Last night, by the time I called it quits and went to bed Threads, Meta’s new social network, had hit 2 million users in 2 hours. As I write this, Meta’s Adam Mosseri says the count has now surpassed 10 million in 7 hours, which exceeds Mastodon’s user base. Currently, Threads is … | Continue reading
The App Store is full of apps for tracking the media you enjoy, and at least for TV shows and movies, many use Trakt.tv as a data source and tracking service and Just Watch to list where you can watch something. That results in a degree of sameness in the category. What’s harder … | Continue reading
Running Threader via Back Tap on Twitter and Mastodon. Instagram just rolled out Threads, the company’s new text-based social network that’s been advertised over the past few weeks as an alternative to Twitter. I’m trying out Threads (you can find my account at threads.net/@vitic … | Continue reading
This week on AppStories, we conclude our look back at our pre-WWDC OS wishes for iOS 17, watchOS 10, and tvOS 17 and look at which came true. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: Notion – Do your most efficient work with Notion Projects. Try it free today. On AppStories+, I re … | Continue reading
Quinn Nelson of Snazzy Labs has an excellent video about the trouble with gaming on the Mac. The video’s title says it all: “Macs Can Game. But Apple Can’t.” As Nelson explains, it’s not the hardware or the software that’s holding the platform back. It’s the size of the Mac marke … | Continue reading
Sketch, explore and share endless ideas with Concepts’ infinite canvas for iPad. Used by creators for visual thinking, note taking, team communication and design, Concepts goes beyond a digital sketchbook. Since everything you draw is a flexible vector-raster hybrid, you can move … | Continue reading
With millions of people facing a long, smokey summer here in the US, I thought it would be a good time to recommend Paku, an iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch app for tracking the air quality where you live. Paku combines Apple’s MapKit framework with public data from PurpleAir … | Continue reading
[audio_player src=”https://cdn.simplecast.com/audio/0de98bba-5e4d-4879-94dc-8c76a3a88322/episodes/f2a87701-2d3f-4466-9f6d-fa5a042199c2/audio/4557209c-e4e8-44ed-992b-c5713f8185ae/default_tc.mp3?nocache” mime_type=”audio/mpeg” total_duration=”00:26:33” caption=”“] [subscribe_to_unw … | Continue reading
This week on AppStories, we revisit our pre-WWDC OS wishes, including visionOS, macOS, and iPadOS, and look at which came true. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: CleanMyMac X: Your Mac. As good as new. Get 5% off today. DetailsPro: Design with SwiftUI, no coding required. 5 … | Continue reading
Paste feels like the kind of clipboard manager Apple might make, especially version 4.0, which was released today. The focus of today’s update is the design of the Mac version app, but it’s also available on the iPhone and iPad. However, it’s the design of the Mac app that makes … | Continue reading
It’s Tuesday morning, and I didn’t feel like working at home today, so after breakfast, I headed out to the co-working space I joined in the spring. As I got ready, I realized my MacBook Air’s battery was a little low. I used it a lot yesterday and didn’t charge it overnight. My … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. Monica Chin, writing for The Verge, interviewed more than 20 professionals to try to figure out who the Mac Pro is for and gauge interest in Apple’s most powerful desktop computer: I wanted to know whether Apple’s purported target demographic — people who spend the … | Continue reading
UI Designer Weekly is a free weekly newsletter by designer Sahand Nayebaziz all about Apple user interface design. As the number of Apple platforms multiplies, staying on top of the latest design trends and principles has never been more important and hard. Whether you’re a desig … | Continue reading
[audio_player src=”https://cdn.simplecast.com/audio/0de98bba-5e4d-4879-94dc-8c76a3a88322/episodes/d255eff1-53b7-4740-9563-7abf5cd3fa64/audio/fce2cc8c-c00e-4739-9a92-fb4be9e295a2/default_tc.mp3?nocache” mime_type=”audio/mpeg” total_duration=”00:39:46” caption=”“] [subscribe_to_unw … | Continue reading
TotK Travel Guide. If your summer’s going to be anything like mine, some of these things should sound familiar: you’re going to play around with the iOS and iPadOS 17 betas and get on some TestFlights for third-party apps; you’re going to spend some time at the beach or perhaps e … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. Yesterday, Apple released the visionOS SDK and updates to its Human Interface Guidelines and developer documentation for visionOS. Within hours, developers had downloaded the Xcode beta and begun testing the visionOS waters, building their apps for the Apple Vision … | Continue reading
