Our iPhones and other portable gadgets require a lot of power to keep them running. The iPhone’s legendary battery life could still use a good boost if you’re consistently uploading Twitter pics and recording audio for those Macworld Expo interviews, and even that old BlackBerry you still keep around could use a lift. Back in the hotel, wouldn’t it be nice if you and a friend could share an outlet to charge your USB powered gadgets while cameras and other recording tools create a rat’s nest of wires to your Mac? XtremeMac’s InCharge Portable provides a duo of USB ports that are ready to charge your gadgets, but even better is the trick up its sleeve.
Posts tagged with "iPhone"
MacStories Product Review: XtremeMac InCharge Portable
How to Use An iPhone and a DIY IR Trigger to Control Your DSLR
Camera junkies rejoice! The iPhone Guru has a neat little DIY post on how to create a homemade IR trigger capable of firing your DSLR camera from a couple dollars worth of parts. He also shows you how to use DSLR.bot (an iPhone app) to trigger your camera, record GPS locations, and shoot time lapse sequences.
Matthew makes note that the reason he’s doing this and not buying a branded IR or cabled remote is this:
DSLR.bot app has some pretty compelling features that allow you to do GPS tagging with a Map Log and synchronized timing that you can then merge with your image data to create Geo-located images shot with your DSLR among some other nice features like HDR bracketing, time lapse shooting and an Intervalometer. It will do far more than even Canon’s $120 timer remote will do and the whole thing will cost you less than $20.
Video and more pictures after the break… Read more
Google Launches Google TV Remote for iPhone
For the few of you who may own a Google TV enabled device (or a TV such as the Sony Internet TV), your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad can now power your futuristic format thanks to the new Google TV Remote app. It’s chock full of glorious soft buttons that could take the Logitech Harmony to task, and includes Voice Search so you can quickly search for content using your iPhone’s microphone. Multiple Google TV Remotes can work over the same network as well, meaning anyone who has an iOS (or Android) enabled device can browse the television right from their lap. The app is free to download from the App Store, and we’ve included a quick video of the Android version below: the experiences are very similar (the iPhone can’t push webpages to their Google TV, however).
#MacStoriesDeals - Friday
NFC Technology In iPhones Could Also Enable Remote Computing
According to a source of Cult of Mac, Apple is planning to use Near Field Communication (NFC) not just as a method for retail payment services but also to turn an iPhone into a pseudo-ID tag for remote login. According to Cult of Mac:
…when a NFC-equipped iPhone is paired with a guest machine, part of the user’s profile includes the apps they’ve purchased through the Mac App Store. The icons for their apps appear on the remote Mac, but aren’t downloaded, our source said.
Once the guest machine is logged into; users would be able to open any of their apps, which would download on demand, although presumably only those from the Mac App Store. Documents too could be accessed and synced using MobileMe from anywhere using this remote login system and once a user leaves, the Mac would wipe any documents and applications.
As MacRumors points out, it is similar to the once promised feature of ‘Home on iPod’ that would have allowed OS X Panther users to sync their Home directory on to an iPod for easy document storage regardless of where you were. Cult of Mac claims that this new feature is currently being developed in OS X Lion but their source stresses that it isn’t guaranteed to become public.
[Via Cult of Mac]
#MacStoriesDeals - Thursday
Happy St. Paddy’s Day all over the world and Happy National Unity Day in Italy! Here are today’s deals on iOS, Mac, and Mac App Store apps that are on sale for a limited time, so get ‘em while they’re hot!
New “If You Don’t Have An iPhone” Ads Feature Apple’s Three E-Commerce Stores
Apple has today added three new adverts for the iPhone to their website and YouTube which have the general theme of “If you don’t have an iPhone” and what you miss out on. The three specific features that the ad’s highlight are the App Store, iPod + iTunes and iBooks which highlight Apple’s strong integration between the iPhone and their three e-commerce stores.
Jump the break to watch the three 30 second ad’s which also all finish with the “Yup, if you don’t have an iPhone, well, you don’t have an iPhone.” phrase - which in typical Apple style is a little self-congratulatory (which you either like or dislike).
WordPress for iOS Updated, Quashes Bugs and Improves UI
The WordPress iPhone and iPad app just got updated to version 2.7 and it’s a big bug-quashing update that supposedly fixes 117 bugs to vastly improve performance and reduce crashes.
UI has also been retooled with the ‘Post Editor’ interface improved to “make it easier to write and edit posts and pages” with quick access to edit post settings, view attachments and add media. Finally multiple attatchments can be added simultaneously, you can use the “pull down to refresh” feature to quickly update comments, posts and page lists and email and URLs left in comments are now able to be clicked on.
[Via WordPress Blog]
#MacStoriesDeals - Wednesday
Here are today’s deals on iOS, Mac, and Mac App Store apps that are on sale for a limited time, so get ‘em while they’re hot!