Apple Purchases Massive 43-Acre Development Site in North San Jose
Shortly after leasing a 300,000 square foot campus in North San Jose, Apple has expanded on its real estate holdings in the area, buying a 43-acre development site at 2347 North First Street for more than $138 million.
According to the Silicon Valley Business Journal, the site, which consists of undeveloped land, is approved for up to 2.8 million square feet of office space, much like Apple’s Campus 2 location in Cupertino. Apple has not submitted building plans for the site, and it is unclear what the company plans to do with the land.
Map showing land bought by Apple and other available real estate in the same North San Jose area
Apple is expanding rapidly in the Bay Area. In addition to the second Cupertino campus and the 300,000 square feet of space leased in San Jose in July, the company made its first real estate lease in San Francisco last week, signing a deal for 76,000 square feet of office space.
Along with office space, Apple is also said to be seeking additional space for both industrial purposes and research and development, possibly for undisclosed projects like its Apple Car.
What’s interesting in the latest transaction is that Apple opted to buy, not lease. It’s possible Apple wants more control over whatever it does there, and simply felt more comfortable owning the land. In addition to office space, Apple has been in the market for broad swaths of heavy R&D and industrial space, industry observers tell me. The latter could be read as a tantalizing sign of Apple’s interest in manufacturing, though such a possibility is for now market speculation.
The land that Apple purchased in North San Jose is located approximately 12 miles from its 1 Infinite Loop campus in Cupertino and is across the freeway from the Mineta San Jose International Airport. North First Street is already home to other major companies like Cisco and Samsung.
Apple Seeds Sixth OS X 10.11 El Capitan Beta to Developers
Apple today released the sixth beta of OS X 10.11 El Capitan to developers for testing purposes, one week after releasing the fifth El Capitan beta and nearly two months after unveiling the new operating system at its 2015 Worldwide Developers Conference.
The update is available through the software update mechanism in the Mac App Store and through the Apple Developer Center.
While early betas introduced minor design changes and features, the last few betas have focused on under-the-hood performance improvements and bug fixes to optimize OS X El Capitan ahead of its public release.
OS X El Capitan builds on the features introduced with OS X Yosemite, focusing on improving performance and user experience. Behind-the-scenes improvements in El Capitan have made a number of apps and processes on the Mac much faster, and the introduction of Metal makes system-level graphics rendering 40 percent more efficient.
Along with a new systemwide font, El Capitan includes a revamped Mission Control feature, a new Split View feature for using two full-screen apps at once, deeper functionality for Spotlight, and several new features for Safari, including Pinned Sites for housing frequently visited websites and a universal mute button that quiets all tabs.
OS X 10.11 El Capitan is available to both registered developers and public beta testers. After testing is completed, Apple will release El Capitan to the public in the fall.
First Firmware Worm Able to Infect Macs Created by Researchers
A team of researchers has created the first firmware worm that’s able to infect Macs, reports Wired. Building on “Thunderstrike” exploits uncovered earlier this year, the worm, dubbed “Thunderstrike 2,” infects Macs at the firmware level, making it nearly impossible to remove. Embedded into firmware, malware is resistant to firmware and software updates, able to block them entirely or reinstall itself at will.
The worm was created by security engineer Trammell Hudson, who first discovered the Thunderstrike exploits, and Xeno Kovah, owner of firmware security consultancy LegbaCore. When Thunderstrike made waves earlier this year, it was a limited proof-of-concept attack with no known presence in the wild, but Thunderstrike 2 demonstrates a real-world worm able to target Macs using the same general vulnerabilities.
Thunderstrike 2, unlike the first demonstration of Thunderstrike, is able to infect a Mac remotely through a malicious website or email. Once on a Mac, it’s able to spread itself to other Macs by hiding in the option ROM of peripheral devices like Apple’s own Thunderbolt to Gigabit Ethernet adapter, external SSDs, RAID controllers, and more. Once infected by a Mac that has the Thunderstrike 2 worm, the peripheral would go on to infect any other Mac it connects to.
“People are unaware that these small cheap devices can actually infect their firmware,” says Kovah. “You could get a worm started all around the world that’s spreading very low and slow. If people don’t have awareness that attacks can be happening at this level then they’re going to have their guard down and an attack will be able to completely subvert their system.”
Removing malware embedded into a Mac’s firmware would need to be done at the hardware level, making it particularly dangerous. According to the researchers, Apple has not done enough to fix the vulnerabilities that leave Macs open to these kind of attacks.
