MacRumors

Apple has retained Lisa Ellman, a lawyer specializing in drone and aviation law, as a Washington lobbyist, reports Bloomberg.

Ellman, a partner at law firm Hogan Lovells, leads her firm's Unmanned Aircraft Systems practice and also co-founded the Commercial Drone Alliance. She has been doing lobbying work for Apple since December.

Apple in 2018 was also a participant in a pilot program that allows the company to operate drones in ways restricted by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration. Apple partnered with the North Carolina Department of Transportation to use drones to capture aerial mapping data.

Bloomberg suggests that Apple's new lobbying efforts indicate a new push into the growing drone field. Apple also has a team working on satellites that Ellman could potentially assist with when it comes to regulations.

In addition to employing drones for mapping purposes, Apple also sells popular drones from DJI in its Apple retail stores and on its website.

Apple has purchased Seattle startup Xnor.ai, a company that specializes in on-device artificial intelligence, reports GeekWire, citing sources with knowledge of the acquisition.

Apple is said to have paid around $200 million for Xnor.ai, and while both Apple and Xnor.ai have declined to comment on the potential acquisition, much of the Xnor.ai website has been taken offline and GeekWire says that a move from the Xnor.ai offices is taking place in Seattle.

Xnor.ai's technology lets companies run deep learning algorithms locally on devices that include smartphones and wearables rather than requiring these computations to be done in the cloud. Xnor promised complete privacy of data along with reduced memory load and power demands.

Xnor.ai's work could potentially be incorporated into future iPhones, improving Siri and other AI and machine learning-based tasks that are done on device.

Update: Apple confirmed the acquisition of Xnor.ai to Axios with its standard acquisition statement: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."

Microsoft today announced the first stable launch of its Edge browser built on the Google Chromium open source project. Microsoft Edge can be downloaded on both Windows machines and Macs.

A beta version of the Microsoft Edge browser has been available for several months ahead of the official, stable launch.

Microsoft's aim with the Edge browser is to provide better web compatibility with improved performance for customers while also making sure there's less fragmentation of the web for developers.

Edge for Mac has been designed to be similar to the Edge experience on Windows, but Microsoft has added optimizations to make it feel more Mac-like. Extensions can be added from the Microsoft Addons store or other Chromium-based web stores like the Chrome Web Store.

The browser includes tracking prevention (enabled by default), customization options, built-in search capabilities with Bing, an Internet Explorer mode for viewing older web pages, and a new wave-style logo that replaces the traditional "e" that past Microsoft browsers have used.

For Mac users who plan to use Edge, the browser is available cross platform and can be downloaded on Mac, Windows, and iOS devices with the Edge iOS app.

Microsoft is planning regular updates for the Edge browser, with Canary, Dev, and Beta updates on a daily, weekly, and multi-week basis. The next stable version of Edge will see an update sometime in February.

Following rumors of a performance-boosting "Pro Mode" coming in the next update to macOS Catalina, developer Marco Arment has argued that Apple should bring an iPhone-style Low Power Mode to MacBooks as well.

Since iOS 9, Apple has included a Low Power Mode on iPhones that reduces the amount of power that the device uses when the battery gets low, and Arment this week shared his experience with his own self-styled equivalent for macOS.

His method involves the use of a third-party app called Turbo Boost Switcher Pro that enables users to disable Intel Turbo Boost on a Mac's processor. According to Arment, disabling Turbo Boost has increased his 16-inch MacBook Pro's battery life by an estimated 30-50 percent and made it "a much better laptop" the vast majority of the time he uses it.

With Turbo Boost disabled, peak CPU power consumption drops by 62%, with a correspondingly huge reduction in temperature. This has two massive benefits:

• The fans never audibly spin up. When Turbo Boost is enabled, the fans annoyingly spin up every time the system is under a heavy sustained load. Disable it, and it’s almost impossible to get them to be audible.
• It runs significantly cooler. Turbo Boost lets laptops get too hot to comfortably hold in your lap, and so much heat radiates out that it can make hands sweaty. Disable it, and the laptop only gets moderately warm, not hot, and hands stay comfortably dry.

Arment claims that despite the reduction in processing power, his MacBook Pro is "still fast enough to do everything I need (including significant development with Xcode)." His only concern is that the app which allows him to enjoy these benefits is on borrowed time: Turbo Boost Switcher Pro relies on a legacy kernel extension that likely won't be supported in future versions of macOS.

