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Переслать - App Review: Caught You! — Make Your iPhone Rat Out Thieves
App Quick Stats
Oh the sheer horror of it! I’m feeling uneasy at the very thought of my iPhone getting half inched. At the moment, my strongest defense against thieves seems to be keeping my iPhone within a 1-foot radius at all times.
Beyond simply keeping a keen eye on one’s iPhone, it would be much more appropriate to leverage some of the device’s actual technology in an effort to ensure its safety and, at the very least, assuage the owner’s simmering worry.
Caught You! is the first app to hit the store that has awoken the tiny gadget-loving Bond inside of me: the app utilizes the iPhone’s raft of connectivity features — specifically 3G/Edge and GPS — in a bid to combat theft.
The Honeypot
Once installed, Caught You! masquerades as a standard iPhone app called Bank Details. The idea is that when your phone is pilfered, the thief — unethical and prone to stealing things as they are — will be sifting through your apps, spy Bank Details and decide to load it up in a bid to access your precious savings.
The Bank Details app invites Mr. Thief to enter a pin number. The thing is, there is no pin number, and so while Mr. Thief is excitedly trying various combinations, the app is covertly mailing its location back to you.
It’s an ingenious concept, executed in an efficient way, putting the iPhone’s Q-esque feature-set to potentially good use. And it’s exciting to think you might catch the thieves at their own game, should that fateful day ever come.
Preparing The Ruse
The setup process is simple — it requests your email address — this initial configuration screen will, the app warns, never be seen again. After this, you simply have to close and open the app a few times — each time agreeing that the app is allowed to use your current location — in order to initialize it.
A tip though: the address you use will be the one that future covert messages are sent to, so it’s best to set that to a rarely used email account, certainly not the email account that you have synced to your iPhone’s mail application.
After this quick setup process, the app will never again ask for permission to use your current location. To all intents and purposes it seems like an iPhone app designed for holding various bank details, account numbers and such.
The developer’s instructions don’t mention this, but if you manage to botch the setup process, by entering the wrong email address, simply delete the app and re-install it. Once freshly re-installed, the app is ready to be initialized.
In The Wild
After the setup period, I took to the streets of central London and tested out the Bank Details app several times. I was looking for speed and accuracy, in terms of the app locating me and firing off an email as fast as possible.
While the app’s performance wasn’t perfect, it was admirable — locating me down to the nearest block. The alert email hit my account seconds after opening the app. The message itself containing activation time, latitude and longitude, plus a very handy Google Maps link.
Now there are of course some unmentioned caveats that may not be obvious to the average user. As discussed, the app needs to be initialized before use. In practice, when the app is activated, the iPhone will need to be able to locate itself quickly and it’ll need a data-connection signal in order to fire off the covert email.
Furthermore, standard practice once your mobile phone is stolen is to call your carrier to de-activate the SIM, contact the police to report the crime and call the insurance company. Delaying any of this might mean you’re ineligible for your insurance and will almost certainly give the individual who scampered off with your iPhone more time to rack up the bill.
Summing Up
Caught You! really does work, in so much as it accurately determines your location and consistently fires off emails to your chosen address. However, it’s unclear just how useful this app would really be. Where it shines is in its psychological comfort-value. It really feels good to know that there’s an extra degree of protection for such a valued possession.
Knowing which block, in which neighborhood, your kidnapped iPhone is on may not be so helpful in practice though. Furthermore, is this the kind of information the police could take seriously or act on? And, if not, surely it wouldn’t be advisable to go knocking on doors in a desperate bid to retrieve your stolen goods.
For worried iPhone-owners who fear that their device could be pinched at any moment, Caught You! is a worry-allaying app that you’ll hopefully never have to use. However, for the rest of us, the app’s prime-feature, while impressive, is vastly outweighed by its lack of practicality. As such, I just can’t see this being useful in a real-world iPhone-theft situation.
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Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - TV.com App Streams Major Network Content to iPhone
Finally, one of the networks has figured out that the iPhone represents a huge audience just waiting for some quality video content. CBS is the network in question, which must’ve gotten tech savvy when they acquired CNET a little while ago. They’re offering content, including full episodes, via the recently released TV.com (iTunes link) application for the iPhone and iPod touch. The app includes content from their affiliates Showtime and The CW.
Don’t get out your noise-makers and party hats just yet, however; it’s not all fun and games. The interface isn’t all that great, and the naming and organization of shows is worse than you’d find on some torrent sites. And the vast majority of the content isn’t full episodes at all, but little clips from various shows that make little sense out of context for the uninitiated, who you might expect an app like this to target (attracting new viewers is the idea, right CBS?).
But what is there, is golden. Full episodes of the original “Star Trek” series, “CSI” (and yes, sadly, “CSI: Miami,” too), and “MacGyver.” Yes, “MacGyver.” On your iPhone or iPod touch. The original DIY gadgeteer has finally arrived on the platform that he probably would’ve greatly appreciated, had it been available in his day. The selection of shows available from any of these titles (and the others they offer) seem chosen at random, however, so keep your fingers crossed that your favorite is among them.
Currently, TV.com is only available in the U.S. App Store, which is terrible for international fans like me. I used my U.S. account, since it’s a free download, but the app knows you’re in Canada (or any other country) based on your IP and displays the now all-too-familiar “We’re sorry, we hate your country” message. Luckily, if you’ve set up Hotspot Shield for iPhone (or iPod touch), like we told you to a while ago, you can still use the app, with very satisfactory results.
To say that CBS is the first to offer this sort of thing would be to ignore the excellent BBC iPlayer that our friends across the pond have been enjoying for months now, but it is the first of the big U.S. networks to go this route. In a perfect world, this would be the glove thrown to the ground that prompts the others to get on board and make this a proper duel, but the networks are confused and scared by this fancy Internet thing, so you never know. I’m keeping my eyes on the horizon for the inevitable Hulu app. Tell your goons to get on it, Baldwin.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - MySQL Showdown: Querious vs. Sequel Pro
Administering databases is not generally an exciting task, it’s right up there with TPS reports and their cover sheets. So why then, are you using the command-line MySQL client to administer your MySQL databases when you have a nice shiny user interface provided by OS X at your disposal?
The people behind Querious and Sequel Pro asked the same question, and have come up with two different answers. Neither are yet at a ‘1.0′ release (Querious is close at 1.0beta2, Sequel Pro is at 0.9.3), however both are extremely functional and stable.
Compared to Querious, Sequel Pro has a relative long history, being an open-source project inherited from the now defunct CocoaMySQL. Querious on the other hand, is a brand new offering and is a commercial product costing $25 (a 30 day trial is available for download).
We’ll take a look at each app, pound for pound, and see who comes out stronger.
MySQL Server Version Support
The first, and critically important, difference to note is that Querious will only connect to MySQL 5 servers. This is potentially a big limitation (it is for me as most of the databases I work with every day are still MySQL 3) — so if you also need to connect to MySQL 3 or MySQL 4, Sequel Pro is the only option out of the two.
Concurrent Connections
If you want to work with multiple servers or databases at once, Sequel Pro presents a new window for each instance. Querious gives you the option of using a tabbed interface like Safari, or creating a new window, and is thus more flexible.
Browsing Databases
Sequel Pro lets you pick the database from a drop down list, then presents a flat list of tables for browsing. This is functional but does limit the visual overview to one database at a time.
Querious gives you a tree view with all databases which expand to show their tables. This allows quickly seeing multiple tables from different databases — the difference is subtle but potentially useful.
