Jim Karpen holds a Ph.D. in literature and writing, and has a love of gizmos. His doctoral dissertation focused on the revolutionary consequences of digital technologies and anticipated some of the developments taking place in the industry today. Jim has been writing about the Internet and technology since 1994 and has been using Apple's visionary products for decades.
I'm working on a post about cutting the cord with your Apple TV, and my best discovery so far is that I'm able to watch the wide range of programming that Sling TV offers for just $20 per month via my Apple TV. The service includes ESPN, ESPN2, AMC, A&E, History channel, TNT, TBS, Disney channel, Travel Channel, CNN, HGTV, Food, and more. This can be done in two different ways: mirroring your iPhone or iPad using AirPlay and using Sling TV as your credentials for the WatchESPN app.
By Jim Karpen
There are likely occasions when you're listening to a playlist or to shuffled music, or listening to Apple Music, and you hear an artist you like — and you want more. At that very moment you want to listen to more from the album or to hear more from that particular artist. Siri is here to help.
When Apple announced iOS 9, I got really excited about the forthcoming News app. And now that I'm using it regularly, I feel my excitement was warranted. Plus, I like the snappy and seamless manner in which one can toggle between the overview of the news and a specific story. And I recently learned there's an even easier way to return to the overview, as well as to read the next story without going to the overview.
Apple first announced HomeKit, its smart-home platform, in June of 2014, but HomeKit-compatible devices have been slow in coming. And frankly, it may not have been easy to understand exactly what HomeKit is and what the benefits are. iHome generously sent me its smart plug a few weeks ago, and now I finally get what HomeKit is. It's really cool. I want to share with you what I've learned, in case you're interested in what HomeKit is and whether you may want to start creating a smart-home environment. This is especially relevant now, because with the annual Consumer Electronics Show currently going on, more and more HomeKit devices are being announced.
By Jim Karpen
Apple introduced third-party keyboards in iOS 8 after a lot of user requests. Now, the options seem endless, from the popular SwiftKey app to adding a gif keyboard for fun communication between friends. To add a third-party keyboard, the first thing you need to do is download a keyboard app from the App Store. Once downloaded, the setup is easy.
By Jim Karpen
By Jim Karpen
As my fellow blogger Todd Bernhard noted in this post, Apple has updated its Remote app for iPhone or iPad (free) to work with the new fourth-generation Apple TV. I've been using it a bit and am pleased with how intuitive it is — and how similar it is to the remote that comes with the Apple TV. here's how to use the Apple TV Remote app for iPhone or iPad.
By Jim Karpen
Walmart hasn't adopted Apple Pay, and it's not clear whether it will (though one report I read said the company is increasingly open to it). Now, however, you have another option for paying at Walmart. Last week the company launched a new mobile payment system at selected stores that lets you pay for your purchase at the checkout counter by scanning a QR code with your iPhone or iPad. (For it to work on an iPad, though, you'll likely need to have a cellular data model.) The new mobile payment system will be available nationwide by the first half of next year.
It's gotten so it's almost impossible to read a web page on your iPhone these days. As intrusive ads appear and disappear, the text on the page jumps around, causing you to lose your place. Sometimes this garbage even causes the text on the page to disappear on an iOS device. In the past using Reader View in Safari or an ad blocking app was an option, but now it's become an imperative. As a writer for a magazine, I sympathize with the need for publications to generate revenue, but as an article in Sunday's New York Times says, ads are destroying the user experience. A separate article outlines the types of ads that are so annoying, from the "Brash Bulldozer" to the "Belligerent Blockade" to the "Adamant Anchor."
I use reading glasses for some things, a concession to middle age, but fortunately I don't ever need them when I'm using my iPad. That's because I've adjusted the settings so that the text is larger and bolded, making it much easier to see. These settings apply to all of Apple's apps and to third-party apps that support Apple's Dynamic Type. Ever since iOS 8 was introduced, Apple has gathered text size, bold, view, and brightness into a single panel in Settings.
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