iOS - page 87

Meet Dave. Here he is. Dave Pell. He writes one of the best internet newsletters there is, and now his newsletter is an app called NextDraft.

We’ve been talking about it for several weeks, and today, Evernote 5 makes its public debut on the Mac — exactly a week after touching down on iOS. This mammoth update brings over 100 new features, in addition to a swanky new user interface. The whole thing has been “re-imagined” to make it more accessible and more useful than ever before.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was at the Churchill Club in Santa Clara this week to be interviewed by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman. One of the most interesting subjects he talked about was Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform, and how it compares to its two main rivals, Apple’s iOS, and Google’s Android.

As you might expect, he didn’t have many good things to say about his competitors. In fact, he called Android “wild” and “uncontrolled,” before saying the iPhone is too expensive and too controlled. Windows Phone, he feels, sits in a sweet spot between the two.

Hello, reader. while you’ve obviously found a source of news you like for Apple-related info, where do you go for non Apple-related news? (I know: “If it’s not Apple-related, I don’t wanna read it!” But just bear with me here).

Expedia launched an all new updated mobile app today for both Android and iOS. Bringing new flight info, an updated interface to browse and search across hundreds of hotel properties and airline flights, and special mobile-only deals. The updated app is only available in the US at this time, and brings functionality closer in line with Expedia’s web-based features.

Telltale Games today announced that the season finale, Episode 5 of Walking Dead The Game, “No Time Left,” is slated to launch on all platforms next week, November 20th. This will be the first episode that comes out simultaneously on console, Mac, iOS, and PC. This is the final episode of critically acclaimed episodic game based on Robert Kirkman’s comic series, The Walking Dead.

To say Samsung and Apple have a strained relationship would be quite the understatement. A once symbiotic partnership has turned into an all out war over claims of patent infringement and design copying. Their global legal battles have disgusted enough judges and consumers to spawn serious debate over the current status of our patent system and a call for reform.

Apple’s new Maps app leaves a lot to be desired, and while there are some decent alternatives out there, the only worthy replacement for Apple Maps is either Google Maps or Nokia’s Maps. Neither company has an iOS app ready to go just yet, but Nokia is planning to change all that.

In a few weeks Nokia plans to release a maps app for iOS called Here. The app will be free for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch owners, and Nokia is hoping that it will persuade some iOS users to try out their smartphones as well.

Despite losing some of the tablet marketshare to Android tablets this year, the iPad and iPhone are still the two most popular non-PC devices to watch video on. A new study on video monetization conducted by FreeWheel found that Apple iOS devices make up more than 60% of all non-PC/Mac video viewing.

Even though Android tablets and smartphones have seen major gains, they’re still a work in progress and their users don’t consume media as heavily as iOS users.

This is Curiosity, a free iOS game from British gaming icon Peter Molyneux. The idea is that all of us – everyone playing the game – work together to peel off layers of cubelets that make up the larger revolving cube. At the center, a surprise (and a prize) awaits the person lucky enough, and determined enough, to tap on it at the end.

Only two people in the whole world know what’s at the center. Do you care what it is? Do you care enough to spend hours tapping on your iDevice to find out? No, really: hours.

There are plenty of USB-capable guitars. But there aren’t many $200 USB guitars. Now, you can not only get a USB Stratocaster for the price of a terrible Android tablet, but it actually comes from Fender — albeit under the Squier diffusion brand. But whatever, right? It’s a Strat, and you can hook it straight up to GarageBand and play it through some of the sweet (not Fender either) amps.

Call of Duty: Black Ops II launched today, and with it comes a new update to the Call of Duty Elite app for iOS. In addition to support for the latest game, the app brings an “all-new iPad experience,” which includes a new feature called Elite TV that allows you to live-stream Black Ops II gameplay and multiplayer guides.

It’s been almost a month since Apple began shipping the iPhone 5, and we’re still waiting for some of the biggest apps to be updated for its larger 4-inch display. Fortunately, as of today, eBay and Skype are not longer on that list.

