Apple has confirmed its acquisition of Coherent Navigation, a GPS company with expertise in mapping and self-driving vehicles.
Founded in 2008, Coherent Navigation is one of the leading companies behind what is known as High Integrity GPS or — appropriately enough for Apple — iGPS. Unlike regular GPS, which is accurate only within meters, iGPS’ high level of accuracy means it can provide geographic positioning data within centimeters.
The first official trailer for the Steve Jobs movie we’ve all been waiting for is finally here. The one-minute clip gives us an early look at Michael Fassbender as Apple’s co-founder and former CEO, along with co-stars Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen and Jeff Daniels.
The App Store is a busy place, and it’s easy to miss an awesome new release, an update that makes an old app worthy of re-downloading, or a hidden gem you didn’t even know you even wanted.
That’s why we’ve done the work for you and collected the most awesome new apps from the past week.
This week: Why the iPhone 6s could be the best “s” update yet; Nintendo promises five top-notch titles coming to iOS; the paltry earnings of top Mac App Store apps; and just when we thought we’ve seen it all … a new iPhone accessory helps you deal with your major gas issues.
Our thanks to Automatic for supporting this episode. Plug Automatic into your car’s data port, and their beautiful app will show you where you parked, how to save fuel with tips based on your actual driving, and even diagnose and turn off your car’s check engine light.
Full show notes ahead!
Many people say they want to get fit, but what does this actually mean? Fit for what?
The websites of leading fitness trackers, like Apple Watch, Fitbit, Microsoft Band and Jawbone Up don’t shed much light on this question. They talk a lot about the things that their devices measure, and even suggest changes in how we go about our day, but they rarely explain why this matters or what the actual benefits are.
Dueling developer events Google I/O and Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference will happen in the next couple of months, which makes this an exciting time of year for Apple and Android fans.
Both events attract a lot of attention — they’re two of the biggest software-focused conferences in tech — and getting a ticket to either one is nearly impossible.
But which is better? Find out what we think in this week’s Friday Night Fight with Cult of Android versus Cult of Mac!
What happens when you try to get a broken Apple Watch repaired? Not much of anything!
I know this because my Apple Watch broke last week and I have a repair order pending.
Luckily, the watch is covered by Apple’s AppleCare+ extended warranty, which covers accidental damage. It also offers two-day express replacement. No downtime without your new precious.
This would be great, but Apple doesn’t have any watches to replace it with. Apple’s watches are in such short supply, it might be Christmas before a replacement is available.
No gadget ever caused me to lose as much sleep as the Apple Watch.
I wish I could forget about Apple’s shiny new smartwatch, but the damned thing has me under its spell. It’s the curse of Cupertino, and I’m just another hapless a victim.
So here we go. A new video series featuring, of all people, our Editor and Publisher Leander Kahney.
You’ve heard him on the CultCast. You’ve read his books.
You’ve been educated, entertained and occasionally enraged at his stories here on Cult of Mac. And now he is going to come into your lives in talking pictures with his new video series, Kahney’s Korner. The format is pretty loose, but he is never at a loss for words, so this should be pretty fun.
The iPhone 6s is set to get a considerable camera boost, as per a Weibo posting from Kevin Wang, IHS Technology’s research director in China.
After years of using 8MP cameras in its iPhones, Wang claims the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus are likely to boast 12MP cameras — theoretically greatly improving the current standard of iPhone photography, which is already pretty darn high.
But there’s a twist.
Your Apple Watch doesn’t need an iPhone to make it whole.
The new wearable is capable of performing a variety of tasks without a tether to your phone. All it needs is a connection to a familiar Wi-Fi network, and you can start putting it to use even if its iPhone buddy isn’t around.
My Apple Watch says I’ve used 1 GB of storage space, with 5.2 GB left over and available.
As those two numbers reverse, I’ll start looking at which apps are taking up the most storage on my wrist, then eliminating the ones that take up too much space.
Here’s an easy way to figure out which storage-hogging apps need to go.
Never mind that espionage is a dangerous line of work. The secret agent game promises plenty of intrigue and lots of fun spy gadgets.
If I knew exactly what today’s tools of the trade are, someone would probably have to kill me. Politics and enemies change but spies’ needs are essentially timeless: Disguises and false papers maintains a cover, tracking and listening devices record movements and conversations, and small, secret cameras copy documents and photograph dubious characters.
