Version 4.0 of Daily Steps is here, and it’s quite the update.
WHAT’S NEW
- iMessage app. Share your step count with friends in a fun, customisable way.
- Apple Watch complications. See your step count at a glance - anytime, anywhere, from any watch face.
- Support for background app refresh in new versions of watchOS 3. Daily Steps will periodically update in the background resulting in faster load times and quicker access to your step count.
At their Special Event last week, Apple introduced a whole new caterogy of wearable device and yet no one is talking it. This is the start of a major shift in how we think about consumer technology, and what our devices can do for us.
Tomorrow, Apple are holding a ‘Special Event’ at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for what is widely believed to be the unveiling of the iPhone 7, and Apple Watch 2 with new bands. It is, of course, also the event where we’ll hear more about the release of iOS 10, tvOS 10, watchOS 3, and macOS Sierra.
Honestly, I’m still undecided on whether to upgrade from my iPhone 6. The iPhone 7 isn’t shaping up to be very exciting, and really the only thing it’s missing is 3D Touch - which is exciting but not a justification to buy a whole new phone. Quite frankly, I just want a new MacBook Pro but there are strong reports which say the Mac won’t be mentioned tomorrow, and we’ll likely have to wait until the end of October. Apple are making it incredibly difficult for me to give them money, but whatever. The non-Retina screen I’m looking at as I type this is burning my eyes, but that’s cool Apple. You take your time. I’ll wait. Others have speculated as to how and when they’re going to be announced. I’d love for them to be announced tomorrow, and a release date set (even if it’s for much later in the year). At least then we’d know what we’re getting, and when.
The real topic of controversy this year is the rumoured (but almost certain) removal of the headphone jack from this next-generation iPhone. The best explanation I’ve heard floating around - and the one I agree with most - is that it’s happening this year to get the fuss out of the way. Any significant change Apple make to a product, especially the iPhone, will undoubtedly get a lot of media attention. By making it the focus of the 2016 iPhone, Apple are able to offer a significantly redesigned iPhone in 2017 with the hope of no negative press coverage. It’s a smart way to get all of the complaints out of the way early, on an iPhone that won’t prove significant in the history of the product. News moves fast, and no one will care about the removal of the headphone jack by the end of this year. Perhaps even by the end of this month.
So how will you listen to audio on your iPhone 7? I’m going to assume for the sake of this post that the iPhone 7 will come with earphones that plug into the Lightning port of the iPhone (the port you currently use for charging), and that Apple will heavily push the sale of wireless (most likely Bluetooth) earphones. There will also be some kind of adapter that you can plug into the Lightning port to use existing earphones with a 3.5mm headphone plug if you so desire. Whether or not this comes in the box remains to be seen.
I’ve stayed relatively mute on this topic ever since the rumours became loud earlier this year, simply because I don’t care. I’m neither for nor against its removal. It sincerely doesn’t bother me. If the headphone jack stays, cool. If it doesn’t, also cool. I’ll live, and so will you. It’s not what you’d believe if you read Twitter, or were closely in tune with the tech media, but I honestly don’t care, and don’t think many others outside of these circles do either. The frequency and reliability of reports saying it’ll be removed make it pretty obvious this was a controlled leak by Apple, to ease us into the idea over the last six months, without springing it on us tomorrow. Considering the fuss in the media thus far, I was surprised the first my mum heard of the removal was this past weekend. It surprised her, but only took a 20 second explanation and she understood why it’s probably going to be removed and was fine with it.
As little as I care, it’s important to think about the implications for the community as a whole. After all, the iPhone is a device used by upward of 40% of people in developed countries, and is the single best selling phone. As someone who catches public transport frequently, I’m always looking around to see how people are using their tech, and I’d say 80% of people fit into one of two categories - they either use the earphones that are included in the box with their smartphone, or they’re using Bluetooth earphones. Common brands of Bluetooth headphones include Bose, Sony, and Jaybird. The removal of the headphone jack won’t have an impact upon these people at all. They’ll buy the iPhone 7, and either pull out the earphones in the box and start using them, or they’ll pair their existing Bluetooth headphones and be done with it. This doesn’t leave a great number of people impacted by the change. As for everyone else? Well, I’m sure they’ll either be able to buy an adaptor for a few bucks, buy a new pair of Lightning earphones (which will undoubtedly soar in popularity after this month), or take the plunge and buy some Bluetooth earphones. Similar to the transition between the 30-pin dock connector and Lightning, we’ll all have forgotten the 3.5mm headphone port was a thing before long.
The removal of the headphone jack will anger many, but it’s important to remember this change is inevitable. Any change to the iPhone will make people angry, but all in all this change isn’t as significant as you’ve been made to believe. Remember, most people don’t care. They’re going to buy the iPhone 7, use the lightning earphones that come with it, and get on with their life.
