Microsoft today updated Cortana for iPhone with a significant redesign that has been available to Android users since December. As noted by Paul Thurrott, version 2.0 of the app is more responsive with redesigned calling, texting, and reminders and more immersive full-page answers with quicker page transitions.
Cortana's mobile redesign launched on Android in December
Cortana is Microsoft's equivalent of Siri for Windows PCs and smartphones, Xbox, iOS, and Android. The personal assistant enables users to ask questions, check the weather, schedule calendar appointments, set reminders, track packages, look up sports scores, and many other tasks that Siri is capable of.
Apple has topped Laptop Mag's Tech Support Showdown list for the third year in a row, receiving praise as "the best tech support in the business," and beating out nine other computer-making companies in the process. Laptop Mag said that its list is aimed at helping customers see who has the most reliable and clear customer service in the tech industry.
To conduct the research, the magazine sent reporters undercover to make calls, query support chat online, and ask questions on social media, and accumulated data on the following top ten notebook makers: Apple, Microsoft, Acer, Razer, Dell, Lenovo, HP, Asus, Samsung, and MSI. Each company was given a grade on a 100-point scale, and Laptop Mag weighted 60 points towards online support and 40 points toward phone support.
For Apple's winning spot, the company received a 56 for its web support score and a 37 for its phone support score, resulting in an overall mark of 93 for the Cupertino company's tech support in 2017.
Laptop Mag went more in-depth about its experience with Apple support in various forms, discussing a six minute response time from the @AppleSupport Twitter account and a positive, snappy experience with the new Apple Support iOS app. The site also put Apple to the test by calling three separate customer service reps to test their knowledge of the newest changes to macOS and the Touch Bar on the MacBook Pro.
Call 1: Hayley then instructed me to disable iCloud Drive, and explained how to keep a local copy of the files. During the 2 minutes it took to download the files, I chatted with Hayley about the weather down in Florida, as he was positive and easy to talk to.
At the end of our chat, I asked if there was some way to turn iCloud Desktop and Documents off without disabling iCloud Drive. Hayley said there was not, which is, unfortunately, not the case. The call took 8 minutes in total.
Call 2: My next call connected me to Frank in Oregon, who explained that the physical fn key makes the Touch Bar show the Function keys. Frank also showed me how to set specific apps to use the Function keys in the Touch Bar, and he needed to place me on hold to ask colleagues if I could do the same for Finder.
After telling me that there was no such option, Frank directed me to a feedback page where I could ask Apple to add this option in a future version. In total, the call took 15 minutes, but Frank solved my main question in only 3 minutes.
Call 3: My last call connected me with the upbeat and chipper Letasha, who showed me the icon in the dock and menu bar that you click to activate Siri. Before we concluded, Letasha explained how to change the keyboard command used to start Siri. The call lasted 7 minutes.
On average, it took Apple's reps 6 minutes per call to get answers — a minute less than its time last year.
Ultimately, Laptop Mag noted that while the customer service reps might have a few spots of incorrect knowledge about Apple's software and hardware, they still "provided solutions in a speedy and positive manner." While Apple's web score was unrivaled at 56, the company's phone score of 37 was beat out by Acer at 38 points. In total, Acer came in second with a total score of 88 points, making it the "top-rated Windows PC vendor for support" and gaining ground on Apple's number one spot.
If Apple wants to improve its support, it should ensure support techs learn about all of the new features so that they can give completely accurate answers to questions on topics such as iCloud Documents. Its Twitter account could also improve by providing answers directly, instead of linking to posts where the content is found. Overall, though, Apple offers the best support of any laptop manufacturer, as it has for many years.
Last November, Apple won the "Gold" #Customer award for its helpful responses from @AppleSupport on Twitter. According to Twitter, Apple ranked #1 among support accounts for average engagements and average engagements for followers, racking up 150,000 likes and retweets since its launch in March 2016.
On Twitter, users can ask Apple questions between 5:00 a.m. and 8:00 p.m. Pacific Time, and the company's support team normally responds within a few minutes. Although Laptop Mag said that it didn't award Apple "any points for finally creating a Twitter support account," the site noted that it's one of the best parts of Apple's expansive customer support system and it applauded "the team running that account for the timely, helpful replies."
Check out Laptop Mag's full report on Apple's customer service performance right here.
