Alex Heath - page 82

Apple just announced that Siri Dictation will be implemented systemwide in OS X Mountain Lion. The feature will be integrated across the OS, “even in apps like Microsoft Word.” A small dialog box with the Siri mic appears when you want to dictate.

“Now in Mountain Lion you can share right from the app where you’re working. There’s a share button on the toolbar.” Like iOS, you can share files and media with social networks like Twitter and Flickr, or send something directly to AirDrop. Want to send a tweet? Do it directly in the OS. Facebook integration will also be present in Mountain Lion.

Open browser tabs will be synced with iCloud across devices, and there’s a “Do Not Disturb” option for Notification Center.

Craig Federighi took the stage after Phil Schiller at WWDC today to talk everything Mac. OS X Lion has been a wild success, and 40% of all Mac users run the operating system 9 months later. 26 million copies have been shipped exclusively through the Mac App Store.

There are 60 million Mac users around the world, and Apple’s market share has been rising exponentially in the desktop space over the past few years. The rest of the PC industry has seen a decline in sales.

“iCloud has taken off like a rocket with over 125 million registered users,” said Federighi. Apple also ran through tentpole features of OS X Mountain Lion that were revealed in the developer preview months ago. Some new features, such as Siri Dictation, were also announced.

Following the announcement of the revolutionary new MacBook Pro with Retina display, Apple has updated a score of OS X apps for the new screen resolution. Final Cut X can now be viewed in full 1080p on the new Pro’s 2880 x 1800 display. Professional apps like Autodesk and Adobe Photoshop will support the 220 ppi screen right out of the gate.

Mail, Safari, iMovie, iPhoto and more apps have also been updated. And… wait for it…. Diablo III is ready for Retina on the Mac. O yes.

Apple will ship a Retina-ready version of OS X Lion with the new MacBook Pro when it ships. Non-Retina apps will be pixel-doubled automatically.

Following a refresh to the MacBook Air lineup, Apple’s Phil Schiller unveiled a revamped MacBook Pro today at WWDC12. The updated machine boasts Intel Ivy Bridge 2.7GHz (turbo boosted up to 3.7GHz), USB 3.0, Nvidia GeForce GT 650m graphics, and 7 hours of battery life.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro spec upgrade costs $1199, while the 15-inch will sell for $1499. The 15-inch is offered in $1799 and $2199 models with beefier quad-core chips. The outwards design of these upgraded MacBook Pros have stayed the same.

Apple CEO Tim Cook took the stage at WWDC12 and kicked things off with some numbers. The App Store currently boasts 400 million accounts, making it the largest and “most vibrant app ecosystem on the planet.” There are over 650,000 apps in the App Store, and 225,000 are made for the iPad.

Apple has seen a staggering 30 billion App Store downloads since the store’s launch in 2008, and third-party developers have been paid a “mind-boggling” $5 billion.

The App Store is available in 120 countries around the world, and Apple is adding 32 more countries today.

“Nothing makes us happier than to see hundreds of thousands of developers around the world using our hardware and software to share their ideas,” said Tim Cook. “It’s becoming an economy in and of itself.”

Whether it’s for new products or routine maintenance, Apple’s online store goes down from time to time. Today, for example, the store went down ahead of Apple’s WWDC keynote that’s set to begin within the hour. When the store comes back online, expect new products, like updated MacBook Pros, to show up in Apple’s inventory.

Have you ever wondered what happens behind the scenes when the Apple online store goes down? Well, even Apple’s own engineers in Cupertino don’t know what new products are coming next.

Apple is set to launch its 2012 ‘Back to School’ promotion soon, according to the rumor mill this morning. With the purchase of a new iPad, educational customers will be eligible to receive a free $50 iTunes gift card. A new Mac purchase will come with a $100 gift card.

Apple’s WWDC keynote is starting in less than two hours, and the company is expected to unveil iOS 6 and new Mac hardware.

It’s almost here, folks. One of the biggest events of the year for an Apple fan is today, June 11th. Tim Cook, Phil Schiller and others will be taking the stage at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in sunny San Francisco at 10 A.M. Pacific/ 1 P.M. Eastern.

We’re expecting a whole lot of announcements from Apple tomday, so stay tuned to Cult of Mac for breaking coverage all day, and especially starting at 10/1 Pacific/Eastern, when our live-blogging coverage of the keynote will commence.

