IPhone news and information

Archive for November, 2011

Siri hasn't been caught cooking dinner yet, but hackers worldwide have boldly taken Apple's personal assistant to a whole new level by incorporating its functionality with a plethora of different devices. We've seen Siri use custom commands, change the temperature in your house, and even allow select car owners to utilize their automobile's Bluetooth integration. Nifty, no doubt, but this assistant's evolution towards greater heights isn't over yet. Vimeo user toddtreece has whipped up a slick demo of the iPhone 4S' right hand gal (or guy) taking command of his television set. From changing channels to turning off devices, with the help of a proxy and a few parts, you can get your own home setup running on voice activation. Feeling a bit guilty for your sudden interest in slothfulness? Fret not -- Siri's apparently quite good at calling you out. Have a look just after the break.

[Thanks, Jesse]

Continue reading Too lazy to grab your TV remote? Use Siri instead

Too lazy to grab your TV remote? Use Siri instead originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 21:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

When eHarmony first brought its iPad app to us a couple of months ago, I had the great idea (I thought) to put together a feature for TUAW around the idea of only the iPad app to access the very popular Internet dating service, find a date, and then review both the app and the date itself. So eHarmony kindly provided me with a couple months of membership, and I set to work using the iPad app to craft my profile, find some nice women to date in Los Angeles, and eventually go out with one of them.

Unfortunately for eHarmony, my lack of appeal outlasted their service, and despite chatting with a few nice women, none of them wanted to meet me over dinner or drinks. But I can't fault the iPad app itself. The whole experience is really impressive, featuring an interface that I actually enjoyed using more than the official web site. If you're a real loser like me, eHarmony still won't guarantee you a girlfriend or boyfriend. But if you're already using the service and have an iPad, the app is definitely worth a look.

The whole process is surprisingly quick and clean on the iPad -- the app's interface is modeled around a big circular table of sorts, with the view zooming and rotating around to look at various physical items portrayed on the screen. Your sign-in page is a notebook, for example, where you can write your name and password, and then the view zooms to another book where you can enter your information and fill out your profile with the usual dating site information (likes, dislikes, personal information and questionnaires). After it's filled out, you can browse around the rest of the site, checking out a "Book of You" that has information about your personality and who you're compatible with, and your "matches" which are laid out like a series of Polaroid photos on the wooden desktop. The physical metaphor is really effective, and the iPad is an excellent medium for browsing through photos and information.

The app works smoothly (though my iPad is only WiFi, so I'm not sure how it loads over 3G), and there are lots of really fun touches, which surprised me a bit. When you first log in, there's a coffee cup on top of the screen, and you can actually play with it, causing ripples and splashes on the surface of the java. When you touch a match's picture, you don't just get transferred to their profile, their picture actually zooms over to another section of the table and then gets inserted into their profile page. This is all with sound effects, too. The app shows a surprising amount of design thought and consideration. I'd guess that's because eHarmony probably hired an experienced Mac and iOS development house to make it, but I don't know who that is (and the companies in those kinds of work-for-hire agreements don't usually talk about that anyway).

At any rate, the eHarmony app is terrific, and I actually did come to prefer it to using the main web page, mostly because the web itself doesn't offer up pictures of matches before you actually go and see their profiles. There were a few settings that I had to go in and change that I couldn't on the iPad version (specifically where my matches were supposed to come from. Being in Los Angeles, I obviously wanted to meet someone who lived close to me), but when actually browsing the service and reading and responding to messages, I found being on the iPad was the ideal.

The app is free, but to use it, you'll need an eHarmony membership, which comes with a few different prices. You'll have to decide for yourself whether or not that's something you're interested in. Some folks have found a lot of good relationships with apps like this, while some have a better time just going to a bar. As for me, my search continues. Ladies, if any of you are looking for a smart and funny professional blogger who knows a lot about iPhone games and enjoys running around Santa Monica, I'll be here!

Daily iPad App: eHarmony originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 20:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

There are a lot of solutions to getting your hands on files, video and audio remotely. You can do it on your own configuring firewalls. Apple had iDisk, but that is slowly fading and it's going to be dead next year unless Apple changes its mind. Of the many methods I've seen, Dane-Elec has come up with a product that is both easy and secure. It's called the my-Ditto system. It consists of an external hard drive you attach to your Mac or PC via ethernet. Essentially it's a NAS, or network attached storage. Once it's up and running, you can access your files from any remote computer via a secure USB key. Pop it into any other computer anywhere, enter a password, and the files you have sitting at home are available. Even better, you can see your files from an iOS device running a special my-Ditto app.

The my-Ditto hardware offers systems up to 4 terabytes of storage, and there are starter systems of 500 gigabytes, or empty drive casings that let you populate it on your own. The systems also support RAID for data redundancy.

I was sent a 500 GB system to try. Setup was pretty easy. Plug the my-Ditto into your router, run the software from the USB key, and register. The USB keys need to be matched to your device with a serialization scheme, and if you need more you can buy them from Dane-Elec or just use a flash drive you buy anywhere and go through the steps to match it securely to your system.

