iPadOS 13 introduced native support for opening multiple windows of the same app side by side. Now, seven months after iPadOS 13.1 officially shipped to users, Microsoft has started beta-testing the ability for iPad users to do this on Word and PowerPoint for iPad.
Microsoft shared the news in a blog post detailing how users can “take advantage” of the new (for Microsoft) feature. Here’s how you do it:
It's been almost eight years since the last iMac redesign. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
A redesigned iMac, a more affordable HomePod, and a powerful new Apple TV are just some of the products Apple has planned for 2020, according to one reliable reporter.
Bloomberg’sMark Gurman also revealed expectations for the 5G iPhone lineup, scheduled to launch this fall, and for a 14-inch MacBook Pro during a Twitter Q&A with followers on Tuesday.
One of the best keyboards money can buy for iPad Pro now comes with a built-in trackpad. The Brydge Pro+ is one of the first to truly embrace mouse support in iPadOS. And it costs a lot less than Apple’s official Magic Keyboard, which won’t debut until May.
Like almost every other Brydge keyboard I’ve used, this one delivers a terrific typing experience that you can rely on every day. It feels superbly comfortable, and it’s brilliantly designed. It makes your iPad feel like a MacBook in the most elegant way possible.
Despite all that — and my appreciation for Brydge as a company — it’s really hard for me to recommend the Pro+. It gets so many things right, but completely misses the mark where it really matters. Here’s my full Brydge Pro+ review after several weeks of use.
UPDATE: February 25, 2021: Brydge is currently preparing a big firmware update for the Pro+ that promises to eliminate its trackpad issues for good by adding native multitouch gestures. That means the Pro+ will soon offer exactly the same functionality as Apple’s own Magic Keyboard.
We have yet been able to test that firmware update, but we have heard that it lives up to Brydge’s promises. Bear that in mind before reading the rest of our original review below.
A new way to interact with apps. Photo: Alexander Käßner
This brilliant new iPadOS concept imagines a spectacular “main menu” concept that would change the way we interact with iPad apps.
The feature, designed by Alexander Käßner, would allow for cleaner apps and a standardized method of accessing common functions. It works much like the toolbar every Mac user is familiar with.
Apple may give us brand-new wallpaper options in iOS 14. Photo: DongleBookPro
The latest iOS 14 leaks hint that new wallpaper settings and Home screen widgets are coming to iPhone and iPad.
Apple is expected to separate its default backgrounds into categories. It also might give users the ability to place real widgets anywhere they like on their Home screen — a feature Android has had for more than a decade.
It will be essential for those who rely on a VPN. Photo: VPN Unlimited
Apple will roll out an iOS 13.4.1 update this week to fix a VPN bug on iPhone and iPad, according to a new report out Tuesday.
An earlier investigation revealed a security flaw in Apple’s most recent iOS releases that prevents virtual private networks from encrypting all traffic. The issue can cause data and IP addresses to be exposed.
It's not the LIDAR cam that makes the new iPad Pro magical.... Photo: @YSR50
This week on The CultCast: Forget the A12Z and LiDAR Scanner, it’s iPadOS and the new Magic Keyboard that just supercharged the iPad Pro — we discuss! Plus, we’ll tell you the best new features in iOS 13.4. And Tim Cook, aka The Cookie, uses Apple’s massive supply chain prowess to deliver hugely needed supplies for medical workers — we got the story for ya right here!
Our thanks to LinkedIn for supporting this episode. A business is only as strong as its people, and every hire matters. So head to LinkedIn.com/cultcast and get a $50 credit toward your first job post.
Dark Mode is one of many features of the iOS 13 SDK. But devs have extra time to adopt it. Photo: Apple
Apple moved back a deadline to prevent iPhone and iPad developers from posting software updates to the App Store built with out-of-date tools. Developers now have three more months to upgrade.
Apple’s newest iPad Pro will begin landing on customers’ doorsteps Wednesday, March 25. Will it be worth their hard-earned cash? Let’s find out from reviewers who already have their hands on one.
Unsurprisingly, the 2020 iPad Pro is already being dubbed Apple’s best tablet yet. It improves upon an already winning formula with a LiDAR Scanner, Ultra Wide camera, and faster connectivity.
Some still bemoan missing features in iPadOS. When it comes to the hardware, however, there’s very little to complain about.
It’s now possible for developers to make their apps available as a universal purchase. Apple enabled the change on Monday, paving the way for macOS, iOS, tvOS, and watchOS apps to be bundled as one.
Apple is not forcing developers to use universal purchases. It does hope, however, that the move will promote the use of Catalyst for porting iPad apps over to Mac.
There's a temporary workaround, but no fix yet. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Mac
Apple is aware of Personal Hotspot problems some users are facing after updating to iOS 13, according to a report published Saturday.
The company reportedly distributed an internal document to Authorized Service Providers acknowledging the issue. There is no fix for the problem yet, but there is a temporary workaround users can employ in the meantime.
Craig Federighi and new iPad features? What more could you want? Photo: Apple
Apple is bringing true trackpad support (and improved mouse support) to the iPad. Get ready to enjoy it by learning all the new gestures from Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering.
In a new video released by Apple Wednesday, Federighi demonstrates the improvements and shows how simple swipes can help you access Control Center, switch between apps in Slide Over, return to the Home screen, and more.
Apple’s brilliant new Magic Keyboard is going to make working on iPad Pro better than ever before — but what if you don’t own an iPad Pro? Logitech has you covered with its new Combo Touch keyboard case.