Spotlight is, in my opinion, one of the most underrated features of iOS. I know so many people who don’t use it, yet I find it indispensable when it comes to searching for emails, notes, contacts, and apps I’ve hidden in a folder somewhere. And with SLightEnhancerSearch, a new tweak for jailbroken iOS devices, it’s even better.

SLightEnhancerSearch enhances Spotlight by introducing the ability to search YouTube, Twitter, Amazon, the App Store, and lots more — right from your home screen.

Wonderful Day is a different sort of one-dollar reminders app. It’s there to remind you of the things you’d like to get done, not the things you have to do. Although it sports an attractive visual design, it suffers from a handful of crucial failings that make it less useful than it could be.

After being stripped of his position as senior vice president of iOS software, Scott Forstall will now server as an advisor to Tim Cook until he leaves Apple in 2013. While we can’t be certain why he’s really leaving the Cupertino company, rumor has it he’s been axed for refusing to apologize for the half-baked Maps app in iOS 6, and his fiery personality that often upsets others in the Apple camp.

However, Michael Lopp, a director at Palantir and a former senior engineer at Apple, believes firing Forstall was a big mistake. Lopp believes that Forstall “was the best approximation of Steve Jobs that Apple had left.”

Every so often, an iOS developer attempts to make a quick buck by creating a simple app, naming it after a hugely popular jailbreak tweak, then releasing it in the App Store with the same logo and screenshots. That’s exactly what JB Solutions has done with IntelliScreenX, a $0.99 app that promises to be the ultimate notification center for your lock screen. In reality, it’s nothing more than a nasty alarm clock.

Microsoft’s awesome Xbox app for iOS got a major update this week, and it’s kicking off this week’s must-have apps roundup. It’s accompanied by another great update to Clear, a terrific list-management tool; plus a nifty counting app for iPhone, and a new photography app that lets you apply awesome effects to your photos.

As you might have guessed, Rovio’s latest App Store release, Angry Birds Star Wars, kicks off this week’s must-have games roundup. It’s accompanied by a gorgeous action RPG called Wraithborne, a new word game from EA, and a great side-scrolling platformer called Storm the Train.

Mike Schramm writes about technology and games for Joystiq and TUAW during the week. He’s also a pretty decent guy. He also finds it fun to code on the weekends. I know, it makes no sense to me, either.

Schramm has just released his second iOS game to the iTunes app store, and it’s called Benediction. Actually, the full name is Benediction – a game by Mike Schramm, a name most likely necessitated by the many other apps out there with a version of the word ‘benediction’ in the title.

Benediction has three things going for it. Those three things got me to download the game, then play the game, then continue playing the game until I was forced to set my iPhone down and actually do some work. This is a great game, and you’ll be sad if you don’t check it out for yourself.

Readers of a … certain age. Will remember. The way William … Shatner. Used to talk. On Star Trek. Few of you will have … wished to make poetry that sounds. Like. That. On your iPhones. But now … you. Can. My God, Bones. My God.

Apple’s Find My iPhone service is often used to locate thieves who have stolen iOS devices, but it can also be a life saver. A 17-year-old was air lifted to hospital on Friday, November 2, following a car accident in Santa Barbara, California. But if it wasn’t for Find My iPhone, paramedics would have struggled to find him.

Have you ever purchased an iPad from Walmart, then got it home and found its box was battered, or worse, the device itself was smashed? It probably happens a lot in Pikeville, Kentucky, where employees at one Walmart store have fun with Apple’s latest tablet by throwing new units around the stock room.

And if that wasn’t stupid enough, they also recorded themselves doing it for a video that explains “why you don’t buy an iPad from Walmart.”

After being bombarded with requests, Pinterest is finally going to allow users to create private boards. Pinterest is calling them “Secret Boards” and rolling them out in hopes that users will use them to create their holiday shopping lists. I’d call that wishful thinking, since we all know what those “Secret Boards” are really going to be used for.

Questions is a video ask-and-answer community for iOS. A bit like a video version of Quora – although where Quora encourages thoughtful discourse and discussion, Questions is all about brevity and snappiness. You only get 10 seconds to ask a question or submit an answer.