By Conner Carey
It seems like there are thousands of fitness apps to choose from and little advice on where to get started. Meanwhile, the most difficult part of any workout routine is to begin. Running, in particular, can feel daunting when you’re sitting on the couch, but nothing beats the movement of propelling one’s body through the air. Here’s a list of four running apps to help beginners feel like pros.
By Conner Carey
The iBooks app for iPhone is a great way to collect and read your favorite books or pdfs. The iBooks store has the latest in e-reading across all genres. However, if you’re an avid user of iBooks, it’s easy to lose track of which books you’ve read and how many you haven’t. iBooks doesn’t let you filter by read and unread, but you can create collections to organize your reading list.
When Apple announced iOS 9, I got really excited about the forthcoming News app. And now that I'm using it regularly, I feel my excitement was warranted. Plus, I like the snappy and seamless manner in which one can toggle between the overview of the news and a specific story. And I recently learned there's an even easier way to return to the overview, as well as to read the next story without going to the overview.
By Conner Carey
Reviewing the iPad Pro, I can’t help but feel like it was made for artists. The best apps I’ve seen optimized for the device are sketching apps. One such app is part of Adobe’s creative cloud, Adobe Photoshop Sketch (free). It’s still too early to find art solely made on the iPad Pro, but I decided to scour Behance for art specifically created with Adobe Photoshop Sketch on the iPad. Here’s my favorites.
By Conner Carey
The new iPad Pro is out and available for order. There’s much talk as to whether or not the iPad Pro can replace your PC, but the answer to that question could very well change over time as more apps are optimized with the iPad Pro in mind. Some developers are ahead of the game and have already released apps to show-off the new iPad’s capabilities. Here are five of the best iPad apps you can download now.
By Paula Bostrom
I love using Wallet. Instead of my actual wallet or keychain getting weighed down with shopper loyalty cards, the Wallet app stores them all in one place, no plastic required. Here's how to switch from plastic to the Wallet app.
By Conner Carey
Maybe you’re not ready to buy those songs you love in iTunes, but you do want to save them for purchase later. Well, in iTunes you can easily create a wish list for those songs.
By Conner Carey
The iBooks app is extremely useful for keeping books and pdf files together in one place on your iPhone or iPad. From the iBooks app, you can visit the iBooks store and browse the top charts and featured books on the market. However, storage space fills up quickly and you may not want to keep all the books forever. When your My Books storage is getting cluttered, here’s how to remove iBooks from your iPhone or iPad.
By Conner Carey
In the Apple News app, you have the option to view stories you tap as a preview or as the full story. Preview is the default function and makes sense for slower Internet connections; however, if you want to automatically read the full story, here’s how to change the setting.
By Krisoy Desouza
Views on Top (free) is an app where you can locate the best scenic experiences from around the world. People who love travel also adore the opportunity to take a good photograph or two. Some of the world’s best scenic locations are on here.
By Daniel Rasmus
For people who spend time a lot time on the phone at work or in traditional audio calls delivered through Voice over IP (VoIP), Facetime, or on any of the dozens of audio and video conferencing services, Plantronics has recently shipped the ultimate accessory: the Voyager Focus UC ($299.95).
By Conner Carey
I’m a music sharing fiend. Yet, if I want my Facebook friends to listen to a track, I always share Youtube videos, even if I’m listening to the song on Spotify or Apple Music. This is because you can listen to a Youtube video from your News Feed but Spotify and Apply Music links take you to the respective app. However, that's officially changed.
By Todd Bernhard
It's a reality today that all wearables will be compared to the Apple Watch, but the Activité Pop ($149.95) from Withings compares favorably. For starters, it's a lot more affordable, at about $150. It's also waterproof, which Apple doesn't claim. The first thing you'll notice is that it's analog. That means the battery life can be measured in months (up to eight), not hours. It's still smart, just don't expect to read your text messages on it. What you can do, though, is track your activity, steps, and sleep, and receive vibration alarms.
By Jim Karpen
Sometimes particular conversations or individuals can become a bit of a nuisance in Messages — so much so that you'd like to stop receiving notifications for that conversation. Maybe you are part of a group conversation run amok or a family member likes to text you during work hours? Fortunately, you can turn on Do Not Disturb for any particular conversation.
By Conner Carey
Apple Music is kind of tricky. Sometimes My Music wouldn't play when I was away from Wi-Fi and out of Cellular reach and I couldn’t figure out why. Turns out, not all of My Music in Apple Music is available offline. Which means I’ve been using Cellular data without knowing it. To prevent this, Apple Music has the option to view Only Offline Music.
By Conner Carey
On by default, Safari Quick Search uses search shortcuts to look within websites. Therefore, if you type a website name as a part of your search, Safari will look within that website for what you need. For example, type “Youtube cat video” to show YouTube search results for cat videos. If you’d rather this feature be turned off, here’s how.
By Conner Carey
When you type in popular app names into the Safari search url bar, Apple will try to match that with apps you either have or may want from the App store. It’s a suggestion feature turned on by default. Here’s how to turn it off.
By Conner Carey
You don’t need 3D Touch to take a gif-like video, and it seems Instagram saw an open market after Apple's Live Photos release: meet the app Boomerang (free) for capturing short loop videos. Boomerang shoots a burst of 10 images and strings them together to create a mini video. From there, you can share the burst to your phone, Facebook, or Instagram.
One of the interesting new features of iOS 9 is its "proactive" smarts. Apple wants your device to anticipate what you want to do depending on the context. A good example of that is how your iPhone or iPad now responds when you plug in earbuds or headphones. Your device figures that you want to listen to something, and a small icon appears in the lower left corner of your lock screen that shows the most recent audio app you've been using, whether that's Apple Music, Spotify, Podcasts, or any other app.
By Conner Carey
With iOS 9, your iPhone looks through the Mail app to let you know who might be calling when an unknown number comes in. This is true for outgoing calls as well; iOS 9 will try to match the number you’re calling with a contact from emails. If this is a function you’d like to turn off, here’s how.
