When I was learning how to code, one of the problems I had was no specific idea for an app to create. A vague idea cropped up since then but having done absolutely nothing about it, I’m glad to see that Apple have done the hard work for me. Their new feature Genius Browse is an interactive feature to help you pick what to watch next.

Last month, Apple released an excellent ad that showcased the accessibility features that can give more people the opportunity to experience college and student life (specifically in America, but obviously everywhere). I was going to blog about this at the time, but had forgotten until it was mentioned on The Last Leg of the Year on New Year’s Eve. As host Adam Mills said: Yes, it was self-serving, yes they were bigging themselves up, and yes they timed it for International Day of People with Disabilities. But by crikey, they made a powerful message.

So, the dust has settled and I finally have a moment to put fingers to keyboard and jot down some thoughts from this year’s WWDC announcements. I’ve been quite lacking in keeping up with any news so was blind going into the Keynote, and they crammed quite a lot in without there being anything too major.

A couple of months ago, Apple launched a new service as part of their news subscription called News+ Food. The additional app functionality appears in the News+ app, bringing together recipes from around the different outlets that appear in the News app, and allows you to save any recipes you might find. As with other recipe apps, it then allows you to make sure you’ve got all the ingredients available, and then follow along as you cook with an easy view within the app.

Apple Music has been doing annual reviews for a while now, looking at the songs you’ve listened to in the year and highlighting your most listened to albums and artists for a good summary of twelve months of music. I’m always disappointed in my Music reviews though, because I don’t listen to enough variety or repetition (outside of musicals) to make it worthwhile. A lot of my listening happens via someone else’s device and a HomePod, so they get all the credit.

I previously wrote about the new feature in Apple Podcasts that auto-generates transcripts, with mixed feelings about it. A great improvement, and a step forward for accessability, obviously, but the accuracy and layout of it weren’t exactly what I would have gone for. I said at the time: As a creator, that’s all you actually have to do, read it and check it. You can opt out and provide your own transcripts if preferred, but this would at least be a great starting place to save some time. It’s not perfect, as you’d imagine, being a first release and relying on computer-generated text-to-speech that is so much better than it used to be but still has room for improvement. Because it is just transcribing the words, there is no differentiation between speakers, whereas I used to create my transcripts more like a script.

A recent addition to Apple Maps is the option to create a Custom Route, and this is a great integration for me. It’s not new technology to be able to plot a potential walking route for yourself, I’ve been using various options for a while. Being able to plan where you’re going, how far a route is, how long it might take, whether it crosses busy roads, etc. it’s all part of the fun.

I’ve been gradually discovering some of the fun things that the latest iOS and watchOS releases can do, but one of the main ones in Apple Fitness suddenly became very handy recently. I was under the weather recently, and I suddenly remembered the new feature that allows you to pause your activity rings on the Apple Watch. That’s right, PAUSE!

This year’s Apple WWDC has been and gone, and it’s taken me a while to get round to writing about what was unveiled during the Keynote. In part, that’s because it probably wasn’t as exciting as it could have been. The normal announcements and reveals felt very rushed because half of the presentation was saved up for the AI stuff.

I’ve had a couple of mental health revelations this year, simple things that I’ve learned about myself. They mostly fall under the category of things that you read tips for all the time and think, well sure that’s just common sense, then realise you’re not actually doing it and that might be why you’re bending under the stress. Meanwhile, recently, Apple launched a new element to their health tracking platforms called State of Mind. This falls under the category Mental Wellbeing in the health app, alongside Time in Daylight (I really want to use this measure but seem to always have too long sleeves) and Mindful Minutes (used to be called Breathe, I think?).

It’s the Monday of WWDC week which means Apple Keynote day, and it is always a lot of fun to see where they think technology is going next. This time, it’s all about the mixed reality headset, something which has been discussed for a while and leaked more seriously by tech journalists recently. So it wasn’t a surprise when Tim Cook announced the Vision Pro headset, but it was a surprise to see how space age looking their set of goggles were, and also quite shocking to see the price. (Starting at $3,499!)

Apple launched a separate music app for Classical music this week, dedicated to the classical music genre, whilst continuing to work with your existing Apple Music subscription. I think this is an interesting idea, and if I hadn’t been taking a pause from monthly challenges then 30 days of classical music could very much have been on the cards.

Apple have released a comprehensive round up of their 2022 entertainment and services - inevitably happy about how successful they have been - with wisdom from VP of the sector, Eddy Cue. There are lots of facts and figures, as you might imagine, but I do like the summary from Mr Cue:

One of the innovations Apple Fitness+ feature is artist spotlight workouts, where all the music on the workout playlist are from one specific artist, giving you a chance to really celebrate with your favourite artists or get into the groove with a specific vibe. If I’m honest, I’ve not been a big fan of these, but I don’t have a good reason for that. Some of the featured artists haven’t necessarily been my cup of tea, but there have been a couple I’ve liked and just not really been bothered about.

