MacRumors

Apple this afternoon updated its YouTube channel with three new tutorials designed to walk people through using various photography features on the iPhone.

The videos cover shooting an overhead photo on iPhone using the level feature, shooting in black and white, and adjusting slo-mo timing on iPhone to change the slow motion effect of a previously captured slo-mo video.

Apple regularly shares iPhone photography tutorials in this ongoing tutorial video series to provide users with tips and tricks on using various Photos and Camera features. Like many of Apple's tutorial videos, these new tutorials are aimed at people who aren't particularly familiar with the feature set of the iPhone.

Apple does, however, sometimes highlight features that even some seasoned users might not be aware of or remember, so these videos are often worth the 30 seconds it takes to watch them.

Apple today seeded the third beta of an upcoming tvOS 11.3 update to developers for testing purposes, two weeks after seeding the second beta and just a day after releasing the tvOS 11.2.6 update.

Designed for the fourth and fifth-generation Apple TV models, the tvOS 11.3 developer beta can be downloaded onto the Apple TV via a profile that's installed using Xcode and Apple Configurator.

The tvOS 11.3 update introduces support for AirPlay 2, allowing the Apple TV to be added to the Home app as part of a HomeKit setup.

With AirPlay 2, you can play the same song on multiple Apple TVs in different rooms, and when AirPlay 2 officially launches, that functionality will extend to other AirPlay 2 devices like HomePod and AirPlay 2 compatible speakers.

Other new features in tvOS 11.3 include enhancements to Match Content support, automatic frame rate switching on the fourth-generation Apple TV (a feature that was added to Apple TV 4K in a past tvOS update), and automatic mode switching for AirPlay video sessions.

Over the past few weeks Snapchat has been rolling out a major user interface overhaul to more and more users on its iOS and Android apps. Most users have responded negatively to the app redesign, which separates friends from brands so that users can focus on people they actually know, but condenses stories and text chats into one page.

Today, Snap Inc. announced an additional update to Friends and Discovery pages that should help make it easier for users to navigate between stories and chats.

On the Friends section of Snapchat, users will be able to cycle through tabs related to active stories, group chats, and "all" content. The Discovery section's tabs will focus on separating publishers, creators, and the community. Snapchat said tabs will be launching fairly soon on iOS, and Android will follow in the coming weeks.

In addition to tabs, today Snapchat users will have many more GIF sticker options to choose from thanks to full support from GIPHY. Snapchat has partnered with GIPHY and greatly expanded its library of GIF stickers that users can discover and place into a story. Previously, the only GIF stickers available in Snapchat were in-house designed stickers that launched late in 2017.

Users can tap the sticker icon, type in the search field, and a new GIPHY section in results will showcase GIF stickers related to the search query. Like other stickers, GIF stickers can be scaled, rotated, pinned to a video story, and more than one can be added to a snap. Snapchat's GIPHY support launches one month after Instagram announced a similar wide-scale support for GIF stickers in its own version of stories.

Apple TV 4K models with 64GB of storage are finally back in stock following months of shipping delays for the larger capacity model.

64GB configurations are currently estimated for delivery in 1-2 days in the United States and several other countries on Apple's online store, while same-day pickup is now available at dozens of Apple's retail stores.

Back in November, shipping estimates for the 64GB model fell back to 4-5 weeks. The estimate began to shrink gradually in January and has now improved enough for next-day delivery to be a possibility again as of this week.

Apple never provided a reason for the shipping delays, but it may have been due to a recent shortage in the NAND flash storage market.

Apple TV 4K was released last September in 32GB and 64GB sizes for $179 and $199 respectively in the United States. Apple recently began selling refurbished units for $30 off in the United States, a roughly 15 percent discount.

Following an ad for a senior product manager last spring that hinted at Spotify's interest in creating a hardware product, this week a collection of new job listings further suggest the launch of a physical Spotify product will be coming in the future (via Music Ally). The listings call for an Operations Manager: Hardware Product, Senior Product Manager: Hardware Production, and Project Manager: Hardware Production and Engineering.