In addition to releasing the visionOS SDK and developer tools today, Apple has updated its Human Interface Guidelines and published additional visionOS documentation for developers. The updated HIG begins with an overview of designing for the Apple Vision Pro, covering topics lik … | Continue reading
As I wrote earlier today, Apple has a lot of plans for its Podcasts app this fall, but the company is not waiting to roll out all of the changes to the app. Yesterday, Apple Podcasts added the following nine new subcategories to the app’s search tab on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Appl … | Continue reading
Today, Apple announced the visionOS software development kit that will allow developers to start creating apps for the Apple Vision Pro. In addition to the SDK, an update to Xcode is introducing Reality Composer Pro, which lets developers preview 3D models, animations, images, an … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. Apple’s services have become an increasingly important part of the company’s product lineup, but they didn’t get a lot of time at WWDC this year. However, that doesn’t mean there aren’t some interesting new features coming with OS releases and beyond. There are a w … | Continue reading
Fernando Silva of 9to5Mac came up with a clever workaround to have ‘clamshell mode’ in iPadOS 17 when an iPad is connected to an external display. The catch: it doesn’t really turn off the iPad’s built-in display. Now before readers start spamming the comments, this is not true c … | Continue reading
This week on AppStories, we consider the impact that this year’s OS releases will have on third-party apps. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: CleanMyMac X: Your Mac. As good as new. Get 5% off today. DetailsPro – Design with SwiftUI, no coding required. 50% off throughout J … | Continue reading
WWDC never gets old. There’s the excitement surrounding Apple’s announcements, but it’s far more than that. At its heart, the value of WWDC is in the people you see. Ten years ago, I attended my first WWDC ever as the parent of what is now called the Swift Student Challenge. At t … | Continue reading
Fin is a simple and elegant way to track your finances on your iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch. The app takes the hassle out of keeping tabs on your income and expenses with a straightforward, modern interface that supports multiple accounts, including cash tracking. Fin privacy-fo … | Continue reading
[audio_player src=”https://cdn.simplecast.com/audio/0de98bba-5e4d-4879-94dc-8c76a3a88322/episodes/cd4410b3-3c6a-4fd9-a168-68011bc76f76/audio/c5c10253-4967-4bc1-afa0-b9c7b0e8f546/default_tc.mp3?nocache” mime_type=”audio/mpeg” total_duration=”00:23:41” caption=”“] [subscribe_to_unw … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. Earlier this week, I linked to Tom Warren’s story on The Verge about Apple’s Game Porting Toolkit and gamers’ early experiments with running Windows games on Apple silicon Macs running macOS Sonoma. Yesterday, Christina Warren, writing for Inverse, published an in- … | Continue reading
Today, our friend Stephen Hackett launched a follow-up to his successful series of Apple history calendars with a campaign on Kickstarter. This year’s calendar features more of Stephen’s excellent photography, along with notable dates in Apple’s services and retail history. Here’ … | Continue reading
This week on AppStories, I was joined by Alex Guyot to talk about the new features coming to Apple Notes and Reminders, as well as new Mac hardware announced at WWDC. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: DetailsPro – Design with SwiftUI, no coding required. 50% off throughout … | Continue reading
Excellent developer-focused take on the Vision Pro by David Smith, who also tested one last week at Apple Park. I particularly liked his reasoning for why it’s important to begin understanding a new Apple platform sooner rather than later: Another reason I want to develop for vis … | Continue reading
Chance Miller, writing last week at 9to5Mac, notes how Apple’s most expensive AirPods model are going to miss out on two key features announced at WWDC: Adaptive Audio (which blends Active Noise Cancelation and Transparency mode) and the new ‘Siri’ command that does not require s … | Continue reading
Earlier today in my Vision Pro story, I wondered about how Apple will showcase and set up the headset for customers in retail stores in the future. For some excellent analysis on this topic, look no further than Michael Steeber’s latest issue of the Tabletops newsletter. Michael … | Continue reading
Vision Pro. I’m going to be direct with this story. My 30-minute demo with Vision Pro last week was the most mind-blowing moment of my 14-year career covering Apple and technology. I left the demo speechless, and it took me a few days to articulate how it felt. How I felt. It’s n … | Continue reading
