The all quiteness from Apple is the sound of approaching of a storm. And this one’s named iBooks 2. A software designed to let iPad, iPhone and iPod user get access to textbooks via their own devices using an Apple patented software.

iBooks 2 will comprise of a number of features, most exclusive being the 3-D imaging and gesture control. Particularly designed to focus student’s needs, the software allows to read textbooks, watch videos and  even take notes right inside their e-books, as reported by Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president for world-wide marketing. Along with this wonder app, Apple also released iBook Author that would allow users to make any book of their choice and upload it to Apple’s iBookstore. According to Guardian, the textbooks will be available in the US only. The iBookstore will feature a range of books with customers ranging from every walk of life. It also provides books for students that are in either high schools or colleges with the pricetag of products ranging from $14.99 to $499.

This iBook is particularly released to compete with Amazon’s kindle Fire that grabs most of the e-readers in the market.

Source  Guardian

Apple is set to enhance the security measures for the users of its MacBook and iOS Devices, patents published by United States Patent and Trademark Office reveal. According to them, the password  recovery information could be stored in a charging adapter of the device. By merely plugging in the adapter, the password details would be displayed on the device.

This would eventually lead to an increased sense of security and privacy among the users as the power adapters aren’t usually lost or stolen along with the devices. This would also relieve the users of prevailing password retrieval methods like security questions and the setting of complicated, alphanumeric passwords too.

However, in the case of loss of the power adapter, some retrieval methods have to be employed. They include backing up the system to multiple peripherals connecting your device and the secondary power adapters. Retrieval over a  remote server is also mentioned.

Nevertheless, it is yet to seen how it gets endorsed finally!!!

Source   The Apple Blog

iPhone Dev-Team has released the next generation of redsn0w, the jailbreaking utility for iOS. Redsn0w 0.9.9b1 carries many improvements and a bunch of new features. The newer redsn0w doesn’t require any IPSW (iOS firmware) file to jailbreak your device as it fetches pieces of public IPSWs from Apple and save them for later use. Another best feature of redsn0w is that it allows you to fetch, verify and use your SHSH blobs within the utility.

Redsn0w 0.9.9b1 only includes new features and improvements and not any new jailbreak support. Using redsn0w 0.9.9b1 you can jailbreak iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPod touch 4G, iPod touch 3G and iPad running iOS 4.3.x or iOS 5 beta.

Here is the official list of new features:

• uses DFU mode to try to automatically determine which device and FW you have
• fetches pieces of public IPSWs from Apple (once).  Non-public IPSWs must be provided manually (once).  It then caches those pieces for future use.
• “Just boot” is a tethered boot.  Uses whatever “Preferences” you’ve set for boot logo and kernel boot-args
• “Pwned DFU” puts your device in a pwned DFU state for some of the iTunes stuff detailed below
• “Recovery fix” gets past 1015 types of errors (when baseband portion of restore fails).  Should work on iOS5 beta too
• “Select IPSW” is for picking non-public IPSWs, or overriding auto-detection
• “SHSH blobs” has a bunch of options…
• “Fetch” – fetch current PARTIAL blobs on device.  Should complete in under 10 or 15 seconds.  Puts the set of PARTIAL of blobs on your computer as a plist.  Checks if Cydia already has a full set for this device and build.  If not, it submits this PARTIAL set and returns Cydia’s acknowledgement or rejection
• “Verify”  – cryptographically verifies existing blob files from either redsn0w, TinyUmbrella, or Cydia server.  You can select a whole bunch of blobs to verify at once if you want (like the TinyUmbrella directory)
• “Submit”  – both verifies and submits one or more blob files to Cydia.  This lets you copy your entire TinyUmbrella cache of blobs up to the Cydia server
• “Query” - queries the Cydia server for all available FULL or PARTIAL blobs for a given set of ECIDs
• “Stitch” – stitches either FULL or PARTIAL blobs to a STOCK or CUSTOM IPSW

