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Monday, January 31, 2011

Evernote

Jeffery Battersby, Macworld

Projecting The iPad's Entire Interface

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Last week during Macworld 2011 (formerly known as Macworld Expo) I spent a portion of my time standing in front of attendees demonstrating one thing or another on an iPad. Unlike other presentations that similarly projected images from an iPad, the images from my iPad were darned near pristine. This is the story of how I did it.

How To Really Shrink The Dock

Keir Thomas, Macworld

Mastering iMovie Trailers

Jeff Carlson, Macworld

App Turns iPhone Into A Smarter Camera

Kate Greene, Technology Review

A large aperture creates a shallow depth of field, so an object of interest remains crisp while the rest of the scene is blurred. The iPhone has a small aperture, meaning all parts of an image are equally in focus. SynthCam overcomes this limitation by capturing multiple scenes and combining them to make a single image.

Creating An iPhone App "From Scratch"

Dev-P

This tutorial explains how to compile, build, and deploy to the Simulator an iPhone application without using Xcode or Interface Builder. I don't claim that this is the best way to go about developing without Xcode/IB, but, it works well for me.

A Look Back At The 2011 Show

Dan Frakes, Macworld

In short, attendees were there to see what’s out there that’s not from Apple, and companies had a much better chance of standing out from the crowd than when the show floor was dominated by huge booths from Apple, Adobe, Microsoft, and the like.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Finnish Regulator Calls For iPhone Refun

Bill Ray, The Register

Finnish iPhone users unhappy at the inability of the handset to operate below zero are entitled to their money back, even if the limitation appears in the small print.

The clarification comes from the Finland's Consumer Agency, as reported by Finnish news agency YLE.fi, in response to numerous questions from concerned Finns who are unhappy that their shiny Apple toys won't promise to work again until the spring, at best. So unless the shop specifically stated the zero-degree operational limit, then the regulator reckons iPhone-purchasing Finns are entitled to their money back.

Simian: Mac OS X Package Deployment Via App Engine

Google

Evernote Helps You Get Organized

Hayley Tsukayama, Washington Post

Once you figure out the main subject areas of your life (kids, work, a big project or apartment listings), Evernote becomes an indispensable tool.

"Ihnatko Almanac" Books To Explore Apple Tech

Chris Foresman, Ars Technica

Physics Puzzler 'Cover Orange' Is Clever And A Good Bit Of Fun

Blake Patterson, TouchArcade

Macbook Air 11-inch And 13-inch

David Chen, Taipei Times

Why App Developers Are Celebrating The iPad

Mark Hachman, PC Magazine

A year on, the Apple iPad is unquestionably a success story for Apple. And for app developers who jumped on the bandwagon, the early support has paid off, several said in interviews at the Macworld show here.

The Power Of The Platform At Apple

Steve Lohr, New York Times

The more people buy iPhones and iPads, the more software developers and media companies want to write applications for them, as various as games and digital magazines. And consumers are more likely to buy iPhones and iPads when more entertainment and information applications are available on them. The combination of hardware, software and services is what corporate executives, economists and analysts call a platform. Successful technology platforms sustain and reinforce growth. And this self-reinforcing cycle is known as a network effect. It helps the platform owner and raises a barrier to competitors.

Saturday, January 29, 2011

Scratch-Me-Not

Virginia Heffernan, New York Times

Some Apple users seem to believe that screen protectors are the secret to turning their prized possessions into heirlooms. But other Apple fans oppose the use of screen protectors, which they see as obstructions or even barriers to intimacy.

Omni Group Continues Push On iOS, Adding Cloud Sync For Plan And Focus

Chris Foresman, Ars Technica

We sat down with Case to see what Omni has in store for 2011, which includes a major update to OmniPlan (with OmniFocus integration), and bringing OmniOutliner to the iPad.

Verizon Confirms iPhone Pre-orders For 3 AM On February 3

Kelly Hodgkins, TUAW

Apple Pushing Its At-home Advisor Program To College Students

Kelly Hodgkins, TUAW

As an Apple At-Home advisor, you receive a free iMac, full benefits and are paid more than $10 per hour to work 16 hours per week during the school year and 40 hours per week in the summer.

Expressive Helps The Speech Impaired Learn And Communicate

David Winograd, TUAW

Like most AAC apps or devices, it allows those without the power of speech due to Autism, Downs Syndrome or even temporary verbal problems to communicate. Tapping on categorized symbols allow one to build phrases that are spoken. The app contains 450 pre-set symbols and more can be added.

Dolly Drive Syncs Time Machine To The Cloud, Creates Bootable Backup

Dave Caolo, TUAW

This new solution (they just launched this week) offers encrypted Time Machine sync to the cloud and even create a bootable version of the local drive you've been using for Time Machine thus far.

Friday, January 28, 2011

iBank 4

Jeffery Battersby, Macworld

iBank 4.1 is a powerful and easy-to-use personal and small business finance application that is constantly being updated, offers a useful set of features, and, most importantly, is designed by developers who seem hell-bent on pleasing their customers and adding new and better features to their application.

Line2 - 2 Numbers 1 iPhone

Glenn Fleishman, Macworld

Q.&A.: Deleting Mac App Store Apps

J.d. Biersdorfer, New York Times

To remove a Mac App Store app from your computer, you uninstall it the way you uninstall most Mac programs. Just open the Applications folder on the Mac’s hard drive and drag the unwanted app to the Trash can; you may need to type in your administrator password to do so. Then go to the Finder menu and choose the Empty Trash option.

With Skype 5.0 Out Of Beta, Group Video Chat Becomes A Premium Feature

Marco Tabini, Macworld

Voice-over-IP developer Skype says that its latest client for the Mac is now out of beta and officially available for download as a fully-supported product. With the latest release, Skype has made some changes to its software in response to customer feedback and is also packaging some functionality into a “premium” pricing tier.

Genieo Now Available For Mac, Recognizes Your Favorite Web Content

Dave Caolo, TUAW

Genieo is now available for the Mac with a unique approach to managing information overload. The developers are interested in a service that learns your preferred topics, your trusted sources, and how you find and read information on the web. Genieo then presents you with content you're certain to like, without any scripting or filtering from you, the user.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

iTunes Goes CDMA-Friendly

Alexander Vaughn, AppAdvice

Apple Indicates Final Xserve Orders Won't Ship For Two More Months

AppleInsider

With just days to go before Apple officially pulls the plug on its Xserve line of rack-mount servers, the company has indicated that all orders for the systems taken today and through Monday won't ship for at least another two months.

When The CEO Gives iPads To All: One CIO's Story

Tom Kaneshige, CIO

Ballal, though, faced a bigger question: What will happen after employees got a hold of the iPad?

Apple, News Corp To Hold Event To Launch The Daily

Jim Dalrymple, The Loop

According to the invitation received by The Loop on Thursday, News Corp Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch will be joined by Apple’s Vice President of Internet Services, Eddy Cue to introduce the newspaper.

Recosoft Announces InDesign-to-Office Conversion Tool

Philip Michaels, Macworld

ID2Office works as a plug-in for the CS4 and CS5 versions of InDesign, Adobe’s page layout tool. It will convert the text, associated fonts and styles, paragraph structure, tables, graphics, and other object and document properties to their matching object and file properties in Microsoft Word and PowerPoint.

MacBook Pro Supplies Tightening Ahead Of Potential Refresh

Eric Slivka, MacRumors

MacRumors has heard from several sources that supplies of Apple's existing MacBook Pro models, particularly the 15" and 17" sizes, are beginning to run low in Apple stores and at third-party retailers, suggesting that the company may be drawing down stock in advance of an update to the product line. At least one major retail chain has reportedly notified its branches that it has been unable to fulfill replenishment orders, a situation that has been tied to forthcoming product updates in the past.

With Skype 5.0 Out Of Beta, Group Video Chat Becomes A Premium Feature

Marco Tabini, Macworld

With the latest release, Skype has made some changes to its software in response to customer feedback and is also packaging some functionality into a “premium” pricing tier.

