iPhone Hacks | iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone Blog » evasi0n 1.4 to Jailbreak iOS 6.1.2 Will Be Released Today

New Microsoft Windows 8 tablet ad pokes fun at Apple’s iPad

iPhoneHacks — Thu, 23 May 2013 05:39:11 +0000

Microsoft has released a new Windows 8 tablet ad featuring the ASUS VivoTab Smart tablet, which pokes fun at Apple’s iPad. The ad titled “Less talking, more doing” makes use of Siri voiceover to highlight some of the shortcomings of the iPad by pointing out Windows 8 features that are not available on the iPad such as live titles where information is dynamically updated, support for multiple windows at once and Microsoft Office products such as PowerPoint. The ad then goes on to say that “Should we just play chopsticks,” and shows the Garageband app, which seems like a dig at Apple’s iPad and iPad mini ad that have featured the app. Meanwhile, the Windows 8 tablet is shown updating the live titles. The ad ends by highlighting the price difference between the iPad, which costs $699 (64GB) and a 64GB ASUS VivoTab Smart tablet, which costs $499. Check out the ad embedded below and let us know what you think. HT: The Verge Continue reading →

Developer hacks iOS to forward notifications to Google Glass

Rounak Jain — Wed, 22 May 2013 21:45:23 +0000

Cydia developer Adam Bell, maker of Message Box that brings system wide Facebook chat heads, has now developed a new tweak to forward all iOS notification to Google Glass. Glass, in its current form, is very limited when it comes to iOS integration, but by forwarding all notifications Bell’s tweak makes Glass a very useful accessory for people who don’t like checking their phones each time a new notification comes in. Glass doesn’t just display these forwarded notifications, it also stores them so that you can scroll through them later on. So tweets, iMessages, reminder alerts and every other type of notification can now be pulled by Glass. This is obviously jailbreak-only, and Bell says that he’ll be releasing the source code of the tweak on GitHub in a few days, and will follow up with a Cydia release. Glass is still in its pre-alpha/alpha stages with a very limited rollout, and as Google approaches closer to a consumer release support for iPhone will be improved upon. Via: 9to5Mac Continue reading →

Google to add Voice Search to Chrome for iOS soon

iPhoneHacks — Wed, 22 May 2013 21:01:15 +0000

Google has announced plans to add its enhanced Voice Search feature to Chrome for iPhone and iPad. Chrome users will be able access the Voice Search feature in the Chrome app by tapping on the microphone button just above the keyboard as you can see in the screenshot above. Touch the microphone, say your search query aloud and see your results (in some cases spoken back to you), all without typing a single letter. Try these queries with the update (coming soon to the App Store): - “How many miles from San Antonio to Dallas?” - “What’s the weather in Rome?” - “Who stars in The Internship?” Chrome already has a microphone button in the omnibar that allows you to search handsfree with the voice Search feature, but based on the screenshot it looks Google is bringing the voice search interface from the Google Search app. So it should also display the text on the fly, which would be quite cool. Google has also mentioned that the update will also reload web pages faster by using the cache more efficiently. Google is also encouraging developers to give users an option to open links in Chrome in their apps, as the update will come with an option to return back to their app with a tap. Google has said it will adding these features in the next update of Chrome for iOS. However, it hasn’t provided any release date for the update. As always, we’ll let you know as soon as it is released. Via Google Chrome Blog Continue reading →

Scanner Pro: The ultimate document scanning app for iOS [Review]

