Leander Kahney's Blog, page 1484

I recall the time I met someone who was not only vision impaired, but nearly blind. However, their loss of vision didn't prevent them from enjoying computers. Although we were both able to get a lot done, they wouldn't have been able to get as much as I can get done without special tools like a large display with overly magnified and software enhancements on their computer.

Apple's iOS mobile operating system offers nearly the same features to help the vision impaired and even people who depend on reading glasses to see things displayed on the iPhone's tiny display. Here's how to access them.

Launch the Settings app, tap General, tap Accessibility and you will see two options that might help you if you have problems reading your iPhone screen.

Zoom – turning this option on will allow you to quickly zoom in and out of screens by tapping once with three fingers at the same time to toggle the feature on or off. Now double tap again with three fingers, hold and drag up and down to change the zoom level. I really like this feature so much I leave it turned on all the time due to the ability to toggle it on/off easily.

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Large Text – turning on this option will make the text displayed in the Calendar, Contacts, Mail, Messages and Notes apps a lot bigger. You can go from normal (off) sized text to anything from 20pt text to a whopping 56pt text. Definitely handy if you've misplaced your reading glasses or if you are vision impaired.

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These simple tips about iOS aren't rocket science, but could easily be missed by people due to their location in the Settings app. I cannot tell you how many people appreciated these small tips when I wrote about them a couple of years ago. Now that I'm older and wear glasses (of which there never seem to be enough of them lying around) I am glad to be able to fall back to using these tips to see my iPhone display whenever my glasses aren't around.

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Published on November 17, 2011 12:28

iShred With This iPad Turned Snowboard Designed In Tribute To Steve Jobs [Video]

As a tribute to Steve Jobs, the guys over at Signal Snowboards decided to make a plank that was totally infused with the spirit of Apple design.

The result? A snowboard milled from a block of aluminum with a glowing, Apple-like logo and a built-in 3G iPad 2.

The verdict? Not exactly a great plank for maneuverability, but I'm just impressed they didn't crack that iPad into a million pieces after their first trick./

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Published on November 17, 2011 11:49

¡Híjole! Apple TV Software Gets Updated To Support Mexican Netflix And Fix Audio Bugs

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It's a tiny, tiny squidge of an update, but an update nonetheless: Apple has just released version 4.4.3 for the Apple TV, adding support for Netflix in Mexico and resolving an audio issue where sound might not play through the optical port when the attached TV is turned off.

As usual, to grab the update, just hit up Settings > General. Enjoy all those great streaming episodes of Abrázame Muy Fuerte!.

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Published on November 17, 2011 10:57

Apple Gets One Last Nuke From Xerox: A Killer Location Patent That Could Toast Facebook, Foursquare, Google, Etc.

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Photo by autopoiet - http://flic.kr/p/9aEXJE

Apple has a long history of taking a technology created by Xerox and transforming it into the heart and soul of computing, such as the mouse or the concept of a graphic user interface. Now comes word Apple owns a Xerox patent for location based services. The patent could prompt Apple to sue a wide array of companies, ranging from Android-backer Google to social networking giant Facebook and any others relying on the ability to check users' location.

Issued Wednesday, the patent actually dates back to 1998, when it was originally filed by Xerox (and received in 2000.) Apple appears to have purchased the patent Dec. 17, 2009. Not only does the patent pre-date many of today's technology, including Android-based smartphones, GPS receivers, Facebook, Foursquare and more, but the IP is written so generally as to cover a wide swath of devices.

Here is how the the patent describes a "location information system:" A receiver that receives location identification information from at least one site specific object identifying a location.ladd., where at lease one site specific object is a beacon.laddend.; and a transceiver that transmits the location identification information to a distributed network and that receives the location specific information about the specified location from the distributed network based on the location identification information, wherein the location specific information provides information corresponding to the location.

What that language means is that the patent could cover ads sent to a cell phone based on its location, all mobile phones using GPS to locate users – even the use of QR barcodes that provide user information based on location. In essence, if Samsung and other companies thought they had enough legal headaches from Apple, their problems could multiply exponentially.

The ball is in Apple's court.

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Published on November 17, 2011 10:39

After The Kindle Fire, Amazon Will Challenge The iPhone With A 2012 Kindle Phone [Report]

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With the Kindle Fire, Amazon has proved that it is possible to compete with the iPad, at least in the budget tablet market. Will they try to take the crown from the iPhone's head next with a so-called Kindle Phone? Yup, maybe!

