Swipe Issue 37 Sample

NEWS 4 APPS 11 FEATURE 26 HOW-TO 33

iPhone SWIPE

NEWS • REVIEWS • TIPS

Welcome

mag

A note from the editor We’ve got an absolutely jam-packed issue this time around and one that we’re sure you’ll love.

After looking back at 2013 in our last issue, this time round we gaze into our crystal ball and see what’s likely for 2014. Will Apple release an iWatch or a real Apple TV? Find out in the Features section.

We also start the first in a new series of our favorite apps – if you’re a walking dictionary then you’ll love our selection of word games. Some of the newest apps are also on test, including puzzle game LYNE, and disposable picture taker Shoots & Leaves.

Lastly, in How-to we have the second part of our Keynote guide and our top five tips for getting the most from the App Store. Add in all the latest news from the world of Apple and you’re sure to be kept busy until our next issue arrives in two weeks’ time.

Thanks for reading

Meet the team

Contributors Steve Jarratt Craig Grannell iOS, iPhone, iPad, AirPlay, AirPrint, iTunes, Safari, iCloud, iMessage, and any other trademark is a trademark of Apple inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.

Screenshots are for illustrative purposes only and all prices are correct at the time of publishing.

NEWS

Wearable tech Apple hires experts

I

t seems that the evidence for some sort of wearable tech from Apple is growing. Two recent hires include Nancy Dougherty, previously working at Sano Intelligence building hardware for measuring blood streams, and Ravi Narasimhan from general medical devices firm Vital Connect.

Sano Intelligence is currently building a small, painless patch that can work on the arm and uses needle-less technologies to analyze blood. This could expand to being placed on the back of an ‘iWatch’ to measure a wearer’s glucose levels, kidney function, and electrolyte balance, taking the functionality far beyond just a basic watch.

A recent concept of what the iWatch could look like from 9to5Mac

Narasimhan’s work at Vital Connect saw him working on a sensor that can be worn on the skin, as well as personally holding 40 patents and over 15 pending, with many of these in the medical sensor area.

Along with these two hires, it’s been reported that Apple is working with other biometric technologies, including iris scanning. It’s been rumored that Samsung is looking to implement iris scanning software into the Galaxy S5, which is likely to be released this year. Hopefully both of these new hires will be put to good use in upcoming devices. n

China launch Tim Cook in Beijing After years of negotiations, the iPhone has finally launched on China Mobile, the largest network operator in the world. With a subscriber base of over 760 million, Apple will hope that many will convert to either the iPhone 5c or 5s and boost their standing in China.

Foxconn has stated that China Mobile ordered 1.4 million for the launch weekend alone.

To celebrate the launch, Tim Cook made a personal appearance at the Beijing Apple store where he signed the first ten iPhones to be sold and answered questions, mainly about the possibility of a larger-screened iPhone.

As is to be expected, Cook dodged the enquiry, saying: “We never talk about future things. We have great things we are working on but we want to keep them secret. That way you will be so much happier when you see it.”

With the next iPhone unlikely to be launched until September, we’ll just have to wait and see. n

APPS

W

ord games on the iPhone have moved far beyond simple word searches and crosswords. In this feature, we find five of the very best for you.

Time was word games either involved scribbling in a wordsearch book or arguing with your family about the spelling of a particularly suspiciouslooking word in a game of Scrabble (and then watching in horror as the dog ate the Q). But today’s iOS devices have propelled the genre far beyond its roots, building on familiar foundations to fashion games that are far more innovative, daring, interesting, and dynamic.

In this feature, we present our five favorites, a selection of classic titles sure to test your vocabulary, ability to think under pressure, and, in one case, how you’d respond to a trapped friend living in a chilling dystopian world of censorship and government surveillance. One thing’s for sure: these aren’t the same as your parents’ word games!

Letterpress atebits

Price: Free Version: 1.5 Size: 4.2 MB

I

magine Boggle crossed with a landgrab game like Risk and you’re well on the way to understanding how Letterpress works. You and a friend play online (via Game Center), taking it in turns to select letters on a fiveby-five grid. On completing a word, claimed tiles turn your color, and your opponent then attempts to take them back by playing a word of their own.