In September, I wrote about the latest updates that iOS 16 brought to the Apple Books app, in particular a consternation about the stupid cross in the corner ruining the reading experience. Well, thank goodness, they’ve fixed it. This week saw a raft of updates to various devices, and as ever, I’m grateful to have a nerd in the house to make sure everything is up to date as and when it’s needed.

Sleep is one of my most favourite and precious things and one of the benefits of being child-free is that it’s a commodity I can have plenty of - although never enough, obviously. Tracking sleep has been endlessly fascinating to me for a good while now, from those apps that suggested you pop your phone under your pillow to see how it’s going, to the first tracking introduced by Apple on the watch.

In the latest updates to both watch and phone, Apple have paid a lot of attention to health and fitness with updates to sleep tracking, accident detection and workout setups. One thing I hadn’t realised is that they’ve also added a whole range of new badges based on your Fitness+ activity. I love badges! There have long been awards for trying your first of a new workout type, or maximising the stats for a workout, eg. most calories burned, furthest distance travelled, etc. Now there is a similar setup but exclusively for the Fitness+ collection, celebrating types of workout tried, number of each and total altogether, plus an intriguing workout streak. If there’s anything I love more than a badge, it’s a streak.

Apple released watchOS 9 and iOS 16 this past week which usually means a hideous evening of updating all the gadgets and running around looking at progress bars every which way. But it’s usually worth it for what the new release brings and this year, I’m determined to actually make the most of it and fully understand what upgrades have arrived, rather than just getting on with my day and being surprised when six months later I find a useful bit of functionality.

Apple held their traditional September event today, focusing in on three main areas: Watch, AirPods, and iPhone. The event was called Far Out which led a lot of people to think they were improving night photography but, it turns out, the space age part of the programme was about reaching out to satellites in an emergency. More on that in a moment, instead, let me start with the things I might actually get some use from.

Being in the Apple device cycle means putting up with the unfortunate changes they make to their devices until either you get used to it or they roll it back. I tend not to complain too much about them because I’m still so hugely in awe of how brilliant my phone and iPad are, so the benefits far outweigh the cons.

Did you know there’s stand up comedy on Apple Music? I just found some recently, stumbled across it by complete accident, and I was surprised. Although, when I really thought about it, it does make sense. Old school stand up comedy used to be released on records, didn’t it, with people happily playing their favourite stand up on repeat.

The good news is my second attempt at a thirty day challenge was more successful than the first, in that I actually managed to do the thing every day for the full thirty days. In case you missed it, February’s task was to do the 30 Day Core Challenge that Apple Fitness+ had very kindly put up I suspect especially for me. And I did it! The first fifteen days were five minute workouts, and the second half was full of ten minute workouts, and I managed to do every single one, every single move (not always pretty but I tried), every single minute.

My second thirty day challenge of the year takes things away from the mental side of life (language learning) and more into the physical (health and fitness). Don’t worry, I’m sure not all the challenges will fit into the Crystal Maze categories. Almost as if they were listening to me, Apple Fitness+ released some updates this year that included a handful of curated collections - workout schedules to help you achieve certain goals. One is to get a stronger back, one is to get a better night’s sleep, and one, clearly made just for me, is a thirty day core challenge.

It’s been about a month that Apple Fitness+ has been out in the wide world and I’ve been using it pretty consistently since then. I wrote some thoguhts when the service initially launched and I thought it would be worth an update. My bottom line feelings haven’t changed: it’s a great addition to my fitness schedule but it doesn’t replace anything wholely. I turn to it when the main aim of my workout is closing my rings because having the visuals up on screen really helps achieve those goals. When I’m after something a bit more intense, Les Mills is still my go to.

It feels like Apple Fitness+ was announced so long ago - time moves slowly these days, right? But finally, mid-December, the new service launched and I was very keen to try it out. It’s a subscription service that you can either purchase separately or as part of a bundle of Apple services (my option), but it’s squarely aimed at people who have an Apple Watch as well. Once you’re on board, the integration with the watch is incredible and makes it all worthwhile - without a Watch, I’m not 100% sure it stacks up against the vast array of fitness alternatives.

New software became available this week for Apple devices - phones, iPads, TV, and watches - and brought lots of new and intriguing functionality. I can’t wait to get best use out of widgets to organise the phone home screens, tracking sleep on the watch, and scribbling various things on iPad with the pencil. But one of the things I didn’t think I would be so interested in has totally grabbed my attention, and that is sharing Apple Watch faces. Putting together the ideal watch face is something I wish I was better at but just can’t get interested in. I’ve settled on two main faces for my watch, one focusing more on activity, the other on weather and calendar info. I flip between those two and that’s about it.