A hidden weapon can get a spy out of a jam. A concealed cyanide pill — so the intensely devoted might say — beats interrogation.
We love our spy stories. It is why the James Bond film franchise endures, James Patterson sells books and there are spy museums from Prague to Washington, D.C. (where there are two). Here’s a less-than-clandestine peek into the shadowy spy gadgets that filled the world of espionage over the years.
According to a new research note issued by UBS’s Evidence Lab, the latest quarterly sales for the iPhone are set to be even more impressive than most people are anticipating.
And given that nobody is sleeping on the iPhone’s success as it is, that means some astonishingly big numbers.
If you’d like to see the Apple Watch in a cool new way, we have something to show you.
Apple created the below Apple Watch assembly drawing as part of its Made for Apple Watch program, which supports designers who are interested in creating third-party bands for the new wearable. It includes guidelines, notes and measurements of every part of the Watch, but mostly it’s just beautiful to behold.
When you hit your Apple Watch’s side button, just under the Digital Crown, you get a list of the contacts you‘ve marked as Favorites in order to send your heartbeat or taps to them via Digital Touch, or folks you want to text with using your new Apple wrist gadget.
There are seven different presets for color coding those contacts, too, which default to red, blue, green, yellow, orange, white and purple.
Did you know that you could customize the colors of each of these seven slots? Here’s how.
The iPhone is probably the best, most portable gaming device around. Even so, sometimes nostalgia kicks in and you miss your old Gameboy.
The Arduboy is a new, credit card-size console that is just as portable as an iPhone, if not more so. And it can play all the old 8-bit games your iPhone can’t.
BitTorrent’s not just a way to torrent anymore.
Released a couple years ago, BitTorrent Sync proved itself to be a great way to keep your files synced between machines without trusting a service like Dropbox with your data.
And now? BitTorrent Bleep, a serverless chat app, is here to show you you can do without Snapchat or iMessage.
The New York Times recently updated its NYT Now app for the iPhone to version 2.0. It was already an excellent app for staying on top of the day’s news, and now it’s the best.
Apple Watch is hands down the most beautiful smart watch you can buy, but it doesn’t have a gorgeous round face like the original Apple Watches did. Jony Ive never even considered using a round design because “a circle doesn’t make any sense” for a list-based interface, but the crazy tech pranksters at Peripatetic Pandas are ready to show him how wrong he was.
Using a metal grinder to round out the Apple Watch’s corners, the guys who also solved the iPhone 6’s protruding lens problem have also devised an ingenious way to get a custom round Apple Watch. Sure, their method will void your warranty, but it’s pretty amazing that the watch still works after the beating it receives.
Watch the gory video below:
Early adopters of the Apple Watch have had a few weeks with their new gadgets, and they’re having experiences that may not be worthy of one of Apple’s austere presentations. But that doesn’t mean people aren’t getting a lot of use out of the things and finding occasionally odd ways to integrate them into their lives.
A bunch of reddit users have been sharing their stories, and here are some of the more peculiar things Apple’s new wearable can do.
The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus may just be the biggest incremental “s” upgrades Apple has ever done, according to a new report.
As per well-connected KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the iPhone 6s will feature twice the RAM of its predecessors, a significant processor upgrade, better camera, new color option, sapphire display, strengthened shell, improved Touch ID and Force Touch.
Just about the only thing that would stay the same, in fact, are the two size options!
They promised us all jetpacks — these guys got them and took them to one of the world’s most remarkable locales. And you get to ride along if you dare.
The latest eye-popping (and possibly stomach-churning) video from Yves Rossy (aka the Jetman) shows the Swiss daredevil inventor and his new sidekick soaring in formation over desert sands and Dubai’s awesome skyline with nothing but jetpacks and a total lack of fear.
The Apple Watch’s tiny screen has already proven to be a boundless landscape for creatively organizing app icons, but one obsessive reddit user has created the most scientifically convenient app layout we’ve seen yet.
The future is here, folks, with a little gadgety box called a CH4 that you place near your rear end to measure the amount of gaseous emissions from your nether regions.
Pair that with an app on your iPhone that tracks the foods you eat and compares that with the amount you fart, and you’ve got one handy device for your office, car, or dorm room.
Now all it needs is to deliver a little electric shock each time you fart, and this thing would be perfect.