iOS

Apple: Pencil Support for Navigating iOS UI Will Return in Next Beta →

February 24, 2016 · 16:44

Chris Welch received an official statement from Apple regarding navigating the UI with the Apple Pencil, which I mentioned recently:

Apple Pencil has been a huge hit with iPad Pro users, who love it for drawing, annotating and taking notes. We believe a finger will always be the primary way users navigate on an iPad, but we understand that some customers like to use Apple Pencil for this as well and we’ve been working on ways to better implement this while maintaining compatibility during this latest beta cycle. We will add this functionality back in the next beta of iOS 9.3.

This is good news. Whatever the real reason, I’m glad it’s here to stay.

Justice Department Wants to Force Apple to Unlock a Dozen More iPhones →

February 23, 2016 · 15:29

Devlin Barrett:

The Justice Department is pursuing court orders to force Apple Inc. to help investigators extract data from iPhones in about a dozen undisclosed cases around the country, in disputes similar to the current battle over a terrorist’s locked phone, according to people familiar with the matter.

The other phones are at issue in cases where prosecutors have sought, as in the San Bernardino, Calif., terror case, to use an 18th-century law called the All Writs Act to compel the company to help them bypass the passcode security feature of phones that may hold evidence, these people said.

The specifics of the roughly dozen cases haven’t been disclosed publicly, but they don’t involve terrorism charges, these people said.

This is going to get a whole of a lot uglier before it gets better. If it gets better.

Federico Viticci’s iPad-Only Setup — a Year in →

February 23, 2016 · 15:24

Federico Viticci wrote at length about his iPad-only workflow yesterday, and I have to say that I envy him that he can go and do this:

OS X is a fantastic desktop operating system, but it runs on machines that increasingly don’t fit the lifestyle of users who, like me, can’t sit down at a desk every day. I can’t (and I don’t want to) depend on Macs anymore because I want a computer that can always be with me. The majority of the world’s population doesn’t care about Xcode. I want to use an OS without (what I see as) cruft of decades of desktop conventions. I want powerful, innovative apps that I can touch. An iPad is the embodiment of all this.

I’m currently travelling, as you may have noticed, and I had a touch decision to make when packing — iPad Pro or MacBook Pro. I ultimately went with the MacBook for one reason, and one reason only — to retain the ability to edit my RAW files in Adobe Lightroom. iOS software still has a way to go, and I wish companies such as Adobe would start working on a full LR replacement, instead of making it a companion app.

A year into my iPad-only setup and with only one task left for my Mac, I feel safe to say I’ve moved past OS X at this point. The iPad Pro and iOS 9 have continued to free me from the physical constraints of my MacBook thanks to better hardware and a stronger software ecosystem. Macs are great, and they’re not going away any time soon, but they’re no longer the kind of computers I want to use. I need a computer that I can hold, with built-in 4G Internet and apps I can touch, and with a vibrant developer community whose apps constantly improve how I get work done. That’s an iPad.

I wonder at times if younger people have it easier when adopting a newer platform. I’m probably ten, if not more, years older than Federico, and I find things easier on OS X, most probably because I’ve known the intricacies of this operating system for a numbers of years now, whereas iOS is constantly evolving. This reminds me of the time in my teens when I used to play Doom a lot, using just the keyboard for everything. When I switched to Quake, I continued to use the keyboard, despite the fact that using a mouse and keyboard simultaneously gave the player much more precision. I still remember the day I walked into an internet café and saw four kids firing away, right hands on mice, left on keyboards. I finally made the switch, but it wasn’t easy for me, and they were probably just five or six years younger than me. The difference was that they skipped the keyboard-only phase…

And I never even tried to switch to playing FPS games on a gamepad…

Apple Pencil Crippled in iOS 9.3 Betas →

February 23, 2016 · 02:42

Serenity Caldwell for iMore:

I’ve never been much of a navigational-stylus-on-the-iPad person, so it initially surprised me when I began using my Pencil outside of traditional drawing and sketching apps. But on the iPad Pro, it feels right — especially if you’re switching between sketching a drawing or altering a photo with the Pencil to another app. If I’m looking at Google Images in one Split View pane while drawing in the other, it’s easy to move the Pencil from side to side.

