Monday Morning News

Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2018/04/monday-morning-news300418/

CNET claims Apple is working on a wireless AR/VR headset, targeting a 2020 release. According to their sources, it’s said that the headset will have a resolution of 8K per eye, which is not only much higher than any headset currently available, but might just be high enough to be on the outskirts of what’s possible with the fastest graphics cards money can buy. That being said, maybe graphics technology will catch up and make Apple’s AR/VR headset dreams a reality.

Apple’s range of AirPort wireless routers is soon to be no more, following confirmation to iMore that the company is discontinuing AirPort products. While Apple notes that existing devices will be available via Apple’s online, brick-and-mortar, and third-party outlets until stocks last, after that it’ll be the end of the devices that were originally rumoured to be discontinued over a year ago. Mesh networks may be all the rage these days, but AirPorts were renowned for their simplicity and ease-of-use.

If you need a new wireless router and really want an AirPort Extreme, chances are you can still find one. But for the rest of us, what are the recommended alternatives? Six Colors points out Marco Arment’s advice, who says Ubiquiti is for true nerds that want to eke as much performance as they can from their Wi-Fi, while everyone else should get Eero. Apple sells Linksys’ Velop mesh networking kits, but you’ll need to look elsewhere if you want a wireless backup target (or start backing up to the cloud).

A new Siri glitch gives us the “vulgar slang” definition of the word “mother” that ends in something that rhymes with “trucker”. Originally discovered on the Apple subreddit, Ars Technica explains that the second definition of mother possibly comes from the Oxford dictionary, although it’s listed as vulgar slang. Sounds like exactly the kinds of thing we should be teaching our machine-learning AIs.

The Verge reports iTunes is now available on the Microsoft Store for Windows 10. It’s been a while coming, given that Microsoft first revealed iTunes would be making its way to the Microsoft Store almost a year ago, but whatever delayed the release has now been resolved, and those in hell can now enjoy a cold glass of ice water.

If I had an Apple Pencil, my favourite iPad feature would undoubtedly be using Instant Notes from the lockscreen to start taking notes or scribbling without having to unlock the device. AppleInsider notes the feature can be used to create a new blank note every time, which offers a level of privacy versus opening the last note created on the lock screen.

Luke Kanies says Apple has a focus problem on the iPad, and it’s not that you can only do so much at once on the iPad, it’s that keyboard input doesn’t work like you expect it to half the time. Even with prompting, telling the iPad you want it to focus this particular email, the keyboard remains stubbornly unresponsive for simple tasks like deleting emails, which really hinders iPad productivity if you have to resort to touch to accomplish such simple tasks.

Over at MacStories, Federico Viticci tells us about the simple, extensible nature of the iOS 11 Files app. Third-party GitHub app Working Copy now has the ability to commit documents directly to GitHub from the Files interface, which lets you do some pretty cool things given that the standard document browser interface is used in every app that has Files integration. It’s impressive what developers can accomplish given enough freedom in the sandbox.

Overcast 4.2 is out, and Marco Arment calls it the privacy update. Overcast now prefers anonymous, email-less accounts by default, offering a method to switch from an email-based account to an anonymous one (and vice versa). There’s also ad-tracking image blocking within HTML show notes, as well as support for individually password-protected episodes within a password-protected podcast feed.

9to5Mac gives us five reasons that make Overcast better than Apple Podcasts. While that’s not a particularly high bar, even if you’re a casual podcast listener there are advantages of third-party podcast clients that you should be considering which will improve your listening experience for the better.

I didn’t realise they were killing Airport Express. Not every stereo system comes with Airplay built in. Silly!

Many of the decisions they are making cause me to start having thoughts like “well, last time they screwed up, they brought Jobs back to fix things… that is no longer an option”.

The sky is falling. Slowly.