InMethod

Oft nachgefragt: ein Beitrags-Update über meine ‘Homescreens‘. Seit März 2011, als die letzte Aktualisierung dieser Artikel-Serie erfolgte, hat sich die eine oder andere App verschoben, geändert und aussortiert. Der derzeit aktuellen Stand ist an dieser Stelle festgehalten. Vielleicht finden an diesem Montag ja speziell frische 4S-Käufer, die einen ersten Grundbedarf an Software benötigen, die eine oder andere Anregung. Ich persönlich ziehe jede individuelle Empfehlungen allen generischen ‘Hitlisten’ vor. Genau deshalb soll mein privater Einblick auch nicht alleine bleiben: Wer Screenshots oder Tipps von seinen verwendeten Apps in den Kommentaren kundtun möchte, ist dazu herzlich eingeladen. Zwei Anmerkungen noch: Die zwei benutzten Hintergrundbilder gibt es hier und hier. Auf meinem Standby-Screen befinden sich dieses und dieses Bild. Außerdem führe ich zwei Ordner mit ‘Review’-Software, die ich mir für dieses Blog noch genauer anschauen möchte. Da diese Programme (noch) keine Empfehlungen sind, verbleiben sie für diesen Artikel ohne Erwähnung. Außerdem verstecken sich in den iPhone-Ordnern: Delivery Status touch (3.99 €); Dropbox (kostenlos); eBay (kostenlos); iCab Mobile (1.59 €); Skype (kostenlos); WeatherPro (2.99 €); Tumblr (kostenlos); Verbs (0.79 €); WhatsApp (kostenlos); PayPal (kostenlos); Analytics Pro (4.99 €); Boxcar (kostenlos); Articles (2.39 €); Instapaper (3.99 €); Facebook (kostenlos); Kicktipp (kostenlos); Flickit Pro (3.99 €); 360 Panorama (0.79 €); Lab (0.79 €); Halftone (0.79 €); Instagram (kostenlos); Finnish English (2.39 €); Evernote (kostenlos); Reeder (2.39 €); CrashPlan (kostenlos); Meine Freunde suchen (kostenlos); Shazam (kostenlos); Synonymwörterbuch (19.99 €); iSSH (7.99 €); Handoff (1.59 €); Screens (15.99 €); Google+ (kostenlos) und AirPort Dienstprogramm (kostenlos). Außerdem verstecken sich in den Ordnern: Evernote (kostenlos); iOutBank (9.99 €); Pages (7.99 €); iSSH (7.99 €); Dropbox (kostenlos); iMovie (3.99 €); Skype (kostenlos); Numbers (7.99 €); Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery (3.99 €); Bumpy Road (2.39 €); Cut the Rope (1.59 €); Emberwind HD (1.59 €); Groove Coaster (2.39 €); The Last Rocket (2.39 €); Contre Jour HD (2.39 €); ShadowGun (3.99 €); Comic Zeal (5.99 €); Flipboard (kostenlos); Kindle (kostenlos); Tagesschau (kostenlos); Wired (2.99 €); Zeit Online (kostenlos); Big Picture (2.39 €); Color Splash (1.59 €); Instagallery (1.59 €); Instamap (1.59 €); PhotoSync (1.59 €); Remote (kostenlos); Boxee (kostenlos); iCab Mobile (1.59 €); Simplenote (kostenlos); Air Display (7.99 €) und PDF Expert (7.99 €). * Alle Affiliate-Links (Danke!) führen direkt in den App Store. Read More

By Rene Ritchie, Monday, Aug 22, 2011 | While HP may not have killed webOS when it cancelled webOS hardware, it certainly stuck the knife in it and twister really, really hard — and every webOS user, Palm loyalist, and PreCentral.net reader felt it. Some might choose to stick with it, to see if HP’s incompetence can somehow be turned around by a forward thinking, hardware genius licensor, but others might have finally had enough. If you’re one of those, the dedicated, the abused, we think Apple’s iOS and iPhone and iPad hardware might be the perfect thing to salve your wounds and restore your sense of gadget wonder. We’ve got 960×640 retina displays, easy-peasy FaceTime video calling, high quality 5 megapixel, back-illuminated camera that shoots 720p 30fps video, the massive update that’s iOS 5 just down the road. And hey, if you’re worried about moving over your personal data like contacts, finding apps, getting used to the differences, and wondering where to get help — Relax. You’re in the the right place. Here’s everything you need to know (more properly, everything the TiPb iPhone Forums have taught us) about switching to iPhone and iPad. When half of Apple’s original iPhone team left for Palm to make the webOS, maybe you went with them? Or maybe you’re a loyalist who stuck with Palm from Treo to Pre or Centro to Pixi or Veer and never even considered an iPhone until now? No worries. You’ll feel right at home. Mostly. The biggest similarity between iOS and webOS is that they both share a sense of design — of taste and elegance, of great user interface and experience. webOS certainly handles many things better, including the brilliant Card and Stack metaphors, but overall iOS is clean, consistent, and arguably has the best fit and finish in the business. But taste only matters if you can get your stuff done. Hopefully if you’re using something called webOS your personal info is all store up in the cloud. If so, you should have no trouble getting it onto your iPhone. Just like the pioneering Pre, iOS 4 can handle multiple ActiveSync accounts, including Exchange proper as well as Google Sync’s implementation for Gmail. Just tap the Settings icon on the Home Screen, tap Mail, Contacts, and Calendars, choose Exchange, and enter your credentials. If ActiveSync isn’t to your fancy, you can tap Other and set Read More

