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Google releases Calendar app for iPhone, complete with Material Design

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Last November Google officially outed its redesigned (and Material Design-infused) Calendar app for Android, and today it’s bringing the same design and features to iOS. The search giant has released Google Calendar for iPhone, and it’s already up for grabs in the iTunes App Store.

Believe it or not, this is the first ever official Google Calendar app for iOS. So far to get Google’s calendar on Apple’s mobile platform you were able to use the system built into the OS, or countless third party apps. From now on you’ll also have this official alternative. Read more »

Update to Pandora for Android brings Google Now cards

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Pandora for Android received a major update. Version 5.8 brings support for Google Now cards to the music streaming app.

Google Now support means that users can search for and play music straight from the search giant’s personal assistant. Read more »

Apple ResearchKit transforms the iPhone into the ultimate research tool

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Apple’s “Spring Forward” event had a lot to offer users. A big portion of the presentation was devoted to a new Apple platform, dubbed ResearchKit. It aims to bring advanced technology to the hands of researchers, medical personnel and end users to simplify the way we track and care for our health. It also does much more, like diagnosis and even remote consultations.

ResearchKit is a new framework, which enabled developers to easily employ all of the iPhone’s sensors in a way, specifically tailored to battling diseases and delivering health services. It can aggregate data from various fitness applications and help them stay interconnected. When granted permission, the platform will use user data, like weight, blood pressure, glucose levels and asthma inhaler use, measured by the phone or third-party apps, couples that with live sensor data from accelerometer, microphone, gyroscope and GPS sensors and creates a full picture of the user’s health status. Furthermore, the platform is entirely open source so that everybody can easily get on board and build applications for a good cause. Read more »

Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets for iOS now let you make a copy of a file

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Google has updated its Sheets, Slides and Docs iOS apps with a feature that was previously only available in the web UI. Dubbed Make a copy, the feature allows you to make a copy of a spreadsheet, presentation, or document, depending on the app you’re using.

In addition, the update brings the ability to copy links to the device’s clipboard. There is also a new accessibility settings menu which appears within Slides and Sheets apps when VoiceOver is enabled in Settings. Finally, the updated apps also feature bug fixes and performance improvements. Read more »

Google has launched a dedicated PDF viewer on Android

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Google PDF Viewer is the latest addition to what can definitely be considered Google’s office suite for Android. The application is, like the name suggests, nothing more than a lightweight PDF viewer. Now, you might be saying to yourself – “Why would I need that, Google Drive has one built-in”. And you would be absolutely true. But there is still a reason for the app to exist and a very good one.

You might remember, that a few days ago we reported on one of Google’s new Android endeavors – Android for Work. The project’s goal is to make your personal Android device much more organized and convenient to use both for work and outside the office. The idea is to have a separate set of applications that are dedicated to your business and are separate from your main apps. This, of course, means that Google has to begin launching a new set of productivity apps, which appear to mirror existing functionality, hence the Google PDF viewer. Read more »

Imagine your SatNav software avoiding areas of poor cellular signal, Apple holds the patent now

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One of Apple’s numerous patent applications has been granted a green light today and unlike most other vague texts, this one is quite interesting, particularly in its implications. The Cupertino tech giant now has the sole legal right to produce a “Navigation system acquisition and use of cellular coverage map data”.

What this entails is a system, which is able to model SatNav routing options, based on cell signal strength. The idea is that you cell phone is pretty aware of the signal strength at any given time and thanks to anonymous data reporting, Apple has that information at hand. This can then be aggregated on a map and used to suggest routes that avoid areas with shady cell strength or even, perhaps, too congested places. Read more »

New Imgur iOS application offers browsing images in style

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Most of you have surely used Imgur’s services for instant and easy image sharing. The platform has come a long way since it was lunched, back in 2009. Today, Imgur is so popular that it is no longer merely an image hosting solution, it is now more or less representative of image sharing trends online.

