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Posts tagged with "app store"

Apple Launches App Store Hall of Fame

The App Store was launched exactly 848 days ago in July 2008. Today, Apple launched a new section in the App Store called “App Store Essentials: Hall of Fame” which is aimed at presenting the “very best of the best” and contains 50 apps for iPhone and iPad, both paid and free.

Among the apps, there are true gems such as Angry Birds, Hipstamatic, Instapaper, Reeder for iPhone, Siri (which was acquired by Apple), Zen Bound 2, Facebook and Photogene. Surprisingly enough, the official Twitter app didn’t make the list, nor did other clients such as Twitterrific or Weet. The list will likely grow during the weekend and the holiday season, so perhaps more apps will be added.

You can check out the Hall of Fame by following this link in iTunes.

Developers, Start Submitting Your Mac Apps Today

Apple is now accepting submissions for the Mac App Store. With an email sent to registered Mac developers earlier today, Apple confirmed that Mac apps can now be sent to Apple for approval.

We don’t know which developers are jumping on this today and whether Apple has refined its review guidelines following the many doubts arisen in the past weeks, but we know it’s going to be huge – right?

The Mac App Store is set to open in less than 90 days. We can’t wait.

VLC for iOS May Soon Be Gone From the App Store Due To Videolan’s Complaint

VLC, the popular media player for Windows, Mac and Linux that landed on the iPad in September and on the iPhone last week, may soon be gone from the App Store. Rémi Denis-Courmont, one of the primary developers of VLC, explained that Videolan sent a formal notification of copyright infringement to Apple regarding the way VLC for iOS is distributed in the App Store. VLC for iOS is developed by French 3rd party studio Applidium.

Basically, here’s the problem: VLC is an open source program distributed under the GNU General Public License (also known as “GPL”) while VLC for iOS is, as you may guess, distributed under Apple’s iTunes Terms and Conditions, which don’t allow users to install both free and paid apps on more than 5 devices. This restriction is also known as “DRM” which stands for Digital Rights Management. So even if VLC for iOS is free, Videolan can’t accept the fact that Apple’s DRM goes against the original GNU license VLC’s code is based on. Read more

14 Hours Later, Ratings and Reviews Still Gone From The App Store

We noticed this last night and we thought it might be a temporary glitch, but 14 hours later reviews and ratings are still nowhere to be found in the App Store.

If you try to open an App Store app page, in fact, you’ll notice that ratings and user reviews have simply disappeared. The “Customers also bought” section is in there, and reviews are accessible through Apple’s web view for iTunes pages, but you can’t find them in the App Store.

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A Cloud Over The Mac App Store

Wayne Dixon over at Macgasm, about how app data will be backed up with the Mac App Store:

So this leads me to wondering something: how does the application’s data get backed up? Right now within the iOS App Store, your data is backed up when you sync your iOS device and this information is then backed up again when you backup your computer (you do backup your computer, right?). But if your application data is just stored locally and you do have to do a re-install of your computer, even though you are able to download the software itself again, your data may not be easily placed in the correct location, even with backups.

When Apple announced the iOS-like model for the desktop we didn’t really wonder much about how the backup model was going to be carried over to the Mac. Is it going to be carried over at all? On the current version of OS X (and on previous iterations as well) each app stores its data in various folders on the hard disk. Usually it’s the “Application Support” folder inside a user’s library, but preferences, caches and databases may be stored somewhere else. Not to mention the possibility to manually select a different destination for the main database in some applications, think of 1Password, Candybar and DEVONthink. Is the Mac App Store going to change this? Read more

Too Late? MacUpdate Desktop Gets Auto-Updating

MacUpdate’s stand-alone application, MacUpdate Desktop, was recently updated with improvements and some new features (but may be too little too late because of Apple’s newly revealed Mac App Store). New features: MacUpdate Desktop lets users keep their installed software up-to-date without having go to the MacUpdate or developer’s website. The Desktop application can automatically check for updates in the background and will alert you of new application updates. Support has been added for checking web-browser plug-ins and installing Safari extensions. Improvements: The scanner engine is faster and uses less resources; improved version and application matching and an improved installation engine that makes updates even more accurate.

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Apple Planning Additional App Store LockDown During Thanksgiving Week

Apple usually locks down iTunes Connect for developers during the week of Christmas. This procedure known as “lockdown” doesn’t allow developers to submit updates for their apps and perform price changes, as they’re basically forced to stay out of iTunes Connect, the system underlying the App Store distribution.

According to a rumor published by 148apps, Apple is planning an additional lockdown this year during the week of Thanksgiving. The lockdown is admittedly a problem for developers who need to submit fixes to their applications, but it’s also a great marketing opportunity as charts and top apps are not updated either during the period. If you’re there on the first day, you’ll stay there for the whole week. Read more

Mac App Store: Big Changes Coming Soon to iOS App Store Too?

Last night I took some time to re-watch the Back to the Mac event video Apple posted in 1080p on Youtube, to see if I could spot elements I may have missed on the low-quality iTunes and streaming versions. Indeed I noticed something in the Mac App Store demo I hadn’t seen before, or perhaps really focused on: in the right sidebar, under the “Quick Links” box, there’s a “Purchased” link which, supposedly, should bring you to your purchase history page. Read more

Apple Showcasing “Special Education” Apps In The App Store

Every week Apple launches a new custom section in the App Store for iPhone and iPad. This week Apple is featuring “Special Education” apps, and more than 60 different applications are listed in the section. Apps such as Things from Cultured Code, Sign 4 Me, Dragon Dictation and Color Identifier are included. It’s surely one of the most populated app sections Apple launched to date.

Special Education is available here. Read more