Globally popular messaging platform Viber will add a new self-destructing chat feature to its iOS app later this week (via The Verge).
The new feature, called "Secret Chats", gives users the option of starting entire conversations that self-destruct after a certain time limit.
Users can prevent messages within the secret chat threads from being forwarded to other conversations. The feature also notifies users on iOS when someone takes a screenshot, and blocks screenshots altogether when chat threads are viewed on an Android smartphone. As with all Viber chats, the messages are end-to-end encrypted, while users can also opt to hide Secret Chats behind a PIN code.
The feature comes hot on the heels of the "Secret Messages" feature the company introduced earlier this year that lets users specify how long individual messages can be accessed for after being viewed by the recipient.
Viber has more than 800 million registered users worldwide, with particularly strong followings in parts of Asia and across eastern Europe and northern Africa.
Samsung will add a facial recognition capability to its upcoming Galaxy S8 because of doubts about the speed and reliability of iris scanning alone, according to a report yesterday in the Korea Economic Daily.
The news comes amid rumors last month that Apple's "iPhone 8" will feature a "revolutionary" front-facing camera system with the potential to combine the advantages of both facial and iris recognition.
Due to some limits of iris scanning such as speed and accuracy, we have decided to add facial recognition to the Galaxy S8," a Samsung official was quoted as saying. "With a face scanner, it will take less than 0.01 seconds to unlock the phone."
Citing a second Samsung official, the report said the mobile business division had completed the software side of the technology and is currently testing the facial recognition in prototypes. The S8, which is expected to be the biggest to rival to the upcoming OLED iPhone, will launch on March 29.
Apple's ability to combine the technologies in a single camera system may be achievable thanks to built-in transmitting and receiving infrared modules, backed by software algorithms made by PrimseSense, which Apple acquired in 2013.
Apple is expected to include the camera system in a radically redesigned, minimal-bezel handset with an OLED display that includes built-in fingerprint recognition. The so-called "Tenth Anniversary Edition" model is expected to launch in the fall alongside two, more typical "S" cycle edition phones that will supersede the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus.
The rapidly increasing take-up of Apple's Swift programming language was confirmed again yesterday with the publication of a survey that ranks the popularity of programming languages.
In the latest TIOBE Index, Swift was ranked 10th, up four places from March 2016. As CultofMac notes, the nine programming languages ranked above it are at least two decades old, so breaking into the top 10 is a feat more impressive than it sounds. Swift was only introduced by Apple in 2014, replacing Objective-C as an easier-to-learn language.
Apple has promoted Swift as ideal for kids who are keen to code, with its gentle learning curve demonstrated in Swift Playgrounds, an app that teaches children how to use the language. Apple has been updating and refining Swift since its debut, and is set to unveil Swift 3.1 this spring.
The TIOBE Index is calculated using search engine data to approximate the popularity of programming languages within online coding communities. Earlier this year, a quarterly study revealed that Swift had become one of the most sought-after freelance developer skills among employers.
Sci-Fi puzzle adventure game Love You to Bits has been named Apple's App of the Week, and as a result, it will be free to download for the next seven days.
Released in February of 2016, Love You to Bits is normally priced at $4.99. In this game, players take on the role of Kosmo, a space explorer who is searching for the parts of Nova, his robot girlfriend that was destroyed in an accident.
Gameplay consists of exploring strange worlds of planets, solving puzzles, and hunting down hidden objects to uncover the details of the love story between Kosmo and Nova.
Universal Explore enigmatic planets full of mind-boggling puzzles to be solved! Meet and outsmart dozens of bizarre creatures and aliens from all around the universe!
Breathtaking Experience and rebuild a thrilling love story for all audiences: pure visual-storytelling with stylized visuals and a hair-raising soundtrack!
Cute Reconstruct the touching past of Kosmo and Nova by collecting dozens of their hidden love-tokens.
Enduring Coming soon, extra unique levels will be added to "Love You to Bits"! The adventure continues with no in-app purchases of any kind!
To play the game, an iPad 2 or newer, iPhone 4s or newer, or fifth-generation iPod touch is required. iOS 8 or later must also be installed.
For more free and discounted apps, make sure to check out our Deals Roundup, which includes an up-to-date list of app deals. Our Deals Roundup is updated with new app deals multiple times a week and is a good resource for finding app sales.