“Some vendors like Dell and Lenovo have been very active in trying to rapidly remove vulnerabilities from their firmware,” Kovah notes. “Most other vendors, including Apple as we are showing here, have not. We use our research to help raise awareness of firmware attacks, and show customers that they need to hold their vendors accountable for better firmware security.”
Kovah and Hudson have notified Apple about the Thunderstrike 2 vulnerabilities, but thus far, Apple’s only fixed one of five security flaws and introduced a partial fix for a second. Three of the vulnerabilities have not yet been patched, but it’s likely Apple is working to get the flaws fixed in an upcoming security update.
More information on Kovah and Hudson’s research and the Thunderstrike 2 exploit can be found in a lengthy report over at Wired.
How to switch from iOS to Android and keep all your stuff
Switching to a phone within the same ecosystem is a breeze, thanks to cloud synchronization and format compatibility, but what happens when you want to get a new handset that runs on a different operating system? A very common case is when people are trying to switch from iOS to Android.
This can become a convoluted process, so we thought we should give you some good tips. In this tutorial we will show you the best ways to transfer all your data from an iPhone to an Android device. Let’s jump right into the goods.
How to transfer contacts
This process’ simplicity will highly depend on your previous practices for syncing contacts. Are you synchronizing your contacts to your Gmail account? If so, getting your contacts on your brand new Android smartphone is a breeze! All you have to do is enter your Google account. All your saved numbers will be automatically downloaded.
If you don’t synchronize your contacts to Gmail, however, you will have to work a little harder. The easiest way would probably be to use iCloud to get a .CVF file and then import that to your Android phone (or Google Contacts).
- On your iPhone, go to your Settings app and select “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”.
- Go to Settings > iCloud and turn on “Contacts”.
- Your contacts will upload to Apple’s cloud services shortly.
- Now use a browser to go to iCloud.com and log in with your Apple ID.
- Select “Contacts” and then click on the gear icon in the lower-left corner.
- Click on “Select all”.
- Click on the gear again and select “Export vCard…”.
- When the .CVF file downloads, you can either import that file to your Google Contacts or straight to your phone.
- If you want to use Google Contacts, just go to contacts.google.com and click on “Import” and then “Go to old contacts”. Click on the “More” button and select “Import”. Select the file and you are done.
- To import the .CVF file directly to your new smartphone, just get the file into your phone using any methods such as transferring via a microSD card or by hooking up your phone to your PC. Once the file is on your device, you simply open your Phone app and tap on the menu button. There should be an option to “Import/export”. Select the file and be on your way.
How to transfer calendar
Just as it was with Contacts, your calendar can also be synced to your Google account, but that will only be convenient if you did it from the beginning. You don’t want to manually change all your calendar entries, so we will show you how to transfer all your calendar events in a batch. Oh, and we will use iCloud once again.
- Go to your iPhone’s Settings app and select “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”.
- Select “Add Account” and log into your iCloud account.
- Allow your iPhone to sync your local calendar files to iCloud.
- Use a browser to access iCloud.com and login with your iCloud account.
- Click the Calendar icon to open the Calendar interface.
- On the left pane, click the “Share Calendar” button beside the calendar that you want to export.
- In the popup balloon, tick “Public Calendar”. Copy the sharing URL that appears below it.
- On a new web browser tab or window, paste the copied URL.
- Change “
webcal"in the URL to “http"and press the Enter key to open the address. - Your Web browser will download a file with random characters as a file name. This file is actually a copy of your iCloud Calendar entries.
- Save the file to a convenient folder on your computer. For convenience, you may rename the file and add the
icsextension (e.g., calendar.ics). - Open and login to Google Calendar on your Web browser.
- On the left pane of the Google Calendar interface, click the menu arrow at the right of “Other Calendars”.
- Select “Import Calendar”.
- Select the exported calendar file that you downloaded from iCloud. You can also choose the destination Google calendar (if you have more than one) in the same dialog.
- Click the “Import” button to upload the file. Once importing is finished, you should be able to see the imported entries in the Google Calendar web interface. The new entries will also be synced to your Android device.
Transferring your photos
Oh, all those precious photos. It would be horrible to lose them in the process of switching to Android, right? You could probably do things the old way and manually transfer files… like a caveman. Or you can just take advantage of the awesome cloud storage services we now have access to.
You could just back up your photos to Drive, Drobbox or your service of choice, but I happen to prefer using Google’s new Photos app. This new service allows you to upload unlimited high quality images and sync them across smartphones. And yes, it’s available for both Android and iOS.