Both applications let you browse table records, allowing you to easily sort fields by clicking the column headers or filtering a specific field. Querious takes this one step further, allowing full text searches across all fields, or even specifying a custom WHERE clause just for that table.
Table Structures
Viewing and modifying table structure definition is much the same with both apps, allowing easy modification of table fields and indexes. Sequel Pro displays both structure and index on the same screen, while Querious splits these into two. The advantage that Querious has here is that it allows viewing and modifying the table and individual field character encoding. Sequel Pro doesn’t support this. Both have an easy facility to show and copy to the clipboard the corresponding CREATE TABLE query for the table definition.
Queries
At the end of the day, the most important feature of any database tool is how efficiently you can run queries. Almost any database task can be performed via a query, so any UI feature that is missing can be made up for by a strong query runner.
The huge advantage that Querious has over Sequel Pro when it comes to to running queries is syntax highlighting and code completion. The code completion will give you options to complete SQL reserved words and table entities. The syntax highlighting visually distinguishes reserved words from table entities and user constants, allowing you to spot typo errors quickly. Sequel Pro on the other hand, just gives you a plain text box.
Both applications support query histories, allowing you to click and see previous queries you’ve run. Sequel Pro does this with a drop down list to select a previous query. Querious lists these with a datetime stamp — requiring you to click the item before you can see the query — this could increase the time it takes to find that old query you’re looking for. Unfortunately, neither app allows you to go back and forth in the query history via keyboard shortcuts. On the keyboard shortcut note: in Sequel Pro you can type your query and then press enter to execute it. This should work the same with Querious (and does with an external aluminum keyboard) but it just ignores fn-return on my MacBook Pro. This is a minor bug, but is critical for every day use. Keyboard shortcuts are a must-have feature for me to use an app on a daily basis — stopping my work flow to move the mouse constantly just slows things down.
Querious and Sequel Pro also offer ‘Query Favorites,’ allowing you to store commonly used queries. Sequel Pro just uses a single drop down box again to select the query. Querious takes this further allowing multiple collections of favorite queries, giving each one a name. This allows you to group common queries by tasks or databases.
Server Maintenance
Querious allows editing users and allows full user privileges management with a simple point & click interface. Sequel Pro has no specific UI to handle this.
Both apps expose menu options to perform table maintenance such as analyzing, checking, flushing, repairing and optimizing. They also allow you to flush user privileges. The one thing that Sequel Pro can do that Querious can’t, is view the current server-side variables.
Importing and Exporting
Querious and Sequel Pro both allow importing and exporting databases or single tables in SQL or CSV/Tab files. Sequel Pro also allows exporting tables in XML.
Clipboard Support
You can select records (from a table or query) with both applications and copy them to the clipboard. Sequel Pro will copy these as tab delimited text, allowing pasting into a text editor or spreadsheet like Numbers, effortlessly. Querious goes a step further, providing an option sheet when copying, allowing you to specify the format to go into clipboard: CSV, Tab or SQL. The ability to copy records as SQL Insert statements is quite powerful, especially if you want to move specific records to another database or table quickly.
Verdict
When it comes to MySQL 5 servers, Querious matches and exceeds the features of Sequel Pro with style. If you don’t need to connect to a MySQL 3 or MySQL 4 database, Querious is just more polished and feature-rich than Sequel Pro and is well worth the small price tag. I hope they add MySQL 3 and MySQL 4 support soon, as I will start using it the instant they do so.
Gallery
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Apple Declares No More Uninformed Reviews, App Store Ratings Jump
Once upon a time, anyone who wanted to could post a review of any app available in Apple’s App Store. You could just drop in on the top paid apps list, prepare a number of scathing single-star reviews based on the outrageous prices of each app, and possibly make a significant dent in their overall rating (especially if you were looking at some of the international stores, where there aren’t nearly as many ratings as there are in the U.S.).
It was misleading, it was petty, and it was stupid. Luckily, Apple did away with most of that nonsense when they limited the ability to review to people who’ve actually purchased an app. What remained, however, were all the spurious reviews made prior to the ban, with no way for users to distinguish between the two, and still affecting the app’s cumulative score.
Well, as of this week, those reviews are no more. Apple has gone through and pruned all of the reviews made by non-customers, according to MacRumors. It’s obvious when you look at the number of reviews for an app like Super Monkey Ball before and after Wednesday, which have gone from 4,197 to only 3,710. As a result, the average rating on a number of apps have gone up.
The move is long overdue, and I’m glad Apple did it, although I wonder how they determined which reviews were legitimate and which were by people who hadn’t downloaded the app. I suppose they do have access to the purchasing history of everyone with an iTunes account, in which case it makes sense why it took this long, since that seems like a lot of work. Hopefully now the reviews represent a more accurate reflection of what customers are getting, but it’s still far from a perfect system, and could stand further improvements, like weighting reviews according to latest version numbers. Apple seems to be committed to making it work, though, so we’ll see what the future brings.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - doubleTwist Takes Jab at iTunes Tyranny
Look out iTunes, there’s a brand new media manager in town, in the form of a public beta just released for OS X. The program is called doubleTwist, and it’s the brainchild of anti-DRM crusader “DVD” Jon Johansen.
Ars Technica had a look at it in length, and it seems to be fairly promising. The idea is the same one behind Pioneers of the Inevitable’s Songbird, namely to provide users with an alternative to Apple’s own iTunes, which is sometimes criticized as having an unnecessarily large memory footprint, among other failings.
The killer feature of doubleTwist, the one which really sets it apart from both Songbird and iTunes, is its ability to sync your media on pretty much any portable device of your choosing that’s capable of playing it back. In fact, doubleTwist supports syncing with literally hundreds of devices, among them the standard heavy hitters like BlackBerry, Sony’s PSP, Nintendo’s DSI, and just about any mobile phone you can think of. Except, and this is the odd part, for the iPhone and iPod, which are currently available for PC users only, though the Mac client with iPhone/iPod support is in private testing.
Curiously, doubleTwist does feature a mandatory sign-up before you can start using it. And, annoyingly, you have to wait to receive a confirmation email and click an activation link before the application will even let you get past an authentication screen. It wouldn’t have been nearly as aggravating if I’d just received the email right away, but I had to wait quite a while to even get started.
Aside from login issues, the program itself is intuitive and easy to use. It can automatically scan all of your drives, folders, and connected mobile devices for any kind of media to build a comprehensive library, organized by where it was found. Unfortunately, doubleTwist is DRM-phobic in its current incarnation, and will not find or recognize any DRM-enabled content, besides iTunes music, which it can presumably play by running Quicktime in the background.
The beauty of doubleTwist, from the perspective of someone who hates messing about with conversion software and often gets frustrating results when he does, is its automatic conversion feature when dragging and dropping media to different devices. If the device is one of the many doubleTwist has in its expanding database, your file will either just be transferred to it automatically if already in a compatible format, or converted into a file type the device will recognize. No muss, no fuss. Which is also a limitation, since you have no control over conversion.
I’m not sure it’ll ever replace iTunes as my primary media manager, since I’d miss Apple proprietary features like AirTunes support, but it does help me wrangle my gadget collection a little better, and with a lot fewer headaches. Let’s hope future updates fully realize doubleTwist’s early potential.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Sony Set to Take On Growing Dominance of iPhone and iPod Touch
Sony is no doubt feeling the heat from Apple, whose campaign to push the iPod touch (and the iPhone, though less directly) to the forefront of mobile gaming continues, with another recent advertisement using the “Funnest iPod Ever” tag line, and highlighting another selection of games available for the platform. They’ve also introduced a Games Showcase attached to the official iPod touch page of their web site. It looks like Sony may be taking Apple’s success seriously into consideration in designing their upcoming successor to the PlayStation Portable, their own mobile gaming device.