David Gilson — Wed, 22 May 2013 20:40:27 +0000

You might not realise, but you’ve got a document scanner in your pocket. Remember all those spy films where the hero pulls out a tiny camera to take a copy of the villain’s plans to take over the world? You too can do that because your iPhone’s camera is more than capable enough to take high quality document snaps. While just the built-in camera app alone is fine, it’s always difficult to avoid perspective distortions and have shadows get in the way. Scanner Pro is here to help with all of that, read on to find out how. When you first use Scanner Pro, it’s not at all clear quite how it organises its scans. You actually perform scans in batch loads, and each batch is shown on the top-level of the app. When I started testing it, I didn’t realise I was working within my first group/batch. I eventually learned that these groupings of batches were extremely useful and that you can organise things even more by creating a folder to put batches in – groups of groups! The best thing with the batch system is that once you’ve completed a group of scans, the group can be uploaded to a number of online services as a multipage PDF. When starting to scan, you may take a photo within the app, or import a photo from the camera roll. The latter option is useful if you have a bunch of document photos you took before buying the app – you can still give them the Scanner Pro treatment. The first thing that Scanner Pro does is allow you to draw a quadrilateral around the area you wish to have scanned. This solves the first problem of photo-scanning – perspective. Scanner Pro is actually quite smart as it tries to guess the area you wanted to scan. I found this to be consistently almost accurate – by that I mean that it usually gets the plane of perspective correct, but it usually adds on an extra area that I don’t want to include. The corner controls for setting the shape can be quite fiddly, but Scanner Pro has two tools to help with this. Firstly, a magnifying glass appears to help you get close in. Secondly, if you’re finding that your finger is occluding the area of interest, or you’re bumping into the side of the screen, a two finger gesture can launch a long ‘handle’ so that you can move the corner from a distance. However, I’m still trying to work out exactly what the magic combination of touches is to get the handle on the corner I intended is. Next in the process is tweaking the visual properties. Here, you can set brightness, contrast, rotation, and image size. Also, you can set the document type: photo, greyscale, or document. The latter option (which is default) is perhaps the most useful as it uses software to smooth out all of the uneven shading you’ll always get when you photograph a sheet of paper. Once the scan has been created, there are a large amount of options on what you’ll actually do with it. You can save single scans to your camera roll, and print documents via networked printers. Scanner Pro lets you open in installed apps such as Evernote and Instashare. Even more surprisingly was built-in support for uploading to Google Docs, Dropbox, Evernote, and any WebDAV server. Given the clarity created by Scanner Pro’s algorithms, the built-in support for uploading to your Evernote account makes the two apps a perfect combination. Of course, this is only so for Evernote users. However, Evernote users enjoy the service’s powerful optical character recognition so that both images and image- based PDF files are made searchable by Evernote. Creating an Evernote note within Scanner Pro. Scanner Pro is pretty much the whole package if you happen to use your phone for heavy duty document scanning. Bear in mind that the app is relatively expensive ($6.99). However, you might find that the expense if worthwhile if you regularly need such a tool. There are other apps that can do a similar job when it comes to correcting perspective. However, Scanner Pro’s biggest strength is in its ability to organise scans and share with other apps. ➤ Download link ($6.99) Here’s a source image that we used with Scanner Pro … … and here’s the scan we produced. Continue reading →

Twitter for Mac update finally brings Notification Center integration

iPhoneHacks — Wed, 22 May 2013 19:04:47 +0000

Twitter has just released an update for its Mac app (v2.2.1), which finally brings Notification Center integration. Even though OS X Mountain Lion (10.8) brought Twitter integration to the Mac, it strangely didn’t come with Notification Center integration. Here’s what’s new in version 2.2.1: Notification Center integration: receive notifications when someone mentions you or when you receive a Direct Message. You can configure this from the app’s Preferences window. This update also includes the following changes: * Fix for Growl notifications not working in Lion and Mountain Lion * Fix for bug that prevented un-favoriting tweets * Fix for missing account switcher in composer * Fix for error message when posting a tweet with a pasted image * Fix for enlarged avatar when dragging a tweet into an email * Fixes for crashes and various other bugs You can download the update via the App Store app or you can download the latest version via this direct App Store link. HT: 9to5Mac Continue reading →

Apple says Samsung Galaxy S4 and Google Now infringes its patents

Rounak Jain — Wed, 22 May 2013 18:27:54 +0000

Last week, we told you that Apple’s adding Samsung’s latest Android flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S4, in its second patent lawsuit against the Korean company. Today, more details about the suit emerged as Apple filed a formal motion to add Samsung’s Galaxy S4 in the list of infringing devices. Apple claims that after analysing the three Galaxy S4 units it bought from Sprint, Verizon and AT&T, it found the same infringing features that it found on the other phones named in the lawsuit: [The] analysis revealed that the Galaxy S4 infringes five of Apple’s asserted patents in the same ways as Samsung’s already accused products. Apple has determined that the Galaxy S4 infringes one or more of the asserted claims of the ’502, ’647, ’959, ’414, and ’604 patents. Two of those patents are about Siri’s universal search (’604 and ’959), one about asynchronous data sync (’414), another one about performing actions on auto detected patterns in text like phones numbers (’647) and the last one about autofill in text fields based on past inputs (’502). Apple notes that since it asserted the Siri universal search patents against Android’s quick search box, Google also launched Google Now, which replaces the search box on many phones. So it’s accordingly updating the suit. We wonder if Google Now on iOS infringes these universal search patents, and if it does, is it protected by virtue of being on iOS. Via: FOSS Patents Continue reading →

