Apple today announced plans to build a 400,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art data center in Waukee, Iowa, to better serve North American users of iMessage, Siri, the App Store and other Apple services. Like all Apple data centers, the new facility will run entirely on renewable energy from day one.
Apple’s investment of $1.3 billion will create over 550 construction and operations jobs in the Des Moines area, and the company is contributing up to $100 million to a newly created Public Improvement Fund dedicated to community development and infrastructure around Waukee.
Category: Apple
Report: Apple Scales Back Self-Driving Car Plans⇢
Daisuke Wakabayashi at The New York Times is reporting that Apple is dialing back its self-driving car dreams, after hiring scores of employees under the banner of “the next big thing:”
These days, Apple’s automotive ambitions are more modest. The company has put off any notion of an Apple-branded autonomous vehicle and is instead working on the underlying technology that allows a car to drive itself. Timothy D. Cook, the company’s chief executive, said in an interview with Bloomberg in June that Apple is “focusing on autonomous systems.”
iTunes U Moving to Apple Podcasts⇢
According to Apple’s announcement and support pages, it will automatically convert iTunes U Collections to podcasts in September and eliminate the iTunes U section of iTunes on macOS. That means there will no longer be a way to download iTunes U course materials on a Mac. The change also means that the iTunes U catalog will only include courses and will only be accessible from an iOS device.
Tim Cook Comments on Charlottesville⇢
What occurred in Charlottesville has no place in our country. Hate is a cancer, and left unchecked it destroys everything in its path. Its scars last generations. History has taught us this time and time again, both in the United States and countries around the world.
We must not witness or permit such hate and bigotry in our country, and we must be unequivocal about it. This is not about the left or the right, conservative or liberal. It is about human decency and morality. I disagree with the president and others who believe that there is a moral equivalence between white supremacists and Nazis, and those who oppose them by standing up for human rights. Equating the two runs counter to our ideals as Americans.
On Multitouch’s History⇢
Dave Hamilton, writing about an article in a Carnegie Mellon University newsletter:
The article details how Roger Dannenberg, Paul McAvinney, and Dean Rubine worked together to create one of the world’s first multitouch interfaces starting back in 1983. As is the case with many of our most important technologies, multitouch was initially conceived to serve a creative purpose: to facilitate generating music on a computer. A single touch interface wasn’t suitable, so this group of musically-inclined computer scientists set out to fix that… and did so by creating a multitouch interface they called The Sensor Frame.
Messages in iCloud Removed in new iOS 11 Beta⇢
When Apple announced iOS 11, one feature mentioned was “Messages in iCloud,” which promised to keep your iMessages in sync and backed up to iCloud for easy restore onto a new device. It’s not a headlining feature, but one that would make life with iOS devices a little bit nicer.
Looks like the feature was pulled from today’s iOS 11 beta release:
The “Messages in iCloud” feature has been removed in iOS 11 beta 5 and will ship in a future software update to iOS 11. Users can continue to receive and store messages on each device, and they can continue to backup and restore messages using iCloud Backup.
LTE-Enabled Watch Rumored⇢
Mark Gurman, Scott Moritz and Ian King:
Apple Inc. is planning to release a version of its smartwatch later this year that can connect directly to cellular networks, a move designed to reduce the device’s reliance on the iPhone, people familiar with the matter said.
Currently, Apple requires its smartwatch to be connected wirelessly to an iPhone to stream music, download directions in maps, and send messages while on the go. Equipped with LTE chips, at least some new Apple Watch models, planned for release by the end of the year, will be able to conduct many tasks without an iPhone in range, the people said. For example, a user would be able to download new songs and use apps and leave their smartphone at home.
Another iPhone SE Rumor⇢
Mitchel Broussard at Macrumors:
Apple supplier Wistron is preparing to expand its India-based iPhone manufacturing, with production geared towards the next-generation iPhone SE, according to local sources (via Focus Taiwan). Apple is hoping to build its share of the Indian smartphone market by giving Wistron the majority of the orders for the new iPhone SE, which is said to ship in the first quarter of 2018.
I think Spring 2018 is the make-or-break it spot for the SE. I have trouble seeing Apple letting it go longer than two years without an update — if it’s going to be updated at all.
Apple Posts Q3 2017 Results⇢
Apple has posted its Q3 2017 results:
“With revenue up 7 percent year-over-year, we’re happy to report our third consecutive quarter of accelerating growth and an all-time quarterly record for Services revenue,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We hosted an incredibly successful Worldwide Developers Conference in June, and we’re very excited about the advances in iOS, macOS, watchOS and tvOS coming this fall.”
Here are some details from the results and the call:
Steve Troughton-Smith Uncovers Next iPhone in HomePod Firmware Bundle
Well, this is very interesting. Apple software wizard Steve Troughton-Smith spent some time digging though a firmware download for HomePod. In it is some information about Face ID, a rumored feature of the next iPhone:
I can confirm reports that HomePod’s firmware reveals the existence of upcoming iPhone’s infra-red face unlock in BiometricKit and elsewhere pic.twitter.com/yLsgCx7OTZ
— Steve T-S (@stroughtonsmith) July 31, 2017
Dubbed Pearl ID, this technology will use infrared to unlock an iPhone when a known face is detected.
Sketchy Rumor on iPhone SE Update Appears⇢
The rumor comes from French-language blog iGeneration, which cited an unnamed source claiming Apple will hold a product event in late August to introduce an updated version of the 4-inch smartphone.
Mickaël Bazoge, the author of the article, told MacRumors that he received the info from a “new source” with an unproven track record. He expressed some skepticism, but added that the source “seems reliable.”
As Rossignol points out, no iPhone has ever been launched in August. However, the SE was the first iPhone to launch in the spring outside of the Verizon iPhone 4.
Apple Machine Learning Journal⇢
A new online journal, published by Apple, about machine learning. A while back, there was a story about how important publishing is in this field. While this doesn’t meet all those needs, it’s a nice look into what the people on this team are working on, at least to an extent.
There’s even an RSS feed.