The biggest cue they’re rumored to be taking from Apple is a switch to exclusive digital distribution, instead of retaining support for disc-based media via their own proprietary UMD format. I am myself a PSP owner, and I admit that I find the discs both cumbersome and antiquated now that I’m used to just downloading, resetting, and playing on my iPhone and iPod touch.
News of the new device comes from David Perry, Chief Creative Officer of Acclaim, as reported by Kotaku’s Brian Crecente. Perry says the news of the new device comes directly from one of its developers at Sony, and I suspect the leak might even be one that’s officially sanctioned by Sony in order to steal some of Apple’s thunder.
We’ve already seen the mobile gaming market change in the wake of the arrival of the iPod touch, with Nintendo’s introduction of the DSi, which adds some built-in media playback ability to the mobile console. It makes sense that Sony and Nintendo would do their best to bridge the gap between their own products and Apple’s jack-of-all-trades.
This move probably also means another mobile app store is on the way, although the exact nature of the PSP 2’s isn’t explained in detail. CNET is speculating that 3G as well as Wi-Fi might be offered. Sony, of course, has experience with direct digital distribution via their PlayStation Network Store, so they won’t be starting from scratch.
I think they have a chance to give Apple a run for their money, in fact, as long as they can appeal more to casual gamers while still keeping the core crowd interested. An OLED touchscreen like the one that’s forthcoming on their latest incarnation of the Walkman would go a very long way to adding to the appeal of a new PSP, as would the addition of the often-requested second analog joystick. If they are going to take on Apple, they should know their strengths, and game system controls are definitely one of them.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Sync Your iPhone/iPod With Any Computer
One thing I have always wanted to do is be able to sync my iPhone or iPod with any computer. Lifehacker had an article a while back on doing this, but the software they used does not support the iPhone or iPod touch. So, I have developed a method to connect any iPod or iPhone to any computer to download the music or movies from that computer to the iPod or iPhone.
Once configured, you only need your iPhone/iPod, the USB sync cable, and a computer with iTunes to implement the hack (the idea being you always have your iPhone or iPod and the person with the computer has the iPod USB cable). It takes about 20 minutes to set this hack up and then only a few seconds to implement each time you would like to use it.
Things to Note
- If you want to be able to do this hack on both Mac and Windows machines, you’re going to have to configure two separate iTunes libraries: one from a Mac and one from a Windows machine.
- I was using an iPhone when writing this tutorial, so the iPod directions may vary slightly.
- If you are using an iPhone or iPod touch: When you sync your device, the account last used to access the iTunes Store from the computer is synced to the mobile device. So make sure you sign out of your friend’s iTunes account before you sync your device, otherwise when you try to download the application via the app store on your phone you will be logged in as them.
- This method does not work with DRM’ed music.
- Using this method will let you plug your iPhone/iPod into any computer and listen to the music directly off of it. Whereas before, this was not possible.
What You’ll Need
- Computer with iTunes
- iPhone: Wi-Fi, USB cable, iTunes, phone
- iPod: cable, iTunes, iPod
- Software (Mac): Smultron, Hex Feind, IpodDisk (Open Source Free Software for Macs)
- Software (Windows): Hex Edit, Pod to PC
Configure Your iPhone/iPod for Use as External Storage
You are only going to have to configure your iPhone or iPod to be used an external storage once.
- iPhone: Download & Configure Air Sharing ($4.99)
- iPod: Setup as hard drive
- Connect iPod to computer and open iTunes
- iTunes > Preferences > iPod Tab
- Click checkbox “Enable disk use”
- Close iTunes
Manually Manage Music and Videos On iPhoneiPod
We need to make it so we can simply drag songs onto our iPhone/iPod.
- Launch iTunes
- Connect iPhone/iPod
- Select the “Manually manage my iPhone/iPod” option
- Close iTunes
Create an iTunes Index On Your iPhone/iPod
If you want to be able to sync with both Mac and Windows computers you will have to make two separate iTunes index folders: one for the Mac and one for Windows boxes. So, just do this step both a Mac and Windows machine.
- Mount your iPhone/iPod as external storage device.
- Point the iTunes index to your iPhone/iPod. On a Mac: while holding “option,” double click on your iTunes icon. On a Windows machine: while holding “Shift,” double click on your iTunes icon in your start menu.
- A "Choose your library" window will pop up. Select "Create Library."
- Under “Where” select the location on your iPod/iPhone from the pulldown. Save as: “iTunes1″. iTunes will Launch. Close it. If you decide to do this on a Mac and Windows machine, make a folder called “iTunes 1″ from the Mac and a folder called “iTunes 2″ from the Windows machine.
Editing Files On iPhone/iPod
You are only going to have to edit the files on your iPhone once. We need to edit those files so that whatever computer you connect your device to will think it can sync to your iPhone/iPod. I found this tutorial over at the Shiny Things blog. Thanks Andrew!
- On your computer navigate to your iTunes music folder. Macs: User> Music > iTunes. Windows: Music > iTunes.
- Right click on “iTunes Music Library.xml” and open it with a text editor (Smultron, or something similar, in OS X and Notepad in Windows)
- Look for the “Library Persistent ID”
- There will be a string of numbers and letters between the “string” tags. (In the screenshot below it is 2817B0BEDC7A2E5F). Copy this entry to another document for safe keeping.
- It’s time to edit the files on your iPhone/iPod. Go ahead and mount your iPhone/iPod and then navigate to the iTunes folder we created earlier.
- Find the “iTunes Music Library.xml,” and open it with a text editor.
- Look for the “Library Persistent ID.” First, copy whatever is between “string” tags to a text document for safe keeping. Next, Replace whatever is between the “string” tags with our key that we copied earlier. In our example we are replacing the ID on the iPhone/iPod with 2817B0BEDC7A2E5F
- Save the file and close it.
- Now find the file called “iTunes Music Library” and open it with the Hexeditor mentioned above in “What You’ll Need.” (On a Windows machine it is called “iTunes Music Library.itl”)
- Select “Find and Replace” from the Edit menu. Make sure “Hex” matching is selected (not ASCII). In “Find” enter the ID from the iPhone/iPod before we replaced it (The ID we put into a text document in step 7). In Replace, enter the ID we copied from the original computer (in our example it’s 2817B0BEDC7A2E5F). Choose Replace All, there should be one match.
- Save the file. Close the Hexeditor.
- We are now completely done configuring the iPhone/iPod. If you want to be able to sync to both Windows and Mac machines, make sure the do the all the steps listed above on both machines.
Getting Music From Other Computers (Finally!)
Getting music from computers that are not your home computer is the step that you will have to perform over and over again.
- Mount your iPhone (using Air Sharing) or iPod (as an external storage device)
- Point the computer’s iTunes index to the one on your iPhone/iPod. Mac: while holding “option,” double click on your iTunes icon. Windows: while holding “Shift,” double click on your iTunes icon in your start menu.
- A “Choose your library” window will pop up. Select “Choose Library.”
- Navigate to the “iTunes 1″ or “iTunes 2″ (depending on if you’re on Mac or a Window’s machine) folder on your iPhone/iPod and select “Open”
- iTunes will launch
- The actual iTunes library will be empty, this is OK. We aren’t adding things to the iTunes library, just to the iPhone/iPod library. Your iPhone/iPod should appear in the left hand column of iTunes. Click on your iPhone’s or iPod’s music library to select it. A playlist should appear in the main iTunes screen with all the music form the iPhone/iPod.
