Posts in news

TestFlight Goes Live For Everyone - Distribute & Receive Beta Apps Effortlessly

TestFlight has been in lockdown mode for a while, and I’ve had plenty of opportunities to put the service through its paces before they opened their doors to everybody this evening. I’ll just say that TestFlight is incredibly convenient for installing beta applications on the fly - there’s nothing more annoying than unzipping iPad or iPhone files, dragging them to iTunes, syncing, and it doing all over again when updates are distributed. TestFlight simply has you log into their site via your iPad or iPhone, tap a button, and you can browse through the beta apps developers have subscribed you to for immediate downloads. It’s so much easier for developers to submit one beta to TestFlight than to package their app and distribute it to dozens of emails, and it’s much easier on the tester to be updated and install updates. It’s completely Apple worthy, and if you’re a developer we encourage you to sign up for the service so you can focus on creating content instead of worrying about beta distribution.

TechCrunch notes that the service is free to developers, while a paid Enterprise version is in the works that will allow for licensed versions of apps to be passed through the airwaves (presumably for corporate/in-house application use).

[via TestFlight, TechCrunch]

Verizon Launches First Official iPhone Commercial

It begins. Verizon has just launched its first official commercial for the iPhone 4, the very same iPhone that’s been in the Apple rumors for years. In case you missed it, it’s real and  it’s coming on February 10. The commercial is a little too dramatic, maybe, but I guess it’s also appropriate: Apple will sell millions of these things this year.

“To our millions of customers, who never stopped believing this day would come…”

February 10. Verizon iPhone. Video below. [Youtube via Engadget] Read more

Apple Seeds Mac OS X 10.6.7 To Developers

Looks like 10.6.6 wasn’t the last version of Snow Leopard, after all. Earlier today Apple seeded a new version of OS X to developers, 10.6.7. Build number is 10J842. From the release notes, the focus areas are:

  • AirPort
  • Bonjour
  • SMB
  • Graphics Drivers

Mac OS X 10.6.6 was released two weeks ago with support for the Mac App Store. No word yet whether or not support for AirPrint through shared printers will find its way back into this new version of OS X once it’s released.

Skyfire Makes Another Million With iPad App

Remember Skyfire? The alternative browser for the iPhone that comes with a lot of extra functionalities, including the possibility to play Flash videos through remote proxy servers that transcode Flash content to iOS-optimized video. The iPhone app was insanely successful as it managed to pull in a million dollars in just three days in the App Store. The app has also been sitting on top of the iPhone charts for weeks now.

In case you didn’t notice, right ahead of Christmas the Skyfire team released an iPad version of the app, priced at $4.99. It was good timing and a clever move as the App Store was about to shut down for developers and apps that climbed the charts in those days gained thousands of downloads. Skyfire for iPad is no exception: three weeks into the App Store, another $1 million in the developers’ hands – although 30% will go to Apple. That’s around $700,000 in revenue so far, as MobileCrunch reports.

Skyfire for iPad is available here. It’s a cool browser, but I’m still not sure what’s the real need of Flash compatibility for videos on iOS devices. Apparently though, people bought it. And that should be enough for the developers. Read more

Apple Employees Average $46k a Year

The New Yorker’ John Cassidy looked over the balance sheets of Apple and Goldman Sachs to decide which company offers the best return on its capital. Cassidy used the latest earnings reports from the two American companies, then calculated that the two had similar profit margins but very different economic returns. Each company’s return on assets was examined, determining that Apple is twenty times more profitable than Goldman Sachs.

Apple is more profitable for a few a few reasons - it makes highly desirable products that people spend their hard-earned money on. There’s always a huge demand all Apple products so they can decide their margins (usually high ones) which are well over the cost of manufacturing; thus giving them a nice profit on every iDevice or Mac sold. Read more

New Apple Patents: Multitouch Display On Mouse, Heart Monitor for Music

A new day, new Apple patents surface on the Internet. Unlike most days when we get to know the latest inventions the teams at Cupertino have been awarded, today’s design embodiments and ideas are fairly interesting and not so much projected in the future like a touch-based iMac could be. As reported by Patently Apple, a new patent shows two new possible touch input systems that might soon replace our usual mice and physical keyboards.

