Family Sharing is probably one of the few awesome features on iOS 8, which are mostly directed towards users and not developers. Unsurprisingly, the Apple TV 7.0 update, being the biggest one yet for Apple’s set-top box, brings the feature to Apple TV 3 too.

Family Sharing comprises of two main features.

The first is the ability to link up to six family members to one account, so that everyone can share the same credit card and download all the purchases the family makes. On Apple TV, you can now access all the purchases (movies, tv shows, music, etc.) made by others in your Family Sharing group, even if they were made on iPhone or iPad.

Because all your purchases are stored in iCloud, whenever one person buys a movie or TV show, everyone in your family can enjoy it on Apple TV or whichever device they’re using.

The second part of Family Sharing provides for children below 13 years of age the possibility to have their own iTunes account. But every purchase they try to make on Apple TV will have to be approved by a parent before it is completed (Ask to buy feature). That ought to prevent lawsuits like this one in the future.

How to enable Family Sharing for Apple TV?

Unfortunately, there isn’t a way to set up Family Sharing directly from the Apple TV. The screen just shows a notification to read more about it from the Apple website. So you’ll have to set it up from an iOS 8 device, and then access it on Apple TV.

Just go to your iPhone or iPad Settings -> Choose iCloud -> You’ll find a “Family” tab on top -> Go in there and choose “Add Family Member”.

An invitation will be sent to the person. If the recipient is sitting next to you, you can let him enter his password on your iPhone to accept it or else he can accept it from his own device. From this screen, you can create an iTunes account for your child and also set another family member as the parent who can approve the purchases your child makes.

Now go into your Apple TV Settings and make sure you are logged in with the same account which is included in the Family Sharing group. There isn’t much left to do here. Go into your Movies channel and choose the Purchased tab. You’ll find a Family Sharing option here, which will show all the accounts in the group (image on the top). You can select someone and access all his purchases.

Read more on the Apple TV 7.0 update and Family Sharing.

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As we already reported, the refreshed design of Apple TV 7.0 software includes a new set of flat, iOS 7/8-style icons and a new thinner font.

The new app for Beats Music, the subscription music service Apple purchased earlier this year, comes with the interface similar to that of other Apple TV channels and allows users to log into their Beats accounts to listen to streaming music from the Apple TV.

There is also a 14-day free trial for those signing up directly from the Apple TV.

Introduced at WWDC 2014, Family Sharing allows family members to share purchases from iTunes (music, movies, TV shows) and the App Store, as well as family calendar and photos.

Family members can browse and download each other’s iTunes, iBooks or App Store purchases. Up to six members can participate, each with their own Apple ID. Parents can create Apple IDs for children, which includes Ask to Buy, requiring parental permission for purchases.

Apple is also expected to soon change the way AirPlay works in iOS 8 by adding peer-to-peer, the same protocol which it used in AirDrop to share files.

Peer-to-peer AirPlay discovery and playback.
With iOS 8, you can wirelessly connect iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch to Apple TV without first connecting to the organization’s network. Which means you can present or share your work even if you’re offline or the organization has a complex network.

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Apple today rolled out a new firmware for the 2nd and 3rd gen. Apple TV. Apple TV software update 6.2 (build 11D257c) is probably only focused on bug fixing and includes “general performance and stability improvements.”

Last week Apple added four new channels to the Apple TV (ABC News, PBS Kids, AOL On & Willow TV) along with a redesigned Flickr app.

Earlier in June, Apple released Apple TV 7 beta 1 firmware to developers. The new beta, intended to be used for “testing AirPlay with iOS apps”, also brings iCloud Family Sharing and some Continuity features to Apple TV.

Also read: WWDC 2014 and the invisible Apple TV

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Released earlier today, the new Apple TV software beta brings iCloud Family Sharing to the big screen, 9to5Mac reports. That’s in line with our predictions on how the future Apple TV may look like.

Introduced at WWDC 2014, Family Sharing allows family members to share purchases from iTunes (music, movies, TV shows) and the App Store (games!), as well as family calendar and photos.

iOS 8 introduces Family Sharing, making it easier than ever to communicate and share purchases, photos and calendars within the same household. Family members can browse and download each other’s iTunes®, iBooks® or App Store purchases. Up to six members can participate, each with their own Apple ID. Parents can create Apple IDs for children, which includes Ask to Buy, requiring parental permission for purchases. Family Sharing automatically keeps everyone connected by creating a shared family photo stream, shared calendar and provides an option for locating family members and their devices.

