News tagged ‘applications’

Yesterday Silicon Alley Insider reported that Palm had a chance to be acquired by Apple, but eventually HP’s bid was higher. Referring to an anonymous source that was familiar with the negotiations, author Dan Frommer wrote:

"Apple was mostly interested in Palm's huge library of intellectual property and patents (450+ patents on file, another 400+ applications on file). And unlike some other bidders, Apple even seemed committed to funding Palm's operations, perhaps to challenge RIM's dominance in the keyboarded segment of the smartphone industry, our source says."

It is reported that Google also wanted to purchase Palm to spite Apple, but the company didn't know whether Apple was actually bidding for Palm, so no moves were made in that direction.

Eventually HP acquired Palm and now has plans to use its webOS in company's future tablet devices that will compete with Apple's iPad.

Few days ago Fring released new update for their iPhone app. Now it supports multitasking and, what is more important, 3G video calling via front facing video camera. With new Fring you can make video calls to anyone who has the same app installed on his device (and that must not be necessarily iPhone).

9to5mac already tested this new function and found that the quality of video leaves much to be desired, though over WiFi it's a bit clearer (that is why Apple didn't make 3G support for FaceTime). In some situations video call over 3G didn't have any audio streaming, so the interlocutor could not be heard.

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Well-known blogger Jonny Evans from ComputerWorld posted yesterday an interesting article where he analyzed some of recent trends in Apple's success and made few conclusions about the company's next steps. Here is a short list of it:

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Apple announced yesterday that applications targeting to iOS 2.x will no longer be supported. This means that apps for iOS 2.x will be rejected during approval process. Developers are encouraged to re-build their apps in Xcode and set the target to iOS 3.x or later so they will not run into submission or app removal issues.

Although it was for the most part overshadowed by the hysteria over the new iPhone 4, Apple had another “new” launch last week – the $99 iPhone 3GS 8GB with iOS 4 support.

Well, obviously it’s “last year’s model”, but just a couple of days ago it was still the best iPhone in the world quite capable of competing with much newer devices. Now with the help of iOS 4 iPhone 3GS supports folders, multitasking, and other cool features, and it’s only for $99.

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Keeping up with the times, the official Twitter application now supports iOS 4 in its latest build. The program can now run in the background, and you’ll be able to send twits while working with other applications. Nor will you have to start the application all over every time you want to check on the latest events.

The app is free and can be downloaded here.

According to a recent Piper Jaffray's  research, out of 4 billion applications downloaded onto iPads, iPods and iPhones, 81% are free and the cost of the other 19% is averagely $1.49.

These numbers mean that Apple’s profit from apps since the opening of the App Store is $428 million, about 29 cents per application, while the company spent approximately $81 million to distribute the apps themselves.

It sounds like a huge sum of money at first, until you understand that it makes up just 1% of Apple’s total gross profit of $33.7 billion over the same period.

According to yesterday’s announcement, Apple have sold three million iPads during the first 80 days on the market since the device was launched in the US on the 3^rd of April with Wi-Fi only models. To sell 2 million, it took approximately 60 days, so it can be said with certainty that the sales of the iPad are accelerating.

Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs says that people are loving iPads and it’s becoming part of their lives. The company is working hard to allow more and more people to use this wonderful device, and next month the iPad will be available in 9 more countries: Singapore, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Mexico, Luxembourg, Ireland, Hong Kong, Belgium and Austria. The information on the prices and pre-order for these countries is expected to be revealed soon.

According to the press release, more than 11,000 iPad-specific applications are now available in the App Store.

Here's an official changelog for recently released iOS 4 for iPhone and iPod Touch:

This update contains over 100 new features, including the following:

• Multitasking support for third-party apps*
– Multitasking user interface to quickly move between apps
– Support for audio apps to play in the background
– VoIP apps can receive and maintain calls in the background or when device is asleep
– Apps can monitor location and take action while running in the background
– Alerts and messages can be pushed to apps using push and local notifications
– Apps can complete tasks in the background
• Folders to better organize and access apps
• Home screen Wallpaper*
• Mail improvements
– Unified inbox to view emails from all accounts in one place
– Fast inbox switching to quickly switch between different email accounts
– Threaded messages to view multiple emails from the same conversation
– Attachments can be opened with compatible third-party apps
– Search results can now be filed or deleted
– Option to select size of photo attachments
– Messages in the Outbox can be edited or deleted

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So iPhone 4 is finally unveiled and what do we have in it? Here is a list of hardware upgrades:

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As you remember, tomorrow is the day when the WWDC officially starts, but some guy named Adam Jackson made photos of inner banners at Moscone Center in San Francisco (where the conference is held).

As you can see from the photos, the main banner features the slogan “The center of the app universe”. Other banners are focused on iPhone OS and its new features. One of them reveals applications Evernote, Bento and Air Sharing gathered in one folder named “Productivity” and the slogan “Drag. Drop. Organize”.

Other banners emphasize the popularity of Apple’s App Store. “4 Billion Apps Downloaded”, «200,000 Apps on the App Store» - these are the slogans found on the photos.

The last banner has the word “appvertise”, which means it is focused on iAds, new advertising technique in iPhone OS 4.

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Today Engadget revealed new information on the next-gen Apple TV that was received from sources close to Apple.

The architecture of the upcoming device is based on iPhone OS 4, which means it will have the same hardware (A4 system-on-chip) with 16 GB of flash memory, video out and power socket. It will be 1080p HD capable, and will look like "an iPhone without a screen".

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Recently Wall Street Journal reported that Daimler AG's Mercedes-Benz is going to equip its forty dealerships with iPads for more effective selling and leasing cars. The devices will have company's Advantage app installed on. That will enable dealers to have a quick access to the latest rebates and discounts and complete credit applications on the go without the need of leading the customer to a desk with a PC.

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YouPorn, one of the world's largest porn sites, has announced that they will be soon iPad compatible. The site has begun re-encoding their entire video archive to make them viewable on the iPad. In the App Store parental controls can limit access to content inappropriate for minors. On the web, this gets much more difficult.

An open letter published by Adobe co-founders John Warnock and Chuck Geschke reveals their true position to Apple. They say Apple wants to "undermine the next chapter of the web". They also believe that the consumers must have a free access to the content regardless to their computers, browsers or any other stuff.

"No company - no matter how big or how creative - should dictate what you can create."

In answer to Jobs' saying that Flash is a closed system Adobe co-founders informed that specifications for Flash are published and available for free so anyone can make their own Flash player. What Apple does is creating walls for their applications and content, thus creating a threat to a future of free Internet, which actually cannot be controlled by anyone. The letter ends with these words:

"What we don't love is anybody taking away your freedom to choose what you create, how you create it, and what you experience on the web."

It is interesting to notice that Adobe also started new advertising campaign on popular tech news sites and in newspapers. Their ads list technologies they "love". One of them even contains the tongue-in-cheek inscription "We [heart] Apple".