Technology

New features are coming for the desktop version of the messaging service, WhatsApp, as the company is rolling out new update through the official beta channel.

One of the new features being introduced is the incoming call ringtone and turn off all desktop incoming calls. This feature would extend more control to the users while managing call notifications when they are using the web version of the messaging application.

WABetaInfo reports that the second feature in the new update would be a new interface for Contact Info, Business Info, and Group Info. The new web interface would be similar to the interface users see on their Android or iPhone when they are looking at a contact or group info.

The new interface feature is being rolled out for specific beta testers only.

“If you want to verify if the new interface is already enabled for your WhatsApp account, just open Contact Info or Group Info (and be sure it’s not Business Info)”, WABetaInfo said.

The new features will be available for users once they update their application to the latest versions, however, there is a chance that some might not receive the new options right now. The WhatsApp update tracker said that those users will soon receive updates with more activations following.

WhatsApp desktop beta versions may be released for a specific platform in advance so the users have to wait for some days to get the new version for the platforms they are using.

Collectors of Apple products have the chance to own an original Apple computer that was hand built by the tech giant’s founders, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak, some 45 years ago.

The functioning Apple-1, considered to be the great-great-grandfather of today’s sleek chrome-and-glass Macbooks, is expected to fetch up to US$600,000 at an auction in California.

Known as the “Chaffey College” Apple-1 is one of only 200 made by Jobs and Wozniak at the very start of the company’s odyssey from their famed garage start-up to megalith worth US$2 trillion.

What further adds to it rarity is the fact that this computer is encased in koa wood, a richly patinated wood native to Hawaii. Only a handful of the original 200 were made on this pattern.

Jobs and Wozniak mostly sold Apple-1s as component parts. One computer shop that took a delivery of around 50 units decided to encase some of them in wood, the auction house shared. “This is kind of the holy grail for vintage electronics and computer tech collectors,” Apple-1 expert, Corey Cohen told the Los Angeles Times. “That really makes it exciting for a lot of people.”

According to The Los Angeles Times reported the student — who has not been named — paid just US$650 for it at the time. That student now stands to make a pretty penny: a working Apple-1 that came to the market in 2014 was sold by Bonhams for more than US$900,000.

Apple raced to success in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but foundered after the departure of Jobs and Wozniak. The company was reinvigorated in the late 1990s, and Jobs was brought back into the fold as the chief executive. He oversaw the launch of the iPod, and later the iPhone, before his death in 2011.