New iPhone, Android Apps to Help Parents Understand Their Children's Teeth Development

Atlanta-based Pediatric Dentist today announced the launch of My Baby’s Teeth and Teething Chart in the Apple and Android App stores. The apps will help parents understand their baby’s teething progress and teach them more about the developing mouth of their children.

Founder and creator of these apps, Dr. Vishant Nath owns five pediatric dental offices in the Atlanta, GA suburbs. As a father of three, he wanted to create an app that parents can use prior to, and in-between dental appointments to learn about the development of their children’s teeth. They are a first in these type of interactive dental care apps.

The one-of-a-kind apps allow parents to input their child’s age and see, on average, what teeth should be coming in and receive age-related teething tips and information. Next up, Nath says the apps will allow parents to look up pediatric dentists and read/provide reviews. This third party review will enable parents to select a dentist based on accurate reviews and not marketing or promotion from a dental office.

“As a parent and dentist, I know how important healthy teeth development is in young children. My Baby’s Teeth and Teething Chart help parents focus on this development in between appointments,” says Dr. Vishant Nath, My Baby’s Teeth and Teething Chart Creator. “These apps are an extension of my desire to build awareness about healthy teeth and good dental hygiene. I created the apps to share my expertise with parents everywhere, not just the patients I see on a regular basis in my practices.”

My Baby’s Teeth and Teething Chart are free and can be found in the App Store on iPhones or Android devices.

How to completely hide any app or folder on your iPhone or iPad

Keeping prying eyes from poking around in your more precious apps is always a concern, especially for those of us with nosey friends or kids. Until now, keeping apps private meant hiding them in a folder somewhere, but wouldn't it be ideal to be able to hide apps entirely? Thanks to a funky trick in iOS 7.1, you can. Here's how:

Here's our starting screen. Make sure you have a full page of apps and a full dock.

Now you need to create a folder with the apps we wish to hide. We'll call this folder "Folder 1" for simplicity. In this example I'll be hiding the Facebook and Starbucks apps, but you can do this with absolutely any app on your phone that can be placed in a folder, including those pesky stock apps that refuse to be deleted.

Next you need to nest Folder 1 within another folder, which we'll call "Folder 2." If you're not familiar with how to do this, check out our iOS 7.1 nested folder tutorial here.

Once you have Folder 1 nested, you must remove the apps you placed in Folder 2, leaving just Folder 1 within Folder 2. You should now have what appears to be a blank folder on your home screen. You should now have one open space on your Home screen, but we need to fill that, so drag any random app you have into that spot.

Now, go into Folder 2 and highlight Folder 1 so you can move it. Drag Folder 1 out of Folder 2 and down into the dock area. This will cause Folder 2 to disappear after a second, and as soon as it does, release Folder 1 in the dock. Instead of finding a new home on your screen it will disappear completely. We have now hidden the Facebook and Starbucks apps.

You won't find them anywhere, on any screen or within any folder. Yet, you still have full access to them via the iOS search feature. Touch the middle of your home screen and pull down, revealing the search bar. Type in the name of the hidden app you wish to use and you'll find it's still there and can be used just like normal.

Regret the decision to hide an app? You can easily bring back all of your hidden apps by either restarting the device or by going into the iOS settings menu, clicking the "Nike + iPod" app and activating, and then deactivating it. Once you've done so, all hidden apps will pop back onto the Home screen.

As I said above, you can use this trick to hide any apps or folders you want, and still have full access to the apps via the search bar. YouTuber Videosdebarraquito uses a similar trick to hide stock apps using the Newsstand on the iPhone 4/4s, but our tutorial should work for anyone running iOS 7.1. Now enjoy your newfound power of secrecy, and don't get into any mischief.

Office for iPhone and Android finally available as free apps

In addition to launching Office for iPad, a freemium app that requires a paid Office 365 subscription in order for users to also be able to edit their documents on the tablet, Microsoft has made some changes to its Office Mobile for iPhone and Androidapplications. Both mobile apps are now free of charge, The Next Web reports, but only for home use, speculating that business customers will likely require an Office 365 subscription for either version of the apps.

Previously, an Office 365 subscription was also required for Office for iPhone and Android in order for users to be able to edit documents on the go – the apps were available as free downloads before yesterday’s update, but only offered users support for viewing documents.

Microsoft may be interested in better competing against Apple and Google on their respective mobile platforms, as the companies offer iWork and QuickOffice for free, respectively, to new iOS 7 and Android 4.4 device owners.

Microsoft also plans to bring Office to Android tablets in the future, as well as a Metro version for touch-friendly Windows devices, the publication has learned. “In the future we will bring Office apps to the Windows Store and other popular platforms, including Android tablets,” a Microsoft spokesperson said.

