iBooks App For iPhone, iPad & iPod Touch To Get Folder Management Option Soon

It is not just the apps on the iPhone homescreen that can now be organized with folders. According to a rumor, Apple could be offering similar folders to the iBooks app that will let users organize the books in their virtual library better. Called Collections, the new feature will let users to collate books and PDF documents into separate groups for easier management.

To organize books into collections, users will have to tap on ‘Edit‘ icon. Now, tapping on any book icon will bring a checkmark that can be used to move the document to any specific Collection. There is also going to be a Collection tab on the top of the iBooks app from where the user can view all the Collections which may then be edited or deleted. The section will also let users create new Collections.

No word yet on when these features will be rolled out.

Simple iOS 4.2 Hack Replaces iPad Mute Switch With Orientation Lock

Among the many changes that iOS 4.2 brought about, one very noticeable change was with the iPad Orientation lock. This physical switch on the side of the iPad enabled users to easily lock the orientation of the iPad – a useful tool while you are watching movies or reading ebooks. Apple however replaced this with an alternate virtual button for orientation lock and changed the functionality of the original button to instead serve as a mute switch.

If you do not like this and would like to revert the functionality back to the original state, there’s a hack for that – on the Cydia store. Users who have jailbroken their iPad can now grab the free to download NoMute for iPad tool that will let users keep their orientation lock intact. There is apparently a bug in the application that seems to trigger the mute action as well when the switch is invoked. Hopefully, this will be resolved soon through an update.

Download Hootsuite For iPad From App Store Now

If you are a heavy user of social networks, then it is very unlikely that you are yet to hear about Hootsuite. This is a nifty third party client that helps users manage all their Twitter and other social network accounts from one place. Hootsuite has now announced that their application for iPad is now available for download from the App Store.

It is worth noting that Hootsuite had introduced a few limitations on their service which primarily meant users looking to manage more than five social networks using the service had to pick between one of the paid plans. So, while the Hootsuite app for iPad is free, you may have to pay for one of the paid plans if you are looking to manage more than five social networks.

The Hootsuite for iPad app can be downloaded by clicking this iTunes link.

Angry Birds App For iPhone & iPad Downloaded 10 Million Times

If you own an Apple or Android phone, chances are that you have definitely heard of this game called Angry Birds. Though I personally find nothing addictive about this, apparently so many people actually are, and the application – since its release in December 2009 – has now been downloaded 10 million times from the App Store. That number is inclusive of the original Angry Birds series, then a Lite version that was added in February 2010, the HD version for iPad and also the recently launched versions for Halloween. The Halloween variants for iPhone and iPad alone sold one million copies inside six days which puts the momentum of popularity gained by the developer in recent times into perspective.

Sometimes success can be a vicious cycle and one of the major reasons to Angry Birds success can be it being featured all along on the App Store. The app now has been rated by over 300,000 users and still manages a mind boggling 5-star.

What’s it about the Angry Birds game that you think makes it so addictive?

Play FarmVille On iPad With New App

Do people still play Farmville? It has been a while since I saw a Farmville update from friends on my Facebook profile. Apparently, a lot of people still do and are looking forward to tend to their farms from multiple platforms. So developer Zynga has taken note of this and has now brought the FarmVille app to the iPad platform. The updated iOS app is marked by “HD” indicating that this includes support for the iPad. You may be aware that the company had released a FarmVille iPhone app earlier this year.

In a statement marking the announcement, Zynga’s president of studios, Steven Chiang has said,

“We want to reach people wherever they want to play the games they love, and deliver the most fun and social experience on every platform. The iPad is a spectacular gaming device, and the new FarmVille app leverages its larger touch screen interface and enhanced graphics. FarmVille on the iPhone was an instant hit and now we are giving people another Apple device to play on.”

If you can barely wait, click here to go ahead and download the app for your iPad.

How Many Apps Are On The App Store?

There has been a little bit of debate over the past week about the exact number of apps that are now available on the Apple App Store. During the September 1 media event, Steve Jobs had announced that their App Store was home to close to 250,000 applications. On Saturday, a few websites “broke” the news that the store had already crossed the 300,000 app mark.