- Download the iOS Google Photos app.
- During set-up, the app will ask if you want to backup your photos. Go ahead and turn the feature on.
- Your photos will begin uploading. This will use a substantial amount of data, so be sure to connect to a WiFi network.
- When all images are uploaded to Google Photos, pull out your Android phone and download the Photos app from the Google Play Store.
- Go through the set-up process. Your images will be there.
Of course, you can also do it manually by using a PC.
- Connect your iPhone to your PC via USB cable. Do the same for your Android phone.
- On your Windows PC, open “My Computer”.
- You should be able to see two new drives or entries under “Portable Devices”. One is for your iPhone storage (usually labeled “Apple iPhone” or “Edgar’s iPhone” or something similar) and the other is for your Android. If you don’t see them, try installing the phone drivers.
- Open the iPhone’s storage in a new window.
- Open your Android’s storage in a new window.
- On the window for your iPhone’s storage, locate the folder named “DCIM”. You will find your photo folders inside the that folder.
- Simply select the photos that you want to transfer. Then, drag them from the iPhone images folder and drop them onto your Android images folder.
How to transfer music
You can always just transfer your music the old fashion way, as well – by manually moving files from phone to phone. It’s probably easier to simply upload your tunes to Google Play Music, though. Of course, this is given that you have all your music on your computer. We will assume you are using iTunes, for obvious reasons. Make sure to go to iTunes and download any music you may have purchased from your phone and isn’t saved locally.
After doing that, just use Google Music Manager to upload all your music to Google Play Music. This will sync across all Android devices, but the only main issue is that if the file is not downloaded, you will use up data while playing it. Make sure to pin or download songs you want to hear offline.
- Download Google Music Manager to your PC.
- Install the program and run it.
- During set-up, there will be an option to “Upload songs to Google Play”.
- Select “iTunes” and finish the initial set-up.
- Sit back and let the program upload all your songs to Google Play Music.
You will have to struggle with some things
Moving to a new platform can be a bit tiring and complicated. We gave you some tools that will make your experience much smoother, but know there are some things you simply can’t avoid. For one, you will need to manually find all your apps and install them. There’s no way to transfer applications from iOS to Android.
In addition, you should upload any documents and odd files to your cloud storage service of choice. You can easily download these from your Android phone using the official app.
All set? Happy transferring! Also, we know everyone has a different way of doing things. What other methods for transferring all your goodies do you use? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Xiaomi retakes the smartphone lead in China as Apple slips
It looks like Apple’s time at the top of China’s smartphone heap was short-lived. Researchers at Canalys estimate that local brand Xiaomi has once again become the country’s smartphone market share leader, snagging 15.9 percent of shipments during the second quarter of the year. In fact, Apple is down to third place — one of Xiaomi’s fastest-growing rivals, Huawei, claimed the runner-up spot with 15.7 percent. Samsung and Vivo rounded out the top five.
It’s not certain what tipped the balance for Xiaomi, although big phones like the Mi Note (shown above) likely helped. That leadership might not survive for much longer, however. As IDC warned earlier, the days of a rapidly expanding Chinese phone market appear to be over. Vendors are mostly trying to poach customers from each other, rather than enticing first-timers who are finally well-off enough to buy a smartphone. In a volatile climate like that, it might only take one hit phone (or a spectacular flop) to shake things up.
[Image credit: AP Photo/Jeff Chiu]
Filed under:
Cellphones, Mobile, Apple, Samsung
Via:
CNET
Source:
Canalys
Tags: android, apple, china, huawei, iphone, marketshare, mobilepostcross, q22015, samsung, smartphone, vivo, xiaomi
More ‘iPhone 6s’ Display Assembly Photos and Renderings Revealed
Following the release of several photos of a claimed display assembly for the “iPhone 6s” over the weekend, Macfixit Australia has shared additional images of what appears to be the same display assembly, further suggesting the leaked images to be real internal parts for the next-generation iPhone.
One of Macfixit’s photos includes a quality control label showing a pass date of July 29, which, if legitimate, would put the assembly in a correct time frame for Apple’s traditional September iPhone launches. The image also appears identical to those released over the weekend by repair company GeekBar, with the same possible cutouts for a taptic engine to fuel Force Touch and a slightly thicker frame.
