MacStories

0:0025:36 Sponsored by: Unite 4 – Turn Websites into Apps on Your Mac This week on MacStories Unwind: MacStories CES Rundown: Highlights of This Year’s Most Intriguing (and Bizarre) Announcements Apple Announces Major Expansion of Its Racial Equity and…

My coverage of CES has always been virtual. This year the show itself is virtual too, which left me wondering whether there would be much to cover. Although there are fewer vendors participating than in the past, the event continues to provide a steady stream…

This week on AppStories, we conclude our miniseries on workflows with a look at what they’re using to manage calendar events and team communications. Plus, Federico springs a big app surprise on John and listeners.

Today, Apple announced a significant expansion of its Racial Equity and Justice Initiative (REJI), the $100 million project to help eliminate barriers to opportunities and address injustices confronted by communities of color. The new projects, which build on…

I came across Puppr during its recent feature as Apple’s App of the Day and decided to give it a try. The app is a simple and fun instructional tool for teaching your dog new behaviors and tricks. Since I’ve been staying with my parents for the last couple…

Saturday, Apple suspended social media app Parler from the App Store. The move followed Google’s removal of the Android version of the app from the Play Store on Friday and happened at roughly the same time that Amazon announced that it was ending Parler’s…

Unite 4 for macOS can turn any website into an app for your Mac. The app uses a lightweight, WebKit-powered browser as a backend, allowing you to easily create isolated, customizable apps from any site. It’s a terrific way to get those sites you visit every…

0:0013:49 Sponsored by: SaneBox – Organize Your Inbox, and Never Waste Time on Email Again This week on MacStories Unwind: MacStories Two Months with the HomePod mini: More Than Meets the Eye Apple Recaps Its 2020 Services, Including the App Store’s…

As a smaller, affordable smart speaker tightly integrated with Apple services, the HomePod mini is a compelling product for many people. The mini is little enough to work just about anywhere in most homes. At $99, the device’s price tag also fits more…

In a press release today, Apple provided an update on its services. According to Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of Internet Software and Services: Now more than ever before, customers around the world have found inspiration and value in the breadth…

SaneBox is your personal email assistant that automatically organizes your inbox, saving you valuable time. SaneBox works with your existing email service, making sure that only the most important messages reach your inbox. The rest of your messages are…

My calendar needs are pretty simple. I have a shared family calendar to keep tabs on personal obligations and a personal MacStories calendar for work-related events. I also share a calendar with Federico for scheduling podcast recording times and other events,…

The 2020 Artisanal Software Festival is a fantastic collection of carefully-crafted apps for writing, research, thinking, and more at terrific prices. As in past years, software artisans from around the globe come together to offer fair discounts direct to you…

This week on AppStories, we take listeners along on Federico’s recent tour of modern task managers and discuss the app we have settled on to keep track of our projects and to-dos.

Scenecuts is a new utility app for controlling HomeKit devices from your Mac’s menu bar. The free, open source app, by Seattle developer Nick Hayward can control HomeKit scenes from the menu bar app’s drop-down menu, customizable per-scene menu bar icons,…

After a few months of use, Jason Snell has written a great article on the iPhone 12 line’s two outliers. Despite waiting for the shortfalls of a small phone to become apparent, the other shoe never dropped for him on the iPhone 12 Mini. Small phone…

The Apple Watch and iPhone can collect a lot of fitness data. The trouble is, there’s so much information available that it can be a little overwhelming and difficult to sift through in Apple’s Health app. The situation has left an opening for third-party…

HealthView is a beautifully-designed iPhone and Apple Watch app that brings the health data those devices collect together in a highly-customizable, unified dashboard. The iPhone and Apple Watch are capable of collecting lots of health data but making sense of…

0:0034:48 Sponsored by: Agenda – Date-Focused Note Taking This week on MacStories Unwind: MacStories MacStories Selects 2020: Recognizing the Best Apps of the Year Apple Releases iOS and iPadOS 14.3 with Apple ProRAW, App Clip Codes, Fitness+ Support, and…

Ever since the release of the AirPods Max there has been confusion about how power management for the headphones works. Apple has clarified the situation with an update to an AirPods Max support page that MacRumors discovered explaining the different power…

WallCreator 2.0. In September, I shared WallCreator, a shortcut to generate wallpapers for iPhone and iPad using gradients or solid colors. The first version of WallCreator allowed you to generate randomized wallpapers with just a couple taps from either the…

This week on AppStories, we reveal and discuss the 2020 MacStories Selects Award winners and runners-up.

Headland is a new game for iOS and Android by the award winning game studio Northplay. The game revolves around a young boy exploring a world of his own imagination; fighting enemies and hunting down the missing shards of his robot friend’s “imagination…

Our level of cardio fitness is a strong predictor of our overall health. With yesterday’s release of watchOS 7.2 and iOS 14.3, the Apple Watch now supports monitoring and alerting you when your cardio fitness level is too low over time. Per Apple’s press…

ProRAW is a big deal for iPhone photography. Joining Austin Mann’s article that I linked earlier today is an even deeper dive by Ben Sandofsky, a member of the Halide Mark II team. Sandofsky does a fantastic job of contextualizing the benefits of ProRAW and…

Microsoft today announced updates to their suite of Microsoft 365 apps to support Apple Silicon, including design tweaks to match the look of macOS Big Sur: We are excited to announce that starting today we are releasing new versions of many of our Microsoft…

Apple debuted Fitness+ yesterday alongside iOS and iPadOS 14.3. The service, which integrates tightly with the Apple Watch, offers workout classes on the iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV, and uses the Apple Watch to track your heart rate and other metrics. There are…

With the release of iOS 14.3, Apple’s ProRAW image format is available in its Camera app and third-party apps like Halide Mark II. Travel photographer Austin Mann, who has been testing ProRAW, published a story explaining why the new format matters,…

Today Apple released iOS 14.3, a mid-cycle update which includes quite a few very nice features. App Clip Codes were announced alongside iOS and iPadOS 14 at WWDC, so it’s good to see them finally making it out to the public. Similarly, Apple ProRAW was…

John: The MacStories Selects Awards are our annual love letter to apps and the people who make them. Apps have become ubiquitous, seeping into every corner of our lives. They help us find a job and home, get work done, blow off steam, order a meal, and…