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Posts tagged with "apple"

Reposado, An Open-Source Update Service Independent of OS X Server

Hosting an internal Apple Software Update service involves having to rely on Mac OS X Server to update you various testing machines if you want to test software against various releases of Leopard and Snow Leopard across hardware. Walt Disney Animation Studios, however, have released Reposado, an open-source project founded upon Python that eliminates the need for OS X Server while alleviating some previous limitations.

The open-source benefit of this project is immediately applicable for small businesses. As TUAW’s Chris Ward points out, running your own update solution for businesses allows administrators to economize on bandwidth by downloading the update once, and distributing it internally. For both developers and IT administrators, Reposado takes this a bit further by leveraging what a company is likely to already have available in equipment. It’s a cost effective solution that’s currently available for download via GitHub.

All you need available is a box running an Apache 2 web server and the ‘curl’ binary tool, and provided you already have an old Mac around (such as a Mac Mini), utilizing these tools is incredibly easy. Replicating Software Update catalogs and updates, Reposado is powerful in that it supports deprecated updates. Apple’s course of action only offers and encourages admins to download the latest software, yet testing environments require that software be compatible across multiple iterations of software. With Reposado, you can branch any update to various machines on your schedule, giving you time to test new software before deploying it.

[Managing OS X via TUAW]

Apple Proposes Standard To Make SIM Cards Smaller

According to Reuters, an executive of Orange has confirmed the French carrier is backing Apple’s plans for a new standard to make SIM cards smaller in order to use them in future thinner mobile devices. The proposed standard aims at reducing the size of SIM cards, which are currently implemented as “micro” models in the iPhone 4 and iPad.

We were quite happy to see last week that Apple has submitted a new requirement to (European telecoms standards body) ETSI for a smaller SIM form factor – smaller than the one that goes in iPhone 4 and iPad,” said Anne Bouverot, Orange’s head of mobile services.

“They have done that through the standardization route, through ETSI, with the sponsorship of some major mobile operators, Orange being one of them,” she told the Paris leg of the Reuters Global Technology Summit.

Reuters claims the approval process for such a new standard would take time, with new devices carrying the new SIM models not coming out at least until next year. A rumor surfaced last year indicated Apple was working closely with Gemalto to develop an integrated SIM card that would be embedded in every iPhone to enable users to quickly switch between carriers without restrictions and obligations, but this new report seems to suggest Apple is simply aiming for a smaller chip, perhaps following the opposition from carriers to an embedded SIM that would cut mobile operators out of the retail game.

Apple “Investigating” Lodsys Claims, Official Response Later This Week

Following Lodsys’ response to the debate surrounding the patent infringement claims they sent to a number of iOS developers last week, The Guardian reports Apple is “actively investigating” these claims, with an official response expected to come from the company later this week.

Apple’s legal department is understood to be “actively investigating” claims by Lodsys, a patent holding company based in Texas, to have a claim against iPhone and iPad developers who use in-app purchase systems. So far Lodsys has served papers on about a dozen iOS developers who it says are infringing its patent 10/732,102, which it bought in 2004 from the inventor, who filed it in the 1990s, covering user interaction over a network.

Apple is not expected to respond to the claims, which have been passed to it by affected developers, until later this week.

Last week, Lodsys sent legal notices to some iOS developers who were using in-app purchases and upgrade buttons in their iPhone and iPad applications, claiming the implementation of this kind of upgrade process was patented and subject to licensing fees. The debate the followed the blog posts and tweets from developers who didn’t understand how it was possible to infringe a patent while using Apple’s own SDK quickly made Lodsys write a series of blog posts detailing how the company was already licensing the patent to Apple and Google, but not to indie developers. Lodsys is asking for a 0.575% fee of US revenue over the period the technology was implemented, giving developers 21 days to decide whether or not they want to license the patent. Lodsys also explained that Apple can’t extend the rights of the patent to third-party developers, in spite of its intention to build a eco-system revolving around a single SDK to write software for iPhones and iPads. This left many developers wondering whether in-app purchases were still a feasible option, considering Apple’s 30% cut off every transaction and the newly discovered legal implications.

In the meantime, Lodsys is sending more legal notices to other developers, with The Iconfactory apparently receiving one this morning as tweeted by co-founder Talos Tsui and James Thomson, the first developer who got hit with Lodsys’ patent claims. Notably, The Iconfactory has the popular Twitter client Twitterrific for iPhone and iPad available in the App Store, featuring an upgrade button to remove advertising with in-app purchase.