I also found it hugely useful at times when I couldn’t sit or stand at a desk: When I first got the iPad Pro, I was recovering from an illness, and spent about a week working on the couch. When reading, the Pro’s screen was often just a hair too far away or awkwardly angled for me to scroll or tap with my fingers alone, but the angle and length of the Pencil made it the perfect tool to use on the screen while I rested.

I haven’t found that to be the case for me. I don’t like using the Pencil to navigate the UI or to select text, but…

Unfortunately, whether by bug or intentional design, the Pencil’s navigational prowess appears to have vanished in the iOS 9.3 public betas. With 9.3, you can no longer scroll or manipulate text; the only places the Pencil works are on canvas or when pressing digital buttons.

I don’t want this to go away — this would force me to put down the pencil when taking notes in Split View or when popping out to another app in Slide Over for a few seconds. I do use the Pencil then, just because it’s quicker than putting it down.

Please Apple, don’t cripple the Pencil.

iOS 9.3 beta 4 — What’s New?

February 23, 2016 · 02:22

It appears that iOS is the one which is evolving most of the bunch, not that that’s a bad thing — there’s still a lot of work to do, especially after introducing the new iPad Pro, multitasking features, and external keyboard support. I just hope that Apple doesn’t continue down the path of crippling the Pencil in iOS 9.3…

Continue reading →

Pew Research Center Poll: 51% Say Apple Should Unlock iPhone →

February 23, 2016 · 01:45

Pew Research Center:

As the standoff between the Department of Justice and Apple Inc. continues over an iPhone used by one of the suspects in the San Bernardino terrorist attacks, 51% say Apple should unlock the iPhone to assist the ongoing FBI investigation. Fewer Americans (38%) say Apple should not unlock the phone to ensure the security of its other users’ information; 11% do not offer an opinion on the question.

I strongly believe that many of these people would change their mind if they knew more about the subject, and the potential consequences.

Among those who personally own an iPhone, views are about evenly divided: 47% say Apple should comply with the FBI demand to unlock the phone, while 43% say they should not do this out of concern it could compromise the security of other users’ information.

Among those who own a model of smartphone other than the iPhone, 53% say Apple should unlock the phone, compared with 38% who say they should not.

That second part is not surprising to me.

Pair-Lock Your Device With Apple’s Configurator to Effectively
Disable Every Logical Forensics Tool on the Market →

February 23, 2016 · 01:05

Jonathan Zdziarski:

This article is a brief how-to on using Apple’s Configurator utility to lock your device down so that no other devices can pair with it, even if you leave your device unlocked, or are compelled into unlocking it yourself with a passcode or a fingerprint. By pair-locking your device, you’re effectively disabling every logical forensics tool on the market by preventing it from talking to your iOS device, at least without first being able to undo this lock with pairing records from your desktop machine. This is a great technique for protecting your device from nosy coworkers, or cops in some states that have started grabbing your call history at traffic stops.

I Chose the MacBook Pro Over the iPad Pro

February 11, 2016 · 20:44

I loved all my iPads, especially when travelling. They’re light, take up little space, and I even read on them instead of on my Kindle, just to have one less device with me. However, when I travel to places and plan to take a lot of photos, I always take my MacBook Pro1 instead of an iPad, albeit the decision is not an easy one.

While I can pretty much use the iPad, and more recently the iPad Pro, for close to everything, it does not run Lightroom nor does it support RAW files the way Lightroom for the desktop does. That is the single reason why I take the laptop. If I had an iPad mini, I would have probably taken that too2. But I don’t. And I want to be able to edit my photos.

So, Adobe, what I want, and need, is Lightroom for iOS which replicates the desktop version’s features, and allows me to transfer everything over to my Mac once I get home, integrating it easily with my existing catalog. Please make this happen.

  1. 2014 Retina 13″. ↩
  2. Instead of the Kindle most likely. ↩

Microsoft Buys SwiftKey for $250 Million →

February 3, 2016 · 09:29

Tim Bradshaw and Murad Ahmed for the Financial Times:

Microsoft is paying about $250m to acquire London-based Swiftkey, maker of a predictive keyboard powered by artificial intelligence that is installed on hundreds of millions of smartphones, according to people familiar with the deal.