Power-user Replacements For OS X Apps

Mike Subelsky

I've noticed that the longer I use OS X the more replacements I'm finding for Apple's built-in applications. Apple focuses heavily on design and aesthetics, which means their apps often lack power-user features. Here's my list.

Macworld Industry Forum: John Gruber Talks About Web Apps Vs. The Web

David Winograd, TUAW

Inability To Boot To Safe Mode In OS X

Topher Kessler, CNET

Apple’s Life-Saving Potential

Kym McNicholas, Forbes

The San Ramon Fire Protection District, which is located east of Silicon Valley, has released an app that notifies people who are trained in CPR when someone is having a heart attack nearby.

We’ll Refund Your Old Purchase If You Switch To App Store – Developers

Giles Turnbull, Cult Of Mac

Mizage, makers of the Divvy window management application, have come up with a clever way round the problem of migrating customers from traditional online purchases to official Mac App Store purchases: if you can prove you’ve bought their app twice, they’ll refund your original payment.

First Glance At Objective-C And The iPhone SDK

Webb Brown

All things considered, Objective-C feels pretty easy to pick up coming from an OO background -- not to say it doesn't have some curveballs. My guess is that the biggest adjustment for those coming directly from a Java background is (re)learning to manage memory allocations effectively.

Review: Downloading Mac Software, Made Simple

Dana Wollman, Associated Press

I set up the Mac App Store on my MacBook and spent a week treating myself to new games and other apps. Suffice it to say, I can get used to having a computer that tries to be as smart as, well, my smart phone.

Apple Removes Banned Nazi Anthem From German iTunes

Eric Kelsey, Reuters

Apple removed a notorious anthem of the Nazi Party from the German version of its iTunes online music store on Wednesday, a German spokesman for the U.S. firm told Reuters.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Macworld Industry Forum: Jason Snell On How Apple Does It

David Winograd, TUAW

At the Macworld 2011 industry forum this morning, Jason Snell, the editorial director of Macworld magazine, talked about "how Apple does it." His first point was that Apple is not just Steve Jobs. Steve created a great management team that just doesn't get enough press. Regardless of what happens with Steve, Snell says, Apple will do fine.

Macworld Industry Forum: Bill Atkinson On Interface Design

David Winograd, TUAW

Not so long time ago, Atkinson noted, users were quite separate from the computing experience. UI design evolved to the now familiar the desktop metaphor, then stopped. This is going to change with mobile devices.

Developers Hail Mac App Store Successes

Ben Camm-Jones, Macworld UK

Three weeks after the Mac App Store opened its virtual doors, there are plenty of success stories to be found in the developer community.

iMedia Browser Update Adds Flickr Browsing

Philip Michaels, Macworld

Witch Window Manager On Sale For 48 Hours

TJ Luoma, TUAW

Witch shows you not just which applications are running, but it also shows you all of the different windows that are running in those applications.

The Easy Way To Check Your Mac’s Logs Without Fear

Ron McElfresh, Mac360

Yojimbo For iPad

Stuart Gripman, Macworld

Yojimbo users who travel with an iPad will want to pick up Yojimbo for iPad—the required Yojimbo 3 for Mac is a free upgrade after all. Those who aren’t invested in Yojimbo should give it serious consideration. Both the iOS and Mac apps are polished and stable. If you need the flexibility of bi-directional synchronization, you’ll have to either look elsewhere or wait and see if a future revision brings it.

Bare Bones Software Yojimbo 3.0.1

Stuart Gripman, Macworld

If you don’t yet have a place to store your digital odds and ends, and don’t require two-way synchronization with a mobile device, Yojimbo is a very strong option.

Apple Revamps Its Public Website Using HTML5

Daniel Eran Dilger, AppleInsider

Apple has relaunched its entire website with a new design using HTML5, adding a darker, glossy navigation bar and speedy new animated page layouts for Mac and iPod pages.

Cases That Fit Verizon's iPhone 4 May Be In Short Supply

Mark Milian, CNN

A shortage of cases for the Verizon iPhone could be a problem, and not just for people looking to protect their shiny new devices from accidental damage. The cases also can improve cell reception.

It's not clear how stocked Apple Stores will be February 10 with cases that fit the Verizon iPhone. Apple did not respond to a request for comment.

iOS 4.3 Cometh: First iOS 4.3 Video Airplay-Capable App Gets Approved

Alexander Vaughn, AppAdvice

While iOS 4.3 hasn’t been released yet, it seems that Apple is already allowing iOS 4.3 AirPlay-enabled apps into the App Store. The first of them, StreamToMe just made it to the store and allows users to stream video to an Apple TV that was sent from a computer to your device.

New Apple Ad: iPad Is Iconic

Mark Gurman, 9 To 5 Mac

Verizon To Offer Unlimited iPhone Data Plan For A Limited Time

David Chartier, Macworld

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Verizon COO Lowell McAdam confirmed that it will offer its $30 unlimited data plan during the launch of the iPhone—but the plan's days are numbered. McAdam did not specify a cutoff date for offering the plan, but he reiterated statements the company made in June 2010 that Verizon will soon follow AT&T’s lead and drop unlimited data plans altogether in favor of a tiered pricing model.

Verizon Dishes On iPhone Hotspot Pricing

David Chartier, Macworld

Verizon iPhone owners will be able to take advantage of the 3G wireless hotspot feature for an extra $20 per month on top of the iPhone’s required voice and data plans—that’s the same price that applies to current Verizon smartphone owners.

Default File-sharing Behaviors In OS X

Topher Kessler, CNET

Drive Genius 3.1 Adds Live Defrag

Jim Dalrymple, The Loop

Interview: Marco Arment

Rands In Repose

"I’d find stuff all day at work that I didn’t have time to read, so I made Instapaper as a simple, one-click link-saving service for myself to time-shift links from the work day to my train commute."

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Adobe Photoshop Express 1.5 Improves Image Capture

Dan Moren, Macworld

Radium 2.7.5

Dan Frakes, Macworld

Radium makes it easier and, frankly, more fun to listen to Internet radio and several online music services.

James Murdoch: “The Daily” Will Launch With Subscriptions In Coming Weeks

Joe White, AppAdvice

James Murdoch, Chairman and CEO of News Corp. (EU and Asia), recently confirmed that “The Daily” will launch “in the next few weeks.” Furthermore, Murdoch added that he thinks the weekly subscription fee of $0.99 will be sufficient to support the publication.

Change System Preferences By Script

Dan Miller, Macworld

Sorenson Media Releases Squeeze 7

Jackie Dove, Macworld

Sorenson Media has launched Sorenson Squeeze 7, an upgrade of the company’s video encoding program. The new version features a trio of key new functions: GPU acceleration, adaptive bitrate encoding, and new input and output formats.

The Pendulum Intended For @Mac.com Is Nearly Through

Casey Tschida, AppAdvice

A New Mac App That Manages Your Money

Alexis Kayhill, Mac360

Kodak Patent Complaint Against Apple, RIM Rejected

Associated Press

How The iPhone Mail App Decides When To Show You New Mail

Basil Safwat, The Invisible

This is serious attention to detail. It’s not something people will show off to each other on the bus, or something that you can put on an advert or trumpet on a feature list. It just makes the app a bit quieter and a bit more well behaved.

Apple Brings The App Store To Twitter Promising Exclusive Offers

MG Siegler, TechCrunch

Now it appears that Apple is taking another step into official Twitter land today with an account for the App Store.

Wacom Bamboo Pen & Touch Handier Than A Mouse For Some

Jessica Maldonado, MacNews

Google Cloud Print Lets You Print GMail Content From Your Mobile Device

Marco Tabini, Macworld

Apple iTunes And The Home Insurance Blame Game

Jonny Evans, Computerworld

You should check your digital music is insured, as many insurers don't offer coverage for your digital music collections within their standard policy -- and Apple won't help you get your music back if it gets lost or stolen -- even though it could.

Monday, January 24, 2011

Majesty 2: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim

Stephanie Kent, Macworld

A few problems with screen navigation aside, Majesty 2 makes for a fun, brain-bending test of planning and defending a fantasy kingdom.

