IBM launches new cloud collaboration to power application development
Businesses are constantly seeking to improve the digital experience that they offer their customers, delivering something that's engaging and personalized. Add in demand for mobile access from every device, integrated social capabilities, and the need to analyze data from the internet-of-things to quickly make decisions and companies are looking for faster ways to create improved customer experiences.
Today IBM and Portico Consultancy are unveiling new cloud services to help businesses of any size quickly build, test and deploy applications to deliver on their requirements.
Opera 30 adds sidebar extensions, improves tab views
Norwegian browser developer Opera Software has released a landmark version of its niche web browser for desktop and mobile. Opera 30 FINAL debuts with three notable new features.
Version 30 makes it easier to view and switch between tabs, adds new sidebar extensions and introduces a new Trash folder to make it possible to restore bookmarks.
Google's self-driving cars never caused crashes
After US organization Consumer Watchdog made what it claims were "repeated calls for disclosure", Google is now releasing monthly reports on its self-driving cars, which will detail the number of accidents said vehicles have been involved in.
Google’s report for May 2015 said that during the six years the self-driving car project has been running, a total of 12 minor accidents have occurred over the 1.8 million miles driven.
Apple Swift 2.0 will be open source
Apple is a company that embraces closed ideology. Its operating systems only work on certain hardware which it selects and sells. Its App Store features our-way-or-the-highway guidelines. Worst of all, on iOS, the user cannot even choose a default browser or email client. Hell, even when you use a browser other than Safari, it must use WebKit.
Today, however, this archaic ideology may be softening -- slightly. Among the hubbub of all the flashier WWDC announcements, Apple announced something miraculous -- its Swift 2.0 programming language is going open source. Yes, really.
U.S. government embraces HTTPS
When it comes to the web, you expect U.S. Government sites to be very secure. Hell, with all of the money we taxpayers pay, the websites should be the most secure in the world. Unfortunately, this is not the case. You see, not only are many .gov websites not secure, they do not even universally use HTTPS. In other words, there are shopping sites more secure than those of the most powerful nation in the world.
Today, however, this changes. Barack Obama's White House has completed a new standard that all U.S. government websites will be forced to follow. While it is embarrassing that this is only happening in 2015, it is better late than never.
Cortana joins the mile high club -- Microsoft takes your travel plans to new heights
While Windows Phone is not the best mobile operating system, Cortana is the best overall digital assistant. Google Now is very useful, but cold and heartless. Siri is just... a pleasant way to get the weather -- I'm only half-joking here. Microsoft's offering is a mix of personality and usefulness that truly makes life better; I cannot wait until she is available on iOS and Android.
Today, Cortana joins the mile high club. No, she is not doing anything naughty (I hope); she is making air travel a better experience for Windows Phone users. In other words, she is almost like a nagging mom or wife (or dad, husband) that gets you to the airport on time!
Apple to make it much easier for Android users to switch to iOS 9
Part of the reason why smartphone owners stay with their current choice of mobile operating system is they don’t want to have to mess around transferring personal data between devices. If you have an iPhone, upgrading to a newer model is very straightforward, and if you have an Android device, upgrading to a newer or different one is just as easy. Switching operating systems is, however, a real pain.
Apple wants to make it easy to go from Android to iOS and is introducing a new app called 'Move to iOS'.
Apple Music and Beats One radio launch to shake up audio streaming
It was not the industry's best-kept secret -- Sony let the cat out of the bag a little early -- but at WWDC today, Tim Cook officially took the wraps off Apple Music. Set to compete with the likes of Tidal and Spotify, Apple's new streaming music service sits neatly alongside iTunes and has the involvement of Dr Dre, Trent Reznor, and Jimmy Iovine to name but three.
Cook stepped into Steve Jobs' shoes for a moment, introducing the famous "one more thing" that has been missing from more recent Apple events. Not a company to hide its light under a bushel, Apple's Music service is not just a music streaming service, but "the next chapter in music". But there's more than just Apple Music; there's also Beats One, Apple's first ever radio station.
