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Why Apple is keeping the current version rating, I'm not entirely sure, but it should be scrapped.

Because there are apps (Example - Audyssey Music Player) that went from a paid app to a free app. The difference is the paid app gave you all the headphone profiles for free. The free app charged you $1.99 for every profile now.

So while the paid version got 5 stars from users who loved it and paid the $5 or whatever for it, when it went free and started charging people, it was getting 1-star ratings. Because naturally the people who loved it and used the free profiles suddenly got pissed off at having to pay for it. Or that what was formerly free is now an in-app purchase

Is it fair for an app to be 5 starts and screw over the users? If global app ratings became standard, then what happens are crap devs will simply publish an app with everything free to get the massive 5 star reviews to get featured. Then they'll make it all in-app purchases so what was formerly free is now $$$. Sure it hurts their ratings, but if they can exploit this to get on the featured list of popular apps, I'm sure the additional revenue will make up for the losses.

And then there are just the bum versions - a 5 star app may have a bad release and everything breaks inside it, so it deserves a one-star until the developer fixes it (I know several devs who have made bum releases).

Of course, this doesn't fix the biggest issue I saw - I seen several apps pop up the "Rate this app!" dialog just before the freemium trial period ended. So the user was doing really well and getting lots of whatevers, asked to rate the app and gives it 5 stars as they're having fun. 5 minutes later, they're being inundated with "You need to pay for this feature" nags begging to buy stuff.

So naturally that app gets good reviews because by the time they're hit up with the money, the 5 stars are left and they're all happy and great that the app is fun etc. And of course, the app will never ask for another review, so the user likely doesn't know how to update their review.

But --- that's about all it can do. Few apps can participate (any?)

Apple added app integration last year for some specific domains and expanded on it this year (domains like messaging for example, so Siri can send messages through third party messaging apps).

I also would not put it at the level of personal assistant but I've found it works fairly well generally, and like others have been saying has been generally improving.

I had read Siri request data was anonymized and kept for 18 months, not 6. But it seems like with literally billions of queries that is enough data to train ML algorithms really well. In fact if you train too far back the kinds of requests people are making may not even be relevant anymore and pollute your training!

Until Xcode runs on iPad, or until Swift Playgrounds expands into domains other than those that Logo used to occupy (graphics and robotics), apps can't app apps on iOS. Sorry, app guy.

Not too bright, are ya? You can download the current macOS and iOS updates without having an AppleID account from https://support.apple.com/en_U....

How do you then install it? Genuinely curious.

Double-click?

Not too bright, are ya? You can download the current macOS and iOS updates without having an AppleID account from https://support.apple.com/en_U....

How do you then install it? Genuinely curious.

Obviously you don't work in this field. You can speculate that Apple is implementing HEVC encoding and decoding in software, but you're wrong.

Dude, you have no idea what you're talking about. Watch this video from the horse's mouth.

The A8 does not support hardware H.265 decoding. H.265 hardware decoding was only introduced in the A9. Apple has implemented software H.265 decoding for all iOS and macOS systems which don't have a hardware decoder, and that includes the Apple TV.

I wanted to correct erroneous speculation

Too bad, kid. It turns out that's my job.

Not too bright, are ya? You can download the current macOS and iOS updates without having an AppleID account from https://support.apple.com/en_U....

You only need an AppleID account to login to the App Stores to install/update walled garden apps. There's nothing on macOS stopping you from downloading, installing and using 3rd party apps off the internet or sneakernet.

You're an AC that works at Teleperformance or some other call center, and you think you know what you're talking about. No Apple ID is required to create an account on a Mac or to download updates.

Update (iOS and MacOS) are available here, no App Store required.

As he stated, you do need an Apple ID for the App Store and iCloud features.

The only people who were wrong were the LYING Apple support staff that despite https://support.apple.com/en-u... knowing about the problem have been 100% caught LYING to customers at every Apple store in Australia.

They knew there was a simple fix for their incompetent error, but LIED to all customers who contacted them about this problem.

