Apple will soon require apps with any third-party logins to offer Sign In With Apple also

Something from the fine print out of today’s WWDC keynote. Sign In With Apple didn’t get a ton of time on-stage today, but it should prove a nice new feature for the company — and for those concerned about handing over sensitive information to third-parties.

Turns out it will also be required for app developers utilizing any sort of third party login service. If they offer social logins or other third party options, they’ll have to offer Sign In With Apple as an option.

TechCrunch has learned that the company will require the new feature for developers utilizing services like Google and Facebook’s third-party login. Apple acknowledges the requirement at the tale end of its newly updated App Store Review Guidelines.

“Sign In with Apple will be available for beta testing this summer,” the company writes. “It will be required as an option for users in apps that support third-party sign-in when it is commercially available later this year.”

Yes, that means that apps with third party logins like Google or Facebook or whatever other service must offer Apple’s sign in service as well — once the service is out of beta later this year. Apple’s position on this is that there is a real benefit to offering users a sign-in option that does not require a user to hand over their personal data to an outside third-party company when trying to use a service.

A company like Bird, for instance, would want to offer customers the quickest possible signup process to get them onto a scooter. Right now, that means a social login that can put a user as little as one tap away from a ride. The tradeoff, of course, is that now Facebook knows that user is logging into that app and whatever information they’ve chosen to share with Facebook can be anonymously paired with that data to serve ads etc.

Apple’s argument is that the consumer benefits if they do not have to pass along information to anyone other than the direct company they are working with — and even then they do not have to give them anything personally identifiable.

Apple noted the lengths it took to ensure user privacy during today’s event. The ability to auto-generate a random “relay” email address that forwards to the users’ received one of the biggest applause breaks of the event.

It wasn’t clear on stage but unless a developer requests an email there is literally no second step to signing into/up for an app or service with Apple’s new sign-in service. It’s literally the holy grail of signups – one single tap and it’s done. This is huge for apps that want to get people onboarded as fast as possible, especially for use in the moment. And, it’s worth noting, they also get the benefit of not having to hand off inferred usage data to outside sign-in services from other companies.

Requiring developers to utilize the feature could go a ways toward minimizing the use of popular logins like Facebook — though it could also rub a few companies the wrong way in the process.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2EQas8K

A closer look at Apple’s reinvented Mac Pro

Apple only announced one new piece of hardware at today’s, but it was a doozy. After years of promising a refresh for the long lamented Mac Pro line, the high-end desktop finally got its modular upgrade.

To mark the occasion, Apple devoted a considerable amount of space to showcasing the device is various states, powering multimedia work stations and alone on the table for all the world to see.

The Pro’s certainly striking. Looks-wise, it’s more direct descendent of the shiny metal Power Mac G5 tower of yore than the more recent trashcan Pro. There are plenty of tweaks, of course. It appears a bit smaller than the G5, while the vent holes have been mode much larger, for a kind of cheese grater design, at first glance — an effect that’s only enhanced by the prominent handle, up top.

Otherwise, the enclosure is relatively minimal, with a soft metal metal design and massive Apple logo on the side. The tower is elevated slightly, atop a pair of shiny metal legs (optional wheels have returned, as well, for those who require a slightly more mobile experience). Up top is a large swiveling handle that can be used to move the computer around (in lieu of wheels) or removing the aluminum housing with a pull, for easier access inside.

The more traditional tower design allows for additional modularity. That, of course, was one of the major issues with the previous Mac Pro, which caused Apple to head back to the drawing board. Apple’s version of customization naturally centers around its own engineering, but there’s plenty of potential power to be had here, including the MPX graphic modules with dual Radeon Pro Vega IIs and Intel Xeon chips with up to 28 cores.

The company’s once vice-like grip over the world of creative professionals has been challenged in recent years with lines like Microsoft’s Surface. The iMac Pro represented a reasonable stopgap for the company as it went back to scratch with the Mac Pro line. But while the all-in-one is powerful, those with truly demanding workflows no doubt found it lacking.

The company happily discussed how much it had undercut the competition at $5,999 — but it’s important to note that those who are really serious about the category are almost certainly going to want to upgrade from some of the base-level specs including, notably, the 256GB SSD. When we’re having conversations about editing 4K and 8K video, you’re going to want something beefier out of the box.

The Pro Display XDR  6K monitor is also quite lovely. And it’s interesting to see the company getting back in the monitor game after handing off a lot of the heavy lifting to the likes of LG. At $4,999, it’s $1,000 cheaper than the Pro — until you add back in the optional $1,000 stand.

There are some nice tricks here, too, like the ability to swivel to portrait mode for specific editing needs. Though once you start totaling up that Apple shopping cart, you may need to look into a second mortgage.

As far as firepower goes, however, Apple looks to have delivered with the Pro’s return.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2WKtt6v

Apple attacks Facebook by becoming the asocial network

Apple’s updated TestFlight will let users submit feedback with a screenshot

Apple’s TestFlight app testing platform is getting an upgrade. With the new version of Xcode 11 announced this afternoon at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference, TestFlight apps will automatically enable user feedback. Now, when a user shares a screenshot from the Testflight app they’re trialing, they will have a new option to share it as beta feedback while also optionally adding their comments. The idea is to prompt more users to offer feedback, by making it more of built-in experience than before.

It’s also a feature found in the popular app feedback platform, Instabug.

Developers will be able to review all the feedback they receive on App Store Connect, and can download the details for later reference.