- Drag any music you want into your iPhone’s library. Make sure you drag into your iPhone’s/iPod’s library, not the iTunes library.
- Since we are loading the library our iPhone/iPod is connected to, not the computer’s local iTunes library, we have to manually locate music on the computer to be able to add it to our iPhone or iPod. In OS X navigate to: User > Music > iTunes > iTunes Music. In Windows navigate to: My Documents > Music > iTunes > iTunes Music.
- When you’re done getting music, safely disconnect your iPhone/iPod and close iTunes.
- As a final step, we need to point the computer back to its original iTunes library. On a Mac: while holding “option,” double click on your iTunes icon. On a Windows machine: while holding “Shift,” double click on your iTunes icon in your start menu.
- A “Choose your library” window will pop up. Select “Choose library.” Point to the iTunes Music folder on their computer (Inside the Music folder on both Mac and PC).
Getting the New Music Back Onto Your Main Computer
iTunes won’t let you take the music off your iPhone/iPod, so we’re going to have to use third party software.
- Download iPodDisk (OS X Free Open Source iPod Ripping Software) or Pod to PC (Windows)
- I made a playlist on my iPhone called “New” so I know what to download.
- Import all songs from the “New” playlist.
- Empty the “New” playlist so that you do not accidentally download the same songs next time you sync.
And there you have it! I know it’s a lot to digest, so please let me know if you have any questions in the comments.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Apple Could Partner With Verizon, Rack Up Sales
More rumors are making the rounds that Apple will soon be breaking up the sweetheart deal that has held until now with AT&T and do some seriously flagrant cheating with rival Verizon Wireless. Sources for the information are cited as “Apple deepthroats” by one outlet, which, while suitably mysterious sounding, doesn’t exactly inspire confidence in the accuracy of the information. That said, there are plenty of other reasons to suspect that this deal might be very real, not the least of which are the amazing gobs of cash Apple stands to rake in by tapping other providers.
There’s also the corroborating evidence that Apple has been looking specifically for EVDO-CDMA engineers, which is exactly the standard Verizon uses for its wireless network. This upcoming June it will also be exactly two years since the iPhone’s original release, which some said at the product’s launch was the term of the exclusivity deal between Apple and AT&T. Were Apple to announce Verizon availability alongside a new iPhone product launch in June, they would stand to sell a lot more handsets than if they stuck with AT&T, where many customers locked into long-term contracts might be unwilling to upgrade just yet.
If Apple invests in developing a CDMA version of the iPhone, they don’t only stand to gain in the U.S. market, either. International carriers like Bell and Telus in Canada also use the CDMA standard, and would jump at the chance to offer an iPhone since it would allow them to better compete with Rogers (and their subsidiary, Fido), which has seen tremendous gains since adding Apple’s little miracle worker to their lineup. Apple is such a contender in the smartphone arena that the breakdown of exclusivity could even lead to more competition among service providers in terms of data plan pricing, which benefits consumers most of all.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - MobileMe Receives Minor Refresh
After a short period of downtime in the early hours of the morning, MobileMe has emerged with a slight refresh to the interface, numerous speed improvements, and changes to the interface for the Mail, Calendar and Contact apps.
The login page has also undergone a minor re-design, aiming to provide more information and delegating less space to the display of the various application icons. The changes will be well-received, particularly to regular users of the online applications.
Mail
A few changes to the Mail app center around the composition of new messages. Notably:
- The compose window address selector shows all email addresses for contacts, not just home and work addresses.
- Newly added email addresses to Contacts appear in the compose window selector without having to log out and log in.
These are both welcome improvements, fixing oversights which have been niggling users since the launch of the service. However, rather than being impressive new features, these are simply adjustments to functionality which should really have been in place at the outset.
In addition to composition changes, the fix brings improved printing of HTML formatted messages.
Contacts
The MobileMe contacts app is fairly simple, doing its job in an effective and straightforward way. As with the Mail alterations, these are simple fixes focusing on improved results when searching with both first and last names and improved Japanese name ordering.
In addition, vCard export now supports all text fields rather than the limited previous selection — good for those wanting to move away from MobileMe!
Calendar
The Calendar application has undergone the most notable overhaul, with speed improvements across the board. Users now benefit from a faster start time when accessing the Calendar for the first time along with much faster performance when switching between day/week/month views. Speed has occasionally been a limiting factor for me when using the online calendar, and I may well be more tempted to view it more often now.
A few changes to view settings have also been integrated, with the calendar now retaining your last view settings, such as day, week, or month view, as well as whether you’ve set the To Do panel to show or hide. This is great news for regular users, who won’t need to re-set their display preferences every time they log in.
Login Page Changes
The original MobileMe login page received a great deal of acclaim as an attractive interface that gave a good overview of the functionality available. Apple has managed to implement a re-design which retains these original positive aspects, also integrating a brief written overview of MobileMe’s features. It looks good to me!
A full list of changes can be seen in the accompanying Apple support document.
Is it Enough?
MobileMe has come under fire from critics since its launch, on account of the service speed, synchronization not working as initially advertised, and patchy periods of downtime. Reliability has undoubtedly improved dramatically in recent months, but are the recent changes enough to create a better impression of the service overall?
Personally, I’ve always found the online applications at me.com to be satisfactory. The main sticking point has been the sometimes-questionable synchronization between Mac, Me.com and my iPhone. I must admit that I’ve found this to have improved in recent months and my level of praise for the service is gradually increasing. Rarely do I open my iPhone to find that I’m missing a contact or appointment previously added on my laptop.
I’d be very interested to hear your opinion on whether the recent interface and speed changes make any difference to you. Is your opinion of MobileMe being affected by the minor issues you have with usability, or the fact that it’s lacking major features which haven’t yet been implemented?
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Apple Shareholders Re-Elect Board
The annual Apple shareholders meeting had a different tone than usual on Wednesday, lacking the presence of company CEO Steve Jobs. The Apple board hasn’t had a straightforward year, leading the company through a global financial crisis and aiming to stem the ongoing investor uncertainty surrounding Steve Jobs’ health.
Shareholders seemed to embrace the positive on the whole, wishing Jobs a Happy Birthday (he turned 54 on Tuesday) and offering mixed opinion on how the board handled disclosing information surrounding recent events.
A Healthy CEO
As expected, a great deal of time and attention was given to Steve Jobs. As the man who has provided visionary leadership for the company in recent years, to many he is a vital member of the Apple corporate machine. His announcement of escalating health concerns last month caused a stir in the technology press, with rumors about his condition changing every day. Thankfully, this has now settled down as people have come to realize that Apple won’t collapse without his presence.
Shareholders approached the board with a mix of acceptance that personal matters need to be kept private, and questions of whether enough information has been provided. According to Fortune, they were in good enough spirit to sing Happy Birthday and wish him well.
Comments from an Apple shareholder for 20 years, Roland Quintero of Palo Alto, Calif., summarized the general consensus well:
The problem is between corporate and personal responsibility. Anything Apple says would affect the market. The board’s decision reflects a desire to maintain stability and market share. As a shareholder, I, personally, would like to know more, but I understand the no-win situation the company is in.
