Apple's iPhone always manages to sell in high numbers when the holiday season approaches, and history has repeated itself once again this year. Thanks to strong sales of the brand new iPhone 5, iOS has peaked at the top of the smartphone market share in the United States, according to data collated by research outfit Kantar Worldpanel Comtech.
It was somewhat funny when I came across Tap-Translate. You see, in my professional life, my industry is actually Translations & Localization, and coming from that, I know how important it is to be able to read a foreign language write-up with the right deliverance of meaning to reach the right conclusion. This is even more important in certain industries and professions, like the financial services sector, but anyone using the internet can come across any such case where you might find some information useful to you in a language that you don’t understand, but would still want to read it. Thankfully, with browsers like Google Chrome, you can get a whole page automatically translated – complete with automatic source language detection – but what if you don’t have access to such a desktop browser? What if, like me, you, too, are a fan of browsing the web on your iPad?
Black Friday's name stems from the opportunity businesses have to turn a profit, or remain in the black, by making huge sales to customers enticed by the savings on offer. That's all very well for the companies, but on a personal level, it's important we too keep our heads above water, and as we collectively drag ourselves from the financial meltdown of a few years ago, we should take all the help we can get in maintaining financial stability. To mark Black Friday Weekend, we've had a little hunt through some of the best money apps available for iOS, and for all-round performance and ease-of-use, Budget with Back in Black has emerged as one of our favorites.
We're becoming increasingly reliant on our mobile devices to run many of our daily errands; so much so, in fact, that it can often be difficult to keep track of everything we've done. There are plenty of event-tracking apps available right now over at the App Store, but none do them quite like Last Time, a handy utility app for the iPhone.
The iOS App Store is home to pretty much every genre of apps a user can think of, but if mashing up different types of music is your thing and creating new tracks from old, then the iMashup universal app could be worth serious consideration. Music lovers of all levels can use the app to experiment with music stored directly on their iOS devices to create unique and interesting mashups that should only take minutes to create. With powerful features that are almost bordering on professional lines, iMashup should provide entertainment for any sort of music lover.
Cydia is definitely no stranger to tweaks and enhancements that are created with the intention of improving the rather lackluster multitasking experience which Apple has provided with iOS. Developers have gone about handling and displaying background apps in their own unique way, some of which were extremely good and some just downright terrible. The new jLauncher tweak is yet another personal implementation of multitasking, but one that makes use of the full-screen interface and is sure to delight many jailbroken iOS users.
Considering Apple is such a huge company and one of the largest players in the mobile and consumer technology industry, it shouldn't come as any huge surprise that there is always a lot of speculation flying around about the company and their potential product launches at any given time. Whenever a new iPhone or iPad is released, it is inevitable that the rumor mill will kick into gear for the next major announcement, but there are a few points of speculation coming from Apple analyst Gene Munster that could prove to have some merit and could potentially be worth paying attention to.
The dismissal of iOS SVP Scott Forstall at Apple, which has led to Jony Ive taking the helm in the future direction of the company's mobile software, has brought a whole new impetus on the prospect of iOS 7. With Ive said not to be a fan of the skeuomorphic designs throughout iOS, they'll likely go the way of the dodo, but it's not just the faux leather and paper expected to be updated when the next generation of iOS software eventually arrives next year.
It features an all new design, has a 4-inch gorgeous Retina display, the new powerful Apple A6 processor, is billed as being the best thing to happen to the iPhone since the iPhone, and now thanks to AT&T in the United States, the eight week old iPhone 5 is available for consumers to obtain through as a refurbished device with a severely reduced price-tag. Because the sixth-generation iPhone is relatively new into the world we haven't yet seen Apple offering any refurbished models of the device through their usual channels so it's great news for consumers that AT&T are stepping up with this offer.
Although Cydia plays home to a large number of powerful, in-depth and awfully creative system based packages, the fact still remains that a lot of iOS device owners choose to go through the process of jailbreaking purely for the ability to modify and customize their iPhone, iPad or iPod touch to suit their own tastes and styles. Theming the device is extremely popular through WinterBoard activated interface assets, but it is also highly likely that the new Go Desk desktop rendering package will convince many users to also add some live home screen animations to their devices.