A few possible third-party case manufacturer design renders have also been shared by uSwitch and Nowhereelse.fr‘s OnLeaks channel, backing the theory that this year’s iPhone line will be slightly thicker than the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. Theories that support Apple’s reasoning behind increasing the iPhone’s thickness — other than the inclusion of Force Touch — include attempts to avoid another “Bendgate” controversy from last year with a stronger body. Height and width of the iPhones shown in the renderings are also marginally larger than the measurements for the current lineup.
While the iPhone 6 came in at 6.9mm thick, the iPhone 6S is 7.1mm, according to our source.
The iPhone 6S Plus, which was the model most often cited in the so-called ‘bendgate’ scandal, has also been body-building. It’s gone from 7.1mm thick to 7.3mm, we were told.
The renders also suggest that the “iPhone 6s” could be missing the slightly protruding camera found on the current lineup, perhaps made possible by the slightly thicker body. The “iPhone 6s Plus” renderings, however, continue to show a protruding rear camera. uSwitch does note the renders could simply be incomplete, so Apple’s plans for rear camera designs remain unconfirmed. Otherwise, the site notes an overall similarity between generations, with a home button, volume rockers, lock switch, and screen size that make the new phones “largely indistinguishable” from last year’s models.
Even with the possibility of a thicker frame, the size increase of the so-called iPhone 6s would be small enough to allow most accessories and cases to function with both generations of the device. News and rumors regarding the “iPhone 6s” and “iPhone 6s Plus” have begun to proliferate in the past few weeks, and will no doubt continue to do so as we head into the iPhone launch season.
Apple Reportedly Considers Becoming a Mobile Carrier by Leasing Network Capacity in U.S. and Europe
Apple is currently in early talks to launch its own mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in both the United States and Europe, according to information gathered by Business Insider. A few sources close to Apple suggest that the company is testing the service right now in the United States, with early negotiations beginning in Europe to bring the MVNO service overseas.
If completed, Apple would essentially become its own network carrier, freeing the company and iPhone users from any particular current carrier like T-Mobile or AT&T, and allow users to pay for the usual data, calls, and text services directly from Apple. The MVNO would allow Apple to lease space from network carriers already in the business of providing data to customers, with the Apple SIM card — already included in the cellular versions of the iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 3 — picking up and switching between carriers on the fly for the best service possible.
As Business Insider points out, the testing of the MVNO service doesn’t guarantee its eventual arrival for customers using an iPhone in the United States and Europe. But, if the company does intend to eventually become a carrier itself, it would be a fairly long-term goal of five years or more to be fully implemented.
If Apple is testing the service then there’s no guarantee that it will launch, and if it does, it’s not going to roll out anytime soon. Telecoms sources say that Apple is looking long-term with its MVNO, and could take at least five years to fully launch the service. Apple has been in talks with telecoms companies for years over its MVNO plans, and it’s an “open secret” amongst carriers that a virtual Apple network is on the way.
Speculation surrounding Apple becoming its own wireless provider has been swirling for a decade now, resurging in various rumor and patent stories every now and again over the years. With Apple rumored to be in “advanced talks” with mobile standards organization GSMA in the production of a standardized mobile electronic SIM card — which would allow customers to avoid being locked into a dedicated network carrier — the company appears to at least be positioning itself for the possibility of a future MVNO launch.
iPhone Battery With 1715 mAh Capacity Possibly Destined for ‘iPhone 6s’ or ‘6c’ Appears
French site Nowhereelse.fr last week shared a photo [Google Translate] of a battery appearing very similar to an iPhone battery and labeled as being from Apple’s usual supplier, but the battery’s capacity of 1715 mAh leaves questions as to whether the battery is intended for the upcoming “iPhone 6s” or a smaller “iPhone 6c” that has reportedly been delayed or canceled.
The battery’s 1715 mAh capacity is lower than the 1810 mAh capacity of the iPhone 6 battery, indicating Apple would have to have increased power efficiency of the device for the “S” generation in order to achieve the same battery life as its predecessor. Given the consistent overall design of the iPhone 6 and 6s, it is unclear why Apple would reduce the battery capacity at all, unless other changes such as a thicker display panel needed for Force Touch support are reducing the internal volume available for the battery in the iPhone 6s.
Another option is that this battery is for Apple’s rumored “iPhone 6c”, which was reportedly a new 4-inch iPhone Apple had under development but which appeared to have been canceled or delayed earlier this year after supply chain evidence dried up. The battery in today’s photo carries a manufacturing date of March 2015, so it does come from the timeframe when iPhone 6c claims were still circulating, although its capacity is higher than that of fellow 4-inch devices such as the iPhone 5s (1558 mAh) and iPhone 5c (1510 mAh).