Twitter adds photo tagging to its iPhone and Android apps

Twitter today announced an update to its iPhone and Android apps that lets you tag up to ten people in any photo you post. Additionally, the update also lets you upload up to four photos at once.

To help you tag people in photos you upload, a new "Who's in this photo?" button appears in the tweet compose screen once you've attached a picture. If you choose to tag friends, their Twitter handles won't take up space inside your tweet, affording you more space to caption the photo you're posting. You can customize notifications and privacy options for who can tag you inside the Settings page in the app or on the web.

Were Twitter's latest features inspired by Ellen Degeneres' group selfie, the most retweeted photo ever? Perhaps. If each celebrity in her photo were tagged, it would indeed be a lot simpler to follow them all. Twitter has traditionally struggled with discovery, and has experimented with various ways to show new users who to follow and why to follow them. In its announcement today, Twitter was quick to point out that photo tags will show up inside tweets embedded on the web.

But on a broader scale, Twitter likely added tagging for the same reason Instagram did nearly one year ago. Twitter is all about "the now," so it's easy to lose track of quality content over time. Photo tags give the company the ability to index photos by person. The company already gave each user profile a photo gallery showing their recent uploads. Perhaps soon, Twitter will also also add a "Photos of me" tab the same way Instagram did. While the ability to tag friends in photos is certainly useful, Twitter now looks more like Facebook and Instagram than it ever has.

Leaked: Apple’s plan to turn iPhone into your personal doctor

NEW DELHI: Smartphones can already track and record details of a user's physical activities but if Apple goes ahead with its plans, the next iPhone may come with a new app called Healthbook, which will help people manage almost all aspects of their general health.

According to screenshots leaked by 9To5Mac, a website that reports on Apple products, Apple is aiming to significantly expand on how smartphones track and record data on a user's health and fitness with Healthbook.

Currently, phones like iPhone 5S, Galaxy S4 and Nexus 5 have dedicated hardware that allows physical activity apps like Move and Runtastic Pedometer to track the movements of a user and generate reports, showing the number of steps a user took or number of calories consumed every day. But if the supposed screenshots of Healthbook are real, then Apple's iPhone will do lot more.

According to information cards part of the Healthbook app, Apple is aiming to give iPhone users ability to track physical activity, nutrition, blood sugar, sleep pattern, respiratory rate, heart rate, hydration level, oxygen saturation, weight and blood pressure.



While tracking physical activity seems simple enough - an accelerometer in the phone can sense the body movement - it is not clear how Apple will measure blood sugar or oxygen saturation for a user. Currently, the best way to measure these vital signs is through specialised health tools.

The rumours suggest that Healthbook will likely work with iWatch, a wearable gadget that Apple will reportedly launch this year. The iWatch may give Apple ability to collect more precise and accurate health data about a user. To track data related to oxygen saturation or blood sugar that requires special devices, Apple may use third-party tools that communicate with iPhone wirelessly.

Apple is not alone in turning smartphones into health tracking gadgets. With apps like Runtastic and Calorie Counter downloaded by millions, Samsung realized the health and fitness tracking potential of smartphones early. In 2013, when the company launched Galaxy S4, one of the features it highlighted was S Health, an in-built app that used the special hardware in the phone to track the physical activity of a user.

A few months later when Apple announced iPhone 5S, the company said the device had a small processor called M7, which was dedicated to tasks related to tracking the physical activity of a user. Apps can use M7 to better track a user without affecting the battery life significantly. Google's Nexus 5 too has an additional processor similar to M7 for facilitating easy tracking of a user's physical activity.

With Galaxy S5, Samsung is expanding on the health-related features. The new Galaxy phone comes with a heart-rate sensor. It also works with Galaxy Fit, a physical activity tracker that doubles up as a smartwatch, to collect and store health-related data about a user. Galaxy Fit too has a heart-rate monitor.

So far Apple has not announced any device like Galaxy Fit or even an app like S Health but the leak of Healthbook shows that health and fitness tracking is likely to be an important area for the company.

In the last one year, Apple has hired a number of fitness experts, including Jay Blahnik, who was a consultant to Nike, Roy JEM Raymann, a sleep expert, and Dr Michael O'Reilly, a health expert. The company's executives also reportedly met officials of the US Food and Drug Administration in December 2013 to discuss health and fitness related apps or products the company might be building.

For smartphone companies, health and fitness tracking is a logical next big feature in their devices. Tracking and quantifying health or physical activity is not easy. But with the ubiquity of smartphones, which are full of different kinds of sensors and can talk to gadgets like a smartwatch or a fitness band through NFC or Bluetooth Low Energy, smartphone companies believe they have a chance to give users an easy way to track their health.