The only people who were wrong were the LYING Apple support staff that despite https://support.apple.com/en-u... knowing about the problem have been 100% caught LYING to customers at every Apple store in Australia.

They knew there was a simple fix for their incompetent error, but LIED to all customers who contacted them about this problem.

The only people who were wrong were the LYING Apple support staff that despite https://support.apple.com/en-u... knowing about the problem have been 100% caught LYING to customers at every Apple store in Australia.

They knew there was a simple fix for their incompetent error, but LIED to all customers who contacted them about this problem.

https://developer.apple.com/li... Media and Web New in tvOS 11.0 - Support for High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) is a new standard for video encoding that offers substantially better compression than H.264 at the same level of visual quality. Use AV Foundation to playback movies containing HEVC encoded tracks, and to export videos. VideoToolbox clients can encode and decode HEVC video bitstreams. New in tvOS 11.0 - Support for High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF). High Efficiency Image Format (HEIF) is a new standard of image compression that nearly doubles current data compression ratios for the same level of image quality. Added functionality to the Photos and Core Image frameworks to display, encode, and export HEIF images.

It has more to do with the fact that it is Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) this week.

Apple TV

I don't think Apple TV does HEVC in hardware. The specs don't mention H.265 or HEVC whereas H.264 is mentioned. So if it can decode HEVC in software comfortably then I'd guess it can do VP9 and AV1 decoding in software just as comfortably.

Because VLC on iOS isn't a thing?

Question: Will these new Macs finally support OpenGL 4.5? As far as I can tell, the highest version that Apple currently supports (as of Feb 9, 2017) is OpenGL 4.1.

OpenGL 4.1 was released almost 7 years ago on July 26, 2010, and OpenGL 4.5 was released almost 3 years ago on August 11, 2014. That means Apple is stuck 13-14 GPU generations behind Windows and Linux, which have been using OpenGL 4.5 for the past 5-6 GPU generations.

p.s. Don't tell me to use Metal/Vulkan, and don't tell me to check for OpenGL extensions. Either they pass the OpenGL 4.5 version check, or I won't bother buying a Mac so I can support the platform.

What about this one?
http://help.apple.com/iphone/1...

You mean like SiriKit (Introduced in iOS 10)? It's how you can request an Uber or Lyft through SIri - apps can register commands against Siri for these actions.

No. Those are very tightly sandboxed to avoid competition with Apple's key services which is why you can't even hook up simple things like Play song in Spotify or Get directions to location in Google Maps or Open document from Onedrive.

As dumb as it is, Siri could have been extended with thousands of commands, by simple API hookups. It was plain old programming, not AI. They didn't do it. They didn't make Siri truly useful.

You mean like SiriKit (Introduced in iOS 10)? It's how you can request an Uber or Lyft through SIri - apps can register commands against Siri for these actions.

Detachable tablets such as Microsoft's Surface line and Apple's iPad Pro will lead the growth as consumers have turned away from laptops in favor of these more versatile computing devices.

Surface Pro perhaps. But I don't see how an iPad Pro, constrained by the App Store Review Guidelines, is "more versatile" than a PC that can run anything. In particular, the ban on time-limited free trials has hindered ports of applications from macOS to iOS. And even if you stick to free applications, it'll cost you $499 extra if you want to be able to compile them from source because loading applications onto an iPad Pro requires a Mac, which starts at $499.

Current displays do still use subpixels, they're just smaller so harder to see - e.g. read this - https://support.apple.com/el-g...

Since iOS 8, Apple recommends everybody uses the new WKWebView which replaces UIWebView: https://developer.apple.com/re...

However, WKWebView is not as flexible as UIWebView; more specifically, there is no support for a custom NSURLProtocol. Basically to get the performance gains of using WKWebView, you can't do the things you want to do.

For Opera specifically, this bug filed against webkit lays out the features they would like to implement, but are unable to: https://bugs.webkit.org/show_b...

