Apple Announces Release Dates for New iPad Pros, Macs, and iOS 12.1

Apple announced release dates for the new hardware unveiled during the keynote held at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House today and iOS 12.1. Here are the dates for each:

iPad Pros:

Pre-Order Date: Today
Ship Date and in stores: November 7th

iOS 12.1

Release Date: Today

MacBook Air

Pre-Order Date: Today
Ship Date and in stores: November 7th

Mac mini

Pre-Order Date: Today
Ship Date and in stores: November 7th

You can also follow all of our Apple event coverage through our October 30, 2018 hub, or subscribe to the dedicated October 30, 2018 RSS feed.

Replay Apple’s October 30, 2018 Keynote and New Product Videos

If you didn’t follow the live stream or announcements as they unfolded at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House today, you will be able to replay it on Apple’s Events site soon. You can also catch all the product videos on YouTube.

The keynote video will be streamed here and on the Apple TV using the Apple Events app. Also, a higher quality version should be made available soon through iTunes on the Apple Keynotes podcast.

Apple has posted new videos, including its product-reveals for the new iPad Pro, MacBook Air, and Mac mini on its YouTube channel too. You can find all those videos below after the break.

You can also follow all of our Apple event coverage through our October 30, 2018 hub, or subscribe to the dedicated October 30, 2018 RSS feed.

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Halide Developer Ben Sandofsky Breaks Down How the iPhone XR Captures Depth Data→

Ben Sandofsky from the team that makes the Halide iOS camera app has a detailed post on the iPhone XR’s camera and how Apple creates Portrait Mode photos with a single lens. Sandofsky walks through how Apple uses Focus Pixels to develop a rough Disparity Map and combines that with a Portrait Effects Matte to create Portrait Mode images.

The results have some advantages, but also distinct disadvantages compared to the iPhone XS’s camera. As Sandofsky explains:

It seems the iPhone XR has two advantages over the iPhone XS: it can capture wider angle depth photos, and because the wide-angle lens collects more light, the photos will come out better in low light and have less noise.

However:

…most of the time, the XS will probably produce a better result. The higher fidelity depth map, combined with a focal length that’s better suited for portraiture means people will just look better, even if the image is sometimes a bit darker. And it can apply Portrait effects on just about anything, not just people.

Although Apple’s Camera app can only take Portrait Mode photos of people on the iPhone XR, the upcoming Halide 1.11 update will combine the XR’s Disparity Map and Halide’s own blur effect to apply a similar effect beyond human subjects. Sandofsky admits that the feature isn’t perfect due to the low quality of the Disparity Map created by the XR, but the photos included in his post show that it can take excellent pictures under some conditions.

It’s remarkable what is being done to squeeze depth information out of the XR’s single lens and instructive to understand how the underlying technology works. It’s also apparent that Apple has made significant advancements since the introduction of the first dual-lens cameras.

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Daylite: Take Your Business Further with Mac CRM [Sponsor]

Daylite is different than most CRMs and that’s a good thing. Unlike other web-based CRMs that focus on customer relationships and sales, Daylite takes you further by going through the full customer cycle from closing the deal to finishing the project and it even allows you to access your information offline.

With all your team’s information in Daylite and accessible when you need it, your business runs smoother.

Daylite is specifically designed for Apple devices so you can integrate with Apple Mail on your Mac, and leverage features like Siri and Caller ID on your iPhone.

Daylite helps you and your team:

  • Remember when to follow up by setting tasks & reminders
  • Remember important details by tying emails, call and meeting notes to clients and projects
  • Keep track of all the moving pieces on a project with tasks, emails, and calendars all in one place
  • Streamline your sales and project processes with customizable pipelines and checklists
  • Improve team efficiency and make collaboration easy by having everything organized & searchable in one place.

From meeting prospects & winning business, to managing the moving pieces on projects so they’re done on time, all the way through following up for referrals and repeat business, it’s all done in Daylite.

Ready to take your business further? Start your free 30-day Daylite trial today!

Our thanks to Daylite for sponsoring MacStories this week.