Apple today updated its App Store with a major "Celebrating Indie Games" promotion that highlights a huge range of games created by independent developers and small app development companies.
According to our sister site TouchArcade, Apple's indie games promotion may be the reason some high profile indie titles are coming out over the course of the next few days, including Bit City, Typeshift, and Card Thief.
Most of the highlighted apps aren't on sale during this promotion, but it gives iOS gamers a way to find quality games that they may have missed.
Apple's new TV app for iPhone and iPad is currently available in the United States only, but that may change in the near future.
TV app on iOS 10.3 beta 5 in Canada
The fifth beta of iOS 10.3 seeded to developers and public testers on Wednesday appears to include the TV app in place of the Videos app for some Canadian users, including myself. For context, my iPhone 7 Plus's region is set to Canada and I am signed into an Apple ID account linked to the Canadian store.
While the TV app can be opened, it is not fully functional. The "Watch Now" tab directs users to the "Store" tab, which does not load properly. The main "Library" tab listing TV shows and movies in a user's iTunes library does work, as does the "Search" tab, which integrates with apps such as Netflix.
Additionally, a few Canadian users on Reddit claim they do not see the TV app on iOS 10.3 beta 5. Given this is pre-release software, it is unclear if Apple is actually testing the TV app beyond the United States, or if there is simply a bug or glitch. We'll know for sure when iOS 10.3 is officially released.
Apple launched the TV app on iOS 10.2 in the United States to simplify the television-watching experience and help users discover new TV shows and movies to watch. The app provides a unified experience for accessing your TV shows and movies across multiple video apps, such as Netflix, Hulu, and HBO GO.
Plex today announced that its new Plex Cloud service has officially launched, making it available to all Plex Pass users. Plex Cloud has been in beta testing since September of 2016, but is now ready for a wider release.
Plex Cloud is designed to allow Plex users to store their media in the cloud so that it's accessible from anywhere without the need to set up a local server.
Using a compatible cloud service, Plex Pass subscribers can create an always-on Plex Media Server that can stream any media content to any device with Plex installed in 60 seconds or less. As with a standard local server, media is organized using the Plex app for quick access to TV shows, movies, music, pictures, and more.
Because Plex Cloud relies on cloud storage, Plex Pass customers will need access to Dropbox, Google Drive, or OneDrive. A subscription may be required, based on how much storage space is required for an individual's media library.
A Plex Pass is also required for access to Plex Cloud. The Plex Pass, which includes access to other upgraded features as well, is priced at $4.99 per month, $39.99 per year, or $119.99 for lifetime usage.
Apple has announced that its relocated St. Johns Town Center store in Jacksonville, Florida opens Saturday, March 11 at 10:00 a.m. local time. The next-generation store will be located at 4835 River City Drive, just down the street from its current store at 4712 River City Drive in the open-air shopping complex.
Apple's existing St. Johns Town Center store opened in March 2005
Apple's new 9,100-square-foot store is situated between Tesla and Tory Burch stores near the southeast end of the Town Center. The space, which was vacated by Forever 21 last year, is over twice as large as its current store, which opened in March 2005. The older location will likely close by Saturday.
Elsewhere, Apple plans to double the size of its Woodland Mall store in Grand Rapids, Michigan to 8,000 square feet, according to MLive. And in China, a store with a beautiful staircase is set to open at Jinmao Place in Nanjing in the near future. Apple has yet to announce an official grand opening date.
For years, Apple has sent new Genius hires to its Infinite Loop headquarters in Cupertino, or sometimes an auxiliary campus in Austin or Cork, to receive hands-on training for up to three weeks. Recently, however, Apple appears to have stopped offering these group-oriented trips, according to people familiar with the matter.
Apple's off-site Genius Training program has been replaced by an in-store, self-guided experience using company-provided reference materials, according to a source. The training now involves watching web-based seminars through the Apple Technical Learning Administration System, or ATLAS, another source said.
In Cupertino, Apple had a small training facility with a mock Genius Bar and Macs set aside specifically for trainees to take apart and perform test repairs on. But with the switch to web-based seminars, Apple is allegedly providing "virtual take aparts" only now, with no physical hardware.
"This means that many customers who check their computers in for repair may have their device serviced by someone who has never physically worked on their model of computer before," said a person familiar with the matter.
