With that controversial point out of the way lets move on to the app itself which provides a start menu like interface for all the activities that you do frequently from launching apps, texting, calling, emailing, searching the web and more, you can set all of these actions up and customize them to meet your specific requirements.

One significant change with the pro version of Launch Center is how it looks which sees a significant improvement from its previous incarnation. From the polish of the app icon to the new grid layout the whole application looks like it’s just come out of a car showroom as it glints and gleams as you drill down through the activities that you want to launch.

When you first launch the app it will already be setup with default actions which include the ability to turn on the camera flash as a flashlight, toggle the brightness, search google and dial a contact to name but a few. It’s in the configuration of the app where you can personalize your requirements is where Launch Center Pro starts earning its stripes.

The first thing you’ll want to take advantage of when you start customizing Launch Center Pro is the use of Groups for while the initial grid is set to 4 x 3 squares to set to your own actions the use of Groups open up an additional 12 actions spots for each of the initial 12. Now that adds up to a lot of shortcuts which may defeat the purpose of the app in the first place but it’s a nice option to have!

Setting up your actions is easy, after going into edit mode, (there’s no wiggle here!), you can either edit an existing action by clicking on it or tap an empty one to create a new one. From here, after selecting to create an action you can choose from one of the common or installed actions before getting the option to customize them even further.

The level customization will depend on the action, for example if you have Tweetbot installed you’ll be able to choose from launching the app, tweeting, tweeting a specific username, launching a profile or searching, while choosing the Music app only provides the ability to launch it. This is not a limitation of Launch Center Pro however but more how any given app allows it to integrate.

Not only can you set a multitude of actions but you can also set the color of the icon and select one of a plethora of images to identify your icon, similar to the images you can have if you have Emoji enabled for your txt messages.

With your shortcuts all setup you can start using Launch Center Pro for what it was intended for, launching actions. Once you launch LCP you simply tap any shortcut and the associated action will launched, while accessing shortcuts that are part of a group requires you to tap and hold and then drag your finger to the shortcut you wish to launch.

There is also the ability to schedule actions which works more as a reminder than anything, rather than actually launching the requested action they launch an alert that will enable you to launch the action, kind of scheduling lite! This limit appears to be more of a limit of the Apple approval process than anything else however.

Once you’ve been using LCP {$2.99} for a few days consistently you’ll wonder how you’ve lived so long without it, even more so if you are a heavy user of the iPhone with a lot of apps as Launch Center Pro will do away with your need to remember where all your apps are.

What we like

• Polished looks
• Lots of customizable actions
• Launches actions not just app

What to know

• Controversial upgrade option
• Limited scheduler

The standalone app operates similar to the iPhone camera but has the ability to post the images to Facebook much faster and easier without going through two different applications. The Facebook iOS app could now be used strictly for accessing user’s profiles and posting messages. However, all other forms of interaction can be used much more easily through smoother, and better developed applications.

By releasing Facebook Camera, the company is likely making moves to set up integration with Instagram. Facebook purchased Instagram for $1 billion in April and will probably slowly erase Instagram’s name and use its user base and popular features in the new Camera app. There are currently several features such as commenting and liking the photos in the stream as well a number of filters adopted from Instagram and more may appear in the near future. Facebook developed the app to simplify the task of posting images to a user’s profile, which is a very long process with the normal iOS app.

With the Facebook iOS app, the images do not post properly at all times and sometimes comments and likes do not appear correctly. An app dedicated entirely to photos, comments, and likes will ease some of the issues that users have. Facebook Camera makes perfect sense, and will likely get better once integrated with Instagram in the future. A report published on The Verge elaborated the collaboration of Instagram and Facebook with the following:

The Facebook Camera team has been working on the app for months, and Mark Zuckerberg reportedly kept his desire to purchase Instagram close to the vest, as if he almost impulse-bought it. Had the Instagram deal never occurred, Facebook Camera wouldn’t really be much of an Instagram competitor anyway, lacking any mobile-only social circles and hashtagged sharing around specific topics. “Enhancing the Facebook photos experience on mobile is long overdue,” Facebook’s Derick Mains told me. “We really had to step up our game, and we’re committed to building Instagram independently.

The Facebook Camera is now available for free in the iOS App Store.

{via MacRumors}

The FAA issued iPads for pilots to use as replacements for paper charts and has received positive feedback from pilots and other flight crew suggesting that it is a viable replacement. Now, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration is planning to expand the usage of the iPad during flights and even for its employees. The administration is also planning to create its own App Store to accompany the new widespread adoption. According to a report from AvWeb, 1,100 FAA employees use the iPad, and with the expansion, that number will increase, with mechanics and lawyers receiving most of the units.

The FAA allows employees to do basic actions on the iPad, such as checking email, and sending messages, however, does not allow access to FAA networks. This may be because of the iPhone’s and iPad’s numerous unstable security measures, which have been criticized in the past. If the FAA builds their own App Store, they would be able to tailor their services for their employees and would be able to extract far more usage out of the iPads, and make them viable replacements for a notebook computer. Tailored apps would include aeronautical maps and charts which are consistently used during flights by pilots, who must be able to access information quickly and efficiently.

The FAA’s manager of Architecture and Applied Technology pegged a timeframe for 2014, where employees will be able to request an iPad as a replacement for a laptop computer. Last December, American Airlines became the first airlines to fully adopt the iPad as a replacement as an electronic flight bag. The iPad is very lightweight and could advance to become an integral part of the FAA if they remove a rule banning the use of electronics during take-off and landing.