SuperSync 4.0 Makes It Easier To Sync iTunes Libraries

David Chartier, Macworld

Your iPad Is An Arcade Cabinet: The Journey From Joke To Product

Ben Kuchera, Ars Technica

Automator Workflow Of The Month: Automate Folder Backup

Christopher Breen, Macworld

You know that you should have a long-range plan for regularly backing up all your important data. But there are times when you want the extra security of backing up an ongoing project at more frequent intervals. The following Automator workflow will do just that by taking items placed in a particular folder and backing them up to another drive.

Airfoil Speakers Touch

Glenn Fleishman, Macworld

Think of Airfoil Speakers Touch from Rogue Amoeba as turning an iOS device into a portable speaker. The app works with Rogue Amoeba’s Airfoil commercial software for Mac OS X and Windows. Airfoil captures and redirects audio that’s playing on a computer to a variety of devices: other computers, AirPort Express, Apple TV, and mobile hardware running this iOS app.

Wireless Printing From An iPad

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Chrome 8

Nathan Alderman, Macworld

Chrome 8 is free, it’s fast, and there’s very little it can’t do that other browsers can. Firefox users in particular may find that Chrome combines all of that browser’s advantages with vastly faster performance. If it keeps improving at this rate, Chrome could soon leave Safari a distant second place in the Mac browser competition.

David Hockney's Friends In Art: The iPad And iPhone

Barbara Isenberg, Los Angeles Times

David Hockney may be pretty isolated here in Yorkshire, some four hours by train from London, but that's the way he likes it. Ensconced near the quiet rural landscape he's immortalized in paintings and watercolors, he has more time not only to draw but to experiment with new ways of making art.

The Understudy Takes The Stage At Apple

Miguel Helft, New York Times

In Silicon Valley, Mr. Jobs is also known for relentlessness. Yet on many levels, he and Mr. Cook are opposites. While Mr. Jobs is mercurial and prone to outbursts, Mr. Cook, who was raised in a small town in Alabama, is polite and soft-spoken. He is often described as a “Southern gentleman.” While Mr. Jobs obsesses over every last detail of Apple’s products, Mr. Cook obsesses over the less glamorous minutiae of Apple’s operations.

Apple’s Bet On Publishing

Frédéric Filloux, Monday Note

In a nutshell, Cupertino is betting on “many small” rather than on “few big ones”.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Nuance Makes Dragon Mobile SDK Available For Developers

Joe White, AppAdvice

Google Latitude Updated, Now Supports iPhone 3G

Joe White, AppAdvice

Apple’s First Verizon iPhone Commercial Also Touts AT&T: “Two Is Better Than One”

MG Siegler, TechCrunch

10 Billionth App Prize For UK Woman

Press Association

Gail Davis, from Orpington, Kent, said that it was her two daughters who purchased the Paper Glider game from the online store.

Apple, who run the store for its 160 million iPhone, iPod touch and iPad users, have declared Ms Davis the winner of its Countdown to 10 Billion Apps competition meaning she will receive a 10,000 dollar (£6,250) iTunes gift card.

Snail Mail Push Alerts

Make

Getting iPhone push notifications from objects in your physical world is possible using an Arduino with an Ethernet Shield, a PHP-enabled web server and an iPhone app called Prowl. In this video, I show how to set up a mailbox so that it pings your phone when snail mail is delivered, but it's very easy to adapt this project to whatever suits your needs.

Saturday, January 22, 2011

Apple App Store Hits 10 Billion App Download Mark

Bob Brown, Networld World

Review: Alfred App For Mac OS X

iSource

Alfred is slowly but surely melding with the rest of my machine — not because it’s any less interesting or useful two weeks in, but because it’s so effective and feels so natural that it might as well be part of the operating system — and isn’t that what the best help is like? So good you could simply take it for granted?

How To Create A Portable Hackintosh On A USB Thumb Drive

Will Fancher, Lifehacker

People put linux on their flash drives all the time. They also get hackintosh on their hard drives quite often. However, it'd be nice to be able to get the same live experience we get with Linux using OS X. With a distribution of OS X 10.6.2 called iPortable Snow, we can.

Review: Wallee iPad Mount (Verdict: Killer)

Jason D. O'Grady, ZDNet

Transmit 4 Improves On File Transfers

Adam C. Engst, TidBITS

Basic file transfer is no longer rocket science, and if you have relatively minimal needs, nearly any file transfer client will suffice. But if you’re looking for power and flexibility beyond what some other programs can offer, you won’t go wrong by checking out Transmit.

TestFlight Makes iOS App Testing A Lot Easier

David Chartier, Macworld

The service leverages some of the wireless app installation features that Apple added in iOS 4, which were designed mainly for in-house enterprise apps. TestFlight acts as a bridge between the developer, the tester, and the Apple Developer Center.

The Mystery Of Spontaneously Installed Growl

Derik DeLong, Macworld

Growl is known to many a Mac user, but its sudden and surprising appearance in some Macs has caused a stir.

Friday, January 21, 2011

How The iPad Wants To Be Used

Fraser Speirs

The iPad is an intensely personal device. In its design intent it is, truly, much more like a "big iPhone" than a "small laptop". The iPad isn't something you pass around. It's not really designed to be a "resource" that many people take advantage of. It's designed to be owned, configured to your taste, invested in and curated.

Apple Says It Monitors Work Conditions In China Amid Outcry

Michael Kan, Macworld UK

Apple restated its pledge to provide safe working conditions for workers assembling of its products after environmental groups in China released a report criticizing the tech company for failing to be transparent about its suppliers.

Appletell Reviews Art Text 2

Erica Marceau, Appletell

Universal iPhone Bumper From Apple Sneaks Into Apple Store

Victor Agreda, Jr., TUAW

Quark Launches App Studio For iPad Publishing

Jackie Dove, Macworld

Publishers who use Quark Publishing System—an editorial workflow system for medium-to-large businesses—can now use App Studio to create and publish custom iPad apps. Quark Publishing System automatically assembles and publishes each digital issue.

Washing Machine 2 Review

Karl Hodge, Macworld UK

Washing Machine is a fast, convenient way to target and regularly clean up downloaded data on your Mac. The Secure Clean feature is definitely worth a few quid. The clear interface and seamless integration are impressive too.

iMovie 9.0.2 Update Available

Megan Lavey, TUAW

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Immaculate Reception, Or, A MobileMe Mystery

Jim Matthews, TidBITS

My deduction was that all Apple Store Wi-Fi networks broadcast the same network name, and since I’ve used this iPhone on an Apple Store network in the United States, it happily (and silently) joined this one, and took the opportunity to sync my calendar with MobileMe.

My Backup Plan: Dan Frakes

Dan Frakes, Macworld

Fake GSM Base Station Trick Targets iPhones At Security Conference Demo

Ellen Messmer, Network World

While his Black Hat DC Conference demonstration was not flawless, a University of Luxembourg student on Wednesday did show that it’s possible to trick iPhone users into joining a fake GSM network.

Reading OS X System Messages Without The Console Utility

Topher Kessler, CNET

Music For Shuffle Features Music Designed For The iPod Shuffle

Mike Schramm, TUAW

Musician Matthew Irvine Brown has compiled a set of 18 musical tracks, about an hour of music total, designed to be played in random order on the iPod shuffle

Four Lessons From Evernote’s First Week On The Mac App Store

Phil Libin, TechCrunch

We just finished our first week on the Mac App Store and it might have been the most important week in Evernote’s history. Here’s how it went and what we learned.

Apple Faces Pollution Storm In China

Kathrin Hille And Jamil Anderlini, Financial Times

A group of 36 Chinese environmental groups has accused Apple of failing to address concerns over pollution and worker health issues in factories supplying components for its gadgets. In a report to be published on Thursday, the groups rank Apple last in a list of 29 multinational technology companies based on how each company dealt with inquiries about pollution and occupational health hazard incidents at factories in their supply chain.

Vox Is A Minimalist Music Player And Converter For Mac OS X

Adam Dachis, Lifehacker

Mac Plus Reused As A Time Machine Server

David Quilty, TUAW

Showing us that there is, in fact a much more useful application for an old Mac Plus than a DJ using it as a helmet, Macenstein reader Dean Gray has turned his 1986 Mac Plus 1 MB into a Time Machine Server.