A handful of Geniuses have shared photos of their training experience on social networks over the years, with one person calling it a "life-changing experience" and others echoing similar positivity. One source described it to us as a "rite of passage" and "a milestone in the career" of an Apple retail employee.
Apple's Genius Training program was for years a rite of passage for Apple Retail employees: not only a training opportunity, but a chance to visit one of Apple's corporate campuses, to get questions answered at the source, and, for those who headed to Cupertino, to experience Silicon Valley and the Apple culture. The traditional "selfie" in front of One Infinite Loop was a milestone in the career of every Apple Genius.
Apple Store managers have been quietly informing new Genius hires of the changes in recent weeks. It is unclear if the off-site training is permanently discontinued, or if it could return to Infinite Loop or Apple's new campus in the future. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Last year, we revealed a new Apple retail position called Technical Expert, which falls between Technical Specialist and Genius. These employees are able to provide mobile repairs, a task previously limited to Geniuses, and troubleshooting for software and products like the Apple Watch and Apple TV.
One of Facebook's Snapchat clones is launching worldwide today within Facebook Messenger, after a previous soft launch in countries including Poland and Australia. Called "Messenger Day," the new feature will allow Messenger users to post updates that disappear after 24 hours.
The twist with Messenger Day, according to Facebook, is that the app's filters and features encourage users to create new plans in the moment, instead of revisiting things your friends have already done like on Snapchat.
To facilitate this, Messenger Day includes a collection of photo and video filters -- like the time of day or call-outs asking to grab food -- that will provide appropriate context for friends viewing posts. According to Facebook VP of messaging David Marcus, who spoke with TechCrunch, this will let Facebook Messenger users snap a quick photo, add a frame, and see if any of their friends are up for going grab a coffee or watching a movie, without having to text individual people or post on Facebook itself.
"This is about today. It's not about yesterday. It's not about tomorrow" Marcus tells me. "The 2 key functionalities are 1. I'm going to set context because it's going to make for better conversations if people know where I am and what I'm doing. And 2. It's about where I want to take my day, like 'I'm bored and I want to go out for coffee' or 'I want to go see a movie' so I'm going to use a frame, take a photo, and see which of my friends are going to engage with me to actually make that plan, because planning is one of the core capabilities of a messaging app."
Like Instagram Stories, Messenger Day sits atop Facebook Messenger and shows the days of your friends in a row of horizontal icons that autoplay one after another when viewed. Users can interact with specific posts by sending a message to the poster, and an "Active Now" indicator will let users know who is online and available to meet up with in the moment.
All of the usual doodling options, filters, and stickers of other apps will also be found in Messenger Day. For its plan-making filters, Facebook said that there are over 5,000 of them, including invites to going for a run, grabbing drinks, and other activities. Users can even create custom filters through text.
This is where Messenger Day’s unique slant on Stories for messaging comes in. The searchable, categorized filters include calls to action like “Who’s up for grabbing coffee?”, “Road trip”, “Movie night?”, “Let’s grab drinks”, “Let’s go for a run”, and tons more. These make it easy and fun to invite friends to hang out with you offline.
And unlike posting “who wants to grab dinner?” on Facebook where a lack of responses could make you look unpopular, the posts disappear and all replies in Messenger Day are private so you don’t have to worry about seeming lonely.
Including Messenger Day, Facebook's Snapchat copying has grown to include Instagram Stories, WhatsApp Status, and the yet-to-launch-worldwide Facebook Stories. Within Facebook Messenger, some users noticed recently that a few of the company's "Reactions" have been made available to respond to friends' messages, including a new thumbs-down option.
Photography app VSCO has announced a handful of new features for its users, centering around the addition of its separate GIF creating DSCO app [Direct Link] directly into the main VSCO app. Thanks to the inclusion, users can now create looping images and post them to their VSCO feeds.
Similar to the camera wheel options on Instagram and in the iOS Camera, users can tap DSCO at the bottom of the camera in VSCO to switch over to the video format, record a moment, and upload it to VSCO. The company has shared a collection of DSCO examples on its website for users to check out.
In addition to DSCO, a few new community-side features have been added into the VSCO iOS app, including the ability to block unwanted users from interacting with your content. VSCO images are public so blocked users can still view any image they want, but they can no longer follow users who have blocked them, repost, or favorite their images or DSCO videos.
