Cult of Mac

The robots haven’t taken our jobs yet, but as we wait for that glorious (or terrible) day it’s getting more and more important to keep up with an increasingly competitive professional marketplace. Luckily, there are a lot of great resources for learning the new skills of today’s trades, and we’ve gathered a handful of the best. From project management to coding and data analysis, there’s not a resume that can’t benefit from these courses.

Google’s Chromecast platform has been given a brand new name: Google Cast.

The new name makes more sense given the platform’s ability to stream more than just Chrome tabs, but the Chromecast dongle lineup will retain the old moniker for now.

Apple is reportedly in “advanced talks” to acquire Imagination Technologies, the British chip design company which creates the PowerVR graphics chips Apple uses for its iOS devices.

If it is able to acquire the company, it would mean that Apple would be able to bring GPU design in-house, much as it has done with its internally-developed ARM-based CPU cores.

Are you a third-party dev, advertiser, or Apple employee hoping to use targeted ads or personalized recommenders based on Apple customer data? There’s an app for that. Good luck with that!

That’s according to a new report, which states that Apple has an internal committee consisting of three expert “privacy czars,” who have have to sign off on any and all collection of Apple user data.

And if you thought the App Store review process could drag on, you’ve got another thing coming: debates over individual uses of data at Apple can, in some cases, continue for upwards of one year.

Bigger isn’t always better. With the iPhone SE, Apple has designed a tiny smartphone that’s destined to become a gigantic hit.

The device, unveiled during Apple’s “Let us loop you in” event Monday, looks like a totally amazeballs iPhone — and it comes with an Android-low price. Here’s why this little dynamo will take the world by storm.

Phil Schiller called the Apple Pencil “the greatest accessory Apple has ever made” during yesterday’s keynote event, and now Apple’s giving you the chance to keep your official Cupertino stylus alive for a bit longer — thanks to a new pack of four extra Apple Pencil tips.

A cynic would call it greenwashing, but the most surprising thing about Tim Cook’s “Loop you in” event was what it said about how he’s running Apple.

When Steve Jobs was around, Apple’s product events were about the products, and little else. Yeah, Jobs would often start with corporate issues, but he usually boasted about how the company was absolutely crushing it.

By contrast, the first 25 minutes of Monday’s event — almost half of the hour-long presentation — focused on things only tangentially related to Apple products. Cook and his lieutenants discussed government snooping, privacy, recycling, the environment, renewable energy, creating platforms for sustaining customers’ health — and even protecting Chinese yaks.

Jobs used to touch on issues like these, but under Cook, they’ve taken center stage. Cook has turned Apple’s product events into showcases for corporate responsibility.

Apple is always talking about how many professions increasingly rely on the iPad for work, and developers Onshape have just added another: Computer-Aided Design (CAD) modelers.

Onshape’s new app lets iPad Pro owners carry out the compute-intensive calculations and graphics for 3D solid modeling from their supercharged tablet, using their trusty Apple Pencil.

In some sad news, Andy Grove, a.k.a. one of the founders and former CEOs of Intel, passed away yesterday at the age of 79.

The Budapest-born Grove was a mentor to many people in Silicon Valley, including Steve Jobs, who once noted that he was one of the only people Jobs would willingly work for. Grove famously arrived in the United States with less than $20 and rose to turn Intel from a startup into one of the world’s largest and highest valued semiconductor chip makers.

In a Twitter tribute, Tim Cook wrote that Grove, “was one of the giants of the technology world. He loved our country and epitomized America at its best.”

It seems there is little that Apple enjoys more than poking Google with a big stick, and the company’s been at it again, reminding everyone that just 2 percent of devices running Android are updated to the latest Marshmallow release.

During its big iPhone and iPad event this morning, Apple trotted out execs to peddle its wares, but the company just couldn’t help taking a swipe at the competition.

The Department of Justice is putting its battle against Apple on hold.

In a new court filing published today, the U.S. government has asked a federal court to vacate the hearing set for Tuesday between Apple and the FBI on whether the company can be legally compelled to write software that would assist the FBI in hacking the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone.

So did the feds finally see the error of their ways when it comes to weakenening iOS security? Not quite. But the government says it may have found a way to hack terrorist Syed Farook’s iPhone 5c without Apple’s assistance.

The Internet’s reaction to — and riffing on — today’s Apple event is more entertaining than the presentation was. We aren’t even sure some people even waited for the company to be done breaking all of that news we were already aware of. We know we started doodling at some points. I drew a scary dragon.

Still, it’s fun to see what people can do with even the most sedate of Apple events, and it’s also nice to take a break from pasting our old posts into WordPress minus the phrase “according to rumors.” We aren’t actually doing that; don’t worry. We’re professionals here.

Professionals who can draw some badass dragons.

Apple is putting more tools in the hands of educators today with the official launch of the new Classroom app for iPad that promises to opens up new, more engaging ways of teaching and learning on the iPad.

The new app is part of the new iOS 9.3 education features Apple has added that allow teachers to manage student devices, share work and assignments, as well as track students’ progress to help them stay on track.

Small was the new big at Apple’s “Let us loop you in” keynote today. And while some felt the 64-minute unveiling was the most snooze-worthy event ever, Apple used it to unleash the most important iPad its made since the original tablet launched in 2010.