{via AppleInsider — Image Credit: 9to5Mac}

There are plenty of little jailbreak tweaks for iPhone 4S that come along, while they are very nice they don’t change your life. Aloud is not one of those tweaks, ok, it may not change your life but, it can certainly change they way that you use your iPhone.

At first it seems that Aloud is a fairly straight forward tweak, it simply reads aloud your notifications for you using Siri’s distinctive tones, however, you don’t have to stick to the voice set for Siri, you can instead choose from one of over 30 different voices, some of which can be very funny if you don’t think it’s thinly veiled racism! However it’s the depth of Aloud that makes it fully functional and usable in your everyday life.

Enabling Aloud is simple, once downloaded from Cydia a new option is added to your Settings and the full app can be either enabled or disabled. At this point all notifications will be read aloud to you as soon as they appear on your screen. This means that you don’t have to be looking at your iPhone to know whats happening.

This may be a little overkill though, having every notification read out to you may be too much for you, let alone everyone else that will also be able hear your notifications, including the text message from your significant other telling you that they love you, if not worse!

Help is at hand though as there are multiple options to control which alerts are read and when. You can set which apps don’t speak aloud by turning them off via the Application setting for that app completely but then you can also limit them based on whether your device is locked or not, only when you are wearing headphones, while you are on a call, on certain wi-fi networks or when certain apps are running. The options are endless, although there’s no way to only speak the personal text messages from your significant other as mentioned previously.

The latest update to Aloud will even read a full email to you, again, that may be a little to much to handle, although if you’ve enabled the Stop Speaking Activator method you can immediately stop the notification being spoken by completing one of the many Activation methods, in my case a double click of the Home button.

The features keep on coming though and now Aloud can even announce map directions for you from the default maps app. This could be the difference between spending big on a full fledge navigation app or not.

If you only buy one Jailbreak app then this is the one, it’s the reason why people jailbreak. Aloud is available in the Cydia Store now for just $1.99.

Gallery

There’s been a double dose of great news for Twitter, and more specifically, Tweetbot fans today as not only were Tweetbot users rewarded with a huge update but also got the news that many of them were waiting for in the form of the release of Tweetbot for iPad.

Tweetbot 2.0 for the iPhone list of updates include in-line thumbnails of images, 5 minute auto-refresh of your timeline and much more. A full list of the new features can be read here and are included as a free update to those who have already purchased Tweetbot.

This version comes with many significant improvements to the Timeline and Direct Messages. Here are the major changes in more detail:

• Updated timeline view
• Image thumbnails in timeline
• Links now colored and single-tappable
• “Retweeted by” bar now integrated and tappable
• Cell colors adjusted for better contrast
• New direct message view.
• Redesigned “New Tweets” bar (Can be dismissed by tap and configured in Settings > Display)
• Timed auto-refresh (timeline, mentions, and DM’s will refresh every 5 minutes)
• Readability added as mobilizer service
• Much improved tweet replies view
• Links in user’s bio now tappable
• “Huge” font size option in Settings > Display
• Improved scrolling performance

The even bigger news is the immediate release of Tweetbot for iPad which brings all of the wonderful personality of the iPhone version to the big screen. It’s not a universal app so if you already have the iPhone version you’ll need to pay out another $3 for the iPad version but after just a few hours use I can definitely say that it’s worth it.

The app allows you to sign in to all your favorite chat clients including Google Chat, Yahoo, Aim, Twitter and Facebook to name but a few and what’s even better is that if you have multiple gmail accounts, such as a personal and a professional one you can sign into them both and communicate with your friends and colleagues on both of them at the same time.

As well as sending text messages you can also send pictures and videos over many of the protocols and have group chats too. With push notifications for Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo and AOL too you should never miss an important message ever again.

What’s also great about IM+ Pro is that it’s still being actively updated to included new features such as the recently added Angry Birds theme and Neighbors interrogation.

IM+ Pro is my personal favorite messaging client and at just 99 cents it’s an absolute steal.

During Apple’s WWDC 2011 keynote event Scott Forstall announced that iOS 5 brings 1500 new APIs for developers and more than 200 new features for users. However, only 10 were highlighted during the keynote presentation. iOS 5 finally brings “notification center” to iOS devices which allows users to manage all notifications by swiping downwards on the status bar.

iMessage, the tenth feature announced during the event turned out to be one of the most exciting features of the iOS. The new messages app supports iPhone, iPad and iPod touch and allows iOS device users to exchange messages using WiFi or 3G connection. iMessage directly competes with BlackBerry’s hugely popular BBM service. Apple’s new messaging app supports text and pictures messages and you can share videos and contacts too.

For iPhone users iMessage cleverly integrates with the existing messages app. When you start typing the recipients name the app contacts Apple’s server to determine if the user has iMessage and if the other device is running iOS 5 then the send button on your device will turn blue which indicates that the message won’t be billed by your carrier. However, if the recipients device does not support iMessage then the send button turns green which indicates that the message will be sent as a normal SMS / MMS and will be billed by the carrier.

iMessage also supports some of the more advanced features like group messages, delivery and read reports and your entire conversation is always in sync across all your iDevices.

If most of your friends or family members use iPhones, iPads or iPod touches then iMessage would certainly become the primary way to text each other. It’s taken Apple five major software releases to finally come up with a universal messaging application for iOS device users. Forstall was confident about the reliability of the company’s new service as it is built on Apple’s existing robust push notification system.

Are you excited about iMessage for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad? Let us know what you think in the comments below.