To further facilitate an environment of positive feedback, VSCO has added the ability to favorite posts between users without the public at large being able to see favorites. VSCO said that this makes favorites "a private acknowledgement between two people," and lets its users take bolder creative risks without the worry of like counts that other platforms have.
VSCO is a place to take creative risks and share what you love, not what you think others will love. This is why VSCO does not publicly show your follower count or how many people reposted your image — it’s where you can be you.
The company said that the newly announced features will be rolling out over the next couple of weeks. In December, VSCO added RAW image capturing and editing on iOS 10 devices.
VSCO is available to download for free on the iOS App Store. [Direct Link]
Readdle today updated its popular PDF Expert app for the Mac to version 2.2, overhauling the app and adding new features to make editing and annotating PDFs even easier than before.
New editing tools automatically detect the font, size, and opacity of the original text in a PDF document, so PDFs can be edited more like regular text documents for a much quicker editing experience.
Readdle has also introduced a new toolbar layout that's specialized for tasks like going over a contract or reading an article, with options for viewing several pages of a single document, comparing two documents, and more.
To make searching faster, version 2.2 of PDF Editor includes search indexing, plus the ability to search all opened files and save history has been added.
Uncertainties over Foxconn's manufacturing expansion into the United States have been raised once again, this time following comments made by company chairman Terry Gou, who spoke to reporters at an event celebrating the start of construction on a $8.87 billion display plant in Guangzhou, China (via Nikkei). At the ceremony, Gou told reporters he had just returned from a trip to Washington without confirming if he met with the Trump administration while he was there.
Since the November election, and even before it, the Trump administration has advocated for Apple specifically to make some of its products in the U.S. and not at foreign facilities, leading to multiple reports that Apple suppliers are looking into building large plants stateside. Now, Gou has raised concerns over any of the company's previous U.S. manufacturingplans because he's not sure if the U.S. government can work fast enough to stay ahead of all of the work needed to be done before any company like Foxconn can build a successful, large-scale facility in the states.
"I am concerned as to whether the U.S. can resolve all the investment issues in only a few months' time," Gou said, adding America also lacks the skilled labor and comprehensive supply chain the display industry requires.
"Does the U.S. offer incentive programs for foreign investors? They'll need to pass bills first, and we'll need to wait for American authorities to make a decision first," Gou said.
Ultimately, Gou tried to avoid strictly siding with one country or the other, saying that the best course of action would be to support both once the option became available. "I am not willing to choose between [the U.S. and China]. Why should I give up on any market?" Gou ended the line of questioning from reporters with a pledge for the governments of both countries to avoid a trade war and "get along peacefully."
"It is in the interest of the entire humanity that China and the U.S., the top two economies in the world, can get along peacefully," Gou said. "They are in the process of gambling with each other, and I can foresee that the two will eventually work together to grow [their] economies and deliver beneficial outcome for many. If they don't, then everyone will be losers."
In a separate report from Reuters, Foxconn is now said to have lost ground in its bidding for Toshiba's memory chip business "due to its close ties with China." The Japanese government is worried about "the transference of key technology" if a winning bidder has a close relationship with China, and Toshiba executives are reportedly aware of the government's wishes and "will take into account how close bidders are to China in the selection."
Apple accounts for over 50 percent of Foxconn's total revenue, and because of lukewarm demand for the iPhone 7 in 2016, Foxconn saw its first ever profit decline since the company went public 1991. Optimism has now surrounded the company's 2017 outlook, however, due mostly to excitement for the debut of the "iPhone 8," perhaps called the "iPhone Edition."
Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues 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.
Reuters published an article on Thursday that reveals some of the painstaking work that goes into making Siri capable of speaking additional languages, which remains one of its biggest strengths over rival virtual assistants.
The behind-the-scenes look appears amid claims that Apple has squandered its lead in the voice-assistant space, with Amazon, Google, and Microsoft all advancing the features of their respective assistants recently.
But for a smartphone market in which most sales are outside the U.S., Siri's big advantage over the other assistants is underlined in the number of languages it can speak. Microsoft is said to have an editorial team of 29 people who work to customize Cortana for local markets, while Google and Amazon say they plan to add more languages soon. But it's a game of catch-up: Apple already has 21 languages, localized for 36 countries. That compares favorably to Microsoft's Cortana (eight), Google Assistant (four), and Amazon's Alexa (two).