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

How To Add Or Remove Icons From The Dock

Roman Loyola, Macworld

Purchased apps from the Mac App Store are automatically added to the Dock. That’s great if you plan to access the new app on a frequent basis. But if it’s an app you’ll use infrequently, you probably don’t want it there. Here’s how to remove icons from your Dock. I'll go over adding icons to your Dock, as well.

How To Manage Your Mac’s Power On, Power Off

Jeffrey Mincey, Mac360

In an effort to make our household more green this year than last year, we’re adjusting our Mac lifestyle to include using the Mac only when we need it. That means power management. The problem is that Apple doesn’t help us. So, we have to help ourselves.

Find Any File 1.5.1

Dan Frakes, Macworld

Reader’s Digest For iPad Arrives In The App Store

Tyler Tschida, AppAdvice

'iDOS' Open Emulation Rabbit Hole Still Exists, Sort Of

Eli Hodapp, TouchArcade

Using the freeware utility iPhone Explorer, adding additional games to iDOS is as simple as browsing your apps in iPhone Explorer, opening the iDOS folder, and then dumping whatever files you want inside of the iDOS documents folder.

Are You A Secret Apple Stockholder?

Brett Arends, Wall Street Journal

You may not know it, but you are probably a secret Apple stockholder. And maybe a big one.

Apple is everywhere on Wall Street. Few stocks are as widely held in regular mutual funds as well as in hedge funds. Few affect the performance of so many retirement portfolios. This is especially unusual because Apple is such a volatile growth stock. In recent years it's fallen by two-thirds and it's quadrupled. Most of the other shares that crop up in every portfolio are dull ones like Exxon Mobil or Procter & Gamble or Johnson & Johnson.

How To Move Your iTunes Media Folder

Christopher Breen, Macworld

If you love music, movies, TV shows, and podcasts there’s a good chance that your iTunes Media folder (formerly called the iTunes Music folder, and yours might be called that if you’ve been using iTunes for a long time) has swollen to the point where it’s pushing up against the bounds of your hard drive’s capacity. In such cases you need to move your media to a more expansive drive. Here are the steps for doing just that.

Billings Pro 1.0

Jeffery Battersby, Macworld

Billings Pro is a superior solution for managing company-wide time billing, client-related expense tracking, and invoicing. While I’d like to see some kind of iOS app for handling time sheets for non-administrative employees, Billings Pro’s Web-based time sheets are a good temporary measure, making Billings Pro an attractive solution for managing your business’ billing and invoicing needs.

App Watch: Fiddling On The iPad

Yukari Iwatani Kane, Wall Street Journal

Music app developer Smule’s latest app, Magic Fiddle, emerged out of a dare. Walking out of classical musician Lang Lang’s concert in San Francisco last April, in which the pianist played an encore with Smule’s iPad piano app, Smule co-founder Ge Wang joked with colleagues about creating a violin app that would force users to put their iPads up to their face and rest their chins on the device to make it work. “We thought, ‘Wow, that idea is so bad, it might just work’” says Mr. Wang, looking back.

Almost seven months later in November, the company came out with Magic Fiddle, a violin app.

Apple Releases MacBook Air, iDVD Updates

David Chartier, Macworld

Backing Up And Recovery: Time Machine

Graham K. Rogers, Amitiae

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

A World Without Jobs

Andy Crouch, Culture Making

As remarkable as Steve Jobs is in countless ways—as a designer, an innovator, a (ruthless and demanding) leader—his most singular quality has been his ability to articulate a perfectly secular form of hope. Nothing exemplifies that ability more than Apple’s early logo, which slapped a rainbow on the very archetype of human fallenness and failure—the bitten fruit—and made it a sign of promise and progress.

TiVo Releases Official iPad App

David Chartier, Macworld

Simply called TiVo, the DVR pioneer’s new app does double duty as a program guide and remote for TiVo Premiere and TiVo Premiere XL boxes.

Mac IT Guy: Macs And Active Directory

John C. Welch, Macworld

It's certainly possible to connect Macs to networks that are running Active Directory. But sometimes it takes a little doing.

Microsoft Introduces OneNote iPhone App

Dan Miller, Macworld

OneNote is similar to apps like Evernote: It allows you to create different kinds of notes and then save them to the cloud. From there, you can access them from any Mac or iOS device.

Holiday Sales Help Apple Start The Fiscal Year In Style

Philip Michaels, Macworld

Apple saw sales of $26.74 billion and a net profit of $6 billion—both quarterly records—for the three months ended December 25, 2010, the company announced Tuesday. Sales grew nearly 71 percent from the $15.68 billion in revenue that Apple reported for the year-ago quarter. Earnings jumped 75 percent year-over-year to $6.43 per share, up from $3.67 last year.

Print-to-PDF Mysteries Revealed

Marco Tabini, Macworld

Because PDF support is built right into the operating system, OS X’s printing system gives applications the ability to “print” a file directly to PDF. In practice, this means that any application that supports printing is capable of generating a PDF file that can be saved, e-mailed, or faxed to a third party.

Hands-on With The OWC Mercury Elite-AL Pro Dual Mini SSD

Steven Sande, TUAW

Monday, January 17, 2011

Apple Media Advisory

Apple

Apple CEO Steve Jobs today sent the following email to all Apple employees:

"At my request, the board of directors has granted me a medical leave of absence so I can focus on my health. I will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company."

Understanding Apple’s Fixed-layout EPUBs

Liza Daly, Threepress Consulting Blog

iBooks now supports an extension to EPUB that allows publishers to create books with precise layout using CSS. This is Apple’s own extension, not part of the EPUB specification itself (and not one that they suggested be included in EPUB3).

The goal of this post is to simply document the extension and show how to create new works with it. I’m not going to debate whether it’s a good thing for the ecosystem here.

Apple's App Store On Pace To Surpass Total iTunes Music Sales By March

Sam Oliver, AppleInsider

How To Customize A Magic Trackpad

Rob Griffiths, Macworld

The BetterTouchTool utility allows you to define your own gestures and actions. In addition to its not-yet-final support for the Magic Trackpad, BetterTouchTool works with many third-party trackpads and Apple’s Magic Mouse. It even lets you assign various actions to keyboard shortcuts.

Create Message Links With Mail Proxy Icons

Lex Friedman, Macworld

When you open an individual message in its own Mail window, you can drag that message’s proxy icon to any desktop window to create an Internet Location File (.inetloc) that points right back to the message. If you want quick repeat access to an important e-mail, using the proxy icon essentially allows you to create a desktop bookmark.

Coming Soon: A New Way To Hack Into Your Smartphone

Robert McMillan, IDG News Service

Weinmann says he can do this by breaking the phone’s “baseband” processor, used to send and receive radio signals as the device communicates on its cellular network. He has found bugs in the way the firmware used in chips sold by Qualcomm and Infineon Technologies processes radio signals on the GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) networks used by the majority of the world’s wireless carriers.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Bad Apple TV Upsets Owner

Jon Yates, Chicago Tribune

"I know there are a lot of other people with this problem," he said. "Apple needs a patch to Bonjour that works properly."

McGinnis said one of the reasons he bought the Apple TV was because of Apple's reputation for producing easy-to-use products. In the end, it was anything but easy.

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Project HiJack Uses iPhone Audio Jack To Make Cheap Sensors

Chris Foresman, Ars Technica

Making accessories that tie into an iOS device's Dock connector is an expensive proposition: it requires getting certain components from Apple and applying for a costly "Made for iPhone" (or iPod or iPad) license. However, it is possible to use the headphone jack for two-way data communication with an iPhone and also to power small electronic circuits. A group of students and faculty from the University of Michigan's Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department have developed a small device it calls the "HiJack" to make sensing peripherals easily accessible to those on a tight budget.

Twitter For Mac’s Spectacular Hidden Little Feature: Tweet Anything From Anywhere

MG Siegler, TechCrunch

For example, if you’re browsing the web in Safari or Chrome, highlight a word or passage and right-click. At the bottom of the drop-down, you’ll see the “Tweet” command. Hitting it will populate a tweet for you with the highlighted section. And it works in TextEdit, iChat, Calendar, Mail, etc. If you read it, you can tweet it.