CGP Grey on the benefits of self-driving cars, and more specifically how they’ll change traffic as we know it. My favourite part analyses why road intersections are so inefficient at present with human drivers, and how this will all change once fully autonomous cars are on the road.
Today, I’m excited to announce two new gateways – the Telstra Gateway Max 2 and Telstra Gateway Frontier
Exciting stuff from Telstra today. I don’t praise them often but credit where credit’s due!
And early 2017 we’ll launch Australia’s first ISP-supported hybrid gateway, the Telstra Gateway Frontier, which brings together Telstra’s mobile and fixed networks in one device to connect you quickly and keep you connected, even if your fixed line is unavailable.
So, if you’re moving house, this means you can use the gateway to connect to the internet using our mobile network while you wait for your fixed line service to be activated.
Drawing attention to the above two paragraphs, this is an interesting idea and one that I applaud Telstra for having. Now of course, the devil is in the detail and it comes down to how they choose to utilise this hybrid feature, and also how they choose to charge for it. However, it opens the door to solutions when Cable/NBN is down. I routinely read Tweets from people asking to be reimbursed for their 4G tethering/hotspot usage while their home Internet is down, or suggestions to allow for unlimited 4G usage during an outage. With this hybrid router, that is something which Telstra can be implemented seamlessly.
Planned outage? No worries, give the customer unlimited 4G through their router for that time. They wouldn’t notice the difference for the most part - their home Wi-Fi would run as it always does.
we have partnered with Australian consultancy Design + Industry to develop these gateways so you can proudly display them in your home
Ah, a router that looks half decent that you won’t want to hide! It kind of looks like a fan, but whatever, it’s decent. 👍🏻
There are plenty of articles floating around the web this evening that try to explain the state of Apple Pay in Australia in light of the recent media attention the issue has received, but I’m linking to this one by Graham Spencer because, as an Australian, he is one of the more qualified people to talk about it.
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The fact of the matter is that Australia’s contactless payment infrastructure was leaps and bounds ahead of the rest of the world, and in particular the United States, not long ago. We’ve remained in the lead, on par with Canada, but I fear that lead will be short lived. Since the introduction of Apple Pay in the U.S.A., their contactless payment infrastructure has surged ahead and with the help of offerings such as Square, will probably rival if not exceed that of Australia shortly.
The reason the banks down under aren’t as keen on mobile payment as most feel they should be (with the lone exception of ANZ) is that they spent years getting ahead with their own proprietary technology. This rollout took time and money and they don’t like the thought of Apple and others waltzing in and taking advantage of this infrastructure. This is a poor excuse, and one that if the banks hold on to for too long could result in Australia falling back from our “world leader” status in contactless payment technology. Surely the competitive advantage derived from fantastic contactless infrastructure is nearly at an end, and opening up the infrastructure is the next step forward?
Customers want mobile payment solutions, it’s that simple. It has worked in the States, and hasn’t created competition problems. In fact, Apple Pay has spurred innovation and investment in infrastructure. Who’s really interested in the $2.99 “tap and pay” sticker offered by the Commonwealth Bank? It’s ugly and clunky. Apple/Android Pay make for a far better user experience. Ultimately shouldn’t the banks be striving to deliver this?
If Australian banks had their way they’d have infinitely more control over payment systems than Apple request with Apple Pay. It’s not Apple we should be worried about. As Graham says in his article, Apple aren’t foreign to negotiating Apple Pay deals either. The “fear” the banks are pretending to have of Apple, Google, and Samsung isn’t warranted.
Quite frankly I’m disappointed in the reluctance of my bank to support Apple Pay, and even more disappointed in the excuses they’ve come up with. Two years since launch, it’s about time all of the major Australian banks jump on the Apple Pay bandwagon.
Today, I ship a small app project I’ve been working on. It’s nothing flashy, nothing too exciting, but it’s mine. It’s called GST calculator, works on iPhone and Apple Watch, and does exactly as the name suggests. Boring, right? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It does what it’s supposed to, does it well, and looks good while doing it. When I first discovered my own need for an app like this, there were some with similar functionality that hadn’t been updated in years, or didn’t support the iPhone 6 screen etc. so that’s how this project was born. It’s been sitting on the shelf for a few months now, but having finished exams last week and having a bit more time I decided to polish it off and ship it, in order to free myself up for the iOS 10/watchOS 3 updates I’ll be making to Daily Steps over the next few months. (And possibly a new iOS 10 messages app - if I am fortunate enough to have a good idea.)
The prominence of charging stations at airports is unquestionably a result of failure on the part of device manufacturers.