Jon Reynolds and Ben Medlock, who founded the company in 2008 when both were in their 20s, will each make upwards of $30m from the buyout, which is set to be announced this week.

I have been a SwiftKey user on Android for many years and while the keyboard layout has its own issues, it has one absolutely genius function: the ability to choose two primary languages. This means that the keyboard will auto discover which one we are currently typing in and autocorrect as necessary — there is no need to change the language at all.

I really hope Apple adds this feature to iOS soon — I really miss it, switching between keyboards dozens of times per day. I’m not alone — Federico Viticci also sees this as a problem. The thing is… the technology to overcome this already exists. Please Apple, add it to your to-do list.

Daniel Details How to Use Drafts and Workflow for iOS →

January 25, 2016 · 16:27

Daniel Wallace:

If you liked my post about blogging on an iPad, and the best writing programs available on the iOS App Store, here’s a little more.

In my first post, I assumed that you were writing an essay-type post, full of big ideas, in which prose came first, and the links and quotations came second. First you wrote, and then, when you had finished writing, you went back and cleaned up the piece, got it ready for the web.

That’s why I began the piece talking about writing apps on the iPad, great programs like Ulysses and Drafts.

But, of course, not all blogging is like that. Sometimes we are responding to another person’s post, or want to connect a few different arguments; sometimes we just want to fire off a quick piece that’s nothing more than a link, a quotation, and a comment.

In theory, these sorts of posts would be a slog to compose on an iPad. You’ve got to select text on a web page, copy it into your text editor, go back, select links, copy them over, HTML or Markdown those links up, and then send the post to your blog. It’s a lot of bother for a quick response. But with the new capacities of iOS9, the best iPad (and iPhone) apps are getting better and better at speeding up the process for you.

Why should a short post take you a long time to write, when it doesn’t have to?

I’ve been meaning to incorporate the excellent Drafts for iOS [App Store] into my workflow for over a year now, for more automation. Daniel’s post, which details how he uses Drafts, has given me an excellent idea — to expand my workflow even more, to publish linked or regular posts, with quotes from the clipboard or Drafts, and mash it up all together in Workflow [App Store], without leaving Safari.

Hopefully my plan will be actually possible to execute…

Microsoft Is Bringing Its Windows Phone Keyboard to iOS →

January 16, 2016 · 12:53

Tom Warren:

One of my favorite features in Windows Phone is its truly excellent keyboard. It’s far more accurate and easy to use than the default iOS keyboard and many Android alternatives, but you’ve had to use Windows Phone to take advantage of it so far. Microsoft is planning to make its Word Flow keyboard available on other platforms, starting with iOS.

The problem with iOS third-party keyboards is that they mostly suck due to the system’s restrictions. And they’re usually even worse for foreign languages.

iOS 9.3 Preview on Apple.com →

January 12, 2016 · 14:52

This latest iOS release adds numerous innovations to the world’s most advanced mobile operating system. There are improvements to a wide range of apps, along with great new additions to CarPlay. iOS 9.3 may even help you get a good night’s sleep. And you’ll find a preview of new features that will make using iPad in schools easier and better for students and admins.

I’m hoping that Apple is pushing forward with better keyboard (external and on-screen) for iPads.

Thoughts on the iPad Pro On-Screen Keyboard

December 14, 2015 · 14:51

Since getting my iPad Pro a few weeks ago, I’ve been writing on it a lot, using mostly the software keyboard, but also helping myself out with an external one. I bought an Origami Workstation a few years ago, and since it’s in perfect working order, as is the Apple Wireless Keyboard it contains, I’ve been using that combo quite often. This might change when my Smart Keyboard finally arrives, but in the meantime, I’ve been thinking about the iOS 9 on-screen keyboard a lot.

Continue reading →

iOS 9.2 Beta 4—What’s New?

November 19, 2015 · 12:00

Apple released iOS 9.2 beta 4 yesterday, adding few new features and instead focusing on bug fixes. The most notable features were added in beta 1 to Safari View Controller: Action Extensions and the ability to long press the reload button to either reload the page without content blockers or to request the desktop version of the site.

Continue reading →