Remember when gaming on the Apple TV meant holding the Siri Remote sideways? Those were the good old days of gaming on the Apple TV circa 2015. With rumors circulating that Apple (or Beats) is working on a game controller, I thought I’d revisit why this is something I’ve wanted for over a decade now,...
Dropover
Interesting Links
AI safety has been in the news a lot lately with the heads of multiple frontier labs calling for a slowdown of model development. Hayden Field of The Verge has an excellent overview of why Silicon Valley is freaking out and where things may be heading. (Link) There were already rumors that Apple’s M7...
App Radar
John: Flighty Flighty, which supports the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch, was updated with a few interesting features this week. First, the app’s Dynamic Island integration has been updated to show a departure countdown in the compact version of the view. The gate badge and in-flight progress graphics have been updated and now support...
The iPhone 18 Pro Camera: Apple Reference Image and Tyler Stalman’s Review
In the wake of last week’s Surprise and Shine event, Apple published a post on its Security Research blog about Apple Reference Image, a way to verify that a photograph taken with an iPhone hasn’t been altered. As Apple explains, AI offers helpful features like one-touch removal of distractions from an image, but that can make knowing what is real difficult.
This is not a simple problem to address. Modern cameras rely on sophisticated image-processing algorithms to produce the final viewable image, so certifying that an image accurately reflects what a real camera sensor captured requires a chain of trust covering the sensor as well as the computational photography software that interpreted the capture. Industry approaches to this problem, based on the C2PA standard, attach provenance metadata after capture and certify the history of image edits from that point forward. This approach, however, is vulnerable to compromise at any point in the editing chain, and a viewer has no way to detect such a failure. It can also create privacy risks for photographers working in dangerous conditions by tying the image to a public identity, either to a particular device or to an individual.
…new, opt-in camera mode lets a photographer create a securely timestamped reference image that accurately reflects what was captured by the iPhone’s camera sensor. Dedicated secure hardware on the device protects the integrity of this reference image, and Private Cloud Compute protects the privacy of the image data during processing.
The entire post is well worth reading because the solution is both clever and a great showcase of what Apple’s control over its chipset and Private Cloud Compute architecture can achieve for its customers. Apple also supports Google DeepMind’s SynthID watermarking technology.
Also, don’t miss Tyler Stalman’s review of the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max on YouTube. Tyler always does a fantastic job with his reviews, and this year’s review doesn’t disappoint, covering features like the camera hardware’s new variable aperture and what this year’s software updates mean for iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max users.
Chance Miller on the Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4→
Apple Watch reviews are out and Chance Miller at 9to5Mac has an excellent, in-depth look at both the Series 12 and Ultra 4. One of the things that Chance points out that might not be immediately obvious to many people is that the inclusion of an always-on chip as part of the S11 system on a chip allows Apple to fill meaningful gaps in both Watches’ data collection:
They will capture your heart rate every five seconds, regardless of whether you’re moving or stationary. Having such frequent and accurate heart rate readings unlocks new levels of data and insight.
When measuring your heart rate once every five minutes while stationary, previous Apple Watch models had an inherent blind spot. They either didn’t capture moments where your heart rate increased while not working out, or they captured one or two arbitrary readings somewhere in the middle of those moments.
That always-on component, combined with the Secure Exclave, is what Apple will also use to keep microphone data private and secure for features like Live Rewind and Siri Recap that are coming later this year.
It was these more frequent heart rate and HRV readings, along with the larger, more accurate sensor on the rear of the Apple Watches, that led me to order an Ultra 4. So I was also glad to see this observation from Chance after his first week with the new Watches:
In my one week with the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4, I’ve found that added data very insightful. I’m learning more about how little things I do throughout the day impact my heart rate. For example, I can visualize the impact of a late afternoon cup of coffee, or the impact of a stressful moment at work.
That’s the sort of feedback that you can act on and the kind of data that I expect developers will be able to use to make even more meaningful apps across the health and wellness spectrum.