Opera on iOS implements a custom HTTP(S) protocol to do:
1. Data savings (see http://www.opera.com/turbo ). This greatly improves connectivity under crappy network conditions for millions of users. It's especially important for people in countries which can only dream about 4G.
2. Peer-to-peer inobtrusive security. For that we collect bits of site security information that is only available via low-level network APIs.
3. Presenting sites as icons (and grouping multiple pages into the same icons). For that we hook into the HTML data stream to parse meta data ASAP. In addition we intercept and react on HTTP redirects. This is a part of the http://operacoast.com/ app identity.
4. Progress loading reporting, automatic retries on bad networks. For that we do traffic QoS monitoring.
5. Fast going back and offline content. That is controlled partially by a custom cache, and partially in NSURLProtocol.
6. Ad-blocking.

You can get around the CC requirement on the App store, but you have to know how to do it. Basically, you need to create your Apple account from within the app store. If you create your account on the website or anywhere other than from within the App store or iTunes then you don't have the option.

Apple does have this information on their website, if you dig for it, but you won't find it anywhere when you're actually trying to get something from the App store.

For the life of me, I can't figure out why. While Microsoft has researchers battling Parkinson's, building programming languages for children with vision impairments, and designing eye-controlled wheelchairs, Apple... Well, Apple now has three pages of dongles to choose from: https://www.apple.com/shop/mac... - (Insert winky face to show that I'm only HALF-kidding.) ;)

When I recently enabled two-factor authentication on my iCloud email, it broke Thunderbird.

There is a workaround - app-specific passwords.

Fixed Thunderbird for my iCloud email, anyway...

Apple developer licenses are ridiculously cheap when compared to most other companies. It's 99 USD/year for a macOS or iOS license. The 299 USD license is only if you intend to develop in-house apps that you distribute and update internally. The bigger headache for most FOSS teams is that they either have to register the license to an individual or to an organization. Registering under an individual is quick/easy but can be problematic if something happens to that person or they decide to hijack the project (both of which have happened with FOSS projects before). Registering an organization is fairly easy as well but creating and maintaining a legal entity can be a headache depending on where it's based. In most states in the US you have to have a charter, keep minutes, financial reports, etc. Given that it's already a labor of love for most people on the project, finding someone with the time and experience to deal with all of that can be difficult. So most don't.

How do you explain that Appel has job listings in Ireland?

But I guess you can't, because just as California likes to tax things, retards like to hate Apple with #FakeNews.

This figure is itemised on the Apple site . Basically they're claiming every job that touches Apple in some way, e.g. the workers at Caterpillar that make the generators used in Apple's data centers. 1.5 million of them are "jobs created and supported by the App store", which is sourced from a report that uses a really broad definition of an App Economy worker and includes support workers and "spillover" jobs.

RSS got me here, and it's my personal news aggregator and podcast collector of choice. And I really like to read it on my phone in the subway and to listen to new audiobooks and sounds of friends in the evening. It's Owncloud News and Cloudnews here. And simply iTunes for podcast, as this is the only useful cast for it. https://github.com/owncloud/ne... https://itunes.apple.com/de/ap...

There's a lot to unpack in that one sentence.

1) Dividends aren't their primary means for returning value. 70% of their capital return program is via stock buybacks.

2) I understated the size of the program in my last comment. It's worth $250 billion through March 2018, rather than the $150 billion I previously said.

3) As that link also shows, Apple is paying $2.28/year, not $1, so it's a better value than you suggested, though still below average across the market.

4) The reason the dividends aren't a great value at the moment is because their shares surged 20+% in the last quarter, shifting the value proposition. At the time the dividends were set last year, they were on par with the S&P 500 averages. It's likely Apple will adjust them when they announce their earnings for the quarter sometime this week (today maybe?).

All of which is to say, this suggestion that Apple isn't returning value to shareholders, despite being actively engaged in the largest program in history to do exactly that is either disingenuous or misinformed. And pointing out that their dividends aren't a great value at the moment is also a bit strange, given that they're neither the primary means by which Apple is returning value, nor has Apple had the opportunity to adjust their dividends since the value proposition shifted.

OS X has Launchpad, which is designed to be touch-friendly despite no OS X systems coming with a touch screen. Nobody uses it, so you may not remember it.