"I suspect that this is the last year I'll get to run the latest OS and be able to turn off Turbo Boost at will, making all of my future laptop usage significantly worse," says Arment.

An iPhone's Low Power Mode reduces battery usage by disabling background app refreshing and automatic downloads, locking the screen after 30 seconds, and via other methods. Would you be happy to see an optional Low Power Mode in a future version of macOS, too? Let us know in the comments.

United States President Donald Trump this afternoon weighed in on a disagreement between Apple and the FBI, calling on Apple to "step up to the plate" and "help our great country" by unlocking the iPhones used by Florida shooter Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani.

Trump said that the U.S. is "helping Apple all of the time" but Apple refuses to "unlock" smartphones used by "killers, drug dealers and other violent criminal elements."

The Twitter rant comes following a request yesterday from U.S. Attorney General William Barr, who asked Apple to unlock the iPhone 5 and iPhone 7 used by Alshamrani. Barr complained that Apple had provided "no substantive assistance" and said that it is critical "that the public be able to get access to digital evidence."

After Barr's request, Apple issued another statement and provided further detail on the data that has been provided, as well as once again stating that there is "no such thing as a backdoor just for the good guys." Apple's full response to Barr that ultimately triggered Trump's tweet is below:

We were devastated to learn of the tragic terrorist attack on members of the US armed services at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Florida on December 6th. We have the greatest respect for law enforcement and routinely work with police across the country on their investigations. When law enforcement requests our assistance, our teams work around the clock to provide them with the information we have.

We reject the characterization that Apple has not provided substantive assistance in the Pensacola investigation. Our responses to their many requests since the attack have been timely, thorough and are ongoing.

Within hours of the FBI's first request on December 6th, we produced a wide variety of information associated with the investigation. From December 7th through the 14th, we received six additional legal requests and in response provided information including ‌iCloud‌ backups, account information and transactional data for multiple accounts.

We responded to each request promptly, often within hours, sharing information with FBI offices in Jacksonville, Pensacola and New York. The queries resulted in many gigabytes of information that we turned over to investigators. In every instance, we responded with all of the information that we had.

The FBI only notified us on January 6th that they needed additional assistance -- a month after the attack occurred. Only then did we learn about the existence of a second ‌iPhone‌ associated with the investigation and the FBI's inability to access either ‌iPhone‌. It was not until January 8th that we received a subpoena for information related to the second ‌iPhone‌, which we responded to within hours. Early outreach is critical to accessing information and finding additional options.

We are continuing to work with the FBI, and our engineering teams recently had a call to provide additional technical assistance. Apple has great respect for the Bureau's work, and we will work tirelessly to help them investigate this tragic attack on our nation.

We have always maintained there is no such thing as a backdoor just for the good guys. Backdoors can also be exploited by those who threaten our national security and the data security of our customers. Today, law enforcement has access to more data than ever before in history, so Americans do not have to choose between weakening encryption and solving investigations. We feel strongly encryption is vital to protecting our country and our users' data.

The current dispute between Apple and the U.S. government mirrors a similar incident in 2016. Apple was ordered by a federal judge to unlock the iPhone owned by San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook. Apple fought hard against the order, which was asking for backdoor access into iPhones, and explained that weakening security "makes no sense" and would create "new and dangerous weaknesses."

Apple ultimately won the dispute and the government was able to find another way to access Farook's iPhone, which may also be an option in the current situation. Bloomberg this afternoon spoke to several security researchers, including Will Strafach, who said the government could "absolutely" get into the iPhone 5 and iPhone 7 owned by Alshamrani using technology offered by Cellebrite and other iPhone cracking firms.

As in 2016, Apple is not likely to cave in to government demands because doing so would compromise the security of all iPhones. A new report from The New York Times suggests Apple is privately preparing for a legal fight while also attempting to publicly diffuse the situation.

Apple executives are said to be surprised at the case's "quick escalation" and some of the team working on the issue are frustrated that the Justice Department "hasn’t spent enough time trying to get into the iPhones with third-party tools." Apple CEO Tim Cook has put together a team handling the dispute, and the group is said to be hoping to steer the situation towards an outside resolution that "doesn’t involve the company breaking its own security."

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

On iPhone and iPad, a long press (also known as a press-and-hold) gesture will often initiate a different action in an app that isn't immediately obvious, such as revealing an icon's contextual menu. On recent iPhones, a long press will sometimes also offer haptic feedback in the form of a vibration, which Apple calls Haptic Touch.

