iOS 12 - page 7

The iOS 12 public beta is available to download and install on any of your compatible devices. The public beta is essentially the same as the developer beta, only each build is released around a week after the developer version. So far, the develoer beta has been surprisingly stable, but its definitely not ready for regular day-to-day use (more on that in a moment). But if you’re feeling brave, or if you have a spare device you’d like to use to see what all the fuss is about, then installing the beta is easy.

Siri Shortcuts are the iOS way to automate actions you do over and over. The WWDC 2018 keynote gave an examples of chaining together a bunch of these actions into one shortcut — order your favorite “coffee,” and give you directions to work, or switch on the lights at home one whole hour before you get there in order to, I don’t know, waste electricity? To trigger these little automations, you just tell Siri, using a pre-chosen keyword/name.

However, you don’t alway want to put together lots of steps. Sometimes you just want Siri to carry out a single action with a Shortcut. For instance, opening up your favorite news site in Safari, or sending a message to your spouse, or viewing your most recent photos. The good news is, you can do all of these right now, even without the fancy new Siri Shortcuts app.

You no longer need to be a developer to try Apple’s biggest software updates of 2018.

Public testers can now get their hands on the first public beta builds of iOS 12 and tvOS 12 that bring tons of UI changes and feature improvements to the iPhone, iPad and Apple TV.

You don’t need to wait for iOS 12 to find out how much time you’re wasting in Facebook.

The social network is testing a new tool that will show you exactly how many minutes you’ve spent inside its app each day. It will also give users the ability to set their own usage caps.

In this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine: HomePods went on sale in Europe this week, and I ordered one. It arrived the very next day. I tried it out, and then sent it back to Apple the day after that. Why? Because it’s a half-finished product. Siri is just as glitchy and annoying on HomePod as elsewhere. It doesn’t work properly with a Mac.

You’ll find that story and more in this issue. Get your free subscription to Cult of Mac Magazine from iTunes. Or read on for this week’s top stories.

Apple gave developers a hot new beta for iOS 12 this morning, adding a host of improvements to its huge update for iPhones and iPads that is coming out this fall.

iOS 12 beta 2 comes just two weeks after Apple revealed the update at WWDC 2018. The update contains a number of UI tweaks, new apps and performance improvements that are supposed to make the iPhone and iPad more stable than ever.

Apple is making it easier for iPhone users in the United States to be located by the emergency services with iOS 12.

When the update rolls out to everyone this fall, users will be able to automatically and securely share their location data with 911 first responders to help reduce emergency response times, Apple confirmed today.

iOS 12 has been jailbroken just one week after the first beta was made available to registered developers.

Security researches have demonstrated the hack on an iPhone X. The process, which installs Cydia, takes less than a minute and requires no other hardware.

This week we write a screen-play using text messages, make music out of random internet radio streams, and enjoy Apple’s own Voice Memos app, on the iPad at last.

In this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine: In iOS 12 and macOS Mojave, Safari gets solid improvements that will win you back from Chrome — especially if you value your privacy. But while safeguarding your privacy and security on the web fuels many of Safari’s great new features, there’s much more Safari goodness to anticipate.

You’ll find that story and more in this issue. Get your free subscription to Cult of Mac Magazine from iTunes. Or read on for this week’s top stories.

Apple put a feature in the first iOS 12 beta designed specifically to thwart iPhone unlocking tools that use the Lightning port to get access to the device. But Grayshift, maker of a prominent unlocking tool, says it already has a workaround.

This is good news for the many law enforcement agencies around the U.S.  who’ve invested in Grayshift’s GrayKey unlocker. It’s not so good for anyone who wants to be sure their iPhone can’t be hacked.

iOS app that misuse iPhone owners’ contact data for their own gain are about to get slammed with the ban hammer.

Apple revealed a number of new ways it’s trying to protect users’ privacy at WWDC 2018, but one major change that wasn’t mentioned on stage could have huge ramifications for companies that try to profit off your iPhone’s contact information.

Do Not Disturb gets a few great additions in iOS 12. These new features are very simple. However, they will make a big difference in how we use our phones — and how we interact with other people. Let’s take a look.

iOS 12 and macOS Mojave are all the rage after WWDC 2018, but Apple’s not quite done working on iOS 11 and macOS High Sierra.

