Archive for the ‘Mac’ Category

Apple releases iPhone OS 4 beta 4

Thursday, May 20th, 2010

 

The latest beta version of the iPhone OS 4 has just been released. Like the rest of the world, we are also eagerly waiting to know what’s new this time…

From when the iPhone OS 4 was released on April 8th 2010, Apple has kept to their two week cycle by releasing 4 beta versions to the OS till date. The iPhone OS 4 came with over a 100 new and exciting user features and the developers were offered more than 1500 new API’s. Read more about OS 4 beta 1 release here.

The new additions to the already awesome iPhone features were revealed by Gizmodo yesterday following the release of the beta. Some of the features include a customizable user dictionary which allows users to add new words to the iPhone dictionary. In the earlier versions it used to pick up corrections made by the user and stored it automatically. Now the users can bypass this functionality and have their own custom user dictionary for convenience.

                iPhone OS 4 beta 4

There have also been changes to the display with the home screen being different and the inclusion of new wallpapers. It also lets you view the photo rolls in landscape, by letting you choose the orientation. The SDK also hints that the future versions of iPad and iPhone may come out with an LED camera flash.

Another exciting feature is that Apple has provided its users with a tethering option teaming up with AT & T, which will allow them to share the iPhone’s internet connection with a computer using a USB or Bluetooth.

As with all beta releases this one is also sealed and available only for the developers. But chances are that Apple may make the final version available soon. Till then, keep waiting for what Apple has in store for its users.
 
iPhone Team

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    Mac update – iPhone OS 4.0 beta 1 released

    Monday, April 12th, 2010

     

     

     iPhone OS 4.0 Beta 1 – A Quick Look

    Just a week after the release of iPad, Apple has still not decided to take a break as a news-maker. New version of the iPhone operating system – iPhone OS 4.0 beta 1 , announced  on April 8 2010, will have 100 new features plus a seven tentpole features for its customers. The OS is compatible with the previous versions iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch 3rd Gen. But iPhone 3G and iPod Touch 2nd Gen will not be able to access some of the features such as multitasking. iPhone application developers have more to work on and deliver.

    Few highlights of the tentpole features are as follows:

    • Multitasking – Though this is not a new application, battery life and performance factors make it stand ahead of the previous techniques. Apple provides seven multitasking APIs to the developers such as VOIP, Background location, audio etc. Fast application switching can keep apps in standby and resume anytime. App developers have a challenge or advantage with this.
    • Enhanced mail service – All mail in one inbox , open attachment provision and fast inbox switching facilities are  too good to ignore.
    • ibooks – eBook reader application with sync page and bookmark feature to bring in a new experience
    • Game Centers – Social gaming network along with 50,000 gaming applications. Thus Apple has its Xbox live.
    • iAd – Developer can embed advertisements within their applications which shall be dynamically and wirelessly delivered to the device. Again, 60 percent of the revenue will be for the developers.
    • Enterprise additions – Better data protection, mobile device management, new VPN options, Exchange servers etc are a few of the features.
    • Folder - This feature is the seventh tentpole

    For the iPhone app developers there are over 1500 new APIs. Some of them are:

    •  Address data detectors
    •  Automated testing
    • Block based animation
    • Clendar access 
    • Call event notification 
    • Draggable map annotations
    • Embed PDF meta data
    • Full access to still and video camera data
    • Full map overlays
    • In-app SMS
    • iPod remote control accessories
    • Photo library access
    • Quick look
    • Performance profiling tools
    • Power analysis tools
    • Spell check

     We at Software Associaes have been building iphone applications for quite some time now and are quite excited for the new release!

    By iPhone Team ,Software Associates

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      Posted in Mac | 1 Comment »

      Downloads using Mac browser

      Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009

      Have you ever faced problem in downloading a ZIP format file using MAC browser? Well we certainly have, let me elaborate the problems with ZIP archives.

      There are many libraries available in PHP for manipulating the ZIP format archives. Zip archives created using these libraries works fine under Windows and Unix browsers but has serious problems on the Mac browser.

      PclZip       is a PHP class that can extract or create ZIP format archives. This class supports relative paths/no paths, comments and recursion through subdirectories.

      To solve this hitch in Mac browsers , redirect to the ZIP archive after creating the archive using PclZip library instead of sending the file to the browser for download.