The Journalists and Processes That Drive Apple News→

Today Jack Nicas of The New York Times published a first-of-its-kind in-depth look behind the curtain of how the Apple News journalistic team operates. The piece highlights Apple’s distinct handling of the news, where human curation is a larger driving factor than at other major tech companies. Nicas writes:

Apple has waded into the messy world of news with a service that is read regularly by roughly 90 million people. But while Google, Facebook and Twitter have come under intense scrutiny for their disproportionate — and sometimes harmful — influence over the spread of information, Apple has so far avoided controversy. One big reason is that while its Silicon Valley peers rely on machines and algorithms to pick headlines, Apple uses humans like Ms. Kern.

The former journalist has quietly become one of the most powerful figures in English-language media. The stories she and her deputies select for Apple News regularly receive more than a million visits each.

Lauren Kern, the editor in chief of Apple News, heads a staff of journalists that span the globe. One of their chief responsibilities is selecting each day’s top stories for the app.

Ms. Kern leads roughly 30 former journalists in Sydney, London, New York and Silicon Valley. They spend their days consuming news across the internet, fielding 100 to 200 pitches a day from publishers, and debating which stories get the top spots.

Ultimately, they select five stories to lead the app, with the top two also displayed in a prominent window to the left of the iPhone home screen. They also curate a magazine-style section of feature stories. The lineup typically shifts five or more times a day, depending on the news.

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Tim Cook Calls for Strong Privacy Protections

On Wednesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook spoke at the International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners in Brussels. Cook, who has stated many times that Apple believes privacy is a fundamental human right, called for federal privacy legislation. As transcribed in Ars Technica’s post on the speech, Tim Cook said:

We at Apple are in full support of a comprehensive federal privacy law in the United States. There, and everywhere, it should be rooted in four essential rights: First, the right to have personal data minimized. Companies should challenge themselves to de-identify customer data—or not to collect it in the first place.

Second, the right to knowledge. Users should always know what data is being collected and what it is being collected for. This is the only way to empower users to decide what collection is legitimate and what isn’t. Anything less is a sham.

Third, the right to access. Companies should recognize that data belongs to users, and we should all make it easy for users to get a copy of, correct, and delete their personal data. And fourth, the right to security. Security is foundational to trust and all other privacy rights.

Cook also commended the European Union on its General Data Protection Regulation, which went into effect earlier this year.

The importance of privacy to Apple is reflected on its website, during public events, and elsewhere. As the amount of data collected about everyone increases and the methods for creating sophisticated profiles of people with that data become more advanced, providing consumers with the tools to make informed decisions about what they share and control that data has become increasingly important. These aren’t issues that Apple can solve on its own, but as one of the largest global technology companies, it’s heartening to see the company taking a proactive stance on privacy.

Safari Technology Preview Allows Websites to Switch Themes Based on Mojave’s Dark Mode

With Mojave, Apple introduced a user-selectable Dark Mode. Although Dark Mode is implemented throughout Mojave and Apple’s system apps, it’s not automatic. Third-party developers have to update their apps to adopt the feature. Many developers have already added Dark Mode support, but when you run across one that hasn’t, it can be jarring.

Safari has a similar problem. Although the browser incorporates Mojave’s Dark Mode, which makes the app’s chrome dark, websites have no way to detect if a Mac is running in Light or Dark Mode. As a result, even if a site has light and dark themes like MacStories does, the theme has to be switched manually.

Safari Technology Preview 68 changes this by adding support for the prefers-color-scheme media query. Websites that implement the feature will be able to detect if a user’s system is set to Light or Dark Mode and apply a light or dark theme to match the user’s preference. Similar to apps, website owners still need to implement a dark theme for their sites, but if they do, the new feature will switch themes automatically.

Safari has a relatively small piece of the overall browser market, so broad adoption of dark themes is by no means an inevitability. However, I’m glad to see the feature coming to Safari soon because if you use Dark Mode on a Mac, bright white webpages clash with the rest of the UI.

Twitter Testing Reply Buttons, Presence Indicators, Ice Breakers, and More→

In an interesting move that highlights Twitter’s recent efforts to develop its product more openly, soliciting feedback from its user base, the company invited The Verge’s Casey Newton to a meeting where it shared details on a handful of new features it’s working on.

