Introducing DualSense the New Wireless Game Controller for PlayStation5

Microsoft Edge Is Now More Popular Than Firefox | Digital Trends

The web has changed a lot over the years, and so has the way we use it. The thing that hasn’t changed? The web browser, the tool every one of us depends on. Here’s why it’s well past time for new ideas.

Digital TrendsArif Bacchus

Play Stadia Pro for free, starting today

Video games are a great way to socialize while at home, so we’re giving gamers in 14 countries free access to Stadia Pro for two months.

GooglePhil Harrison

Disney Plus surpasses 50 million subscribers

The international rollout of Disney Plus in a number of countries has helped it roll past the 50 million subscriber mark, the company has announced. To compare, Netflix has 167 million subscribers worldwide.

The VergeJulia Alexander

Leaker Claims New 13-inch MacBook Pro Coming as Soon as Next Month

Apple will announce a new 13-inch MacBook Pro in May with the codename J223, according to a rumor shared by YouTuber and leaker Jon Prosser. ...

MacRumorsTim Hardwick

No one’s getting new emoji in 2021 because of the pandemic

The Unicode Consortium says it’s delaying the release of emoji in 2021 and will be pushing back the schedule until 2022. This means the deadline to submit new emoji goes until September 1st.

The VergeAshley Carman

Google extends free access to advanced teleconferencing features to September 30th

Google has announced that it will extend free access to some advanced Google Meet features to all G Suite and G Suite for Education customers until September 30th. Previously, Google said it would offer free access until July 1st.

The VergeJay Peters

Apple and Google partner on COVID-19 contact tracing technology

Apple and Google announce a joint effort to help governments and health agencies reduce the spread of the virus, with user privacy central to the design.

Apple Newsroom

Cyberpunk 2077’s DLC will be revealed before release, CD Projekt suggests | VGC

Company says it’s planning “no less” DLC than it released for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Video Games ChronicleAndy Robinson

Zoom's security issues

• Zoom quickly fixes ‘malware-like’ macOS installer with new update
• Zoom has disabled a feature that was exposing users’ LinkedIn profiles
• Thousands of Zoom recordings exposed because of the way Zoom names recordings
• Zoom announces 90-day feature freeze to fix privacy and security issues
• Image Credits: Kaspersky

Intel's 10th Gen CPUs

• New 10th Gen Intel Core H-Series Processor Launch

Apple acquires Dark Sky

• Dark Sky Has Been Acquired by Apple and Its API Will Be Discontinued at the End of 2021
• Image Credits: Dark Sky

AirTag Confirmed?

• Apple references unreleased AirTag item trackers in new support video
• Image Credits: Guilherme Rambo

Dope Links

• 5 Must-Know Xcode Shortcuts for Unit Testing
• Use Web Workers in your Vue.js Components for Max Performance
• How to protect Serverless (Open)API's?
• Announcing AWS Lambda support for .NET Core 3.1
• Pluralsight's Free April Month
• Virtual Disney World

Apple's software updates

This week Apple has updated all their operating systems. Here is the list of the most prominent changes:

iOS 13.4

• iCloud Folder Sharing,
• Universal Purchase allows to purchase single copy of an app for all user's iPhones, iPods touch, iPads, Macs, and Apple TVs,
• Revamped toolbar in Mail app,
• Third-party navigation apps are now supported by the CarPlay Dashboard,
• 9 new Memoji and Animoji stickers.

iPadOS 13.4

• Mouse and trackpad support,
• Shared iPad feature is now available for enterprise users,
• Also includes all changes from iOS 13.4.

macOS 10.15.4

• iCloud Folder Sharing,
• Universal Purchase allows to purchase single copy of an app for all user's iPhones, iPods touch, iPads, Macs, and Apple TVs,
• Time-synced lyrics for Apple Music, with ability to jump to part of a song by clicking a line in lyrics view,
• New Parental options.

watchOS 6

• In-app purchases are now available for ‌‌Apple Watch‌‌ apps,
• ECG app and Irregular heart rhythm notifications are now available in Chile, New Zealand and Turkey.

tvOS 13.4 & HomePod

• General bug fixes and improvements.

