If you wear an Apple Watch, you have probably noticed that if you walk at a brisk pace with your arms moving for at least two to three minutes, the Apple Watch will start to give you credit towards the green activity circle. That kind of walking isn't a strenuous workout, so does it really help? Gretchen Reynolds of the New York Times reports that, based on a new study of physical activity, short walks reduce your risk of dying prematurely just as well as longer walks do, so it doesn't matter if you reach 30 minutes of walking by taking a bunch of short walks or just a few long walks. Of course, you'll need to do more than that to lose weight, but the Apple Watch is correct to give you credit because even those short walks are still doing your body some good. And now, the recent news of note:
- Lit Software (a sponsor of iPhone J.D. this month) profiled on its blog Atlanta attorney Lloyd Bell, who used TrialPad on his iPad to present medical records and other evidence to a jury in a medical malpractice case, resulting in a $26 million verdict.
- In an article for Slaw, Virginia attorney Sharon Nelson and her husband, security expert John Simek, write a good overview of the risks of cloud computing for attorneys. While they think that attorneys should be cautious, they also believe that "the cloud will generally protect a law firm’s data better than the law firm would itself."
- In an article for Venture Beat, attorney Jeremy Horwitz reviews the new sixth generation iPad, finding that it is a great alternative for many iPad users.
- Rene Ritchie of iMore wrote a comprehensive review of the new sixth generation iPad. The title sums it up well: "Half the [iPad] Pro for half the price."
- In an article for Macworld, Michael Simon compares the 9.7" sixth generation iPad to the 10.5" iPad Pro. Serenity Caldwell of iMore also compared the two. Keep in mind that this is the iPad Pro that was released a year ago; I expect Apple to release a 2018 version of the 10.5" iPad Pro this Summer or Fall.
- I am a huge proponent of attorneys (and others) using password managers, and my personal favorite is 1Password. This week the company unveiled 1Password Business, designed for larger teams. It includes features like Active Directory integration so that companies can automate provisioning.
- Scanner Pro by Readdle (my review) is my favorite app for turning paper documents into PDFs, and I use it frequently. But Scanbot is also an excellent scanner app, and I see that this week it was updated to version 7, adding lots of new features.
- AirPods are one of my all-time favorite Apple products. Vlad Sarov, who reviews high-end audio equipment for The Verge, posted a review and finds them to be the best in class. But what is just as interesting is that Sarov originally panned the AirPods before he had a chance to really try them, and Jonathan Kim provides an interesting perspective on this 180° change.
- Michael Steeber of 9to5Mac interviewed Rob Janoff, the man who designed the Apple logo back in 1977, a version of which is still being used today.
- iOS 11.3 came out last week. Rene Ritchie of iMore explains what is new.
- I've seen very favorable reviews of the Nest Hello, its version of a video doorbell, including this one by Martyn Williams of TechHive and this one by Phil Nickinson of iMore. It may well be the best choice if you use a Google Home device. I would be interested to see a reviewer select the best video doorbell for folks who use an iPhone and Apple's HomeKit technology.
- Zac Hall of 9to5Mac explains how to use HomeKit to automatically turn on outdoor lights based on sunset and sunrise. I have two different sets of lights in the front of my house — a downstairs front porch and an upstairs front porch — being controlled by HomeKit to do just this.
- This item is for my 10 year old daughter, and any of you out there who have kids who are similarly engrossed by Harry Potter. Bryan Chaffin of the Mac Observer reports that on April 25th, there will be a new iOS game based on the Harry Potter franchise. This one takes place before Harry Potter was born, and it is set at Hogwarts and reunites many of the voice actors from the movie such as Maggie Smith and Warwick Davis. I have no doubt that my daughter is going to spend many hours on this one.
- And finally, Apple released a one minute video this week showing how easy it is to take a picture of whatever is on your iPad screen and annotate it using an Apple Pencil:
