Welcome to week two of our recaps of recent software news, opinions, how-tos, new releases, and coming attractions. For the latest reviews from our editors and new products, subscribe to our newsletters. Apple's playbook Cupertino fans are playing Fantasy Apple in advance of June's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). Rumors are circulating that Apple will announce the iPhone 6, 'til August or September though it may well not be available. The long-rumored iWatch and Apple TV appear to be no-go for this conference, according to Re/code's sources. Which means -- apart from that possible iPhone 6 -- that the big news for WWDC will likely be software. OS X 10.10, aka Syrah, is the successor to Mavericks, and 9to5Mac says it sounds like a major redesign, but there are no specifics about features. OS 8, aka Okemo. Rumors abound: HD audio tracks support, Mac apps like TextEdit and Preview, a split-screen view for iPad (though Ars Technica points out that this handy feature comes with difficulties). That's a lot of updates, so there is also speculation that some features may get pushed to iOS 8.1. Whatever Apple announces next month, you can take a trip down memory lane with CNET's evolution of iOS. Healthbook is an iOS 8 app that will allegedly monitor certain vital signs and help you track your health and fitness. Mac has some screenshots. In other Apple news: the case of the missing texts. Adam Pash reports that after he switched from iPhone to Android, he quit obtaining text messages from friends on iPhone, because his phone number remained linked to iMessage. He has not yet found a solution. On Thursday another unhappy user filed a lawsuit over the iMessage black hole and is seeking class-action status. Speaking of iMessage, Apple is considering putting your contacts' photographs in the background of text chats, according to a patent filing. This could potentially help prevent misdirected texts. New releases, new features Google released an updated Search application for iOS that lets you ask questions via voice -- ZDNet says it puts Siri to shame. Square has killed Wallet and released Square Order (iOS), which lets you buy food and other items from local businesses. It's available in San Francisco and New York. Google Maps now features "Quick facts" information boxes from Google's Knowledge Graph. Currently the feature appears only on the desktop version of Google Maps. TuneIn Radio (Windows, iOS, Android) has gotten a little more social, letting users follow their favorite radio stations. Outlook.com Web email users can now reply in-line and have more options for creating rules. From the Department of Unintended Consequences: A free anti-greed iphone app called Make It Rain (iOS) is earning its makers $50,000 a day, says Re/code, after the application hit No. Tunes free chart. Coming attractions iPhone game sensation Flappy Bird shall return, possibly in August, with multiplayer functionality. Microsoft has dropped the Kinect as an Xbox requirement, which drops the price of the standalone console to $399 -- that's available June 9. Also, you no longer have to buy a Live Gold subscription to get access to Netflix, Hulu Plus, HBO Go, and other entertainment apps on Xbox. Google appears to be beta-testing a new Web interface for Gmail, which may or may well not become a public release. The UI looks somewhat more like the mobile app's redesign, and Gchat is beginning to resemble Hangouts. For more Google speculation, head over to the just-released I/O schedule and Ars Technica's tea leaf reading. Will we someday be able to run software on Android and vice versa iOS? Six Columbia PhD students have developed Cider, which does just that. It's a prototype and not available to the rest of us, so for now just watch the demo along with Papa Smurf. Moneyhorse Games says it shall release a North Korea-themed game, Glorious Leader, on PC and Android by end of year. The retro video game stars Kim Jong-un on a unicorn, as well as Dennis Rodman. Don't you have to be a virgin to ride a unicorn? Departures Facebook has killed Camera and Poke as standalone apps; they're no longer in the iTunes store. On Thursday Google ended third-party iphone app access to Google Voice. Voice is still available, though it's on deck to become integrated with Hangouts, but if an alternative is wanted by you, we rounded up four Android software for voice over IP. Today Google announced it has acquired Quest Visual and, makers of the Word Lens translation apps. Team Word Lens says the app (iOS, Android) and its language packs are free while they transition into Google Translate. TrueCrypt's cryptic warning is downright alarming. Threatdown Google has seven layers of security for Android applications uploaded to Google Play, but malware still creeps in. On "Mission Impossible," agents got instructions that ended with, "This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds." Privacy concerns once make exploding messages sound appealing again. Quartz reports that Dstrux lets you send files that can be viewed for a time period (like 5 seconds) that you set, but the files can't be copied, saved, or screen-grabbed. Dstrux is available for the Web now, with an iphone app coming in May. Meanwhile, this week Yahoo bought Blink, another iphone app for sending self-deleting messages, and then deleted Blink from the software stores. Last week Gmail became the first standalone software in Google Play to reach 1 billion downloads. Google is bringing a feature of two-factor authentication to corporate Google Apps accounts: If a log-in looks suspicious, the ongoing service will text the user a verification code. Pro email: Mashable reports that Google has launched Google Apps Message Encryption to encrypt messages sent to other systems. It costs $35 annually per user. Personal email: Benjamin Mako Hill found that regardless if you don't use Gmail, Google might have some of your email, because you send messages to persons who are on Gmail. Usually "https" in a browser's URL field tells you that the site is encrypted and secure. However, as Ars Technica reports, malware slingers have been forging the site certificates of antivirus vendors to lure people into entering credentials. Adobe released a bunch of patches to Acrobat, Reader, Flash, and Illustrator. Go update if you haven't already reckoned with the annoying pop-up reminders. Last month Microsoft ended support for Windows XP, Office 2003, and SharePoint Server 2003, so they were not covered by Tuesday's security patches. How to... Mute annoying friends Twitter. And improve your Twitter experience otherwise. Stop missing updates from friends on Facebook. Make the new Firefox look and act like the old Firefox. Add emergency contact facts to your iPhone's lock screen. Change the behavior of your Android device's volume buttons. Edit PDFs on Windows. Share your Steam gaming library with family and friends. Add interesting calendars to Sunrise on iOS. Delete comments on Instagram for Android. Get non-Amazon Appstore programs on your Kindle Fire. Be a beta-tester Google's Creative Lab has released a spelling game, Spell Up from Chrome, to help ESL students and anyone else who wants to brush up their ABCs. You need Chrome to play it, and it runs on desktop, Android, and iOS, but on iOS the voice feature doesn't work. MIT Media Lab Playful Systems and the Dalai Lama Center for Ethical and Transformative Values have teamed to produce 20 Day Stranger, an iPhone iphone app that anonymously pairs you with someone else in the world to give you a sense of their life. Apply for an electronic penpal at the 20 Day Stranger site. The Shout application lets you resell anything -- your spot in the cronut line, concert tickets, a dinner reservation. It is wanted by the creators to be a Craigslist-type marketplace, but Betabeat notes the app's potential to become a scalper's paradise. Shout is testing in New York now and is slated for Los San and Angeles Francisco this summer. Get Shout at the App Store, but you'll need an access code from Shout to participate.
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