According to the page for the Operations Manager, Spotify is "on its way" to developing and launching its "first physical products," potentially hinting at an upcoming rival device to Apple's HomePod. Although the job listing pages are not full confirmations of Spotify's entry into the smart speaker market, in terms of physical hardware a speaker of some kind does make sense for the music streaming company. The "connected hardware" could also refer to devices like wireless headphones and other music-based products.

A Spotify speaker would enter the market as a competitor to products like Apple's HomePod, which as of now can play Spotify but lacks deep integration with the service and instead favors Apple Music. Spotify's speaker could flip that and focus on the company's own streaming customers, of which there is a large market of more than 140 million subscribers worldwide who could be interested in a Spotify-focused speaker.

The person who gets hired for the position will help the company in setting up an operational organization for manufacturing, and build up the supply chain, sales, and marketing, all while working out of the company's office in Stockholm. All three job listings state that the employee's work will "impact the way the world experiences music."

Spotify is on its way to creating its first physical products and setting up an operational organisation for manufacturing, supply chain, sales & marketing.

We are looking for a passionate and seasoned Operations Manager that will contribute in the creation of innovative Spotify experiences via connected hardware. You will define and manage Distribution, Supply, Logistics, fulfillment and Customer Service for Hardware Products. You will also work with partners to deliver the optimal Spotify experience to millions of users. Above all, your work will impact the way the world experiences music.

As the rivalry between Apple Music and Spotify has grown since the former service's mid-2015 launch, Apple Music is now forecasted to overtake Spotify in paid subscriber numbers in the United States as soon as this summer. That prediction came from The Wall Street Journal earlier in the month, in a report that stated Apple Music's monthly growth rates have been exceeding Spotify's by about three percentage points. In terms of worldwide numbers, Spotify still has about 70 million paid subscribers compared to Apple Music's 36 million.

After over three years on the App Store, developer Nuance has decided to discontinue the gesture-based Swype Keyboard apps for both iOS and Android devices. The company's announcement of the iOS app's discontinuation came earlier this month, but it's only just begun to garner attention due to a confirmation of the Android app's removal given to XDA Developers.

On Android, the company discontinued its Swype+Dragon for Android keyboard app, which combined Swype's unique swipe-to-type feature with Dragon's voice dictation. On iOS, it appears that one version of Dragon remains on the App Store in the United States, called Dragon Anywhere. Attempts to search for "Swype Keyboard," however, do confirm the third-party keyboard app is gone from the App Store, with results surfacing rival company apps like SwiftKey.

According to Nuance, the company's decision to shut down Swype was a "necessary" move, granting it the ability to focus on selling AI solutions in the enterprise market. Recently, Nuance has been working on voice dictation software for medical professionals, as well as placing it within vehicles.

Nuance will no longer be offering the Swype keyboard on iOS app store. We’re sorry to leave the direct-to-consumer keyboard business, but this change is necessary to allow us to concentrate on developing our AI solutions for sale directly to businesses.

We hope you enjoyed using Swype, we sure enjoyed working with the Swype community.

Although Swype is no more, users still have access to third-party iOS keyboard apps like Gboard, SwiftKey, Fleksy, Grammarly, and more. In terms of functionality, SwiftKey is the app that aligns most with Swype's swipe-to-text abilities, letting users enter text one handed using the SwiftKey Flow feature.

iOS 8 updated iPhones and iPads with the ability to support third-party keyboards on a systemwide basis, and at the time Fleksy, SwiftKey, and Swype jumped to the top of the paid and free iOS App Store charts in multiple countries. Although Fleksy has had a rocky development history, Swype is the first of these initial keyboard apps to see its development discontinued completely.

Samsung plans to slash its OLED panel output in response to Apple's decision to cut production of iPhone X due to "weak demand", the Nikkei Asian Review reported on Tuesday. Samsung will make OLED panels for 20 million fewer iPhones at its South Chungcheong plant in the January to March quarter, a lot lower than its original goal of supplying panels for 45 million to 50 million iPhones, according to the paper.

Samsung is said to have made a 13.5 trillion won ($12.6 billion) capital investment in anticipation of the originally expected number of OLED panel orders from Apple. The new target reportedly reduces plant production to roughly 60 percent of original forecasts, and Samsung's display business is expected to suffer revenue declines for the first half of 2018. Samsung stock fell as much as 2.3 percent in morning trade, reported Reuters, while shares of some Japanese OLED component makers also declined.

