Apple's iPhone 8 will shatter previous sales records, top analyst reportedly says

Apple's iPhone makers of are slated to
make 120 million to 150 million iPhones in the second half of 2017, a volume that would crush all previous sales, according to a top analytics firm report cited by 9to5Mac.
KGI Securities forecasts three new iPhones with wireless charging from Apple next year, 9to5Mac reported Tuesday. The phones could include one
major redesign, the iPhone 8, with two more iterative updates to the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus, according to 9to5Mac.
With features like a glass chassis and a bright, flexible screen, the new handsets could outsell Apple's most popular phone to date, the iPhone 6 phablets, KGI's analysis said. KGI's updated forecast comes on the heels of a Wall Street Journal report that Apple is considering more than 10 designs for its 10th anniversary iPhone next year, including at least one flexible screen design.
To be sure, Apple doesn't always sell every iPhone it plans to make. Last year, Apple initially provided the supply chain with high numbers only to cut numbers later, according to UBS analysts.
But an iPhone sales boost could provide much-needed relief to Apple investors, who watched iPhone sales drop from their year-ago volumes for three-straight quarters this year. Analysts surveyed by FactSet expect Apple to sell 78 million iPhones in the December 2016 quarter, up from 75 million from a year ago, bringing the second-half 2016
sales to 124 million.

Apple signals the end of the line for some Macs by declaring them vintage, obsolete

No PC or gadget lasts forever, even if it lasts longer than you might think . At some point, it becomes obsolete and can no longer be repaired or serviced
by the manufacturer. At that point, it’s dropped from the list of supported devices and you’re essentially on your own.
Although Apple appears to be no slouch in terms of supporting its products, even it has to draw the line somewhere. Starting on December 31, a number of
Apple Macs will be dropped from the support rolls and be officially declared as obsolete, according to a 9to5Mac report .
Apple’s terms for PCs and iOS devices that are no longer repairable at Apple Stores and resellers are “vintage” and “obsolete.” Once a Mac receives
that designation, its repair staff will no longer be able to order parts for the machines and thus will no longer be able to effect repairs. Apple defines
“vintage” machines as “those that have not been manufactured for more than 5 and less than 7 years ago,” whereas “obsolete” products are “those
that were discontinued more than 7 years ago.”
The status of machines added to the list varies by region. For example, Apple still provides support for Macs in California and for all Apple products in Turkey at Apple service providers, as well as for
iPod and iPhone products in California via Apple Retails Stores and online support. Obsolete products are not supported anywhere.
The machines that reached vintage status in the U.S. and Turkey and obsolescence everywhere else include the 15-inch and 17-inch MacBook Pro
(early 2011) models, while the Mac mini (early 2009) and 13-inch MacBook (mid-2009) models reached obsolete status. If you’re an owner of any of these machines, or the machines on Apple’s
overall list of vintage and obsolete products, then it’s definitely time to consider an upgrade.

Take a look at Apple’s new design book without spending $300

Apple last week impressed and shocked the world when it released a brand new product just weeks after unveiling the iPhone 7. For just $300, Apple fans can now get their hands on a new coffee table book that highlights a select history of Apple products dating back to 1997, beginning of course with the iconic Bondi Blue iMac.
Okay, so maybe nobody was impressed. And sure, maybe no one was shocked either, aside of course from the deluge of snarky Internet commenters who
were quick to blast Apple for having the gall to release a book for $300.
Dedicated to the memory of Steve Jobs, Apple design guru Jony Ive explained the impetus behind the book’s creation as follows.
“Honestly, it felt more of an obligation than something that we felt really compelled to do,” Ive said during an interview last week. “The reason for
that, and I guess it’s a fairly obvious one, is that as designers, we are far more interested in and consumed by the future; in what doesn’t exist yet.
But we’ve been working together for 20, 25 years, and it felt like the right and appropriate thing to do.
You get a sense of what we’ve learned as a team and of how technology is evolving.”
The book is appropriately titled “Designed by Apple in California” and is available in two sizes, a 10.2 x 12.8 inch version that retails for $199 and a 13 x
16.3 inch version that retails for $299.
If you’re at all curious about what a few hundred bucks will get you, Michael Kukielka over the weekend put together a walk through of the book where we can take a gander at the vibrant photos
that fill the pages of Apple’s curious new product.
And in case you missed it the first time around, Stephen Colbert last week covered Apple’s new book by spoofing one of the company’s famed product introduction videos.

Samsung’s Prepping A Galaxy S8 PLUS Model

In a bid to undo the damage done by the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 debacle, Samsung plans on hitting back big time in 2017 with a new, larger model of the Galaxy S8 called the Galaxy S8 Plus.

This means, in 2017, there will be two Galaxy S8 handsets: the standard Galaxy S8 and the new Galaxy S8 Plus. Both models will feature EDGE displays and, thanks to new design and display technology, will feature a bezel-less design so the overall size of the handset should not be much bigger than current Galaxy S7 models.

The standard Galaxy S8 will feature a 5.7in OLED display, while the Galaxy S8 Plus will pack in a larger 6.2in panel. But – and this is the kicker – the overall size will not be impacted too much by the inclusion of what is a very large panel, thanks to new design language that will see Samsung eradicate bezels from the handset’s design. Think something like this.

Interestingly, Apple is expected to be doing something similar with its iPhone 8 models in 2017. Both models will apparently feature an all-touch front panel with the Home key embedded inside the new OLED display. This will open up lots more room for display and create a more engaging viewing experience.

So why is Samsung making a new Plus model Galaxy S8? Simple: it wants to win back disgruntled Galaxy Note 7 users early on in 2017. How Samsung will differentiate the two models remains to be seen, but given the lack of interest in its Galaxy S6 EDGE+ handset it seems likely the larger, more costly phone will have to feature a couple of interesting USPs in order to encourage adoption.

Other notable features said to be inside the Galaxy S8 are Viv, Samsung’s new digital assistant technology, a dual-lens camera, new processor technology, improved RAM, Android Nougat, and improved optimisation for overall better performance and stronger battery life.

Here's the official line on VIV from the people that made it:

"Viv is an artificial intelligence platform that enables developers to distribute their products through an intelligent, conversational interface. It’s the simplest way for the world to interact with devices, services and things everywhere. Viv is taught by the world, knows more than it is taught, and learns every day."
When will these phones launch? That’s the million dollar question. But given the damage the Galaxy Note 7 has caused to Samsung’s bottomline, the company will almost certainly push for an early release in order to quell the damage caused by the Galaxy Note 7 being taken out of contention in 2016.

Beyond this, Samsung has also confirmed that the Galaxy Note range will return in 2017. Between now and then we have the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8 Plus to look forward to, as well as new releases from LG, HTC and, potentially, Nokia….

What do you want to see inside the new Galaxy S8?

The first guy Steve Jobs ever fired at Apple ... and he wasn't even an employee

Michael Geary has been a programmer living in Silicon Valley since before the world called it Silicon Valley. And he's got some incredible stories to tell.
For instance, he's pretty convinced he was the first person ever fired by Steve Jobs.
He was living in Palo Alto in 1976 and shopping in a health food store.
"I was a scraggly looking hippie and I ran into this guy at produce. He was a scraggly looking smelly hippie. I just introduced myself and it turned out we
both into computers," Geary said.
Jobs told him he just started a company called Apple Computer, and the name comes from "byte" as in "take a byte out of the apple, ha, ha," Geary recalled. (A byte is computer storage term.)
"He and Woz were literally working on the Apple 1, literally just the two of them," and he mentioned he needed someone to do some programming for him.
"He needed a disassembler for the 6502 chip," Geary said.
A disassembler is a computer program that translates the chip's language into assembly language. A 6502 were for a new kind of computer, very small ones, not huge mainframes. Geary was
working at company doing programming on mainframes.
Back in those days, it was really expensive to buy computer chips to write programs for them. But it was possible to fake having a real chip by using a software program called an emulator, which pretended to be the chip. Geary had access to a mainframe and an emulator at work, so he told
Jobs, "I can do that."
Geary went home and started to write the disassembler code.
"Steve called me back a few days later and said 'this dissembler, this is a for a microprocessor.
Your work is all with mainframes. They are nothing alike. All you know is mainframes, forget this whole thing,' " Geary recalls.
"When we hung up, I was pretty disappointed. Then I thought, 'Who is this guy telling me I can’t program? I’ll show him. I’ll write a partial proof of
concept and I’ll visit him and show him the code,'" Geary said.
So he dug up the address to Apple Computer and showed up, with no appointment. It turned out to be the address of an answering service. Jobs and Woz were still working in the garage. In those days, a garage startup wasn't considered a very reputable office.
"I said to myself, these guys are flakes! They are never going to make it. And I turned around and walked back out the door," Geary said.
And he was obviously wrong.
Years later, Geary got asked to do a short contract job at Apple (working on an email client called Diplomat) but the signing of the contract was stalled. And at another health food store, this one
in Los Gatos, California, he once again ran into Steve Jobs.
Geary approached Jobs again, and they had a laugh about the first time they met. Geary didn't tell him that he wrote the program. Instead, he nudged him to sign the contract. On the following Monday
it was signed, though Geary didn't interact with Jobs after that.
In fact, Geary didn't see him again for many years.
By that time, Jobs was ill.
They were at a restaurant in Menlo Park, California, and Geary was at the next table.
"He looked like he vaguely recognized me. I didn’t want to interrupt. I should have said hello. I should have told him I did write that program. I didn’t have quite the guts to talk to him at that point," he said.
Jobs passed away a short time later.
"In the back of my mind, I'll always regret not talking to him that night," Geary said.

A dozen iOS 10 feature gems that Apple forgot to mention

Last month, when Apple released iOS 10 the latest system software for the iPhone/iPad, it made a big deal out of the major features, like a redesigned Music app and contextual predictions in
Autocorrect.
But Apple’s engineer elves worked for a year to overhaul iOS 10, and they’ve planted lots of hidden gems.
Take a picture—fast
The tiny camera icon in the lower-right corner of the Lock screen—for quick access to the Camera app—is gone. In iOS 10, getting to the point of taking a photo is even faster. Click the Home
button to wake the phone—and then swipe left anywhere on the screen. In under a second, you’re ready to take a photo.
Collaborative Notes
You and your buddies can now edit a page in Notes simultaneously, wirelessly, across the internet.
Fantastic for planning an event, building a wish list, working together on a little brainstorming document, and so on.
Open the Notes app. Find the page you want to share, and then tap the round Person icon at the top. You’re asked to share the page using any of the usual methods: by message, email, AirDrop, and so on.
Once your colleague accepts your invite, you’ll briefly see yellow highlighting appear on the note to indicate where that person is making changes.
New magnifier
Oh man, this is great: You can triple-click the Home button to turn the iPhone into the world’s best electronic magnifying glass. Perfect for dim
restaurants, tiny type on packages, and theater programs. You can zoom in, turn on the flashlight, tweak the contrast —the works.
To set this up, open Settings -> General ->
Accessibility -> Magnifier, and proceed.
Color blindness filter
For the first time, the iPhone can help you if you’re color-blind. The Color Accommodations now lets you turn on special screen modes that substitute
colors you can see for colors you can’t.
To set this up, open Settings -> General -> Accessibility -> Color Accommodations -> Display Filters, and turn on the kind of color-blindness you have (red/green, for example).
The phone’s colors may now look funny to other people, but you should have an easier time picking out the colors when it counts.
Eliminate the click
You can get an extra efficiency when it comes to waking up your phone by eliminating the requirement to click the Home button.
Instead, you can just touch your finger to it. That wakes the phone and unlocks it in a single motion.
To find this feature, open Settings -> General -> Accessibility -> Home Button. Turn on “Rest finger to open.”
That’s all there is to it.
Control center trix
You know the Control Center? It’s that half-page of essential settings controls that opens when you swipe upward from the bottom of the screen.
If you have an iPhone 6s, 6s Plus, 7 or 7 Plus, iOS 10 lets you hold your finger down on some of the icons to produce shortcut menus. The Flashlight now lets you choose from three different brightness levels. The Timer button offers presets for 1 minute, 5 minutes, 20 minutes, and so on. The Camera button offers Take Photo, Record Slo-mo, Record Video, and Take Selfie. That kind of thing.
Photos movies
In iOS 10, the new Photos app introduces Memories: beautiful, automatic, musical slideshows made of all the pix and videos from a certain trip
or weekend. Most people are pleasantly surprised at how coherent and well-created these are, even though they’re totally automatic.
Open Photos; at the bottom, tap Memories. There they are. You can tap one to play it; you can also adjust the musical style, the length, and even which photos and videos are in it.
And once you’re satisfied, you can share it or post it online.
Photos search
Photos’s Search box lets you find
images according to what they show. You can search your photos for “dog,” or “beach,” or whatever.
You can’t type anything you want—you have to choose a noun from one of Apple’s canned categories—but you can combine a noun search with, for example, a place search, making it much
easier to find a certain photo.
Well, at least when the gods are smiling. Apple’s image recognition software makes a lot of mistakes. But it’s off to a very handy start.
Photos people
The iOS 10 Photos app can now auto-group the people in your photos, using facial recognition—for example, all pictures of your mom appear in a
clump.
To see it at work, open Photos, tap Albums, and tap People. You can even drag your favorites into the top of the screen for quick access later.
Some of these features don’t work until iOS 10 has analyzed your photos, which can take at least a day (during which the phone has to be plugged into power).
Apple proudly points out that all of this analysis is done on your phone. (That’s in contrast to services like Google Photos, which offers similar features
but requires that Google access your photo library.)
Emergency Bypass
This new switch means “Let ringtones and vibrations play when this person calls, even when Do Not Disturb is turned on.” A million parents will now get better sleep at night.
To find it, open Contacts; find the important person’s card; tap Edit; tap Ringtone. There’s the Emergency Bypass setting, right at the top.
Delete the bloatware
For the first time, you can hide Apple’s starter apps on your Home screens (Watch, Home, Stocks, etc.), so you’re not saddled with the icons you never use. You can “delete” them just as you would any app:
Hold your finger down on one until the icons start wiggling, and then tap the X button. (You’re not actually deleting them—only hiding them. They still
occupy 150 megabytes.)
If you ever want one again, use the App Store to find it and “re-download” it. (You’re actually just un-hiding it.)
Bedtime-consistency management
Medical research tells us that sleep deprivation— and inconsistent sleep schedules—takes a terrible toll on our health, mood, and productivity. So iOS
10’s Clock app offers a new Bedtime tab. You answer a few questions about your sleep habits, and the app will attempt to keep your sleep regular —prompting you when it’s time to get ready for bed,
waking you at a consistent time, and keeping a graph of your sleep consistency.

