Friday Morning News

Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2017/03/friday-morning-news170317/

The latest iPhone rumour claims the new iPhone model will come with a “mostly flat” display, with perhaps a small curve at the edges. The rumours still seem to claim it will feature an edge-to-edge OLED display, and it’s also said to come with 2.5D cover glass that’s been used since the iPhone 6 to give the glass overlay a slight curve and allow it to sit flush with the case.

Developers Firi Games say they’ve seen a single instance of an unreleased Apple TV model and tvOS 11 in their logs. The AppleTV6,2 is the first of its kind to be seen anywhere, with the fourth-generation Apple TV with Siri being the AppleTV5,3. AppleInsider speculates that this could be the as-yet unknown 4K Apple TV that could be in testing at Cupertino right now.

A patent application from Apple describes a method to look at and unlock a mobile device using facial recognition. This patent builds upon an earlier patent of the same name granted to Apple in 2016, which in turn was built upon a patent granted in 2015. It seems that Apple is just refining their facial recognition technique, with minor differences between each version.

Depending on who you ask, the iMessage App Store isn’t doing well following its mildly successful launch. Following the initial months where the iMessage App Store saw 100% month-on-month growth, that figure has dropped to just 9% after the hype has somewhat died down, as reported by TechCrunch.

The seventh beta of iOS 10.3 and macOS 10.12.4 have been released to developers and members of Apple’s public beta testing program. If it seems a little soon after the previous beta release, it is, coming just three days after the previous beta and suggesting that the public release is not too far off.

You’ll note that Withings accessories are not included on Apple’s HomeKit page. One possible reason is because of Apple’s ongoing legal battle with Nokia, who owns Withings.

MacStories has a review of the iPad-only LiquidText, saying that the uniquely digital PDF experience is like no other, especially with version 3.0 which applies the same digital-only ideas to note-taking and annotation. LiquidText won Apple’s most innovative iPad app of 2015 award, and two years later, LiquidText is now applying that innovation to its Apple Pencil integration.

Over at Six Colors, Jason Snell writes about what Apple’s next step in podcasting may be. There’s somewhat of a resurgence in podcasting, and instead of sitting on its laurels, Apple may soon be doing something about. Apple could support paid subscriptions to podcasts, for example, or release an Android version of its podcasts app even though great third-party alternatives already exist.

Jason Snell also says AirPods represent how Apple’s push for simplicity is sometimes frustrating. There are no gestures for track management with AirPods, but at the same time, would you really want a separate touch/tap gesture for every possible kind of playback control?

If you’re looking for something to play this weekend, you’re in luck. The App Store is on some kind of indie game promo spree at the moment, and limited time discounts mean there’s plenty to bang for your buck to be had.

My idea/dream for AirPod gestures would be similar to the clicker on EarPods.

Tap = Play/Pause
Hold = Activate Siri
Double tap = Skip forward
Triple tap = Skip back
Slide finger up and down the AirPod = control volume

Of course it’s easy to play armchair quarter back with having very little insight into the design and engineering challenges this would pose (but that’s their problem to solve).

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Also, I know the chance of this happening is slim to none, but I really hope Apple comes up with some sort of program to update movies from 1080p to 4K (like they did with 720p → 1080p)

As in iTunes allowing a download of a 1080p copy of a film originally purchased as a 720p film?

But Apple have no plans to support 4K do they?

Read the second item in the original post.

Sorry didn’t see that, but I don’t put much faith in rumours like that, especially given earlier reports that Apple have no plans to move to 4K … but then again this is the same Apple that said they’d never release a stylus for a touch screen device.

I remember blue ray is a world of hurt but I don’t think I’ve read any reports of Apple never doing 4K. They have to move beyond 1080p at some point, if it’s not 4K, 1080p will be really old hat by whatever time that is (that wouldn’t be unheard of with current Apple though).

8K ia apparently due out soon so maybe they’ll move straight to that… Ok maybe not

I doubt it. 8K will be wellllllll established before Apple goes there.

Sooner the better. I’m not buying a new Apple TV till I can use it to output 4K.

I literally love everything about my AirPods… except Siri. It’s painfully slow on my iPhone 6 anyway (I don’t know how Apple thinks that’s okay but that’s another topic), so I could be waiting upwards of 5-10 seconds between activating Siri, and getting my music to play (if that command is recognised at all).

I feel like this is a common thread throughout Apple’s new products: “it’s a great product, but Siri holds it back”.

gets on the phone
“Hi, Tim? Yeah this is @FaultyTaco over at the AppleTalk Australia forum.
Good thanks, you? Excellent, now I won’t hold you up, just wanted to let you know that @Oldmacs won’t be buying a new Apple TV until you guys pull your finger out and support 4K.
What’s that? You’ll drop everything and get right on it? Great news Cookie, I’ll let him know. Cheers.”

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And? Your point is?

Siri is slow, unreliable and just dumb when it came to responses, compared it to the Google Now service some time ago and Google was FAR better (better voice recognition, better respones to queries and faster) so use that instead. To me Siri is yet another swing and miss by Apple.

I find Siri and diction on my watch good but useless on the phone. On the phone I may as well manually go do what I wanted to do because it rarely does it first time. Can’t believe this year it will be 6 years old, should be so much better by now. Doesn’t make much sense to me why it is like this.

I agree, they really missed a treat by letting Siri just languish half-finished.