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On iOS, all apps must go through the App Store. On macOS, the Mac App Store is just one method of distribution and developers are free to publish their apps independently on their own website. This means app rejection policies on macOS are not as painful as with iPhone or iPad, but they are nevertheless significant. Developers are reporting that apps made using Electron (which is a framework that allows companies to ship web apps in a native app wrapper) are now being rejected by the automated Mac App Store review process....

Two weeks after seeding developers with macOS 11.5 beta 3, the fourth beta has arrived for developers. The build comes just after the macOS Monterey beta 2 arrived yesterday. Update 1:10 pm PT: The fourth macOS 11.5 beta is now available for public testers too. If you’re enrolled in the developer or public beta program, the OTA for macOS 11.5 beta 4 should be showing up soon if it’s not already....

After laying off some 30 employees last month, The Merchant Consortium Exchange, or MCX, announced today that it is ending its the ongoing CurrentC beta test and postponing all future releases. The beta test will be suspended on June 28th, according to an email sent to beta testers in Columbus, Ohio and obtained by The Consumerist. After the beta test ends, MCX will disable all customer accounts and end consumer access to the service....

Apple has once again distanced itself from its past efforts in order to market its new Apple Music streaming service. The company has begun promoting the service using a unique geofilter in the popular Snapchat messaging application. The geofilter has showed up in select areas of Los Angeles, including at The Grove mall where an Apple Store is located. It is unclear if this filter is meant to appear at specific highly populated areas like The Grove or around all Apple Stores....

Apple today has released iOS 12.4.2 for a handful older iPhone and iPad models that were not updated to iOS 13 last week. The update includes . The update is available for the iPad Air, the iPad mini 2, and iPad mini 3, as well as the 6th gen iPod touch, iPhone 5s, iPhone 6, and iPhone 6 Plus. All of these devices were dropped from support with iOS 13....

Apple released their first update to the new iOS Version 5 yesterday — iOS 5.0.1. The update from Apple includes multitasking gestures for the original iPad, bug fixes with Documents in the Cloud and improved voice recognition for Australian users. The largest update however for most of us is a fix for bugs which were affecting the battery life of all devices running iOS 5.0 — iPhone 4S users in particular....

Image: Cult of Mac For those who are unable to use the web-based recovery tool for OS X Lion, Apple has released a new Mac application that allows users to create their own OS X Lion recovery/installation external drives. Specifically, this drive lets you reinstall Lion, repair the disk using Disk Utility, restore from a Time Machine backup, or browse the web with Safari. You need a recovery HD already setup to create this new drive....

Apple yesterday rolled out iOS 8.4 to iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch users and the big news, of course, was the addition of Apple Music and Beats 1. It appears now, however, that Apple removed a feature still used by many from the operating system. As pointed out by several users on Apple’s Support forum, the company appears to have removed Home Sharing support for music in iOS 8.4. The Home Sharing support page has also been updated to reflect that the feature is not present in iOS 8....

The Financial Times has officially been removed from the App Store after failing to comply with Apple’s in-app subscription model that requires payments to be processed through iTunes (giving Apple a 30% cut in the process). The publication used to have an iPhone and iPad app, which appear to have been removed from the App Store today. Fortunately for FT (not so much for Apple), they also have an HTML5 web app alternative that they’re urging iOS users to use instead....

After allegations that Apple was copying the classic Swiss Railway clock design for its new Clocks app in iOS 6, Apple was expected to meet with Swiss Federal Railways SBB to presumably find some sort of resolution. SBB made an official announcement on its website (via TheVerge) today, claiming it has reached an agreement with Apple: Swiss Federal Railways is not disclosing how much the agreement is for, but it said Apple has agreed to its licensing terms for use of the Hans Hilfiker designed railway station clock design....

