The Mac App Store could use some support. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
This is a guest post by Karthik Suroju, a digital marketer at CloudMagic.
The iOS App Store is a one-stop destination for everything consumers need on the iPhone and iPad. However, that’s not the case with the Mac App Store. At the beginning of January 2016, there were 1,234,267 apps for iPhones, 662,984 for iPads and a mere 27,011 for Macs.
Tim Cook is pushing for end to end encryption. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Apple CEO Tim Cook has vowed to continue fighting ‘the good fight’ for the American people in its war against the federal government over encryption.
Cook sat down for a lengthy interview with Time as part of the magazine’s March 28 cover story on Apple, saying that he’s a “big optimist that we ultimately arrive at the right thing” in the battle between privacy and national security, however the company is prepared for a long and important battle.
The long ranging interview touches on everything from Apple’s case with the FBI, cybersecurity, civil liberties, and even Donald Trump. We read the entire transcript so you don’t have to and pulled out the 11 most revealing bits below:
Use LastPass with even fewer actual codes. Photo: LastPassMaking two-factor authentication a little simpler. Photo: LastPass
Two-factor authentication is super secure, but incredibly annoying when you’re in a hurry. LastPass, one of the front-runners in password managers on desktop and mobile, might have the solution with a new mobile app that will simplify the login process to LastPass, which can then manage your many web accounts with ease.
Instead of entering a passcode to get into LastPass, you can have its new mobile Authenticator app send a simple verify button that will let you sign in with one tap. Here’s a quick video to see how it works.
Colorful as all heck with brightness controls that actually work for reading. Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac
Best List: Yeelight by ipegtop
Most smartbulbs I’ve tried only let me use my iPhone to change the color of the bulb and to turn it off and on. I’ve never found one bright enough to read by, either, making me wonder if it’s even possible with the current technology.
The Yeelight is my answer: It’s a fantastic, app-controlled, touch-enabled smartlamp that’s colorful enough to set a fun mood while also being bright enough to use for my before-bed reading ritual.
Google is finding increasingly effective ways to keep its data secure. Photo: David J. Roger
The latest Google Transparency Report shows that since January 23, 77 percent of all requests to its servers have used encrypted connections.
The numbers on the new report are current as of February 27, and the company says it’s “working hard” to achieve full encryption across all of its services.
Want even faster access to your most-used Google Drive files? Let Launch Center Pro do the heavy lifting! Photo: Ally Kazmucha/The App Factor
Launch Center Pro has solved many workflow problems for me over the years. Most recently it’s been an immense time-saver when it comes to accessing Google Drive files I need often. While the Google Drive app itself is decent enough, it only acts as a hub to Google’s other apps, which is somewhat annoying.
That’s why I started using Launch Center Pro to speed up the process. Here’s how you can, too.
Woz has the magic touch with computers. Photo: Reddit
Before Steve Wozniak co-founded Apple Computers, he was just a super-nerdy kid who loved to operate HAM radios. In a new video interview detailing the most formative moments in his totally geeky life, Woz explains how he went from tinkering with electronics to teaching himself binary by 5th grade, and then made a machine that played tic-tac-toe in 6th grade.
Woz eventually got so good with machines that he could design a mini-computer in two days. Those skills led to his creation of the Apple II computer, which put his and Steve Jobs’ fledgling company on the map.
Watch as Woz recounts his childhood obsession with computers, during the humble beginnings of Silicon Valley, below:
Apple is not quite done tinkering with OS X 10.11.4 before its public release.
The company seeded the seventh beta of OS X 10.11.4 to developers this morning, a little over a week after Apple released the last beta for the desktop operating system.
A great way to track your movie watching. Photo: Letterboxd
If you’re a movie fan, you may well have visited the website Letterboxd at some point — giving you a fun way of tracking your movie-watching, built around a neat social network premise.
Today Letterboxd finally got around to launching its official mobile app, bringing the service to iPhones everywhere. Trust us, if you’re a cinema lover, this is a “must download!”