When Apple Arcade launched, I was very excited and blogged about it a couple of times. I intended to try ALLLLL the games, even though there were over 100 at launch and the collection was only going to grow. If I’m honest, I tried out a handful, mostly the ones mentioned in those prior blog posts and realised the rest didn’t really appeal. And now, for the moment, I’ve cancelled my Arcade subscription. The weird thing I found was that having the subscription meant I felt pressure not to try out any other apps until I had exhausted those that I was definitely paying for. And I didn’t want to play all of those apps. In fact, of the twenty or so that I tried, only two stuck with me, and only one of those had long-term playability.

Everyone has their own unique way of dealing with the apps on their phone. Some are very organised, keep everything in folders, download an app, try it, store it or immediately delete it. Others, like me, are a bit more haphazard about things: lots of apps that have been downloaded to try, lots of things taking up space that don’t need to, half-hearted folders and a bit of a mish-mash of everything going on.

Apple TV+ launched on Friday and yes, you can expect plenty of future updates on the content that came with it. Dickinson was mega! But this isn’t about that. This is about the first episode of Oprah’s Book Club distributed by Apple. I’ve already discussed how I dived right in and started reading the book as Apple quite cleverly coincided the book club with their new reading goals in the Books app.

I can’t commit to listening to Beats 1 on a regular basis, as much as I love what they’re doing on the Apple Music platform – but there’s one thing I try very hard not to miss, and that’s Julie Adenuga’s Friday show. It’s Fridaaaaaaaaay. I love Julie, and her weekday show is excellent, crammed with music and interviews that sometimes veer slightly too grime for my tastes but otherwise are eminently enjoyable and listenable. However, when you get to the Friday show, things really shift into gear.

One of the things Apple is renowned for, and also vilified for, is their unified approach to technology. They make the software and they make the devices which helps to have a more seamless experience as a user (although not at the moment!) and now they’ve added content to their list as well. When I wrote the post about enjoying the new reading goals in association with Oprah’s book club moving to the Apple platform, I hadn’t realised quite what a crossover experience the team have created.

In the latest iOS release, Apple have got a lot wrong. Many things that used to function now no longer do so, and everything is just that little bit more flaky. I’ve never restarted my devices quite so much as I have these past few weeks. However, one thing that I have enjoyed is the new reading goals. The Books app, or iBooks as I can’t help but keep calling it, was always a tangential thing for me. I love reading and books but Kindle was my app and store of choice. The Apple Books app, whilst making a really nice reading experience, didn’t do much in terms of promotion, finding material, or collecting your works once downloaded. Meanwhile, I’ve just spent a significant amount of time putting my books into Kindle collections on the iPad which was an easy process and makes for a nice digital bookshelf.

Just a quick update on my previous post about the launch of Apple Arcade. I listed five games that I played when they first came out but since then I’ve tried a couple more that are worth a mention. We also investigated the new ability to pair a Playstation controller to the Apple TV and play games on the big screen - which can make a big difference depending which game you’re playing.

You know how people often say that technology can fix problems they didn’t even know they had? Well, Apple have fixed a problem that I definitely didn’t have – not enough access to games. Their recent launch of Apple Arcade is interesting and exciting for many reasons, but more than anything, when am I going to find time to play all of these titles? On the one hand, I never really thought the app gaming world needed a revolution or a boost – there was plenty out there to play, free games, paid games, lots of choice, lots of variety. But on the other hand, if Apple can help put a bit of a spanner in the free-to-start-with-but-then-pay-to-actually-get-any-enjoyment-out-of-the-game model that has taken the app world by storm, then I’m probably glad to see it.

Two recent conversations about movies have made me realise there’s a key component of the digital rental process that is missing and would make life so much better. At the moment, on Apple in particular, you can buy a film for a high price initially that drops the longer a film has been in the world. Or you can rent a film for a slightly lower price but only keep it for a certain amount of time.

Every year, Mr C and I sit down and watch the Apple Design awards. Every year we download several of the apps that we’ve missed over the months. And every single year, Mr C says: “They should do more with the design awards, a podcast, a TV show. You should blog it.” I was confident I already had, and looking through the archives proves me right, but I can’t quite believe it was four years ago.

I’ve been watching Apple WWDC keynotes for a few years now, and they’re often quite interesting with bits and pieces that make a difference to me and how I use my devices. This year seemed different – perhaps because I made strides towards learning Swift and being a developer myself, but perhaps also because they announced such a lot of things. I was hooked, and afterwards my brain was buzzing.

I suspect I have talked before at length about how fun I find the Apple Watch activity badges, and how they encourage me to keep moving. Recently I’ve been less obsessed with them, getting on with my own plans and seeing what badges fall my way without forcing it. However, this month, something weird happened and I wanted to get the monthly badge so desperately despite the odds being significantly against me. It was a calorie count achievement, and it seemed quite tricky but I was making good progress. Then I had a bad few days and figured I probably wasn’t going to get the badge after all. Except on the final day of the month, it was tantalisingly close.

