I hope all of you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
There will be no more news updates on MacVolPlace until January 3.
Please be safe and I will see you back here then. -- Michael.
Tim Schaaff has left Apple Computer for Sony Corporation, where he has been appointed to the newly-created position of Senior Vice President of Software Development, effective immediately. -- AppleInsider.
After speaking with 20 Apple Specialist this week, research and investment firm Piper Jaffray said that resellers are experiencing stronger holiday sales of both iPods and Macs this year verses last year, with only a "handful" of customers choosing to hold off their new Mac purchases until Intel Macs are unveiled. -- AppleInsider.
iCab is an alternative web browser. It supports HTML 4, image filtering, cookie filtering, bookmarks, java and javascript support, search modes, importing of web archives from Explorer, download manager, and more.
Vern Seward composed a Christmas carol dedicated to those slaving away over their Windows PC. -- The Mac Observer.
MacFixIt continue to receive reports from readers who have had complete success using purportedly Windows-only hardware devices with Mac OS X. As they've been noting in their prior reports on this topic, most of the devices mentioned need no driver installation. In many cases, this is due to devices' adherence to the OHCI (Open host controller interface) standard, which Mac OS X supports. FireWire and USB devices that use OHCI generally exhibit at least partial compatibility with Mac OS X out-of-the-box, and if truly compliant, full compatibility.
Mactracker 4.0.2 provides technical info for every Apple, Motorola, Power Computing, and UMAX Mac OS computer, plus iPods, printers, and other Apple hardware. Major changes in this release are a timeline option to view models by date introduced, plus updated history information for the latest iPods. MacTracker is free (donations accepted) for Mac OS X 10.2 and up and iPods. (Classic Mac OS and Windows versions still at 4.0.1.)
Deep Freeze Mac has changed the way IT Professionals approach end-point security; its non-restrictive concept offers the most robust Macintosh protection available. The need for IT professionals to perform rebuilds, re-image, or troubleshoot computers is eliminated with Deep Freeze Mac's reboot-to-restore technology. The result is a dramatic reduction in support and IT expenditures and a substantial increase in computer uptime. This edition of Deep Freeze Mac can be deployed and controlled with Apple Remote Desktop (ARD).
Apple's newly announced Power Macs are expensive, but deliver never-before-seen performance, including the highest score of any computer on the CPU-intensive CineBench rendering test; however, it still under-delivers in terms of gaming performance and the company is late to the market with its first dual-core processors. Awarding the Quad G5 systems a 4.5 out of 5, the review of Apple's Quad Power Mac G5 by PC Magazine says the system is worth upgrading to "for those who need (and can justify) the power and expense. The dual G5 cores in each of the two CPUs push the G5 Quad to performance numbers we've never seen before. With four true cores working on the same task, the G5 Quad powered through our new Adobe Photoshop CS2 tests at a speedy 57 seconds.
Digigami announced that its new MegaPEG HDTV VBR MPEG-2 encoder is capable of matching, and in some cases exceeding the picture quality of current H.264 encoders while simultaneously offering reduced bit rates. Echoing Sony's recent claims that MPEG-2 can and will achieve quality/bit rates comparable to H.264 for the next generation of optical disc formats, the company said that its MPEG-2 encoder is "actually outperforming H.264 by a wide margin on 720p/1080p film content. Typically, our HD MPEG-2 encoder can produce VBR files two thirds to one half the bit rate produced by current H.264 encoders. On our website we have compressed material which supports this assertion." Apple's video iPod uses the H.264 format to play movies, as does its QuickTime 7 software. The Digigami MegaPEG HDTV VBR MPEG-2 encoder is available for $1,000 (system requirements were unavailable).
On the Mac mini product page, the company is highlighting the funky projects that customers have sent them using the Mac mini. Among the projects featuring the Mac mini: a Millennium Falcon with built-in camera, an in-dashboard installation and an autonomous robot.
In addition to the Mac mini colocation's discussed on the Mac mini web page above digital.forest, a hosting and colocation provider, offers colocation for your Mac mini, if you want to use it as a server. Be warned, though, that you might want to update the hard drive to a faster and more reliable model before you count on it for day to day server use.
Despite your best efforts, some photos just turn out bad. But what if the bad photo in question is that one shot in a million? You may not be able to turn a bad photo into a well-shot photo; however, with a little creative problem solving, you might just be able to turn it into something worth keeping. Macworld's latest installment in the -- Digital Photography Help Desk series tells you where to turn in a photo emergency.
Admit it, you probably looked a Javascript in the late 90's , thought it was good for a few narrow areas (special effects on a web page, validating user input) and then went elsewhere to program in a 'real' language. If asked, we'd complain about lack of language features and the restrictiveness of running only within a client side browser. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
Do you remember the day when Linux users had no Internet browser? Under the conformities of MSXML Document Standard, those days would return. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
Many of the big players now offer free or 'light' versions of their databases, some would call them crippleware. Builder AU compared databases from Oracle, IBM, Microsoft and MySQL, and the open source offering came out on top.
It's incredibly easy to create and syndicate your own audio content. Here's how. -- Webmonkey.
Bad information and outright lies pulled off the internet can cause harm. In a benign case, maybe you louse up a term paper. In its malignant form, you could ruin a life. What, if anything, should be done about it? -- Wired.
Many people are interested in getting their linux or BSD desktop interface to look as much like Apple's very successful OS X gui as possible. Now you can do it by yourself. [Or you could just get a Mac!] -- Linux/BSD Gangsters.