Apple Stores Installing NFC Payment Systems?

According to BGR, several sources have suggested Apple may be gearing up to install new payment systems in its retail stores, quite possibly implementing the NFC technology that’s also been rumored to be one of the key features of the iPhone 5, in spite of recent reports claiming the opposite. The website reports Apple’s POS system (based on iPod touches) recently went offline for an entire day causing employees to not be able to process payments, and new tables (different from the standard ones) with cash wraps have also been installed in some retail locations, leading to speculation as to whether Apple is looking to renew its payment system.

Additionally, we have been told that there were recently multiple “overnights” in Apple retail locations, which required store employees to “assist in installing TBD devices” throughout the stores “as the retail segment of Apple grows.

We have a feeling Apple’s 10th anniversary plans might put a few pieces of the puzzle in place, but one of our sources also believes that NFC payment processing capabilities are among the enhancements that will be brought about by the new gear.

It’s unclear from the report whether Apple is planning on updating their POS technology with NFC to enable compatibility with future devices that will feature the technology on a consumer level, or if retail stores are simply installing new hardware for internal usage, not necessarily implying new iPhones with NFC are on their way. Multiple reports in the past months had pegged Apple was considering NFC for future iPhones and iPads, but recent speculation from different sources has suggested NFC simply isn’t ready for mass adoption, with Apple saving the implementation of Near Field Communication for another generation of devices.

Samsung and Toshiba Awaiting Apple’s Approval on sub-30nm NAND Chips

As reported by Digitimes today, several NAND chip manufacturers including Samsung and Toshiba are still waiting for Apple’s approval on their new production processes below 30nm. As Apple is the biggest buyer of NAND flash memory with popular products like the iPhone, iPad and MacBook Air (the first line of Mac desktop computers to come with flash memory by default), manufacturers want to make sure mass production is “feasible” while waiting for the company’s consent to move forward with the new process that involves sub-30nm chips, with Samsung operating at 27nm and Toshiba at 24nm.

Both Samsung Electronics’ and Toshiba’s 2Xnm-made products have not yet been certified by their biggest customer Apple, the sources claimed.

Micron Technology and Intel were ahead of peers in volume producing chips using their jointly-developed 25nm technology in the first half of 2011, followed by Samsung’s ramp-up of 27nm, Toshiba’s 24nm and Hynix Semiconductor’s 26nm. This marked the beginning of a race among major NAND chip suppliers to transition to 20nm-class processes, the sources said.

The website notes certification times for new manufacturing process have extended to up to 9 months from 6 to ensure greater “product performance, quality and reliability.” In terms of consumer products, manufacturing process below 30nm result in higher memory density in NAND chips, thus leading to faster devices with more capacity. Smaller processes are also linked to lower costs. Put simply, adopting new production standards for Flash memory will bring devices and computers with more storage on board and lower production costs for Apple in the next years, though Samsung and Toshiba have to wait for now. [via AppleInsider]

Lodsys Responds to iOS Developers Over Patent Infringement Notices

Last Friday there was news that a number of independent developers for the iPhone and iPad had received legal warnings that they were violating patents that Lodsys owned. Suffice to say it sparked an outcry from developers, users and commentators; few had anything nice to say of Lodsys. Well today they have responded to a number of criticisms on their website in a series of Q&A posts. The key patent in question was that of Dan Abelow who sold his portfolio of patents to Lodsys back in 2004.

Its first response was in regards to the fairly frequented notion that Lodsys is a “parasite, troll, should die etc.”, they respond to this in saying that they are just like any other company who sells a product or service – they try to “get value for the assets it owns”. They write in the post “threats and irrationality don’t help.  In particular, the death threats are seriously uncool.”

As for the question of the patents being “too broad”, Lodsys notes how easy it is too look back in hindsight, saying “of course this is how everyone is going to do it”. In response to patent licensing being unethical and similar questions, they say that it seeks an economic return to sell their patent assets, completely legal and furthermore citing the notion that patent licensing encourages future invention.

As for why they directly contacted developers and not Apple, they say it is because Apple (as well as Microsoft and Google) has already licensed the patents in question. They claim that they cannot provide the third party developers with the rights to the patent, and Apple hasn’t approached Lodsys for the purpose of attaining an eco-system-wide license for the patents. They say their goal is not to prevent developers from using the technology, rather that it is to popularize it and charge a relatively small license for it.