1. Stitching is NOT yet supported on iPhones!  Need to work out the baseband part of the restore process.
2. FULL blobs stitched to a STOCK IPSW gives you a completely self-contained signed IPSW that iTunes will accept without any tricks (no need to go into pwned DFU mode, no need to start TinyUmbrella TSS server, no need to redirect to Cydia server for blobs)
3. PARTIAL blobs stitched to any IPSW requires you to go into pwned DFU mode before running iTunes.  No need to start TU or use Cydia though.
4. Stitching either FULL or PARTIAL blobs to a CUSTOM IPSW also requires a pwned DFU start before iTunes restores.  No need to start TU or use Cydia though.
5. Will eventually support fetching the blobs directly from Cydia instead of a file on your computer

Download Links:

redsn0w 0.9.9b1 for Mac
redsn0w 0.9.9b1 for Windows

Via: @MuscleNerd Source: Dev-Team blog

Apple’s iTunes App Store has passed the 10 billion downloads milestone. More than 10 billion apps and games for iPhone, iPod and iPad have been downloaded from iTunes App Store since its release in July 2008. iTunes App Store is the world’s biggest mobile App Store with more than 300,000 apps available. On January 18, 2011, the App Store had over 9.9 billion downloads, and now today on Saturday, January 22, 2011, the Apple App Store sold its 10 billionth app. Its a great achievement in less than 2 years.

The vast choice of apps and games is one of the solid reasons behind the success of Apple and iOS devices.

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Source: Apple

HD Photographer is a Cydia tweak which allows you to shoot HD quality widescreen photos on your iPod touch 4G. This tweak increases the default camera resolution of iPod touch 4G from 960×720 to 1280×720. You can download HD Photographer from Cydia via BigBoss repo for $0.99 only.

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Cupcakes! Holiday Edition has been released by Maverick Software. The app is available now with a price tag of $0.99. “Cupcakes! Holiday Edition makes it easy to bake a batch of the perfect cupcakes for the season. Pick your cupcake liners, fill the pan with cake batter, pop it in the oven, and before you know it your cupcakes will come out piping hot. Shake your phone to get the cupcakes out of the pan and then choose from all kinds of specially designed frostings & toppings, all in Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas themes” This is what the developer of the app said.

Features of Cupcakes! Limited Edition are

• 37 different holiday cupcake liners, including pumpkins, spider webs, candy corn, fall leaves, black cats, turkeys, pilgrims, Christmas bows, holly, santa, snowflakes, and much more

• 13 different cake batters, with seasonal favorites like pumpkin, apple spice, fruitcake, cranberry, and Christmas pudding

• The ability to set your baking time, from lightly baked to crispy burnt cupcakes

• 38 types of frosting, both decorative (like jack-o-lanterns, Christmas bells, chocolate santas) and holiday tastes (peppermint, pumpkin pie, orange, cranberry)

• 60 toppings, from candy ghosts & gummy spiders to chocolate turkeys & sugar plums, seasonally colored sprinkles, and Halloween candy favorites

• 25 flavors of official Jelly Belly gourmet jelly beans to add as toppings

• 12 kinds of plates and 12 tablecloths, with fun seasonal themes

• 7 fillings (pumpkin, peppermint, orange, and more) to add to your cupcakes

• Holiday candles you blow out by blowing on your phone! (shake your iPod for older iPods)

• Ability to submit your cupcake to the “Cupcake of the Week” and Hall of Fame contests.

Download Cupcakes! Holiday Edition(iTunes Link)

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The most loved iPhone app Angry Birds which was at the No.1 spot in the iTunes paid apps category is now been replaced by a game which is relatively very young. Cut the Rope was released two days ago on the 5th October, 2010. Both the games are available with a price tag of $0.99.

Download Cut the Rope from iTunes

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Sega’s much awaited game Sonic the Hedgehog 4 has now been released. Sonic 4 is now available for whooping tag price of $9.99. The game features enhanced gameplay elements, including the classic Sonic Spin Dash, and the versatile homing attack. The game comes with a size of 88.7 MB.

Features of new Sonic the Hedgehog:

• Two exclusive levels build specifically for the iPhone & iPod touch using the accelerometer.
• All of Sonic’s classic moves are available, including the newer Homing Attack which will add a new level of control and excitement.
• Race through 4 unique zones containing 4 acts each as well as 7 special stages.
• A staple of the Genesis-era games, the special stages return allowing fans to collect the 7 Chaos Emeralds and unlock Super Sonic.
• Dr. Eggman returns with new and improved mechas and will go berserk when he accumulates damage.

Download Sonic Hedgehodge 4 from iTunes

Here is the trailer of the game:

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