Apps With Maps: 11 iPhone GPS Apps Compared

Glenn Fleishman, Macworld

App Store Tips, Tricks, And Hacks For The SysAdmin

brunerd

Sid Meier's Civilization V

Chris Holt, Macworld

It’s two steps forward and one step backward for this series. The graphics are better, the hexagonal tiles make sense, and the social policy system is vastly improved. But the long build times, frustrating battle mechanic (how my armored tanks can ever get defeated by archers I’ll never know), and lack of true innovation is frustrating. For such an epic, engrossing, and altogether peerless series, it’s strange that the developers keep reconfiguring the formula only to expose new flaws in the game. Personally, I think the franchise fails to be as ambitious as it once was: why not bring back the espionage ability from Beyond the Sword or give us new ways to engage other civilizations or imagine new technologies for us to research? Civilization V is a game about evolving your society to become the best. The developers need to find more inspiration from their source material.

TurboTax Takes iPhone Filing Nationwide

Joel Mathis, Macworld

The TurboTax program that lets users file directly from their iPhone has gone nationwide in time for this year's tax season.

Apple’s Mac App Store Troubleshooting Advice

Ted Landau, Macworld

Friday, January 14, 2011

Alfred 0.8

Dan Miller, Macworld

The bottom line: If you're taking full advantage of everything that Butler, Launchbar, or Quicksilver has to offer, there's no need to switch to Alfred. But if you want a keyboard-based launcher and don't need all the power (or complexity) of those three, Alfred is an excellent alternative. It can handle the most common launcher tasks, with a clean, simple interface; it's a pleasure to use.

10 Essential iTunes Keyboard Shortcuts

Kirk McElhearn, Macworld

Here are 10 great keyboard shortcuts that can save you time as you work with iTunes.

Use FlexTime, LaunchBar, Spaces And AppleScript To Get Things Done

Justin Blanton

As of late I’ve had a terrible time concentrating, on anything. So, I did what any self-respecting computer geek can’t help but do, and rationalized further procrastination by telling myself I was going to create a new, usable workflow. The end result of this little productivity tangent is a combination of FlexTime, LaunchBar, Spaces and AppleScript, and does the following when set in motion.

Does The Mac App Store Allow Commercial Use?

Ian Betteridge, TechRadar

So yes, you can use that copy of Aperture on a machine you use for business. If you're using the product for business, though, the terms of use are slightly different to "personal use". You can't install the software on machines you "control" (as you could with your kids' Mac), so you can't put the software on the machines of other employees, even if you own the business or manage the Macs. If you have multiple Macs which only you use, that's fine – you can install all your apps on all your machines.

Apple Updates Epson Drivers For Snow Leopard

Jonathan Seff, Macworld

Thursday, January 13, 2011

How To Make A Solid Mac Backup Plan

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Apple's iPhone: No FaceTime On Verizon's 3G Network

Troy Wolverton, San Jose Mercury News

Apple and Verizon officials confirmed Wednesday that the Verizon version of the iPhone -- like the AT&T one before it -- will be able to make FaceTime calls only while connected to Wi-Fi hotspots. Verizon has touted the resilience of its network and said it is more than ready to handle iPhone users' data traffic. But at least for now, that traffic won't include FaceTime calls.

Google Nixes Direct H.264 Support In Chrome

Brett Terpstra, TUAW

Google has announced that its web browser, Chrome, will be removing support for direct HTML5 playback of H.264 video in the coming months, in favor of Google's WebM media container (which leverages the VP8 video codec). This is a blow to the adoption of Apple's preferred video standard, as well as an hint that the web may see some continued churn within the video format arena.

Initial Code For OpenJDK For Mac OS X Published

John K. Waters, Application Development Trends

Dock Items In OS X Locked In Place

Topher Kessler, CNET

There may be a few reasons why this happens, including faults with the Dock preference and database files in addition to odd settings that may be added to the Dock when you install applications.

Get The Menubar Tool That Follows Your Mouse

Alexis Kayhill, Mac360

Yojimbo: An Info Manager That Takes Advantage Of The Macs'

MacNews

For those users needing an information manager that takes full advantage of their Mac's unique capabilities, and who don't need access to that information on devices other than a Mac, Yojimbo is a great and obvious choice.

Posterous Review

Joel Mathis, Macworld

The app’s simple and elegant posting process should make it attractive to any iPhone owner with a Posterous account.

Creating (Or Obtaining) A Wireless Printer

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Lyrica 2.0

Dan Frakes, Macworld

Lyrica searches seven online lyrics databases for the currently playing track and displays those lyrics, if found, in the Lyrica window.

Steve Jobs Flip-Flops On The iPad’s Orientation Lock Switch

Tyler Tschida, AppAdvice

Steve Jobs isn’t one to cave under pressure, whether it’s from the media, other tech companies, or even the most fervent of Apple users. However, with the release of iOS 4.3 beta, it appears that he has made a very un-Steve-like move. He has decided to go back on his declaration from late last year and has allowed Apple’s iOS development team to restore the ability to lock the iPad’s screen orientation using the physical switch on the side of the device. iPad users, rejoice!

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

How To Rip CDs With iTunes

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Microsoft And Apple Back Away From Novell Patent Purchase

Electronista

Microsoft Disputes Apple's 'App Store' Trademark

Rik Myslewski, The Register

Apple Will Not Allow Verizon To Preload Software On iPhone

Daniel Eran Dilger, AppleInsider

New iPhone users on Verizon's network won't find preloaded carrier software on their phones, but will be able to download carrier-specific apps from iTunes.

How To Back Up Your Gmail Using Apple Mail Or Outlook

Dave Greenbaum, GigaOM

Since Gmail supports POP, all you need is a POP email program to download your emails from the cloud while still keeping a copy out there on the server.

Panorama Sheets For Mac: A First Look

Steven Sande, TUAW

Sometimes, though, Mac owners need a database management system that isn't as powerful as Panorama but can handle operations that would choke Excel or Numbers.

MimioStudio 7 Now Available For Mac

Joel Mathis, Macworld

The new software updates the Mimio Interactive System, which gives teachers the ability to convert traditional whiteboard into a digital teaching tool by mating a sensor bar to a computer and a video projector.

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

iPhone 4 Will Be Available Through Verizon Starting In February

Megan Lavey, TUAW

Verizon Confirms The iPhone With Personal Hotspot

Kelly Hodgkins, TUAW

Verizon iPhone Can't Handle Data And Voice Simultaneously

Steven Sande, TUAW

Since the Verizon iPhone operates on the CDMA network, it will not be able to handle voice and data at the same time.

AT&T And Verizon iPhone Plans Compared

David Chartier, Macworld

The minimum cost for both Verizon and AT&T with data and SMS plans is almost exactly the same, with a total individual plan price of $60 on both networks (again, this is assuming Verizon's current data plan offerings—that price is subject to change). Things get more interesting once you get into the family plans, as Verizon offers more minutes than AT&T, but charges $10 to $20 more, depending on the voice package.

Pics Of The New Antenna, WiFi Sharing Prefs On Verizon iPhone

Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica

Verizon iPhone Won't Fit Many Existing iPhone 4 Cases

Dan Frakes, Macworld

Although the iPhone offerings from AT&T and Verizon may look the same, they're just different enough that you'll need to be careful when buying a case or similar accessories.

Director Shoots First Major Movie Solely With iPhone

AFP

A movie claimed to be the first ever cinema-standard film to be shot solely on the iPhone has been premiered by celebrated South Korean director Park Chan-Wook.

TrackPro: The Making Of An iPhone App

Mike Clark

This project was a lot of fun and I'm glad I took it on. I can't emphasize enough how important it is to dive into a real project as a way of learning something new. It helps you cut through all the possibilities of what you could learn and focuses your energy on what you need to learn... right now... for your app!