Just like the Magic Keyboard, the Combo Touch boasts real, backlit keys and a built-in trackpad. Unlike the Magic Keyboard, it also offers functions keys, and it’s pretty affordable at just $149.
Everything we wanted the Smart Keyboard to be. Photo: Apple
Apple’s exciting new Magic Keyboard is going to make working on iPad Pro better than ever when the accessory debuts in May. It’s a huge improvement over the Smart Keyboard Folio in so many ways.
Prices start at $299, which makes the Magic Keyboard an expensive upgrade. For many iPad Pro users, however, it will be well worth it. Here are five reasons why the Magic Keyboard with trackpad blows our minds.
The new Magic Keyboard looks incredible. Photo: Apple
The surprise iPad Pro refresh, unveiled on Wednesday morning, has us all reaching for a credit cards. If you’re still on the fence, Apple’s awesome new ads will convince you this is a worthwhile upgrade.
Both highlight iPad Pro’s increasing ability to replace a traditional computer thanks to its blazing-fast A12Z Bionic processor, brand-new Magic Keyboard, and true trackpad support.
iOS 14's Home screen could be very different. Photo: Apple
iOS 14 will ship with a brand-new Home screen layout that allows users to arrange icons in a list, according to a new report. The view is expected to be customizable and will incorporate Siri Suggestions for making your most frequently used apps easier to access.
It could be the biggest change to the Home screen since the first version of iOS debuted with the original iPhone in 2007.
iPad multitasking, Split Screen and all that stuff, has been getting a bad rap recently, and rightly so. It’s a mess. But amidst this storm of iPad hatred, there’s one great feature that stays great: Slide Over. On the iPad, Slide Over lets you dock a mini, iPhone-size version of an app over on the right side of the screen. You can swipe this away to hide it, and swipe again to bring it back out.
That’s cool, and very handy (as we shall see in a moment). But even better is that you can dock a whole bunch of apps over there, ready to use, and then fan out the stack to help pick the one you want. Let’s take a look. You’re going to love this.
Dark Mode is one of many features made possible by the iOS 13 SDK. Photo: Apple
Apple warned developers today that it’ll soon automatically reject any iPhone or iPad software submitted to the App Store if it wasn’t written with the iOS 13 SDK.
Even the Magic Mouse combines touch, drag and drop better than the iPad. Photo: Harpal Singh/Unsplash
The iPad added drag and drop in iOS 11. We’re now on the third version of iOS to support this potentially super-useful feature, and yet it still doesn’t work. Third-party app support remains spotty and inconsistent. And, worse, drag and drop doesn’t work properly even in some of Apple’s own apps.
On the Mac, hot corners are essential — and amazingly useful. You can put your display to sleep, trigger Mission Control and more, just by flicking the mouse to a screen corner. If you’re one of those people who likes to use a mouse with your iPad, you can utilize these same flick-to-activate gestures on the tablet. And there’s a bonus: Hot corners on the iPad are way, way more powerful than on the Mac.
Get ready for scroll-bar scrubbing. Photo: Cult of Mac
We all know how to scroll through long documents or lists on iOS, right? You swipe on the screen, and then keep doing it, over and over, as fast as possible, like some kind of maniac. And, at some point in the future, you will probably arrive at the other end of the list. Scrolling to the very top is easy — just touch the top of the screen. But in iOS 13, you can grab the scroll bar that appears on the right side of the screen, and use it to navigate.
This is a really, really useful feature. Here’s how it works.
Split View is great, but it's way too hard to use. Photo: Charlie Sorrel/Cult of Mac
Apparently, some people really hate multitasking on the iPad. It’s easy to see why. All you have to do is accidentally drag a link in Safari, instead of just tapping on it, and you end up with a split-screen view, with that link in its own window. And getting rid of that window is a huge pain, even if you know how to do it.
Fortunately for people who hate iPad multitasking — which isn’t really multitasking, but is Apple’s term for the confusion of multiple-window views on iPadOS — Apple lets you turn off the feature. Here’s how to disable iPad multitasking (and why you might not want to).
Have you upgraded yet? Photo: Ian Fuchs/Cult of Mac
Apple’s big iOS 13 update has now made its way to an impressive 70% of all iPhones and 57% of all iPads, Cupertino’s latest data reveals.
Just 23% of Apple smartphones are running iOS 12, while a mere 7% are running an earlier version of its software. A whopping 77% of all devices introduced in the last four years have been upgraded.
The iPad changed mobile computing forever. Photo: Andrea Nepori
There were tablet computers before the iPad, but they were thick plastic laptops with the screens reversed, with awful, bendy TFT screens. The first iPad seems thick and clunky now, compared to the latest ultra-thin iPads Pro, but at the time it felt like a slice of the future.
When Steve Jobs introduced the iPad a decade ago today, some critics wrote it off as “just a big iPhone.” The only thing was, a lot of people really wanted a big iPhone. And ultimately, the iPad changed mobile computing as we know it.
More terrifying than a blank Pages document. Photo: Charlie Sorrel/Cult of Mac
iOS 13 and iPadOS added official support for adding fonts to your iPhone and iPad. You’ve been able to do it for a while, using third-party apps that hack their way around the problem using software configuration profiles to install typefaces on your system. If you’d like to learn how to download fonts on iPad, check out this detailed guide.
And you can still use those. In fact, you may have to, as we’ll see in a moment. But now you can also install fonts from the App Store, as well as previewing them in a new built-in panel. Let’s take a look.