MyAppleMenu - Mon, Dec 7, 2015

Mon, Dec 7, 2015The Set-Off-A-Spark Edition

Apple Turns Stores Into Classrooms, by Sean Coughlan, BBC

The technology firm is using its 468 stores as bases for tutorials in the annual "Hour of Code" project.

Craig Federighi, one of Apple's top executives, says he wants to "set off a spark" in young learners. He also wants to dispel the geeky image of "solitary" computer programmers, saying "it's an incredibly creative medium, not unlike music".

Amex Deal With Apple Shows Unfair Advantage: MasterCard, by Shaun Drummond, Sydney Morning Herald

MasterCard says American Express's deal to be the first to roll out Apple Pay outside the US and Britain is evidence of the lack of regulation of Amex compared with Visa and MasterCard, whose fees are capped. [...] He said Apple Pay launching in Australia with Amex proprietary cards was a symptom of its ability to charge merchants much higher fees than Visa or MasterCard and therefore having much fatter margins to share with Apple, which has been demanding a cut of the fees paid to banks before allowing them onto Apple Pay.

A spokeswoman for American Express rejected Mr Grobler's comments. [...] "Issuers make their own choice about where they put their revenue and banks have some serious revenue that they could play with as well."

Stuff

How To Ease Move From A Mac To iPad, by Rob Pegoraro, USA Today

Marvel At The New Features In Version 5.0 Of This Popular Prototyping App, by Aldrin Calimlim, AppAdvice

Marvel lets you design apps right on your iOS device by turning sketches and mockups into tappable app prototypes. This allows you to share and pitch your ideas in a more interactive way than the conventional PowerPoint presentation or the clunky email attachment.

Quick Hit: Soundtwirl App, by Jason Shadrick, Premier Guitar

The Soundtwirl app for iOS is a fun way to get some valuable practice time in when all you have is your iPhone or iPad. At its core, the app provides some good backing tracks in a variety of styles, tempos, and keys. The handy mixer interface allows you to pull out bass, drums, keys, or guitar.

Quickly And Easily Create And Manage Twitter Lists With Listomatic, by Aldrin Calimlim, AppAdvice

Develop

An Aptitude For Apps, by Wong Li Za, The Star

“I told him since he liked Apple so much, why not go through tutorials on YouTube and find out how to create an app,” recalls Lim, a technical manager in a multinational company in Penang. (Although Lim has an IT background and taught Wern Jie HTML and web programming, app programming is completely new to the 40-year-old.) Wern Jie did just that, learning the basics of the Swift programming language within a week and developing a few simple apps like the Rock, Paper, Scissors game, a flashlight and calculator.

Notes

Hey Siri, Don’t Trivialize My Timer, by Daniel Jalkut, Bitsplitting

I’ve been more irritated by this cuteness after years of using the feature and, I suppose, the frequency with which I set one and three-minute timers. It’s mostly a passing exasperation for me, but it strikes me as an example where emotionally charging a software interaction is a risky proposition.

Yuma School District To Look At iPad Security, by Rachel Twoguns, Yumasun.com

Losses Point To Bleak Future For Music Streaming Services, by Robert Cookson, Financial Times

The future appears bleak for companies whose sole business is music streaming. An increasing number of investors and people in the record industry expect that digital music distribution will be dominated by a few large, cash-rich technology groups — in particular, Apple, Google and Amazon.

Bottom of the Page

"Cross-platform" has gone from meaning "runs in both Windows 95/98 and Windows NT" to "runs in both Mac and iOS, and maybe Android."

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