Interactive Fiction In The Ebook Era

Keith Stuart, The Guardian

For now, it's just fun to re-discover the concept of interactive novels; their limitations and quirks, their conventions and narrative tactics. There's just one problem – very few of the above apps allow you to re-trace your route through the pages or to re-roll the dice. Like the computer game versions of family favourites such as Monopoly and Scrabble, this represents the removal of tactile, emergent player activities, it is the prescriptive victory of the ruleset over the player. In other words, it means I can't cheat.

Kindle App Gets Side-loading, Background Downloading

David Dahlquist, Macworld

Perhaps the most notable addition in the update is the support for side-loading of content into the Kindle app. You can now add compatible files into the Kindle library from Mail attachments or other apps that support the iOS feature that allows you to open files in other apps. In addition, you can now drag compatible files to the Kindle app via iTunes, when your iOS device is connected to a Mac or PC, by clicking on the Apps tab, scrolling down to the list of apps with file-transfer support, clicking on the Kindle app, and then dragging files into the window to the right.

Google Mobile Now Supports The Google Voice App, Sudoku Puzzle Solving, And Reading Print Ads

Casey Tschida, AppAdvice

$100K In 4 Months: A Niche App’s Path To App Store Success

EndLoop Blog

2 Ways To Record, Edit, Enhance, And Convert Audio

Ron McElfresh, Mac360

The iPad Workflow

Eric Schwarz, SchwarzTech

Monday, January 10, 2011

Scaling And Cropping Images On The Cheap

Christopher Breen, Macworld

iWork.com Beta Adds Keynote Animations, Presentation Embedding

Steven Sande, TUAW

Apple Drops iPhone 3GS To $49

Dan Moren, Macworld

Last week, AT&T announced that it would drop the price of the iPhone 3GS from $99 to $49; on Monday, Apple matched the move.

An iPad For Every Child

Fraser Speirs, Macworld

Since January 2010, my colleagues and I at Cedars School of Excellence have been deploying a new computing program in our school—with exciting results.

Apple Announces Dates For iTunes Festival London 2011

Michael Grothaus, TUAW

Apple Launching Personal Setup For Macs At Apple Stores

Mark Gurman, 9 To 5 Mac

When you purchase a Mac at an Apple Retail store an employee will help you setup your e-mail accounts, walk you through the Mac App Store, setup an iTunes account for you, and show you the basic pointers of owning a Mac. Some stores will even have dedicated Mac setup stations.

How To Avoid Public GPL Floggings On Apple's App Store

Jason Perlow, ZDNet

If you develop software for Apple’s App Store, which now also includes the Macintosh platform, then you are obligated to do a preliminary code review yourself and be absolutely sure you aren’t using any GPLv2 components before you submit an application for electronic distribution.

Otherwise you might find yourself having to re-write thousands of lines of code, or even worse, become subject to public floggings by groups such as the SFLC and incurring significant legal costs. Oy vey.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Dear Apple: It's (Past) Time To Let Us Customize Our Alert Tones

Chris Rawson, TUAW

The iPhone has been on the market for going on four years now, and yet we still haven't been blessed with the ability to use our own sounds for these alert tones. My only question: why the hell not?

Mac App Piracy Risk Overblown, For Now

Dan Moren, Macworld

The inclusion of a reasonable anti-piracy system will likely provide the necessary deterrent, and that’s what Apple has provided. Now it’s up to developers to make sure that they’re using those tools correctly.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Photoshop Premiere Elements A Serious Competitor For Final Cut

Dennis Sellers, MacNews

Day 1 For A $1 App On The Mac App Store

Pauli Olavi Ojala's Notes

Even if this level of sales doesn’t keep up, I’m definitely motivated to publish more stuff on the Mac App Store in the future.

Apple Pulls VLC Media Player From The App Store

MacNN

Apple has finally pulled Applidium's VLC video player app from the iTunes store due to a licensing discrepancy. The situation is one of the prominent examples of conflict between the open-source GNU General Public License, which is tied to the VLC player, and the terms detailed in Apple's own App Store licensing.

Mac App Store Licensing And Copy Protection, Explained

Jason Snell, Macworld

Beyond entering in your Apple ID and password, this is all on the honor system.

User Interface Conservatism Versus Liberalism

Adam C. Engst, TidBITS

The real problem with UI liberalism is that it reduces the usability of the platform as a whole. That’s of little concern to the individual developer, who just wants her app to stand out, but it is—or at least it should be—of concern to Apple, whose platform becomes harder to use with every app that reinvents the steering wheel.

The Mac App Store And The Increasing Simplification Of OS X

Shawn Blanc

In many ways the Mac App Store is today what the iTunes music store was in 2003 — a new storefront to help promote and grow an already-established industry that could use a bit of a boost.

The Future Of Mac App Store Installs

Daniel Jalkut, Red Sweater

What’s most interesting about all this is that there is clearly an infrastructure in place for allowing a wide variation of behaviors, all centering around the multi-purpose Buy/Installed button in the App Store. I would like to see the volume-check options documented and made explicitly available to developers, so that we can help prevent unwanted redundant purchases on the part of our customers. I would also be curious to know if other hooks are in place or are planned to for example allow developers whose apps do show up as installed to second-guess that assumption and encourage the App Store to provide a “Buy” option to customers.

HyperMac Sidesteps Apple Patent Headache With DIY Solutions

Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica

Apple Updates Remote Desktop, Adds Widget

Philip Michaels, Macworld

In addition to the client and admin updates for Apple Remote Desktop, the company introduced a new dashboard widget that provides an at-a-glance view of remote computers.

'Installed' Apps, The Mac App Store, And You

Dan Moren, Macworld

It would be nice if Apple provided a way to absorb existing applications, or at the very least allowed developers the ability to discount the Mac App Store versions of their apps for users who owned previous versions, but there’s no indication that such an option is the offing, so don’t hold your breath.

Line2 Adds Unlimited Phone, Voicemail And Texting To Your iDevice For $10 A Month

Victor Agreda, Jr., TUAW

Line2 is a tri-mode calling app for your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. It uses data, WiFi or even cellular voice connections to make and receive calls -- a first for iPhone. While there's a 30-day free trial, the service ultimately costs $10 per month. But for that fee you get unlimited calls, unlimited texts and a powerful voicemail system.

Developers Weigh In On The Mac App Store

David Chartier, Macworld

Hands On: Software Updates Through The Mac App Store

Roman Loyola, Macworld

In case you’re wondering how minor software updates through the Mac App Store work, here’s a look.

Verizon Finally Lands The iPhone

Shayndi Raice And Yukari Iwatani Kane, Wall Street Journal

The largest U.S. wireless carrier will make the long-awaited announcement at an event Tuesday in New York City, a person familiar with the matter said Friday.

Verizon sent out invitations for an event to be held in New York City on Tuesday asking that recipients "Join us as we share the latest news," but didn't specify the subject matter. The event will be headlined by Lowell McAdam, president and chief operating officer of Verizon Communications.

Friday, January 7, 2011

The Widescreen Laptop Conspiracy

Mike Taber, Single Founder

I blame Apple for part of this transition. For years, widescreen has been the only format available for their computers. They’ve morphed their company into something of a media mogul with the iPod and iTunes. With the recent release of AppleTV, they’re poised to enter the video market after dominating the audio market. Somehow, that translates into hundreds of lemming companies yanking standard format laptops from the shelves and replacing them with widescreen. Is there a good reason? I don’t think so.

QuickCursor 2.0

Dan Frakes, Macworld

These days, between Twitter, Facebook, Internet forums, and Web forms, most people spend a good amount of time typing in text boxes and fields. In fact, if you use Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or another Web-based e-mail system, or if your work requires you to use Web-based tools, you may even do most of your text typing and editing outside of your favorite text editor—or at least frequently copying and pasting between your favorite editor and your browser.

Hog Bay Software’s QuickCursor aims to make this back-and-forth easier—easy enough that you’ll start using your favorite text editor any time you have to type or edit text.

Mac App Store Downloads Surpass 1 Million In First Day

Dave Caolo, TUAW

Let's say it's off to a good start. Apple has announced that users downloaded over 1 million apps from the Mac App Store since its launch just over 24 hours ago. That's a truly incredible number. The fact that millions of iOS users instantly knew how to use the Mac App Store certainly helped.