It’s good to see that shareholders do accept that a level of privacy is needed, both for the sake of Jobs and his family, and also to preserve a stable share price for the company. As the months without Jobs tick by (and software/hardware releases keep coming), Apple seems to be coping very well with Tim Cook temporarily running the company. It would be great to see Jobs back and fighting fit in the future, but this stint without him should go a long way towards showing that Apple has the internal vision and direction to continue innovating without him at the helm.
Re-electing the Board
The shareholders made the decision to re-elect the entire Apple board of 8 people, including former vice president Al Gore and Google CEO Eric Schmidt. Votes were taken on four proposals to change shareholder say on executive compensation, increase required company disclosure and alter staff healthcare provision, but none were passed.
The decision to retain all board members demonstrates a show of support on behalf of the shareholders, and a belief that the company is still being lead by those with the knowledge and expertise to ensure future success. It’s exactly what Apple needed to retain stability and confidence in otherwise turbulent times.
In typical secret fashion, Apple prohibited attendees from carrying mobile or communications devices into the shareholder meeting, to ensure that information wasn’t misinterpreted or leaked during the presentation. Despite this, a few tweets did manage to leak out while the meeting was in progress.
Dividend Payments
Questions surrounded dividend payments, with hopes from shareholders that a portion of Apple’s extensive cash balance would be used to reward those investing in the company. Apple held over $25 billion in cash at the end of the most recent quarter, the second largest cash level among high-tech companies.
With many companies struggling financially at present, Apple would appear to be in a strong position to continue operations as normal, along with pumping money into research and development. With any luck, they’ll come out of the current recession with an ever-improving hardware and software lineup. On the whole, the re-election of the board and wishes for Steve Jobs’ return to good health bode well for the company.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Paul Thurrott: Safari is From Apple, Therefore I Hate It
Paul Thurrott has weighed in with his opinion of the new Safari 4 update, and he’s not impressed. While no surprise, it’s the manner in which he blasts the product (and, of course, Apple’s users) that was especially interesting.
I was wondering how Thurrott was going to counter the incredible speed of the browser engine. Apple’s own marketing aside, others have tested it and confirmed it to be the fastest web browser available. I assumed he’d blast the test methodology, or claim that IE 8 would be better (though IE 8 was in the tests), etc. But no, he took a different tack altogether. He simply acknowledged the browser engine is good, and then blasted the UI because he’s apparently a manly man who doesn’t need no steenking graphics.
I Don’t Like Apple’s Products, They Shouldn’t Either
So let’s see what pearls of wisdom we get from Mr. Thurrott:
Of course, Apple being Apple, they are promoting Safari 4 as if it were the second coming. It’s “the world’s fastest, most efficient, and most innovative” browser, according to the humble folks in Cupertino.
Good point. Why can’t Apple’s marketing department just say their stuff sucks and be done with it? One question, though: Why is it when Microsoft lies (the CEO, no less) Thurrott doesn’t care? Odd that he has a lie detector on everyone at Apple, but seems to ignore Microsoft’s own CEO.
Tabs on Top, Thinking on Bottom
Apple’s worst decision in this browser is the way it handles tabs… in Safari, tabs are integrated into the title bar area.
Apple claims that moving the tabs to the title bar saves space. But it only saves space because Safari now uses a native-like title bar: In previous versions of the browser, there was no true title bar, so the tab row didn’t really add to the height of the UI.
Huh?
Apple also claims that the new Tabs on Top reduces clutter, but the truth is, on Vista and 7, it looks horrible and cluttered.
Lots of people have opinions on this, Mac and PC. I see no reason for a window’s title bar to be sacrosanct. In my opinion, using it for tabs means the title bar is, in fact, showing the title of the currently displayed window (tab). I could make a valid case that putting tabs there lets the title bar do what it’s supposed to do.
Top Sites (and Top Shots at Apple’s Users)
Now let’s see what Thurrott has to say about Top Sites:
Apple fanatics–you know, those idiots who would buy anything with an Apple logo on it–will get all giddy and clap like little girls at a Hannah Montana concert when they see Top Sites, the new default Safari 4 home page. But these people are missing the point (what else is new?)
Hmm, that isn’t really about Top Sites at all, is it? Of course, no Thurrott opinion piece is complete without blasting Apple’s user base. Odd that he does so while still claiming that Mac users are the smug ones, isn’t it?
Top Sites’ curved, TV-like display would look wonderful on, well, a TV. But it’s pointlessly visual in a tool that, by nature, is used to find information online.
Fifty bucks to anyone who can honestly decipher that statement. What the heck is “pointlessly visual” supposed to mean? Hey, maybe Thurrott’s whole post is “pointlessly textual!” And what the heck does finding information online have to do with whether it should be visual or not? Geez, most of us don’t use Lynx any more.
It’s unclear why a simple grid of Web site previews wouldn’t be just as useful, and more in keeping with the Web browser aesthetic. Oh, right: Microsoft did it first, in IE 7, over two years ago
No they didn’t, but I don’t expect the Windows SuperSite to know the difference. The IE feature shows a visual grid of the tabs currently running. This is hardly the same as showing a visual grid of the sites you visit most often. But, as long as Thurrott brought it up, why isn’t IE’s feature “pointlessly visual?” Because IE’s grid is not curved? Really? So I guess the problem with Apple’s display is that it just looks too good for simple, hardworking Windows folk.
The nicest thing about Top Sites is that you can turn it off:
No, the nicest thing about Top Sites is that it’s customizable in terms of what, where, and how many items it shows. Unfortunately, it’s just too visual for poor Thurrott! If only Apple had made it uglier.
As for me, my “top sites” have always been in my Bookmarks Bar so I can access them via keyboard, but I’m going to use Top Sites for the visual history search that, as we’ll see presently, Thurrott also doesn’t believe in.
Cover Flow (Or, More Visuals? Ahhhhh!!!)
And speaking of pointless visual effects, allow me to point out the most recent and most egregious use of Apple’s Cover Flow display… it makes absolutely no sense at all in a browser. Naturally, Apple added it to Safari… it’s hard to even know where to start, and of course we’ll have to discuss it over the giddy clapping of those easily-impressed Apple geeks in the corner.
From some of the articles and comments I’ve read elsewhere, Thurrott is not alone in this thinking, but people need to give it a rest. When it comes to Cover Flow, it appears there are only two kinds of people:
- Those that recognize it can be useful sometimes, and use it for those occasions.
- Those that have no idea how to grab a handle and drag it to the top.
Well, here’s my view of it, and I better speak up lest Thurrott not hear me over my “giddy clapping” (quick question: is clapping “pointlessly audible?”). Below is what my Safari Collections look like.
As you’ll see, there’s nothing there but the search box (which, being text-based, I’m sure Thurrott approves of). I do this because for my bookmarks I don’t normally need a preview. I generally know them pretty well. And I’d rather have the real estate for dragging bookmarks around or deleting them, which are the primary reasons I visit this page.
On the other hand, when searching through History, I find the page preview tremendously helpful. These are pages I haven’t bookmarked and don’t know as well. To access this I go to the Top Sites page and hit the search box.
As just one example, I wanted to go back to a specific Lynx page I had stumbled across after finding the link above. No way I’d remember the URL, but the page preview made it easy to find the page amongst all those in search for Lynx.
Another example was last night when I had done some comparison shopping for a new digital camera. The pages really add up, and then I wanted to get back to one I’d seen earlier. A visual search made it a snap to find the page I wanted.
So, for me, Cover Flow is less useful for sites I know (bookmarks), but in only 24 hours it has already been extremely valuable for searching history. But, alas, it’s just so…visual. Thurrott’s eyes!
Look, I’m no Luddite. … This stuff is pointless.