A new design that more clearly indicates how to reply to tweets was one project in the works. Current prototypes resemble the sort of UI found on Facebook and Instagram, with a reply button indented underneath tweets. Related to that change, and in another modeling of other popular social networks, the UI for threads is being worked on to better resemble a conversation rather than a string of individual tweets.

One of my favorite ideas from those shared with The Verge was something Twitter calls “ice breakers.” Newton writes:

Another feature Twitter is considering is a twist on the pinned tweet designed to promote conversations. The company showed me a design that would let you pin an “ice breaker” to the top of your profile to let people know you wanted to talk about something specific. The company’s design director, Mike Kruzeniski, told me it could help Twitter users channel their followers’ enthusiasm into discussions they wanted to have — whether it be about a new project, a current event, or some other item of interest.

The current implementation of pinned tweets is fine, but I love the idea of conversation starter tweets that can be changed up over time as users’ interests and desires for connection change.

Finally, presence indicators and status indicators are two similar features that would, respectively, let the world know when you’re online and ready for conversation, and share a status within your status such as “at WWDC19.” While I’m generally not a fan of presence indicators, according to Newton Twitter’s will be entirely optional, which I appreciate. If the feature were used sparingly enough, it could be a replacement for the standard AMA (“ask me anything”) tweets that are common when a user is free and open for conversation. Most likely though, Twitter will activate presence indicators by default for all users, making that specific use case doubtful.

None of these changes are set in stone, so be sure to make your voice heard if you feel strongly about any of them. As Twitter’s Sara Haider told Newton:

“Coming up with a product in a silo and dumping it on people is not going to work,” she said. “Some people are going to love it. Some people are going to hate it. We want to understand what people’s feedback is, and then tweak and iterate on the product.”

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Why Shortcuts Matter for Accessibility

Since it was announced at WWDC over the summer, the lion’s share of conversation around shortcuts has been about getting things done quickly and efficiently. Apple’s marketing message focuses on how shortcuts in iOS 12 help “streamline the things you do often” using Siri and/or the Shortcuts app. The company also recently put out a press release highlighting top App Store apps that have integrated shortcuts to extend their functionality, touting them for “making [users’] favorite apps even easier to use with a simple tap or by asking Siri.”

While the convenience factor of shortcuts is appreciated, an important aspect to their utility is accessibility. It’s a crucial aspect of the story around shortcuts, because while everyone loves a time-saver or two, these workflows also have the potential to make iPhone and iPad more accessible. In an accessibility context, shortcuts can be lifesavers in terms of reducing cognitive load, excessive swiping and tapping, and other common points of friction often met by disabled users.

Shortcuts, Past and Present

Before considering shortcuts as an accessibility tool, it’s important to understand their roots in order to properly frame them into perspective. The idea that shortcuts, or workflows, can prove valuable as an assistive technology isn’t a novel one.

Workflow, on which the Shortcuts app is based, was acquired by Apple in early 2017. Two years earlier, however, Apple selected Workflow as an Apple Design Award winner primarily for its integration of iOS accessibility features. Ari Weinstein, who joined Apple to work on Shortcuts post-acquisition, told me in an interview at WWDC 2015 that he and his team received feedback from several blind and visually impaired users who were curious about Workflow and wanted to try it. As a result, the team felt adding VoiceOver support was “the right thing to do,” Weinstein said.

To paraphrase Kendrick Lamar, Shortcuts got accessibility in its DNA.

Given the history lesson, it’s not at all far-fetched to think the Shortcuts app would have appeal to disabled users. Like Overcast and Twitterrific, Shortcuts is an app built for the mainstream, yet it has the care and design sensibility to carry relevance for a variety of use cases, like being fully accessible to a blind user via VoiceOver. This isn’t small potatoes; given Apple’s commitment to the disabled community, it’s certainly plausible Workflow’s ode to accessibility made the app all the more desirable.

More Than Just Productivity

As I reported during WWDC, Apple’s focus this year, software-wise, marked a departure from how they’ve traditionally approached accessibility enhancements. Unlike past years, there were no new discrete accessibility features for any platform. (AirPods with Live Listen is close). Instead, Apple chose to hammer on the idea that the tentpole features (e.g. Group FaceTime in iOS 12, Walkie-Talkie in watchOS 5) can be enabling technologies. The overarching theme of the conference was that the new features were so well designed that they brought inherent accessibility gains.