Mac App Store Stumbles Over Pre-owned Apps

Ted Landau, Macworld

What these glitches have in common is that they all involved apps that I already owned and was trying to reacquire via the Mac App Store. It may take time, and a few App Store updates, before Apple gets this all sorted out. In any case, as people begin to acquire most of their apps from the Mac App Store, it will become less of an issue.

Time Machine Holds A Place In My Heart, And It Should In Yours Too

Erica Sadun, TUAW

Time Machine is like version control for your life. It lets you restore files that you've lost or changed along the way, and does so in such a simple and elegant fashion that you never have to wonder "Did I back this up?" Time Machine just works.

How To Fix Mac App Store “Error 100″

Federico Viticci, MacStories

Hands On: Twitter For Mac Brings Big UI, Functionality Updates

Jacqui Cheng, Ars Technica

Whether you love it or hate it, the new app certainly reflects Brichter's urge to go outside the box and try new things.

Finder Now Offers To Search Mac App Store For Unknown File Types

TJ Luoma, TUAW

If you try to open a file in the Finder and it doesn't recognize the extension, it will now offer to search the Mac App Store for applications that can open that filetype.

Uniformity Vs. Individuality In Mac UI Design

John Gruber, Daring Fireball

iOS uses these sliding animations to give you a sense of place.

Twitter for iPhone follows this model to a tee: accounts, tweets, tweet details — arranged left to right, with animation as you move between them. In today’s new Twitter for Mac, though, the sliding animations when you switch between tabs add nothing contextually. They’re not merely harmless eye candy, either. As Morgan notes, these animations create a false sense of stacking where no stack exists. They’re technically excellent, but conceptually misleading.

Mac App Store Gives Gamers Plenty Of Options

Chris Holt, Macworld

The day-one releases on the Mac App Store mainly target the casual games market. The first-person shooter, action-adventure, and strategy genres are all fairly absent at this stage. Similarly, high-end titles—save for Harry Potter—haven’t arrived yet, but that doesn’t mean we won’t see other marquee games on the store at a later day.

Twitter For Mac Demonstrates iOS-ificiation Of Mac Software

Lex Friedman, Macworld

Twitter for Mac has the advantage of your (comparatively) enormous monitor, and yet it too employs a drilldown-style interface. That interface, coupled with smooth and subtle animations, helps you keep track of where you are in the app—precisely the way the app works on your iOS device. It doesn't need to do that, but I believe Twitter correctly concluded that the approach offers mental navigation benefits, in addition to space-saving ones.

Hands On With Apple's Mac App Store

Roman Loyola, Macworld

So does the Mac App Store deliver? You can fire up the Mac App Store and see for yourself. But if you’re the type who likes to read travel guides before going on vacation, read on. I spent Thursday morning wandering up and down the Mac App Store’s virtual aisles, and I’ve come away with a few first impressions of the experience.

Apple Denies It's Searching For New CFO

Jim Dalrymple, CNET

It's Clippy! Back As A Mac App Store Utility

Erica Sadun, TUAW

The new Clippy, the better Clippy, the Macintosh Clippy allows your Mac to remember previous pasteboard entries for those always awkward times when you have to copy not one but two or more separate items after another. You can pull items as you need them directly from the menu bar at the top of Finder.

Transferring Angry Birds Saved Game Data To Mac App

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Mac App Store By The Numbers -- Almost 1,000 Apps On Day One

Richard Gaywood, TUAW

Lack Of Receipt Checking Could Enable Mac App Store Piracy

Megan Lavey, TUAW

Receipt checking is the process that lets developers verify that the app is installed as a valid purchase by checking the embedded purchase receipt, which is included (in encrypted form) by Apple and contains the UUID of the Mac authorized to run the app. Apple did not force developers to implement a particular way of handing these receipts and as a result, some paid apps are not properly protected against piracy.

Thursday, January 6, 2011

iLife ’11 From The App Store Excludes iWeb, iDVD

Peter Cohen, The Loop

Mac App Store Opens With More Than 1,000 Apps

Jason Snell, Macworld

To enable the Mac App Store, Snow Leopard users will need to update to Mac OS X 10.6.6, either by using the Mac’s built-in Software Update or via a download from Apple’s Website. Apple said the update would roll out to users beginning at 5:30 a.m. Pacific.

iLife, iWork, Aperture Now Available On Mac App Store

Jason Snell, Macworld

The three key apps in the $49 iLife ’11 suite—iPhoto, iMovie, and GarageBand—are now available via the Mac App Store for $15 each. The boxed iLife ’11 suite, in contrast, costs $49—slightly more than the three apps a la carte, though the suite also includes iDVD and iWeb, two apps that haven’t been substantially updated in recent years.

The three apps that make up the $79 iWork ’09 suite—Pages, Keynote, and Numbers—are also available on the Mac App Store, for $20 each, undercutting the $79 price of the boxed suite. It’s an even better deal if you’re only a user of one of the apps—Keynote, for example.

Apple Restricting Employee Vacations As First 2011 Products Loom

Neil Hughes And Kasper Jade, AppleInsider

Apple is quietly prohibiting vacation days for some retail employees for three weeks beginning later this month, a move that could foreshadow a significant product introduction in the coming weeks, AppleInsider has learned.

Photomatix 4

Gary Coyne, Applelinks

Photomatix 4 continues its domination of the HDR Photography landscape with its new release of version 4. The big news is that hdrsoft has now provided an excellent mechanism to deal with objects that have moved during your multiple-image capture. In addition, Photomatix now displays a sample strip of thumbnails to let you quickly see and click to display your image in a variety of presets prvoided by Photomatix (you can also create your own). These presets let you easily view an image with either Image Fusion or Tone Mapping to help you determine which approach might give you a better look for your image.

Turning A Tablet Into A Board Game

Katherine Boehret, Wall Street Journal

This week, I tested a game that successfully marries digital and analog games by using the first physical device to digitally interact with the Apple iPad screen. The $40 Duo by Discovery Bay Games doesn’t plug into the iPad, nor does it connect to the iPad via Bluetooth or other means. It sits on the iPad screen in a specific spot and uses a built-in light sensor on its underbelly to interpret light signals displayed on the iPad screen during a game.

Returning To Apple After Nine Years

Lorenz Szabo, TidBITS

Installing Software On A Mac With A Dead DVD Drive

Christopher Breen, Macworld

Yes. You could use the media drive on your MacBook to install software to the Mac mini. This can be accomplished via FireWire Target Disk Mode or through disc sharing.

Apple Releases iWork Update 5

Jim Dalrymple, The Loop

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Location-aware Neer App Shows Loved Ones Where You Are

Sam Felsing, Macworld

Neer taps into to your phone’s GPS features which can be a drain on battery life. Qualcomm, however, claims that it has designed the app with power efficiency in mind—the developer’s goal is to give users one full day of battery life when they run Neer. And Qualcomm says it’s working to improve the app’s effect on battery life in future versions.

Magazines On The iPad: Separating Fact From Fiction

Thomas Fitzgerald

Going forward, I suspect Apple probably will dedicate an area of the iTunes store to magazines, and they probably will make it easier for publications to include subscriptions directly in the App through the app store payment system. But for now, don’t believe everything you read regarding what “can’t” be done because most of it already is.

Documents To Go® Premium - Office Suite Review

Jeff Merron, Macworld

Editing any complex document, or even doing something as simple as selecting a spreadsheet cell, is often a challenge on the iPhone’s small screen. However, Documents to Go Premium seems to make the best of the iPhone’s limitations. DataViz seems to not yet really understand that the iPad is a different beast, and that a different interface isn’t only possible but also, in many ways, preferable.

More Schools Embracing iPad As Learning Tool

Winnie Hu, New York Times

A growing number of schools across the nation are embracing the iPad as the latest tool to teach Kafka in multimedia, history through “Jeopardy”-like games and math with step-by-step animation of complex problems.

