Macworld UKの July 2018 の目次

This year’s WWDC was all about software. That meant no new Mac announcements, no low-cost HomePod, no iPhone SE... nothing but iOS, tvOS, watchOS, and macOS. There was still plenty to get excited about, though. Apple’s upcoming operating systems are going to deliver a host of improvements and new features when they are released this autumn. Here’s everything Apple announced at its keynote presentation. iOS 12 This is the big one. Apple’s most popular devices run iOS, and they are getting a big, fat pile of improvements. Here’s a quick list of everything announced, but for a deeper dive, check out our iOS 12 feature on page 21. Performance: Apple is paying special attention to performance, particularly on older devices. The company says that, on an iPhone 6s Plus, apps…

After vowing to address the growing concern of smartphone addiction earlier this year, Apple is now making good on its word. During the WWDC keynote, Craig Federighi took some time to spotlight some of the new features in iOS 12 designed to help users get a grip on their smartphone habits. Rather than roll out small perfunctory capabilities, Apple is jumping right into the game with a slew of major changes that put it on par with Google’s impressive efforts in Google’s Android P. There are three components of Apple’s new digital health initiative: Do Not Disturb, Notifications, and a new app called Screen Time. Working together, they represent a whole new way to get a handle on how you use your iPhone and keep it from bugging you too…

With tvOS 12, the Apple TV 4K finally gets the improvements necessary to be the best streaming box on the market. Announced at Apple’s WWDC keynote, Dolby Atmos support is a highlight, but Zero Sign-on could be the most important advance in making streaming media boxes easier to use. Dolby Atmos Apple TV 4K launched last year with a handful of issues, HDR and frame rate switching hiccups chief among them. Further iOS releases smoothed all of those out, but one oft-requested feature was still missing: Dolby Atmos audio support. With tvOS 12, Dolby Atmos comes to the Apple TV 4K. All you need for full 3D immersive audio is an Atmos-supporting sound bar or receiver. This makes Apple TV 4K the only streaming media box to be certified for…

It’s been a long time coming, but having your Mac tell you that some of your apps will stop working brings some immediacy to the issue: If there’s a 32-bit Mac app you rely on to get work done, and it’s no longer being updated, on forthcoming versions of macOS it will only work with compromises, and ultimately it won’t work at all. Don’t fear the death of your old software, my friends. Your current long-in-the-tooth favourites, and old friends you said goodbye to years ago, can live on and still be useful, thanks to the miraculous digital afterlife known as virtualization. A legal hedge against obsolescence When you think about emulation (if you think about it at all), it’s probably in the context of downloading software that lets you…

On the hunt for something new to play? If you have a pretty capable Mac, then you have a lot of options right now. May delivered a nice stack of new games worth checking out. Role-playing epics like Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire and The Elder Scrolls Online’s Summerset expansion are the two biggest examples, but this month’s list also includes some offbeat or atypical picks like House Flipper, Monster Prom, and Quarantine Circular. 1. Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire Price: £32.99 from Steam (fave.co/2sCmigr) Obsidian’s original Pillars of Eternity was an excellent throwback to Baldur’s Gate-style isometric role-players, and now the long-awaited Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire is here to continue its tale. Here, we see the fantasy crew battling through an archipelago, sailing in swashbuckling fashion, and pursuing…

It’s called macOS Mojave, and the next version of our favourite desktop OS was introduced by Apple software chief Craig Federighi at the WWDC keynote. While there was nothing earthshaking about the presentation, the new features we saw could improve the experience. And yes, it looks like iOS apps will eventually come to Mac, although maybe not in the way you were expecting. Here are our favourite bits. Dark Mode Dark Mode doesn’t change the way your operating system works, but it does change typically white macOS screen elements like the Dock, Taskbar, and windows to something that’s more akin to Apple’s beloved space grey for hardware. It even works with Xcode. Considering that space grey peripherals are now available for Macs apart from the iMac Pro, it’s a perfect…