According to AllThingsD, reporting Citigroup:

Based on our supply chain channel checks in Asia led by Kevin Chang, Citi's Taipei-based hardware research analyst, we believe an Amazon Smartphone will be launched in 4Q12. Based on our supply chain check, we believe FIH is now jointly developing the phone with Amazon. However, we believe that Amazon will pay NRE (non-recurring engineering fees) to FIH but the device and multiple components will actually be manufactured by Hon Hai's TMS business group (the same business group that makes Amazon's E-reader and the 8.9" Amazon tablet). We believe the smartphone will adopt Texas Instrument's OMAP 4 processor and is very likely to adopt QCOM's dual mode 6-series standalone baseband given QCOM has been a long-time baseband supplier for Amazon's E-reader.

Look, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say: bull. The Kindle Fire makes sense for Amazon because it is a way to easily put a portal in people's hands that allows them to easily buy from the e-retailing giant's huge library of digital content, especially Amazon's Video and Kindle e-book services. But a phone? Not only would Amazon have to get into bed with carriers — a total headache — but smartphones aren't great devices for watching video or reading. Plus, the competition is entrenched: Amazon can't budge the iPhone, or even the likes of Samsung or HTC.

The reason the Kindle Fire was a revelation was because Amazon got in there early, releasing the first tablet since the iPad to be interesting on its own merits, not as a clone of a better device. They can't do the same thing with a Kindle Phone. I doubt Amazon will be so stupid: they are a smart company, and if Amazon has proven anything, its that they don't rush to market with new devices simply because everyone else is doing it. They aren't a manufacturer primarily; they are a retailer. Any hardware they design must forward their retail operations significantly, or else, it's pointless. A Kindle Phone just isn't going to do that.

[via iDB]

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Published on November 17, 2011 09:40

Mac Sales Top 5% Globally For The First Time In 15 Years

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Photo by cackhanded - http://flic.kr/p/CYDGM

For the first time in 15 years, Apple has five percent of the global PC market. The numbers are almost embarrassing: 24.6 percent third-quarter Mac sales growth that beat the pants off a PC industry limping along with just a 5.3 percent increase.

Record sales of 4.89 million Macs during the three-month 2011 calendar period helped Apple top the "magic 5 percent mark," Needham & Co. analyst Charlie Wolf told investors Wednesday. In June, Apple reported Mac sales were 4.7 percent of worldwide marketshare, up from 4.4 percent in 2010.

If that wasn't enough to get your attention, Mac sales during 2011 "represented 20 percent of the growth in the worldwide PC shipments," Wolf added. One company created a fifth of the growth for the entire industry. Oh, did I mention the September quarter was the 22nd straight period Mac sales blew the doors off the PC industry – and even beat its own records since 2006?

But the record sales were limited to the home market, right? The PC is still king at business. Wrong big time. Apple's Mac sales grew 25.6 percent in the home, compared to 4 percent for PCs, sure. But Macs just ate PCs corporate breakfast, lunch and dinner, racking up a 43.8 percent versus 4.8 percent lead, according to Wolf.

What's the source of all this growth? Look east toward China. Mac sales to China grew 57.2 percent during the September quarter with Japan helping with 49.6 percent of increased Mac demand. But China is the "key driver of growth" in the Asia Pacific region, Wolf said.

But it can't be all good news for Apple, right? There has to be a cloud somewhere. True. Apple registered just 2.9 percent growth of Mac sales to the education market, versus 16.9 percent for the PC.

The drop in Mac sales to the classroom? That was because they bought iPads, instead — also made by Apple. Like I said, it's almost embarrassing. Almost.

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Published on November 17, 2011 09:23

Apple Wants To Give Your iPhone Screen-Protecting Airbags

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Apple's iOS devices, especially the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S, are famous for their inability to endure even the smallest of drops without their displays shattering into a thousand tiny pieces. However, according to a patent application from the company, future iPhones could employ a fancy airbag system that prevents them from cracking when they hit the ground.

Uncovered by PatentlyApple, the patent describes a number of solutions for crack resistant glass for portable devices such as the iPhone. In one, Apple envisions a device that features a "shock mount" between the its body and its display, which is automatically inflated when it detects the device has been dropped. PatentlyApple reports:

Apple's patent FIG. 5 shows a housing and a cover glass in cross sectional view having a tunable shock mount 505 disposed there between. The tunable shock mount could comprise of an inflatable bladder 506 filled with a fluid 507. Tuning could be done in various ways such as by selection of materials for the bladder and fluid, and by varying an amount of inflation. Hmm, think of it as a form of air-bag for portable devices.