You can then copy data to the drive, and set up public and private partitions. The system supports secure AES 256-Bit encrypted login. The software also can be set to back up a Mac, PC or Linux box. The server also allows a USB drive to be plugged in, and those files can also be securely accessed.

How did it all work? Quite well. I had one glitch setting my account up. I never received the email that would enable me to fire up the system. That turned out to be a known issue, and it has been fixed. I tried remotely accessing my files from both a Mac and PC laptop. You must have your USB key with you to do this, but it worked fine. The key has both a Mac and PC app on it and that's what you run to access your files.

When you run the app remotely you will see 2 windows. Your remote computer and your local one. Files can be dragged and dropped between the 2, or there is a handy search dialogue box that makes finding files easy. If you have media on the my-Ditto, it can be streamed if you have the requisite bandwidth. Photos can be viewed as thumbnails, which makes browsing them easy.

Multiple users you authorize can access the files simultaneously, which makes it great for group projects. Up to 30 USB keys can be registered to a my-Ditto server.

The iOS app doesn't use a hardware key, but you still get access to your files. You need a password, and all the data is encrypted. If your phone was lost, you simply disable the account and the phone would no longer have access.

In practice, the my-Ditto system is very easy to set up, works as expected, and gives you an easy way to pull files from anywhere. The USB keys can be put on a keychain. If it is lost, there is no way for a person to get your files just by having the USB key. If you forget your password you can re-authenticate your key with the my-Ditto server.

The system I tested sells for US $149.99 and consists of a 500 GB 2-bay enclosure. The second bay is empty if you want more storage. At the top of the line the company offers a 4 TB 2 driver server for $369.00. The iOS apps are free for the downloading and are universal for iPhone and the iPad. These apps also let you transfer iOS accessible files from your iPhone or iPad to your remote server. The app works on 3G or WiFi. There are also versions for Android phones.

The my-Ditto solution is very slick and very easy to use. If you have large amounts of data you want to access from anywhere, I can't think of a competing solution that is as secure and quick to set up. The my-Ditto servers are available direct from Dane-Elec and some retailers.

Gallery: my-Ditto remote server for Mac and iOS

my-Ditto let's you access your data from literally anywhere including your iOS devices originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

We've heard some really good music come out of an iPad before, but to me it's all basically sounded like yeah, it came from a tablet. This remix of Jason Derulo's "It Girl," however, which you can watch below, sounds like the real thing to me. Yes, there's a lot of R&B sampling in there, and some of the sythesizers do sound like, well, synths, but on the whole it sounds really amazing. Professional music, made completely with an iPad!

Plus, the video, by a group called East Midwest Music, is probably the most well-produced iPad music video ever, clearly documenting not only which apps were used for which instruments, but also how they were recorded and put together. Trust me, as a blogger who often has to go hunting around for screenshots to label apps in music videos, I really appreciate that. Definitely give this one a watch below.

[via TechCrunch]

The iPad rocks this 'It Girl' remix originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Amidio is known for their mobile music creation apps for iOS devices. They've brought us fully featured apps like the recent Songineer, Seline HD and Touch DJ. But the focus of their newest app, Laugh Synth, is a little more, well... light-hearted.

Laugh Synth does what it says on the tin, it synthesizes laughs. As detailed on Amidio's YouTube page, Laugh Synth "...takes a sample of a laugh as an input, then divides it into phases and intelligently loops the most notable part, enriching it with the pitch modifications, subtle vowel alterations and crazy effects." I couldn't have said it better myself!

With 25 built-in laugh samples (some of them quite ominous), including Dracula and T-Rex, simply drag your finger around the input panel to mold, manipulate and morph the laugh samples. Take it even further with delay, chorus, bitcrush and reverb effects. And when you eventually stop laughing from all of that, sample some of your own laughs and share them with your friends on Twitter and Facebook.

Honestly, Laugh Synth will either have you chuckling away or (more likely) crying in desperation. But don't take my word for it, check out the video below and get the app for a laughable $US0.99 from the iOS App Store.

Amidio's Laugh Synth makes you cry -- with laughter? originally appeared on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Korean scientists reckon that the capacitive touchscreens on our phones and tablets could help diagnose diseases from what's floating around in your mouth. It works through the screen's ability to detect minute capacitive differences in disease-carrying liquids placed on its surface. Experiments by Hyun Gyu Park and Byoung Yeon Won at the Korea Advanced Institute for Science and Technology in Daejeon managed to detect chlamydia microbes in three different concentrations. Once again, the iPhone acted as medical chief, although the setup isn't yet able to distinguish between different bugs. There are also teething troubles with the touchscreen, as capacitive read-outs can be affected by moisture and sweat that are on the screen alongside your 'sample.' One solution to this would be to create a disposable film that attaches to the iPhone surface. There's a second reason for this, as Park diplomatically puts it: "Nobody wants direct application of bio-samples onto their phone." Let's hope Siri doesn't take it personally.

[Sneezing photo via Shutterstock]

Get diagnosed by spitting on an iPhone, social graces terminal originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 30 Nov 2011 19:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.