Posts tagged with "apple"

Celeste Brings Tightly Integrated Bluetooth Sharing To iOS

Coming later this week to the Cydia Store is a new tweak from CocoaNuts called Celeste, a handy little tweak that will allow you to send and receive various audio, video and image files to and from your iOS device using Bluetooth. Whilst there have been other apps and tweaks distributed through Cydia that brought Bluetooth sharing to iOS such as iBlueNova, Celeste seems to be a much more tightly and neatly integrated tweak.

Celeste keeps it simple by just indicating, via an inverted Bluetooth icon on the status bar, that the tweak is running and then to share files is just a click or two away. Another feature that others have lacked is that Celeste will also make sure any songs and videos you receive over Bluetooth will automatically be synced over into iTunes, as if you had purchased it. Jump the break for a demo of how the tweak works.

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iOS 5 and MobileMe Media Event in April?

According to German website Macerkopf.de, Apple will hold a media event at the corporate headquarters in Cupertino to give a sneak peek of the upcoming major version of their mobile operating system, iOS 5, and the new MobileMe. The website reports [Google Translation] invitations will be sent out in the second week of April, and admittedly this rumor corroborates several blogs’ speculation that Apple wanted to save iOS 5 for a proper dedicated event instead of a quick preview at the iPad 2 event on March 2.

Previous rumors suggested iOS 5 would get a completely new notification system, deeper integration with the cloud (thanks to the data center in North Carolina) and several location-based features. As for design changes, patents Apple had been awarded showed new scrollable menus and other interface styles. MobileMe is also widely believed to come with a new, free version for all customers with cloud backup support for iTunes and other media. Steve Jobs once said in an email to a customer that MobileMe would get “a lot better” in 2011.

Code references found in early iOS 4.3 betas pointed to a new feature in development called MediaStream for photos and videos. In the past months speculation also indicated Apple was working on a smaller version of the iPhone strongly based on cloud services, although the rumor has been debunked from various sources since then.

There is no doubt, however, that Apple will prefer holding a single event focused on iOS 5 rather than including the preview in other product announcements. With an iOS 5 preview and beta likely to ship in April, developers will have plenty of time to update their applications for a possible launch of the new OS at the WWDC in June alongside the new iPhone.

Former Apple VP Shares Thoughts on Steve Jobs→

Former Apple VP Shares Thoughts on Steve Jobs

Former senior vice president at Apple Jay Elliot shares some details and thoughts about Steve Jobs’ “modus operandi” in a recent article at Forbes. That’s an interesting read that, overall, seems to confirm what most people think about Jobs’ way of leading Apple to success:

Rare among corporate leaders, Steve has never made decisions based on a concern for market reaction. He simply is not influenced by whether investors and market analysts will think he’s doing the right thing. But the financial community has come to have confidence in him: his track record for making the right decisions is hard to argue with.

Now Steve is following the same frustrating modus operandi about the question of who will take over the helm of Apple should be be forced to step down for health reasons. Everyone who has ever worked closely with Steve knows that, for him, relinquishing control over any aspect of the company or its products is — well, difficult, to put it politely.

The key point, however, is this:

Over the years, Steve has generated a nearly uncanny ability to recognize talent and to recruit almost everyone he has ever set his eye on. The result is a team that inspires confidence for the future.

Many people still think Steve Jobs does everything at Apple from coding to design to marketing and app development, but they don’t understand Apple as a company is “simply” a well-oiled and functioning machine made of talented people.

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Adobe Releases Its Flash To HTML5 Conversion Tool

Adobe has released its Flash to HTML5 conversion tool to its Adobe Labs website for designers and developers to easily produce HTML5 (and thus iOS compatible) content from a Flash project. John Nack, the Principal Product Manager at Adobe said back in October last year (when the tool was announced) that Adobe’s goal was to “Cut the cost of targeting multiple runtimes & we’ll deliver real wins”.

The tool, codenamed “Wallaby” is limited and far from complete but it should work fine with most Flash banner ads, however projects utilizing ActionScript are currently not supported by the tool. The tool allows simple drag and drop conversion and Adobe says that it “allows you to reuse and extend the reach of your content to devices that do not support the Flash runtimes.”

Whilst Adobe is not at all backing off from backing Flash, it certainly seems that they have been forced into implementing HTML5 support in order to please its customers who see the wide usage of devices such as the iPad and iPhone which don’t support Flash. It is also evident that at least part of Steve Job’s ‘Thoughts on Flash’ article from last April is coming true;

New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too). Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind.