Google, the company that maintains Android, too is interested in creating solutions that help a user track his or her physical activity. Recently, when it announced Android Wear, a version of Android for wearable devices, the company said that with this version of Android, users will be able to track their physical activity in a better way.

"Hit your exercise goals with reminders and fitness summaries from Android Wear. Your favorite fitness apps can give you real-time speed, distance and time information on your wrist for your run, cycle or walk," Sundar Pichai, head of Android and Chrome divisions within Google, wrote on the official blog.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: plus the free app that's better than iPhoto

There are photo-editing apps aplenty on the App Store, so which should you use to improve your iPhone photos? Here we offer a selection of those we’ve found to be the best.

Chances are, you take a lot of photos on your iPhone. It’s the camera you always carry with you, and from the iPhone 4 onwards, the main camera is capable of some great-quality images.

It’s easy to share those photos on Facebook, Twitter and via email or iMessage, but there’s usually room for improvement before you hit that send button. Whether it’s basic edits such as cropping, rotating or whole-image adjustments to local editing and removing unwanted objects, everything is possible if you have the right app.

Apple’s own apps leave much to be desired, which is where third-party apps come in. Here we share a selection of our favourites that allow you to improve your photos, as well as getting creative with effects and borders. You won’t even need to spend any money, as most are free!

iOS 7 Photos app

This is likely to be the app you use most. It’s where you can view all the photos and videos you’ve taken, as well as those in your Photo Stream (including photos taken on other devices such as an iPad).

When you select a particular image you can perform basic edits including cropping, rotating and a one-tap auto fix. There are also some Instagram-style filters and red-eye reduction. But that’s it.

For many people, this is all they need. For others, the ability to increase saturation, edit certain parts of the image and add other effects means the Photos app isn’t good enough. So let’s look at the best of what’s available right now.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: SnapSeed

Price: Free

We’ve used SnapSeed for a few years now, and it’s still the photo editor to beat as far as we’re concerned. Not only is it free, it’s also very easy to use on the iPhone’s small screen and – at the same time – very powerful.

You can import images from your Photo Library or take a new photo. There are all the basic tools you’d expect, but the real power lies in the editing mechanism which involves swiping up and down to choose an adjustment (such as saturation, contrast etc.) and then left and right to increase or decrease the effect.

SnapSeed also lets you perform local edits with its Selective Adjust tool. You can pinch to set the radius for the area you want to adjust, then choose from brightness, saturation and contrast. You can add multiple editing points, and reset, move or delete each one.

There are effects and filters including HDR, tilt-shift, vignette, retro and monochrome. With each, you can adjust their intensity and other aspects.

Finally, you can add borders and share your images to all popular photo-sharing sites, as well as saving the image to your camera roll.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: Apple iPhoto

Price: £2.99 (free on iPhone 5C and 5S)

iPhoto is now free if you have an iPhone 5C or 5S, and costs £2.99 if you don’t. It’s had an overhaul for iOS 7 and offers many of the tools found in SnapSeed.

One area where it’s more powerful is local editing. There are several brushes, such as sharpen, soften and repair which aren’t present in SnapSeed. The repair brush works like the spot healing brush in Photoshop, but results are mixed. It’s hard, for example, to remove overhead powerlines from a photo, but it works well on small blemishes. Unfortunately there’s no clone brush.

iPhoto is a little confusing to use, and its filters – while plentiful – can’t be modified. Photos can be shared back to the camera roll or to all popular sites. Even if you own an iPhone 5S or 5C, both SnapSeed and Camera+ are better photo apps.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: Camera+

Price: £1.49

One way to improve your iPhone photos is to ditch the built-in camera app and install something better. Camera+ is the one you want, and you won’t regret spending £1.50 on it.

It improves on Apple’s Camera app almost in every way, offering separate focus and exposure points, an exposure compensation slider, shooting modes to help you get the best quality in different situations, and a stabiliser function to get the sharpest shots possible. You also get a self-timer (ideal if you want to be in the photo), a level indicator (which works like a spirit level) and a burst shooting mode that lets you take lots of photos in quick succession.

Better still, Camera+ has full editing capabilities, which it calls Lightbox. You can crop and straighten images, add filters and frames. The best filter is Clarity, which intelligently ‘fixes’ your photo, bringing out all the detail. It’s a little like HDR, but with no motion blur.

A particularly handy feature is the ability to save to your camera roll only the shots you’re happy with. That keeps things nice and neat. You can also access previously taken photos from your camera roll and edit them in Camera+.

