The Latest from Comfort Zone, MacStories Unwind, and Magic Rays of Light

By John Voorhees

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Chris has a first look at a new iPad stand, Matt is ready to drop out and have some fun, and a our Coldplay challenges pushes some of the gang to their limits.

MacStories Unwind

This week, Federico questions my character before discovering the joy of audiobooks, while I have been listening to more podcasts and have a question for listeners about which TV show he should watch next.

Magic Rays of Light

Devon and Jonathan highlight the premiere of German-language medical drama Berlin ER and go immersive arctic surfing on Apple Vision Pro.

How I’m Learning Japanese 14 Days In →

Linked By John Voorhees

Brendon Bigley, my co-host on NPC: Next Portable Console, is getting married soon and planning a honeymoon to Japan. Before leaving, he and his partner decided to learn Japanese together. In doing so, Brendon has done a ton of research, quizzing friends who have learned the language, and trying a long list of resources, which he’s published on Wavelengths.

I love the idea that one of the biggest steps in learning Japanese is to learn how to learn Japanese:

So there are about one million different ways to go from here, and because every person is different it means you’ll need to try a few different things to get going. Many people say the first step of learning Japanese is to learn how to learn Japanese, and I’d say that’s almost correct. The first step, once again, is to learn hiragana and katakana… second is learning how to learn Japanese.

The reason things get so wild here is that people will say that you need to start learning kanji, vocab, and grammar simultaneously and it’s not not true. Learning even the most basic grammar helps make sense of sentence structure, which enables you to discern kanji and vocab words in the context of real written language. Conversely, the more kanji and vocab you learn the easier it will become to intuitively parse new grammatical rules as they’re introduced.

Learning how to learn something is a crucial step to any new and complicated undertaking but often gets overlooked. That’s because, as Brendon points out, everyone’s path to expertise in anything is different. It pays to listen to the advice of people you trust, as he did, but it’s just as important to listen to yourself and understand how you learn.

Brendon’s story has great advice for learning anything, but in particular, it’s packed with resources for learning Japanese. There are Mac and iOS apps, web apps, Android apps, textbooks, and more. As someone who has a kid traveling around Tokyo and Kyoto right now, I immediately sent him the link. It’s a great one to file away if you’ve ever thought to yourself, “Maybe I’ll try to learn Japanese some day.”

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PicoChat or PictoChat: Can You Tell the Difference?

By John Voorhees

It’s been a very long time since I reviewed an iMessage app, but past issues of MacStories Weekly and this site chronicle the hundreds of iMessage apps Federico and I tried and wrote about. Today, though, I was reminded that there’s still fun to be had in what has to be Apple’s most obscure corner of the App Store because this afternoon, Brendon Bigley sent me a link to PicoChat for iMessage, a nostalgia-filled delight from developer Idrees Hassan.

PicoChat lovingly recreates the look and feel of PictoChat, a local messaging app that shipped with the Nintendo DS beginning in 2004 and later with the DS Lite and DSi. PictoChat used a short-range proprietary wireless protocol that could only extend about 65 feet, which ultimately led to its demise as smartphones with cellular connections and Wi-Fi became popular. However, for several years, it served as a short-range communications and creative outlet for a generation of kids.

For context, here’s PictoChat running on my matte black Nintendo DSi, a model that is one of Brendon’s ‘dream devices,’ as he recently shared on NPC: Next Portable Console:

Now, here’s a close-up of the original PictoChat interface and the iMessage app side-by-side.

PictoChat on a DS (left) and the PicoChat for iMessage app (right).

Just like the DS, the iMessage version has a teeny tiny keyboard with space above it for doodles. If it weren’t for the lower resolution of the DS’s screen, I bet most people would have a hard time telling them apart.

Getting back to Hassan’s app, it’s accessed like other iMessage apps from the Plus button in a Messages thread. Once you’re finished composing your masterpiece, the app converts it into an image and sends it like any other image is sent in Messages.

That’s it, but it’s more than enough to have sent a whole lot of Nintendo DS fans down a nostalgia-filled rabbit hole today, which was cool. Even if the DS wasn’t your thing, check out PicoChat and send some doodles to your friends and family. It’s a lot of fun.

PicoChat is available as a free download on the App Store.

Podcast Rewind: What’s Next for Apps and Hands-On with the Latest Android and Retro Handhelds

By John Voorhees

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

AppStories

This week, Federico and I make five app predictions for the next five years covering everything from App Intents and automation to the fate of the App Store.

This episode is sponsored by:

P – The water reminder and hydration app.

NPC: Next Portable Console

On the latest NPC, ASUS gaming phones, Retroid’s big surprise, and more Nintendo emulation drama, plus 8BitDo tries to solve the iPhone vertical controller problem, Federico weighs in on the Any Odin2 Portal, and the whole gang has nothing but love for the TrimUI Brick.

Hyperspace: Quickly Recover Mac Storage Without Deleting Files

By John Voorhees

Earlier today, John Siracusa released a Mac app called Hyperspace. The app scans any folder on your Mac, identifying duplicates. When the scan is finished, you can review the results and choose whether to reclaim the unnecessary space taken up by the duplicates.

Ready to scan.

