Apple shuts down the Testflightapp.com service after February 26 2015

Apple purchased the build distribution service Testflight from its previous owner Burstly almost year ago. After this acquisition, apple dropped support for android from Testflight, there is no wonder in that.

Also, apple started to integrate the testflight into the iTunesConnect. Now like we all expected, apple is going to shut down the separate service for testflightapp.com. It means, we cannot use testflight separately anymore, we have to use the testflight services only from iTunesConnect.

Apple send out email to the developers informing about this transformation. Apple clearly states in this mail that the testflight service will no longer be available after February 26 2015, giving one month grace period for the developers to do the transition.

We can export all our testers from our testflight to the iTunesConnect. The mail also contains the steps to do this. The contacts are exported as a CSV format like "First Name - Last Name - Email" format. You can also export the device list, but there is no need for that with the new iTunesConnect pre-release feature.

In case you still need a service exactly like testflight, there are some alternatives. You can try installrapp.com, http://app.io, http://hockeyapp.net.

How to export testers from TestFlightapp.com

1. Sign in to the TestFlight Dashboard at testflightapp.com
2. Navigate to the "People" tab
3. Check mark the teammates you would like to export
4. Open the "Actions" menu on the right side of the teammates list
5. Select "Export Contact Info" to download the exported CSV file

How to import testers into the new TestFlight Beta Testing

1. Sign in to iTunes Connect at itunesconnect.apple.com
2. Click "My Apps"
3. Select the app you want to enable for beta testing
4. Enter the "Prerelease" tab and select "External Testers"
5. Click the plus sign to add new external testers
6. Use the "Import File" from the "Add New External Testers" page to upload the exported CSV file

Google Easter Eggs

Google have some amusing Easter Eggs. Type the following words in the google search bar and see the magic. You will be amazed.

1) google Leet   "goto www.google.com enter 'google leet' and press I am feeling lucky"

2) recursion (shows "Did you mean: "recursion"->same word)

3) do a barrel roll (will rotate the results page a full 360 degrees)

4) tilt (makes the page 'lean' to the right a bit.)

5) let it snow (simulates snowfall and frost on the search results.)

6) binary (changes the number of found results to read out in binary)

7) zerg rush (returns a search page with 'O's eating the search results. Clicking each 'O' a few times kills it.)

8) conway's game of life (shows the the results along with a set of controls to play, pause, maximize/restore, and step.)

9) Search "timer" in the google. The google will initiate a timer for you.

10) Search any number in the google followed by "=english". You will find the typed number in words. For example if you search "123456=english", you will see the following output.

iOS8 - Easter eggs

With the latest update, the iOS began the best OS ever. With the iOS8, apple introduced many feature which you may not aware.

1. With iOS8, you can continue sharing your current location to someone (let's say your friend) forever or for a particular time.

2. iOS introduced extension with helps you do actions without opening the entire app. For example, you can send a quick reply to an incoming mail without leaving the current app. You can accept/reject an iCal invitation without opening the Calender app. Almost all the apps from the apple have this feature. In future, third party apps will make use of this feature and we will get some amazing extensions.

3. Battery status is available in iOS8, although the android have this feature already. The battery status option will list the apps based on their battery usage, you can kill an app which takes so much battery usage.

4. You can hide few photos/videos from your photo library, so that your friend/family members can't see them. You can see your hidden photos from the hidden photos folder.

5. You don't have to enter your credit card info everytime in your iPhone. You can just scan your card, the iPhone will scan the details from your card.

6. If you delete a photo by mistake you can easily recover them. You can recover the photos which are deleted in the past 30 days.

7. HandsOff: Apple introduced a new feature called HandsOff with iOS8 and OS X 10. You can start a work in any apple device and finish it in your another apple device. For example, you can start to compose a mail from your iPhone and finish and send it from your iPad/Mac when they are nearby. Apple also makes these API's public, so third party apps can make use of this.

8. You can send a mail with attachments upto 5GB in iOS8. In apple devices, the attachments are loaded with the mail itself, and in other devices the links of the attachments will be added with the body of the mail.

9. Interactive actions within the app. For e.g when you swipe a mail from right to left, in previous iOS, you will see only the delete menu. Now apps can have multiple menus when you do that swipe action. For e.g., the mail app have delete, reply, Flag...

10. Widgets are introduced like android. Although, they are only limited to the notification center (the UI appears when you swipe from top in the iPhone), not in the home screen like android.

11. Custom keyboards. Third party apps can supply their own keyboard which you can use in your device. These keyboards will appear throughout the iPhone, and you can control these from the settings app like the inbuild keyboards. Apple also updated their keyboard with swipe feature, predictive text...

12. Your recent contact list will appear when you use the app switcher (when you double click the home button). Although this feature is not available for the third party apps.

