Tag Archives: apple

Apple’s iPhone OS coming to more platforms and devices, mostly AppleTV?

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Here’s some hot news. If you thought iPad was just enough iPhone OS then wait, there’s more iPhone OS coming! Yes, Apple is planning to bring the revolutionary App and home screen OS to many more devices.

Proof? A recent job posting which folks at ComputerWorld found, Apple is seeking a full-time engineering manager for “platform bring-up” part of the Core OS platform team.

Here’s a part of it,

The Core Platform team within Apple’s Core OS organization is looking for a talented and inspired manager to lead a team focused on bring-up of iPhone OS on new platforms. The team is responsible for low level platform architecture, firmware, core drivers and bring-up of new hardware platforms. The team consists of talented engineers with experience in hardware, firmware, IOKit drivers, security and platform architecture.

This position requires a very technical and hands-on leader, experience in working closely with hardware team and a deep understanding of bare metal software. You must be a highly self-motivated individual who seeks to create a dynamic and creative team environment in which old problems are solved in new and innovative ways.

What Mashable observed points that Apple is looking to poach the product managers for Google Android who have experience Unix OS and to develop mobile phones supporting Unix like operating systems. Most importantly they are looking for ARM based System-on-Chip (SoC) level design too (*Cough* A4 SoC’s – the most recent ones in the iPad *Cough*) which seems to power iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch’s and Apple TV too.

So now you know the relation. iPhone could possibly come to Apple TV too as both are based of ARM SoC’s and that it currently uses a Mac OS X derived OS which could be made better if the iPhone UI is used and it will enable Multi-Touch input too.

Predictions start being made now. Firstly rather then bringing the OS to a current device, instead there might be a idea bubbling up of a newer device? Not a new product line like tablets but a revision to MacBook, or a MacBook Mini which would have iPhone OS as primary OS or a low ARM Based server.

Much more can be developed on these existing technologies as the iPhone OS defines a new era of computing with so called “apps” to perform and utilize all the hardware capabilities of the device.

Image Credit : Devian Art

iTunes to hit 10 Billion Song Downloads soon : Win $10,000 Gift Card from Apple!

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Apple has revolutionized the Music industry with iPod but if we say, it was just the iPod then we’re quite mistaken. It’s iTunes which went hand in hand with the iPod to create history.

History will be created again soon when iTunes crosses 10 Billion music downloads after the App store for iPhone and iPod touch crossed 3 Billion downloads. From 2001, it has been an amazing journey.

9 years back no one ever know it would ever reach here. This was one of the greatest inventions which changed the way we manage our massive playlists. Apple fought against huge titles and smart campaigns were launched and records were broken. Individual purchase of songs for $0.99 was made possible. All this with iTunes.

Now by the time i refresh my page, over 700 songs are sold. It’s that quick!

Apple is celebrating it too and if your the lucky one to buy the 10th Billion Song then you get a $10,000 iTunes gift card.

Apple turning against Adobe while it seeks cover under Google

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Apple and Adobe are having a kind of coldwar. This all started when Flash was not included in the iPhone OS and now not on the iPad OS too. Recently at a town hall meeting, Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs slammed Adobe and called it lazy.

There have been huge discussions, lengthy blog posts written, tweets all over. Tablets could be the future of browsing and Apple is already a leader in Mobile device manufacturing so it could be a major game player in the future and Adobe knows this fact very well. Apple had skipped flash with the launch of the iPad and perhaps this could be a huge loss to Adobe as they miss a lot of consumers and to consumers as they miss a lot of content.

Apple is not interested in integrating flash in either of it’s platforms (iPhone or iPad) and their CEO in a town hall meeting with their execs said that the future is HTML5. Folks at Adobe did take it seriously and constantly forced on the fact that Flash is installed on about 98% on computers all over the world and 75% of video content is flash and flash covers a huge portion of active content on the Web.