The only niggle is that you’re stuck with Apple’s camera app from the lock screen, so you’ll have to get into the habit of unlocking your iPhone and launching Camera+. Also, bear in mind that you can’t shoot panoramas or videos in Camera+ so use the lock screen to access Apple’s app for those.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: Instagram

Price: Free

Arguably the app that kick-started a slew of filter-toting copies, Instagram is basically a social network that’s all about the photos which look like they were taken on a 1980s Polaroid instant camera.

You need to register for an Instagram account, then you can use the app to take photos which are then shared on Instagram’s website.  You can see what various filters will look like in your scene before taking the photo, but they can also be applied post-shot.

You don’t have to share your photo on Instagram – it can equally be uploaded to Facebook, Twitter or Tumblr.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: Manga Camera

Price: Free

For a bit of fun, try Manga Camera. This free app lets you choose from 20 different comic book frames, and then take a photo of your friend(s) in silly poses.

It isn’t possible to add a frame to an existing image, so you’ll need to use the app to take the photo.

Once taken, you can save the image to your camera roll or share it on Facebook or Twitter.

Best apps for improving your iPhone photos: Photosynth

Price: Free

Like Manga Camera, Photosynth is a bit different to your usual camera app. Using Photosynth you can create full 360-degree panoramas, side to side and up and down. The result is a virtual 3D scene which you can share via Facebook, or view in the Photosynth app.

When taking the photos, on-screen guides help you line up the next shot which is taken automatically when you’re in the right position. The best results come from using a tripod, rather than holding your iPhone at arms’ length, but it’s still possible to get a seamless panorama if you’re careful.

Starbucks releases iOS 7-friendly iPhone app with a few new tricks

We’ve already seen Starbucks show off a new way to pay and tip your barista in the long-awaited update to its iPhone app it previously announced, and today it is finally available and features a brand new design for iOS 7 when buying your latte.

Previously, the Starbucks app featured a number of various tabs on the bottom navigation bar, but the updated version has been dramatically simplified to focus on three main sections under the headers Pay, Stores, and Gift.

Reward member profiles, messages, and Pick of the Week content is now featured in a clean view with the app’s new tip feature as well.

The update also comes with a new icon to represent the refreshed design of the app.However, the update does remove customized drink saving within the app. Starbucks advises you screenshot the view of your customized drink to save it if you use this feature.

Starbucks for iPhone is available for free on the App Store (although your milage may vary for the next few minutes following yesterday/this morning’s iTunes Connect issues).

7 best Chromecast-enabled apps for Android and iOS

The Chromecast took a while to fully realize its potential, but Google finally set third-party developers loose on the streaming dongle earlier this year. There were only a handful of apps to begin with, but now there are hundreds, and more are being added all the time. Everyone knows about Netflix, Play Music, and the other big names, but there’s much more to the Chromecast if you go hunting. Who’s got time for that, though?

We’ve pulled together the coolest, lesser-known Chromecast apps for iOS and Android right here. (Make sure you check the gallery above for screenshots from each app.)

Dayframe (Android)

The high-resolution screens on tablets and phones are a great way to show off pictures, which is the whole point of Dayframe. This app lets you create lovely slideshows with your own local content, as well as online streams from Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr, Google+, Dropbox, and more. It uses immersive mode in Android 4.4, but Chromecast support puts it over the top. Just connect and your slideshow can be viewed and controlled on a TV. All the basic functionality plus Chromecasting is free. A $2.99 in-app purchase adds features like weather overlays, shuffle mode, and custom playlists.

Photo Cast (iOS)

Apple users aren’t completely left out in the cold when it comes to slideshows. Photo Cast is a free app for iPhone that can send your images to the Chromecast in a slideshow that you control on the device. It plugs directly into the iOS photos app, so you’ll have to route any content you want included through that. The app is reliable and fast, but doesn’t have a ton of features. Can’t argue with free, though.

CastPad (Android)

This is a less conventional use for the Chromecast, but it could be useful in a number of situations. CastPad for Android lets you connect multiple devices to a screen and have your doodles mirrored live on the TV. It can be a quick way to entertain kids, or it could be the coolest virtual whiteboard you’ve ever seen. The free version has an ad and only includes black, white, and blue colors. A $2 in-app purchase removes the ad and unlocks 30 colors to draw with.

Plex (Android and iOS)

You probably have plenty of video and audio backed up on your computer or a server, but how can you get it on the Chromecast? Plex. This app plugs into a desktop client to transcode and stream all your video, audio, and photos though the Plex app for Android and iOS. In addition, Plex supports sending all that content to the Chromecast.

It’s probably the most robust streaming option you’ll find because it can play almost anything in extremely high quality. The basic streaming and Chromecast support is free, but you need a subscription ($30/yr) for some extras like offline device sync, cloud streaming, and photo backups.