At Apple, the company starts working on a new language by bringing in humans to read passages in a range of accents and dialects, which are then transcribed by hand so the computer has an exact representation of the spoken text to learn from, said Alex Acero, head of the speech team at Apple. Apple also captures a range of sounds in a variety of voices. From there, a language model is built that tries to predict words sequences.
Then Apple deploys “dictation mode,” its text-to-speech translator, in the new language, Acero said. When customers use dictation mode, Apple captures a small percentage of the audio recordings and makes them anonymous. The recordings, complete with background noise and mumbled words, are transcribed by humans, a process that helps cut the speech recognition error rate in half.
Once the required amount of data has been gathered and a voice actor has recorded the Siri responses in a new language, Siri is released with answers to what Apple believes will be the most common questions. Siri then learns more about what users ask, with additional tweaks made via updates every two weeks.
The drawback to Apple's script-writing approach is that it does not scale, according to Charles Jolley, creator of an intelligent assistant named Oslo. "You can't hire enough writers to come up with the system you'd need in every language. You have to synthesize the answers," he told Reuters. "That's years off."
But it's something the founders of Viv – Siri's original creators – are actively working on. "Viv was built to specifically address the scaling issue for intelligent assistants," said Dag Kittlaus, the CEO and co-founder of Viv, which was acquired by Samsung last year. "The only way to leapfrog today's limited functionality versions is to open the system up and let the world teach them."
Consumers should soon get a taste of how far they've come. Viv technology will power Bixby, Samsung's new virtual assistant, set to feature in the Galaxy S8, which launches at the end of this month.
Apple recently updated its online store for refurbished products to add the 13-inch 2016 MacBook Pro without a Touch Bar, which was originally released in October of 2016.
There are a limited number of models available for purchase with various processor, storage, RAM configurations. Prices are discounted by up to $390, with Apple offering 12 to 16 percent off depending on a machine's configuration.
Only higher-end models with upgraded processors, RAM, and storage are available at the current time, but earlier today, at least one lower-end machine was available for purchase. Apple's refurbished stock fluctuates often, so if you're hoping to get a specific configuration, it's best to keep a close eye on the refurbished store.
13 and 15-inch 2016 MacBook Pro models with Touch Bar are not currently available from Apple's refurbished site, but could be added soon based on the availability of the non-Touch Bar model.
All of Apple's refurbished products go through a rigorous refurbishment process before being offered for sale, which includes inspection, repairs, cleaning, and repackaging. Refurbished Macs come with a one-year warranty that can be extended with an AppleCare purchase. For more tips on purchasing a refurbished product, make sure to check out our dedicated guide.
Didi Chuxing, the Chinese-hailing company that Apple invested $1 billion in, is opening an artificial intelligence lab in Mountain View, California, reports Recode. The lab will focus on intelligent driving systems and AI-based security for transportation, confirming Didi Chuxing's interest in self-driving vehicles.
The facility, located less than 10 miles from Apple's two Cupertino campuses, is one of Didi Chuxing's first locations outside of China. Its location in Mountain View gives Didi Chuxing a better opportunity to recruit key autonomous driving talent, most of which is concentrated in the Bay Area. Google, Uber, Apple, and hundreds of other startups are nearby.
Didi Chuxing has already poached two high-level employees from Uber and Google. Charlie Miller, the engineer who hacked and stopped a jeep remotely is joining Didi from Uber, while Jia Zhaoyin, a senior software engineer at Waymo, comes from Google.
Apple invested $1 billion in Didi Chuxing back in May 2016, and there has been speculation that the investment could lead to a deeper partnership between Didi Chuxing and Apple in the future as Apple is also working on self-driving technology.
Didi Chuxing is the largest ride-hailing company in China, having purchased Uber's Chinese operations in July 2016.
Rumors originally suggested Apple would develop its own autonomous electric vehicle, but Apple shifted focus last summer and is now said to be aiming to create an autonomous driving system that would perhaps allow it to partner with car manufacturers or ride-hailing companies like Didi Chuxing in the future.
The rapidly increasing take-up of Apple's Swift programming language was confirmed again yesterday with the publication of a survey that ranks the popularity of programming languages.