Moreover, Apple suggests another advantage to this solution is that the internal components within the device could be protected from water damage by introducing a waterproof seal.

Other solutions detailed in Apple's patent include one that's already in use with its latest iOS devices, which is the use of alumino silicate glass, better known as Gorilla Glass. PatentlyApple notes the Cupertino company could also employ other glass materials such as sodalime and borosilicate, which are known to make glass resistant to shock.

I've dropped and destroyed a number of iPhones over the years, so a device that features inflatable airbags (or the equivalent) for protection seems like a dream come true to me. What about you?

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Published on November 17, 2011 09:00

iPhones Have Now Beaten BlackBerry In Business

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Smartphones at Work (source: iPass)

A new study contains more evidence the iPhone is taking hold at work, even displacing the stolid business-centric BlackBerry as the smartphone of choice. Of enterprise workers carrying a smartphone, 45 percent said the handset is an iPhone versus 32 percent for the BlackBerry.

According to the Mobile Workforce Report (pdf) from researcher iPass, the percent of enterprise employees packing iPhones rose from 31.1 percent in 2010, while BlackBerry users in the workforce fell from 35 percent. The decline in BlackBerry users was largely due to the RIM device not being able to keep up with the growth of smartphones in the workplace, the report explained.

That slowdown was evident in answers to what smartphone business employees intend to buy in 2012. While 18 percent of enterprise workers plan to get an iPhone, just 2.3 percent said they would buy a BlackBerry.

Android in the enterprise came in a close third, just behind the BlackBerry, registering 21 percent of the business market, overtaking Symbian and doubling its market share from 2010. More than 11 percent of enterprise workers said they plan to buy an Android smartphone next year, with 3.6 percent picking a Windows Phone.

The iPass survey questioned 2,300 workers around the globe.

This is probably a dumb question, but have you traded in your work BlackBerry for an iPhone yet? Let us know in the comments.

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Published on November 17, 2011 08:24

Apple Is Working On A New Power Adapter That Syncs-And-Charges Macs And iOS Devices Simultaneously

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A couple weeks ago, we posted about TwelveSix's PlugBug, a cute little attachment that plugs into your standard MacBook MagSafe charger and gives it a 10W USB port, perfect for charging your MacBook and iPad simultaneously.

The PlugBug's an ingenious little idea, and I'm reviewing one now. However, PlugBug's days might be numbered: a new patent says that Apple is working on a universal power adapter that can charge MacBook Pros, iPhones and iPads, all at the same time.

That's not all, though. Apple's also been working on a way for devices plugged into the same power adapter to sync data between themselves.

Sounds great to me. If there's one thing I hate, it's dealing with multiple cords and cables. Cupertino must hate it too: it's exactly the sort of frustrating duplication of partical functionality that Steve Jobs hated. If Apple can consolidate all of its power adapters and USB cables (maybe by using ThunderBolt) into one universal device that handles everything, so much the better.

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Published on November 17, 2011 08:20

Apple Prepares For iPad 3 By Taking Control Of iPad 2 Supplies [Rumor]

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Rumors that Apple's third-generation will launch early next year have been strengthened by claims from "industry sources" today, who say that the Cupertino company has moved to control supplies of its iPad 2 in a bid to reduce excess inventory. It will reportedly reduce the number of displays manufactured by the likes of Samsung, LG Display, and Chimei Innolux during the fourth quarter of 2011, which could lead to a reduction in iPad shipments.

Apple still has plenty of iPads in its inventory, however, according to DigiTimes. The company sold 11.12 million units by third quarter of this year, but has an inventory strong enough to produce 15-16 million devices, leaving 4-5 million units in its stockpile.

With an iPad 3 on the horizon, the company has reportedly now reduced down iPad 2 display production:

Due to inventory adjustments at Apple, LG Display saw its shipments of 9.7-inch panels to Apple decline from three million units in September to 2.5 million units in October. Samsung managed to keep its shipments of 9.7-inch panels flat at two million units in October, while CMI slashed its shipments from 700,000 units to 350,000 units during the same month, said the sources.

While these manufacturers have had their shipments reduced, Samsung and Sharp have already been instructed to build panels for the next-generation device, and have been doing so since October. TPK Holding and Wintek will join the duo in display production during November or December, according to the sources.

It's likely Apple has taken control of its supplies to ensure that manufacturers can continue to meet the demand of the second-generation device while the next model enters production.

[via The Next Web, image courtesy of TiPB]

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Published on November 17, 2011 04:40