Apple Watch gets much smarter and more useful with watchOS 2
I own an Apple Watch, and I like it, but like so many Watch owners I appreciate that this is a device whose future is coming, but isn’t quite here yet. In my first impressions review I said "What it can do right now is great, but what it will be able to do in the future will be amazing", and it seems as if the future might be coming sooner than I expected.
At the WWDC 2015 keynote Apple revealed watchOS 2, and to say it’s impressive is an understatement. With the upgrade Apple is seriously improving the usefulness of its wearable.
E-sports could become as popular as football
The number of people who watch e-sports is approximately the same as those who watch NHL hockey and its popularity is continuing to grow. The chief executive of gaming and entertainment firm Unikrn Rahul Sood believes that by 2017 it will be as popular as the NFL. Should the popular game, football, be worried about a virtual pretender to its crown?
Since the advent of online gaming and competitive multiplayer competition, e-sports have experienced rapid growth to the extent that major broadcasters are beginning to take note. E-sports are regularly streamed online via services like Twitch, but TV stations in the US, Norway and East Asia have also broadcast events live.
iOS 9 public beta coming in July with split-screen apps and improved battery life
Expectations were high for iOS 9 news at WWDC, and Apple delivered. At the keynote speech at the developer conference we were introduced to the latest version of the operating system that will power iPhones and iPads the world over, with the promise that it has been "refined from the ground up".
What is there to look forward to? Lots. There are updates to Apple Pay, a new News app, updates to Notes, as well as an updated keyboard, split-screen app display, and even a picture-in-picture option. But the news that will get a lot of people excited is that there will be a public beta of iOS released.
App Store hits 100 billion downloads
The App Store is unquestionably one of the main reasons for Apple’s continuing success. It certainly revolutionized the smartphone, and despite a serious challenge from Android it remains the top store for apps across the world.
At WWDC 2015, CEO Tim Cook revealed a couple of major numbers -- the biggest being that over 100 billion apps have been downloaded from the App Store since it opened.
Apple's Newsstand is dead; long live News, baked into iOS 9
Newsstand is set to disappear from the screens of iPhones and iPads all over the world. At today's WWDC keynote speech, Apple announced the Flipboard-inspired News. A customizable news aggregator, News presents users with a selection of content from media partners that include the New York Times, Conde Nast, and ESPN, and it will be built into iOS 9.
Like Flipboard et al, News learns from the types of media you consume and suggests content you might like to read. Noting the current levels of interest in privacy, Apple stressed that personal preferences and habits will never be shared with third parties. This is a theme that cropped up again and again during the keynote, with strong emphasis being placed on the fact that no data is shared externally and articles are not linked to other Apple services.
Apple Pay comes to UK next month
As expected at this year’s WWDC, Apple has revealed that the Apple Pay payment system is coming to the UK in July. As revealed by Jennifer Bailey, Apple Pay chief (and a woman!), it will be accepted at over 250,000 UK merchant locations including Marks and Spender, Costa, Waitrose, Boots, and MacDonald’s.
That’s quite a bit shy of the million plus locations now accepted in the US, but it’s still a good start.
Apple previews OS X 10.11 El Capitan -- yes, that's its real name
While Microsoft has been busy cramming lots of new features into Windows 10, Apple is taking a different, iterative approach with OS X 10.11, called El Capitan. Yes, like the headline says, that is the actual name. The focus is on refinement, with the biggest changes to the latest Mac operating system being a more polished and beefed-up user interface, improvements to the built-in software and better performance.
Visually, OS X 10.11 El Capitan introduces new gestures, like swipe to delete emails in Mail, an improved Safari user interface, which now gives users the option to pin tabs by swiping and the ability to quickly mute audio in individual tabs. The most-obvious and interesting change in this area, however, is related to multitasking.
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