Because of the way Apple’s APFS file system works on the Mac, Hyperspace’s deduplication of files doesn’t delete or move anything. How APFS does this is complicated and explained on the app’s website if you want to learn more, but to over-simplify a bit, APFS allows Hyperspace to eliminate duplicative data without changing the location of the files or their metadata. That means it’s a non-destructive operation, allowing you to reclaim drive space at no cost to your data’s integrity.

Hyperspace gives you a chance to review the files it has identified as duplicates.

The app has safety measures in place so system files aren’t affected, and users can label certain folders as ‘Source’ folders that will never be altered. You also have an opportunity to review the results of Hyperspace’s scan before the app does anything to your files.

Hyperspace requires a subscription or one-time purchase to reclaim space.

I took Hyperspace for a spin to see what it could find on my Mac Studio, which stores about 2.5 TB of data. The scan was impressively fast at around 30 seconds, identifying 4.04 GB of data that it could free up. That’s not a lot in the grand scheme of things, but it was also nice to know that I don’t generate a lot of duplicate files with my workflows.

Hyperspace is free to download from the Mac App Store. The free version allows you to scan the folders on your system. However, to recover space, you need to subscribe for $9.99 per month or $19.99 per year, or purchase a lifetime license for $49.99. There are also options to purchase a single month license for $9.99 or a single year for $19.99.

Rugged, Reliable, and HomeKit-Ready: A Review of Aqara’s G5 Pro Outdoor Camera Hub

By John Voorhees

I’ll cut to the chase: Aqara’s G5 Pro is the best HomeKit-compatible camera I’ve ever used. The device’s capabilities go far beyond its HomeKit integration, and I’ll touch on those below. However, given how hard it can be to find high-quality hardware like the G5 Pro that works with HomeKit Secure Video, that’s been my primary focus while testing this camera.

The Latest from Comfort Zone, MacStories Unwind, and Magic Rays of Light

By John Voorhees

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Matt has a lot of feelings about podcast players, Niléane has gone on an adventure where the sounds are just warmer and somehow better but she can’t quite explain why, and Chris tries to make an all-out war break out.

MacStories Unwind

This week on Unwind, Federico and I offer a peek behind what it’s like to wait for an Apple press release to drop, Federico critiques an Italian’s recommendations of what to buy at Costco and shares a videogame pick, and I have a new movie for listeners.

Magic Rays of Light

Sigmund and Devon check in after the Netflix “bug” that briefly enabled integration with TV app. Then, they highlight the return of Surface, share their thoughts on the Apple TV app coming to Android, and discuss the new iPhone 16e.

Recipes Are Coming to Apple’s News+ Service

By John Voorhees

Source: Apple.

Apple continues to layer new features into its News+ service. With iOS and iPadOS 18.4, the company says the service will add recipes from well-known publishers including Allrecipes, Bon Appétit, Food & Wine, Good Food, and Serious Eats:

With the new Food feature, users will be able to find stories curated by Apple News editors, as well as browse, search, and filter tens of thousands of recipes in the Recipe Catalog — with new recipes added every day. The beautifully designed recipe format makes it easy to review ingredients and directions, and a new cook mode takes step-by-step instructions to the full screen. Users can also save their favorite recipes for later and access them offline.

Source: Apple.

Interestingly, Apple’s press release makes no mention of the Mac. I’d rather use my iPhone or iPad in the kitchen, but a Mac is a great place to browse recipes, so hopefully News+ Food will be brought to the Mac eventually.

Vision Pro to Gain Apple Intelligence, Spatial Gallery App, and Companion iPhone App

By John Voorhees

Source: Apple.

Apple announced today that visionOS 2.4 will add some big features to the Vision Pro.

For starters, Apple Intelligence is coming to the Vision Pro. When I was at WWDC, I was surprised when there was no mention that Apple Intelligence would be added to visionOS. Since then, visionOS 2.0 and three subsequent releases have debuted without any sign of Apple Intelligence. However, that will change with the release of visionOS 2.4 in April.

Apple says visionOS 2.4 will include:

Writing Tools;
ChatGPT integration;
Genmoji;
Image Playground; and
Other unspecified features

Spatial Gallery. Source: Apple

In addition, visionOS will debut Spatial Gallery, a new Vision Pro app that Apple says will feature “a curated collection of spatial photos, spatial videos, and panoramas from artists, filmmakers, photographers, and more,” including new Immersive video titles.

Apple is also releasing a Vision Pro app for the iPhone that adds:

a new way to download apps and games from the App Store; discover experiences from Apple TV, Spatial Gallery, and more; easily find helpful tips; and quickly access information for their Vision Pro. Enhancements to Guest User make it easier than ever for users to share apps and experiences with family, friends, and colleagues using a nearby iPhone or iPad.

The Apple Vision Pro app. Source: Apple.

Apple says you’ll be able to queue a download from your iPhone for your Apple Vision Pro. I gave up trying to share my Vision Pro with my family almost immediately because it was such a cumbersome process, so better sharing will be welcome. If it works as promised, this sounds like a much better approach:

With new enhancements to Guest User in visionOS 2.4, users can start a Guest User session with their nearby iPhone or iPad. When their device is unlocked, they can choose which apps are accessible to their guest and start View Mirroring with AirPlay, making it easy to guide a guest through their Vision Pro experience.

It’s great to see Apple continue to push the Vision Pro forward with better user experiences, new content, and additional ways to enjoy its unique features.