Today I managed to earn this award on my Apple Watch - 1,000 move goals. I don’t quite know how that’s possible, especially since a burst of energy a month or two ago sent my move goal sky high. But I’ve got a good relationship with the goals on my watch now - not over-taxing myself to try and reach them and then burning out, but using them as motivation to keep going when you just need that little extra push to get an award.

It doesn’t matter what you think of Apple or their offerings this week from the latest announcement event. This video, that kicked off the reveal of their TV+ programming, is special. Simple and pure, somehow moving and momentous, really digging into the wonder that is creativity. I could watch it over and over, I really could.

My Swift journey so far has been stop/start in nature, but recently it has become one of those hobbies that occupies a significant portion of my mind, one that I think about a solid 90% of the day. That’s good, really, because it’s a useful skill, coding, and one I am still very much at the early stages of grappling with. I’m never quite sure how much detail to go into here, really, because is it interesting to read about someone else learning how to code? I don’t know. What I am confident in, though, is sharing the resources that are helping me along the way.

There’s quite a few neat things that have been introduced in Apple’s latest software update for iPhones and iPads, but today I’ve been thinking about the new Screen Time feature. It’s on my mind today because Sunday morning is when the report pops up and tells you just how well you’ve managed to waste your week. As a concept, Screen Time is a really good addition. More information is always better, and when I got the very first Screen Time report, I immediately deleted an app that was clearly taking up far too much of my daily life. Since then, my reports have been pretty consistent, but I haven’t yet dug into the vast amount of detail that is available within the Screen Time pages.

Apple’s recent update to iOS12 has brought with it plenty of changes, some are good, some are bad, some are genius, and some make your life better without you actually realising it needed it. I have thoughts on a few of the interesting new features but I’m kicking off with something that is a subtle change but I’m really loving it. I’ve talked before about how much I like the Activity feature on the Apple Watch, in particular the badges that you can earn, and I’ve also talked about how frustrating it is when they don’t work. They seem to be functioning correctly for me at the moment, which is a good start, and it’s always fun to view which awards you have achieved and which you are working towards via the Activity app on the phone.

I have, during the course of writing on this blog, mentioned many times the ways and means I am enjoying Wimbledon - whether that is indulging in endless TV and radio streams, analysing what options are available on various app stores, or even being lucky enough to attend the tournament itself. This year, I am firmly back in my armchair, and have even indulged in a couple of days off work to ensure I capture as much of the opening matches as I possibly can.

Apple’s limited edition January-only new year’s activity badge worked it’s magic in our household. The first available week, Mr C and I were both working on maxing out our activity rings each and every day, and it got a bit competitive. Turns out when a badge is limited edition, it really does have a motivating effect. We managed this January one in the first week… come on Apple, what’s next? More badges required!

Apple have presented Watch users with a new challenge for January, hoping to encourage people to stick to their new year’s resolutions and get active. A notification on the watch this week highlighted a new and unique badge that can be earned during January 2017 by completing the activity, stand and exercise rings for a full week Monday to Sunday. It’s harder than it sounds, particularly if you’ve spent Christmas lounging on the sofa, but it’s totally doable and I love, love, love the motivation a standalone badge can give you.

I’ve been paying a bit more attention to my Apple Watch exercise rings again recently, and although I usually work on a week by week basis, I was perusing the history in the accompanying iPhone app. There, you can see how you’ve done each month and it’s also a good way of comparing days, ie. seeing if you often take Fridays off. I was surprised, however, going back a couple of months, to see a trend I hadn’t really noticed at the time.

I was superbly excited going into this year’s Apple Music Festival, even more so than usual. Previous years have seen me bouncing around in glee at the concept of a fortnight’s worth of free live music, streamed around the globe to be soaked up in the comfort of my own living room. This year, given my focus on musical education, I was looking forward to it even more! Plus, the line up looked exceptionally good.

After a little bit of delivery drama, my new Apple Watch Series 2 arrived just in time for the weekend, and so naturally, I headed out to test out the one thing I’ve been looking forward to since it was announced - swim tracking!

Apple Music gets quite a lot of stick for its functionality and usability, and I can understand the complaints to a degree. However, I’ve used it constantly these past six months for my weekly album adventure and much more, so I’m listening to more music than I probably have before in my life. I’m comfortable with how it works and I love it being part of my iOS experience. There’s one feature I really would like, though, and that is a Reading List style place to save things for the future. If you use Safari, you’ll know it’s easy to save whatever web page you’re on to your Reading List so that you can revisit it at a later date. Or if you’re anything like me, save stuff that you take several months to get round to looking at.