Siri shortcuts is another of those features. In my briefings with Apple at WWDC and since, shortcuts has been one of the first items they wanted to discuss. Like Group FaceTime and others, the company firmly believes in shortcuts’ potential as an accessibility aid. Their enthusiasm is warranted: for many users with certain cognitive and/or physical motor delays, the consolidation of tasks can reduce friction associated with remembering how to perform a task and then doing it. In this way, shortcuts are the inverse of task analyses; rather than extrapolating tasks into their individual parts (e.g. tapping a series of buttons in an app), the Shortcuts app’s automation turns them into a single step. (You break down steps when creating your own workflows, but that’s beside the point being made here.) Lest we forget about Siri; being able to use your voice to activate shortcuts is a boon for people with motor delays, as the “hands free” experience can be empowering.

For disabled people, shortcuts’ focus on speed and accessibility can open up new possibilities in terms of what they can do with their iOS devices and how they do things. Throw in system accessibility features like VoiceOver and Dynamic Type, and the Shortcuts app becomes far more compelling than simply being a sheer productivity tool.

”We see huge accessibility potential with Siri Shortcuts and the Shortcuts app. It’s already making a difference — helping people across a wide range of assistive needs simplify every-day tasks like getting to work, coming home, or staying in touch with friends and family,” Sarah Herrlinger, Apple’s Senior Director of Global Accessibility Policy & Initiatives, said in a statement. “We’re getting great feedback about how powerful the technology is in streamlining frequent tasks and integrating multiple app functions with just a single voice command or tap.”

How I Use Shortcuts

I am far less prolific in my adoption of shortcuts than some people. Others, like Federico and Matthew Cassinelli, are far more well-versed in the intricacies of what is possible and, more importantly, how you chain certain commands together.

My needs for shortcuts are pretty spartan. The shortcuts I use most often are practical, everyday ones I found in the Gallery section of the app. I currently have thirteen shortcuts; of those, the ones that are the most heavily-used are the laundry timer, tip calculator, and one for texting my girlfriend. While I have enjoyed spelunking through Federico’s work for esoteric, power user shortcuts, the reality is my work doesn’t require much automation. I typically don’t need to do fancy things with images, text, and the like. That isn’t to say these tools aren’t cool or valuable; they’re just not necessarily for me. For my needs, quick access to, say, the laundry timer is worth its weight in gold because I always forget to move my clothes.

Consider another shortcut of mine, Play an Album. I’ve been listening to Eminem’s new album, Kamikaze, virtually non-stop since it came out at the end of August. Rather than manually launch the Music app, find the album in my recently played queue, and hit play, I can utilize the Shortcuts widget to play it with a single tap. The manual method is three steps which, while not tedious for me in any way, is more work. Going back to the task analysis analogy I used earlier, not only is Play an Album faster, it particularly helps me conserve precious visual energy I otherwise would have expended finding the album. For fine-motor skills, the shortcut also saves on potential cramping in my fingers caused by my cerebral palsy. Again, what can take multiple taps can be condensed into a single motion. For many, that’s a huge win.

The same concept applies to sending iMessages to my girlfriend. Using the shortcut, what would normally be a multi-step process is reduced to a single step. The advantage for me is a matter of kinetics, but for others, the advantage very well could reduce cognitive load and increase executive function. Not insignificant.

The Bottom Line

As is the case with stuff like Markdown and Apple Pay, technologies not built expressly for accessibility’s sake, the Shortcuts app is so well considered and approachable that anyone can use it, regardless of ability. There are no complicated settings or special modes; as Apple designed it, it just works as they intended it.

That’s what makes Shortcuts’ star shine brighter. Yes, Apple is pitching it for speed and convenience. Yes, shortcuts can be as pedestrian or as nerdy as you want them to be. Above all, however, the Shortcuts app is accessible. It’s an app that’s reachable to the widest possible audience, turning its utilitarianism into something far greater.