From the Editor’s Desk: Quick hits on a working weekend
It’s a working weekend — those of you who’ve been around a while might remember what that’s code for — so I’ll keep things really brief this week. Still have a few thoughts on things, though, so let’s get to it.
Get ready to pay more for apps on Windows Store from next month
Microsoft will update the price tier values for Windows Store during the week of April 13, 2015. Windows Store supports 96 tiers that publishers can use to price paid apps and in-app products. These price tier values are updated periodically to maintain consistency across currencies, accounting for changes in foreign exchange rates, taxes, and other geographic pricing considerations. The information comes through an email Microsoft has sent out to developers, alerting them of the change.
Beginning April 13, the price tier values will be updated and while the US Dollar (USD) price in each tier will remain the same, the prices in all other currencies adjusted relative to the USD price.
Regarding web ads redirecting to the App Store
You land on a web page in mobile Safari and all of a sudden you’re torn away and dumped into some game on the Apple Store.
We’ve gotten complaints about this — and experienced it ourselves — for what feels like a couple years. Something causes a web page, when opened, to immediately redirect you to the App Store, almost always to the listing for a popular game. Maybe the perpetrators are hoping you’re so enticed by the game you download it even after being hijacked, so they’ll get some revenue, direct or affiliate. But it deplorable and, even after a couple of years, it’s unclear how and why it keeps happening.
Apple patched Safari iOS 8 in an effort to prevent just this kind of behavior from happening. It slowed things down for a while, but other methods of circumvention certainly seem to have been found. The original assumption was that it was caused by bad-actor ads inserting code to bust out of their frames and force a redirect to iTunes. Now it seems like it’s more complicated than that, because it also seems to be happening on sites without any ads capable of doing that.
Jason Snell recently wrote about it on Six Colors as a follow up to Ben Mayo’s post from 9to5Mac. Here’s what Jason had to say:
If Mayo is seeing this behavior on Six Colors, though, we have to assume that something else is at work, such as:
- Exploitation of a bug in Safari that puts the browser in a particular state even after it’s left a page contaminated with that code
- JavaScript firing in a different Safari tab/window, making Mayo misapply blame for the behavior
- Interception and rewriting of page code by a carrier, ISP, or even a compromised wireless router
It could be all of the above, and more. It could be a complex attack with elements in ads, caches, browser exploits, compromised routers, bad ISPs or carriers, or bad certificates on devices.
Certainly it’s the responsibility of ad brokers to make sure they never approve any ads containing any code that behaves this way, and of sites like iMore to make sure we ban anything that gets through. It’s still a wild web out there in many ways, however, and some brokers and sites might be okay with this kind of behavior.
If it really can persist beyond the original point of contact, it might be worth checking to see if it’s left anything behind. To see if you have any profiles installed on your iPhone or iPad you can’t account for, go to Settings > General > Profiles (at the bottom). If you’re experiencing the problem, you can also try wiping your Safari cache. That’s in Settings > Safari.
We’ll keep looking into it, and I’m sure others will as well, and update when we have more information.
Candy Crush Soda Saga: How to beat levels 40, 52, 60, 70, and 72
The ultimate guide to beating levels 40, 52, 60, 70, & 72 in Candy Crush Soda Saga!
If you’re playing your way through Candy Crush Soda Saga and our basic tips, hints, and cheats just don’t seem to be enough for you to get past some of the harder levels, we’re here to help!
In this guide we are taking a look at some of the hardest levels to beat out of the first 100 levels. So if you’ve exhausted all your other options and just can’t seem to pass them, follow along for the best tips, hints, and cheats we have to help you pass them!
Level 40
Level 40 requires you to find 6 bears that are hidden underneath an array of different confections you’ll need to break through. In order to uncover them, you’ll want to focus on certain kinds of special pieces more than others. Concentrate on forming these candies more than anything else:
- Fish
- Vertical stripes
- Donut holes
- Packaged candies
Since you start off at the top of the level, vertical striped candies are ideal for stripping a layer off an entire row. These are much more important at the beginning of the level than they are once you get lower into the grid. If you have a chance to make a horizontal striped candy, still take the move, but just wait to use it until it drops into the grid and can clear an entire layer horizontally. Detonating them at the top won’t do you any favors.
You’ll also want to start collecting fish early on, but try not to use them right away. Fish have a tendency to clear a piece that the game thinks is important — at least that’s the case most of the time. Save these for towards the end. If you’re left with only a piece or two of ice to crack, the odds are pretty good you can get to it with a fish.
Packaged candies are important in this level since they clear a ton of the board in one swoop. They’re especially useful when combined with a fish or a donut hole. Anytime you can wait to get these to combine, it’s worth it.