Also read: WWDC 2014 and the invisible Apple TV

Be sure to follow Apple TV Hacks on Twitter, Facebook or Google+ for all the latest AppleTV-related news.

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WWDC 2014 is over, and noticeably absent from last week’s keynote and sessions was any mention of the Apple TV. For a billion dollar product, this silence from Apple means one of two things: it could mean the business isn’t important, or more likely, it could mean that there are big things coming that aren’t ready for public consumption. Taking the assumption for the moment that a mere billion dollars is important to Apple, let’s review the announcements made last week and see how they may apply to the Apple TV product line.

(Reading between the lines of Apple’s announcements is often very telling. For example, prior to the iPhone 5 announcement, at WWDC Apple announced “auto layout” for iOS apps. On its own, it was a well-received feature, but in light of different screen sizes of the rumored new iPhone models, that feature took on a whole new perspective.)

Announcements last week that show promise:

Metal

Possibly the most interesting announcement for future Apple TV potential is the announcement of Metal. Metal is a set of developer API’s that allow “bare metal” access to the full graphics capabilities of the underlying hardware.

The game demos that were shown were fairly incredible for an iPad, and showed the hardware that Apple ships is getting closer and closer to “console-level” graphics capabilities. Granted, the demo was shown on an iPad Air, which greatly out-performs the current Apple TV products, but the Apple TV is overdue for a hardware refresh.

With most consumer televisions supporting 1080 resolution, an Apple TV with equivalent hardware specs as the iPad Air would outperform the Air. Not until TV’s reach 4k resolution does a television surpass the Air’s resolution.

HomeKit

There was a fair amount of unsubstantiated rumor and buzz around HomeKit prior to the announcement, with some proclaiming that Apple would “own” the home automation market. Instead, what Apple did is much more powerful – they have created an underlying architecture and set of API’s that enable developers to standardize the interaction of their devices and integrate different vendors seamlessly.

The ability to control home alarms, thermostats, and lights is very powerful. Having the ability to leverage this information in your home from the largest screen you own would hopefully be an area of expansion as this technology is adopted, and combined with Siri would be an even more powerful offering.

Siri

There are a couple of interesting tidbits surrounding Siri. Obviously, expansions in supported languages and overall capabilities is always interesting, but also fairly expected. Song recognition would be a feature that could be interesting for home use, and the ability to purchase content via iTunes store lays even more groundwork.

But there is one feature that would be essential to have Siri become a core part of Apple TV. The announced “always on” feature is the one. “Hey Siri, let’s watch some football” would seem to be a very Apple-ish way of approaching the living room. It will be interesting to see if this feature moves to the TV.

Continuity and indoor location API’s

This announcement has the most “start into my crystal ball to see the future” around it. With Continuity, Apple is likely using Bluetooth LE (think iBeacon) capabilities in their devices to determine when you are typing an email on your iPad and walk up to your Mac, and transfer the document and state of one device to another.

Obviously this is a “cool” technology, but if you apply it to the Apple TV, the feature takes on a whole new perspective. Apple could expand this capability to allow you to transfer the viewing of a YouTube or iTunes video directly to the Apple TV rather than AirPlay it.

But even more interesting is the overall concept of location-awareness. If the Apple TV knew that your iPhone was in the room, when you launched the “Remote” app on your iPhone, it would pick the appropriate Apple TV rather than making you select.

AirPlay could default to the nearest device. Content on the TV could automatically be selected based on the current user. Age restrictions could be automatic based on the devices in range. Many, many possibilities.

Photos

Apple has “upgraded” their photos support from iOS devices, allowing photos to be hidden, storing all photos in the cloud, and streamlining the uploading and editing of cloud-based photos. As photos are already supported on the Apple TV using the current iCloud services, we can safely assume that the new capabilities will likely be supported as well.

Family Sharing that allows family members to share purchases from iTunes (music, movies, tv shows) and the App Store (games!), as well as a family calendar and photos looks very promising, too.

And let’s not forget that in iOS 8, AirPlay will use peer-to-peer to connect to the Apple TV, letting us share the content from the iOS device on the big screen much easier and faster.

Another WWDC, another year, and no Apple TV public API support. Yet Apple has continued to lay more and more groundwork so that if, and hopefully when, they do open up the Apple TV to developers, it will be with a set of mature and extensive capabilities.

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