John Voorhees

5429 posts on MacStories since November 2015

John is MacStories' Managing Editor, has been writing about Apple and apps since joining the team in 2015, and today, runs the site alongside Federico. John also co-hosts four MacStories podcasts: AppStories, which covers the world of apps, MacStories Unwind, which explores the fun differences between American and Italian culture and recommends media to listeners, Ruminate, a show about the weird web and unusual snacks, and NPC: Next Portable Console, a show about the games we take with us.
@johnvoorhees@macstories.net
@johnvoorhees.macstories.net
voorhees@macstories.net

Beddit Sleep Tracker Acquired by Apple→

Beddit, which makes a sleep sensor that collects sleep and other health data and sends it to companion iPhone and Apple Watch apps, was acquired by Apple. According to Beddit’s privacy policy:

Beddit has been acquired by Apple. Your personal data will be collected, used and disclosed in accordance with the Apple Privacy Policy.

Since the introduction of the Apple Watch Series 2, Apple has placed renewed emphasis on the health and fitness tracking features of the Watch. One notable hole in Apple’s lineup of built-in health and fitness apps has been the lack of a sleep tracker. With Beddit, Apple fills that gap and presumably adds a team of engineers that can help it develop additional sleep tracking capabilities in-house.

The Beddit 3 Sleep Monitor is available on Apple’s online store.

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SQLPro Studio: A Cross DB Management Tool for macOS [Sponsor]

Do you work on a Mac, but need to interface with Enterprise Databases such as Oracle or Microsoft SQL server? Are you tired of firing up a Windows virtual machine just to run a query? Have you ever wished for a native Mac client? SQLPro Studio is the answer you’ve been looking for.

SQLPro Studio is a native Mac application that works with MSSQL server (both on premise and in Azure), Oracle, MySQL, PostreSQL and SQLite. The interface is fast and responsive, just like you’d expect from a native Mac app. It should go without saying, but SQLPro Studio can connect to databases hosted on Windows, Mac or Linux operating systems and supports either direct connection, or tunneling over SSH.

Write and execute queries in the tabbed query interface, SQLPro Studio supports all the features you’d expect: drag and drop fields from the SQL browser on the left to the SQL editor, auto complete SQL statements including table and field names, even reformat your SQL code to make it ‘pretty.’

You can easily export results as CSV, JSON or XML, and you can edit your results inline so long as you have a primary key on the table.

SQLPro Studio is your all in one solution for managing databases of all kinds, natively, from your Mac!

SQLPro Studio - macOS database management UI is available for $109.99, but MacStories readers can get 20% off by using the promo code MACSTORIES.

SQLPro Studio Studio is also available on the Mac App Store.

AppStories - Ep. 4 - 32 minutes

Interview: App Discovery and the iTunes Affiliate Program with AfterPad’s Kevin MacLeod

FedericoJohn
AppStories+ Deeper into the world of apps

AppStories Episode 4 - Interview: App Discovery and the iTunes Affiliate Program with AfterPad’s Kevin MacLeod

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AppStories+ Deeper into the world of apps

Federico and John talk about the iTunes Affiliate Program and its importance for app discovery and independent curation with Kevin MacLeod of AfterPad. The episode was recorded before Apple’s clarification of changes to the program.

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Apple Clarifies That Affiliate Program Changes Affect In-App Purchases Only

On April 24th, Apple sent an email to participants in the iTunes Affiliate Program that said:

Starting on May 1st 2017, commissions for all app and in-app content will be reduced from 7% to 2.5% globally. All other content types (music, movies, books, and TV) will remain at the current 7% commission rate in all markets. We will also continue to pay affiliate commissions on Apple Music memberships so there are many ways to earn commissions with the program.

The drastic cut in the rate on apps and In-App-Purchases and the short notice took participants in the program by surprise.

The May 1st deadline came and went seemingly without any change to the payout rate on apps. Apple has since posted a clarification to the iTunes Affiliate Resources website that says:

We’d like to clarify some changes being made to the Affiliate Program. Commissions for all iOS in-app purchases will be reduced from 7% to 2.5% globally, and all other content types (including music, movies, books, paid iOS apps and TV) will remain at the current 7%.

Anecdotal evidence since May 1st supports the clarification that the change to affiliate commissions affects In-App Purchases only. Links to apps and other content sold by Apple will continue to earn 7%, which is welcome news for websites and developers who rely on that revenue.

Game Day: Antitype

The clean, elegant design of Antitype caught my eye immediately. It’s a scrambled word game from BorderLeap that’s all about opposites. From its design to its gameplay, what makes Antitype unlike other word games is its unique approach that requires you to think about its puzzles differently than you would other word games. That makes the rules a little hard to grasp when you first try Antitype, but once you have the system down, it’s addicting.

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iOS Audio Recording and Editing Apps

John

Audio recording has been a mainstay of iOS since at least iOS 3 when Apple introduced its Voice Memos app. The iOS audio APIs have some notable constraints like the inability to maintain a Skype call and record an external audio source simultaneously, but that hasn’t stopped a comprehensive set of audio recording...

App Debuts

John

Aurora Browser Aurora is a simple Mac browser that’s handy if you need reference material nearby. The browser has minimal chrome filling all available space with content and sits on top of all your other windows, so it doesn’t get lost. If Aurora gets in the way though, you can collapse it into its...

Q&A

Question: I made several custom ringtones and stored them on my Mac as well as Amazon Drive (any other cloud storage would be fine as well). So, one day I was trying to load a ringtone from cloud storage, transfer it to my wife’s iPhone and…install it. But how? I couldn’t figure out any way...

Album

John

Glasses Cats with Attitude The animation of these cats is excellent. Cats with wild glasses and messages for your friends and family add a little attitude to your conversations. Vikings Head Vikings could be an up-and-coming sticker category; at least I hope so. This cartoon-style pack is a good alternative when you’re tired of...