Disney+ in Western Europe

Disney has launched their streaming service in United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Germany, Ireland, Switzerland and Austria. Disney says that Disney+ will be available in France in April. Additional Western Europe countries, including Belgium, the Nordics, and Portugal should get access this summer.

Dope Links

• What’s new in Swift 5.2
• Code coverage for Swift Package Manager based apps
• Swift Package Registry
• A Jira clone built with Vuejs & Nodejs/Graphql
• CSS units cheat sheet
• Animated CSS Background Generator
• Unity Learn Premium FREE for 3 months
• A Repository for all Intel Technical Content prepared for GDC 2020
• Presentations from GDC 2020 (online presentations)
• Raytracing in Excel

Xbox Series X First impressions

Austin Evans had a chance to look at the Xbox Series X. His video gave us not only a fist look at the console, but the official specifications as well:

• Custom 8 core AMD Zen 2 CPU, clocked at 3.8GHz single thread, and up to 3.6GHz for sustained multithread load,
• Custom AMD RDNA GPU, 12TFLOPS, 52 CUs at 1.825GHz,
• 16GB (GDDR6) of RAM,
• 1TB NVME SSD,
• Expandable storage: 1TB expansion card,
• External Storage: USB HDD Support,
• 4K UHD Blue-Ray Drive,
• Dimensions: 301 x 151 x 151mm.

Video also clarified the naming convention:

• Xbox - is the name of the next generation of Microsoft consoles,
• Xbox Series X - is the name of the console.

Beside Evans' video, Microsoft also published their own clips:

• Xbox Series X - Loading Times Tech Demo
• Xbox Series X - Quick Resume Tech Demo

Playstation 5 Specification

Sony (via Digital Foundry) revealed the full specification of the next console:

• Custom: 8-core AMD Zen 2 CUP clocked at 3.5GHz,
• Custom AMD RDNA GPU, 10.28 TFLOPs, 36 CUs at 2.23GHz ,
• 16GB (GDDR6) of RAM,
• 825GB SSD,
• Expandable Storage: NVMe SSD Slot,
• External Storage: USB HDD Support,
• 4K UHD Blue-Ray Drive.

Apple revealed new products

Due to coronavirus, Apple Spring event never happened and Apple just update their website/store with new hardware.

New MacBook Air

• Display: 13.3-inch LED backlit (2560 x 1600px) with True Tone,
• CPU:  from 10th generation 1.1GHz dual-core Intel Core i3 up to 1.2GHz quad-core Intel Core i7,
• GPU: Intel Iris Plus Graphics, supports up to 1 external 6K display at 6016x3384px @60Hz,
• RAM: 8GB base, 16GB maximum
• Storage: 256GB base, 2TB maximum,
• Battery:  up to 11 hours,
• Camera: 720p FaceTime HD,
• Keyboard: Magic keyboard with scissor mechanism 😁,
• Ports: Two Thunderbolt 3,
• Price: starting at $999.

New Mac mini

• CPU:  from 3.6GHz quad-core 8th-generation Intel Core i3 processor up to 3.2GHz 6-core Intel Core i7,
• GPU: Intel UHD Graphics 630, supports up to 1 external 5K display at 5120x2880px @60Hz,
• RAM: 8GB base, 64GB maximum
• Storage: 256GB base, 2TB maximum,
• Ports: Four Thunderbolt 3, Two USB 3 ports, HDMI 2.0 port Gigabit Ethernet port (configurable to 10Gb Ethernet) 3.5 mm headphone jack,
• Price: starting at $799.

