Microsoft today announced huge updates for the Microsoft Band and Microsoft Health apps along with the first release of an SDK for third-party developers and a web dashboard, too.

The updates announced today are in response to user feedback and besides the web interface includes support for biking, new ways to scan and respond to notifications and integration with Microsoft HealthVault and MapMyFitness. There are also 5 new guided workouts to choose from.

Apple will drop support for logging into iTunes using your AOL username and password at the end of March 2015. Apple originally partnered with AOL for logging into iTunes in late 2003, and used to give users the option to log in either with their email address and password or their AOL credentials. Will still be able to use your AOL email address to register for iTunes.

Apple will pull support beginning March 31, and users must convert their username and password to an Apple ID before that time, according to the company’s support article:

You must convert your AOL Username to an Apple ID in order to maintain access to the stores and to content you purchased previously.

You can find Apple’s support page with the instructions for converting your AOL username and password into an Apple ID at the link below.

Source: Apple, via 9to5Mac

Microsoft Health has added a pretty nifty web app to the apps already available on different platforms, meaning you’re never far away from your data, regardless of the device in front of you. Arriving at the same time as new features and a developer SDK for the Microsoft Band, the popular wearable few can actually buy continues to get better and better.

Here’s a quick first look at the new web dashboard.

Archos has decided to help a new education effort in France with a selection of Windows 8.1 tablets and notebooks that it will offer to schools in its native country at special prices. This new program is designed to be a part of France’s “Grand Digital for Schools Project” which is aiming to give 50,000 tablets and notebooks to middle and high-school students in 2015 and over a million such devices to students in 2016.

Pivots is a new number game for the iPhone where you use math in a race against the clock. The objective of Pivots is to add rows and columns up to 15 before the clock runs out, and the game offers you the ability to change the board in order to reach your goal.

Pivots lets you change the board by rotating 2×2 squares in order to reposition numbers in a given row or column. Every time you successfully line up a row or column that adds up to 15, you earn points and put time back on the clock. Failed moves will see time subtracted. As you make progress in Pivots, new levels will speed up the clock and add multipliers to your score.

Pivots is a free download, though there is a $1.99 in-app purchase to remove advertising. You can get Pivots from the App Store right now.

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Google announced earlier today that it has acquired “technology and intellectual property” from the online payments company Softcard. Rumors about the acquisition were first reported in January. The news puts the fate of the recently launched Softcard Windows Phone apps for Verizon and AT&T customers up in the air.

April is coming sooner than you think, and developers know this all too well.

Hundreds of iOS developers are hard at work prepping all sorts of WatchKit apps for the Apple Watch: Health monitors, RSS feed readers, social communications apps, business programs, and more.

Wareable and Wired spoke with several developers in the last week about their impending Apple Watch software, and they’re offering a bit of a sneak peek at what’s in store for users when the device launches.

Wareable spoke with ten developers working on a variety of apps for the watch, including list-making, a ski tracker, and a smart home remote:

Curtis Herbert’s Slopes app is designed for skiers and snowboarders who use an iPhone’s GPS to record stats and form: “Think Nike+ or RunKeeper, but for winter sports, and with unique takes on visualising data, such as 3D replays right on your phone.” The goal of the companion app is to make it easier to check in on stats while on the mountain: “Gloves get in the way of TouchID, and iPhones are usually buried deep in warm pockets. So an Apple Watch app is perfect for getting details at a glance, and you can start recording without ever taking out your iPhone.”

Wired has a more focused look on companies specifically looking to innovate in the health space:

Take Propeller Health, another tool for those with respiratory conditions. In addition to monitoring inhaler usage with the company’s Bluetooth sensor, its location-sensing mobile app tracks weather, pollen count, and air quality (along with other personal trigger factors) to notify a patient when conditions arise that might initiate an asthma attack. The notifications are personalized and contextually relevant, and since they’re on the wrist, they could be even less obtrusive than they are on a smartphone.

Both of these roundups excite me for different reasons: Wareable’s roundup gives a good overview of what we might see appearing on our watch faces come April, while Wired’s interviews paint a fascinating picture of the Apple Watch’s potential to change the health landscape. As someone who’s consistently been frustrated with fitness trackers because I do a sport that’s not particularly conducive to step-tracking, I have high hopes for the Watch’s varied sensor data; it’s also really exciting to think about the potentials for long-term lifestyle changes and further Health app integration.

What apps do you folks most want to see come to the Apple Watch on launch day? Let us know in the comments.

Source: Wareable; Wired

Apple has launched their new crash reporting service with the latest beta release of Xcode 6.3. The new service is designed to make it easier to find and fix crashes quickly. Apps submitted with debug symbols to both the TestFlight beta service and the App Store will have their crash log data aggregated into crash reports, according to Apple:

Apps that you’ve submitted with debug symbols to the App Store and to TestFlight will have their crash log data collected and aggregated into crash reports that will automatically download into Xcode. The enhanced Organizer window makes it easy to triage your crashes, jump directly to the offending code, and mark a crash as resolved.

Developers can find out more about Apple’s new crash reports service in Apple’s iOS Developer Library.

Source: Apple 1, 2

Lenovo CTO Peter Hortensius has issued an open letter today concerning the Superfish software that the company pre-loaded onto some of its notebooks in the latter end of 2014. While a large portion of the letter is dedicated to steps the company has already taken to stop pre-loading the software and help customers remove it form their machines, Hortensius also details steps that the Lenovo is taking to address security issues and software vulnerabilities in the future.