The only thing that makes level 40 hard is the small amount of moves you’re given to complete it. As long as you take your time and give priority to using the four combo pieces laid out above, you should be able to clear it fairly quickly.
Level 52
In level 52 you need to pop 8 soda bottles. As you pop them, another one will re-appear in its place. The easiest and best way to clear this level is to focus on creating and using fish. I’d tell you to try and get fish next to a striped candy but in my experience, doing this always results in a vertical stripe, which is the opposite of what you really need.
Instead, use fish as you acquire them unless you see a useful combo coming your way, like swiping two fish together. At the very beginning of the level you also want to make sure that you’re swiping towards the bottom but not below the soda line, as this won’t allow more pieces to fall that could help you.
Level 60
In order to beat level 60, you’ll need to get all 5 bears above the candy necklace string in 35 moves or less. With lots of pastries standing in your way, you’ll have to be strategic about how you do this. When you start level 60, pick a side to start clearing and stick with it. Doing this lets you drill away at cupcakes and other pastries faster. Toggling between sides when you don’t have to means you’re wasting moves.
There are two kinds of candies you should focus on making in this level:
- Coloring candies
- Packaged candies
If you’re lucky enough that you can manage to get a coloring candy next to a packaged candy for a combo, game over. You will have beat the level. However, since we already know how difficult coloring candies are to make to begin with, if you just can’t manage to get one, focus on floating packaged candies between large groupings of pastries and detonating them. The more board you can clear in a single move, the more flexibility you’ll have at the end of the level when it comes time to navigating your bears to the top.
Level 70
Level 70 is a find the bears level, 20 to be exact. The hardest part about level 70 is making enough room at the beginning of the level in order to start making special candies. The easiest way to do this is to make getting rid of the cupcake wrappers highlights in the above image your first priority. Once these are gone, you’ll have more room to focus on special candies. The two that you should focus on making the most of are:
- Packaged candies
- Striped candies (horizontal or vertical)
After you’ve cleared most of the cupcake wrappers we talked about above, start making special candies but always focus on making them as low as you can on the board. The reason you want to make moves lower to the bottom is because the more new candies that appear on the board, the better the chance you have of creating a cascade effect. This way most of the cupcakes towards the top start clearing themselves with little effort on your part, and while using fewer moves.
Above I mentioned that packaged candies and striped candies are your most valuable in this level. That’s because if you can get them next to each other you can clear lots of cupcakes in a single move. You obviously don’t want to depend on this strategy the entire time but always be on the lookout for the opportunity to achieve that particular combo. Almost every time I’ve passed level 70, it was the result of a few lucky packaged and stripe candy combos.
Level 72
Level 72 requires you to get the bear above the string. It’s divided into 5 different sections that you’ll need to navigate your bear through. In each section, you’ll want to take a slightly different approach.
Section 1:
Easy enough. Match a licorice cage to release a fish as fast as possible. Once it’s free match it and it will swim right to the next licorice cage. That fish will swim directly for the striped candy. Your bear will then move to the second area.
Section 2:
Go ahead and detonate the first donut hole by swapping it with the purple candy. This will bring your bear into view. You’ll notice that there are blue candies in the bottom blocking your way that are nowhere to be found in the accessible part of the game board. Don’t make this harder for yourself than it needs to be. Instead of making tons of vertical striped candies, focus on releasing the donut hole at the top of the board and matching it with a red candy. If you can do this, the blue candies will match themselves and you’re on your way to the next portion of the level.
Section 3:
Focus your energy on the middle of the board and attempt to make a combo out of a fish candy and a striped candy. This will clear the soda bottles fastest and raise the soda level. Then all you’ve got left to worry about is matching candies and floating your bear to the top.
As a side note, if you have a striped lollipop hammer at your disposal, this will make quick work of floating your bear towards the top. This works in section 4 as well.
Section 4:
Start by clearing all the cupcakes in the middle of the board. Once that’s done and the soda level is at the top, create a fish and striped candy combo to float your bear all the way to the top. Just be sure that you don’t have any cupcakes or bottles left or the fish will make that its target instead of bringing your bear to the top.
Section 5:
Section 5 is the last one and is pretty straight forward. You just need to get your bear above the string on the left. If you used our tips above, you should have plenty of moves left to accomplish this. The easiest way is to try and match as many soda bottles as you can without the help of fish. Then use the fish to pop any candies that are standing in the way of reaching the candy necklace. And if you can get a striped fish over there, even better!