[Via The Loop]

iPad 2 Launch Details Roundup

There has been an avalanche of information regarding the iPad 2 launch since the Apple event last week so if you are confused, unsure or just want a refresher on the launch details just jump the break for a full roundup of all the important details!

Also be sure to check out our iPad 2 roundup to get all the details what exactly is new and awesome about the iPad 2.

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Yes, The iPad 2 Is Carrier Unlocked

Over the weekend there were some reports that WiFi+3G iPad 2’s would be locked to a specific carrier after people read on the Canadian Apple site that “the iPad model you purchase is specially configured to work with either Bell, Rogers, or Telus.” It turns out that this wordage, whilst technically correct, is very confusing in that whilst the iPad is initially configured to work with a specific carrier, it can be reconfigured to work with other carriers at any stage.

This has been confirmed by a number of people from iPadinCanada to TUAW that have all confirmed from a variety of sources including Rogers Wireless, Apple Experts and Apple Support that you can swap SIMs and carriers with the iPad 2. The only issue (a very minor one) is that the iPad will need to connect to iTunes after the SIM has been swapped to download the new carrier settings, which is required for the 3G service to be usable.

So to be totally clear to all those interested, the iPad 2 is not carrier locked, rather Apple has just over-simplified the information it provided, because you can indeed reconfigure the iPad to work with another carrier with a simple SIM swap and iTunes sync. The one caveat to all this is of course the Verizon (CDMA) iPad 2 which will not be able to switch to any carrier using a GSM network because it does not contain a 3G chipset compatible with GSM networks.

[Via TUAW]

iPhone 5 To Revert Back To Aluminum Back And Internal Antenna?

A Chinese source has told Economic Daily News (translated by Macotakara) that Apple is abandoning the glass backing of the iPhone 4 in favor of an aluminum casing as well as ditching the external antenna design. According to the source the;

Decision to design similar to iPod touch instead of using glass is supposed that Apple seems to stop problems which are told widely damages from scratching, difficulties of painting white and weight of glass.

The source also reported that Apple is abandoning the current external antenna design that was plagued with controversy over the “death-grip” signal loss and attenuation issue. Although unclear, it seems that the translation implies that the “antenna will be designed to penetrate cellular and Wi-Fi waves via resin made Apple logo” which Apple actually does have a patent for.

Finally the source noted that Apple will include the new A5 processor in the fifth iteration of the iPhone, the same processor in the new iPad 2. As with all Apple rumors, including those regarding the iPhone 5, take them with a grain of salt. In particular when the source has a shaky record in previously predicting a 7-inch iPad by Christmas 2010.

[Via MacRumors]

iPad 2: Apple’s Smart Iteration

By now you’ve probably heard and read everything you need to know about the iPad 2. The second generation tablet that’s thinner, lighter (not so much, after all), has cameras and also happens to come with fancy (some people say revolutionary) Smart Covers to protect and clean your device without putting it entirely into a case. Pretty much as I wrote in November, this is the iPad upgrade I was expecting.

But is this the iPad 2 I was hoping for? Or rather, was March 2 the iPad 2 event I was looking forward to? I would say yes, and no.

I’m going to get an iPad 2 from the United States on March 11. 16 GB WiFi model with a $39 Smart Cover. I guess that’s what most consumers will end up with, and I’m happy to stick with my last year’s choice of “just” 16 GBs of storage considering how it’s possible that Apple will slowly move to cloud storage, always available at any time with a simple Internet connection. Which brings me to the second point: the geek in me was hoping for a brief mention of iOS 5 at the iPad 2 event which, you might have seen, didn’t happen. I can see, though, why Apple decided to keep iOS 5 for a dedicated event in Cupertino. Read more

Top-Notch GTD App Voodo for iPad Gets Reviewed, Plus A Giveaway!

If you are looking for a GTD app that works on the iPhone and iPad you have many, many excellent options that include Things, Due, OmniFocus and a multitude of others. Well now you can add Voodo to that extensive list of compelling GTD apps. Voodo had previously been available as an iPhone app but earlier this week it made it to the iPad as well and I was able to give it a go whilst it was being approved last month.

Jump the break for a review of Voodo for iPad and win one of five copies of the iPhone companion app!

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