Apple has begun rolling out web links and iTunes web previews for Apple TV apps. The change, first noticed by Jeff Scott and which we were able to confirm via Safari on OS X, allows users to link to tvOS apps in a web browser, which will show an iTunes Preview with screenshots, app description, and other information.
Apple Starts Rolling Out Web Previews for tvOS App Links
Connected, Episode 87: Ticci on the Scene→
A sleep-deprived Myke joins Federico and Stephen to talk about WWDC, new MacBooks and App Store search.
On this week’s Connected, the first details of our upcoming trip to San Francisco for WWDC, some fun speculation on Apple’s announcements, and some hints on what we’re announcing tomorrow at MacStories. You can listen here.
Sponsored by:
Fruity Maps→
Fruity Maps is a proof of concept web app made by Tim Broddin (via 9to5Mac) to demonstrate what an Apple MapKit web view would look like.
This is undocumented, but Apple is also using an embedded MapKit view on their WWDC Attending page, which seems to suggest that an announcement in June could be likely. Tim has posted some details on how he put this together on GitHub.
Igloo: An Intranet You’ll Actually Like [Sponsor]
We all struggle with productivity. We are constantly pressured to accomplish more, and to do it quicker. There is no one definitive way to accomplish that, and we have all devised our own little method to make things work.
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Work has evolved and your tools should too. Never email yourself a file again. Bring your company into the 21st century - send your IT guy to try Igloo Software for free.
Igloo is an intranet you’ll actually like.
Our thanks to Igloo for sponsoring MacStories this week.
Fall Developer Conference Organizers Offer Discounts→
There is no doubt that San Francisco is an expensive place to visit for a week, which puts WWDC out of reach financially for some developers. Fortunately, there are a lot of other Mac and iOS conferences held throughout the year that cost less and provide an opportunity to learn and meet fellow developers. To highlight their events, a group of Fall conference organizers have gotten together to offer a discount on admission to their events:
For the next 24 hours the following iOS / Mac community conferences are offering a 10% discount on the price of admission:
- 360|iDev | August 21–24 | Denver, Colorado
- try! Swift NYC | September 1–2 | New York, New York
- Indie DevStock | September 16–17 | Nashville, Tennessee
- Release Notes | September 27–29 | Indianapolis, Indiana
- CocoaLove | October 14–16 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
- Úll | November 1–2 | Killarney, Ireland
Use the coupon code “COMMUNITY” before April 20th at 9am Pacific Time time to receive the discount.
I attended the inaugural Úll and Release Notes conferences and highly recommend both.
The cost of admission to any of these conferences is already less than a ticket to WWDC, but if you want to save an extra 10%, act fast because the offer is good for only 24 hours.
BitTorrent Sync: For Privacy, Speed, and Control
BitTorrent Sync (or “BTS” for short) is a newer player in the space of personal file syncing compared to Dropbox or Google Drive, but it has some power and flexibility that I have not found anywhere else. Today I want to tell you about the first of what I suspect will eventually be a series of posts about “How I Use BTS” over the coming months.
App: The Human Story Team Shoots for June Premiere and Launches Quantify
Last week, Story & Pixel announced that it is pushing to release the upcoming documentary App: The Human Story in early June, just before WWDC. I remember being at The Talk Show live recording at WWDC in 2014 when Jake Schumacher and Jedidiah Hurt, the team behind Story & Pixel, captured some of their first footage for the film. That was followed by a successful Kickstarter later that summer, and a whole lot of work since then. This past Fall, Story & Pixel debuted fifteen minutes of opening footage for App at XOXO Fest in Portland.
During production of App, the Story & Pixel team needed a discrete way to timestamp footage while they were filming as a sort of bookmarking system that would allow them to quickly jump to certain footage during the editing process. They tried things like taking notes, but found that it disrupted interviews. To solve the problem, Story & Pixel, working with developer Ryan Newsome, created an iPhone app with four large buttons that can be discretely tapped while filming to create up to four different types of bookmarks. The bookmarks can be exported into Adobe Premiere Pro (subscription required) when you’re ready to edit your footage.1
The app, called Quantify, launched last week and is free with a choose-your-own-price subscription model. Subscribing adds the ability to export to Adobe Premiere Pro and premium support.
App has been in production for almost two years now and it’s great to see that Story & Pixel are in the final home stretch. Judging from the footage that has been previewed so far, I think we are in for a real treat.
- One thing that immediately occurred to me when playing around with Quantify is that something like this would be handy for podcasters who want to mark portions of audio that need editing, contain information that should be added to show notes, or where a chapter marker could be added. ↩
Apple Updates MacBook: Faster, Longer Battery Life, Rose Gold Option
Apple has today updated its MacBook line with faster processors, an extra hour of battery life and the option to pick a Rose Gold finish. The MacBook now comes with the sixth-generation dual-core Intel Core M processors that go up to 1.3GHz, with Turbo Boost speeds up to 3.1GHz. It also now comes with faster PCIe-based flash storage and faster 1866MHz memory.
“MacBook is the thinnest and lightest Mac we have ever made and it’s our vision for the future of the notebook,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Customers are going to love this update to MacBook, with the latest processors, faster graphics, faster flash storage, longer battery life and a beautiful rose gold finish.”
Graphics performance has also been improved by up to 25 percent on the refreshed MacBooks as a result of the inclusion of an Intel HD Graphics 515 card. With the improved battery life, the refreshed MacBook should last up to 10 hours for web browsing and up to 11 hours of movie playback.
US Prices for the MacBook are unchanged and start at $1,299 for a MacBook with a 1.1 GHz Intel Core m3 processor, 8GB of memory and 256GB of flash storage.
The MacBook Air has also received a minor refresh, with 8GB of memory now standard across all configurations of the 13-inch MacBook Air.
You can read Apple’s full press release here.
Apple Pay Expands to Singapore Through American Express Partnership→
Juli Clover, writing for MacRumors, reports that Apple Pay has today launched in Singapore:
Apple today updated its website and its Apple Pay support document to note the expansion of the Apple Pay payment service to Singapore. With the addition of Singapore, Apple Pay is now available in six countries, including Canada, China, Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Apple Pay is available in Singapore through a partnership with American Express, first announced by Apple in October of 2015. By partnering with American Express, Apple has brought Apple Pay to Singapore, Canada, and Australia and will expand it to Hong Kong and Spain later this year.
Unfortunately, Apple’s partnership with American Express is once again limited to those who have a credit card issued by American Express for now. Those with an American Express card issued by their local bank will not be able to use Apple Pay – it is the same situation to Apple Pay in Australia and Canada. However, things may soon change, as Apple has listed on the Singaporean Apple Pay website that Visa support is “coming soon”, as well as support for DBS, UOB and Standard Chartered.