australia, Apple was forced to change its marketing for the new iPad by stating on its website the device wasn’t compatible with Australian 4G networks. In spite of the iPad still working with 3G networks, however, Apple decided to keep the “WiFi + 4G” name even after the initial clarification. This appears to be changing now as the company rolls out an updated product name across all its international websites.

Apple’s iPad Tech Specs page carrying the new name is available here.

iCloud “Beta” Website Briefly Shows Reminders, Notes Web Apps

A few minutes ago, developer Steve Troughton-Smith tweeted a photo showing a “beta” login page for iCloud.com, Apple’s suite of web applications to access iCloud services like Mail and Calendar. The photo showed Apple’s icon-based navigation for iCloud.com, with the addition of Reminders and Notes icons in what appears to be an internal version of iCloud.com carrying future features. The login page clearly states the beta version of iCloud.com is available to developers running the latest versions of OS X and iOS.

Available at beta.icloud.com, I managed to grab a screenshot before Apple quickly pulled the website and started redirecting it to iCloud’s public website. The beta page showed a testing environment, and I was able to see the Notes icon in the background, as tweeted by Troughton-Smith.

The accidental availability of iCloud’s beta webpage seems to suggest Apple will announce more web-based functionality for the service at its upcoming WWDC event in June. Just last week, a series of web notifications were briefly showed on iCloud.com.

Update: Courtesy of reader Benjamin Crozat, here’s a larger screenshot showing the just-pulled iCloud.com website. It appears Apple also had a testing website available at developer.icloud.com, which has started redirecting to the company’s public iCloud product website as well.

Update #2: As noted by Tom Klaver, strings in website’s code suggest a beta of iOS 6 will be necessary to use the new web apps. The icon Apple was using for Reminders is also available on Apple’s servers here.

Update #3: Interestingly enough, other code strings from developer.icloud.com point to a new developer icon on Apple’s servers. Currently, Apple offers a developer portal for iCloud at developer.apple.com/icloud with links to downloads and documentation. As several developers have wished for Apple to provide more debugging tools for iCloud-enabled apps, however, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see new web-based tools for iCloud being unveiled at WWDC.

Image via SlideToLock:

Adobe Launches Creative Cloud, Proto, Collage for iPad, Updates Touch Apps

This morning, Adobe officially launched Creative Cloud, the company’s new subscription-based service that gives users access to CS6 applications, Touch apps, and other tools for a monthly fee. Described as a “digital hub” to download apps, access online services, and share files, Creative Cloud comes with various online storage options to store files directly on Adobe’s servers and access them at any time from connected apps, such as the Touch ones released or updated today.

Creative Cloud starts at $29.99 per month with a one year contract for qualified customers (all registered users with CS3 or later); standard pricing, as detailed in the image below, starts at $49.99 per month with a one year contract, or $74.99 per month with no contract required. Unsurprisingly, Adobe maintained the same pricing scheme for European customers, with subscriptions starting at €29.99, €49.99 and €74.99. The Adobe Touch Apps, available on the App Store, will give users with an Adobe ID one free month of Creative Cloud with “2GB of cloud storage plus the ability to sync between tablet and desktop, access files from the web, and easily share with others.”

Read more

Say Hello To Amazing Alex, The Next Game From The Makers Of Angry Birds

Rovio’s CEO today revealed on Finnish TV that the next Rovio game will be called Amazing Alex and will launch within two months. Rovio will be reworking the game a little and it will center around Alex (the main character) who is a “curious young boy who loves to build things”.

“The quality pressure is high. We want to maintain the high standard Angry Birds fans have come to enjoy,” Hed said.

It’ll be based off of Casey’s Contraptions (see above image) which Rovio yesterday acquired to, from developers Snappy Touch and Mystery Coconut. On that acquisition, Rovio’s VP of franchise development, Ville Heijari, said yesterday that “The gameplay is a perfect fit in our arsenal with its approachable, fun and highly addictive take on the physics puzzler genre”. He also noted that Rovio was “reworking the title to enhance it”, so that it was in the Rovio style of “expect the unexpected”.

The Next Web points out that Rovio already owns the domain amazingalex.com as WHOIS records show. Today’s news comes after a stunning week for Rovio, hitting 1 billion Angry Birds downloads and revealing first-quarter revenues of 75.4 million euros (roughly US$106.3 M).

[yle, via The Next Web]