Boxee for iPad is another live-converting, video streaming app (like our favorites StreamToMe and Air Video), but it also lets you collect videos from the web that you want to watch and does all of this for free. The app itself isn't terribly useful on its own, so you'll need to install Boxee Media Manager (also free for Windows and Mac) to stream videos from your local computers to your iPad and the Watch It Later bookmarklet to collect videos from the web. The Media Manager software lets you add directories on your computer with video inside and access them from the iPad app. You'll then be able to watch those videos on your iPad. If the format isn't compatible, Boxee will convert it in real-time. In our tests, we found that lower-quality AVIs tended to look better perhaps because converting a 720p MKV required a bit more power—which is to say that a higher quality source may not be better for live conversion purposes. Also, while conversion was quick it took quite awhile to load the actual video prior to playback. Currently there is no AirPlay support but Boxee is working to add that feature. The Watch It Later bookmarklet is really handy as you can surf to any page with a video on it, click the bookmarklet, and save that video to your iPad. All the collected web videos were quickly available to watch right from the iPad. While the feature set is pretty good, and the interface is beautiful, the first release has some quirks that might make it a little problematic for some users. If you're patient, however, it's a good local streaming option for all kinds of video. You can follow Adam Dachis, the author of this post, on Twitter, Google+, and Facebook.  Twitter's the best way to contact him, too. Read More

By Leanna Lofte, Thursday, May 5, 2011 | Every day, TiPb gets flooded with announcements for new and updated iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps and games. So every day we pick just a few of the most interesting, the most notable, and simply the most awesome to share with you! I Act In Fact To Do List: Experience the satisfaction of getting the right things done effectively and have more fun along the way. Includes unique features help prevent procrastination or over-scheduling, and provide you feedback for continuous improvement. [$1.99 - iTunes link] Contact Notes: This app makes it very easy to utilize the iPhone Contacts’ notes field, to keep notes for your contacts. You can see all the notes you’ve entered in your iPhone Contacts’ notes field on one page, search by keyword through all your contacts’ notes easily, and add a new note in your iPhone Contacts’ notes field with fewer presses. [$0.99 - iTunes line] 8coupons: The largest source for local deals in every zipcode in the U.S. with 500K deals from Groupon, LivingSocial, Restaurant.com + 4,000 other deal providers. [Free - iTunes link] Air Video: Now with improved TV Out support and the ability to playback in the background. [$2.99 - iTunes link] YumYumBoy: Help YumYum, a gluttonous boy, eat as much as he can to satisfy his appetite, while trying to avoid the vegetables his mum throws at him. [$0.99 - iTunes link] Any other big apps or game releases or updates today? If you pick any of these up, let us know what you think! Read More

Posted 04/12/2011 at 9:00am | by Cory Bohon Computing up "in the clouds" is the new craze. With an abundance of cloud services available from Google, Microsoft and independent companies like Dropbox, one might wonder why you’d need to build your own server solution. But, what if you don’t like the idea of leaving your personal data on another company’s server? Then, you build your own online cloud to store and retrieve your data remotely. In this article, we’ll show you how to use a Mac to set up your own cloud services, including storing and transferring files, streaming media, and even using your Mac to serve up web pages. You can then access these services remotely on your Mac or an iOS device. >> Mac with OS X Snow Leopard >> “Always-on” internet connection We’ve covered setting up Hamachi for use as an iTunes Home Sharing server before, but you can also use it to retrieve and send files to and from other Macs (and Windows PCs) that are connected to the same Hamachi Virtual Private Network. After following our previous article to set up the Hamachi network, navigate to System Preferences  > Sharing. Ensure that the checkbox beside of File Sharing is checked. This will allow administrators to access all of the drives on the Mac and will allow other users to access shared folders. After logging into your Hamachi VPN, open a Finder window. Just as if you were on your local network, your Shared computers connected to the same VPN will show up under the Shared heading. We previously covered how to access your files on-the-go via your Mac through SFTP by enabling and configuring SSH on your Mac and network. SSH (or Secure Shell) provides access to your Mac’s files through a protocol called SFTP (Secure FTP). Using this method, you can access your files no matter where you are as long as you have an Internet connection and an FTP client. To access your files using a Mac, use an SFTP client like Panic’s Transmit or Cyberduck. If you’re trying to access your files from an iOS device over SFTP, try an application like Good Reader. Setting up the Hamachi VPN on your Macs, you can also access iTunes Home Sharing through iTunes on multiple computers. This means that you can remotely stream music from your home Mac over the Internet. So, no matter where Read More