Apple is serious about augmented reality. Tim Cook has been clear about how important it is, saying it will “change the way we use technology forever”. With ARKit in iOS 11, Apple brought AR capabilities to hundreds of millions of phones. With iOS 12, it brings developers ARKit 2 with enhanced capabilities like 3D object detection, persistent experiences, and shared AR spaces. It’s a robust improvement on what is arguably the best set of AR tools for mobile devices anywhere. What’s new in ARKit 2 When ARKit debuted with iOS 11 last September it immediately made waves, but the limitations were obvious. With iOS 11.3, the ARKit developer tools got more powerful, adding the ability to track vertical surfaces and non-flat surfaces. Now, just one year later, Apple is updating…

The iMac made an instant impression when Apple first unveiled it in May 1998. But it didn’t start to really shake things up until it began to ship – which happened 20 years ago on 15 August, 1998. Arguably the most influential desktop computer of the past two decades, the original iMac’s specifications seem quaint by today’s standards. If you were lucky enough to own one, you came home with a 233MHz PowerPC G3 processor, 32MB of RAM, a 4GB hard drive, a 15in built-in monitor, and stereo speakers – all in an amazingly stylish case. The Bondi Blue wonder heralded the return of Steve Jobs as a visionary leader for Apple, and it halted Apple’s mid-1990s financial free fall. Initially marketed as an easy-to-use gateway to the Internet, the…

Somewhere in my basement I have an original graphite AirPort Base Station (pictured). It’s one of the few non-working Apple products I couldn’t bring myself to recycle, and the reason is twofold. One, it’s one of the Apple’s best designs. In an age where routers were ugly boxes with giant antennas, Apple’s curved base station really did look like a UFO. Even after it stopped working, I kept it on my shelf for years. The other reason is its history. Even more than the iPhone, iMac, iPad, and iPod, the AirPort Base Station is, to me, the greatest example of Steve Jobs’ genius. The original AirPort wasn’t a product for Apple’s power users, it was made for consumers at a time when wireless networking in homes was a foreign concept.…

With rumours swirling about the first Apple Watch redesign due to land in the autumn, Apple used its WWDC keynote to focus on some of the new features in watchOS 5. The new features just might keep some of those old models in circulation a little longer – though not the original Watch, which will be dropped from watchOS 5 compatibility. From workouts to watch faces, version 5 is shaping up to be one of the best upgrades to watchOS in years, and we can’t wait to get our hands... er, wrists on it. Here are five reasons why it’ll be a must-upgrade. 1. Fitness features Apple Watch is already one of the best fitness trackers you can buy, and watchOS 5 is only going to make it better. It…

Plenty has already been said about the 20th anniversary of the iMac (see page 48), the computer that played an instrumental role in bringing Apple back from the brink. But the legacy of the Bondi Blue iMac is still with us in many ways today – not just in the computer that shares its name, but in an overriding philosophy that Apple continues to exemplify across its product line. If you wanted an indication of how Apple would be doing business in 2018, you could do worse than cast back two decades and look at the decisions that it made when it produced that first iMac. (A machine that itself took a page directly out of Apple’s own playbook for the original Macintosh back in 1984.) The line is anything…

HOW TO GET RID OF A PERSISTENT MACOS MESSAGES BADGE ICON The badge that can appear on selected apps in the macOS Dock is a helpful reminder that you’ve got something that requires attention. But when the badge ‘sticks’ and continues to remain in place even after you’ve carried out your task? It’s a persistent itch you want to scratch. This can happen in the Messages app, as I discovered recently after texting myself a link when I couldn’t get the oh-so-reliable AirDrop to work between my phone and computer. The link arrived, but the badge wouldn’t disappear. Closing the conversation in the list in the left of the Messages window didn’t help. Nor did quitting the app. I tried a suggestion many forum posters around the Apple universe of…

Your laptop’s built-in speakers aren’t doing any favours for the gigabytes and gigabytes of music and movies on your hard drive. Even the best ones can leave your audio sounding thin and lifeless. External speakers – along with a good set of headphones – are a must for getting the best fidelity from your media files. A trip online or to your favourite electronics store will reveal a head-spinning variety of options in this category, with some systems costing as much or more than you paid for your laptop. You don’t need to take out a personal loan to upgrade your audio, though. Quality speakers can be found even with a budget of around £50. And while there is a certain degree of ‘you get what you pay for’ at…