Developers received a fresh batch of beta updates this morning, including the second builds of iOS 11.4.1 and macOS 10.13.6, both of which bring a host of bug fixes and under-the-hood improvements.

Apple is giving the iPhone a more fluid UI with some tiny tweaks in iOS 12 designed to shave tenths of seconds off each interaction.

You may not even notice the changes once iOS 12 launches to the public, but in a session at WWDC last week, Apple revealed how you can now perform actions without waiting for UI animations to finish. It sounds like an insignificant update, but once you see it in action you’ll be swooning for iOS 12’s release.

Prepare to be wowed:

Apple fans that have been complaining for years that Siri is dumb might be a little creeped out by how much better the digital assistant is in iOS 12.

With the new Siri suggestions Apple introduced this week, your iPhone will now be able to prompt you about events you haven’t even told it about. One developer posted his experience of Siri learning about a lunch just through iMessage.

Prepare to be impressed:

iOS 12 tidbits and screenshots have been flooding the web all week after Apple dropped the first betas for iOS 12 and macOS Mojave. But there’s a small problem with all that.

It turns out that posting screenshots from Apple’s unreleased software is a total violation of the NDA developers agreed to before becoming iOS developers.

It may not have been action-packed, but this week’s WWDC was bursting with great stuff. Don’t miss our WWDC 2018 reactions on this week’s episode of The CultCast. Then stick around for our list of all the best new iOS 12, watchOS, and macOS features announced at the keynote.

Our thanks to Casper for supporting this episode. Learn why Casper makes the internet’s favorite mattress, and get $50 toward select mattresses at casper.com/cultcast.

Shortcuts is a cool feature in iOS 12 that carries out a collection on actions with a single Siri command. But a startup accuses Apple of stealing its logo.

The company’s name is Shift, and both it and the Apple Shortcuts app have logos that are stylized versions of the letter ‘s.’ Additionally, both use similar colors: blue and magenta.

Your Apple Watch will soon be able to track symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, thanks to a new API from Apple.

Details of Apple’s big software updates are still flowing out of the San Jose convention center as Apple dives into the details during sessions. During its session on advances in research and card frameworks Tuesday the company revealed it’s developed a new Movement Disorder API that could be groundbreaking for people with the disease.

It’s 2018, and yet Safari still wouldn’t show you website icons, aka favicons, in its tabs. But that has — finally — changed. In both iOS 12 and macOS Mojave, Safari can now display favicons. All you need to do is toggle one setting.

Who cares? Well, favicons make it much easier to identify the site you want among a whole mess of open tabs. You can simply look for a site’s colorful logo icon, instead of squinting at a few letters of truncated text when trying to find the right tab.

In the battle of digital voice assistants, people often mock Siri for lagging behind competing products from Amazon and Google. During Monday’s WWDC 2018 keynote, Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of software engineering, glossed over those failings, calling Siri the “world’s most-used digital assistant.”

What he neglected to mention was the increasing frustration of Siri users expecting more from a voice assistant. From simple requests returning inaccurate results to the inability to performthat he compound actions, Siri was in desperate need of attention going into WWDC. But will the Siri upgrades in iOS 12 do the trick?

You’re in a noisy bar or restaurant and can’t hear the person across the table from you. Good news: With a feature added in iOS 12, you can use your AirPods and iPhone as a low-cost hearing aid.

This feature is called Live Listen, and it’s been available for certain hearing aids for some time. But soon, anyone with a pair of Apple’s wireless headphones will be able to use it.

Website favicons have finally returned to Safari in macOS Mojave. The teeny-tiny icons, which make it easier to distinguish between sites in open tabs, are also coming to iPhone and iPad for the very first time with iOS 12.

At Monday’s WWDC keynote event, Apple introduced its new Screen Time initiatives which will help users keep tabs on just how much they use their iPhones. It’s something that people have been pushing for a while, and it’s absolutely the right move on Apple’s part.

But that doesn’t mean it can’t be the source of humor. In a new skit, late night talkshow host Conan O’Brien skewers the concept with his idea for an iPhone Basic — with no screen, no buttons, and basically nothing that could distract you from living in the real world. Check it out below.