Apple has made extensive use of the long press gesture and ‌Haptic Touch‌ in its apps, which means if you don't tend to long press screen elements, you could be unaware of some convenient shortcuts to everyday actions, or you could even be missing out on app functionality altogether.

Note that the default minimum period that a finger must press on the screen for the long gesture to be recognized is half a second. If you're having trouble performing a long press, open the Settings app, go to Accessibility -> Haptic Touch, and try selecting a Fast or Slow touch duration. There's also a handy interactive demo area for you to test each setting.

1. Bookmark Multiple Tabs in One Go

Make sure you have a few tabs open in Safari that you want to reference at a later time. Now, select one of those tabs, and in the main browsing window, long press the Bookmark icon (it looks like an open book).

A popup menu will appear on the screen that includes options to Add to Reading List and Add Bookmarks for X Tabs, X being the number of tabs open. Once you've tapped the latter option, you'll be asked to save the tabs in a new bookmarks folder. Alternately, you can choose an existing folder in which to save the tabs.

2. Bulk Copy Links in a Bookmarks Folder

Following on from the last tip, if you long press on a bookmarks folder in Safari, you'll see a Copy Contents option pop up in the contextual menu.

Selecting this will copy a list of every website URL in that folder to your clipboard, allowing you to paste it elsewhere for easy sharing.

3. Fast Scroll Web Pages

A scroll bar appears on the right-hand side of the Safari window whenever you swipe to navigate a web page.

If the content you're viewing is long, perform a long press on the scroll bar. The bar will swell slightly and you'll be able to drag it up and down and scroll at a much faster rate.

4. Close All Open Tabs

If the number of active tabs has gotten out of hand in your browser session, long press the Tabs icon in the bottom-right corner (top-right on ‌iPad‌) of the web page view to reveal the Close All Tabs option.

If you're in the vertical tabs view, you can reveal the same option by long pressing the Done button, which appears in the same location.

In iOS 13, you‌ can actually get Safari to close tabs on your behalf, based on when you last viewed them. Launch the Settings app and select Safari -> Close Tabs, and you'll find options to make the browser automatically close tabs that have not been viewed After One Day, After One Week, or After One Month.

5. Re-open Recently Closed Tabs

If you've accidentally closed a browser tab in Safari and want to open it back up, open up the Tabs view and long press on the "+" icon to get a look at all of the tabs that you've recently closed.

It's worth remembering that this long press option exists, because if someone gets ahold of your phone and checks your browser, even if you've closed out a tab, it's still going to be accessible in Safari, unless you were using a private browser window or have cleared your browsing history.

6. Open All Bookmarks in a Folder in New Tabs

This option appears in the same contextual menu described in tip 2. Long press a bookmarks folder and you'll see an option to Open in New Tabs.

Select the option, and Safari will open everything in that folder in separate tabs, ready for perusal.

7. Preview a Favorite Site or Hyperlink

If you want to take a peek at what a specific web page hyperlink has to offer before actually visiting the site, long press the link to get a preview of it. Note that you can also perform this action on the Favorites or Frequently Visited sites that appear in the start page of a new tab.

If, say, you just want to copy a URL and would rather not have to wait for the preview to load every time you long press on one, simply tap Hide preview at the top-right corner of a link preview, and you won't get one again.

You can revert this functionality on the same long press screen at any time by selecting Tap to show preview.

8. Merge All Safari Windows

This one is exclusively for ‌iPad‌ users running iPadOS. If you have multiple browser windows open in the background, you can tidy things up by merging all of them, including their tabs, into the active browser window.

Simply tap and hold the Tabs icon in the top-right corner of the screen and select Merge All Windows.

9. Download a Linked File

Now that now Safari has a Downloads Manager, you can download files directly from hyperlinks. Simply tap and hold a linked file, then select Download Linked File from the contextual menu. You can tap the Downloads Manager icon in the top-right corner of the address bar to check on its progress.

This option works for web pages, too. If you long press the headline of this article, for example, you can download an HTML version of it.

10. Access the Tab Control Panel

Another one that's just for Safari on ‌iPad‌. Next time you have multiple tabs open, tap and hold one of those tabs to access the new tab control panel.

From this panel, you'll see options to copy the URL of the tab to the clipboard, close all other tabs, and two entirely new options allowing you to Arrange Tabs By Title or Arrange Tabs By Website. Select one of the latter two options, and your open tabs will be arranged alphabetically.