iPhone - page 243

Most Mac users will experience one of three reactions after reading the word “Rosetta.”

The first involves breaking into a cold sweat, and possibly hives, after remembering that Apple no longer supports the translator that ran all those old, useful apps written for PowerPC-based Macs after Apple switched over to Intel chips.

Option two, imagining the Rosetta Stone itself, the magical key to unlocking ancient script, stumbled upon by Napoleon’s troops

Or there’s an association with foreign phrases, mall carts and almost certainly the most recognizable name in language software, Rosetta Stone.

We’re focusing on that last one here, and about how Rosetta Stone has finally brought their language software, in the form of the Navigator series apps, to the iPhone — for free.

EveryThink, an amazing get-it-all-done-and-in-one-place app, has just updated to version 1.3.1, bringing a host of improvements to an already pretty great app.

The new update adds Dropbox to the already existing Google Drive support, meeting invitations from within the app itself, Siri Reminder integration, and Facebook support, which brings contact photos and Facebook calendar events in automatically.

New usability features have also been added, including a guided introduction to the many features of the EveryThink app, as well as landscape orientation, so you can hold your iPhone the way you want to and still use the spatial organization central to the app’s interface.

Over at The New York Times, Bits columnist Nick Bilton has a gripe to pick with Apple. He doesn’t like the fact that push notifications keep pouring in during a voice call on the iPhone. “Even when the device is placed on mute, it vibrates when a notification comes in, rattling your skull for a never-ending second,” says Bilton.

I had never actually thought about this annoyance until I read Bilton’s piece. And coincidentally, it actually happened to me while I was on the phone earlier today. I remember quickly pulling my iPhone away from my face in shock at the vibration and loud noise in my ear.

This seems like something that should be fixed. What say you? Should Apple say hasta la vista to notifications during phone calls in iOS 7? Let us know in the comments below!

Passbook is cool, and one of the neat features of the service is the automatic refresh of information on your passes, letting you keep track of stuff like your Starbuck’s balance, or airline miles, or other kinds of cool stuff.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t always work automatically. This can be an issue if they include balances or loyalty points, right? Luckily you can refresh each of the passes in Passbook manually.

Here’s how to do that.

Peter Belanger is a San Francisco-based photographer. You’ve never heard of him, but you’ve definitely seen his work. He’s the guy that makes Apple products look so perfect in every Apple ad, so if you’ve seen an ad for an iPhone, iPad, or iPod within the last few years, you’re probably very familiar with Peter’s work.

In a recent interview Peter talked about his creative process with commercial photography. Finding the perfect lighting for each surface of a product is the ultimate challenge, but Peter explained what the creative process is like when working on an Apple product shoot.

Over the last few months developers and websites haven’t seen much iOS 7 beta traffic coming out of Apple’s set of IP addresses in Cupertino. However, over the last few days traffic from devices running iOS 7 has increased for a number of websites and apps.

Onswipe has reported that it has seen a big spike in traffic on its partner sites that run its HTML5 optimized mobile websites. Cult of Mac has seen the number of visits from iOS 7 users increase in our traffic logs, starting around April 29th as well.

T-Mobile finally started selling the iPhone back in April, and it has already been a successful move. In its financial report for the first quarter of 2013, which was published this week, the carrier reveals that it sold half a million iPhones in less than a month.

Cute and practical, that’s the Itomaki adapter from Softbank. The charger is shaped like a kind of smoothed-off cotton reel, and – surprise – lets you wrap the charger cable around it when not in use.

Samsung loves bashing its competitors, and it often does so in advertisements for new Galaxy products. So it’s no surprise that the Korean company has programmed its S Voice assistant to bash the iPhone. Ask it if it’s ever used Apple’s popular smartphone and S Voice delivers a scolding response.

If you’re going to make an iPhone stand that slips onto a keyring, you may as well make it look like a key, amirite? Right? Hello?

Ok, so that part of the design is a little dumb, but the Keyprop itself is pretty ingenious, especially the way it manages to work with both the iPhones 4 and 5.

Eton’s new BoostSolar a) is here just in time for sunny summer and b) solves many of the problems usually present in solar chargers. It also looks pretty cool, and less like the utili-hippy designs beloved of rivals.

Apple’s Passbook app and system lets you use passes that contain time-sensitive or location-sensitive information. For example, you might have a pass that triggers when you enter a specific store, like Target. Or, you might have airplane tickets going through Passbook, if you use that specific airline’s iOS app.

The ideal here is that the passes show up on your lock screen, so you don’t have to launch an app. This doesn’t always work, however. What can you do when it doesn’t? I’m glad you asked.

After giving Gmail some link support for Chrome, YouTube and Google Maps yesterday, Google is now ready to help developers integrate Chrome for iOS into their apps.

Google just published a new blog post reminding developers of some new Chrome integration tools for iOS developers that will let users open a webpage in Chrome and then come back to the app with just a tap. Despite iOS’s closed system that doesn’t let users set a default browser, the new Chrome tools will let users have the choice to open a link in Safari or Chrome.