Trunk: A versatile Lightning cable for your iPhone 5

iPhoneHacks — Wed, 22 May 2013 17:27:09 +0000

If you’re frustrated with tangled cables of your iPhone’s Lightning to USB connector, then Gizmodo points us to a cool new accessory called Trunk by iLoveHandles. Trunk is a short, posable Lightning charging cable for your iPhone 5, which can be bent and used as a stand for the device. It’s also ultra-protable. It’s so small that you can straigten it out and put it in your pocket. Trunk’s reinforced core can actually support your iPhone 5 in almost any position, letting you more easily use it as a navigation device in your car, or just keeping it off the floor while it’s charging from an outlet. Just make sure you’re ok with only four or five inches of slack. It reminds me of Twig, the ultra-portable cable for the iPhone, which comes with a bendable wire skeleton and three legs that allowed you to use it as a tripod stand for the iPhone. It also could be used to wrapper for your EarPods’ cord. Trunk is available on iLoveHandles website for $19.95. HT: Gizmodo Continue reading →

Apple rolls out revamped Online Store

iPhoneHacks — Wed, 22 May 2013 14:51:57 +0000

Apple has quietly revamped its Online store with a cleaner and more modern user interface. Here’s a list of the design changes we’ve noticed so far: The most obvious change is the three column layout has been replaced with a more image centric UI featuring large tiles of products and services. Apple’s Online Store – homepage (old) Apple’s Online Store – homepage (new) The left hand sidebar that gave you quick access to accessories pages, gift cards, the refurbished and clearance store has been removed. You now have to navigate to a particular product to access the accessories link in the horizontal navigation bar. The link to the refurbished & clearance store has been moved to the bottom of the page. The Store services and promotions that were previously in the right hand sidebar are now featured along the products. For example: the main page of the Online store is currently promoting products such as the iPad and the iPad mini for Father’s Day celebrations. The accessory pages have also been revamped. The main accessory page for a particular product features large titles of the accessories. The right hand sidebar provides quick access to accessory categories. iPhone accessories page (old) iPhone accessories page (new) The revamped Online store seems to have been rolled out across all countries. Overall, the revamped Online store looks a lot more modern. Let us know what you think in the comments. Continue reading →

The iPhone is still the best mobile phone in America, but survey says it’s starting to slip

Stefan Constantinescu — Wed, 22 May 2013 13:00:21 +0000

The annual American Customer Satisfaction Index for mobile phones has just come out, and of course Apple is on top, but they’ve fallen from 2012′s score of 83% of customers being satisfied with their products. This year they’re “just” 81%. How do the others compare? Samsung is at 76%, as is Nokia, and Motorola of all companies is at 77%. Both HTC and LG have slipped, down to 72% and 71% respectively. What should this data tell you? People are expecting more and more out of their mobile phones. Let’s be a little honest, as much as the iPhone rocks, it’s due for a face lift, and hopefully we’ll see that next month at WWDC. Considering how fast the Android ecosystem is moving, Apple is starting to seem a bit slow, which shows with these new numbers. You should also take into account that this data focuses on phones, an area of the market that is growing, no one denies that, but it’s not growing nearly as fast as the market for tablets. There it’s iPad or … there is nothing else. Just the iPad. Continue reading →

Apple is (again) the world’s most powerful and valuable brand this year

Stefan Constantinescu — Wed, 22 May 2013 12:00:39 +0000

The annual BrandZ list is out, and it looks like Apple is, for the third year in a row, the world’s most valuable brand at $185.1 billion. Google comes in second place with a brand value of $113.7 billion. Samsung, which wasn’t even in the top 50 last year, is now the world’s 30th most valued brand. What you really want to know is are these numbers meaningful to ordinary consumers? The answer is no. Similar to how marketing people give each other awards for the best marketing campaigns every year, BrandZ telling people which brands have the most value doesn’t really signify anything meaningful. If you were to buy your food based on this list, you’d be eating a lot of McDonald’s, for example. Still, it’s nice to see that Apple holds such a powerful position, namely due to their high quality products. Samsung may be outselling Apple in terms of number of devices sold, but really, how are you going to compare a budget $149 Galaxy sold on a street corner with a $649 Apple iPhone 5? You just can’t. Continue reading →