Every year Apple picks the very best apps in the App Store as recipients of its prestigious Apple Design Awards (ADAs). iPhone apps like Infinity Blade and Mac apps like Pixelmator won last year, and this year’s winners are just as good.

11 apps were awarded ADAs today by Apple at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, California during WWDC. The awards are meant to “celebrate excellence and recognize the outstanding work of iOS and OS X developers.”

Here are the winners of the 2012 ADAs:

The way Apple currently handles FaceTime and iMessage across multiple devices doesn’t work. An iMessage is sent to your iPhone’s number, and it doesn’t show up in the Messages app on your iPad or the beta Messages app on your Mac. The iPhone is the only device that can be reached via iMessage or FaceTime by both a phone number and Apple ID. The iPad, iPod touch and Mac all have to use an email address. If an iMessage is sent to your iPhone’s number, it doesn’t show up on your iPad. So you have to tell your friends to use your Apple ID address for iMessage if you want it to work on all of your devices.

This is a severely flawed way of handling communication between devices, but the good news is that Apple has fixed this problem in iOS 6.

Siri is getting a major update with iOS 6, including support for Apple’s newest iPad. There’s plenty of new features to see, so we went hands on with Siri running on the new iPad. Check out the video after the break.

Following the announcement of Apple’s new Retina Display-equipped MacBook Pros, new updates for several of the company’s OS X apps have been seeded. Final Cut Pro, Aperture, and iPhoto for Mac have all been updated with Retina graphics for the new MacBook Pro. The updates include several more improvements, including a shared photo library between iPhoto and Aperture.

While the new MacBook Pro’s retina display, light weight, and thin format factor were all show stoppers, the notebook’s battery is also a major feature and feat of engineering. Apple claims that despite powering all those pixels, the new MacBook Pro with Retina display has a battery will last for seven hours on a single charge and offer a full month of standby power. Unsurprisingly, much of the its internal space is devoted to the mammoth battery required for that feat.

The new MacBook Pro with Retina display isn’t the first Apple device to sport a massive built-in battery. The new iPad also sports one and the MacBook Air line has had most of its internal space devoted to its battery  for years. Each new mega-battery from Apple represents an advance of battery technology that few other companies could deliver.

This morning at WWDC, Apple unveiled a brand new Maps application, complete with a stunning 3D mode and redesigned user interface. In this video, Cult Of Mac goes hands-on with the new application. Spoiler alert: It’s awesome.

Despite delivering excellent business solutions in many of its products, there’s always a consistent refrain that Apple doesn’t understand business customers or corporate computing needs. Apple didn’t focus on many specific business uses of the new and upcoming products announced during today’s WWDC keynote. If you look closely, however, there are definite signs that Apple is designing iOS 6 and Mountain Lion,.

At today’s WWDC keynote, Apple unveiled iOS 6, which includes features like Facebook integration, a totally new Maps application, Passbook, and more. We’ve got a first hands on look at iOS 6 right here, for your viewing pleasure. Take a look at it after the break.

Apple today released a new version of iTunes for the Mac and Windows that brings compatibility for the newly-released iOS 6 developer beta. During the WWDC keynote earlier today Apple unveiled iOS 6 to the world, the first developer preview has been made available. You’ll need the new iTunes 10.6.3 before you can install iOS 6 on any of your devices.

There are some other bug fixes and improvements packed into iTunes 10.6.3, and everyone is encouraged to update now.

During today’s keynote Apple showed a slide that mentioned iOS 6 would get some “Redesigned Stores” but Scott Forstall never went into detail on what the stores look like. Now that we’ve got iOS 6 loaded up on our iPhones we’re finally able to see what the new stores look like and boy are they a great improvement over the predecessors. Here’s what the new App Store, iTunes, and iBooks look like in iOS 6:

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It’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of Apple events: the secrecy, the frenetic guessing games, the lines at Starbuck’s. It’s like Christmas–before your older brother ruined Santa for you–and it happens a couple of times a year.

So Cult of Mac got the inside scoop from developer Chris Lott, who was sitting inside on this unusually warm San Francisco day with a restless crowd of developers at the World Wide Developer Conference, for his take on the keynote announcements. Lott works with Darren Murtha Design; the two currently have eight iPhone/iPad apps in the iTunes store, most of them nifty learning games aimed at the preschool set.

There have been concerns about the fate of the Mac Pro ever since Apple killed off the Xserve a year and a half ago. Although Apple didn’t say the Mac Pro was on the chopping block, the company did let it go without an update for quite some time. Although the Mac Pro didn’t get featured in today’s WWDC keynote like the MacBook lineup, which includes the new MacBook Pro, it did receive a long-needed update.

