2025-04-01 03:42:46
Categories in Mail for macOS.
Today, Apple released iOS 18.4, iPadOS 18.4, macOS 15.4, visionOS 2.4, tvOS 18.4, and watchOS 11.4. These releases represent an eclectic mix of new and updated features along with smaller changes scattered across each of the OSes.
One of the biggest changes is that the automatic message categorization feature added to iOS’ Mail app in December is now available on the iPad and Mac, although the Categories view can be switched back to List view if you prefer the old style. The updates to Mail on the Mac and iPad also include a digest view that combines multiple messages from one sender into a unified thread as well as sender contact photos.
Priority notifications have arrived on iOS, iPadOS, and macOS, too. The feature is designed to surface important alerts. In my experience, the feature works fairly well but has a more expansive definition of what a priority message is than I do.
Better than most of the news I’ve read recently.
News+ subscribers will notice a new Food section in the News app. The feature draws from several publications and includes a cooking mode that looks a lot like the lyrics view in Music. I haven’t tried to cook using News yet, but I have saved a few recipes I’ve run across during the beta period. I just wish I could export them to Mela or another third-party recipe app.
This year’s set of new emoji is more limited than in past years. There’s a face with bags under its eyes, paint splatter, root vegetable, harp, leafless tree, shovel, fingerprint, and the flag of Sark.
Apple Intelligence is now available in more languages on the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and the newly AI-infused Vision Pro, including English (India, Singapore), French (France, Canada), German (Germany), Italian (Italy), Japanese (Japan), Korean (South Korea), Portuguese (Brazil), Simplified Chinese, and Spanish (Spain, Latin America, US). Default app customization has been expanded, too, allowing users to change out the Translate app in the U.S. and elsewhere and to pick an alternative navigation app in the EU.
The updates include other miscellaneous additions:
Worth the wait? Nope.
Last summer, Apple showed off three art styles in Image Playground, including a Sketch style that didn’t make it into last fall’s releases. That’s changed, as you can now generate artwork using the Sketch style on the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Vision Pro.
Spatial Gallery.
Of all the OSes, visionOS has received the most substantial updates. The Apple Intelligence features found on the iPhone, iPad, and Mac are available on the Vision Pro for the first time. The Vision Pro has a new system app, too: Spatial Gallery includes a collection of Immersive Videos, spatial photos, panoramas, and more. At launch, you’ll find behind-the-scenes footage from Severance along with third-party content from Red Bull, Cirque du Soleil, and others. Along with changes to the Vision Pro’s OS is a new Vision Pro app for the iPhone that includes tips, information about your Vision Pro, app collections, and highlighted content that can be added to your Watchlist.
The new Apple Vision Pro app for the iPhone.
Guest Mode has been improved on visionOS, too. With your iPhone or iPad, you can set up and manage sharing your Vision Pro with a guest whose eye and hand setups can be saved for 30 days. It’s a marked improvement over the OS’s original sharing procedure, but the Vision Pro is still fundamentally designed to be a device that’s primarily used by one person. Guest Mode can also be managed using an iPhone, simplifying onboarding for someone unfamilar with the Vision Pro.
The changes to watchOS are minor. Version 11.4 includes the new emoji, the ability to control Matter-compatible robot vacuums, and an option for the Sleep app’s wake alarm to break through Silent Mode. The updates to tvOS are small, too. You’ll probably notice a big button marked with a lowercase ‘i’ in the TV app that takes you to a show or movie’s information page and a big “+” button for adding items to your Watchlist. There are other refinements to the UI, but not to the OS’s core functionality.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we get one more round of OS updates before WWDC, but I expect it will be a quieter update period until then, since most of the remaining Apple Intelligence features announced last June have been delayed indefinitely. But as always, we’ll be on the lookout for any tidbits in subsequent updates to share with readers.
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Join Now2025-03-29 03:25:42
Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:
Niléane insists she’s not bringing another task manager, Chris has a new e-ink toy he loves, and the whole crew finds interesting ways to add some more text expansion to their lives.
This week, Federico and I each share a couple of drink discoveries and I have an update on my video recording and gaming setups, before we share a TV show, documentary, and movie deal.
Sigmund and Devon highlight the premiere of Seth Rogan-led Apple Original comedy The Studio and recap the captivating second season of Severance.
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MacStories launched its first podcast in 2017 with AppStories. Since then, the lineup has expanded to include a family of weekly shows that also includes MacStories Unwind, Magic Rays of Light, Ruminate, Comfort Zone, and NPC: Next Portable Console that collectively, cover a broad range of the modern media world from Apple’s streaming service and videogame hardware to apps for a growing audience that appreciates our thoughtful, in-depth approach to media.
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Join Now2025-03-28 03:35:48
Earlier today, Nintendo held its last Direct for the original Nintendo Switch. Next week, Nintendo will share more about the Switch 2 during another Direct.
