Originally published at: https://appletalk.com.au/2019/07/wednesday-morning-news030719/
An Apple Newsroom post shares how the Australian Women’s Cricket Team is using the Apple Watch to track activity and workout data to improve player performance. By utilising an app developed by the Australian Institute of Sport, members of the Australian Women’s Cricket Team have more access to their workout data, allowing coaches and mentors to ensure they’re not overdoing it and risking potential injury, while at the same time being more accountable for the training and energy they are putting in.
Speaking of the Apple Watch, Apple has updated its "Close Your Rings" Apple Watch activity mini-site with new stories from users. The great thing about Apple Watch activity tracking is that you can get more active by sharing your activity with other Apple Watch users, close your activity rings for fun, or when you’re bored and have nothing better to do, all features that are accessible to everyone regardless of your fitness level.
A piece in the Wall Street Journal reports on events leading up to Jony Ive’s departure from Apple, saying Apple’s Chief Design Officer became "dispirited" after the launch of the Apple Watch in 2015, as well Ive’s own feelings that Apple itself was becoming less design-focused and more operations-led. After the Apple Watch was launched, many at Apple viewed Ive’s departure as inevitable, as the executive often failed to show up to meetings and showed little interest in the product development process.
Apple CEO Tim Cook has fired back against the Wall Street Journal’s timeline of events, calling it "absurd" and its "conclusions just don’t match with reality". In an emailed response to MSNBC Senior Reporter Dylan Byers, Cook writes that the Wall Street Journal’s reporting "shows a lack of understanding about how the design team works and how Apple works", "distorts relationships, decisions, and events to the point that we just don’t recognise the company it claims to describe". The Journal stands by its story, saying it is based on conversations over more than a year with people that worked with Ive, as well as people close to Apple leadership.
Over at TechCrunch, Matthew Panzarino’s summary of Ive-related commentary says there’s two streams of thought surrounding Ive leaving Apple. Either you think that Jony Ive checked out years ago and isn’t as good as he once was, or that Apple is doomed without its famed designer at the helm. Contradictory positions, to be sure, but there’s a lot of evidence to suggest that Apple will be just fine without Ive being a part of its core leadership and design teams.
The FCC in the US briefly published and then pulled regulatory information relating to an unreleased MacBook Pro. The model number lined up with recent Eurasian Economic Commission filings, suggesting that an update for Apple’s MacBook Pro Escape is imminent, although whether this is a subtle redesign or just a speed bump is anyone’s guess.
Leaked CAD images show what the rumours claim is this year’s iPhone, complete with square camera bump and three rear-facing camera lenses for the iPhone XS successor, with a similar square camera bump and two rear-facing cameras for the iPhone XR successor. Both designs look very similar, but we’ll have to wait and see how accurate it is.
Another sketchy rumour claims Apple may launch an iPhone without Face ID in the future, instead featuring under-display Touch ID. The target market for this device would be the price-sensitive Chinese market, although such a model may be popular elsewhere given the high cost of iPhones overall. While it would be extremely unusual for Apple to release a device only in one specific market or geographic region, if I were Apple I would be very hesitant to release a device that may cannibalise sales of my more premium models.
The third developer betas of iOS 13, iPadOS 13, tvOS 13, watchOS 6, and macOS 10.15 are now out. Everyone’s still downloading the updates, but the biggest changes in this iOS 13 beta seem to be minor changes to the Home app, amongst others. Going off previous releases, we can probably expect a public beta release tomorrow.
Microsoft has published a support article saying that users attempting to update their Boot Camp installations of Windows 10 to the latest, Windows 10 version 1903, may not be able to thanks to a driver incompatibility. Microsoft says the workaround is to update your Boot Camp Windows Software Support drivers, otherwise Microsoft has a workaround in the works which should be available later this month.