Thousands of developers will be crammed into the Moscone Center this morning to watch Apple talk about new products like iOS 6, Mountain Lion, and possibly some new Macs. It’s going to be a very busy, exciting day. We can’t wait!

Don’t expect Apple to stream today’s keynote live, but keep hitting refresh on Cult of Mac for breaking news stories all day, plus post-keynote reactions. Apple usually posts a video recording of the keynote a few hours later, and we’ll have that live as soon as it’s up, along with a 90-second video recap for you impatient types. To whet your appetite, check out our complete roundup of what to expect from Apple at WWDC 2012 and our history of Apple product announcements at WWDC from the past decade.

Image: James Martin/CNET

Tim Cook gave his first major interview since becoming Apple CEO at the AllThingsD conference last month, and the full video interview with Cook has now been made available.

Clocking in at 1 hour and 40 minutes, Cook’s interview with Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg tackles all kinds of topics, including the state of Apple post-Steve Jobs, upcoming products, China labor practices, and more.

Apple’s unveiling of its next major operating system, iOS 6, is right around the corner. Scott Forstall and Co. are expected to announce the new OS to developers at WWDC next week. Very little is actually known about iOS 6, but there have been some rumors that made headlines over the last few months.

iOS 6 looks to be an evolutionary upgrade from iOS 5, rather than a revolutionary jump forward. Here’s what we expect to see.

Chinese forum WeiPhone.com has posted alleged download links to Apple’s iOS 6 and Safari 6 developer preview files ahead of WWDC tomorrow. Apple is expected to introduce the software on Monday, June 11th and release a preview to developers. The links provided by WeiPhone are currently inactive, but they will assumedly start serving iOS 6 and Safari 6 beta downloads for supported iOS devices once Apple lifts the curtain tomorrow.

I’ve never been particularly interested in theming iOS on my jailbroken iPhone. Apple’s stock iOS design is simplistic and efficient. The last thing anyone wants is to look at an over-designed interface every day.

With that said, I’ve also been wanting a change of pace recently. With iOS 6 on the near horizon, I’ve been looking for beautiful and interesting jailbreak themes to switch things up on iOS 5.1.1. It just so happens that one of the most gorgeous themes ever made was just released in Cydia.

More good news for those of you attending WWDC next week. Apple just announced the speakers for its lunchtime sessions, and a couple of celebrities will be giving talks.

Namely, Hollywood director/producer J.J. Abrams and actor LeVar Burton will be giving presentations on storytelling through technology and creative inspiration.

Following the privacy fiasco surrounding iOS user tracking and Apple’s deprecation of the UDID, a report today says that the company is planning to release a new tool for developers that aids in tracking app users. According to The Wall Street Journal, the software tool’s “new anonymous identifier is likely to rely on a sequence of numbers that isn’t tied to a specific device.”

Earlier today we showed you the email Apple marketing VP Phil Schiller sent in response to Apple removing Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil Speakers Touch app from the App Store. Yanking the app caused quite the stir, as Rogue Amoeba was accused of misusing Apple’s AirPlay API to receive audio to an iOS device.

Schiller said that Rogue Amoeba used AirPlay functionality without proper licensing, and the Airfoil Speakers Touch makers have responded to Schiller with more points of their own.

Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) has been a staple event for the company since since the turn of the 21st century. The first ever WWDC was held in 1983, but it wasn’t until 2002 that Apple started using the conference as a major launchpad for new products. Since then, Steve Jobs and Co. have unveiled products like the Power Mac G5, Mac Pro, iPhone, and plenty of software. Because WWDC has always been a developer-focused conference, Apple uses the event to announce new apps, OS X versions, major iOS updates, etc. For an Apple fan, it doesn’t get much better than WWDC.

With WWDC 2012 set to kick off on Monday, June 11th, we decided to take a look back at the big announcements Apple made at WWDC over the past decade.

The wedge design of the MacBook Air has been patented by Apple, meaning that the Cupertino company now owns the rights to “the distinctive wedge or teardrop profile” of the sexy notebook. Apple’s D296 patent means that the MacBook Air has solidified the tapered, wedge-like design for its class of computer.

