Josh Helfferich

Apple By Josh Helfferich

Pittsburgh Apple store burgled again

According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, the Walnut Street Apple Store in the Shadyside neighborhood is closed this morning due to a smash-and-grab theft. A cinder block was used to shatter the glass doors of the store sometime around 5:30 AM, and a phone call to the store confirms that they were indeed closed this morning. According to the Post-Gazette, the thieves made off with thousands of dollars worth of MacBooks and iPods. This isn't the first time we've seen the Shadyside store victimized by criminals. Back in November, it made national news with another smash-and-grab crime. Of course, any storefront retail outlet with thousands of dollars' worth of portable/fenceable inventory is likely to be a prime target for theft. Sadly, it happens way more frequently than we'd like. Thanks to Steve A. for the tip. Correction: Changed 'robbery' to burglary/theft to be accurate. –Ed.

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Apple By Josh Helfferich

Apple's retail arm aids Japanese employees after earthquake

Earlier today, Kevin Rose published a set of emails he's received that really shine a light on how far Apple has gone to help out those in need during the aftermath of the Tohoku earthquake. The account is that of an Apple Store manager somewhere in Tokyo who has been overseeing his store through the disaster. Just after the earthquake, hundreds of people crowded around Apple Stores to use the internet connections (Rose's correspondent suggests that there's a lack of free Wi-Fi in Japan, making the Apple Stores natural gathering places). Using Skype and FaceTime, victims were able to contact family members and even regroup at the stores. According to the letters, Apple retail stores in Japan have become a sort of safe haven for lots of Apple employees (both retail and corporate) and their families since the quake hit. Apple Japan has been footing the bill for food, water, supplies and even hotel rooms for those in need, stating that their "safety is most important." As public transportation systems have been mostly down, Apple has offered to pay for any and all expenses that may occur should an employee attempt to travel back home through alternate means. This is why I love this company: Apple gets it. Money isn't everything -- people are. That's what's important, and it's good to see them following through on that belief.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Labelbox tags your photos in a beautiful way

A brand new app called Labelbox is taking the iOS App Store by storm this week, and for good reason. It does something simple -- putting labels on photos -- in an aesthetically pleasing and, really, quite fun way. The app asks you to take a photo or choose from your camera roll, at which point it prompts you to apply a label of your choice by swiping over the area the label will go (much like you were actually putting down a strip of tape, neat)! Labelbox also has some pretty deep sharing features built in, including uploading to Facebook, Twitter and the ever-growing Steply photo service. Oh, and the best part? It's free on the iOS App Store. So what are you waiting for? Quit clickin' and start stickin'!

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Gaming

Gaming By Josh Helfferich

Gameloft working on four Unreal Engine games

We have some wicked awesome news on the iOS gaming front today -- Gameloft, the developer of popular 3D mobile games such as N.O.V.A and Asphalt, has announced a partnership with Epic Games that will allow Gameloft to use Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 in four new titles, two of which are expected by the end of 2011. Unreal Engine on Apple devices first became a talking point when Epic Games debuted its tech demo of the engine, titled Epic Citadel, at Apple's iPod event last September. The game displayed graphics that far surpassed anything previously seen on iOS, raising eyebrows around the world. Epic later went on to release the full version of the game, which is now known as IGN's iPhone Game of the Year for 2010 -- Infinity Blade. I, for one, am very excited about this announcement. Between this partnership and its entry into the Mac App Store, Gameloft has been showing some serious ambition. Let's hope we see some great games on the Unreal Engine 3 later this year.

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Reviews

Reviews By Josh Helfferich

Engadget goes hands-on with the new MacBook Pro

If you thought today couldn't get any more hands-on, you were wrong. The folks over at our sister blog, Engadget, just received a review unit of the new 15-inch MacBook Pro with Thunderbolt technology and posted lots of delicious photos for us nerds to enjoy. (Note that unlike many other Apple-branded technologies, there's no InterCap-styled 'B' in "Thunderbolt.") Unfortunately, even though the model has Thunderbolt connectivity, there aren't any peripherals yet available that use the new I/O tech. This means that we won't be seeing any speed test demos in the immediate future, however much of a thrill it would bring. But it will work out of the box with all Mini DisplayPort connectors. The model itself is nearly identical to the previous family of MacBook Pros from a visual standpoint (the only change is a Thunderbolt port vs. the Mini DisplayPort), but it's still fun to watch an unboxing. On an already-busy day, this is a must-check-out for any major Apple geek. Corrected editing error, the trackpad is identical to earlier version.