Pocket Casts (Android)

There’s an entire universe of podcasts out there, and Pocket Casts makes it extremely easy to get them in your phone or tablet. It uses server side refresh to make getting new episodes extremely fast and it includes cross-device syncing. The interface is excellent on iOS and Android, but Android users have a little bonus. The most recent update added support for Chromecast, so you can blast your podcasts over to a TV or anything with an HDMI input. Because it supports audio and video podcasts, Pocket Casts is a great way to get content on your Chromecast. The iOS version still lacks Chromecast support, but it could come later. Pocket Casts will run you $3.99.

AllCast (Android)

If you need to stream photos and video stored on your Android device, AllCast might be the solution. This app can take any file your phone or tablet is able to open, and stream it to a Chromecast (as well as other over-the-top boxes). This doesn’t require any additional servers or cloud services — just the content on your device and a WiFi connection. The free version of AllCast has a 1 minute viewing limit so you can test it out. The full version is $4.99.

PixoCast (iOS)

There’s no version of AllCast for iOS, but PixoCast does a similar job. It can send all the photos and videos in your camera roll to a Chromecast with just a few taps. Unlike Android, there is no file system access on iOS. So if you’re downloading video from another app for playback, you’ll have to make sure they are being kept in the main camera roll rather than in that app’s storage space. PixoCast uses intelligent transcoding to make 1080p video play smoothly, but they still need to be in a format the iDevice can decode. This app will run you $1.99.

Apple iPhone and iPad users infuriated by mystery William Hill App Store pop-ups

Auto-redirecting ads are being blamed for the issue but finding a way to block them has become a major headache for IT developers

Thousands of web surfers have joined in a chorus of criticism at technology giants over 'shady ads' redirecting them to the William Hill betting app.

Auto-redirecting ads are to to blame for the problem and now furious Apple fans are slating the betting giant on Twitter.

In response, William Hill said the pop ups are "not intentional" and they are looking to "resolve the issue".

Popular apps and mobile websites reported to be affected are The Guardian, News.co.au, Salon, Huffington Post, Patheos, Glinner, Radio Times, Sky Sports, Letters Of Note, BBC Good Food and Betfair.

When users are visiting websites, or using apps that contain the hidden auto-redirecting adverts, they are taken to the App Store to buy games or other apps.

In general, the issue has also affected Android users who purchase apps through Google Play but the William Hill betting app 'glitch' so far only appears to have affected iOS users who have iPhones and iPads.

The practice of auto-direct ads has been slammed by industry experts over recent months because of its widespread use in a seemingly unregulated arena.

The so-called "shady ads" is a tag associated with the likes of Candy Crush, clash of Clans, Game of War, Zelda Dungeon and others, according to techcrunch.com.

Annoying: iPhone and iPad users are falling victim to the annoying adverts

The website also said other affected sites include Associated Press, NBC, Cosmopolitan, various newspaper sites and bogs, Perez Hilton and Imgur, among others.

And detecting the problem is difficult because web developers believe the code moves around different pages, so tracking it down and blocking it is a major operation.

It is thought the ads are changed somehow at the source, after they are first approved, making them hard to find.

So who is to blame?

Gaming companies were told by Google last year to clean up their bad practices, like pushing co-installs, meaning two apps are installed instead of one, when selling apps on the Play Store.

But so far, nobody has pointed the finger at who specifically is responsible for the App Store pop-ups.

William Hill denied the adverts were intentional.

Jem Maidment, a spokesperson for William Hill, said: “For a short period there was an issue which saw some mobile phone users automatically directed to our app in the App Store as well as their intended site.

"This was due to a link wrongly set up by one of our suppliers – this is a common problem on mobile ad content across many industries.

"Once this was identified we acted quickly to rectify the situation. It has now been resolved - we apologise for any inconvenience."

Apple and Google have been contacted by Mirror Online.

Internet users took to Twitter to vent their frustration at Apple and William Hill.

Update to iOS App 'Secret' Warns Users About Potentially Defamatory Posts

It's an interesting conundrum for an anonymous app. Rather, an app that allows users to post whatever text or juicy tidbits they want without any way to track who it is that said what. You can say anything, but you can't be mean about it.

No, really: You can't be a jerk. And if you are a jerk — or the app detects that the subject of your post is a person and, thus, you might say an anonymous jerk thing about them, you get a warning to play nice.

You'd be absolutely right to think that what we just described sounds a little odd, but such is the case with a new update to the San Francisco-based "Secret" app. The iOS-only app, which just recently confirmed that it received $8.6 million in funding, recently added a checking process that determines whether the subject of your to-be-anonymous post is a person.

