A savvy developer spotted that Apple's framework for Animoji and Memoji has been altered in an iOS 12 beta to support an iPad-size screen. Rumors of facial recognition in the iPad have been circulating for months, most recently after iOS developer Guilherme Rambo found code last month in the iOS 12 beta that suggests Face ID is coming to the iPad. Now, Steve Troughton-Smith shared a screenshot appearing to show Animoji on the larger iPad screen. The new iOS 12 beta has Apple's AvatarKit framework for Animoji and Memoji developed for iPad. No current iPad models feature facial recognition technology, so it seems likely that Apple has one in the product pipeline that's planned for release at some point'New in iOS 12: AvatarKit comes to iPad.

The anticipation for Apple's upcoming iMac Pro 2017 has just gotten stronger after developers stumbled upon codes that appear to suggest the presence of the "Hey Siri" functionality in the Cupertino giant's new computer. Over the weekend, developers Guilherme Rambo and Steven Troughton-Smith revealed what they found after some digging into Apple's "BridgeOS 2.0" code and macOS. What's very interesting here is that the chip seems to have support for "Hey Siri" functionality. Seems to handle the macOS boot & security process, as expected; iMac Pro lets Apple experiment with tighter control without the rest of the userbase freaking out," Troughton-Smith wrote on Twitter. As per Apple Insider, this could mean that the ARM coprocessor controls the boot process, security and the FaceTime camera. Not only that, the publication said that the inclusion of the A10 Fusion means the iMac Pro is capable of accepting and processing the "Hey Siri" voice command sans the need of clicking the Siri icon or keystroke to activate the voice assistant.

The iPhone 8 'will not be cheap,' according to a Foxconn executive who leaked information about a potentially disastrous manufacturing hurdle facing Apple's eagerly anticipated new handset. Foxconn Vice President Luo Zhongsheng posted - and then quickly deleted - on the social media site Weibo claiming Apple has run into supply chain issues for the much-anticipated phone and is facing a 40 percent defect rate for its new OLED screen. In the post he warns customers may have to pay a premium to make up for the difficulty related to the'special cutting' of the screens, which are believed to be curved edge-to-edge OLED screens. The status Foxconn VP Luo Zhongsheng posted - and soon after deleted - on the site Weibo, which roughly translates to, 'The OLED yield is only 60%! It looks like difficulty of special-shaped cutting is indeed great, the cost will not be cheap.

New details about the iPhone 8 have been revealed every day so far this week, thanks to engineers who discovered clues about the new Apple handset in leaked code for the firm's upcoming HomePod speaker - and now another likely feature has just been reported. The iPhone 8 camera may introduce support for a new'SmartCam' scene selection feature that would be used to intelligently capture the best photos when shooting specific scenes like fireworks and sunsets, according to one engineer. Guilherme Rambo, who found code suggesting the new photography feature in the leaked HomePod software, also discovered code that references authenticating Apple Pay with facial recognition. The iPhone 8 camera may introduce support for a new'SmartCam' scene selection feature that would be used to intelligently capture the best photos when shooting specific scenes like fireworks and sunsets, according to one engineer The code for the SmartCam suggests an array of scenes including Fireworks, Baby, Bright Stage, Document, Foliage. It's assumed the camera would detect objects in the scene to automatically apply the best setting - Apple already uses this type of image recognition to automatically sort photos in Memories and locate photos in Search.

Yesterday, details about Apple's upcoming iPhone 8 were revealed by engineers who discovered clues in the code for the firm's HomePod speaker. Further details have been discovered today, suggesting the iPhone could have a tap to wake function and facial expression detection. The findings also confirm the long-rumoured removal of the home button, which is expected to be replaced with a virtual button. Because the HomePod speaker will have to work with Apple's new phone, it contains references to some of the upcoming features in its code. Apple revealed its HomePod speaker, which rivals Amazon's Echo and Google's Home, earlier this year.

The briefly available HomePod firmware last weekend did not only contain information on the smart speaker's specs and features, but also details about Apple's upcoming iPhone 8. While everything that's known so far about the next-generation iPhone is from various leaks and rumors, what the firmware has is the real deal. Thus, the discovery made by developers recently through their close examination of HomePod's firmware could pertain to the official specs of the next Apple flagship phone. On Monday, developer Steven Troughton-Smith took to Twitter to disclose that upon checking the firmware codes, he learned that the next flagship iPhone would pack in a 2436 x 1125 screen resolution. This resolution is quite bigger than the one that came with the 5.5-inch iPhone 7 Plus last year. Troughton-Smith also pointed out that though the iPhone 8 would come with a taller screen, it's not designed to fit the same kinds of content onscreen as the iPhone 7 Plus.

When developer Guilherme Rambo saw that Apple had released firmware for the upcoming HomePod speaker, he thought it must have been a mistake. The HomePod doesn't come out until December, after all. Curiosity piqued, he started digging through the code, where he found perhaps the last thing he expected: Apple's next iPhone. While some details regarding Apple's redesigned, high-end iPhone--called the iPhone 8 or iPhone Pro, though no one outside Cupertino knows the official name yet--had previously leaked, Rambo found in the HomePod not rumors or hints but Apple's own documentation of one of its biggest releases in years. It confirms a new look with a slimmer bezel, the death of the home button, and a powerful new face-recognition feature.

Apple's HomePod is not scheduled for release until December, but the Cupertino giant may have wanted to out more details about its Amazon Echo competitor. Tim Cook's company has released the device's firmware, and some developers have managed to get their hands on it to get new information about Apple's very own smart speaker. On Friday, Apple reportedly pushed out the HomePod's firmware, and this led developers like Steve Troughton-Smith to learn more about the new device. In his quest to unearth tidbits about Apple's smart speaker, Troughton-Smith found out that the HomePod is going to run the full iOS stack. This is an interesting detail as it suggests that the HomePod would pretty much be like an iPhone sans the screen, MacRumors has learned.

Apple unveiled its Siri-powered HomePod speaker hub at WWDC back in June, and despite a hefty $350 pricetag and the inevitable comparisons to Alexa devices, it actually sounds pretty good. In the lead up to its release this December, Apple pushed out the hub's firmware, revealing that it runs on iOS -- basically like a screenless iPhone or iPad. Just to cut off speculation: there doesn't seem to be any kind of provision in the HomePod OS shell for installing apps or extensions. Obviously, that's not to say the device never will. Since it runs on a full iOS stack through a shell app called "Soundboard," they could always patch in the ability for third parties to load up their software later.