Saturday, March 24, 2007

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) (4 сообщения)

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  • Blast from the Past: Happy 6th Birthday OS X

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    It's hard to believe, but today marks the 6th birthday for Mac OS X, at least as measured from when OS X 10.0 (Cheetah) first went on sale at retail outlets on March 24, 2001. Apple's original press release is still online, and is the source of some mild amusement. It heralds "amazing new functionality such as the Dock, a breakthrough for organizing, documents and document windows." And Apple's trumpeting of there being over 350 native applications for OS X is a far cry from the 5000+ Universal apps available today. Nonetheless, as far as Apple has come it's clear that much was already in place 6 years ago. And with the Leopard launch coming soon, OS X is now really reaching its stride. You can't help but wonder where we'll be 6 years from now (OS XI?). In any case, happy birthday to our favorite OS!

    [Via Digg]

    Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
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  • Apple TV: The first 24 hours

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    After spending a good 24 hours with a shiny new Apple TV, I agree with Mossberg and Pogue: this thing rocks. Apple has produced a great device that makes getting your iTunes and iTunes Store content from your Mac/PC to your TV and entertainment center, and with a nearly 10x lead in the digital media market at 118 million active iTunes users, they have quite an audience for it as well.

    As with everything else in life, however, the Apple TV isn't without its downsides. But instead of penning a post that did nothing but dog the device, I figured I would put together some pros and cons I've found from poking and prodding at the Apple TV:

    Pros

    • My initial sync was performed via that iTunes wireless AirPort Disk setup I wrote about earlier this month. Just to see how far I can push things, I occasionally tried to watch a video that hadn't been synced yet so it had to stream while the sync was still going on, and I never experienced a hiccup besides a noticeably slower start time. Impressive. I must mention, however, that I'm using Apple's ideal setup: a Core 2 Duo MacBook Pro upgraded to 802.11n, with an AirPort Extreme N-based router.
    • As Paul Kafasis confirmed, the Apple TV doesn't require an HD TV, just one that has component (RGB) inputs. That's great news for me, and I can happily say that iTS videos look great on our 32" JVC SD (Standard Definition) TV. HD - what me worry?
    • Thanks not only to Apple's sleek industrial design but also the entirely screen-based UI and minimalist remote, the Apple TV is by far the least intrusive piece of hardware in our humble entertainment center. It has but one tiny white light; no bright calculator-style numbers of blinking lights, unlike my clunky Comcast PVR box.
    • You can turn off the Apple TV's display (holding down Play for a few seconds) during a sync. This 'powers down' the device in more or less the same way you power down an iPod; it isn't completely turned off, and the Apple TV still wakes up instantly at the press of a button.

    Cons

    • This whole 40GB thing is for the birds. We're living in an increasingly digital society, and our libraries are expanding faster than ever. I currently have 28GB of music, 4.26GB of movies (and that includes only two truly feature-length films purchased from the store), 6.13GB of TV Shows and 4.05GB of Podcasts, which is arguably (one of) the most quickly expanding portion of virtually any podcast subscriber's library. While I am on the whole pleased with this device, 40GB is a borderline insult. This is 2007, not 1998.
    • Parts of the UI definitely feel like they were designed specifically for HD in mind, though designing software for the strange, wide world of television can't be easy for anyone. For example: while browsing TV shows to watch, a block of text appears below the show's album cover that contains metadata such as series, show description, etc. Even sitting barely two or three feet away from my SD TV, this text is barely legible, and before you ask: my eyesight is tip-top.
    • Social downside to using the Apple TV: I can't display what I'm watching/listening to in iChat. I'm no software engineer, but me-wagers Apple could easily fix this.
    • While playing music, the Apple TV occasionally swaps cover art and the track control bar horizontally between the left and right sides of the screen. I can understand the desire to do *something* with the TV UI since whatever is on TV is supposed to 'do stuff,' but the effect is really cheesy.
    • The Apple TV is a trojan horse: I *so* have the urge to start buying iTS content without reserve. A long time ago a friend bought Pirates of the Caribbean as a gift for me, but I never caught the movie bug. After playing with the Apple TV for a while yesterday, however, I began wanting to buy movies like never before because this setup just works. I buy, I download, I watch on TV - all from the comforts of my couch (since my MacBook Pro is on my lap). As long as Apple cranks out an iTreadmill sooner or later, I'll consider us even.
    • The Apple TV doesn't seem to be able to initiate a sync while something is already playing on it. This is of course to be expected, and I debated leaving it off this list entirely, but I figured it was ultimately worth a mention.

    But don't leave my pros and cons all alone here - feel free to voice your own! If you've snagged an Apple TV be sure to leave your thoughts here, and if you're still on the fence, we'll try to help you pick the yard with the greenest grass.

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  • Looking for movies to play on your Apple TV? Try 4Flix.net

    Filed under: , ,

    So you've got a new Apple TV, but now you can't afford to buy all the iTunes content you want to play on it? Until that XviD hack comes through, 4Flix.net has opportunistically announced that all of their content is already Apple TV compatible. In fact, their H.264 encoded DRM-free video can be played on your Mac, iPod, or Apple TV. Now, of course, this video content does not include the latest Hollywood movies, but mostly older, often B&W movies. Nonetheless, there are some real classics, like several Hitchcock movies. Unfortunately, I cannot find any information on the actual resolution of the video.

    4Flix.net normally offers movies for $1.99 each or you can get a FREE*PASS subscription that allows unlimited access for $9.99 a month or $49 per year. Right now, though, they are running a special with full access to their library for no charge until the end of the month.

    [Via MacMinute]
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  • Care and feeding of open source programmers

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    [Update: Brian Ganninger of Growl and Adium fame has posted on his strong disagreement with the HandBrake manifesto.]

    Since HandBrake got back under one open-source roof, the attention to everyone's favorite Mac DVD 'archiving' tool has heated up, and with said attention the volume of end-user feature requests has apparently risen. Over at the HandBrake forums, back on March 6, Rodney posted a manifesto called "HandBrake and Open Source - an end-user must-read," pointing out what he sees as the differences between F/OSS and commercial software when it comes to user-driven feature priorities. I quote:

    "Open source software is exactly what it sounds like: It's software written by a (usually small) group of highly-dedicated people that solved particular problems they themselves had and thought others might find useful as well. Like most things that are free, it comes with no warranty: If it does what you want, that's great - that's exactly why it was offered to you. If not, you have the freedom of choice to either modify it to suit your desires or find another software package that more closely meets your needs."

    The core of Rodney's message, as I read it: if you want something weird or customized, either pay someone for it or code it yourself -- don't knock on the glass with your crazy "why doesn't HandBrake do X?" requests, unless you're willing to pull your weight, 'cause everyone here is a volunteer. I don't agree with him on all fronts -- certainly, 'big kahuna' open source projects like Firefox, Webkit or OpenOffice are highly focused on the needs of the end user -- but for apps like HandBrake with a small core of developers, it definitely pays to ask very politely if there's something you desire, and to accept the fact that your priorities may not sync up with the developers' areas of interest. Now, off to learn C -- where did I leave that copy of Kernighan and Ritchie?
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