The ability to show everything that’s on my iPad 2′s screen on a TV using the new HD mirroring function has changed the device from just a remarkably portable computer to a full-fledged entertainment and business center. These are the apps that helped make that happen. There are other options for streaming your computer’s video library to the iPad, but Air Video consistently receives updates to improve its quality and squash bugs, and it works both in your home network and away with relatively little setup. It also supports AirPlay video streaming, but if you don’t have an Apple TV to stream to, it does a great job with the Digital AV Adapter and iPad 2 HD mirroring. If you have a TV in the kitchen, or even just one that you can view from the kitchen, then being able to view ingredient lists and cooking instructions on a large screen can really help make the whole process easier. That’s especially true if the app features instructional video, as Gordon Ramsay’s Cook With Me HD does. Even if it doesn’t, viewing ingredients lists and cooking instruction on a large screen may be better for those that have a hard time reading small text. I like to use the iPad as a canvas from time to time, in combination with a Pogo Sketch or other drawing stylus. Sketchbook Pro is a great app for that purpose on the iPad, and with HD mirroring, it becomes a much bigger drawing tablet — and one that I can use to show off my sketches in real-time as they happen. This comes in handy if you’re working on character design collaboratively with another artist, or if you just want to play Win, Lose or Draw at a party or with a group of friends. If you’re more interested in using the iPad connected to a display as a collaborative whiteboard tool, try Whiteboard Internet Collaboration, which also lets other users with any other iOS device and the app installed join in, too. Whatever your preference for remote desktop apps (Screens and LogMeIn Ignition are two good choices), when paired with an iPad 2 and HD mirroring, they become a way to quickly and easily recreate and access your home computer when you’re on the road, so long as you have access to an HDMI-equipped TV. It might not have the best performance, depending on your connection quality, Read More

By Rene Ritchie, Thursday, Mar 10, 2011 | Last night I sat down with my iPhone running iOS 4.3, tapped on the freshly updated version of Air Video, connected to my Mac Pro running the beta version of Air Video server, cued up some AVI and MKV files, and streamed them flawlessly to my Apple TV via iOS 4.3′s AirPlay. My iPhone wasn’t Jailbroken. My Apple TV wasn’t Jailbroken. But with a huge geeky grin plastered on my face I was finally watching all those old home videos and DVD rips that were never before supported, in any way, by Apple and their luddite Hollywood licensors. iOS 4.3 might be a minor update in many ways but it’s also a game changer for Apple and iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch users. It turns every one of those devices into a media server (AirPlay) and viewing client (Home Sharing or apps like Air Video) at the same time. And it cuts the tether of iTunes and the shackles of sync to do it. That an iPad or iPhone had to be the intermediary was cumbersome, that the setup required an on-PC server component was complex, but it was all doable and once done it just worked. If you want to try it out, follow on after the break. Here’s what you need: Set things up the same way we outlined in our how to use an old iPod touch as an Apple TV tip, but say goodbye to the wires because this is the future and the future is streaming. Tips of the day will range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you’d like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to news@tipb.com. (If it’s especially awesome and previously unknown to us, we’ll even give ya a reward…) Read More

It’s that time again! Apple has released OS update 4.3 for the iPhone, iPod Touch, Apple TV, and the iPad, bringing some cool new features to the respective devices. I could gab for centuries about iTunes Home Sharing and the addition of personal hotspots, but I’ll can that chatter in favor of more game-related stuff about the latest update. Specifically, I want to note the enhanced AirPlay offering. In brief, the 4.3 version of AirPlay connectivity gives both Web apps and App Store apps the ability to output video to the Apple TV. I think you can see the possible gaming kickbacks from this move. If, say, Imangi was feeling froggy, it could theoretically update Imangi: The Game [Free] to output to Apple TV, thus allowing you to play from your couch on a big screen as opposed to alone and on a toilet. That’s cool, right? Obviously, we’ll need to play a wait-and-see game on this feature. Surely, adding in this functionality will take time, tweaking, and testing, which means we’ll likely see a lackluster adoption rate initially. Plus, who owns an Apple TV? Even at its lower price point, it doesn't seem to be exactly flying off the Apple Store's shelves. Regardless, this is exciting stuff. Guess I really need to think about putting that plasma by the toilet after all. So what are you waiting for? Download 4.3! Also, if you happen to have an Apple TV and want to check out this new AirPlay functionality, give Air Video [$2.99 / Free] a try. Sure, it's not a game but playing videos converted real time on my computer, streamed to my iPhone, then relayed to my TV feels like magic. A Fuzzy Memory is featured on the iTunes App Store for new featured apps in Canada! +++Featured #1 in Canada!!!, #11 in US new Medical apps+++ +++Featured #2, #8 in Canada for new Music and Education game+++ Reviews are coming in:Canada: Fun to play! - ★★★★★ by Chronopolis18 - Version 1.0 - Dec 9, 2011 Great atmosphere! Addictive and really challenging! Fun game to play! US: Fun - ★★★★★ by Jtk456 - Version 1.0 - Dec 13, 2011 Challenging yet easy at the same time. Good for working the mind - ★★★★★ by Barn banjo - Version 1.0 - Dec 11, 2011 Simple brain work out Thanks so much everyone! Please keep them coming! I enjoy hearing feedback Read More