More Candy Crush help
If you’re still struggling to beat certain levels in Candy Crush or Candy Crush Soda Saga, be sure to tell us what ones are giving you problems in the comments below! And be sure to check out our other tips and guides by visiting the following links:
- Everything you need to know about Candy Crush
- Top 10 tips, hints and cheats for Candy Crush Soda Saga
- Original Candy Crush: Top 10 tips, tricks, and cheats
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The Chase Bank app no longer works for Windows Phone as support is now entirely cut off
A few weeks ago, Chase seemed to have taken a less-extreme position than Bank of America over its discontinuation of their banking app, announced in January. The massive bank told users that they could continue using the app ‘until further notice’.
The implication at the time (and this all it was) was that if you had the Chase banking app on your phone it would still work into the foreseeable future. Unfortunately, this is not the case. According to reader reports, the app is completely non-functional as of today.
Looking back at the HTC One (M8)
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HTC followed up its very well received One (M7) flagship with the M8, a smartphone with a design that was further refined, which rightfully continued to win awards and fans. As other OEMs were only beginning to find their footing in the design and build quality department, some more so than others, HTC’s latest offering certainly brought with it the hope that this would be the One people chose over the competition. Shortcomings aside, its eye-catching profile and fantastic user experience did lead to a number of users snatching up the One (M8).
But that was then, and this is the HTC One (M8)… now.
Unlike this year, when HTC launched its latest flagship in Barcelona just before the official start of MWC 2015, HTC chose to stay away from any trade shows last year, launching the One (M8) during simultaneous events held in New York and London. HTC has to be appreciated for the fact that they keep their device announcement events pretty simple, a similar philosophy to what we see in the company’s approach to its smartphones.
The One (M8) brought with it the appearance of a second “eye” on the back of the phone, above the 4 MP “Ultrapixel” camera that HTC was still touting as the best low-light camera experience. Though the Ultrapixel camera proved itself in the One (M7) as a decent performer, its detractors focused mainly on the lack of high detail when zooming in, as the pictures were much smaller compared to other flagships.
This time around, a second camera module was going to bring depth data to photos, resulting in better depth of field, similar to what you’d get with DSLR shooters. This certainly caught a lot of people by surprise, given the rumors that suggested that the Duo Camera addition would be for 3D picture shooting, instead of something that allowed you to add effects to just about any picture after the fact.
Aside from the phone, one nice aspect of this new flagship was the addition of many in-house accessories for the One (M8), something that wasn’t always the case with Android devices. And given the out-of-the-box thinking with the Dot View Case in particular, the HTC One (M8) felt like an “experience,” rather than just a device bursting with raw power to appease the the spec hungry masses.
Once we actually got our hands on the phone, much of what we liked from the announcement and the first hands-on continued to impress. In particular, the One M8 stood out from the smartphone crowd due its metal unibody design, which made for a much better looking phone when compared to the plastic or glass builds from other manufacturers, like Samsung with its Galaxy S5. A smooth software experience that didn’t require you to fight with the user interface to get things done, and one of the best audio experiences available to users in the front-facing BoomSound speakers were definitely contributing factors as well. The One (M8) felt like a phone that just worked, which is exactly what many users are looking for in a phone.
The One (M8) is not without its flaws though. The brushed metal is still one of the most slippery surfaces to use, and complaints about the phone slipping about have been observed. Though the rounded sides add to the look, we still don’t think they provide the best grip, even if the narrow profile certainly helps with this. The black bar at bottom of the display housing the HTC logo remains a point of contention for many users, even if HTC insists that the bar is necessary in order to accommodate crucial internal components.
The improved HTC Sense is a pretty different take on the stock Android experience, but it is also one of the easiest to navigate. A vertical app drawer felt odd for a little while, but BlinkFeed was still a nice way of getting the general headlines from the news or social media feeds, and is still considered a better second homescreen addition than what we get from competitors. Though adding contextual colors to sections of the interface sounded like a good idea, I preferred to have everything be monotone or black. Personally, I felt this matched the general dark look of the Sense UI better.
The one area that fell under heaviest criticism was the camera, an iteration from HTC that still included the Ultrapixel construction. While low light performance is always an issue with Android flagships, HTC hoped to alleviate their smaller megapixel pictures by trying to remedy this very problem. While in some cases it proved to be true, my biggest gripe with the One (M8) was its jumpy exposures. Often, I would get pictures that were simply not of accurate color reproduction or of proper exposure, opting for either blown out or darker images, depending on where your focus and exposure were tapped in the viewfinder. While getting good photos was definitely possible, it just didn’t happen as often as we would have liked. For a phone that tries to be easier to use across the board, having to fiddle around for a nice picture didn’t seem to align with that philosophy.