As I walk through the airport preparing for the flight back home to Sydney, I can’t help but notice the abundance of AC and USB power stations, which everyone is huddled around in anticipation of the power their devices are about to receive.
This shouldn’t be the case. “All day battery” isn’t good enough, because it doesn’t mean what the name implies. “All day battery” is really “all day battery with severe limitations.” In order to achieve it, a device must be used exactly as the manufacturer intends for only a certain number of hours arbitrarily chosen by the manufacturer to mean “all day battery.”
It isn’t a hassle to charge a device once a day. I agree with that, but manufacturers need to be striving for unconditional “all day battery,” including edge-cases.
All day battery will only be a reality when device batteries can last as long as humans can last without sleep. A device shouldn’t die before its user- even if its user wakes up, boards a 24 hour aeroplane flight to Europe, and is editing video the entire ride.
This will mean that with normal usage, “all day battery” may in fact get the average user through a full 40-hour working week, but the beauty lies in knowing that they have all day battery available to them should they need it.
Sure, this is ambitious and we’re probably a while off this kind of reality, but it’s something that needs to happen before “all day battery” really means something that’s as good as it sounds.
As I write this, WWDC16 has officially come to an end. It’s been one crazy ride, and one that I will never forget. Thanks to everyone who made it so great, from the staff at Apple, to the fellow attendees and scholars. Everyone I’ve met this week has been approachable and great to talk to. The advantage of being in a building with thousands of other geeks with a common interest is that there’s always something to talk about, and fortunately others seemed to agree. I’ve met so many unique and friendly individuals this week, and they helped make this week as incredible as it was.
Today was the sixth day of socialising with fellow scholars, and yet I still met so many that I hadn’t seen up until this point. Continuing with the trend of being as social as possible, I enjoyed an afternoon coffee with a designer at Apple as well as an iOS developer at Twitter - both of whom used to live in Australia and have since moved over to California with their families. It was rather interesting to hear their stories and experiences.
I have to say, the coolest part of the day was meeting and chatting with CGP Grey in person. I’d seen some Tweets during the week about him hanging around the conference, but due to his mysterious nature didn’t expect to run into him. I won’t say much, apart from his voice is as cool in real life as in his videos and podcasts, and most importantly he’s a SUPER awesome dude. Grey couldn’t have been more friendly and was happy to hold a conversation, which I appreciated.
It was sad this afternoon to have to say goodbye to all the great people I’ve spent the week interacting with, but with social media technology (thanks, developers!) it’s easier than ever to keep in touch. It’s been an exciting, action-packed week and I am looking forward to attending WWDC again sometime in the future - at which time I’ll hopefully be able to meet everyone again.
Fun fact of the day: CGP Grey is, in fact, not a robot.
Tomorrow’s agenda: Hopefully sleep in, before packing, taking one last walk around San Francisco, then heading to the airport for a 17-hour journey back to Sydney.
Fourth day of the conference today and things continued as per usual during the day. I’m spending these last couple of days trying to talk to/meet as many people as possible and that began this morning going down the elevator on my way to the conference. The man in there was also on his way, and we spoke the whole 10 or so minute walk to Moscone West.
In between sessions today, I hung out in the scholars lounge as much as possible talking those those I hadn’t yet met. Even ended up meeting another fellow Aussie and a Kiwi scholar who were great to talk to. Adding to the list, I met up with the creator of the incredibly popular “Heart Watch” app, who is also Australian. We had a good chat about his app and lots of other things. From there, I found myself talking to even more Aussies. This time in a group, and most of them were from Melbourne. It was a bonus to make a contact with the person in charge of Developer Relations in Australia.
The most exciting part of the day was the annual WWDC Bash. Held at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium this year, thousands of developers filled the hall waiting to watch Good Charlotte perform. Now, Good Charlotte are one of my favourite bands so I was very excited however I didn’t expect many others to be. Securing front row seats (or front-row standing room, I should say) was a huge bonus, and resulted in awesome photographs and a few great videos. It was fun to be so close to watch such a great band play live - a definite highlight of the trip so far! Now what I didn’t expect was how crazy the rest of the crowd were. Granted, most of the developers in the room stood around passively watching the show but there were some going a little crazy up near the front. Both Joel and Benji from the band made plenty of cheesy developer-target jokes that were very entertaining and got the crowd warmed up. My favourite would have to be Benji’s one-liner: “The guys at the Genius Bar are just wannabes compared to you.”
Fun fact of the day: It’s crazy, but the hardest I’ve ever “moshed” is now officially with a bunch of developers. Totally unexpected, right?
Tomorrow’s agenda: It’s the last day of WWDC. Haven’t quite planned the sessions and labs I’ll be going to yet, but I aim to spend a full day at Moscone West (from 9am-6pm), making the most of every second.