Letterpress borrows word-construction from Boggle and land-grabbing from Risk

The clever bit is how the game enables you to defend tiles by entirely surrounding them with those you’ve claimed; these darker tiles cannot be immediately flipped by your opponent. Strategy therefore isn’t always about figuring out the longest, cleverest words, but fashioning clusters of territory you can defend and expand as the game progresses.

When every tile has been claimed, the game ends and whoever has the most tiles wins.

Boards are largely random, and so some prove relatively easy to delve into, while others lumber you with only one vowel and a bunch of Js. This means there’s great variety in the battles, from long and drawn-out campaigns through to speedy tug o’ war affairs with the possibility of daring last-second moves to turn a game on its head.

Buy the single IAP ($1.99/£1.49) and you can play as many games as you like

For free, you can play two simultaneous games, but we doubt it’ll be long before you pay for the single IAP to unlock limitless games, themes, and the ‘played words’ list. n Great mix of genres Perfect for mobile play No single-player mode Some boards are nightmarish DOWNLOAD

SpellTower Zach Gage

Price: $1.99/£1.49 Version: 3.1.3 Size: 14.7 MB

S

pellTower’s a devious game. Its sole initial unlocked mode (Tower) presents you with a grid of letters. You tap out strings to make a word, which is then removed from the screen with a double-tap. Any letters suddenly left hanging are rapidly introduced to the concept of gravity and fall directly downwards. You repeat this until you’re done, and higher scores are achieved by making longer words with trickier letters. Simple!

Tower mode is largely static and a great way to improve your SpellTower technique

Other modes are then unlocked, at which point SpellTower abruptly shifts from being a fairly Zen game to a brain-busting puzzler that tests your nerve under pressure. Puzzle mode matches Tower mode but a new row of letters appears with every word you make. Ex Puzzle takes things further, adding numbered badges to letters that denote the minimum word length required to make them disappear.

And then the uncompromising Rush mode has you work against the clock, frantically searching the board for special tiles that will obliterate a line of letters, all while trying to figure out how you can make a seven-letter word that somehow includes four Vs. Varied modes

Against the clock in Rush mode, with ‘locked’ letters that demand minimum length words

Looks great Rush mode can frustrate Nothing else – really

DOWNLOAD

FEATURE

A

pple had a slow but steady 2013, delivering two operating system updates and refreshing the majority of its product lines. But with only a few exceptions – such as the 64-bit A7 processor and the iPhone’s Touch ID – it was evolution not revolution, with updates to existing products and incremental improvements. If Apple is to grow its market share or open up new markets, it needs to be bolder and drive the innovation it’s famous for. So here are our predictions for 2014; some smart guesswork, a bit of extrapolation, and the occasional bout of wishful thinking…

iPhone 6 Currently the company’s biggest revenue stream, the iPhone is vitally important to Apple’s well being. It continually manages to break its own sales records, and the latest iPhones are market-leaders in terms of quality and user experience.

But the massed might of Androidpowered smartphones from the likes of Samsung, LG and Sony is slowly eroding Apple’s market share.

Even Nokia is enjoying a resurgence with its Windows Phone offerings

There have been rumors about a larger screen iPhone 6 for about 18 months now. Many industry insiders are suggesting that Apple will break away from its current 4-inch screen to deliver something more akin to the Samsung Galaxy series, and introduce a display somewhere in the 4.7 to 5.0inch range.

Several websites have published concept artwork taking their design cues from the iPad Air to make an ‘iPhone Air’. The larger screen is mitigated by tiny bezels so the screen is practically edge-to-edge. The designs are always incredibly thin too, though quite how Apple can shave off another couple of mm without compromising performance or battery life we’re not sure.

Image ©: Yanko Design

We think there’s a very good argument for a large screen iPhone 6 later in the year, considering that many thought we’d get it in 2013. This would provide a nice range of form factors and enable Apple to compete with new devices from Samsung and its ilk.

In terms of specs, we’re probably looking at speed bumps, higher-pixel cameras, and increased memory – it’s about time 32GB was the entrylevel option. Apple has also invested heavily in Arizona-based GT Advanced Technologies, which manufactures sapphire glass. Making this larger screen from sapphire certainly makes sense; the material is allegedly strong enough to crack concrete without itself being scratched.