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Computing

Computing By Josh Helfferich

Will 10.7 add a "safe deposit box" to your Mac?

It seems as though Apple is hard at work on new features for OS X 10.7 Lion this summer, and the latest possible addition to the OS is something that would solve a huge problem plaguing the tech world today -- insecurity with remote file storage. According to this find by Patently Apple, we may see a new "Safe Deposit Box" in Lion that aims to protect your files using cloud architecture in the same way that a physical safe deposit box protects your assets at a bank or other location. The basic idea described in the patent revolves around a single icon that, when the user drops a file onto it, would instantly upload and protect the file using Apple-backed cloud servers (which could possibly be located at their new $1 billion North Carolina data center). All of one's secure files would then be available by logging into the Safe Deposit Box service with a user name and password. For enhanced security, the patent also mentions a small window of time before the login expires to prevent accidental viewing of files by other individuals. This storage center would presumably also store digital copies of iTunes purchases, therefore solving the age old problem of losing your precious collection of tunes in a hard drive failure. We've seen similar technology in OS X already with FileVault, which encrypts and stores secure files on the fly. However, we've never seen deep internet-based secure storage from Apple, and it would be a welcome addition for those of us who are working with sensitive documents on multiple Macs (I know I'd be more comfortable with this than, say, Dropbox). It certainly looks like a step in the right direction. Let's hope that this idea is under active development at the big fruit company.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Space Gremlin helps you free up hard drive space on your Mac

Who knew gremlins could be so friendly? A new Mac app from Sean Christmann with the fantastic name of Space Gremlin is now available on the Mac App Store. This nifty little tool will help you to eat up all of the junk that's clogging up your Mac's precious hard drive space. It visualizes the contents of each of your drives in a really intuitive way: item squares that scale dynamically based on how large items are in relation to the parent folder or drive. This means that it's a perfect app for finding out which artist is taking up all that space in your iTunes folder, or which game is causing your Mac to run low on resources. There are some other tools available, namely DaisyDisk 2 (which admittedly has a much prettier interface), but there's something delightfully utilitarian about Space Gremlin that's caused me to make it my go-to app for cleaning up my trusty old Mac Pro. Sure, it doesn't look the greatest, but here's my philosophy -- you don't need a shovel encrusted with rubies to move some dirty old junk. I highly suggest that you take the demo of the app for a spin before you slam down the Washingtons for a copy in the Mac App Store, but either way, I'm sure you'll find Space Gremlin to be a pretty awesome utility. Just don't feed it after midnight. Space Gremlin is available on the Mac App Store for a cool US$3.99.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Share links between Mac and iOS with Dropbox trickery

It's beginning to look like the holy grail for any Mac user that also totes around an iPhone or iPod touch -- being able to open URLs remotely so that one can view them later from the comfort of their big, delicious Mac screen. Thanks to MacStories and their readers, we now have a workaround that fits the bill quite nicely. There are a number of apps and services that let one send links to the iPhone easily, but no one seems to have truly mastered sending links the other way. For that, you'll need a Dropbox account, some knowledge of Folder Actions on OS X and at least one cup of coffee. In the end, you'll be using Dropbox as a middleman between your iOS devices and your Mac, which monitors the Dropbox folders for URLs using Folder Actions. The point is, this is a very doable and very effective workaround for the time being. I'm still waiting for a single service that will streamline the way we send content between desktop Macs and their touch-based brethren, but I'm never one to turn down a fun afternoon of desktop tweaking. You can find the full set of instructions over at MacStories.

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Smartphones

Smartphones By Josh Helfferich

Wall Street Journal backs up "iPhone nano" rumor

We may be in for quite the shakeup of the iOS world if Ethan Smith's new article in the Wall Street Journal has any weight to it. Smith makes some pretty bold claims about a new, less-expensive iPhone, which he states has an edge-to-edge screen and weighs quite a bit less than the current iPhone 4. This lines up pretty well with a lot of the "iPhone nano" rumors that we've been seeing for years, and it's certainly intriguing to see the Wall Street Journal putting its stamp on the story. Presumably, this smaller iPhone would behave more like a data "access point" than a place to store all of your music, movies and books. Those, says Smith, could be managed by Apple's MobileMe service (which would be turning into a free cloud computing service alongside the launch of the new phone), therefore eliminating the need for large amounts of storage space on the actual device. How well this would work is a topic still up for debate, but you know how it goes: Apple always finds a way. I suppose we'll just have to wait and see what Jobs (or Cook) has up his sleeve in the coming months. The WSJ article hints at a summer release for both the micro phone and the revamped MobileMe service.