AirPlay-enabled apps are beginning to trickle out ahead of iOS 4.3′s imminent launch, which will be on Friday, March 11 at the latest (if not today). Tuesday morning, Air Video, which lets you stream video from your computer to any iOS device remotely, got AirPlay support, making it incredibly easy to keep your entire personal movie collection with you at all times. The only downside of Air Video is it only works if your collection is stored locally on your own Mac. If you depend on subscription services to scratch your video itch, you may find yourself left out of the party. Air Video isn’t the only remote video streaming app to get AirPlay support. StreamToMe also recently updated its app to include AirPlay support for iOS 4.3 users. I prefer Air Video because it can function both as a streaming and remote conversion tool, as it is creating a second, streaming-optimized  file which can be automatically added to your iTunes library for later use. StreamToMe offers other great features, however, like music and photo streaming from your iTunes and iPhoto libraries. You can’t stream movies bought in iTunes using either thanks to DRM measures, but there are ways around that for the truly dedicated. Whichever you choose, you get video streaming over Wi-Fi and 3G to your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad, even when you’re outside your home network (with the help of a simple companion application on the computer where your media is housed). And with iOS 4.3, you can stream that stream (stay with me here) from your device directly to a screen or projector connected to an Apple TV. Other iOS video apps haven’t been so quick to embrace the new functionality. As Janko noted after Apple’s press event last week: [I]f you’re looking to get additional TV content on your television via AirPlay, you’ll be disappointed. Hulu’s iPad app won’t support AirPlay for the time being, and Comcast and HBO also are on the fence. Netflix, which is usually keen on supporting as many platforms as possible, isn’t interested in AirPlay — and don’t hold your breath for AirPlay becoming part of the ABC app. That list isn’t likely to get any shorter as the launch proceeds. For many of these subscription streaming apps, the question of whether or not to support AirPlay becomes a thorny legal one that involves licensing and specific platform rights. In many cases, Read More

Apples iOS-Update in Version 4.3 steht bereits vor der Haustür. Am Freitag ist es soweit. Die Entwickler spielen schon seit der vergangenen Woche mit der voraussichtlich finalen Fassung (8F190). Diese Version ermöglicht unter anderem die drahtlose Video-Übertragung von App-Store-Programmen an einen Apple TV, der an einem Projektor, Monitor oder Fernseher hängt. Am heutigen Tag erhält die populäre Streaming-App ‘‘ (2.39 €; universal; App Store-Link) eine Aktualisierung, die dem anstehenden Firmware-Update Rechnung trägt. Version 2.4.5 spielt mit iOS 4.3 und der Server-Anwendung 2.4.5-beta5 zusammen. Damit wird es möglich von einem iPhone oder iPad unter iOS 4.3 die Air-Video-Filmdateien an einen Apple TV (ebenfalls unter iOS 4.3) zu übergeben. Zur Einführung von ‘AirPlay’ war die Beschränkung auf Musik und Fotos als ‘verkrüppelt’ bezeichnet worden. Eine angebliche Steve Jobs E-Mail verwies auf eine Funktionserweiterung für 2011 (““). Trotz der Ankündigung über eine Drittanbieter-Unterstützung konnte man sich lange Zeit nicht sicher sein, dass alle Apps von der drahtlosen Weitergabe Gebrauch machen dürfen. Das jetzt durchgeschleuste Air-Video-Update verspricht daher eine umso größere Freude für Freitag. Ein Apple TV ist für zirka 113 € (Affiliate-Link) zu erwerben. Mit einer schnellen Anbindung ist es damit möglich, eine dieser Set-Top-Boxen bei den Eltern zu platzieren und bei einer eigenen Stippvisite über das iPhone die Videodateien vom persönlichen Heimserver an den Familien-Flachbildfernseher zu werfen. Trickreich, und trotzdem ohne Tricks! (Danke, Filid!) Read More