      Apin Pratap, Software Associates

        Posted in Mac | No Comments »

        Browser statistics over the year

        Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

        The stats from w3schools for Jan 2009 throws some interesting facts on browser usage.

        Good news is that Mac market share is improving – the king of usability and innovation Linux has been steady as always (What Novell used to be and what Microsoft wants to be)
         

        2009 WinXP W2000   Vista W2003 Linux Mac
        January 69.8% 1.6%   16.5% 1.6% 3.9% 5.8%
                       
        2008 WinXP W2000 Win98 Vista W2003 Linux Mac
        December 71.4% 1.7% 0.1% 15.6% 1.7% 3.8% 5.3%
        November 72.0% 1.8% 0.1% 15.1% 1.6% 3.8% 5.3%
        October 72.2% 1.9% 0.2% 14.4% 1.7% 3.8% 5.5%
        September 73.3% 2.2% 0.2% 13.2% 1.8% 3.8% 5.2%
        August 73.9% 2.4% 0.2% 12.5% 1.9% 3.9% 4.9%
        July 74.7% 2.6% 0.2% 11.5% 2.0% 3.9% 4.8%
        June 74.6% 2.6% 0.2% 10.0% 1.9% 3.7% 4.8%
        May 74.0% 2.9% 0.3% 9.3% 1.8% 3.6% 4.7%
        April 73.3% 3.3% 0.5% 8.8% 1.9% 3.7% 4.6%
        March 72.7% 3.7% 0.6% 8.5% 1.9% 3.9% 4.4%
        February 72.4% 4.0% 0.8% 7.8% 1.8% 3.8% 4.3%
        January 73.6% 4.0% 0.8% 7.3% 1.9% 3.6% 4.4%

        Safari and Opera have a loyal band of followers.
        There is quite a lot of users still on IE 6 – Slow move to Vista could be the reason.
        Firefox dominates the market – Mix of 2.x and 3.x
        Chrome is catching up – Gears would help improve on that score. Disappearing links and download hassles need to be fixed.

        There is always the need to build browser compatible websites

        2009 IE7 IE6 IE8 Fx Chrome S O
        January 25.7% 18.5% 0.6% 45.4% 3.8% 2.9% 2.3%
                       
        2008 IE7 IE6 IE5 Fx Chrome S O
        December 26.1% 19.6%   44.4% 3.6% 2.7% 2.4%
        November 26.6% 20.0%   44.2% 3.1% 2.7% 2.3%
        October 26.9% 20.2%   44.0% 3.0% 2.8% 2.2%
        September 26.3% 22.3%   42.6% 3.1% 2.7% 2.0%
        August 26.0% 24.5%   43.7%   2.6% 2.1%
        July 26.4% 25.3%   42.6%   2.5% 1.9%
        June 27.0% 26.5% 0.5% 41.0%   2.6% 1.7%
        May 26.5% 27.3% 0.7% 39.8%   2.4% 1.5%
        April 24.9% 28.9% 1.0% 39.1%   2.2% 1.4%
        March 23.3% 29.5% 1.1% 37.0%   2.1% 1.4%
        February 22.7% 30.7% 1.3% 36.5%   2.0% 1.4%
        January 21.2% 32.0% 1.5% 36.4%   1.9% 1.4%

          Posted in Browsers, Mac, browser compliance | No Comments »

          Mac and IE7

          Wednesday, December 19th, 2007

          There has been cross talk about Microsoft releasing IE 7 for Mac.

          IE 5.2 for Mac is every web developers nightmare when it comes to browser compliance and web standards. Microsoft itself recommends Apple Safari

            Posted in IE, Mac, Web standards, browser compliance | No Comments »

            Leopard is here

            Saturday, October 27th, 2007

            Being an ardent Mac fan since the early 90's, our office Mac which is being shared my many users gets it due respect and care. There is quite nothing like it when it comes to usability. Many of us use safari on our XP desktop for the same user experience.

            Leopard is here

              Posted in Mac, Safari | No Comments »

              Safari for XP

              Wednesday, September 19th, 2007

              We have a group of techies out here who loves the MacOS platform – an icon of usability. The public beta Safari browser is now available for Windows XP The rendering is excellent and does not pose much of browser compatibility problems for IE websites.

                Posted in Browsers, Mac, Safari | No Comments »