In addition to the many games showcased during today’s event was a new iOS and Android app called Nintendo Today. The app is a mix of Nintendo news, a game release calendar, and fun posts like Super Mario short movies and Metroid Dread concept art. Users can theme the app with images from their favorite Nintendo franchises and pick the games and characters they want to follow, which determines what you’ll see in the app’s Home and Calendar tabs. There are also settings to fine tune whether you get notifications about news and events.
Source: Nintendo.
The iOS app includes two styles of widgets, too. A medium widget displays content, such as video from today’s Nintendo Direct, news, and more. The larger widget displays the current month’s calendar and a list of upcoming game releases and other events, and is themed to match the franchise you pick when setting up the app.
Nintendo’s widgets. Source: Nintendo.
According to Nintendo, it intends to continue to announce games via Nintendo Directs. However, the company also says it will be releasing more information about the Switch 2 via the app after its April 2nd Switch 2 Direct, so fans can expect a mix of Directs and app announcements going forward.
Whether intentional or not, the app disclosed a small bit of information about the Switch 2 by labeling a new button on the Joy-Con with the letter ‘C.’ The C button has been rumored for quite a while, and no one knows for sure what it does, but the Nintendo Today app’s image of a Switch 2 appears to confirm that the button is in fact a ‘C’ button.
Nintendo Today is obviously meant to get Nintendo and its products in front of consumers more often via the device that most people are glued to throughout their days. So, yes, it’s marketing. However, it’s also a fun, playful app that’s beautifully designed and the kind of app that I expect Nintendo sickos like me will turn to daily for a little dose of their favorite franchises.
Nintendo Today is available on the App Store for the iPhone as a free download.
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Join Now2025-03-28 02:40:00
It’s been a couple of months since I updated my desk setup. In that time, I’ve concentrated on two areas: video recording and handheld gaming.
I wasn’t happy with the Elgato Facecam Pro 4K camera, so I switched to the iPhone 16e. The Facecam Pro is a great webcam, but the footage it shot for our podcasts was mediocre. In the few weeks that I’ve moved to the 16e, I’ve been very happy with it. My office is well lit, and the video I’ve shot with the 16e is clear, detailed, and vibrant.
The iPhone 16e sits behind an Elgato Prompter, a desktop teleprompter that can act as a second Mac display. That display can be used to read scripts, which I haven’t done much of yet, or for apps. I typically put my Zoom window on the Prompter’s display, so when I look at my co-hosts on Zoom, I am also looking into the camera.
The final piece of my video setup that I added since the beginning of the year is the Tourbox Elite Plus. It’s a funny looking contraption with lots of buttons and dials that fits comfortably in your hand. It’s a lot like a Stream Deck or Logitech MX Creative Console, but the many shapes and sizes of its buttons, dials, and knobs set it apart and make it easier to associate each with a certain action. Like similar devices, everything can be tied to keyboard shortcuts, macros, and automations, making it an excellent companion for audio and video editing.
On the gaming side of things, my biggest investment has been in a TP-Link Wi-Fi 7 Mesh System. Living in a three-story condo makes setting up good Wi-Fi coverage hard. With my previous system I decided to skip putting a router on the third floor, which was fine unless I wanted to play games in bed in the evening. With a new three-router system that supports Wi-Fi 7 I have better coverage and speed, which has already made game streaming noticeably better.
Ayn Odin 2 Portal Pro. Source: Ayn.
The other changes are the addition of the Ayn Odin 2 Portal Pro, which we’ve covered on NPC: Next Portable Console. I love its OLED screen and the fact that it runs Android, which makes streaming games and setting up emulators a breeze. It supports Wi-Fi 7, too, so it pairs nicely with my new Wi-Fi setup.
A few weeks ago, I realized that I often sit on my couch with a pillow in my lap to prop up my laptop or iPad Pro. That convinced me to add Mechanism’s Gaming Pillow to my setup, which I use in the evening from my couch or later in bed. Mechanism makes a bunch of brackets and other accessories to connect various devices to the pillow’s arm, which I plan to explore more in the coming weeks.
The 8BitDo Ultimate 2 Controller. Source: 8BitDo.
There are a handful of other changes that I’ve made to my setup that you can find along with everything else I’m currently using on our Setups page, but there are two other items I wanted to shout out here. The first is the JSAUX 16” FlipGo Pro Dual Monitor, which I recently reviewed. It’s two 16” stacked matte screens joined by a hinge. It’s a wonderfully weird and incredibly useful way to get a lot of screen real estate in a relatively small package. The second item is 8BitDo’s new Ultimate 2 Wireless Controller that works with Windows and Android. I was a fan of the original version of this controller, but this update preserves the original’s build quality and adds new features like L4 and R4 buttons, TMR joysticks that use less energy than Hall Effect joysticks, and 2.4G via a USB-C dongle and Bluetooth connection options.