If so, the app politely suggests that — if you're posting about someone — anything that is "defamatory, offensive, or mean-spirited are against the community guidelines and can be flagged / removed."

According to TechCrunch, a few Secret posters are noticing that the app's name-detection technology isn't quite working at a full hundred percent just yet.

"I mentioned Woz in a secret and a dialog popped up warning me not to defame him. No such warning for poor Dave Morin," the anonymous Secret-poster commented.

Company executives confirmed the update to TechCrunch, adding a mention that this is but "a first step" in what might ultimately be a new set of content moderation schemes for the app. It's unclear whether those might go the digital route – perhaps allowing users to flag or delete posts that are overly offensive against a particular person — or whether Secret might use some of its war chest to employ a real-life moderator or two for the app's content.

If this all sounds like way too much inside baseball, you'd be partially correct. The app's particular focus on Silicon Valley gossip and general tech industry murmurings — or, at least, the posters' interest in such — does make it a bit limited for more general gossip-sharers. However, Secret has self-reported that its users do seem quite a bit engaged:

"When we launched, we planned to spend the first 90 days learning, crafting and polishing the product before turning our attention to growth. We're now halfway there and have found a direct correlation between the number of friends a user has and their engagement on Secret," read s a blog post by Secret (on Medium, of course).

"Notably, 75% of people with more than 5 friends come back every day. Furthermore, 90% of users that engage in a conversation come back within the week, often several times per day. Data like this reaffirms our belief that there is opportunity to build a platform around rich and unexpected conversations."

Fantastical for iPhone updated with WhatsApp support, new alert sounds and more

Fantastical by Flexibits is one of the top calendar alternatives for iOS and OS X. Building on an already successful 2.0 release, the company today updated its iOS app to 2.0.5 and added support for third-party apps like WhatsApp, a handful of new notification sounds and more.

The change log for Fantastical version 2.0.5 is extensive and includes both new features like 1Password integration, improvements to key features such as search and various bug fixes. The full list of changes is as follows:

New Fantastical notification sounds for events and reminders

Added support for opening links in 1Password and Mercury web browsers

Added an option to send text messages in WhatsApp

Added support for creating events with floating time zones

Added an option for the app icon badge to show the current calendar week

Added swipe to delete for unwanted locations from the reminder geofence location list

Added support to tap on URLs and phone numbers in the title of events

Reminders with both a geofence and due date no longer trigger a notification until the day of the reminder is due

Visual update to week view to make events and event invitations easier to read

Improvements to conference call code detection

Improvements to accessibility

Improvements to search speed

Fixed a problem where duplicate notifications would sometimes appear

Various fixes and improvements

Fantastical costs $3.99 and is available for iPhones running iOS 7.0 or later. The productivity app features natural language input, allowing users to type “meeting tomorrow at 9am” and the app will automatically create an event called “meeting” for tomorrow morning at 9AM. It can be used as a standalone calendar for your iOS device or used to sync events between the Mac and iOS version of the app.

You can now chat with privacy with Cryptocat’s iPhone app

Cryptocat, the encrypted chatting service has just released their iPhone app in the App Store. Cryptocat was initially rejected by Apple. It isn’t clear why it was rejected but according to the developers, Apple specifically had a problem with group chat encryption.The developer has indicated in a blog post that the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) helped in resolving the issues with Apple.

Cryptocat has became quite popular in wake of the NSA controversy, where the agency was found to intercept and snoop on communications. Cryptocat’s end-to-end encryption by design doesn’t allow for anyone in the middle to read your messages.

Here’s how it works:

Cryptocat is different from other encrypted chat tools in that it doesn’t require usernames or accounts. Users enter a conversation using a one-time nickname. There are no buddy lists or account activity or account history to link back to the user. This way, Cryptocat offers a unique ephemerality that makes setting up encrypted conversations immediate and without any lasting history that can be traced back to users.

According to the developer, Cryptocat depends on native iOS APIs instead of web cryptography which has been used by other Cryptocat clients. The iPhone app uses the OTR protocol for private conversations, and multiparty protocol for group conversations. Cryptocat is also available for Mac, and also offers browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Opera.

5 awesome tricks that will make your iPhone run much smoother

 

One of the many reasons Apple’s iPhone lineup has been so popular over the years is because of how smooth and consistent the user experience tends to be. When it comes to mobile devices, however, there are always little tricks that can help smooth things out even more. Apple’s new iOS 7.1 software offers some huge performance improvements in addition to big visual changes, new feature additions and some bug fixes. Even still, there are a handful of things users can do in order to ensure that their iPhones, iPads and iPod touch handhelds are running as smoothly as possible.