The last sentence above negates the first.
In Conclusion (Or, How I Explain That Internet Explorer Is Just Fine)
So, how does Thurrott wrap this all up? Exactly in the manner you’d expect:
I still feel that Internet Explorer (7 or 8) and Firefox 3 are better Windows Web browsers than their WebKit-based competitors, and that has nothing to do with the underlying Web rendering technologies involved and everything to do with functionality. Both browsers are simply better in day to day usage.
Hmm, yes, who wouldn’t prefer this dazzling interface:
to this one:
I suspect most people who excitedly try Safari 4 will very quickly move back to the more comfortable confines of IE or Firefox. I already have.
Amazing. In less than 24 hours Thurrott gleaned that Safari is too visual. He also learned that IE is confining, and that he prefers those confines. Good for him.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Apple Puts Spotlight on Indie Acts in iTunes
This must be “Update iTunes Content” week at Cupertino or something, because Apple keeps making changes to the music player. First it introduced iTunes Pass, which provides superfans with heaps of exclusive content released on a staggered schedule over a brief subscription period, and now it’s launched the Indie Spotlight.
The Spotlight is a new subcategory of “More in Music,” a subsection along the right side of the iTunes store home page. You can find it right under the other new category, “Original Songs from Idol,” which is oddly its antithetical opposite.
Clicking on the link will bring you to the Indie Spotlight home page, complete with banners for three categories splashed across the top, all of which are very indie-looking, thanks to some nifty weathered Photoshop effects. I kid, but I genuinely do appreciate the new portal, which offers nice bonuses like a free music video of the week.
There’s also a dedicated Indie Spotlight podcast, which is organized by genre and comes out at a rate of one episode per week. Glancing through the catalog available via the Spotlight, I came across some of the bigger names like Cat Power, Bright Eyes, and Neko Case, but also a lot of hidden gems like Laura Gibson and Matt & Kim. The Artists’ Playlists displayed at the bottom left also offer some great mixes by the people who know best who to look out for; Hercules & Love Affair’s is particularly interesting.
It makes sense that Apple would try to cash in on the popularity of indie music, it’s really just surprising that it’s taken this long. Check out the offerings — at the very least, you’ll get a nice break from the Jonas Brothers.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - AppleTV 2.3.1 Released with Network Test
Sometime between last night and this morning, Apple released a minor update to the Apple TV. The new software version is 2.3.1 and includes a new network test function and other fixes that haven’t been listed by Apple as of this time. The update, just like all previous updates, disables Boxee and other hacks, but these are easily restored by running the patchstick again (more notes on that at the end).
When you run the network test, it will ask if you’ve been having trouble with slow downloads from the iTunes store. You can answer Yes or No to this question and it will still proceed to run the test. It then asks you what download speeds you expect to get from your Internet connection and begins a download test, probably similar to the various speed tests available on the web that simply download a file of a known size and then track how long it takes to complete the download. The test is a little dissatisfying because it doesn’t tell you anything — all the information from the test is sent to Apple and you never know what kind of download speeds you were seeing.
Restoring Boxee was as simple as running the patchstick update again. I had an additional problem on my own Apple TV in that my external USB drive wasn’t seen after the update. I was hoping that a quick reinstall of nitoTV would fix everything, but the USB drive was still not showing up when I ran “diskutil list” from the command line. I rather like having a 1TB Apple TV, so I’m off to restore the box from factory settings and make sure everything is working. I’ll let you know what happens in the comments below.
That said, I wouldn’t let my experience scare you away from the update. The new network test will be useful for anyone that is experiencing problems with downloading purchased or rented content from the iTunes store and there may be other fixes that Apple hasn’t announced yet. Some users on other forums are reporting improved responsiveness on the iPhone Remote app, which would be a welcome benefit.
Let me know how your upgrade goes in the comments.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Syncing Apps With Dropbox
Many Mac users are fortunate enough to have more than one machine. Whether it’s a home desktop and laptop, or a home and office machine, it can be very useful to keep some form of continuity between the two systems. This is easy enough to do with individual files — simply using an online service such as Dropbox or Syncplicity to keep everything synchronized between two machines. But what about applications?
This article will explain how easy it is to keep many popular applications in sync between more than one computer. It doesn’t involve putting all your data on ‘the cloud’ — you still have a local copy if a service closes down for any reason. The steps outlined work for the applications noted here, and may well be applicable to a different piece of software you’d like to keep synchronized. We’ve previously written how to achieve something similar for your iTunes library, but will now take the idea a little further, extending it to other apps.
How Does It Work?
Every application on your Mac has some form of preference or library file — this is where all your application data is stored. What this solution proposes is to store this file on the Dropbox server, rather than simply as a local file. It means that whenever the file changes on one computer, the change is automatically copied across to another machine. When you open the app on another Mac, everything should look the same as you left it previously on the other computer.
Is It Secure?
Dropbox is an extremely secure service, encrypting your information before transmitting it across the Internet. In addition, it supports file ‘versioning’ — this means that if you find that your application preferences are accidentally corrupted or overwritten, it’s simple to revert to an older version through Dropbox. If anything, placing your application library or preferences in more than one location is safer that relying on one sole computer.
Existing Solutions
Many of the applications which are bundled with your Mac are able to sync through Apple’s MobileMe service — iCal, Address Book, Mail, Dashboard and Safari Bookmarks for instance. This works great, and you might not need to use the Dropbox strategy for those applications. I’d recommend sticking to MobileMe for these, as it ensures syncing works well with your iPhone or iPod as well as between Macs.
Getting Started
The first step is to create a Dropbox account if you haven’t already. You receive 2GB of storage for free — probably enough for most simple applications — but you can upgrade to more if you’d like to keep a more data-heavy app in sync. The next step is to locate the library file for that application. For the purposes of this walkthrough, I’ll be using Things, a popular task manager.
The location of the library for Things is at:
User > Library > Preferences > Application Support > Cultured Code > Things
The path is likely to be similar for other applications, and a few examples are shown later on.
Moving Files and Syncing with Dropbox
The next step is a little more complicated. Essentially we need to do two things:
- Move the library into your Dropbox folder
- Create an ‘alias’ to tell Things where to find the new library location
First, close the application in question — ensure that it is completely shut down. Before you do anything, back up the library or preferences file — I can’t stress enough that you should make a copy of the file(s) you’re planning to move, to ensure that if you make a mistake at any point you’re able to simply put them back as before.
The next step is to move the library to your Dropbox folder, usually User > Dropbox. It should sync as normal.
At the moment, when you open Things it will still look for the library in the original location. This is no good, and we need to create an ‘alias’ in place of the library to point Things to your Dropbox folder. This takes three steps:
- Right click the ‘Things’ folder in your Dropbox area, and click ‘Make Alias’
- Move the alias which is created (represented by a folder with an arrow) to the original location: User > Library > Preferences > Application Support > Cultured Code
- Rename the alias to whatever the original folder or file was called, in this case simply ‘Things’
Here are a couple of screenshots showing a ‘before and after’ view of our library folder:
Showing the original Things folder, before we moved it to Dropbox
After moving the original folder and replacing it with an 'alias', this is what you should see
Opening Things should now work as normal, with the application automatically being redirected to the new location of your library.
Setting Up Your Second Computer
You then need to follow the same process on your other computer. Providing you don’t have any information in the application, delete the library file and create an alias from your Dropbox folder in the exact same way.
I wouldn’t recommend using both computers at the same time as you’re likely to lose data, but moving from one to the other (and closing Things each time) should ensure that your data is kept in sync wonderfully!
