Dennis Sellers

<p><a target="_blank" href="http://www.twelvesouth.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">Twelve South</a> is known for creating great products to enhance the Apple experience, and that’s certainly not changed with the BookBook cases for the iPad Pro and 12-inch MacBook. While each case will set you back a pretty penny at $99.99, it’s worth every dollar. </p>

<p>Let's say that you want to stream a movie on your Mac, iOS device, or Apple TV, but you don't know if it's available for streaming. What do you do? Well, you can go to iTunes, Netflix, Hulu, and a dozen other sites and search them individually. Or you can do it the easy way and go to Can I Stream It.</p>

<p>The AWT News Update is on hiatus while my compadre, Steve, takes a road trip. In its place, I’ll offer a text-only (no podcast) summary of breaking stories with a tip o’ my hat to my former website, <em>Apple Daily Report</em>.</p>

<p>On a regular basis, <em>Apple World Today</em> posts a list of notable new apps or app updates that have been released. They may not necessarily be new, but they're popular and deserve mention. Here are today's picks.</p>

<p>Samsung Electronics has begun mass producing what it says is the industry’s first NVMe PCIe solid state drive (SSD) — the PM971-NVMe — in a single ball grid array (BGA) package, for use in next-generation computers and “ultra-slim” laptops.</p>

<p>Apple’s long-in-the-tooth Thunderbolt Display may FINALLY be getting an upgrade at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference in two weeks. The monitor hasn’t been upgraded since July 2011. It’s time for a 5K version to match the gorgeous display of the 27-inch iMac.</p>

<p>Okay, let’s quit calling it a hobby. Apple TV sales have propelled Apple into third place for global set-top box popularity in 2015, based on revenue, according to IHS, Inc. That’s up from ninth place in 2014, according to the research group.</p>

<p>pple files for — and is granted — lots of patents by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. Many are for inventions that never see the light of day. However, you never can tell which ones will materialize in a real product, so here are today’s patent highlights:</p>

<p>Escape Velocity Apps' <a target="_blank" href="http://www.cloudsliceapp.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">CloudSlice for iOS</a> lets you use your favorite cloud services in a new way. It lets you treat all of your linked cloud services as a single storage location which helps just a tiny bit to meet the need for a personal, private cloud to store your data that you'd access from your devices anywhere. </p>

<p>ADATA’s <a target="_blank" href="http://www.adata.com/en/apple/feature/365" rel="noopener noreferrer">Card Reader with Lightning Connector</a> is, as you can tell from the name, a Lightning card reader specially designed for iOS devices and licensed with Apple MFi (“Made for iPhone’) certification. It supports a wide range of video formats, and raw image files. </p>

<p>Last year Apple acquired a UK startup that’s developed a natural language application programming interface [API] that allows humans and machines to have a much more natural conversation. It will use the technology for a “big upgrade” to Siri, its voice-activated digital assistant, reports <a target="_blank" href="http://www.techinsider.io/how-apples-vocaliq-ai-works-2016-5" rel="noopener noreferrer">Tech Insider</a>.</p>

<p>Another day, another lawsuit. Apple and Broadcom have been jointly named as defendants in a legal complaint filed by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) over alleged infringement of nine patented Wi-Fi-related technologies, reports <a href="http://macrumors.com">MacRumors.com</a> .</p>

<p>Apple developers aren't very interested in writing apps for the Watch these days, Tim Anglade, an app developer and vice president for the Realm mobile database Realm, told <a target="_blank" href="http://www.businessinsider.com/developers-have-cooled-on-apple-watch-2016-5?r=UK&IR=T" rel="noopener noreferrer">Business Insider</a>. About 100,000 app developers use Realm's database in apps used by about one billion people.</p>

<p>We’ll be running a limited news update schedule today as we celebrate Memorial Day.</p>

<p>India's minister of commerce and industry, Nirmala Sitharaman, held a press conference <a href="http://www.livemint.com/Companies/lDn53REhqvhqGoIxs9MgwJ/Apples-proposal-to-sell-refurbished-iPhones-in-India-reject.html">on Monday</a> to announce the government had rejected Apple's request, according to <em>Live Mint</em>. </p>