Instead of focusing on concrete details, the new patent covers the general aesthetic of the MacBook Air’s design. Over the past year or so, dozens of laptops, dubbed “Ultrabooks,” have been copying the metallic look and feel of the Air. Could this new patent mean that Apple is setting its legal sights on Ultrabook competitors?

Apple offers a number of search engines for iOS users, including Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft Bing. According to a new report today, Apple will be adding Baidu search engine support for iPhone owners in China as early as next week. The feature will likely be announced alongside other iOS 6 announcements at WWDC.

Baidu is basically the Google of China, owning 80% of the market there while Google only owns 17%. It’s not surprising that Apple would want to support the largest search engine in the iPhone and iPad’s fastest growing market. Not to mention that this is another move that pushes a certain company farther away from iOS.

Rogue Amoeba’s AirFoil Speakers Touch app was recently pulled from the App Store by Apple without any notice. Before getting yanked, the app was updated with an “Enhanced Audio Receiving” feature that essentially turned an iOS device into an AirPlay audio receiver. Apple didn’t like Rogue Amoeba’s use of receiving audio through AirPlay, and the company released a short comment saying “Apps that use non-public APIs will be rejected.” That was it.

The good news is that AirFoil Speakers Touch is back in the App Store after a back and forth with Apple. The bad news is that the newest app version is missing the aforementioned AirPlay audio feature. According to Rogue Amoeba, Apple reps admitted that the whole situation was “poorly handled” on their end.

Yesterday we told you that Apple is getting ready to breathe life into the Mac Pro at WWDC next week, and today more specs for the upcoming machine have been allegedly revealed. It’s been nearly two years since Apple introduced a new Mac Pro, and there are plenty of internal upgrades that need to be made for it to be considered a computer that meets professional standards.

Apple will finally bring its Thunderbolt I/O architecture to the Mac Pro this year, as well as some other major improvements.

Chipset maker Qualcomm today announced its plans for a universal LTE chip that would be perfect for a truly 4G iPhone. Apple’s next iPhone is rumored to feature 4G LTE networking, and Qualcomm’s upcoming chip would allow the device to operate on AT&T and Verizon’s 700 MHz 4G LTE bands. Phones haven’t been able to support multiple blocks of spectrum on the 700 MHz band, but Qualcomm’s upcoming chip would allow a smartphone to take full advantage of LTE speeds on multiple carriers.

Good news for fans of the popular Sparrow Mac/iPhone email client: the app is coming to the iPad. The makers of Sparrow have posted a new teaser page for their iPad app with the tagline, “We are preparing something bigger.”

Everyone is encouraged to enter their email and signup to know when the app will be released. No other details have been provided about the app. A jailbreak tweak

Sparrow caused quite the stir recently when it announced that it would have to charge users for push notifications on the iPhone. Sparrow is available in the Mac App Store for $10 and on the iPhone for $3.

Thanks: Matt

With the MacBook Pro, Air and iMac lineups all expected to see a refresh at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference next week, it looks like the seemingly-abanonded Mac Pro will also be updated. Apple has begun pulling Mac Pro stock from its retail stores and online shipping estimates are also starting to slip. This type of activity is typical right before a new version of an Apple product is announced, as Apple clears out its old inventory to make room for the new.

The Mac Pro saw its last refresh in July of 2010, and many have begun to lose faith that Apple will continue to support its ‘pro’ users as the company transitions to being more consumer-oriented. It would seem that we can all be hopeful for the future of the Mac Pro, as the machine is about to see its first refresh in nearly two years.

Apple today released a very minor update for the second and third-gen Apple TV. iOS 5.0.2 is available now, and the release follows version 5.0.1 released for the Apple TV on May 10th.

No new changes have been provided for 5.0.2 other than, “Addresses an issue which caused content restrictions to be incorrectly applied for the iTunes Store in Australia.” You can download the update now on your Apple TV set-top box.

It’s been rumored that Apple will unveil a totally new Apple TV OS to developers at WWDC. We’ll have to wait and see what Apple announces at Moscone next week.

Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference is set to kick off next Monday with a media keynote, and signage for the conference is already being put up. We expected the banners to start going up Friday afternoon, but Apple has started decorating earlier than normal.

Thousands of developers will fill the Moscone Center in San Francisco, California all next week, and Apple is expected to unveil iOS 6, new Macs, and some other surprises. It’s going to be a wild week!

Update: We’ve gotten more pics from the Moscone Center for you to check out.