Other Applications
Things is simply used as an example here. A few other applications, along with the location of their library/preferences data are:
- Camino: User/Library/Application Support/Camino
- LittleSnapper: Simply alter the library location in the app preferences
- 1Password: Change the library location in the app preferences (more info
- iTunes: See our walkthrough
- Bento: User/Library/Application Support/Bento
Conclusion
I hope you’ve found the walkthrough easy to follow and feel confident to experiment with syncing application preferences and data between your Macs. Providing you always back up your information first, there’s no harm in trying the process out with any of your favorite apps.
I’d be interested to hear how you get on, and do let me know which applications you end up syncing on a regular basis!
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - MindView 3.0 Comes of Age
Do you mind map? Do you like to brainstorm with others using software that helps focus your ideas and prioritize project plans? Maybe you’re into Getting Things Done (GTD) and like to prioritize your tasks visually? If so, then read on my friend.
The folks at Matchware recently released MindView Pro 3.0 for the Mac. What was formerly called OpenMind has an all-new name and some nifty new features. So, what has changed in this new version? Well, it isn’t a significant upgrade, but here is the short list:
- The product has been renamed from OpenMind 2 to MindView 3.
- There is a new Top Down Vertical layout (see below).
- There is a new Power Filter that has been added to the inspector area. Note, that filters are stored per document.
As a long time user of MindManager from Mindjet, I was eager to see how this product worked. I will say that MindManager on the Mac does not compare to its Windows brethren.
One of the reasons I went looking for a new mind mapping client is the ability to import/export the content and maintain file format fidelity. With MindView 3, I can accomplish that goal.
Of the new features in version 3, here is an example of the new Top Down Vertical Layout.
MindView 3 Top Down Vertical Layout
Filters
Another new feature mentioned above is that you can also filter the data in mind maps (generally ones with lots of branches) so that you can see specific information quickly.
MindView 3 Power Filter
Import/Export
MindView 3 has exceptional export and import capabilities. I was able to export the above simple mindmap as a Word file and then reimport it without any loss in data. However, I did have to reapply the visual style chosen in the original mind map. Thankfully, it was an easy workaround as opposed to losing the actual data (or its structure).
The Export dialog box has many options for a variety of file formats.
MindView 3 Export Dialog Box
Templates
Lastly, MindView 3 comes with a great set of pre-defined templates from timelines to bibliographies and much more. MindView 3 also has a vast library of clip art to use within your mind maps.
MindView 3 Template - Acknowledging Sources
Using this template, you can quickly map the related items when building a document that requires sources. MindView 3 automatically assigns the clip art and structure to the mind map, so you just need to enter the respective data - a very big time saver.
MindView 3 Multimedia Catalog
As you can see, the catalog has a rich set of visuals from a wide variety of places. The best part is that you can favorite particular visuals that you use often within your mind maps.
Conclusion
If you need a solid mind map tool, then MindView 3 is an exceptional choice. It has a rich feature set, and for a cross-platform product, it is very easy to use. In fact, the product does an excellent job of adhering to Apple user interface guidelines. And, with its extensive export capabilities, you can get your data out easily and import it into a variety of other programs without a hitch.
So is there a negative? I would have to say the price. MindView 3 retails at $279, which is not cheap. Other competitors in the space are also not inexpensive, with prices ranging from $129-199. Regardless, you do pay a premium for MindView 3. Thankfully, the folks at Matchware have educational and volume pricing. So, if you are a student or you need more than five licenses, you can get a reasonable deal.
As an aside, I find that one major annoyance with the software vendors in the mind map space is that they do not import/export their competitors file formats. Thus, you better be prepared to export it to text and/or OPML (an outline format). Of course, if you are happy with your existing mind mapping tool, then this might not be an issue.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - A Look at Snow Leopard: New Features From the Latest Build
World of Apple this week has been kind enough to post a series of screenshots taken from the latest build of Snow Leopard that show off some of the new features coming in Apple’s latest OS revision. While Snow Leopard is being billed more as a streamlined and smoothed-out version of OS X 10.5, there are still some changes to the UI and feature set coming along with the improvements under the hood.
The latest build does indeed boast significant performance enhancements, including a reduced footprint for most applications, which have been rebuilt using Cocoa. The screens also show that most processes are now native Intel 64-bit, but that applications have an “Open in 32-bit” mode as well. As we’ve noted previously, Quicktime Pro features are all enabled by default, although Quicktime X is still missing. The version included with Snow Leopard is still 7.5.5.
Two new features, though arguably minor, really have me looking forward to getting my hands on Snow Leopard, because they address some of those petty, repeatedly annoying pet peeves of mine that prevent my OS X experience from being altogether pleasant.
The first is a restore feature that’s been added to the Trash Bin. Called “Put Back,” it allows you to undelete the file you just trashed, without having to drag and drop it back to its original folder. This is one of the very few things I miss from my days using Windows. Not everything Microsoft does with their OS is a complete failure. Just most things.
The second is the ability to navigate folder structures from within the “Grid” view in stacks. I actually keep my folders in “List” mode specifically to avoid the annoying problem of having a Finder window open every time I click on an Adobe application, for instance, since they reside in nested folders. There’s even a video of this in action.
All things considered, it looks like Snow Leopard is on track to be one of the most impressive Mac OS revisions in recent memory. Kind of makes you wish they took their time and got things right the first time around, so we wouldn’t have to pay for the privilege of having Leopard’s kinks worked out. I honestly think they should offer some kind of special upgrade pricing for people who’ve already bought Leopard, but I suppose as long as they’re adding something new to the pot that’s actually useful, it’ll be worth taking the hit.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Tumblr On the iPhone: 3 Apps Reviewed
I have tried just about every blogging platform out there and the one I finally stuck with was Tumblr. I like many of the more advanced functions in WordPress, but Tumblr is where it’s at for me. I’ve notice over the past couple of months I have started mobile blogging a lot more, and what better way to do this than with the Swiss Army Knife of a gadget that is the iPhone.
I picked three Tumblr-specific iPhone applications to try, and my final verdict is that you get what you pay for. I sent each of these Tumblr apps through a grueling 3-4 day test consisting of posting photos, text, links, conversations, and audio. Enjoy.
TheTumbler (Free)
This app deserves to be free. The more and more I used it, the less and less impressed I became. There were frequent crashes, which caused me to lose posts once in a while. Not to mention I was never actually successful in getting it to post a simple text post, however I did successfully post in every other way, shape, and form. Overall TheTumbler is a decent enough app for a freebie. Currently I don’t believe this app has much to offer. But we should keep an eye out as I believe we will see good things from this app in the future with the promise of added functions such as groups, private posts, and tags…and hopefully more stability.
Tumble (Free/$1.99)
This app started to fall short for me when I discovered that you can’t post to multiple Tumble Blogs (or groups) from the application. Other than that, this app works well enough, but I’m not sure if it works well enough to warrant a price tag. In my opinion offering this app at the same price tag as Tumblrette (below) is their mistake. Offering this app at a lower price such as 99 cents would be a bit more beneficial. Tumble offers the standard features you would expect for a Tumblr application such as a viewable Dashboard, multiple account management, and location awareness; all of which are only in the pro version. The more basic features are available in a free version.
