For readers: how to use iBooks

Do you love to read ebooks on the iPad? Are you a writer who wants to publish his or her own interactive ebooks for the iPad, and sell them on the iBookstore? Zeeshan Chawdhary, a highly experienced web and mobile developer who is currently the CTO of iCityConcierge Ltd, a travel startup, shows you how to do both in his new book Instant Apple iBooks How-to. To read ebooks, you use the app iBooks in your iPad. To write and publish ebooks, you use the app iBooks Author in your Apple MacBook or iMac. The first five sections describe how to use iBooks, and the rest tell you how to use iBooks Author 2.0, the latest version of the program as of this writing. You should also know how to create an HTML5 webpage.

For readers: how to use iBooks

In these sections, you are introduced to features that enable you to browse and purchase ebooks (or download free ebooks), group these ebooks into different categories; or Collections, and add PDFs to the iBooks library. You also learn about tools that you can use while you read these books. These reading tools enable you to select text from the book to be copied, pasted, and emailed. In iBooks 3.0.2, which was current when he wrote this book, you can also change the color of the highlight when the text is selected, and use the Fonts and Themes feature to change the font size and family of the text, and the color of the book's background. If you're using iBooks 3.1, please note that this version no longer has these last two features. The horizontal bar that appears when you select the text has also changed. When you tap the text to select it, only the words "Copy" and "Search" appear in the bar. If you tap one word, the word "Define" - which enables a box with a dictionary definition of this word to appear - will also show up in the bar. To view iBooks - and the rest of your iPad - in "night mode," go to your Settings app, press Accessibility, then switch Invert Colors to On.

For writers: how to use iBooks Author

Here, Instant Apple iBooks How-to teaches you how to create an interactive London travel guidebook by choosing a template (you can find templates in the program itself, or various websites), and editing the text and graphics. In iBooks Author 2.0, you can now directly drag images from websites onto placeholder images. Then you learn how to create a custom HTML5 Twitter widget that pulls tweets about London into the ebook, and a widget where a 3D object can be viewed and rotated in the ebook. When inserting a 3D object into your iBooks Author 2.0 document, make sure "Auto-rotate object when idle" is unchecked; otherwise the 3D object will not show.

Apple WWDC 2013 Keynote Confirmed For June 10

The 2013 Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) keynote is all set to happen on June 10 as reported by tech site AllThingsD. WWDC is Apple's annual technology conference where the company showcase their new and upcoming products and services to the world.

That being said, there are a lot of speculations that's currently associated with WWDC 2013 which pertains as to what Apple might have in-store with consumers, most especially to avid fans and patrons of the brand. The latest rumors suggests that the Cupertino-based company is going to unveil the company's highly-anticipated new mobile operating system, the iOS 7, as well as the next-generation OS X operating system for Macs. 

There's also a buzz about a possible reveal by Apple for new versions of the iPad and the iPhone, an Apple smartwatch, an Apple TV, an in-car integration for iOS 7, a more social connectivity for iOS 7, as well as the company's own music streaming service called "iRadio." Of course, these are all but speculations circling around the web right this moment, which may or may not come into fruition. However, it is expected that Tim Cook and company might pull in a few surprise announcements in the said event. 

This year's WWDC will kick off starting June 10 through the 14th at Moscone Center in San Francisco. For those wanting to buy tickets to attend Apple's WWDC this year, unfortunately, tickets have been sold out already when they went on sale in April. On one hand, registered Apple developers who can't physically attend the WWDC this year will still be able to view the Apple technical presentations via online stream at the Apple's official developer website.