Imgur has been capitalizing on that and it’s growing into a social network, rather than a simple image hosting website. A very logical step to further aid this development is to target the ever-growing mobile community in a proper matter and Alan Schaaf, the company’s founder and CEO, feels they might have finally achieved that with their new iOS application. Read more »

Gmail 4.0 for iOS brings quick actions to notifications

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Today Google has released the latest version of Gmail for iOS. Gmail 4.0 comes with a few new features, chief among which is the support for quick actions in notifications. So now when you get a notification about an email, you can archive or reply straight from the notification.

As this functionality is made possible by iOS 8, it will only be available to you if you’re on that version of Apple’s mobile operating system (or its later updates, of course). Read more »

Acer now preloads Swype keyboard on its smartphones

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Acer has signed a partnership with Nuance, the company making Swype, to bring the virtual keyboard to current and upcoming smartphones of the company.

Swype is now shipping on Acer’s Liquid S1, Liquid S2, Liquid X1, Liquid Jade, Liquid Jade S as well as the E3, E600 and E700. To enable it, you have to go to the input and language settings on your phone and change the default keyboard to Swype. Read more »

Twitter adds internal browser to Android app in the beta version

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Twitter is testing an internal browser for its Android app, which has been enabled for those on the beta channel. It’s a server side change that will automatically be enabled without having to update the app.

The current stable version of the Android app includes an optional quick read mode, that strips the page of its usual formatting and presents a simplified text and image view optimized for mobile reading. This new update will put the browser in your Twitter app, so links will look exactly like they do in Chrome. Read more »

Instagram begins rolling out new clickable multi-photo carousel ads

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Instagram has started rolling out a new ad format, dubbed carousel ads, that the company says lets advertising brands share more images with people interested in their posts. You will be able to swipe left and right to look through these images, with a click-able Learn More button below them that’ll take you to a website of the brand’s choice.

“One way to look at it is carousel ads bring the potential of multi-page print campaigns to mobile phones – with the added benefit of taking people to a website to learn more. Read more »

Facebook’s Snapchat competitor now lets you explore and follow interesting people

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Slingshot, Facebook’s answer to the very popular Snapchat, has today added a couple of new features. On both its iOS and Android apps, you now have a brand new Explore view.

This surfaces “funny, inspiring and creative people from across the globe”. It’s basically a list of popular people who are active on Slingshot. And you can immediately follow those who you consider to be interesting. Read more »

Chrome for Android will be dropping support for Ice Cream Sandwich

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Chrome on Android has really come a long way since its release back in 2014. 22 versions have been created, each one more capable than the previous and Android 4.0 – Ice Cream Sandwich was the scene, on which everything started.

The team behind Chromium, the open-source project which powers the development of the Chrome browser, has announced that it is leaving behind the software’s original Android 4.0 home, which will no longer be supported after version 42. Read more »

iOS 8 adoption rate reaches 75%, iOS 7 still going strong

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iOS 8 adoption got off to a slow start – it took three weeks to achieve 40% share. iOS 6 and 7 before took only a week to hit 50%. Now, close to half a year after iOS 8 was unleashed to the public, it has clawed its way up to 75%, Apple says.

Version 8 has already had one minor update (v8.1) with the next one (v8.2) expected in about a week and the one after that (v8.3) already seeding to developers. Read more »

Glympse location sharing app gets more car-friendly with a car mode and MirrorLink integration

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Glymspe has released a new application today, which is meant to simplify the usage of the location sharing service within vehicles. The new application is essentially an add-on to the main app and provides a new simplified dashboard interface as well as MirrorLink compatibility.

If you are unfamiliar with what Glympse does, it is basically a very user-intuitive location sharing service. It is meant to quickly tell your contacts where you are and when you are arriving all in a very simple manner.

To do so, you just fire up the app, select a contact and a period for active location tracking and simply hit send. The recipient will then receive a link where he or she can track you current whereabouts until the period you specified expires. Read more »