Fresh Apple: The Apple Blog (6 сообщений)

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The Apple Blog
The Apple Blog, published by and for the day-to-day Apple user, is a prominent source for news, reviews, walkthroughs, and real life application of all Apple products.
http://theappleblog.com
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Ive + Eve
If that picture from Pixar’s Wall-E looks somewhat familiar in all its white glory, it is because it’s design was developed in part by Apple’s own Jonathon Ive. He was called in as a consultant to the process. Here is an interesting comment from Ive:

I wanted Eve to be high-end technology — no expense spared — and I wanted it to be seamless and for the technology to be sort of hidden and subcutaneous. The more I started describing it, the more I realized I was pretty much describing the Apple playbook for design.

The article also states that Ive was secretive about Apple’s goings-on and would not comment on the future of technology designs. If you want to see more, Wall-E opens on June 27th.

[Via Fortune]

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Forum Activity: May 12, 2008
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Free Xserve Training From Apple
If you haven’t tried yet, but are interested in running a server, now is your chance to get some free training about Mac OS X Server. Apple assures that if you don’t have a dedicated IT staff, you can still run a server with their wicked easy-to-use Leopard Server.

The free seminar is aimed at expanding IT departments and small business owners. The only drawback is that it will be in Addison, TX, so only those who live near the Dallas/Fort Worth Area will be able to attend. The seminar will be at the Addison Conference & Theatre Centre (the “re” endings are so hot right now). It is this Wednesday, May 14th, 9 AM to 12 PM.

The topics included are:
- Introduction to Mac OS X Server
- Tools to configure and control your server
- Collaboration using the server
- Podcast Producer
If you are able to make it, blog about it, and link back to this post.

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OpenOffice.org 3.0 Beta Rocks Aqua On Intel
VMware was not the only pre-release surprise this past week as OpenOffice.org launched a beta of their new 3.0 office productivity suite complete with native OS X GUI support (no need to run X11 anymore!) along with a sizable list of other enhancements and bug fixes. TAB put the suite through a series of tests to help readers determine if this 168MB download is worthy of a spot in their Applications folders.
(more…)

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Software Updates & New Release Highlights For Week Ending 05-10
My picks for the best program updates and new releases from this past week:
- VMware Fusion 2 Beta – this popular virtualization tool adds enhanced graphics & printing capabilities plus more diverse import options
- OpenOffice.org 3.0 Beta – one of the most comprehensive (only?) open source office suites adds native OS X Aqua support plus many enhancements to importing files, charting & layout viewing plus new spreadsheet collaboration options
- Transmission 1.20 – a full-featured BitTorrent client which has added support for https tracker connections, IP blocking via Bluetack Level 1 blocklist, better support for mutli-tracker torrents, faster UPnP startup port mapping, statistics resetting and updated Dock badge images
- CoverStream 2.0 – the application that brought CoverFlow to your Desktop has dramatically reduced its memory and disk footprint while also increasing speed twofold and adding new filtering & browsing features along with support for Apple Remotes and integration with Last.FM
- Parallels Desktop 3.0 Build 5600.0 – that other virtualization tools which has fixed many bugs and included support for Microsoft Windows Vista SP1 & XP SP3
- OmniGraffle 5.0.1 beta 1 – the drawing tool for OS X smashes a slew of bugs & crashers
- OmniPlan 1.5.1 – this simple & efficient project management tool has also smacked a ton of bugs, enhanced AppleScript support and enhances security (the app is now code signed)
- Audacity 1.3.5 – this great, open source audio tools gets even better with the ability to record onto the end of existing tracks, updates to suppotig libraries, enhanced user interface elements and many bug fixes
- NetNewsWire 3.1.6 – the “gold standard” in feed readers fixes a nasty memory leak
- Vidnik – a new tool from the fine folks over at Google that lets you use the built-in camera on your Mac to create movies and upload them to YouTube
- Ascent 1.9.2 – this amazing GPS-enabled cyclist/runner/hiker application adds support for new devices, better track manipulation functionality and enhanced drag/drop features
- GPSBabel 1.3.5 – a handy GPS “Swiss Army knife” squashes bugs, adds support for new devices, enhances the user interface and improves document support/compatibility
Full disclaimer: I either regularly use these apps and updated them or deliberately gave them a go this past week. I’m always on the lookout for new toys/tools, so drop me a note if you release new stuff!

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3G iPhone Preference Found in Beta 5 Firmware
Seems like I just posted about 3G iPhone. Actually, that’s because I did. It’s not my fault the internet is aflutter with iPhone love.

At any rate, this morning I was greeted by some interesting news regarding the 3G options found in the Beta 5 Firmware plist file. As you can see, the ability to turn 3G on or off is present — accompanied by the standard message about decreasing battery life for data speed.

From this random and very unverified blog post (via MacRumors):

Note that this is not fake, it is in the beta 5 .ipsw, but will normally not show up on an EDGE iPhone. Turning 3G on will just crash the phone if you use an EDGE phone. If you do not believe me, then decrypt the beta5 rootfs dmg, and see for yourself in /Applications/Preferences.app/Network.plist

So what does this mean, exactly?

It appears that the old Edge phones are going to run the same set of software as the new models when released. Unless there’s further implementation of features that expand upon the options for screen size, battery life optimization and other factors, it’s likely we may not see a drastic change in iPhone hardware in this next version.

If they both can run the same software and that software doesn’t account for a lot of differences, there might be some heavy depression in the camp of people that were expecting high end new features (like videocalls, believe it or not).

Nope, it’s starting to look like the device will simply be a bit lighter, look a bit different (for example, the all black cover rumors) and support 3G. This would be somewhat of a disappointment for me. I was hoping to see a fairly different phone. Now that I really give it some thought, that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

Apple has a winning model here, they need to tweak some things to broaden the market availability of the device. And… that’s about it. Other than 3G support, we don’t need to go too crazy with features that involve a lot more than simple software updates for this round.

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