The Huffington Post has compiled a list of five simple tips and tricks that Apple device owners can use in order to improve the performance and overall user experience on their devices. These tricks are especially important for people who own older iPhones and iPads – all of the new features in Apple’s recent iOS updates bring additional heft to the platform that can really slow older hardware down.

1. Get rid of crap you don’t need
The post advises users to be aware of what’s on their phone and to clear out clutter that is no longer in use. “To check your usage, go to Settings, then General, then scroll down and click Usage. It might take a minute to load, but you’ll be able to see which apps are taking up the most space on your iPhone. Then, remove what you can. That weird game you never play might actually be taking up a ton of space on your phone. Trash it!”

2. Treat it like a computer and clear your browser’s cache
Clearing your iPhone’s browser’s history, cookies and other data can actually have an impact on performance, believe it or not. “To do this, go to Settings, then Safari (or whatever browser app you use), then you’ll see ‘Clear History’ and ‘Clear Cookies and Data.’”

3. Delete old texts
iMessage history is stored in the cloud but heavy SMS users can definitely clear some space by deleting old conversations that are no longer needed. Simply open a chat, and then tap and hold on a sent message until you see the “More…” option pop up. Then choose the messages you want to delete or tap “Delete all.”
If you have a lot of old chats you don’t need, you can also swipe chats to the left in the Messages app’s conversations view to reveal a hidden “Delete” button.

4. Turn off auto app updates
Most people enjoy getting their hands on new features afforded by app updates, but if speed and performance is your top priority, disabling auto-updates might be a good idea. “To turn off auto app updates, go to Settings, then scroll down and click iTunes & App Store. There, push all of the buttons to the left to turn off automatic downloads.”

5. Turn off location services
HuffPo notes that this tip is important not just for speed, but also for battery life and privacy. “A lot of apps use location services to determine where you are, and it’s generally not necessary. Go to Settings, then Privacy, then Location Services. From there, you can choose to turn it off completely (not necessary) or just turn it off for certain apps. Some, like Maps, obviously need your location to best serve you. But many, like Facebook, don’t need to know where you are. Turn off location services for apps that don’t necessitate it. “

Turn Your iPhone Pics Into Watercolor Masterpieces With This Smart App

 
We’ve all used software that promises to turn our photos into beautiful works of art. But let’s be real: they all suck. Waterlogue doesn’t. This novel iPhone app does more than turn smartphone pics into passable paintings. It actually conjures up some truly impressive ones.

The app was created by John Balestrieri and Robert Clair. Balestrieri, now a developer at the kid-centric app outfit Tinybop, has long been fascinated with computer graphics. He’s also long been disappointed with programs that tried to transform photographs into paintings. 

“They were horrible, blurry, terrible messes,” he says of the results you’d normally get from these pieces of software. “There have never really been any, I thought, that had any integrity.” So he resolved to build one of his own.

But Balestrieri didn’t start in on the coding right away. Instead, the former art student hit up second-hand bookstores and bought painting how-to books to brush up on the fundamentals. He also revisited some of those older programs and filters and found that most were based on textbook computer graphics algorithms from the ’70s. In other words, it wasn’t surprising they didn’t have the painter’s touch. 



With Waterlogue, Balestrieri and Clair tried to write algorithms that approached images as a human would. Where older filters dumbly processed images at smallest unit of digital scale–the pixel–Waterlogue instead starts by distilling them into lines. It then boils those down to the ones that a person might actually draw–simplifying the image from a thousand tiny lines, say, to the hundred most essential ones. “Basically, through the process of tweaking the software, I would eliminate or reduce any marks that didn’t look like they were made by a sane individual,” Balestrieri says.

Next, the app simulates the actual painting process. Instead of transforming the whole thing in a single pass, it creates each painting layer by layer, as a real artist would. The app simulates the spreading and bleeding of the pigment onto the canvas, with dedicated properties for the virtual paper, the pigment, the brushes, the water and so on. When he was fine-tuning the app, Balestrieri eventually accepted the how-to books’ recommendations and programmed Waterlogue to paint scenes light to dark. The reason? He found his simulation was so accurate that when darker colors were put down first, they had too much time to bleed into the virtual canvas, ruining the final image.

Balestrieri and Clair tried to write algorithms that approached images as a human would.

It’s not perfect. In many of the 12 presets, faces get less detail than might be desired, with eyeballs ending up as coal black blobs. The painting process is indeed a process, so testing out the different presets takes a few seconds of waiting (though watching your image come to life layer by layer is much more interesting than your typical loading animation.)