This brings us to the capabilities of the Duo Camera. In short, getting depth information for every single photo was a very nice idea, but the execution didn’t do it justice. When shooting a proper subject in a photo, the Duo Camera effects would definitely find the spot and try to stitch it out for a nice bokeh effect, but unfortunately, this effect would often bleed into the wrong parts of the picture. With this fundamental first step already causing some issues, trying to put extra effects on top of the bokeh seemed pointless, not to mention the fact that many of the effects were just impractical. One aspect we did like about the camera experience was the highlight reel made possible by Zoe in the Gallery. Though you might sometimes forget that you can use the Zoe camera to get short clips or even burst shots of your scene, doing so could result in a really nice recap of an event or day in your life. And when done well, it was a nice little surprise to come back to.
In revisiting the HTC One (M8), it still looks like the phone everyone wants because of its nearly flawless design. It certainly is different from all other phones in the space, and if you’re the kind of person that wants to get a bit of attention for your phone choices, the One (M8) was certainly the best bet. It was just a disappointment that HTC couldn’t get the camera right, and even today, it is overshadowed by other cameras that forego tricks and gimmicky additions in order to provide an easy to use and effective photo taking experience.
While the day to day user experience of the One (M8) was one of the best upon its release, ultimately the phone was let down by a poor camera experience that would turn off many users who would have otherwise considered the device. All of that hopefully changes in the HTC One M9, which has a further refined design, a sign that HTC knows where their flagship line has its strengths, along with a much more powerful 20 MP camera. The Ultrapixel camera again makes a return, but this time as a front facing shooter. Furthermore, the Sense UI continues to evolve, without trying too hard to change what makes it so accessible.
As good as the One (M8) was, we are certainly very excited to put its successor to the test.
Google files for patent on cancer-killing wearable
Google X, the company’s “moon shot” research lab, is known to be involved in a lot of projects in a wide variety of fields. Last fall one of those projects was revealed to be a pill that could be used to detect cancer and other diseases. Now the company is back with a patent application for a wearable device that may be able to capitalize on that pill research to do something about the bad cells that it finds in a person’s body.
The pill that was developed uses iron-oxide nanoparticles that can identify cancer cells based on biochemical signals. The nanoparticles will then “paint” the cells and travel through the body with them.
The new device described in the patent application is called a “nanoparticle phoresis” and is described a wrist band wearable device that can transmit energy into a person’s body. The energy could be a variety of forms like radio frequencies, magnetic fields, acoustic pulses, or even infrared or visible light.
The idea is that the energy transmitted into a person’s body can target cells or other molecules in the blood stream that pass within the path of the wearable. One obvious target would be those cells “painted” with nanoparticles. Since they are iron, a magnetic field could be used to draw them out of the bloodstream.
The target would not have to be limited to those painted with nanoparticles though if medical professionals can figure out ways to identify other target cells. As an example, Google describes certain proteins known to be involved in Parkinson’s disease. Energy that targets just those proteins could be used to destroy them, slowing the development of Parkinson’s disease.
source: The Telegraph
Come comment on this article: Google files for patent on cancer-killing wearable
This Lumia 1320 skin case is only $3.95 today while supplies last
Made from multiple thermoacrylics, this Lumia 1320 skin case is highly elastic and resistant to oils. Say goodbye to annoying fingerprints! The back features a matte finish with a glossy edging that enhances the grip around your device. Get yours in black or white today and save 60%
Users reporting new “On Body Detection” lock mode in Android
Based on reports starting to be made by users, Google is either testing or slowly rolling out a new lock mode for Android devices designed to detect when a device is physically in a user’s possession. The lock mode, called “On Body Detection” uses a device’s sensors to detect whether a device is being held in a person’s hand or is in their pocket and will keep the device unlocked. If the device is set on a table or something similar, the device will lock, requiring a user to employ their normal unlock method.
The new method appears to have been designed to help thwart thieves in case a user accidentally forgets their device somewhere. One thing users have determined is that the on body detection feature will not lock a device if the device is handed to someone else, so it is not tied to a specific user – only movement typically of being on a person’s body or in their hand.
Google has not announced anything about the mode, but it appears to be included in the most recent recent Play Services update. Thus far, only users with devices running at least Android 5.0 or higher have the new mode available, so it looks like it may be a Lollipop-only mode.
source: Android Police
Come comment on this article: Users reporting new “On Body Detection” lock mode in Android
This week in Xbox news – March 22nd 2015
Welcome to our weekly ICYMI for Xbox news!
We’ll still be posting major Xbox announcements in the main feed, but I’ll be collecting some of the more nuanced news, rumours and talking points into one handy thread every weekend! So without further a-do…
AIVAnet 