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Over-the-Air Updates for iOS Beta Apps? Yes, Please.

Writing for MacStories, I test many beta versions of new applications coming out for the iPhone and iPad. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the situation, but installing betas on iOS devices is a pain: you have to download the app’s file and the .mobileprovision profile, add them to iTunes, sync and hope that iTunes doesn’t screw up. With each version of the beta (Beta 1, Beta 2, Beta 3…) you have to repeat these steps.

Now we have a solution to this problem: an upcoming open source framework that will allow beta apps to update over the air by directly contacting the developer’s servers, without the need of syncing the device via iTunes. Pretty much like Mac applications do.

I’m seriously looking forward to this. [via Ken Yarmosh]

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BookBook: Wrap Your iPad In Hardback Leather

Of all the cases and stands we talk about every week, the BookBook for iPad has to be one of the best we’ve ever seen. Produced by Twelvesouth, well known makers of awesome Apple accessories, the BookBook turns your iPad into an elegantly bounded leather book. It even works as a stand thanks to an internal mechanism based on a strip and a button. It’s old style.

“Your iPad is held in the case by two soft leather corners and a soft elastic band that runs across the top of iPad. This elastic band is perfectly positioned below the invisible sensors near the top of iPad and just above the iPad viewing window. You see the full screen, all functions will work and you have access to all controls and inputs on your iPad. You’ll also find a button and string stitched into the case, which are used to transform BookBook into a display stand.”

$70 with free shipping for a limited time. At least you can say you did something to save books. Sort of.

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Designers, Rejoice: Review for iPhone Lets You Easily Judge Mockups

Honestly, I didn’t know anything about this new app from Bohemian Coding - but boy it looks useful and beautiful. Review for iPhone helps designers in quickly exporting UI mockups from the Mac to an actual iOS device, so that they can judge their designs in seconds on a real unit.

Just drag the files from your Finder to the Review Sync app for Mac (which runs in the menubar) and they will be exported to the iPhone in seconds, so that you’ll be able to see whether you did a good job or not. For designers, this could turn out to be a huge time saver.

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TaskAware Winners Announced

Thanks everyone who entered the TaskAware for iPhone giveaway. We also want to thank Nino D’Aversa for the promo codes he offered to MacStories readers.

Here are the winners:

Tilt

John Duong-Tran

alan Echia

You’ll receive the promo codes in your inbox in a few hours. Congratulations!

Hidden iOS 4 Code Suggests Verizon iPhone and iPad 2 Being Field-Tested

Interesting rumor Boy Genius Report has published today: according to one of their Apple sources, there’s a block of code buried deep down in iOS 4 which proves that both the CDMA iPhone and next iPad are about to hit the field test stage. The code makes sure that the device doesn’t need iTunes activation to work:

“Our source says that the code queries the device, and if the device is either a CDMA iPhone or iPad 2, the device will auto-activate, thus bypassing the need for iTunes. We’re told this block of code has appeared every year consecutively before a major iPhone / device release, removed right before launch.”

Another source also told BGR that the code name for the CDMA iPhone is N92AP, while John Gruber said it was N92. The next iPod Touch platform code should be N81AP.

January launch for the Verizon iPhone keeps sounding very likely to me. As for the iPad, the iPad-as-a-line idea (like MacBooks and iMacs, with different sizes, specs) is growing on me.

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Slide Reader: A New Google Reader Experience for iPad

What’s to be considered when reviewing a RSS app for the iPad today? The interface design? The features? The Flipboard-killer factor? Or maybe just how much the app is indeed meant for the iPad?

My point is, many apps are just bigger versions of stuff we’ve already seen on the iPhone last year. Some of them are cool and sold well at launch, but they can’t really hope to revolutionize a crowded market such as that of reading news. Then there are a few of them, made by those who took risks, that change the way we make technology fit in our daily lives.

Let’s take a step backwards and think about the iPad as a new device. Is it still possible to create a new app to read news on it? That’s what the Slide Reader developers are trying to achieve.

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Wide Angle Brings Beautiful Photography to the iPad

It’s no secret that the iPad is great at displaying pictures. I mean, it looks like a digital frame, right? And Apple even put a slideshow button right in the device lockscreen. For this reason photography applications are flourishing in the App Store, especially Flickr ones. Think about FlickStackr, Portfolio To Go, or the upcoming Rouse app by Robocat. Not to mention Flipboard’s feature to consume pictures from Boston.com and the like.

A few days ago I downloaded a new app called Wide Angle which allows you to view beautiful photos from The Big Picture and CBC Photo Galleries on your iPad.

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The MacBook Air Project: Modder Puts Mac Under Apple Keyboard

This is the reason why I love the modding community: they have no limits. Whether it’s about hardware or jailbreak / graphical modifications, modders always push themselves beyond the limitations and come up with exceptionals, custom creations.

Bart Reardon of The MacBook Air Project decided to try to fit a MacBook Air right under an Apple keyboard and make everything a single piece. Yes, a 1.6Ghz Core 2 Duo, 2GB RAM and 80GB hard drive computer inside a standard keyboard. He later thought of putting a Magic Trackpad next to the keyboard, too. He thinks that the device “will be used much beyond internet/email….maybe as an AppleTV replacement.”

Seriously, it’s awesome.

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