One argument in favor of this being an iPhone 6s battery is the connector seen on the part, which appears essentially identical to the one seen on the iPhone 6 and distinct from that used on other iPhone models such as the 5s and 5c, but it is otherwise difficult to say what device this battery was planned for.
With roughly a month to go before the expected unveiling of the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, part leaks are rapidly accelerating. Many of them will not reveal much given the similarities between the two generation’s designs, but some subtle differences such as those on the display assembly may hint at changes for the upcoming device.
(Thanks, Ryan)
Apple Testing Service That Allows Siri to Answer Calls and Transcribe Voicemail
Employees at Apple are reportedly putting a new service through its paces, one that would allow Siri to not only answer a missed call instead of a pre-set voicemail message, but give her the ability to record and transcribe those message for users to read as text later (via Business Insider). The messages would be sent to users via iCloud, completely skipping the need to check voicemail.
The so-called “iCloud Voicemail” service could relay information regarding where a user is and specifics as to why they can’t pick up the phone, if given the permission to do so. According to Business Insider, “multiple Apple employees” are testing the new feature and if it stays on track, it could see a debut sometime in 2016 in iOS 10.
Apple’s proposed solution is both incredibly simple and incredibly clever: People like to leave voicemails (it’s often quicker to orally deliver your information than it is to type it in a text message). But they don’t like to receive voicemails (it’s a lot quicker to read a text than it is to listen to the other person talking at you). The new product will also bridge a generation gap: Older users like voicemails. Young people do not.
Apple sends voice data to company servers, where Siri converts the words spoken into text. iCloud Voicemail will presumably function in the same way, sending the raw voicemails to Apple, and Siri will then transcribe them and make them available on your iPhone.
Apple has doubled-down on Siri ever since the digital assistant’s debut, with this year’s launch of iOS 9 — focusing mainly on performance inhancements and subtle design changes — seeing Siri at the heart of the changes. The new iOS will allow the personal assistant to create contextual reminders, search more thoroughly through photos and videos, and grant users an easily-accessible curated list of contacts and apps in “Siri Suggestions,” a quick left-swipe from the home screen.
Dr. Dre Announces ‘Compton A Soundtrack’ Exclusively for Apple Music
Dr. Dre announced over the weekend, on his own Beats 1 radio show “The Pharmacy,” the exclusive debut of “Compton A Soundtrack” on Apple Music (via Pitchfork). The album is set to release this Friday, August 7, and will be available exclusively to iTunes and Apple Music customers.
The Apple-exclusivity announcement was made by Dr. Dre, alongside fellow musician and former band-mate Ice Cube, and director of Straight Outta Compton, F. Gary Gray. Although officially a soundtrack for the film — which chronicles the real-life story of Dre, Ice Cube, Eazy-E, and a few others, around the formation of legendary hip hop/rap group N.W.A. — “Compton A Soundtrack” is also Dr. Dre’s first album in over 15 years. The album will have 16 tracks in total:
01 Intro
02 Talk About It [ft. King Mez & Justus]
03 Genocide [ft. Kendrick Lamar, Marsha Ambrosius & Candice Pillay]
04 It’s All on Me [ft. Justus & BJ the Chicago Kid]
05 All in a Day’s Work [ft. Anderson Paak & Marsha Ambrosius]
06 Darkside/Gone [ft. King Mez, Marsha Ambrosius & Kendrick Lamar]
07 Loose Cannons [ft. Xzibit & COLD 187um]
08 Issues [ft. Ice Cube & Anderson Paak]
09 Deep Water [ft. Kendrick Lamar & Justus]
10 One Shot One Kill [ft. Snoop Dogg]
11 Just Another Day [ft. Asia Bryant]
12 For the Love of Money [ft. Jill Scott & Jon Connor]
13 Satisfaction [ft. Snoop Dogg, Marsha Ambrosius & King Mez]
14 Animals [ft. Anderson Paak]
15 Medicine Mane [ft. Eminem, Candice Pillay & Anderson Paak]
16 Talking to My Diary
Ever since Apple’s acquisition of Beats in the spring of 2014, Dr. Dre’s presence at the company has only grown more prominent, especially in this summer’s launch of Apple Music. Thanks to the streaming service, the musician has his own weekly show on Beats 1 and even began to release some of his original music exclusively on Apple’s new music platform.
AIVAnet 