Windows does not have a touch-friendly interface unless you only use "modern" apps. They don't adjust the size of the drop-down menus on regular apps when you're in tablet mode - something they could do if they lied to the program about the size of the screen to make room (I assume - I don't do Windows GUI development).

Launchpad is keyboard friendly. Click the icon, start typing the name of the program. After you are 2 or three characters into typing it, it filters the many icons down to the one program you are looking for. It didn't need to take over the whole screen, it works similarly on Windows 10. Click in the corner, start typing, click on the program you were looking for, but windows 10 does take over the screen while you do it.

OS X has Launchpad, which is designed to be touch-friendly despite no OS X systems coming with a touch screen. Nobody uses it, so you may not remember it.

Windows does not have a touch-friendly interface unless you only use "modern" apps. They don't adjust the size of the drop-down menus on regular apps when you're in tablet mode - something they could do if they lied to the program about the size of the screen to make room (I assume - I don't do Windows GUI development).

It still exists. It's a $19.99 upgrade to Mac OS X from their app store. The only difference between the desktop and server edition were the software packages and some settings anyway.

I totally fail to see the need for a Hackintosh.... Just use Linux (or Windows) instead - whatever alternate platform your preferred tools work on.

There's a horde of video production people out there who prefer OS X for tools such an Final Cut or Adobe Creative Suite.

Why push a path that isn't supported by Apple?

Because the path is supported by Apple, just very poorly. It's one method of protesting for better support.

I recommend Tiny Tiny RSS if you're willing to run something yourself. Works great, simple requirements (I think I'm actually using sqlite for it) and even supports Google Reader shortcut keys. There's a great iOS app as well as Android options.

If you don't have your own webserver somewhere or don't want to manage it, I totally get it, Feedly is great, too. Just wanted to offer up another option.

Because you're comparing all Mac sales against a single type of product ("ultraportable" Surface). The Mac line-up consists of quite a few product lines including desktop (iMac, Mac Pro, Mac Mini) and notebook/laptop devices (Macbook, Macbook Air, Macbook Pro) that target many different types of consumers.

Ahem. I saw no such "product distinction" in TFS. In fact, It specifically said "Revenue generated by Microsoft Surface Hardware"., and later referring to the "Surface LINE. So, I call shenanigans.

The Surface line consists of Laptops, Franken-Tablets, and now, even a Desktop. So what's "unfair" about my comparison? You might be surprised...

Since those are all designed to DIRECTLY compete not only with all sub-groups of the Mac line (except perhaps the Mac mini and Mac Pro, which, together, likely only account for less than 10% of Mac sales), AND also to DIRECTLY compete with the iPad line, the only thing "unfair" about my comparison was that it DIDN'T include the 5.3 Billion in iPad sales along with the 7.2 Billion in Mac sales. Together, those two product-lines come to 12.55 Billion in sales.

So, what we REALLY have is a 15:1 Ratio of products that are DEFINITELY AND DIRECTLY Competing (and calculatedly-so on MS' part).

Sorry, Dem's da facts.

Suck it.

Because you're comparing all Mac sales against a single type of product ("ultraportable" Surface). The Mac line-up consists of quite a few product lines including desktop (iMac, Mac Pro, Mac Mini) and notebook/laptop devices (Macbook, Macbook Air, Macbook Pro) that target many different types of consumers.

I couldn't find exact statements, but info here and here seem to indicate the commission payment is on the total sale, not on Apple's cut, so the GP would be correct with 23% -> 27.5%.

I couldn't find exact statements, but info here and here seem to indicate the commission payment is on the total sale, not on Apple's cut, so the GP would be correct with 23% -> 27.5%.

Does iOS make the actual MAC address readily available to the application layer?

You can read it here on the "Deprecated APIs" section.

In iOS 7 and later, if you ask for the MAC address of an iOS device, the system returns the value 02:00:00:00:00:00. If you need to identify the device, use the identifierForVendor property of UIDevice instead. (Apps that need an identifier for their own advertising purposes should consider using the advertisingIdentifier property of ASIdentifierManager instead.)