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Apple By Josh Helfferich

Steve Jobs chilling with President Obama today

According to Business Insider, President Obama is scheduled to be flying into the San Francisco area this afternoon to attend an event for District Attorney Kamala Harris and to deliver remarks at a later dinner. What isn't on the President's public agenda, according to an anonymous source familiar with the matter, is a one-on-one meeting with the turtlenecked crusader himself, Steve Jobs. You may think that they'll be talking about several important issues regarding Apple's lead in the technological frontier, but we all know that the President probably just wants to have a little chat about iWeb not being updated. Somebody's in trouble...

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Apple By Josh Helfferich

Apple posts guidelines for Mac App Store (and we have highlights)

Apple has posted the Review Guidelines for what will soon be the omnipresent Mac App Store, and many developers aren't happy with what they're seeing. Like the iOS App Store, Apple will control the gates and review each application before it's posted. Of profits made, 70 percent will go to the developers, and 30 percent will presumably pay for chairs in which Steve Jobs and the rest of his executive team will sit to watch the iOS App Store money roll in. We took the liberty of rounding up some of the most intriguing lines from the document so that those of you who don't have access to the developer portal can get the highlights. According to Apple, your Mac app will be rejected if: It is a "beta," "demo," "trial," or "test" version It duplicates apps already in the App Store, particularly if there are many of them The developer is "spamming" the App Store with many versions of similar apps. You will also be removed from the Developer Program if this occurs. It is not packaged and submitted using Apple's packaging technologies included in Xcode - No third party installers are allowed. It requires license keys or implements its own copy protection It spawns processes that continue to run after a user has quit the app without user consent It has metadata that mentions the name of any other computer platform It uses location-based APIs to control vehicles, aircraft, or other devices (Saying goodbye to my Macbook Air tank project. Sigh.) It uses location-based APIs for dispatch, fleet management, or emergency services It has misspelled Apple product names in its name (i.e., GPS for Imac, iTunz) It looks similar to Apple Products or apps bundled on the Mac, including the Finder, iChat, iTunes, and Dashboard Your user interface is "complex or less than very good" It changes the native user interface elements or behaviors of Mac OS X (Well, that just wiped out 90 percent of the best Mac apps in a single, flaming fist punch.) It creates a store inside itself for selling or distributing other software (i.e., an audio plug-in store in an audio app) Your game portrays realistic images of people or animals being killed or maimed, shot, stabbed, tortured, or injured. (Such as Counter Strike, Halo, and pretty much every other good video game ever produced.) "Enemies" within the context of your game solely target a specific race, culture, a real government or corporation, or any other real entity. (I wonder if this applies to zombies...) It contains user generated content that is frequently pornographic (like "Chat Roulette" apps) Even with that daunting list of red tape, Apple managed to round off the Review Guidelines with a really nice message to those who are creating the apps that sounds like it could be the words of Steve Jobs himself: "Show them their world in innovative ways, and let them interact with it like never before. In our experience, users really respond to polish, both in functionality and user interface. Go the extra mile. Give them more than they expect. And take them places where they have never been before." Now that is a philosophy I can get behind.

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Gaming

Gaming By Josh Helfferich

Angry Birds publisher Chillingo acquired for $20 million

In the wake of such huge news from Apple today, it's hard to concentrate on anything else. Here's one story you won't want to miss, though: Chillingo, the publisher behind the wildly popular game Angry Birds, was acquired by EA Games for a cool $20 million in cash. Not to worry, though, because Angry Birds isn't going anywhere. The rights to the game are actually owned by the developer, Rovio, who updated his Twitter profile earlier today to clarify that Angry Birds was not part of the sale and will not be controlled development-wise by EA. Even so, it's no secret that the App Store's most popular game of all time certainly helped to sway EA towards this acquisition. With many successful apps available, Chillingo probably looked pretty delicious to all of the big fish in the game industry who were hoping to cash in on the mobile market. Now, it's time to fire up Angry Birds and do some additional research on the story. What? Why are you giving me that look? Yes, I'm working!

