Mac Kung Fu LinksList: Thurs 29 Oct 2015

29 October 2015, 06:00

Good M/A/E. Here’s your list of interesting Apple links for today.

Just got a new Mac OS X computer and want to know what apps to install? Or maybe you’ve had one for a while but wondering what you are missing out on? Well this guide covers almost everything you would need to do on a OS X Mac! We have listed the most important ones first – they are (mostly) free, completely awesome and really useful.

➥ 73 Best OS X Apps You Need (2015) [Apps]


What was most apparent to me — and what I didn’t write in my article — is just how much of a sellout Steve Wozniak has become. He’s a serial endorser of products he knows almost nothing about, and he sells tickets to conferences that many attendants might not otherwise pay for. And yet, he’s a god of Silicon Valley. People take his word as scripture without questioning the Holy Father of Apple. He makes headlines. Many view him as some sort of victim. In promotional clips for the latest Steve Jobs biopic, he’s the geeky brains behind the Apple 2 personal computer and the target of much of Steve Jobs’ ire.

➥ Steve Wozniak: walking billboard [Opinion]


Thanks to watchOS 2, developers can write native Apple Watch apps, and so far 1,300 are available. watchOS 2 was released in September, and one of the features users and developers had been waiting for ever since Apple Watch started shipping earlier this year was support for third-party apps capable of running natively on the watch instead of tethering to your iPhone.

➥ Native Apple Watch Apps Hit 1,300 [News]


From their earliest days, podcasts were linked closely to Apple. Their very name came from an Apple product: iPod. Apple included podcasts in its music app before spinning out a separate iPhone app in 2012, then made it un-deletable last year, just in time for a boom in the format thanks to the wildly popular “Serial” series from This American Life. It’s Google’s turn now. The Alphabet company is getting ready to open a dedicated home for podcasts on its Google Play hub.

➥ Google Brings Podcasting to Play Music, Swinging at Apple’s Dominance [News]


Skype is rolling out an update for its iPhone and iPad mobile apps today that introduces a number of ways to use Apple’s new 3D Touch feature on the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, as well as support for video filters not unlike competitive video chat services. For 3D Touch, iPhone 6s and 6s Plus users will find a few ways to use the feature including the usual quick-start actions by firmly touching the Home screen icon. In addition, you can “press on a Recent conversation to Peek the latest IMs or a live video call” and “Force Touch shared locations, photos, contacts and URLs to Peek the content.”

➥ Skype for iOS adds 3D Touch & video filters in latest update [App]


Microsoft is merging two of its most popular mobile apps into one: Outlook email and Sunrise calendar. Outlook has always been a favorite among email users while Sunrise rose to fame for being both free and feature-packed. Combined as one, Microsoft is hoping the move enables users to more seamlessly glide between emailing and calendar tasks.

➥ The sun sets on Sunrise as Microsoft combines app with Outlook [App]


Nintendo tonight has taken the wraps off of its first mobile game during a press event with investors and the media in Japan. The game, called Miitomo, will be available in March of 2016 and is the first of five games the company plans to release by March of 2017

➥ Nintendo announces its highly anticipated first smartphone game ‘Miitomo’ for iOS [News; see also this satire]


The BBC supports a wide range of platforms when it comes to the iPlayer. Offering a way for folk to remain up-to-date with their favorite programs is what makes iPlayer a must-have for many, and luckily for Apple TV owners the BBC plans to finally launch iPlayer on the new set-top box within the next few months.

➥ BBC plans to finally release iPlayer for Apple TV [App]


Without much fanfare, Apple has improved in OS X El Capitan color output capabilities of the Retina iMacs: You can now view many more nuances and therefore smoother color transitions – provided that the software is adapted. Quietly, Apple has adopted a criticism often expressed point: The lack of 10-bit color output of OS X A 10-bit processing in graphics card and panel control enables 1024 instead of 256 gradations per color channel.. This prevents visible strip approximately in large gradients between closely spaced tones. Windows dominates 10bit with appropriate hardware since 2009 (Windows 7).

➥ iMacs learn 10-bit color rendering [News; translated from German]


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