Today's report follows previous claims by Nikkei that "weak demand" for iPhone X has forced Apple to slash its production target by half in the three month period from January. However the claim doesn't tally with Apple's own results reported at its recent quarterly conference call earlier this month, and it's unclear which supply chain sources the publication is relying on. Apple CEO Tim Cook has dismissed these types of reports in the past, suggesting that the company's supply chain is very complex and that any singular data point is not a reliable indicator of what's actually going on.

During its record financial results report for the first fiscal quarter of 2018 (which corresponds to the fourth calendar quarter of 2017), Cook said the iPhone X was the top-selling iPhone model every week since it had debuted in November. iPhone shipments were down 1.2 percent year-over-year compared to the year-ago quarter, but only because of an extra sales week last year – Apple's growth was actually 21 percent year-over-year on an adjusted basis.

Nike today updated its Nike+ Run Club iOS app with a new Challenges feature that aims to help users stay motivated throughout the week by letting them see how their mileage stacks up against other users in the global Nike running community.

The new challenges appear in the Club section of the app. As of writing there are three challenges to join, including a 15K February Weekly Challenge, a 50K March Weekly Challenge, and a 100K March Weekly Challenge. Tapping on one sends you to a summary screen that tells you how many runners are currently participating and how long the challenge runs for.

Tapping on the Join button enrolls you in the challenge, but you can leave it at any time through the challenge overflow menu (the three dots in the upper right corner of the screen). It also looks like you can only participate in challenges if your privacy setting is set to "Friends (social)" or "Everyone (public)".

Completing challenges earns users achievement badges, similar to those found in Apple's Activity app. In addition to the weekly challenges, Nike says there will also be occasional special Nike Challenges, which sound a lot like Apple's seasonal/one-off challenges that many Apple Watch users will be familiar with.

The Nike app's last major feature update came in October, when Nike introduced Audio Guided Runs to coincide with the launch of Apple Watch Series 3 models.

The Nike+ Run Club app can be downloaded on the iPhone and all Apple Watch models, but with Nike+ models, there's an option to launch the Nike+ Run Club app from the exclusive Nike watch faces.

Nike+ Run Club is available from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]

Apple today released a minor software update for the Apple Watch, upgrading watchOS 4.2.2 to watchOS 4.2.3. The watchOS 4.2.3 update comes one month after the release of watchOS 4.2.2, a minor update focusing on bug fixes.

watchOS 4.2.3 can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the iPhone by going to General --> Software Update. To install the update, the Apple Watch must have 50 percent battery, it must be placed on the charger, and it must be in range of the iPhone.

Today's update addresses minor bugs discovered since the release of watchOS 4.2.2, and it includes a fix for a bug that causes device crashes when a specific character in the Indian language Telugu is sent, received or input into an app. Similar fixes have also been released for macOS High Sierra and iOS 11.

watchOS 4.2.3 will be succeeded by watchOS 4.3, an update that's currently in beta testing and slated for release in the spring. watchOS 4.3 introduces portrait orientation support for Night Stand mode, and it reintroduces support for controlling music played on the iPhone with the Apple Watch.

Apple today released a new update for tvOS 11, the operating system designed to run on the fourth and fifth-generation Apple TVs. tvOS 11.2.6 comes one month after the release of the tvOS 11.2.5 update, which focused on bug fixes and other under-the-hood improvements.

tvOS 11.2.6 can be downloaded over the air through the Settings app on the Apple TV by going to System --> Software Update. Apple TV owners who have automatic software updates turned on will be upgraded to the tvOS 11.2.6 automatically.

As a minor 11.x.x update tvOS 11.2.6 focuses on performance improvements and bug fixes to address issues that were discovered following the release of tvOS 11.2.5. It is being released alongside bug fix updates for iOS, macOS, and watchOS to address a problem that caused devices to crash due to an inability to render a specific character in the Indian language Telugu.

tvOS 11.2.6 will be followed by tvOS 11.3, an update that is currently being beta tested and is slated for release this spring.