An addition of 50,000 apps in the span of a month and a half looks phenomenal, if not unbelievable. But are those numbers correct? According to a Fortune report, the websites that broke the news may have erred in picking the right metric to count the number of apps – which is still a guesstimating process. The announcement was made using the metrics used by Mobclix; an ad exchange that counts the number of apps based on the number of apps where their ads appear. The report notes,

“A better way to count iOS apps is to write a program that runs through the App Store looking at all the titles and comparing that list to the titles that were there the day before. That way you know which apps are still live and which, for whatever reason, have been pulled from the store. That’s the method used by 148apps.biz and AppShopper.com, our two favorite app trackers. According to 148apps and AppShopper, the number of iOS apps available for download in the U.S. as of Sunday morning was just shy of 280,000.”

So there you go. A more realistic number of apps on the App Store is close to 280,000. That means you still have a month or so before the 300,000 mark is reached.

Simple iPad Hack To Download Paid Apps For Free Discovered

An Italian website has published details about a relatively simple exploit that has been discovered on the iPad that will make it extremely easy for iPad users to access paid iPad applications for free. The exploit involves accessing the .plist file on the iPad and changing the status of a command from “purchasable” to “viewable“. The paid apps like the New Yorker are noted to change their ‘Buy‘ buttons to ‘Download‘ once this is done enabling easy access.  This can be done by anyone with basic computer skills.

Not all paid apps can be accessed this way though. Only applications that make use of Adobe’s Digital Content Viewer – that includes the Wired and The New Yorker apps – are vulnerable to this hack. Adobe issued a statement last week soon after the hack was discovered noting that they are working on this issue,

“We have confirmed that it is possible for experienced users with detailed instructions to access some digital publications on the iPad that have not been purchased. We are working on a fix and expect to deliver a new version of our Digital Content Viewer to publishers on Friday, October 8″

Interestingly, the hack appears to be working still; a week after Adobe’s self-imposed deadlines. It is not clear what is taking Adobe such a long time for the fix though.

WordPress iPad App To Get Video Upload Functionality

If you are a blogger and is someone who likes to blog from the couch or while you are on the move, then you must surely be a fan of the WordPress mobile apps for iOS, Android or Blackberry platforms. Automattic, the company responsible for the world’s most popular blogging platform; WordPress, has announced an imminent update to their iOS app that will bring video uploading functionality to the iPhone and iPad. The updated app will let users capture videos from their iPhone and upload it to their WordPress blog without having to go through the ritual of uploading it to YouTube and embedding.

While this is definitely an interesting update, Mobiputing reminds us that the iOS app is still a notch lower in functionality in comparison to the Android and Blackberry apps. This is because the iOS app does not have the functionalities like hyperlink buttons, text formatting options including the ability to bold, italicize or underline texts. That’s a pity.

iWork Apps For iPad Get File Transfer Support

Apple has released a new version of their iWork apps – Numbers, Pages and Keynote that bring with a number of new features including the very important ability to transfer files to and from remote locations. With this new version 1.2 of these applications, users may transfer files to remote servers using MobileMe, iTunes or WebDAV.

In addition to this, the latest version of these apps will also bring with them the ability to export files in a Microsoft Office compatible format. If you are a regular user of these applications, you may be aware that the Pages app on iPad already came with the ability to export files in MS-Word format. The new version will thus also allow users to export Numbers documents in MS-Excel and Keynote files in MS-PowerPoint formats. These applications are also noted to now import documents in these Microsoft Office compatible formats quicker and more reliably.

Check out the Apple App Store for the latest versions of these applications.

Google Earth iPhone App Gets Support For Retina Display

Google has released a new version 3.1.0 of their Google Earth app for iPhone that brings support to retina display on the recently launched iPhone 4. Besides this, the latest release also brings Ocean content layer and Underwater bathymetry and ocean surface information to the iPhone user.

The latest release brings the iOS app on par with the Android counterpart. Google had only last month introduced the ocean discovery feature to their Android app. Not surprisingly, the new iOS app is free to download and is compatible over iOS 3.0 and higher and support the iPhone, iPod Touch as well as the iPad.

The Google Earth app for iOS is a pretty nifty tool providing satellite as as informational content from Wikipedia by making use of the users’ location. You can check out the latest version of the Google Earth app by clicking here.