The update, while minor, could allow developers to catch more bugs and other issues during the user testing process before launching their app to the wider public on the iOS App Store. And for the end user, it simplifies the process of testing apps and giving feedback — something in the past they may have neglected to do since it may have required filling out a form or emailing the developer directly.

The change was one of two updates related to app feedback announced today.

Additionally, when users opt into sharing, app developers will also receive anonymized metrics for battery life, launch time, and memory leaks. These will be aggregated and display in the organizer next to the crash and energy use metrics, and are meant to offer developers another way to monitor and improve their app’s performance.

Apple notes that it actually began collecting these aggregated metrics this spring with iOS 12.2, so many apps will already have this data available.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2WF85zD

Meet Apple’s secret weapon for keeping Wall Street happy

Apple has been shifting their business strategy over the past couple years to push the revenues earned from top customers higher and higher, but if you thought a $999 starting price for the iPhone XS was bold, Apple announced earlier today that they’re selling the freaking stand for the display of their new Mac Pro for $999.

As the price of the stand was announced as an aside towards the end of the WWDC keynote, audible murmurs broke out in the crowd visibly catching the presenter off-guard and causing him to lose his train of thought.

The company’s new Mac Pro starts at $5,999, which is incredibly pricey but ultimately it’s a machine that hit plenty of the high-points that the company’s power users were hoping for. The company’s $4,999 Pro Display XDR also hits some high points though its pricing might raise your eyebrows a bit more, but then you find out that the stand doesn’t even come with the freaking thing, and it’s $999.

Surely something with this kind of price tag can do something other than hold up the display! It can, you can also swivel the display 90 degrees much like you can on your $89 ViewSonic.

Apple sees the professional market as a cash cow with non-existent price sensitivities and as its device sales stall this could be a great market to seize, but, come on, this is a pretty egregious middle-finger to professional customers. You can buy a display that matches the Pro Display XDR on many — but not all — fronts and it will cost less than this stand.

Apple releases the $5,000 Pro Display XDR, a 32-inch, 6K display available this fall

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2QExbcg

Apple’s Voice Control improves accessibility OS-wide on all its devices

Apple is known for fluid, intuitive user interfaces, but none of that matters if you can’t click, tap, or drag because you don’t have a finger to do so with. For users with disabilities the company is doubling down on voice-based accessibility with the powerful new Voice Control feature on Macs and iOS (and iPadOS) devices.

Many devices already support rich dictation, and of course Apple’s phones and computers have used voice-based commands for years (I remember talking to my Quadra). But this is a big step forward that makes voice controls close to universal — and it all works offline.

The basic idea of Voice Control is that the user has both set commands and context-specific ones. Set commands are things like “Open Garage Band” or “File menu” or “Tap send.” And of course some intelligence has gone into making sure you’re actually saying the command and not writing it, like in that last sentence.

But that doesn’t work when you have an interface that pops up with lots of different buttons, fields, and labels. And even if every button or menu item could be called by name, it might be difficult or time-consuming to speak everything out loud.

To fix this Apple simply attaches a number to every UI item in the foreground, which a user can show by saying “show numbers.” Then they can simply speak the number or modify it with another command, like “tap 22.” You can see a basic workflow below, though of course without the audio cues it loses a bit:

Remember that these numbers may be more easily referenced by someone with little or no vocal ability, and could in fact be selected from using a simpler input like a dial or blow tube. Gaze tracking is good but it has its limitations, and this is a good alternative.

For something like maps, where you could click anywhere, there’s a grid system for selecting where to zoom in or click. Just like Blade Runner! Other gestures like scrolling and dragging are likewise supported.

Dictation has been around for a bit but it’s been improved as well; You can select and replace entire phrases, like “Replace ‘be right back’ with ‘on my way.’ ” Other little improvements will be noted and appreciated by those who use the tool often.

Here’s everything Apple just announced at the 2019 WWDC Keynote

All the voice processing is done offline, which makes it both quick and robust to things like signal problems or use in foreign countries where data might be hard to come by. And the intelligence built into Siri lets it recognize names and context-specific words that may not be part of the base vocabulary. Improved dictation means selecting emoji and adding dictionary items is a breeze.

Right now Voice Control is supported by all native apps, and third party apps that use Apple’s accessibility API should be able to take advantage of it easily. And even if they don’t do it specifically, numbers and grids should still work just fine, since all the OS needs to know are the locations of the UI items. These improvements should appear in accessibility options as soon as a device is updated to iOS 13 or Catalina.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2Km8fVQ

iOS 13 will let you bypass the App Store download cap when on a cellular connection

 

Just a few days ago, Apple bumped up the limit on how big of an app you can download from the App Store while on a cellular connection, increasing it from 150MB to 200MB. As we noted at the time, it’s always seemed a bit silly that there was no way to acknowledge the file size and bypass the limit — to effectively say “Yeah, yeah, I know. Let me download it anyway.”

Looks like Apple agrees.

As spotted by 9to5Mac, iOS 13 (or, at least, the just-released developer beta version of iOS 13) gives you the option to download large apps over cellular should you choose to do so. Whether you’ve got the monthly bandwidth to spare or you just need a big ol’ monster app/update now (lack of WiFi be damned), iOS 13 seems much more willing to get out of your way.

A new screen in the settings menu reveals three options:

• Always allow
• Ask if over 200 MB
• Ask first (prompting you to make sure you know you’re on a cell connection, even if the download is under 200 MB)

The prompt also offers to hold off a large download for now, automatically downloading it the next time you’re on WiFi.

iOS 13 shipped as a private developer beta today. The public beta is expected to roll out in July, with a full release sometime this fall.

from Apple – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2WlNrFs