13. iCloud Keychain: The passwords stored in your all the apple devices are synchronised. But Google Chrome has this feature already.


Not only these, apple has introduced so many API's with iOS8 like HealthKit, Photo Editing, Extensions... Third party apps will use these features and give us some amazing apps in the future.

iPhone tips and tricks

There are many hidden features in iPhone which are not mentioned anywhere in the apple website, but works.

1. Swipe left on the Compass app and your iPhone will work as a level meter.

2. You can see the timestamps of your text messages by sliding your texts over to the left.

3. As long as the camera app is open, you can use the volume buttons to take a photos.

4. Double-tapping the spacebar will automatically end the sentence with a period and start a new one for you.

5. There is an undo function that allows you to go back if you make a mistake writing a text message, email, or editing a photo. Simply shake your phone and this option will pop up.

6. By holding down the capture button in the camera app, your phone will take a series of photos so you can get the perfect shot.

7. You can enable the emoji keyboard that appears in the whatsapp for all your apps.

Go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Add New Keyboard and select Emoji.

8. HeadPhones: Double click the volume button in of the head phone to play the next songs, and triple click to play the previous song. When the camera app is open, you can use the volume buttons to take the photographs.

9. Triple click the Home button to enable/disable the assistive touch.

10. If you press and hold the dot (.) button in the Safari when entering the web address, you will see multiple options like .org, .net. .com…

11. Double tap the shift button in the keyboard will do the “Caps Lock”. Double tap again to disable Caps Lock.

12. Press the home button and the Off button of the iPhone at the time to take screenshot of the current iPhone’s screen. But few apps can block their screens while taking screenshot to protect their sensitive information.

Google Search Tricks

1. Identify Local Time for Any City in the World using Google
If you want to know current local time in a particular city, use the following method. To see the current local time in Los Angeles do the following. Go-ahead and try this yourself for your local city and see how it works.
Syntax: time in PLACE

time in New York

2. Identify Local Weather for Any City in the World using Google
To see the current weather in Los Angeles do the following. Go-ahead and try this yourself for your local city and see how it works.
Syntax: weather PLACE

weather New York


3. Exclude Keywords in the Search
If you want Google to exclude a word while searching the web page, use – (minus) before the search as shown below. This example searches for the pages which has the word ebooks, and without the word free.
ebooks -free

4. Search for Keywords with Similar Meaning. Include Synonym Keywords in Search
Instead of searching for only the given word, using ~ before the keyword you can instruct Google to search for webpages with the exact given word or the words which has same meaning. In the following example, giving ~tutorial also searches for keywords: guide, manual, reference etc.
ios ~tutorial

5. Match Any Single Word in the Search Using *
While searching, if you are not sure about which keyword to be placed in the phrase, you can match any single word using *.

For example, if you want to search for examples of vim substitution, and you are not sure whether to search for “vim editor find and replace examples”, or “vim editor search and replace examples”, then use * , which will match either find, search or any other word, as shown below.
vim editor * and replace examples
Note: You can also match multiple words by using multiple number of *’s respectively.

6. Use OR in Google Search
Using OR operator in between the words makes the following kind of search possible in Google. Following example will search for bash examples or bash programs.
bash examples OR programs
 
Note: The keyword OR should be in uppercase

7. Identify Definition a Word
To view the definition of a word use the following method.
Syntax: define: <word>

define: big data

8. Search for a Range Using ..
If you are looking for a product in a specific price range use the following. It will search for the pages with text PDA, and $400 to $450 ranged text.
Syntax: text $100..$125

olympics 1900..2000

9. Searching within a Specific Website
You can search for a text in a specific website. The following example shows how to search only within our blog – www.thegeekstuff.com.

examples site:stackoverflow.com

Note: There is no space between site: and the website address.

10. Google Search for a Given Keywords (both without and with sequence)
Basic Search for a Given Keywords – Without Sequence
The very basic feature of Google which everybody is using today is searching for pages which has the given text as:
linux command line history examples

Note: Highlighted words are not in the order as we given in the search box.
Basic Search with Keywords In a Given Sequence
If you want Google to show only the pages which has the words in the given sequence, then double quote that search string as:
"linux command line history examples"

Note: Highlighted words are in the same order as we given in the search box.

11. Search Based on File Type
The following examples searches only the matching keywords inside a Power Point presentations. In the same way, you can search for the doc, pdf and other file types.
iphone filetype:pdf

12. Use Google as a calculator.
Google has a built-in calculator — try entering a calculation like 110 * (654/8 + 3). Yes, your computer also has a calculator, but if you spend most of your day inside a browser, typing your calculation into the browser’s search box is quicker than firing up your calculator app.

Also type the following in the search box and hit enter.
online money converter
online conversion
online calculator

Also, you can do all the above things in the google advanced search