The iPad Pro Apple’s tablets are also crucial to the company’s fortunes, and the new iPad Air and iPad mini are easily best-inbreed devices, with fantastic design and build quality. It’s a safe bet that we’ll see an iPad Air 2, with speed and memory bumps, although analysts are suggesting any new machines will have better, even higher-resolution displays. Certainly the iPad mini’s Retina display still has room for improvement in terms of color fidelity.

But apart from iterative changes, where does Apple go from here? The recent gossip has been about a 12-inch ‘iPad Pro’ designed for enterprise markets and to sit in the gap between the iPad Air and the MacBook Air. It certainly makes sense for people who prefer the portability but still need to look at spreadsheets and documents, or want to be creative. Pair it with a Bluetooth keyboard and you really have the best of both worlds.

Image ©: iMore

Samsung has already launched its own 12.2-inch super-size tablets, and so there’s clearly a demand. With the 7.9-inch mini and 9.7-inch Air, it does seem natural to offer something at the larger end of the scale – rumors suggest iPad Pro will have a 12.9inch display. But will it have all the closed ecosystem limitations of the current iPads, or be more open like a MacBook? Surely it would need to run full versions of Office or Adobe products, and have better file management and storage options than the current iPads? If so, this could be a really interesting product.

One of Samsung’s new 12.2-inch tablets

HOW-TO

Get started with

Keynote part two

H

aving started putting your presentation together you’ll want to add some more advanced objects including tables and graphs as well as animating between slides and your added elements.

Add Graphs If you want to show off statistics or data then adding a graph or table is more aesthetically pleasing than a simple list. To add these elements tap the + icon followed by the option to add a graph or the option to add a table, and then choose from the default options.

There’s lots of 2D, 3D, or Interactive graphs to choose from If you add a graph, tap on it followed

by Edit Data to alter the information shown. This chart is full of default data that you will need to edit or remove to fit with your statistics. If you wish to remove a column or row tap and hold the outside edges of either and then tap the Delete option. Once you’ve edited the data, tap Done to return to the slide.

Data can be added to table cells by double tapping the empty options.

To change the number of rows or columns, tap the table followed by the on either end followed by the up or down arrows.

Change the style Once the data is all correct you may wish to change the style of either your table or graph. Simply tap on the element followed by the icon.

This reveals the default choices at the bottom, similar to when editing text. Use the Chart Options or Table Options to find more settings including font type and size.

Change the style to suit your overall presentation

Animate your slides After you’ve finished your presentation you’ll want to add some animation between slides and to the elements to make them more exciting.

While looking at a slide, tap on any component followed by Animate. This will then reveal the Build In and Build Out options for your selection. Tap on either and choose from the options. To preview, tap the Play option from the top left.

You can add in and out effects to any element on the slide Tapping on the Options, Delivery or Order headings across the top will give you more choices for the animation. Tap Done to return to your slide and select other elements and add transitions.

To add effects between slides, select one by tapping the thumbnail in the left-hand column followed by the None option. The effect chosen here is applied to the whole slide rather than just certain elements. Again you can preview it by selecting Play in the top left and alter the effect from the Options menu. Tap Done to confirm your selection.

Preview When you’ve added all your transitions you can preview them by tapping the button in the top right.

Make sure you make your way back to the first slide though, otherwise you’ll start the preview at the current place.

Previewing your presentation removes all the editing options To progress through the presentation tap the screen to trigger your animations. Once it’s finished you’ll return to the editor and you can make any changes to each transition. When you’re happy, tap Done to confirm all your animations.

Add Notes While you’re making the presentation it can be handy to have some notes to help you remember what to talk about in regard to each slide. Tap the icon followed by Presenter Notes. Select which slide you wish to add notes to from the left-hand side and type out your note. When you’re finished, just tap Done.

Add notes to help you remember what to talk about

iPhone SWIPE

NEWS • REVIEWS • TIPS

mag

In your next packed issue...

Essential games Find out what the best racing games available for your iPhone are

Be connected We look at how the iPhone will interact with other devices in the future

Expert advice We start our how-to of Numbers, Apple’s spreadsheet app

Liked This?

Tap here to review us on the App Store so we can continue to bring you more useful advice and tips

Keep in contact...