Tumblrette ($1.99)
I saved the best for last on this one. Tumblrette was by far my favorite app out of this lot, and like I said at the beginning…you get what you pay for. All of these apps basically have the same home-screen; they all have different post types listed and you tap one to start posting. Simple enough right? Tumblrette takes this a step further by giving you access to your Tumblr dashboard, allowing reblogging, and favoriting posts made by others. I don’t do this often, but I have in the past and I found it to be a nice addition. This app also makes a great feature of the Advanced Post Options, allowing you to change privacy or date settings in a few simple taps. I manage 3 different blogs that are all interconnected through Tumblr, and it is typically a pain to manage them on the iPhone, but Tumblrette conquers this challenge with ease. One feature that stood above the rest was an exclusive feature only found in this app was the ability to record audio and post it to a Tumble-blog.
Overall, my pick of these three was Tumblrette, and at $1.99 it is a solid steal. But go try each of these and decide for yourself.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Task Scheduling With Lingon
In the Windows world, system administrators are likely to be familiar with the Scheduled Tasks service. This allows you to schedule processes, scripts or applications to run regularly at a specific time. In the Linux (and UNIX in general) world the cron daemon has traditionally handled this task.
Until the Tiger release, OS X also used the cron system. However in Tiger and Leopard, Apple replaced it with launchd. This does more than just task scheduling; its job is to launch processes, scheduled or otherwise, however the focus on this article is using it for scheduling tasks.
Why would you want to schedule a task? I have three custom scripts that provide examples:
- Synchronizing my Twitter status to my IM status. It does this every half hour.
- Putting a saved audio file on a remote server into iTunes. This runs at 8AM every Friday.
- Running a customized backup script that runs every day at 8AM.
While launchd is configured through text plist files, to set up basic scheduling we don’t need to know how these work. All we need is a free utility called Lingon.
Once loaded, Lingon displays a list of scheduled events grouped by their scope. It is important to know what these mean so the right section can be chosen when adding a schedule.
- My Agents: These only apply when you are logged in.
- Users Agents: These apply to all users, but only when they are logged in.
- Users Daemons: These apply all the time, even when no user is logged in.
- System Agents: These apply to all users and are necessary operating system services. These are maintained by Apple and should not be modified.
- System Daemons: These entries apply all the time, even when no user is logged in and are necessary operating system services. These are maintained by Apple and should not be modified.
To create a new scheduled event, simply click the new button and select which section your task needs to be in. Enter the name of the process, this can be anything, but should really consist of a unique name such as 'com.appleblog.example-schedule'. Choose the application or script you want to run, and then specify when you would like it to run.
At this stage you can click save and log back in and out of your user session to make your new settings take hold. If your Mac is sleeping at the scheduled time a task should run, this task will run when you wake the machine up.
This is all you need to do for basic schedules. If you do need to do fancy configuration, Lingon allows almost complete control of your tasks beyond its simple UI. Pressing the "Expert Mode" button at the bottom will allow you directly edit the text plist file, easily entering parameters by a drop down list at the top. For full documentation on the launchd plist files, see the launchd.plist man page.
If you want even more control, such as permanently deleting displayed entries, you can delete the physical configuration files. These can be found in the following locations:
- My Agents: /Users/username/Library/LaunchAgents/
- Users Agents: /Library/LaunchAgents/
- Users Daemons: /Library/LaunchDaemons/
- System Agents: /System/Library/LaunchAgents/
- System Daemons: /Users/bed/Library/LaunchDaemons/
Warning: Be very careful with System Agents and Daemons, as these provide crucial elements of OS X. These should only be viewed to gain a better understanding of how OS X works. You are likely to break your operating system if you modify them.
Hear Microsoft, IBM, Dell and Cisco execs at GigaOM’s Green:Net.Переслать - Beginning Mac: Mail
Apple prides itself on creating products that are simple and easy to use. A prime example of this philosophy can be seen in Mail, the default email application included with Mac OS X. Mail is not an all-encompassing “collaboration” tool, and it is not “groupware;” it does email (and a little bit of note-taking and RSS feed-reading), and does it exceedingly well.
Getting Started
The first thing you’ll want to do is set up your account. If you use MobileMe, your account is probably already set up for you. If you use another popular email service like Gmail or Yahoo Premium, Mail can automatically set up your account. If not, you will need to know the name of your incoming mail server (something like mail.me.com), your outgoing mail server (something like smtp.me.com), and your username/password combination. After setting up your account, Mail will download all of your email, and spotlight will index it for easy searching.
Stationary
Apple includes several stationary templates that are highly touted, but rarely used. Most of the people I email could care less about how pretty my email is, and many would prefer not to receive HTML email at all, and that is what these stationary templates are. However, from time to time I like to send one out, because, well…because they’re there. My Mom is normally the lucky recipient, and as far as I can tell, she likes them just fine. When you begin typing a name or an address in the “To” field, Mail searches Address Book for matches, and makes suggestions based on what it finds. Select a name, or type in a new one, type in a subject, type your email, and click send. That’s all there is to it.
Smart Mailboxes
Once you’ve downloaded all of your email, it’s very likely that you will be tempted to organize it. Don’t worry, I used to do it, too. That was before the power of full text search and Smart Mailboxes became a reality. Now, what I do, and what I recommend for anything close to “organizing” email, is to create Smart Mailboxes for keeping things of importance in easy reach. For example, I have a Smart Mailbox set up for emails from family, which simply takes all of the contacts in the “Family” group in Address Book and creates a smart group from them. You can find lots of other examples of Smart Mailboxes with a quick Google search, but I recommend starting here.
There are two ways to create a Smart Mailbox. The first, and most effective, way is to simply enter your search criteria in the search box at the top of Mail. As you type, Mail will display the results of your search, and will also give you the option to save the search as a Smart Mailbox. This allows you to preview and refine your search as needed before creating the Smart Mailbox. When you click “Save” you’ll be offered the chance to add criteria to the Smart Mailbox, and save it as whatever name you choose. The second way is to select “Mailbox,” and then “New Smart Mailbox,” and then enter your search criteria in the drop-down sheet.
Rules
Mail has the ability to perform certain actions on email as it arrives, according to predefined rules. These are defined in the “Rules” section in the Mail preferences panel (Mail > Preferences…). There are many options available both as search functions and as actions to take that can further help organize your email.
Notes and To-Do Lists
Leopard Mail includes the ability to take notes and create to-do lists. Creating notes containing to-do lists is really easy, and very handy. Simply create a new note and at the top, create a context for the list — say, phone calls you want to make — and type the name of the note on the first line. I named mine in classic GTD contexts like @Next, @Phone, @Desk, etc.
Next, click the “To Do” button, and the current line will become highlighted and add a check box on the left of it. All to-do’s that you add to any of your notes will also be seen in the “To Do” group under Reminders in the left-hand pane. In your note, clicking on the red arrow icon to the left of each to-do will bring up a pane where you can add a due date, assign a priority, and integrate the task with iCal.
RSS
Finally, Mail can act as a decent RSS reader to keep current on new posts from your favorite sites. While not nearly as powerful as specialized RSS readers like NetNewsWire or Google Reader, it does a decent job of keeping track of a small number of feeds. It treats each incoming feed item the same as an email, allowing you to move them around to different folders. It will also let you create Smart Mailboxes that apply specifically to feeds, like one that groups all unread feeds together in one place. Depending on how many feeds you subscribe too, Mail’s RSS reader might be a great choice for you.
This article is a very brief introduction to a very powerful application. Apple Mail is almost deceptively simple in appearance, hiding a sophisticated information management application that integrates perfectly into the Mac. For more information, including how to sign and encrypt messages, adding additional criteria into spotlight searches, and a ton of other information, check out the included Mail Help, available in the menu bar.
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