This Week's Sponsor:

Winterfest 2024

The Festival of Artisanal Software

Posts tagged with "March 21"

Apple Releases iOS 9.3: A Collection of New Features and Tidbits

With an announcement in January, Apple unveiled iOS 9.3, a surprisingly feature-rich update to iOS 9 with major changes for education and several tweaks to the user experience of system apps. After the generally positive response to iOS 9 and the 9.1 and 9.2 updates, few were expecting Apple to bring more features to iOS 9 ahead of WWDC and the (likely) unveiling of iOS 10.

For the past two months, I’ve been using iOS 9.3 on my two primary devices (an iPad Pro and iPhone 6s Plus) starting with the first beta, and I’ve been keeping track of all the changes – big and small – that Apple is bringing with their latest iOS release. Below, you’ll find a collection of everything I’ve discovered.

Read more

Apple Posts March 21 2016 Keynote Video & New iPad Pro, ResearchKit, Liam Ads

For those who didn’t follow the live stream or announcements as they unfolded on Twitter and blogs, Apple has now posted the video of its March 21 keynote held earlier today at the company campus in Cupertino.

The video can be streamed here, and a higher quality version should be made available in a few hours through iTunes (on the Apple Keynotes podcast). To avoid streaming errors, Safari is recommended for the best viewing experience.

In addition, Apple has also posted new commercials and reveal videos for the 9.7-inch iPad Pro, ResearchKit, and Liam robot on its YouTube channel. You can find all the videos below.

Read more

The Numbers from Apple’s March 21 Event

Apple CEO Tim Cook walked on stage today and kicked off the company’s March 21 event with his opening remarks on encryption and the FBI, but the keynote was filled with lots of extra facts and statistics.

From adoption rates to apps available on the App Store, these numbers are interesting as they’re typically shared throughout the year in dedicated events or press releases. We’ve compiled the most important numbers from Apple’s March 21 keynote below.

Read more

Apple Announces iOS 9.3 Launching Later Today

Update: Here’s our in-depth overview of iOS 9.3.

As widely expected, Apple has today confirmed the official release date of iOS 9.3 at a media event held at its campus in Cupertino. iOS 9.3 will be released later today for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

Unveiled with a surprise announcement in January and available in beta for developers and public testing since, iOS 9.3 is a major update to iOS 9 that includes notable additions for the visual experience of iOS, changes to Notes and Apple Music, and big improvements to iOS for Education.

The biggest change in iOS 9.3 is Night Shift, a new display mode that reduces the blue light emission of a device’s display to prevent eye strain and help get better sleep. Night Shift is highly reminiscent of f.lux, a popular blue light reduction tool for OS X that was also available for a short period of time on iOS through sideloading before Apple asked the company to pull it.

Also new in iOS 9.3 is the ability to protect notes with a password and grant third-party apps access to your Apple Music library to manage playlists and add songs to the library. The former takes advantage of a unique password and Touch ID to protect notes you don’t want to show by default; the latter is based on a new privacy screen and it allows apps to add songs from the iTunes Store (not arbitrary audio files) to your Apple Music library.

Finally, iOS 9.3 brings some deep improvements to the education framework for iPads in the classroom. As we outlined after its announcement, iOS 9.3 will allow multiple students to use the same iPad with support for multiple profiles, it’ll offer a brand new Classroom app for teachers to manage activity and assignments, and it’ll allow school admins to create Managed Apple IDs for students through Apple School Manager.

iOS 9.3 will be released later today through iTunes and Apple’s over-the-air software update. We’ll have a full overview of the changes in a separate article after its launch.

You can also follow all of the MacStories coverage of today’s Apple’s keynote through our March 21 Keynote hub, or subscribe to the dedicated March 21 Keynote RSS feed.

Apple’s Town Hall: A Look Back→

Jason Snell and Stephen Hackett have taken a look back at the products that Apple has introduced at their Town Hall venue since the iPod in 2001. Timely, because today’s Apple Keynote will also be held at Apple’s Town Hall.

Located at 4 Infinite Loop on Apple’s main campus, the Town Hall conference center was probably designed more for in-company meetings than for major events covered by worldwide media. And yet on numerous occasions over the years, it’s been exactly that.

Monday’s event in Town Hall could very well be the last hurrah for the old 300-seat venue, given that Apple is constructing a 1,000-seat auditorium in its new campus, due to open next year. Before it goes, here’s a look back at key public events in Town Hall, starting in late 2001.

Be sure to watch the accompanying video from Stephen Hackett which features clips from the various Town Hall media events.

Permalink

Apple Events App Now Available on the Apple TV App Store

As first reported by 9to5Mac, a new ‘Apple Events’ channel is now available on the fourth-generation Apple TV’s App Store. The app will enable you to live stream the upcoming Apple keynote on Monday, March 21 at 10am PDT. In the meantime you can also re-watch Apple’s previous keynotes going back to WWDC 2014.

Unlike the Apple Events channel on older Apple TVs, which automatically appeared on the Apple TV on the day of the event, fourth-generation Apple TV owners will have to manually download the Apple Events app from the App Store.

Apple has previously announced that the keynote will also be live streamed on its website if you use Safari on iOS or OS X, or the Microsoft Edge browser on a PC. Apple has also stated that the second and third generation Apple TV will also be able to stream the keynote. Although the Apple Events channel is not yet available on those older Apple TVs, in previous years it has appeared on the Apple TV a few hours prior to the keynote.

More screenshots of the Apple Events app for the fourth-generation Apple TV are embedded below.

You can also follow all of the MacStories coverage of Monday’s Apple keynote through our March 21 Keynote hub, or subscribe to the dedicated March 21 Keynote RSS feed.

[via 9to5Mac]

Read more

Apple Announces March 21 Media Event

As first reported by John Paczkowski at BuzzFeed, Apple has announced a media event for Monday, March 21, in Cupertino.

In the event invitation (pictured above), Apple says “let us loop you in”, possibly in reference to the fact that the event will be held at the company’s campus at 1 Infinite Loop.

According to recent speculation and rumors, Apple is widely expected to introduce a new “iPhone SE” which will feature a 4-inch display, a new 9.7-inch iPad Pro, and new bands for the Apple Watch. It is also expected that Apple will likely announce the official release of iOS 9.3, which has been in public beta since January. iOS 9.3 includes a number of new features including Night Shift, improved News and Notes apps, and more advanced tools and features for using iOS devices in education.

The event is also one day before Apple and the Department of Justice will make oral arguments before Magistrate Judge Sheri Pym in the San Bernardino case.

Update: Apple has set up a special page for the event, confirming that it will be streamed live on March 21. The video will be available here.