The biggest reaction to the Mac Pro’s update today is a sense of relief by many creative professionals and Mac-focused IT departments. The update proves that Apple isn’t signing the death warrant for its most powerful and most expandable Mac. That makes the updated specs a symbol of Apple’s commitment to high-end and high-performance systems in addition to being a major product update.

If I had to pick on adjective for Apple’s upcoming iOS 6, it’d be “local” – Apple is integrating an immense range of local features and giving businesses amazing tools for attracting new customers. Regardless of whether you’re talking about a large chain like Starbucks or a family owned local business, Apple is offering virtually any customer-facing company an immense range of tools to attract and retain new customers.

In less than an hour after the presentation itself, Apple has made the entire WWDC 2012 keynote available for streaming online. The video recording should be hitting Apple’s keynote feed in iTunes at any moment.

You can watch today’s keynote now on Apple’s website. For everything that was announced at WWDC today, check out our complete roundup.

I don’t “need” a new MacBook Pro with Retina display and maxed out specs, but I really want one. I want one like really really bad, and maybe you do too, but if you’re frothing at the mouth to shell out the $4,000 for the top of the line MacBook Pro you’re going to have to be really patient because right now the shipping estimates are 3-5weeks. That’s just long enough for buyers remorse to sink in.

Apple introduced updated MacBook Air and Pro models alongside a totally new MacBook Pro design today at WWDC. Every time one of the laptops was addressed during the keynote, no mention was made of a 17-inch model. Apple only talked about updates for the 13-inch and 15-inch MacBook Airs/Pros.

Now Apple’s new MacBook Pro listings make no mention of the 17-inch model. It looks like the largest MacBook Pro has been axed once and for all.

iOS 6 isn’t scheduled to be released until later this Fall, but if you’re a developer you can get a sneak preview of iOS 6 by downloading it from Apple’s developer website right now and installing it on your device. The iOS 6 beta just went live on the Developer Center so grab it now if you’re willing to take the plunge.

Apple announced a lot of things from the stage at WWDC today, but there was nothing said about the future of the Mac Pro. Rumors speculated that Apple would be updating the two-year-old workhorse today, and the 2012 Mac Pro has just appeared on Apple’s website.

While the physical design of the machine has stayed the same, Apple has upgraded the Mac Pro’s specs: 3.06GHz Intel Xeon X5675 processors, new ATI Radeon HD graphic cards, four 3.5-inch drive bays for up to 8TB of storage, and 2 SuperDrives. A big disappointment is that Apple hasn’t added Thunderbolt I/O or USB 3.0 to the 2012 Mac Pro.

Holy smokes the Apple Store just came back online and we can all flood it with our purchases of the new MacBook Pro with Retina display. Hurry!

Mac gaming, long the red-headed-stepchild of the computer gaming scene, just stepped up its, well, game. Today’s World Wide Developers Conference in San Francisco saw several announcements from Apple regarding gaming, including the fact that the hot new MacBook Pro will have Retina graphics capabilities.

When Game Center was announced for iOS 5, some folks were skeptical. They didn’t really see the value in Apple taking on the leader board scene with already established players like OpenFeint, Plus+, Crystal, Gameloft Live, and others.

Those very same people would surely have to eat their words when they heard today at the WWDC in San Francisco that Game Center has over 130 million people using it and those folks submit 5 billion scores every week.

And now? Game Center is coming to the Mac.

New products and announcements keep rolling out from Apple. The Cupertino company has lifted the curtain on a new iPad accessory called the Smart Case. Instead of the Smart Cover’s flimsy screen covering, the new Smart Case fully encloses the iPad in a polyurethane coating.

The iPad Smart Case covers your iPad — both front and back — yet still retains the thin, light design of iPad. Like the Smart Cover, it folds easily into a stand for reading, typing, and watching video. And it automatically wakes and sleeps iPad on open and close. Made from polyurethane, it’s available in six bright colors. And you can personalize it with free laser engraving on the Apple Online Store.

Looks nice. You can pick one up for $50.

If you weren’t at WWDC today to see the video of Johnny Ive and Bob Mansfield introducing the new MacBook Pro with Retina display, don’t get sad, Apple’s already posted the video on their website. You can watch it right here.

Following Apple’s WWDC keynote today, a new AirPort Express has surfaced in Apple’s online store. The new router sports simultaneous dual-band 2.4GHz and 5GHz 802.11n Wi-Fi, but oddly hasn’t been upgraded from USB 2.0 to 3.0.

The new AirPort Express costs $99, like the previous model.