By now, most MacStories readers are probably familiar with the story surrounding Reddit’s decision charge exorbitantly high fees for access to its API after years of offering it for free to third-party developers like Christian Selig, the creator of Apollo. Since then, the situat … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. During the WWDC keynote, Apple showed off Game Mode for the Mac, which gives a game priority over a Mac’s CPU and GPU resources. Apple has also reduced the latency of AirPods used while gaming and doubled the sampling rate for connected Bluetooth controllers. Game … | Continue reading
MacStadium, the industry-leading Mac cloud and MacDevOps provider, now offers a pre-packaged MacDevOps solution directly from the MacStadium website, enabling immediate use of their popular macOS CI/CD automation tool. With a simplified setup process and instant access, the Orka … | Continue reading
Federico and John also had the opportunity to sit down with three winners of the Swift Student Challenge in the Apple Podcasts Studio at Apple Park. It was fun and inspiring to chat with Damian Perez, Henri Bredt, and Maria Eduarda Cabral de Lucena. [subscribe_to_appstories] Spon … | Continue reading
[audio_player src=”https://cdn.simplecast.com/audio/0de98bba-5e4d-4879-94dc-8c76a3a88322/episodes/805b9202-42b6-43d1-885b-cc84369d33c6/audio/d67a5311-3cb0-4a4d-92ce-72925fc5b227/default_tc.mp3?nocache” mime_type=”audio/mpeg” total_duration=”00:27:19” caption=”“] [subscribe_to_unw … | Continue reading
Today on AppStories, Federico and John interview the creators of five apps that were finalists or winners of the 2023 Apple Design Awards: Zach Gage, the creator of Knotwords, Swupnil Sahai, the developer of SwingVision, Philipp Nägelsbach, the publisher of Engling, Leon Sasson o … | Continue reading
Source: Apple. Every WWDC, I look forward to what Apple’s Notes and Reminders teams have in store for the next version of the company’s OSes. Notes debuted with the iPhone itself, and Reminders wasn’t too far behind. All these years later, both apps remain actively developed, and … | Continue reading
In today’s WWDC episode of AppStories, Federico shares his experience with Apple Vision Pro answering questions from John, Alex, and Club MacStories members. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: Setapp – Grow your app with Setapp. We deliver AppStories+ to subscribers with bon … | Continue reading
The Apple Vision Pro wasn’t the only new hardware announced at Apple’s WWDC keynote event this Monday. The company also introduced a few new Mac models: a new 15” MacBook Air, an upgraded Mac Studio, and the long-awaited Apple silicon Mac Pro. Powering the freshly minted top of A … | Continue reading
In the latest WWDC episode of AppStories, Federico, John, and Alex are joined by MacPaw developer Serhii Popov for a developer’s perspective on WWDC before covering iPadOS 17’s Stage Manager changes in depth, along with Notes, Reminders, and StandBy. [subscribe_to_appstories] Spo … | Continue reading
I’m in Cupertino for WWDC this week, and after yesterday’s whirlwind of announcements and surprises, I had some time to sit down with my 12.9” iPad Pro, install iPadOS 17 beta 1 on it, and try the improved version of Stage Manager. As you know, I have a…complicated history with t … | Continue reading
For this special episode of AppStories, John and Federico were joined by Alex live in the Club MacStories+ Discord community to share their first impressions of the WWDC 2023 Keynote. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: Setapp – Grow your app with Setapp. On AppStories+, Fede … | Continue reading
For this special episode of AppStories, John and Federico were joined by Alex live in the Club MacStories+ Discord community to share their first impressions of the WWDC 2023 Keynote. [subscribe_to_appstories] Sponsored by: Setapp – Grow your app with Setapp. On AppStories+, Fede … | Continue reading
FaceTime is getting more attention in iOS 17 than it’s seen in quite a while, with a number of new features announced at yesterday’s WWDC keynote. All of these changes are coming to the iPad and Mac as well, and even tvOS has been shown some love. tvOS 17 will include a brand-new … | Continue reading
Developers have been clamoring for alternatives for the App Store since the beginning, frustrated by the commissions they pay Apple, shifting app review standards, and the lack of trial versions. The thing is, developers already have another fantastic way to distribute their apps … | Continue reading
Two weeks ago, Apple announced the finalists for the 2023 Apple Design Awards: 36 apps and games in six categories: Inclusivity, Delight and Fun, Interaction, Social Impact, Visuals and Graphics, and Innovation. Last evening, at an outdoor event on the stage built outside Caffè M … | Continue reading