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

iPhoto '11 brings huge updates to printing, full screen, Facebook sharing

Apple has announced a new version of iPhoto in iLife '11, and it brings a boatload of new features to the table, including: Full screen browsing of all Events, Albums, Maps, and pretty much everything else. "Smart" slideshows that use your location information from Places to create dynamic shows that use maps from places you've been. Floating menus that allow for operation of the entire app from the full screen mode. Deep Facebook and Flickr integration that syncs all of your photos both ways, regardless of whether or not they were added by iPhoto. A new email template feature that creates some stunning HTML email galleries of your photos. All of this is wrapped in a gorgeous iOS-styled interface (look at the bottom navigation bar)! More to come in the near future.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Swearch brings style to the iPhone web app

I guess you could say that it finally happened: Someone built a web app for the iPhone so beautiful that it's nearly indistinguishable from something natively run. That person is Steve Streza, and that app is Swearch. Swearch does one thing, and it does it very well. It allows you to search Google, Twitter, Wikipedia, and Flickr quickly. Thanks to resource caching, Swearch is lightning fast once you add it to your homescreen (with a spiffy retina-ready icon, to boot!). Navigation is done through a card-like interface that allows you to swipe through the selection of search engines much like one would swipe through pictures in the Photos app. Once you type in your search, the results are displayed inside the app and are cleared automatically to keep Swearch ready at all times. I've been beta testing Swearch for quite a while now, and let me tell you this: If they'd let me pay for this web app, I would. It's really that good. Try it out for yourself over at Swearch.me. And one last thing: The clouds on the Twitter search page move! How freakin' neat is that? I'm giddy over it. The polish on this app is incredible.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Captio: The simple app that just might change your life

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I have the worst memory. I also have a bad short-term memory. This makes it tough to remember the things that pop into my head throughout the day, and it makes it especially hard to keep track of tasks and other actions that I must take. I've wanted to use my iPhone to "bottle" these fleeting thoughts for years, but nothing on the App Store allowed me to do this without some sort of distraction. Enter Captio, a new app from Ben Lenarts of Boonbits. It's a small note taking application that allows you to capture thoughts, ideas, tasks, and other tidbits of information as they come to you. You may say, "But there are a million of those apps on the store, Josh, you handsome man!" Given, but Captio has one killer feature that everyone else has failed to deliver on: nothing. For example, here's how it works: Step 1: You open the app. Step 2: You type what you need to remember. And that's it. Your idea is in your email inbox. That's what makes Captio so great. You can add a quick photo before Captio whisks the idea out of your mind, but the feature is hidden quite well under the keyboard (as not to distract you). It's one fast app, too. I don't mean that in the same way that reviewers normally say it, either. Captio could outrun Usain Bolt strapped to a rocket cheetah. My iPhone 4 loads it from a cold start in about a second, and it's even quicker when loading from multitasking memory. If you're looking for something to capture everything you need to remember (and capture it quickly), I highly recommend picking up Captio. It's available now on the App Store for a fantastic $0.99. Just be prepared to break the news gently to your iPod icon, though; he won't be happy to lose his spot on the dock.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Google Earth updated for iPhone 4 retina display, includes ocean topography

Google Earth for iOS, which was already one of the biggest "wow" apps on the iPhone (It's the Earth in your pants!), has received a huge update that adds support for the iPhone 4's gorgeous retina display, as well as new ocean topographies that will allow users to explore the underwater depths. You can see from the screenshot above that this adds an insane amount of detail to the textures and drawing space. Even this comically oversized screen grab can't convey how good this looks on a real iPhone 4, though. I highly suggest that you check it out for yourself. Google Earth is a universal application for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch; it is available in the App Store as a free download.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

GV Connect app for Google Voice now available

GV Connect, the Google Voice client for the iPhone and iPod touch that caused quite a stir when it was pulled by Apple last year, has unexpectedly returned to the App Store. Developer Andreas Amann resubmitted the app last week following Apple's new documentation on App Store acceptance. GV Connect is now available in the App Store for a cool $2.99.

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Apps By Josh Helfferich

Justin.TV live streaming iPhone app now available

Livebloggers, rejoice! Justin.TV, one of the world's most popular live video streaming services, has released its new app for the iPhone and iPod touch in the form of an upgrade that enables live video to stream from the device. Both the app and service are free, but the app only works on devices with a camera. Streaming is done over WiFi or 3G, depending on availability. Thanks to Kristi Evans for the tip!

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