The new 9.7-inch iPad Pro is much more than just a smaller variant of the 12.9-inch super slate Apple came out with last year. It’s a machine built to target Apple’s next big customer pool: the 600 million people still using 5-year-old PCs.

“That’s just sad,” Apple VP Phil Schiller said onstage, describing the unfortunate souls toiling with aging Windows machines. And the new, right-sized iPad Pro is exactly what those people need.

The latest Apple TV has 5,000 apps and every one I’ve installed on my Home screen is a pain in the ass to find.

That is, until now. Apple just introduced tvOS 9.2, which brings the organizing power of folders to your 4th Generation Apple TV, and boy are we excited.

Here’s how to organize all those media and gaming apps on your Apple TV with folders.

One of Apple’s biggest reveals at its low-key “Let us loop you in” event today was the premiere of a new set of bands for the Apple Watch. And woven nylon was the star of the show.

These colorful, zig-zaggy straps look like they’re the “fun” options for the wearable, like if you’re going to an ’80s throwback party but you still want to know when you get texts. They’re bright, boast “a comfortable, fabric-like feel” (according to the listing on the Apple Store website), and the best news is that they aren’t super-expensive.

Check out all seven varieties below:

The fourth-generation Apple TV is ready for a new update to tvOS (9.2), bringing Siri dictation to the whole system, including search, user names and passwords. It’s also got a new Folder system like iOS does, which will let you organize your Home screen to your heart’s content, and it will support Apple wireless keyboards and your iCloud Photo Library on the big screen.

If you want to update your Apple TV right now and get all these great new features, just follow the directions below.

Now that Apple’s little keynote is over, the tech company from Cupertino is pulling the switch on a ton of new OS updates, including watchOS, the system that powers your Apple Watch.

If you want to upgrade to the latest OS now, watchOS 2.2, here’s what you need to do.

The March 21 Apple event wrapped up earlier, and we have to say that for the most part, we saw that coming.

The company followed through on every rumor we heard that said it was going to put out smaller versions of its latest iPhones and iPads. It introduced new Apple Watch bands, including a Space Gray Milanese Loop, just like we’d heard. And it totally confirmed that the new versions of tvOS and OS 9 would be out today, which didn’t surprise us at all.

But we did manage to fit a gasp or two between all those yawns. Here’s everything that was actually surprising at today’s Apple event.

Whether you’re recycling your iPhone in order to upgrade to the latest iPhone SE, or you favor Apple products because they’re the best on the market, you can feel good about your choice thanks to Apple’s environmental and medical initiatives.

Cupertino’s favorite tech company dropped four gorgeous videos into its low-key keynote today that showcase Liam, a radical recycling robot, and ResearchKit, which is helping connect people and medical researchers in unprecedented numbers. These two videos, below, along with Apple’s historical 40 years in 40 seconds and the new iPad Pro, are as beautiful as you’d expect from the company that continues to make righteous choices while it makes loads of cash.

The new Apple TV is finally getting folders for apps today, thanks to the public release of tvOS 9.2 that is available now to all fourth-gen Apple TV users.

Apple touted the new update today at an event, previewing new features like app folders, support for Bluetooth keyboards, voice-to-text dictation for text entry fields, a podcasts app and other improvements.

Along with the new Apple TV software, Apple has also released watchOS 2.2 to the public that contains a number of bug fixes, and some small tweaks such as the ability to sync multiple watches to one iPhone, Maps improvements and more.

Take a look at the new features:

The biggest iOS update yet of 2016 is finally here, bringing new features to iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch users.

iOS 9.3 doesn’t contain many design changes, but there are a host of new features like NightShift mode, Touch ID secured Notes, iPad education features, and lots of little changes in Apple Music and Apple News.

iPhone and iPad owners can grab the new update over the air by going to the Software Update section in the iOS Settings app, or you can download it directly via iTunes.

Here’s a look at everything that’s new:

Evolution, not revolution, was the tone of today’s low-key Apple event. Smaller is better, says Apple, with two big product “reveals” that show off compact new devices with impressive internals.

While most of the announcements today have already been discussed and dissected, like the 4-inch iPhone SE, new Apple Watch bands and a smaller 9.7-inch iPad Pro, there were a couple of surprises.

Here are the biggest takeaways from Apple’s oddly low-key “Let us loop you in” event.

Here’s a chance to win big: Our new $1,000 Apple Store Giveaway means a chance to get pretty much any Apple product your heart desires. With a cool grand of Apple credit in your pocket, you can snag a new iPhone SE, a new 9.7-inch iPad Pro or take a huge chunk out of a new MacBook. Or, if you really wanted that Apple TV, it’ll buy a bag full of those.

Entry is free so there’s literally nothing to lose and plenty to gain. But hurry, it’s only up for the next 23 days.

Forget the iPad Air 3. Apple’s new 9.7-inch tablet will be a scaled-down version of its supercharged 12.9-inch iPad Pro — called (drumroll, please) the 9.7-inch iPad Pro.

The new, smaller iPad Pro features four-speaker audio, a rear flash, Apple Pencil support, a Smart Connector for an all-new 9.7-inch Smart Keyboard, Apple’s most advanced iPad camera yet, and some very, very cool True Tone technology for matching the ambient light wherever you are.

Oh, and a fancy new 256GB storage option.