That’s it for now. In the coming months, I hope to redo parts of my smart home setup, so stay tuned for another update later this summer or in the fall.
→ Source: macstories.net
2025-03-27 20:56:30
In the wake of last week’s jaw-dropping Severance season two finale, Apple has released a behind-the-scenes video and a Newsroom story showcasing the ways the Mac was used to edit the show. Both feature Severance’s editors discussing the process – creative and technical – behind the show’s editing. It’s worth checking out both pieces because each offers interesting insights into how Severance is made.
The video shows on-set footage of director and executive producer Ben Stiller leading preparation for the season finale’s marching band sequence. It then follows supervising editor Geoffrey Richman’s process of combing through the 70 different camera angle options assembled into a single multicam clip on a Mac to find the right shot for each moment. The video also features insights from editor Keith Fraase and composer Theodore Shapiro about different aspects of the editing process throughout the season, which involved three editors, three assistant editors, and 83 TB of footage.
In the Newsroom story, Geoffrey Richman dives deep into his editing workflow across various Macs. Richman uses a combination of an iMac at home, a MacBook Pro on the go, and a Mac Mini in a post-production studio to get his editing work done. He puts a lot of emphasis on the flexibility the Mac affords him:
I can work on my laptop and I can work on my iMac, and I can work at the post facility or I can work at Ben’s office, and as long as I’m logged into my account, everything I do shows up everywhere… That aspect of Mac I find very handy — to not think about which system I’m physically at.
Richman points out other aspects of working on the Mac, like macOS’ built-in multitasking tools and the MacBook Pro’s HDMI port, that make the Mac the right tool for editing a TV show like Severance.
Lumon Terminal Pro.
You can read the full story on Apple’s Newsroom. The video, Behind the Mac: Editing Severance, is available to stream both on YouTube and, in a fun twist, on Apple’s fake product page for the Lumon Terminal Pro. While our dreams of refining data on a real Terminal Pro have yet to be realized, you clearly can make great TV on a Mac.
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Join Now2025-03-26 22:08:06
Marcos Tanaka kicked off his App Store career with a real banger when he released MusicHarbor, an app for following the work of your favorite music artists on the iPhone, iPad, and Mac. We awarded MusicHarbor App of the Year in 2020, and since then, it has been steadily updated, making it my go-to app for catching up on my favorite bands. Today, MusicHarbor’s latest update, version 5.0, takes the app even further with new news, top chart, time capsule, and list features.
News.
My favorite new section of MusicHarbor is News, which pulls articles about the artists you follow from a dozen sources. It’s an excellent set of publications that includes chorus.fm, NPR Music, Pitchfork, and others. If there are any feeds among those listed that you don’t like, though, you can turn individual publications off, so they won’t appear in the app.
If you follow a lot of artists like I do, you’ll appreciate that you can also search for artists by name or using keywords found in the headlines of articles. The app includes a row of profile pictures of the artists you follow for whom the app has found news, which is a nice visual shortcut to those stories, too.
A feature I’d love to see added in the future is the ability for users to add other RSS feeds. There are a lot of excellent smaller music blogs out there that I’m sure some users would like to access from MusicHarbor.
Top Charts.
Top Charts is another new MusicHarbor feature that you’ll find in a few places. Whether you’re viewing an artist’s page in the app, or the releases or videos tabs, you’ll find a chart of trending songs or videos with short previews. That makes it easy to browse popular songs and music videos, adding them to your library as you go or opening them up in Apple Music or YouTube to hear more.
Time Capsule.
Another handy discovery tool is Time Capsule that is behind the three-dot More button in MusicHarbor’s Releases section. Here, you’ll find albums released one, two, three, and more years ago, which I’ve found is a great way to resurface forgotten music.
MusicHarbor’s grid and list views.
Finally, you can now switch from MusicHarbor’s default grid of artist profile pictures and names to a list view. The list view works well and looks good, but I prefer the grid, which fits more artists per screen. Still, I appreciate having the choice.
We’ve covered MusicHarbor for several years, and it’s grown up a lot in that time. Each of the app’s features is interconnected with the others in a way that creates something that is greater than its parts. The result is a contextual fabric that ties the features together and gives music fans more than just a list of tracks. That’s always been the power of MusicHarbor, and with today’s release, it’s never been truer. If you’re a music fan and haven’t tried MusicHarbor before, there’s no time like the present.
MusicHarbor is available on the App Store as a free download. Some features require a subscription of $3.99/month, $19.99/year, or a one-time payment of $69.99.
Founded in 2015, Club MacStories has delivered exclusive content every week for nearly a decade.
What started with weekly and monthly email newsletters has blossomed into a family of memberships designed every MacStories fan.
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