Winter’s Philosophers

Charles Simic, New York Review Of Books

“Everyone who thinks is unhappy,” says Sergei Dovlatov in one of his stories. Some crows caw all day, some have nothing to say. I see one of them pace back and forth on my lawn the way I’ve seen Hamlet do on stage. Whatever is bothering him seems insoluble, too much for one crow to figure out on his own. Still, no harm trying, I suppose, even with the racket his relatives are making as they fly to and fro, as if the road they oversee is not covered only with fallen leaves and patches of ice, but also with fresh road kill.

Japan Pushes For Content Control Software On iPhone

MacNN

The Japanese government is criticizing Apple Japan and cellular carrier Softbank for a lack of content filtering on the iPhone, reports say. Specifically, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is expected to ask for region-tailored filtering software to be installed as soon as possible. Local stores are obligated to install censorship tools on phones sold to minors.

Apple Developers Cautiously Eye Mac App Store

Rob Pegoraro, Washington Post

Does that represent a fair deal for Mac developers? I've been discussing the App Store with four of them.

Devices Not Loading Properly At Boot In OS X

Topher Kessler, CNET

There may be instances in OS X where devices that require a third-party driver (such as input devices and cameras) will not properly load at bootup. While a device may load when attached to the system after bootup, it may not be recognized properly when attached at during startup. When this happens, it is usually a problem either with the system's boot caches, or a problem with the developer's configuration of the driver being used for the device.

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

The Crapification Of iTunes’ Classical Music Store

Kirk McElhearn, Kirkville

Apple has clearly caved in to Wal-Mart style classical music sales.

Apple Updates GarageBand, iMovie

Jim Dalrymple, The Loop

CarTrip Will Connect Your iOS Device And Your Automobile

Kelly Hodgkins, TUAW

Apple Bumps UK Prices As VAT Rises

Eric Slivka, MacRumors

Some observers had hoped that Apple might choose to simply absorb the tax increases by reducing their prices slightly in order to maintain the psychological price points used for many of their products, but the company obviously decided that it needed to pass along the tax increase to consumers in order to maintain its margins.

Posterino 2.0.4

Linus Ly, ATPM

Apple's iPad: Restaurants Uploading Menus To Tablet For Diners

Caryn Rousseau, Associated Press

The upscale eatery on the northern bank of the Chicago River has invested in 40 iPads at about $700 each for wine selection. Since April, when Apple debuted the tablet, the device is now in use as a full menu at upscale restaurants, hamburger eateries and quick-service chains like Au Bon Pain. Restaurateurs said that's just the beginning.

Apple Replaces The Out-Of-Warranty iPod Touch I Broke For Free

Phil Villarreal, The Consumerist

After Apple Says Otherwise, iPhone Alarm Still Remains Silent

Nick Bilton, New York Times

On Sunday I wrote an article about an iPhone programming bug that failed to activate the phone’s built-in alarm, leaving a lot of customers upset, confused and late. In the article, I noted that Apple had acknowledged the problem existing but said it would automatically fix itself by Monday, Jan. 3. Yet on Monday morning the problem did not seem to have gone away. A lot of angry iPhone owners wrote in to The New York Times complaining that they had missed flights, were late for work or had failed to drop their kids off for the first day of the 2011 school year — all because the iPhone alarm didn’t work again.

Apple did not respond to a request for comment asking if there was an update to the programming error.

How To Stay Safe At A Public Wi-Fi Hotspot

Glenn Fleishman, Ars Technica

You have a variety of strategies to choose from, some of which are free and some of which have a modest cost attached. None are terribly complicated, but just require a commitment on your part if you feel at risk. Which you should.

New Apple iTunes Movie Features Allow Script Searching, Scene Sharing

Katie Marsal, AppleInsider

Movie studios have quietly expanded the feature set of content available on Apple's iTunes Store, allowing users to search a film's script for specific words, or select a clip and share it with others on a social networking site.

HandBrake Update Adds New Presets, Goes Intel-only

Jonathan Seff, Macworld

HandBrake 0.9.5 adds presets for the iPhone 4, the iPad, and the second-generation Apple TV; allows editing of queued jobs; includes support for SSA subtitles; can now find the VLC media player (required for HandBrake to convert encrypted DVDs) in the user’s Application folder; supports the Blu-ray disc structure (but doesn’t decrypt Blu-ray discs); and more.

Monday, January 3, 2011

Hate The Finder? Get A Finder With Super Powers

Ron McElfresh, Mac360

Restoring Angry Birds Saved Game Data

Christopher Breen, Macworld

What you want to do is move a copy of the highscores.lua file from her iPad to your Mac and then replace the copy of this same file on your iPad with her copy.

Will Businesses Find A Place For iPads In 2011?

Brad Reed, Network World

While businesses have warmed to the iPad more quickly than they did with the iPhone, some say they’re still figuring out what to make of the device.

One big issue is deciding how best to utilize iPads in the enterprise space. Sure, they’re light, accessible and employees love them—but are they really a replacement for either smartphones or laptops? The answer to both questions is so far “no,” at least for most workers.

Rhyme Time

Ben Boychuk, Macworld

Ben Turley’s Rhyme Time helps fill the bill as a simple but reasonably sophisticated rhyming dictionary for the iPhone and iPod touch. The interface is what you might expect of a dictionary: drab and utilitarian. You tap the search bar and up pops the keypad. Type in your word and the app will return a range of word selections.

Layar 4.0 Brings Interactive Features, New Interface

David Chartier, Macworld

Information about the currently selected location is now displayed in a tighter, more polished interface. If you easily succumb to sea-sickness while traveling, the Camera View also takes advantage of the iPhone 4’s gyroscope to stabilize the view.

Apple Woes Continue As Some Oversleep In Asia And Europe

Kelvin Soh And Tarmo Virki, Reuters

Some iPhone users in Asia and Europe complained of malfunctioning alarms on the first working day of 2011, even after Apple reassured users that its phones' built-in clocks will work from Monday.

The problem was not limited only to the iPhone, with some owners of other Apple products, such as its iPod music players, also complaining of a similar problem with their alarms.

Confirmed: New Year’s iOS Alarm Bug Does Fix Itself

Alexander Vaughn, AppAdvice

What Can You Redownload From Apple's iTunes Store?

John Gordon

The rules variation is a bit confusing.

iPhone = Mac 2.0

Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note

iPad Publishing: Time To Switch To V2.0

Frédéric Filloux, Monday Note

It would be unfair to blame publishers such as Condé Nast for the the disappointing performances of their iPad first steps. Six months to adjust to a completely new medium seems acceptable. And the current experiences still produce some helpful lessons.

Sunday, January 2, 2011

Best Mac Email Client: 6 On Test

Ian Betteridge, TechRadar

That leaves us with one winner: Apple's Mail. It's free, works with virtually every kind of server going, is integrated well into OS X, and has plenty of options for handling accounts, spam, and filters.

How My iPhone Made Me Miss My First Flight Of The Year

Helmut Granda

We had been victims of the software glitch.

MacBook Air 11″

Matt Legend Gemmell

If you’re tempted by the 11-inch model’s portability but are worried about whether you could get your work done, put your concerns aside – it’s an excellent machine and more than up to the job.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Studio Artist 4 Review

David Biedny, Mac Life

In a world studded with Photoshop-style image editors and Painter-like natural-media tools, it’s really tough to find a new kind of artistic software that brings something truly unique and innovative to the table. But the little-known Studio Artist 4 totally pulls it off, delivering a one-of-a-kind creative application that can craft visuals like nothing else—if you’re prepared to spend some time mastering its intricacies.

iPhone Alarms May Fail To Activate On New Year's Day

Chris Rawson, TUAW

If you're using your iPhone or iPod touch as your primary alarm clock, it might be time to reconsider.

UltraEdit Makes The Leap To Mac OS X

Michael Terretta, TUAW

UltraEdit for Mac was officially released this month. A favorite of Windows developers, UltraEdit was first released in 1994 as one of the earliest "Notepad" replacement text editors for programmers on Windows.

Why The iPad Is Destroying The Future Of Journalism

Bradford Cross, Measuring Measures

The iPad is a delightful device, but it can't salvage the existing model for journalism.

By Heng-Cheong Leong

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