Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2018/04/friday-morning-news200418/
The latest research note from Ming-Chi Kuo claims this year’s iPhone refresh, which will include a 6.1-inch version of the iPhone. This larger iPhone with LCD display tech would be priced at around US $550 and may even come with dual SIM card slots, which would be a first for iPhones and would presumably require some changes to the UI to allow switching between them.
Apple’s 2018 Environmental Responsibility Report tells us about the company reaching one of their goals, with Apple achieving 100% renewable energy across their worldwide operations earlier this year. There’s still plenty of work to be done, with Apple now turning their attention to reducing their overall carbon footprint, and the production of 4 GW of clean energy in their supply chain by 2020.
Apple’s newest iPhone-part recycling robot is Daisy. Daisy is the successor to Apple’s previous recycling robot, Liam, who was revealed in early 2016. According to TechCrunch, Daisy was built using some of Liam’s parts, is capable of disassembling nine different versions of the iPhone, and working at a pace of 200 iPhones per hour, although her design seems to be much more industrial than Liam.
In the Sydney Morning Herald, Peter Wells spoke to Apple CEO Tim Cook about using different devices, with Cook mentioning that he generally uses a Mac at work, the iPad at home, and always an iPad when travelling. Wells asked about the division between iOS and the Mac, and Cook’s response was to say that he doesn’t “believe in sort of watering down one for the other”. Both are discrete platforms, and if you begin to merge the two, “you begin to make trade offs and compromises”.
I must have missed this earlier in the week, but if you’re currently on the iOS public beta program train, the second beta of iOS 11.4 was released earlier this week following a developer release even earlier in the week. The return of AirPlay 2 and Messages in iCloud features are expected to be the only real features for end-users to look forward to.
Netflix’s iOS app now has new 30-second trailers for popular content. The previews appear on the home tab within the Netflix app, ensconced in circular frames like Instagram Stories, and are played back in a vertical, portrait-mode friendly format. Netflix says previews allow for easier discovery of content.
9to5Mac has a great post cataloging the various shades of Apple’s space grey. It started with iPods that were darker, almost black, while terms like graphite and charcoal being used to describe the colour, which could appear in a number of different shades depending on the lighting and the angle. Recent iPads and iPhones have had much lighter shades of grey, but with “space grey 3”, Apple seems to be moving back into the darkness once more.
Drafts 5 is a major version bump for the most comprehensive iOS text editor apps, and MacStories has the full review. It’s clear from their review that Drafts can play a huge part in your iOS productivity workflow if you primarily deal with text, capable of capturing text entry from anywhere and then taking that to the next level with integrated scripting.
Star Wars: Jedi Challenges now brings the AR experience to mobile devices, with any device capable of running iOS 11 now capable of playing 3D Holochess in AR. The other features of Jedi Challenges require extra hardware, but if Holochess is your thing, then “free is a good price”.
The Verge shows off an incredible jailbreak tweak that turns the incoming call screen into a Pokémon trainer encounter from the Gen II era. While I doubt I’d jailbreak my iPhone just for it, there’s definitely a strong feeling of nostalgia coming from their included demo GIF.
