Apple Watch and Early Detection of Parkinson’s Disease

Scientists have been studying motion tracking as a method for early detection of Parkinson’s Disease, which initially shows up with symptoms of rigidity and tremors. Researchers in the UK are looking to use smartwatches and their motion tracking to help prove an earlier Parkinson’s diagnosis.

Early results are positive, with AI models providing accurate early diagnosis. Further studies are underway, but it makes sense that a sensitive motion-tracking device on your wrist all day would notice things you may not.

Do you remember when the big story about the Apple Watch was that it was a fashion accessory? As the years go by, it becomes so obvious that the Apple Watch is primarily a robust health and fitness device in addition to telling you the time. I’m already starting a campaign to get one on my mother-in-law’s wrist. (Hat tip to Amber Neely at Apple Insider for turning me onto this research.)

iRecord Player

Jony Ive has made a record player with the Scottish audio brand, Linn. It has rounded corners and a lot of more metal. They’re only making 250 of them, and it will only set you back $60,000.00.

ex apple chief design officer jony ive celebrates 50 years of linn with special edition turntable

I actually like seeing Jony Ive doing these bespoke projects. I feel like it is the kind of work he wants to be doing at this point in his life. I wonder if anyone will use these record players as record players or if they will become investment/museum pieces. I’d like to see Jony take on everyday products and make them more useful/beautiful like Braun products are.

Regardless, we now have the answer to the question, “What if someone made a record player with zero compromises?”

Mac Power Users 700: Our Workflows

To celebrate 700 episodes of Mac Power Users (MPU), Stephen and I talk through how we work, including how MPU gets made each week, how we approach our blogs, other podcasts, videos, and more.

This episode of Mac Power Users is sponsored by:

  • 1Password: Never forget a password again.
  • CleanMyMac X: Your Mac. As good as new. Get 5% off today.
  • Squarespace: Make your next move. Enter offer code MPU at checkout to get 10% off your first purchase.

The 15-inch MacBook Air, Apple Silicon, and What It Means for Future Macs

This week there was an interesting interview between Inc.’s Jason Aten and Apple executives Laura Metz and Thomas Tan, as reported by Chance Miller at 9to5 Mac.

The 15-inch MacBook Air seems like a no-brainer. However, the Apple execs explained they needed Apple silicon to make it come true. They couldn’t get “Air” quality battery life and performance without Apple’s M-series chips. That makes sense for a bigger MacBook Air.

It also, however, makes sense for a smaller one. The non-Air 12” MacBook was canned before Apple’s new M-series SoC, but it seems now like that computer, an ultra-portable Mac, is more possible than ever. I can’t help but wonder if that is on the drawing board or if Apple thinks the 13-inch MacBook Air is small enough.

Turn Any Website into an App with Unite 4 (Sponsor)

This week MacSparky is sponsored by Unite 4, the best app for turning websites into apps. These days, many of us are using web services that require us to navigate a website to interact with them. This creates all sorts of issues. When you close your browser, you are closing your tools. When you want to jump straight to the tool, there is no easy way. Some of them are Electron-based and use up your Mac’s resources. Moreover, they often don’t follow conventional macOS standards.

You can fix all of that with Unite 4. Unite 4 takes a website and turns it into an app. It’s dead simple. You type in a URL, and you get a Mac app. It even creates an attractive Mac-friendly icon. 

Of course, people use Unite 4 for productivity apps like Gmail, Hey, Slack, Basecamp, and every other web-based productivity app. But you can also make entertainment apps like Netflix, YouTube, and Disney+. Unite 4 goes a step further with the ability to put these apps in your status bar (which, by the way, is an excellent place for Slack) and create floating windows. It also lets you take a “slice” of a website and put it in your Dock for quick reference.

Best of all, MacSparky readers are getting 20% off this week. Stop going to web pages to get your work done. Check out Unite 4.

The Apple Game Porting Toolkit

With the focus on Vision Pro at WWDC, the Apple Game Porting Toolkit is also an interesting new technology from Apple. It allows game developers to quickly get their games developed for other platforms (primarily Microsoft Windows) ported to the Mac. Game enthusiasts are playing with the new tools (that’s already been updated once since WWDC). Andrew Tsai has been publishing examples of this on YouTube with actual game footage and it is impressive.

The bigger question is whether or not Apple shortcutting the translation process will be enough to convince game developers to port their games to the Mac. To me, this comes down to Apple silicon. The M1 MacBook Air has to be the baseline, and if a developer can get good enough performance on that platform, I think several will make the attempt. There are a lot of M1 Macs going off to college and in teenagers’ rooms. This could be a bigger deal for Mac gaming than people think.