They are announcing Flash for top platforms like Google’s Android, RIM’s Blackberry, Nokia, Palm Pre and these partnerships are a part of the Open Screen Project which has over 50 partners.

For example, the recent Nexus One from Google will rock with a great experience in the browser with Flash Player 10.1.

Adobe can do two things

  • Either get flash integrated or
  • Stop consumers from buying Apple Products

They say they have tried first method whose failure leads them to no other option than the second one. Apple and Google have also grown hostile and as they saw Sharing a common enemy makes way to a great friend, and same applies here. Adobe and Google are taking each other’s cover in their fight against Apple.

Adobe could possible start promoting Google products publicly surely as they’ve got Adobe technology integrated and this would be profitable to both of the companies.

Rumor : The iPad might get a inbuilt camera at launch

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iPad missed the camera. That’s what we know from the announcement for now but Mission Repair doesn’t think so. They received shipment of iPad parts few days back and then they tear it down to show us the possibilities of the camera.

They show us the metal internal frames of the iPad  and they note the “spot” left for a Camera. Next what they try is that they remove a camera (iSight) from a unibody MacBook and try to fit it in the “spot” and to their amazement, it fits exactly!

The Camera fits in the place, the lens also goes into the hole and the LED indicator for the camera fits in too and ambient light sensor hole is just right. Shocking isn’t it? Even i can’t get the fact, and i think this can’t be possible as Apple rarely adds new features after they’ve announced. I think this could be possible in the next version or maybe a device for the corporate world (business ready version) which is more likely to happen after the device enters the market.

Multi Touch finally arrives at Nexus One officially via OTA update

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No more missing multi touch interface on Nexus One, Google just issued a OTA (Over the Air) update for Android running on Nexus one’s which brings in multi touch capabilities to your Web Browser, Gallery and Google Maps. Earlier some third party patches had enabled Multi Touch only in the browser.

This means all those pinch and zoom gestures which iPhone users are much used to have now arrived at Nexus one. Also the Google Maps version is upgraded to 3.4 which brings the talked about “Night Mode” feature to Maps.

Nexus one’s hardware was completely capable of Multi touch gestures but they had not been added initially. Rumors were up that the reason behind Google not adding these features was due to patent infringement matters with Apple as they used the same technology in their popular products, iPhone and iPod touch. Few other market analysts say that it was because Google wanted to track user’s initial reaction to Multi-touch’s absence.

This is an automatic update so it’s not in your hands for the update to start and end but you can surely get the update manually if you don’t have it yet  [Instructions here].

iPad spotted at 52nd Annual Grammy’s with….. Stephen Colbert!

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iPad, iPad everywhere so how could it not be present at the 52nd annual grammy awards? Guess who got it? Stephen Colbert!

Where’s my Nominee list? Oh, it’s on my iPad. (He’s flaunting it a lot)

I am so sure, Apple’s paid a huge amount of money, to get iPad out there and if that’s not true, then Stephen just got lucky. Seems like Apple has kickstarted their marketing campaigns for iPad’s public appearances.

Thanks Engadget.

iPad without flash is a well without water

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If you saw the unveiling of iPad, Apple’s “Magical” Tablet device one prominent thing that most of us noticed and you would have too was the presence of the Blue Lego Block of Ambiguity™ at many places when Steve Jobs showed us the Demo of Safari on the iPad.

This means that no flash support for iPad. GRR. No Flash means No FarmVille, No flash based games, No Hulu, No flash videos, No flash based applications and if research was to be believed more than 70% of webs active content is flash. No access to it on your iPad (If you ever purchase one).

Not sure about consumers but this news has made fellow workers at Adobe real angry. Lee BrimeLow is a platform evangelist for Adobe and his blog post titled, “The iPad provides the ultimate browsing experience”  is a proof to it.

One his Comment replies clear out some more stuff,

@iPadFriend let me say this as clear as I can: APPLE DOES NOT WANT THE FLASH PLAYER TO PERFORM WELL. They don’t want you to go to Hulu or play Flash games because they worry that you won’t buy their apps. We have been trying to work with Apple since the iPhone came out.

Even i don’t get the idea why Apple is keeping flash out of all it’s mobile devices, iPhone, iPod Touch and now iPad. Even if they do so, they would surely get their users very happy but i know, Apple won’t do it.

If they keep going on with this, they’ve already got developers angry and soon consumers would also start feeling what all they have missed without flash. Lee, i am with you!

I don’t know how far this could be true but I think Apple could be working on a Flash like platform itself? Microsoft has silverlight and it’s only Apple who does not have it now so maybe that could be happening and that’s why they are keeping flash out for such a long time.

Thanks Engadget.

How to convert your iPod Touch or iPhone to iPad

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iPad was recently unveiled by Steve Jobs at their Media Event which created enough buzz to take the web by a storm. But guys, you need to wait for more 60 days till the devices start shipping. Too excited for it? Then there’s one way to get it on your iPhone/iPod touch too!

Taimur at RedmondPie did a little homework and found out how to do it. You need a Jailbroken iPhone with Cydia, the winterboard App from the store and few more apps and tweaks to have your iPad on iPhone ready! Also the iBook store which is on iPad is brought to iPod Touch/iPhone using the Classics app with the same user interface!

Here’s a video after break that shows how to do it!

iPad : iPhone on Steroids or Maybe Not

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iPad is here! The blogosphere has gone crazy about it, it’s there on all news channels, all top newspaper headlines. But is it actually worth it? Here’s what we think about it after watching Steve’s keynote and unveiling of the “magical” (Steve, here’s the evil laugh – muaha) tablet. If you missed the event do check out the liveblog where we covered the event second by second!

Design

iPhone is just too awesome and i can’t deny the fact. The design structure is just too good but man, a larger version of it? Literally, if we see iPad it’s like a stretched version of the iPhone. Same style with black border around the screen and a home button at the centre at bottom. Volume buttons on the right (this one’s unlike the iPhone). It’s Exactly like the iPhone and you’ll come to know why i am telling you that.

Home Screen

Same as iPhone. Apps and a dock. Springboard directly from the iPhone OS.

Operating System

It’s iPhone again. All the iPhone applications (140,00+ apps) are compatible with the tablet device. It’s like some sort of app simulator, really. If you run apps they will appear as a small block in the centre of the screen and no doubt you can double the size on the screen but the output quality reduces heavily especially with apps with a lot of text.

Multi-Touch

iPhone taught us what multi-touch actually is. Now Apple’s just using the same technology in the iPad too.  I don’t deny that i would love to use multi-touch on a 9.7 inch screen, but Apple’s where the innovation gone?

Some reasons why it isn’t

There are few things which differentiate iPhone and iPad too. There they go.

Applications specially for iPad

iPhone SDK (Application development kit for iPhone apps) with support for iPad applications was made available instantly at the launch of iPad. The newer SDK allows developer to make use of iPads large screen and offer newer stuff!

iBook Store

This one’s a sure Amazon Kindle killer. iBook store is a app which can be downloaded from the App store for iPad which allows users to download and read ebooks from the store. Something similar to iTunes music store but this time they are selling books. User reviews and more features available at the Ebook store.

Screen Size

Obviously, those who hate playing with small screens will love this creation. iPhone has got a large screen but it’s not enough for many to view pictures in one go or watch their favorite movies or Youtube in High Definition. Large Screen means more fun! Game experience will rock on this too!

iPad is our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price,

The Name

iPad. It’s not iPhone, ha. But we’ve come across so many cases where women have misunderstood the name iPad and related it to a female hygiene product. Bad Luck, Apple.

Pricing

$499 to start with a 16 GB space and a multi touch, 9.7 inch tablet device which is WiFi and Bluetooth ready is good stuff. Way to go.