You are apparently unaware of the Apple Refurbished page. Devices that can be refurbished and resold are sold. Devices that cannot be refurbished economically are recycled. They currently list products in every major category (Mac, Macbook, iPad, iPhone, iPod, AppleWatch, AppleTV) on their refurbished page https://www.apple.com/shop/bro...

Not every device can or should be repaired. I've returned devices where the exact fault couldn't be determined. It is very much pro consumer to shred that machine instead of risking selling someone a device with a hidden flaw.

I use Keynote to give my Atari 2600 Homebrew presentation. To give the presentation I use both my iPhone and iPad. The iPhone plugs into the projector (after turning on Do Not Disturb, of course!). After launching Keynote on both devices I then use the Keynote Remote option from the iPad to connect to the iPhone (via bluetooth or wifi). The larger screen on the iPad makes it easy to see the slide side-by-side with my presenter notes, plus I'm free to walk around the stage without worrying about tripping over wires. There's also a virtual laser pointer and colored marker set that lets you point out things and draw on the slides during the presentation.

I use Keynote to give my Atari 2600 Homebrew presentation. To give the presentation I use both my iPhone and iPad. The iPhone plugs into the projector (after turning on Do Not Disturb, of course!). After launching Keynote on both devices I then use the Keynote Remote option from the iPad to connect to the iPhone (via bluetooth or wifi). The larger screen on the iPad makes it easy to see the slide side-by-side with my presenter notes, plus I'm free to walk around the stage without worrying about tripping over wires. There's also a virtual laser pointer and colored marker set that lets you point out things and draw on the slides during the presentation.

Case closed, even you admit it.

You seem to be having trouble with the differences between selling data about you, and using data about you. Or maybe with reading.

"Easily".

Yep. Just use a browser add-on, such as this one. Most technical people know about them.

It's called a VPN retard

Settle down, petal. Running your PC's traffic through a VPN isn't hard, but it's still more work, expense, and expertise (and slower) than a browser add-on. And it's somewhat less easy if you want to run your entire network's traffic through one, including appliances like a Roku box etc.

And a VPN on your phone won't prevent carrier-installed rootkits from reporting anything they like. Remember Carrier IQ, which was found to be used by AT&T and many others (yes, even Apple), and was caught capturing keystrokes and passwords, copying and sending home texts etc? AT&T bought that not long ago, so it's clearly still in use - and that's only one we know about. Plus of course your carrier logs every call you make and every cell tower your phone touches, so good luck avoiding any of that.

And yes, all that personal data is used by AT&T to sell targeted ads on their AdWorks network, Sprint's Pinsight platform hosts other ad networks too, Verizon's is even bigger now they're buying Yahoo (plus they share your data with AOL), and Apple is no exception.

The problem line is [oneish integerValue], which returns zero, and the rest of your code is just trying to obfuscate this.

Congratulations, you're the first (across three different comment threads) to point that out (though some of the trolls were entertaining).

This is unexpected, but not undocumented. See the Subclassing Notes at:

https://developer.apple.com/re...

I'll note that in Swift, integerValue no longer exists, having been folded into intValue, which gives the expected result of one (just like intValue in Objective-C).

Looks more like a 64-bit issue.

Note that if you use one fewer significant digit (e.g. @"1.111111111111111111" instead of @"1.1111111111111111111") the code works properly. That crosses the threshold where 64-bit integers overflow, which suggests a problem with the conversion used in integerValue. The 32-bit intValue always works properly, as does integerValue on 32-bit systems (where NSInteger is 32-bit, like a regular int).

The problem line is [oneish integerValue], which returns zero, and the rest of your code is just trying to obfuscate this. This is because NSDecimalNumber doesn't overrider integerValue, so it returns the inherited implementation, which returns zero. This is unexpected, but not undocumented. See the Subclassing Notes at:

https://developer.apple.com/re...

I'll note that in Swift, integerValue no longer exists, having been folded into intValue, which gives the expected result of one (just like intValue in Objective-C).