The patent applications reveal a mouse equipped with a multitouch display capable of visualizing information and virtual keys such as a numeric pad on the device’s surface. The mouse would still come with standard features like soft left / right buttons, but in the middle there would be place for a display carrying an additional interface for users. Read more

Apple Sues Nokia Again In The U.K.

Back in September of last year, Apple sued Nokia in the U.K. over 9 patent infringements for technologies developed by engineers in Cupertino. The Finnish company had already sued Apple in the U.S., U.K., Germany and the Netherlands over 37 patent infringements claiming that Apple “owed it royalties for using Nokia technology that allows such basic mobile tasks as sending email or downloading applications”.

Bloomberg is reporting that Apple has fired back in High Court in London challenging one of the seven patents filed by Nokia in its lawsuit against Apple in Germany. The patent covers scrolling on touch-enabled devices:

Apple Inc., maker of the iPad tablet and iPhone, sued Nokia Oyj in the U.K. over claims that one of the Finnish company’s European patents for scrolling technology on touch-screen handsets is invalid.

“Nokia is confident that all of the 37 patents it has asserted against Apple” are valid, Durrant said in the e-mail. “We are examining the filing and will take whatever actions are needed to protect our rights.

The lawsuit is another piece in the complicated puzzle of patent infringement claims that are going around between Apple, HTC, Motorola and Nokia, among others. Perhaps this can help.

iPad 2 Event on February 9?

In case you didn’t know, Apple’s icons are full of secrets. From the Maps icon to the Mail one, they come with references to internal Cupertino jokes the average consumer may or may not understand by looking at a simple graphic file. But sometimes, the reference is obvious.

Take the alleged “iPad 2 Springboard” preview image found in the iOS 4.3 beta: it shows the Camera, FaceTime and Photo Booth icons, but it also comes with an updated calendar icon. Which, unlike the calendar icon used in promo material for the iPad 1, doesn’t have a 27. But why does the calendar app on the original iPad have a 27 on it? Because the device was announced on January 27th, 2010. See the reference?

On this new preview image, the number is 9. The updated icon may or may not suggest that the iPad 2 will be announced on, say, February 9? That’s a Wednesday, and it would be two months before the rumored April 9 release date. This would give Apple a 60-day timeframe to announce the device and get developers ready with their apps.

If Apple doesn’t change the icon again in the next weeks, there’s a good chance we’ll have an iPad 2 announcement on February 9. At least, we hope so. What do you think? [via Shimanke]

Update: Too bad the same “Calendar 9” icon can be found in the current iPad under Settings, Brightness & Wallpaper. We wanted to believe.

Leaked Screenshot of Internal iPhone with Gestures?

Well after the 4.3 Beta that previewed multitasking gestures on the iPad, there is now some supposed evidence that suggests that the iPhone is also being considered by Apple to have gestures thanks to an internal build that BGR claims to have gotten some screenshots of.

Obviously there is an issue with the supposedly leaked pictures, gestures on the iPhone would likely have to be different to those previewed on the iPad that used four or five finger swipes because they would be pretty unreasonable to use on the iPhone’s smaller screen. That said it remains possible that the text is left over from the iPad and whilst being tested internally has not been edited to reflect the iPhone’s gestures.

Engadget notes that information from it sources says that since the lost iPhone 4 debacle Apple made significant changes to how it keeps track of it’s devices and that it added clauses to screens saying “Confidential and Proprietary, if found, please contact…” listing a Cupertino 408 number. The photo’s BGR have gotten a hold have this message, adding credence to this leak. All three pictures posted after the break.

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