Balestrieri says his painting algorithms are the most advanced he’s found in any commercial product. James Gurney, the author and illustrator of the seminal kids fantasy books Dinotopia gave it his stamp of approval, praising the app’s “visual intelligence” in a blog post.

Waterlogue’s sitting high on the App Store charts, with 230 five star reviews out of 285 total. That might have something to do with the low expectations we all have for this sort of software. But it’s also probably because, with Waterlogue, it’s clear that there’s a very thoughtful human touch behind the app’s painterly algorithms.

Starbucks adds digital tipping to iPhone app

 

An exterior view of a Starbucks, on December 27, 2012 in the Chinatown neighborhood of Washington, DC. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Starbucks customers will soon be able to use their iPhones to do more than just pay for their morning latte.

An upcoming update to the coffee chain's app will allow users to tip their baristas from within the app. Customers can currently pay for their drinks through the app but have to use cash if they want to leave a tip.

“This update to the Starbucks app for iPhone is an important next step in digital innovation at Starbucks and one of the many ways we'll expand and improve our digital experience in the months to come,” said Adam Brotman, chief digital officer for Starbucks in a statement.

The upcoming version of the app will also include a “shake to pay” feature, which will enable customers to bring up the barcode of their Starbucks card by shaking their phone. The app will also get other improvements like a more user-friendly design with easier access to account and rewards information.

The company said it would be rolling out a major update to its Android app, which will include digital tipping, “later this year.”

Starbucks says more than 11% of in-store transactions are made with mobile devices, though the company did not say how many of these were made via the Starbucks app. The coffee chain also accepts mobile payments via Passbook and Square Wallet.

Meet the iPhone case that tracks your personal health

Health and wellness seems to be all the craze in mobile tech today. From the heart rate sensors of Samsung’s Galaxy S5 to the dozens of fitness wearables currently coming to market, its obvious that tech companies see this as an area ripe for exploration and innovation. Enter Wello, the iPhone case that puts many of these wellness tracking features right in the palm of your hand.

Wello features an array of sensors that measure heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, and blood oxygen levels on top of providing a read out of your heart’s ECG waves. It accomplishes this in a slim case design that doesn’t add much bulk to the iPhone’s overall footprint (the case is designed more for its functionality than for protection). The user simply holds the iPhone with fingertips and palms making contact to certain points on the case to generate a snapshot of health in a matter of seconds.

Azoi, the company behind Wello, has dreams of expanding its capabilities down the line. Currently, an attachment can be used to measure lung strength in a similar manner to a breathalyzer. More attachments could become available to measure other health aspects like blood sugar levels.

Wello won’t be available until it receives approval from the FDA, but its makers are targeting a fall launch. The case will be available for the iPhone 4s, iPhone 5, and iPhone 5s. All this technology doesn’t come cheap, though. Pre-orders start today at a price of $199.99, or the equivalent of a new on-contract iPhone 5s. By the time the case launches, Apple could very well have introduced similar features to its product line via the iWatch and other sensors that could come embedded in the iPhone 6. Until then, Wello seems like a great solution.

iWatch pushing Apple to expand Siri’s third-party app integration

The smartwatch, as a concept, has faced several obstacles on the path to mainstream popularity, not the least of which is a limited range of input options. With the iWatch, Apple will need to tackle this issue, among others, but the solution might already be built into iOS.

With a small display that makes typing almost impossible and other touch inputs slightly more difficult, voice control could be the answer. Apple already has the groundwork laid out with Siri, but, as a new report states, the voice-controlled virtual assistant will need some expanded capabilities to truly improve smartwatch functionality. This includes opening Siri up to more third-party applications, such as non-Apple messaging apps.

Apple is pursuing such a possibility, one that would allow outside developers to build for Siri without requiring specific licensing agreements between the companies. For services like Wolfram Alpha, their inclusion as part of Siri’s current list of functions comes as the result of direct dealings with Apple, a setup that has led to what many perceive as the stunted growth the voice assistant application.

The iWatch might also feature contextual display options that would adjust the information presented to the wearer based on data gathered by built-in sensors. For instance, if the iWatch senses its wearer has headed out for a run, a fitness tracking app would automatically be displayed.

Such capabilities would go a long way in addressing the drawbacks inherent with smartwatches, which so far have struggled to present information in a way fit for a smaller touchscreen display. In the same way, voice input could lift the iWatch from simple companion device to a functional standalone wearable not limited by its form factor.

It’s safe to say Apple hasn’t been stewing on the iWatch this long for no reason. There are very real issues that the company has needed to tackle head on in order to create the sort of product that would have the same type of mainstream impact as the iPhone and iPad. So far, competitors have had little luck stirring up much excitement for their smartwatch offerings. Apple could just be the company to change that.