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Wednesday, 2 October 2019

Amazon’s Blowing Out a Bunch of Acer Gear, Today Only

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U.S. Air Force Tests Unarmed Nuclear Missile Following North Korea's Latest Missile Launch

The U.S. military launched an unarmed nuclear-capable missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base at 4:13 am ET/1:13am PT this morning, right on the heels of North Korea’s latest missile test overnight. U.S.-based missile tests are scheduled months, if not years, in advance, but the timing is one hell of a coincidence.

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Apple Plans to Allow Siri to Default to Frequently-Used Third-Party Messaging Apps Later This Year

Apple plans to release a software update later this year that will enable third-party messaging apps like WhatsApp, Skype, and Facebook Messenger to work better with Siri, the company told Bloomberg's Mark Gurman.

Specifically, the update will enable Siri to default to the messaging app that a person uses most frequently to communicate with a given contact. For example, if an iPhone user almost always messages a friend via WhatsApp, Siri will automatically use WhatsApp rather than Apple's own iMessage.

It will still not be possible to straight-up set third-party apps as default on an iPhone. Instead, the report claims Siri will decide which messaging app to use based on interactions with specific contacts. App Store developers will need to enable the new Siri functionality in their apps when available.

Currently, users must specify the third-party app they wish to use to message someone, such as "message John with WhatsApp." Following the software update, a user could simply say "message John" and Siri would automatically know to do so via WhatsApp if it is the most frequently used app in this case.

This functionality will later be expanded to third-party phone apps for calls as well, but no timeframe was specified.

In a statement, Apple also defended the competitive landscape of the App Store in response to another Bloomberg story claiming that Apple's default apps have a growing edge over third-party options in the App Store:

Apple offers our users an experience that is only possible from the integration of hardware, software, and services. From the very first iPhone, we have included apps to provide customers with a great experience right out of the box for making phone calls, playing music, surfing the web, and more. With every generation of iPhone we have advanced the built in capabilities for our customers with a few default apps designed for great performance, long battery life, seamless integration, and industry-leading protections for security and privacy. We have also created the App Store, the safest place to get apps, so customers can choose from millions of apps to find the ones that further enhance their iPhone. In the few categories where Apple also has an app, we have many successful competitors and we're proud that their success is responsible for almost 2 million U.S. jobs in a thriving multibillion dollar market for developers. Our North Star is always to create the best products for our customers and that is why iPhone has the highest customer satisfaction in the industry.

Apple added that the Stories tab in the App Store has exclusively promoted Apple's own software only one percent of the time.

Tags: App Store, Siri

This article, "Apple Plans to Allow Siri to Default to Frequently-Used Third-Party Messaging Apps Later This Year" first appeared on MacRumors.com

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It's Not Just You: Twitter and Tweetdeck Still Experiencing Technical Problems Around the World

Twitter and Tweetdeck started experiencing outages overnight and the problem is persisting into the morning hours of Wednesday, according to multiple reports from around the world. The social media giant has been struggling with outages in every corner of the globe for at least seven hours and counting and there’s no…

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Florida Boomer Caught on Video Cutting Brake Lines of Public E-Scooters

Police in Fort Lauderdale, Florida have arrested a man who allegedly cut the brake lines on dozens of public scooters this year. The man has been identified by police as 59-year-old Randall Thomas Williams of Fort Lauderdale, though a possible motive has not yet been released.

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