MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

Apple Retail Stores will sell the Nest thermostat, according to a report from iLounge.The Nest is the brainchild of Tony Fadell, one of the co-creators of the original iPod. A Wi-Fi enabled thermostat that learns from the user and promises significant energy savings, not to mention a much greater ease of use than traditional "smart" thermostats. The Nest's iPhone app allows users to check and ...

Apple's iPad selection page for Asia reveals that the company will be launching the third-generation iPad in both the Philippines and Guam next Tuesday, May 29. This smaller group of additions comes just over two weeks after Apple's last round, which saw the device launch in 30 new countries. Apple has noted several times that its international rollout of the third-generation iPad is the...

At the introduction for the third generation iPad this past March, Apple invited a number of developers to showcase their apps designed for the Retina display-equipped new iPad. One of these was Autodesk, a major developer that has been prolific at writing apps for iOS. Their new app, Sketchbook Ink, has finally arrived on the App Store.Powered by a brand new engine, Autodesk SketchBook Ink...

As highlighted by our sister site TouchArcade, a group of independent developers across a broad array of platforms are having a weeklong sale on their apps celebrating their distribution through marketplaces that allow developers to set their own pricing. Operating under the banner of Because We May, the developers are in many cases offering very significant discounts on their apps. We...

Intuit has upgraded the iOS app for its Mint personal finance tool with two new "most-requested" features that should keep users from ever having to go to the Mint.com website. Until now, there were several important budgeting tasks that required users to head to Mint's website to manage.Users can now create new budgets and edit existing budgets, using a clever "budget slider" to set and adjust ...

Wired points to a recent Technology Review interview with IBM chief information officer Jeanette Horan highlighting the issues of the "bring your own device" trend in which employees choose their own mobile devices to bring to the workplace and use for company business. But even when employees wish to use their own devices, IBM locks down a number of features for security reasons, cutting off...

TiVo owners can control their devices via an iOS app on the iPhone and iPad, but -- for the moment -- can only watch shows on their television.But that's all going to change in a few months. According to a report from ZDNet, TiVo is launching an external decoder box that would plug into the TiVo Premiere set-top box and would deliver content to an iPhone or iPad.The unique part is that the...

Our sister-site TouchArcade notes that Chillingo's excellent physics puzzler Feed Me Oil is free today for both the iPhone and iPad. It's normally $0.99 for iPhone and $1.99 for iPad. Feed Me Oil is something of a mix between World of Goo and Where's My Water?.Every level features two things: A spigot where oil shoots from, and an area (usually designed as a mouth of a strange creature) where...

Several years ago, Comcast began instituting bandwidth caps of 250GB per month on its residential customers. In 2008, this was plenty for most customers, but with the advent of streaming video services like Netflix, Hulu, WatchESPN and others, some users have been concerned about whether the 250GB cap was sufficient for their needs. Today, Comcast has announced it is revamping its cap system,...

Reuters reports that China Mobile Chairman Xi Guohua has once again publicly stated that the world's largest mobile phone carrier is engaged in talks with Apple about offering the iPhone to its customers."We've been actively talking to Apple on how we can cooperate," China Mobile Chairman Xi Guohua, who assumed the post in March, told a shareholders meeting. "I can't give you too many details,...

Apple has filed a motion to dismiss in a case filed by customers over alleged misleading advertising depicting the Siri technology in the iPhone 4S. The lawsuit, filed in March, alleges that Apple's advertising of Siri doesn't reflect real-world usage. When asked for directions or to locate a store, "Siri either did not understand what Plaintiff was asking, or, after a very long wait time,...

The American Customer Satisfaction Index (ASCI) today released its latest rankings of customer satisfaction in the United States for mobile phones and a number of products and services, with the new mobile phone rankings being expanded to include Apple, Research in Motion, LG, and HTC for the first time. In its first appearance in the rankings, Apple easily topped the list with a score of...

Business Insider reports on a new research note from Macquarie analyst Ben Schacter, who claims that Google is working to bring a version of its Chrome browser to iOS devices. According to the report, Apple "may already be reviewing" the app, which could debut before the end of the quarter. Google Chrome browser for Android Google currently splits ad revenue share with Apple for Google...

Seventeen more states have joined the antitrust lawsuit against Apple and several book publishing houses over the pricing of ebooks. Perhaps more interesting are certain details released in the latest filing that were previously redacted, including one from Steve Jobs. Portions of this email have been seen before, but this is the first chance the public has had to see a major negotiation written...

AirPlay is a technology that seamlessly moves audio and video from device to device in the Apple ecosystem. It's built into the iPhone, iPad, and -- most importantly -- the Apple TV set-top box. Among other things, AirPlay can be used to send video from iPhone apps like YouTube, MLB.tv, or WatchESPN to the AppleTV.Apple hasn't advertised AirPlay as strongly as some other features, like the...

Sparrow today announced that its iPhone mail app [App Store] has been updated to version 1.2, bringing several new features including swipe navigation between messages and new support for composing in landscape orientation.New features: - Navigate between messages by swiping up and down - Landscape composing - Edit and create label/folder - Localization in 9 languages: English, French,...

Finnish game studio Rovio has begun to drop hints about its next game -- and its first outside the Angry Birdiverse. Amazing Alex will be based on the game Casey's Contraptions, which Rovio recently acquired. Rovio CEO Mikael Hed told a Finnish TV channel that the game will focus on Alex, "a curious young boy who loves to build things." The Next Web quotes Ville Jeijari, Rovio's VP of...

With the launch of the new iPad, equipped with 4G LTE cellular data, it seems likely that the next iPhone will be similarly supplied. Until then, a new startup called FreedomPop is rolling out a new iPhone case/sled that includes a Wi-Fi hotspot powered by the Clearwire 4G network. FreedomPop, being backed by Skype co-founder Niklas Zennstrom, is offering the $99 device with 500MB of free data ...