They claim in multiple areas that they specialise in efficiently selling rights to patents, they say that by having a consistent price model it also means independent developers aren’t unfairly disadvantaged.

As for how much developers will need to pay, Lodsys clarifies that the in-app purchasing mechanism for example would cost a developer 0.575% of their US revenue over the period the technology was implemented until the patent expires. It gives an example of an app that earns US$1 million in one year would pay US$5,750.

[Via TheNextWeb]

You can read all of Lodsys’ responses on their blog.

Flipboard Blocked By The Great Firewall Of China

It appears that the Chinese government yesterday blocked Flipboard, meaning the app, which is available on the App Store in China, is largely unusable from within China. Flipboad’s CEO, Mike McCue, made the revelation on Twitter yesterday and said in follow-up tweets; “Lots of folks in China had been using us happily until now” and “Guess we had unwittingly poked a hole in their wall which has now been shut down… Presumably unless we block Facebook and Twitter ourselves in China”

The block impacts on Flipboard’s Amazon servers, which are required for users to aggregate their content from various sources, effectively this means that services such as Google Reader, Instragram and Flickr are all blocked from Flipboard users in China. Facebook and Twitter, which were already blocked by the Chinese government, had previously been accessible to some users who used a VPN service, but this latest move has blocked Facebook and Twitter completely from the app.

[Via @mmccue]

iOS 5 Voice Recognition Interface Conceptualized

With far improved voice recognition expected to make its way into iOS 5, the next questions is how Apple will implement it. Well one person, Jan-Michael Cart, has thought of how it might be possible to implement and put together a well-thought out video demonstrating the concept (after the break).

There are number of aspects to the voice recognition he conceptualizes, starting with the notion that it can be used to navigate the entire user interface and is triggered by holding down the home button – much like how Voice Control currently works. Yet instead of bumping you to a whole new screen like Voice Control does, the status-bar will turn blue and serve as a visual guide as to when to speak and telling you how it interpreted what you said.

That’s a fairly straightforward extension of what iOS currently does, what is more intriguing is Jan-Michaels concept of how any text-field can have voice input. All you would have to do is press and hold the text-field and again the status bar turns blue and you speak. For somewhere like notes or mail (which don’t have a text-field but rather an area for a block of text) you would double tab to open the copy and past bar but which would also now have a microphone icon – pressing it would start voice dictation.

As would be reasonably expected, Jan-Michael also believes that APIs would be offered to developers to use voice-recognition and shows how the Facebook app would be an easy candidate for voice recognition support. Make sure to jump the break to watch the video by Jan-Michael, and if you like it, I would highly recommend checking out his YouTube page which has some other iOS 5 concepts including faster app switching using gestures and how widgets could be implemented.

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Guinness World Records Awarded To The iPhone 4, App Store and iOS Games

The iPhone 4, the iOS App Store and a number of iOS games have been honoured with Guiness World Record awards. The iPhone 4 was named the fastest-selling portable gaming system following a first day sales figure of 1.5 million units when it was released on June 24 last year – far exceeding the previous holder of the title, the Nintendo DS which sold 500,000 units over a week in 2004.

“The release of the iPhone has not just changed the mobile industry, but the video game world too,”Gaz Deaves, Guinness World Records’ gaming editor, said in a statement. “With the never-ending App Store selection and an intuitive device, Apple has created a gigantic new space for itself in the casual games genre that literally brings entertainment to users wherever they may be.”

Apple’s App Store has also been awarded the Guinness World Record for being the most popular application marketplace following more than 6.5 billion downloads since its launch in July 2008. The App Store is also the largest downloadable video game store, which had as of September last year, roughly 37,000 games. This figure far exceeds other downloadable game services such as Steam, which offers around 1,110 games, the Xbox Live Indie Arcade, which has 1,300, and the Wii Virtual Console, which offers around 580 games. The final award gong given to the App Store was for having the largest launch line-up of any gaming system – with 145 games that were available on July 10th, 2008.

Several iOS games also received awards including the infamous Angry Birds which received an award for being at the top of the paid apps list in the most countries after selling more than 6.5 million copies since being released in December 2009. Plants vs. Zombies was awarded for being the fastest-selling iPhone/iPod strategy game with more than 300,000 paid downloads in just nine days. It also received an award for being the highest-grossing strategy game in the App Store – generating about $1 million for its developer, PopCap, in just over a week. Lastly, the Tap Tap Revenge game series was awarded the most popular game series in the App Store after more than 15 million downloads since launching July 2008.

[Via LA Times]