ChatGPT Is Surprisingly Thorough at Planning Running Routes→
Every now and then, I go looking for new running routes to mix things up, which was why I was intrigued by this post by Simon Willison, who gave ChatGPT Work his address and asked it to find 5K and 10K routes, using OpenStreetMap data:
It worked for 27 minutes and produced exactly what I’d asked for, as both an embedded visualization and downloadable GPX file and GeoJSON files. Here’s that 5K route:
](https://cdn.macstories.net/images/uploads/2026/09/17/5k-route-1789644737884-49c7f49629.webp)
Source: simonwillison.com
I decided to give the same thing a try and was impressed by the results. ChatGPT spent a similar amount of time, poring over OpenStreetMap data, but it didn’t stop there. The model consulted my town’s website to account for road construction and the availability of sidewalks. Then, it visited the county’s website to review maps of greenways that aren’t part of the local road system. The final results were within 100m of exact 5K and 10K routes with notes on where to be careful to verify safe pathways and road crossings.
What I love about this sort of experiment is that it’s not something I’d ever have thought to ask ChatGPT myself. In hindsight, it’s obvious that all the data is there, ready to assemble. However, it just goes to show the many ways that I, and I’m sure many others, are still just scratching the surface of what LLMs make possible.
TestFlight Fixes and Wishes
Just as I was heading into the final stretch of review season, TestFlight was updated to reverse an update I wrote about in July. That update added search, which was one of my longstanding wishes for TestFlight. However, for some users, the update also changed the sorting of betas from reverse chronological order to alphabetical, including active betas alongside expired ones. As someone who reviews a lot of apps, that made TestFlight barely usable.
With the latest update, I’m happy to report that the sorting order has been restored to reverse chronological order. The most recently updated betas appear at the top of the list, and when you want to find something older, search is a great option. Returning to reverse chronological order may seem like a small thing, but it’s made a world of difference in keeping up with the apps I test.
Search was near the top of my list of TestFlight wishes for years, and its addition made a meaningful difference to the app’s usability. But I’ve had a lot of TestFlight wishes over the years that are scattered across multiple articles, so I thought I’d share what else I’d like Apple to tackle with TestFlight:
- Performance. I test a lot of apps, which slows TestFlight down on every Apple platform. The issue isn’t as severe today as it was when I wrote about it in 2023, but the slowness is still bad enough to make the app hard to use. Whatever the issue is, I’d love to see the list loading time reduced and scrolling through a list of apps become as smooth as it is in the App Store.
- Add filtering, sorting, and folders. Search is a step in the right direction, but allow me to sort by date, developer, category, and other metadata. I’d also like to be able to filter by installation status, so I can just see the betas I’ve installed or haven’t installed yet. User-defined folders for organization would be a nice bonus too.
- Hide inactive and expired betas. I’ve thought about TestFlight’s expired betas section a lot and can’t think of a single reason it exists from a tester’s perspective. Let me hide or exclude expired and withdrawn betas.
- Fix TestFlight emails and automatic updates. TestFlight email notifications can only be turned on or off on a per-beta basis. Adding a global switch would help a lot with managing these messages. Also, automatic updates of betas have never worked on my iPhone, and I’ve talked to others who have the same problem.
- Restore usable betas after a device migration. Apple’s migration from one device to another has gotten much better over the years, but it still does not migrate TestFlight betas, leaving me with a bunch of broken apps on my iPhone every fall.
- Indicate when a beta has been released on the App Store. This strikes me as easy to request, though I’m sure is difficult to implement, but I’d love to know when a beta has been superseded by an App Store version, so I can grab the stable release if I want and know I can publish a review about an app without having to check the App Store repeatedly myself.
The bottom line is that while TestFlight is once again usable, it could be much better. I recognize that TestFlight isn’t an app used by most people, but like Apple’s own OS beta testing program, TestFlight betas are an important part of developers’ workflow. They provide QA feedback and a promotional channel that the friction encountered by TestFlight users undermines.
I’m glad TestFlight continues to get meaningful updates. I just hope it gets more attention going forward.
iOS and iPadOS 27: The MacStories Review
FedericoThis week Federico shares thoughts from his review of iOS and iPadOS 27. Then in the AppStories+ post-show, he explains how he used agents to support the production of the review and Club MacStories extras.
Also available on YouTube here.
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AppStories Episode 501 - iOS and iPadOS 27: The MacStories Review
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