Google Introduces Google Flight.

Google is making it easier for users to plan trips and book flights as well as hotels this holiday season. Google Flights will now update users when flights are likely to increase in price, and help find good hotel deals. “Google Flights can now help you be more confident that you’re booking your flight at the right time to get the best price,” said Nabil Naghdy, Product Manager of Google Flights, in a blogpost. Google Flights now show when specific airlines a user is interested in are expected to raise their prices on specific routes. Users first need to select a specific flight they want to book. A notification indicating when the fare is expected to rise and how much they can save on booking might appear next. Notification bar with tips to choose the best price for a specific route may appear if users are looking to book a certain route but haven't selected a specific airline. “Tips can include things like recommendations for alternate airports or dates,” Naghdy said.
Google Flights may also show tips on an expected price jump for that route. Users will need to click on the card to see more details such as how much the price is likely to increase and when. Google Flights will send notifications via e-mail to users who’ve are interested in booking a flight for a specific route but haven’t done so yet. They can enter the details like airlines, routes etc and Google Flights will send notifications related to the same. Fare expiration and expected price jump notifications feature will roll out in the coming weeks.
Google Flights will let users track and manage saved flights seamlessly on their smartphones as well. There’s an Explore option which will suggest ideas on destinations to visit based on the type of vacation a user is looking for.
Google Flights will now help users find more deals on hotels in a particular location, like “hotels in new york”. Now, if users want to find out hotel deals , they need to tap in the upper left to filter for Deals. Additionally, Google Flights will notify users when savings are available toloyalty members on a hotel’s website.

BMW presents its self-balancing motorcycle of the future

The motorcycle of the future is so safe riders can cruise without helmet -- all of
the thrills with none of the danger -- according to BMW.
The German automaker unveiled on Tuesday its Motorrad Vision Next 100, a sleek, self-balancing prototype the company released as part of its 100th anniversary celebrations.
The zero-emissions bike has self-balancing wheels designed to stand upright even at a complete stop,
stability that the company says will allow riders to forgo riding a helmet.
"Its self-balancing system will help protect the rider at any time," said Edgar Heinrich, the design director of BMW's motorcycle division. "Any late reaction from the driver will trigger and the vehicle will balance out."
"In the future, motorcycle riders will be able to enjoy riding without protective gear."
The world's top maker of luxury vehicles has also premiered this year a futuristic BMW sports car with a flexible body, as well as a self-driving Rolls-Royce and an electric Mini model.
Company representatives said that riding without a helmet remains a fantasy for now, though.
Many countries mandate the protective gear and self-balancing technology is still in the developmental stage -- if the latest concept vehicle becomes a reality, it likely won't be before 2030.
Despite its contemporary features the bike will not be fully autonomous, the company said.
"We do not envision autonomy on motorcycles," said Heinrich, as the driverless autopilot system has faced global scrutiny following fatal crashes in
northern China in January and in the US state of Florida in May.
In September, a Tesla electric car crashed into a tourist bus on a motorway in northern Germany, after the driver who was the only one slightly
injured claimed he had activated the autopilot system.
BMW aims to commercialize fully autonomous vehicles by 2021, a company spokesman told AFP.
The Munich-based group has been collaborating with US computer chip giant Intel and the Israeli technology firm Mobileye to develop self-driving
cars.
Last year, the Munich-based group also joined forces with its German rivals Daimler and Audi, the luxury subsidiary of Volkswagen, to buy the Here digital mapping service from Nokia to assist in the effort.