If you want an ad blocker, then you should install the proper extension:

You're right:

• One
• Two
• Better Option 1
• Better Option 2

In my opinion, it's a personal computer if the person who owns it can develop and run an application for it. Under this definition:

• GNU/Linux: PC.
• Windows (x86 and x86-64): PC because it can run MinGW or Visual Studio.
• Android with Bluetooth keyboard: PC because it can run AIDE.
• iPhone or iPad: Not a PC.
• iPhone or iPad connected to an Xcode appliance: PC.
• Stock game console: Not a PC.
• Retro game console connected to a PC with keyboard: PC.
• Stock Chromebook: Not a PC. All it can do is view web pages.
• Chromebook with Crouton: PC, but very easy to break. Once a Chromebook's owner installs Crouton, the firmware displays an "OS verification is OFF" screen that begs anyone who turns it on to wipe the drive by pressing Space then Enter.

Wait, what? if lambdas are shit programming why did almost every language add them as a features in the last 5-10 years? including c++.

I think you have mostly missed my point, Scala has research oriented roots, and it you're not ok with that, fine. But if it makes you a more efficient programmer, it might just be worth the effort of picking up.

Also, this is what I mean by pattern matching:
http://docs.scala-lang.org/tut...
https://doc.rust-lang.org/book...
https://developer.apple.com/li...

I'll give people the benefit of doubt, but it sounds like a whole ton of commenters here are going on with guesswork.

First of all, no, it's not easy in any way shape or form to create a rogue touch ID reader that would "send signals" allowing the iPhone 7 to be unlocked.
It'd already be plenty hard for someone to open up a phone and replace it surreptiously, let alone coming up with new hardware that would be compatible.

Do you guys even know how the TouchID reader works? Well, neither do I of course... it's proprietary. But here's an overview:
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/12...
http://edition.cnn.com/2013/09...
https://support.apple.com/en-u...

Basically, it works like a very specific and proprietary camera/microscope. It detects fine detailed fingerprint information, converts it into code and sends it to the SoC to be processed via software.
Nothing is processed on the button itself, and even if it was, you wouldn't be able to easily figure out what it did - or it'd be unsecure by definition.

But again, the hardware is very proprietary. You'd probably need insider knowledge of production to even come close to making something that would work like it, and it'd be expensive as hell to reproduce one. The companies that makes these things have secretive processes that not only would be incredibly hard to figure out, it'd be outright impossible to reproduce without proper technologies.

Do people even realize how much easier it'd be to just chop up someone's finger and bypass the whole thing anyways?

Even if you couldn't go to such extremes, it'd be easier for hackers and malicious actors to try to reproduce an entire detailed human finger complete with ridges, pores and whatnot (at it's current stage) than creating some rogue device that could bypass the security enclave somehow.
And you cannot retrieve information from previous fingerprints used for authentication because they are encrypted in the phone storage, not in the reader.

The only likely scenario where Touch ID could be used to steal fingerprints, depending a lot on how it works, would be to use an original unit modified to store readouts, and then creating new hardware that would send those into the system. But that's quite unlikely... if not outright impossible. Again, it depends on how exactly the reader works. Note though how no one every did anything like this, because it just doesn't make sense. iPhones will always have easier vulnerabilities to explore to retrieve data.

It's always good to note though that fingerprint sensors should NEVER be used as the sole authentication method if you have sensitive information inside the phone. Because, like I said, it's a matter of finding a way to make a very detailed reproduction of your finger. With 3D print technology and camera technology always improving, it'll be doable at some point in time.
It was already done for the iPhone 6, though not something that just anyone could do:
http://www.cultofmac.com/29688...

Apple is already facing a class action lawsuit regarding the so called Error 53, related to iPhone 6 bricking the phone if the Touch ID was replaced, so it really doesn't look good for them to repeat the whole deal for the iPhone 7.
https://www.macrumors.com/2016...
Australia's consumer protection agency also just filled a lawsuit:
http://www.ubergizmo.com/2017/...

And you know, the company has backtracked because the very same excuses some commenters are making here were not enoug