New iPad Pro

• Display: 11-inch (2388 x 1668) or 12.9-inch (2732 x 2048) 120 Hz Liquid Retina Display with TrueTone
• CHIP: A12Z Bionic,
• RAM: 6GB,
• Storage: 128GB base, 1TB maximum,
• Battery:  up to 10 hours,
• Camera: 12MP Wide camera, 10MP Ultra Wide camera, 7MP depth camera,
• Audio: 5 studio-quality microphones for calls, video recording, and audio recording,
• Sensors: LiDAR Scanner (depth sensor),
• Price: starting at $799 for 11'' model, and $999 for 12.9'' model.

Magic Keyboard for iPad

Apple also announced a new keyboard for iPad with Trackpad:

• Full‑size, backlit keyboard with a scissor mechanism,
• Trackpad supports Multi‑Touch gestures and the cursor in iPadOS 13.4+,
• USB-C port for charging iPad Pro,
• Compatible iPad Pro 12.9‑inch (3rd and 4th generation) & iPad Pro 11‑inch (1st and 2nd generation).

Dope Links

• Alignment guides in SwiftUI
• Anchor preferences in SwiftUI
• If you need to group values in a sequence you can use Dictionary with init(grouping:by:)
• How to Build a live markdown Editor with VueJS
• CSS / Vanilla JS Challenge | Re-create the Netflix Video Player
• Bootstrap 5 release date and what's new about it
• A set of over 300 free MIT-licensed high-quality SVG icons for you to use in your web projects
• I teamed up with a fellow redditor to try and make the best moon shot we could. Here is the result!
• How Much Toilet Paper?! - The Coronavirus Toilet Paper Calculator

Image credits: Microsoft

iOS 14,  iPadOS 14, watchOS 7 details leaked

Couple of details leaked about upcoming operating systems and new Apple's products:

iOS

• Over-ear headphones with AirPods feature are coming,
• iPhone SE 2 will have TouchID,
• AirTag might have removable battery,
• Home screen will get list view for the apps,
• New augmented reality app will display detail information about real objects,
• 3rd-party apps will be able to integrate their wallpapers with the system
• HomeKit will be able to change the color temperature of lights throughout a day.

iPadOS

• Smart keyboards with trackpads are in the works,
• iPad Pro might have triple camera system,
• Extended support for mouse pointers,
• New OCR system capable to detect text written with Apple Pencil

watchOS

• Sharing watch faces with friends & family,
• Watch face with tachymeter,
• Watch face with country flags,
• Photo watch face could be made not only out of single photos, but entire albums as well,
• Parental controls,
• Sleep tracking app,
• Blood oxygen tracking,
• WatchOS apps will be no longer be based on extensions.

New MacBooks

According to Ming-Chi Ku, couple of new MacBooks will be released in upcoming months:

1. 14- inch MacBook Pro and MacBook Air with Scissor Keyboards will come in second quarter,
2. MacBooks with ARM processor will come in late 2020 or early 2021.

Google Pixel 4a

New details regarding upcoming budget phone have surfaced:

• 5.8-inch (2340 x 1080) display,
• Snapdragon 730 CPU,
• 4GB or 6GB of RAM,
• Hole-punch selfie camera,
• Single 12-megapixel rear camera,
• Fingerprint sensor on the back,
• 3.5mm headphone jack,
• support for dual-sim in 6GB model,
• 3080mAh battery,
• Phone will be available in April starting  at $399.

Coronavirus vs conferences #3

This week another conferences have been affected by coronavirus:

• E3 2020 joined has been cancelled,
• Microsoft's Build 2020 has been converted to online-only event,
• WDDC 2020 will be an online experience.

Dope Links

• Drawing In SwiftUI – A Comprehensive Guide
• Integrating MapKit with SwiftUI
• Avoiding massive SwiftUI views
• How to create Activity Ring in SwiftUI
• Class-only Protocols: class or AnyObject
• Google's Swift Style Guide
• Getting started with Vue & Apollo GraphQL
• Here is what Cloudflare Workers do
• is it canceled yet?
• Re-imagining the Windows Experience

Image credits: the Hacker 34