Apple has just published its third update to the revamped Mac version of iMovie launched last year. The update, version 10.0.3, makes changes to the default font in the new titles first added to last year’s release. It also includes the ability to sort events by date to quickly find clips by when they were recorded. Other improvements include the ability to rotate and crop clips within events rather than projects, an easier method of accessing transition duration settings, faster access to clip speed controls, improvements to how speed changes are handled, and various bugs that could cause the app to crash or not do what was expected....

Apple is out with the second public beta version of the upcoming OS X 10.11.4 software update for Mac. The release adds a secure, password-protected Notes, which sync with iOS 9.3, as well as support for viewing and sharing Live Photos over iMessage with the Messages app. Other focus areas include the iBooks and Photos apps, according to Apple. Today’s release follows the developer version of the same software update earlier this week....

Apple this morning has released OS X 10.10 Yosemite Developer Preview 5. The new update brings various performance improvements and bug fixes. The previous Developer Preview brought some minor user-interface enhancements and significant speed improvements. Apple also released iOS 8 beta 5. We’ll be updating this post live with new discoveries as they are made. You can send us what you find to tips@9to5mac.com. You can find what’s new in this developer preview, below:...

Buried in today’s Q3 2017 Apple earnings call was Luca Maestri’s announcement that Apple Pay is coming to a handful of new countries by the end of the year. The Apple CFO announced that Apple Pay will come to the UAE, Denmark, Finland, and Sweden by the end of this year… Maestri didn’t offer any specific launch information, simply saying Apple Pay is “scheduled to go live before the end of this calendar year” in those countries....

Remember MCX CurrentC, the QR-code based mobile payment system that attempted to take on Apple Pay? Launched two years ago, it immediately started creating waves when it required its retail members to switch off Apple Pay or be fined. If that weren’t bad enough, it was quickly hacked. Apple Pay fans made fun of the service in app reviews, and it wasn’t long before retailers started to break ranks and we saw some rapid back-pedalling on Apple Pay from one CEO before he was replaced by another....

Earlier today, we predicted that Apple had plans to bring the previously-released fourth-generation iPad back into production to replace the aging iPad 2. As expected, the fourth-gen iPad is now available once again on Apple’s website, this time with only a 16 GB capacity. Aside from offering the single capacity choice, there aren’t any changes to the device. This model replaces the iPad 2, which has been around since the days of the 30-pin connector....

Alongside the release of iOS 14 beta 5, Apple today has also released watchOS 7 beta 5 to developers. watchOS 7 includes new features such as sleep tracking, new watch face features, fitness improvements, and more. watchOS 7 beta 5 can be installed by developers through the companion Apple Watch app on iPhone or by heading to the Settings app on the Apple Watch itself. If you don’t yet see the new beta on your device, be sure to keep checking as it’s still rolling out to all developers....

Apple has released iOS 14 beta 8 and iPadOS 14 beta 8 to developers today. The update comes just under one week after the release of the seventh beta to developers and public beta testers. Update: iOS 14 beta 8 is now available to public beta testers as well. iOS 14 beta 8 is available to developers via an over-the-air update in the Settings app. As usual, if the update does not immediately appear for download, keep checking as it sometimes takes a while to roll out to all registered developers....

Apple is rolling out the seventh watchOS 3.2 beta for developer testing on Apple Watch. watchOS 3.2 beta includes Theater Mode which disables raise-to-wake and mutes alerts. Apple is also introducing SiriKit to Apple Watch with watchOS 3.2 beta. SiriKit lets developers integrate their apps with Siri for select uses. Prior to watchOS 3.2 beta, SiriKit was limited to iOS apps. As for Theater Mode, this is how Apple describes the new feature:...

Apple today released their fifth preview of their upcoming Xcode 4 to developers. This fifth preview includes a solid amount of new features, enhancements and fixes but nothing major to note. Here’s a summarized list of the most notable features and enhancements: You can view the entire set of release notes after the break: Editors: The built-in editor modes, Standard, Assistant, and Version are designed to present the most critical information, in context, as you work....