Apple has been facing a number of privacy issues and lawsuits in the U.S. for the last year or so, but things aren’t going any better abroad either. A German court ruled that Apple will have to change some of its practices for how it handles consumer data.

The Berlin court recently struck down 8 of 15 provisions Apple’s listed in its general data-use terms. The court found that the 8 terms deviate too much from German laws because Apple is asking for “global consent” to use consumer data without telling them how the data will be used.

The Boingo app for iOS now allows users to buy Wi-Fi using in-app purchases that are charged to your iTunes account. It makes it quicker and easier to get connected on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch, and means you no longer have to navigate Boingo’s website.

Foxconn has been forced to make preparations for life after Apple following reduced demand for the iPhone and other iOS devices which has caused the company’s revenue to nosedive, The New York Times reports.

The manufacturer has been doing well off the back of Apple’s hugely successful devices in recent years, which have been contributing at least 40% of its revenue, according to analyst estimates. But after suffering a 19.2% drop in revenue during the first quarter of the year, thanks to declining iPhone and iPad orders, Foxconn is now looking at ways in which it can be less reliant on Apple.

I want to call Kenny Jahng right now, didn’t you?

Source: Tim Cox’s Instagram

Remember when people were wandering around idiotically saying the iPhone was a total failure in Japan?

Yup, pretty stupid, but it’s true that, at first, the iPhone didn’t catch on in Japan, and that was a problem for Apple, because Japan is the country where gadgets rule.

So what changed Apple’s fortunes in Japan? Women!

Rovio has launched a new service called Rovio Accounts, which allows you to pick up your saved games on any mobile device. So if you complete ten Angry Birds levels on your Android smartphone, you’ll see the same progress when you login on your iPad.

Rovio Accounts isn’t just compatible with Angry Birds, but other titles from Rovio as well. The service will initially launch worldwide inside The Croods, as well as in the original Angry Birds game for iOS in Finland and Poland.

Despite announcing the sequel to its hit game Plants vs Zombies last year, PopCap still hasn’t gotten around to releasing Plants vs Zombies 2. The “late-Spring 2013” release period PopCap originally promised is about to pass by, so they’ve officially announced that the new game is coming out this July.

Four years have passed since the release of the first Plants vs Zombies, which means we should get a treasure trove of new features, weapons, plants, and zombies once the game hits. We haven’t seen any gameplay footage, but we’re sure it’s going to be great. It has to be. And to make up for the long drought, PopCap says it’s also going to release a spinoff game called Plants vs Zombies Adventures that can be played though Facebook.

Here’s a new trailer for Plants vs Zombies 2: It’s About Time –  

Even though Steve Jobs had a solid working relationship with News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch, it’s no secret that Steve Jobs hated Fox News. In fact, in Walter Isaacon’s authorized biography, Steve Jobs said that “Fox has become an incredibly destructive force in our society.”

Rather than associate Apple’s brand with Fox News, Steve Jobs decided to personally order all of Apple’s ads to be removed from the conservative TV network.

Passbook may be one of the most underrated technologies on the iPhone. In theory, it lets you collect your boarding passes, movie tickets, retail coupons, and loyalty cards all in one place. In reality, it isn’t supported by too many retailers, many of whom already have their own system of handling these types of passes.

In addition, many iPhone users don’t know how to get apps that support Passbook, as the only way to find a special list of apps that are supported by the service is to open the Passbook app itself. If you’re one of those users, here’s how to get some great apps on your iPhone and carry a few less bits of paper and plastic ephemera around with you.

There’s no doubt that the iPhone is one of the most popular pieces of technology ever invented. The rush of people lining up for hours just to buy one usually causes competing carriers to trip all over themselves for the opportunity to sell the iPhone, except recently the list of carriers clamoring for the iPhone has slowly dwindled to just a few prospects.

Despite its successes, Apple is missing out on the chance to sell the iPhone to as many as 2.8 billion new smartphone customers, and according to some experts, the only thing that’s stopping them is Apple’s own rules.

Even though we love the HTC One, there are really only two smartphone manufacturers in the world right now that matter: Apple and Samsung. The two companies have been fighting for every square inch of the global smartphone market, and have managed to take all of the profits in the process.

A new report from Canaccord Genuity shows that while some manufacturers made improvements in the March quarter of 2013, Apple and Samsung still account for 100% of the industry’s profits, with Apple taking 57% and Samsung snatching up the remaining 43%.

Apple haters, Android geeks and misinformed Wall Street analysts will tell you that Apple’s iPhone is falling behind because Apple can’t innovate anymore.

I don’t buy the Apple-doesn’t-innovate BS. Apple is super innovative, and their innovation is focused, disciplined and ultimately results in industry-dominating revenue and profits.

But iPhones are still lacking some of the best innovations out there. This isn’t because Apple can’t innovate. It’s because Apple can’t share. Apple can’t play nice with others. Apple wants to control the user experience, even at the expense of the user.

Apple isn’t open.

This quality used to be a benefit because it prevented the platform from becoming an ugly, confusing, fragmented mess.

But in the past month, Apple’s lack of openness has become a serious problem.

Here’s what I’m talking about.