Aperture 1.0.1 Update addresses a number of issues related to reliability and performance. Among the key areas addressed are:
Here's the perfect tip to go with the new Mac you're getting for the holidays. Learn how Mac OS X Tiger makes it a cinch to move your stuff - files, email settings, bookmarks, etc. - from your old Mac to your new one. -- Apple.
The Pioneers of the Inevitable take aim at iTunes, with open-source music software called Songbird. -- c|net.
It's almost official: Starting Feb. 18, 2009, millions of televisions in American households relying on an antenna to receive "over-the-air" analog broadcasts will go black unless they're outfitted to receive all-digital broadcasts. -- c|net.
One significant new feature in Intel's upcoming Yonah Processor is "Virtualization Technology". Intel describes it as "allowing a platform to run multiple operating systems and applications in independent partitions."
Examples of use Intel provides include administrators performing background system upgrades as well as separating business and personal use environments. The most interesting potential use is described here:
Home users could create virtual "partitions" isolating multiple user environments such as dedicating resources to a PC game, productivity, and personal video recorder-type environments
Potential uses under Apple's implementation of the Intel processors, of course, include the possibility of launching multiple operating systems, such as Windows and Linux, alongside Mac OS X. Alternatively, Tiger's Fast User Switching could be expanded to provide completely independent environments.
This Intel presentation slide posted on Anandtech's article from Intel Developer Forum 2005 confirms that Yonah is expected to include Virtualization Technology.
This technology brings back up a tamper-resistant code patent which Apple was recently granted. The patent description curiously also had a description of the use of multiple operating systems:
Apple also talks about securing the code while interchanging information among multiple operating systems. Linux, Mac OS X and Windows are called out specifically in the filing.
Forbes reports that Goldman Sachs research analyst David C. Bailey maintained an "in-line" rating on Apple Computer but raised earnings estimates for the company, expecting holiday iPod demand and anticipation of upcoming product announcements to continue to drive earnings growth into 2006. "2006 will undoubtedly mark another major year in Apple's transformation, but its new markets bring together tougher competition," wrote the analyst in a recent research note. "If early indications from suppliers prove correct, Apple is likely to move further from its Mac core in 2006, leveraging its brand and building on the consumer success of iPod."
MacInTouch's new report on Content Management Systems (CMS) includes some great resources, leads and experiences from readers, plus a variety of options, many of which are free/open-source.
After attempts earlier this year to encourage Mac users to consider possible security threats on a platform that has had no virus threats in several years, Symantec on Tuesday admitted that its own NAV anti-virus application makes Macs less secure and could allow a malicious user to remotely take control of the computer, according to ZDnet Australia. Symantec has admitted that all versions of Norton Anti-Virus (NAV), including the version for Mac OS X, contain the security vulnerability and has yet to issue a patch to fix the issue; however it has updated its scanning signatures to look for applications that try to exploit the vulnerability, according to the report.
Rob Griffiths of Macworld was minding his own business, writing a fine column on how lousy the global Services menu has become, but during his research something miraculous happened: he caused a solution (Service Scrubber) to be created!
Apple and Microsoft will again provide the bookends for the year. In January, Apple is expected to unveil the first Macs based on Intel (INTC ) processors. These are likely to include a new generation of mobile chips designed to bring more desktop-like performance to Windows and Mac laptops. And in the fall, Microsoft will release a version of Windows, called Vista, that will bring the first major change in the look and feel of the operating system in a decade. -- BusinessWeek.
Sanrasoft Software Ltd., a Chennai-based firm, has unveiled what it claims is a breakthrough anti-virus technology based on the intention of malicious codes, protecting PCs from not only known viruses but also from unknown malicious codes including viruses, Trojan horses, worms, spyware, keyloggers and hackers." -- EE Times.
MacResearch, which I think is a great site for the Mac using Scientist, has pondered the question of why there hasn't been a boom in Scientific Software exclusively for the Mac. As a Mac-using Scientist and Developer, I am quite well credentialed to offer some insight into this. -- Maniacal Extent.
In the world of Web 2.0 - today's shorthand for using software that lives on the Internet for what were traditionally desktop-bound applications - there is real reason to believe a worthy rival for Word will emerge.
One that I have been trying is called Writely. I am not ready to hit the delete button on my Word icon, but this Internet-based program is so good that I can see the potential in the near-term future. A comparable Web service called gOffice is not too far behind. -- International Herald Tribune.
O'Reilly releases DV Filmmaking: From Start to Finish. This book provides a solid foundation of tremendous value to a beginner, while addressing the fine points of filmmaking with a level of sophistication, detail, and insight that even the most worldly director or educator can appreciate. Ian David Aronson, the book's author, draws upon his years of experience teaching at the college and graduate level, his extensive professional background as a media producer, and his unmistakable love of cinema to create a text that's educational and fun to read.
Geert Matton wanted to integrate his iPod into his car and do it in a way that he would be able to use the full potential of his iPod and in a nice way, no haywire of cables. This is what he came up with. -- O'Grady's PowerPage
Just when I thought that WiFi (802.11b/g) networks were getting safer, I get an email from a friend indicating that Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) has been cracked. -- ZDNet.
We've no idea what's up for the expo, but the tea leaves point to Intel's Viiv. Efforts to find out what the new digital-entertainment platform is all about reveal that Intel's just as secretive as Apple. -- Wired.
The Newton Museum is closing, and everything's gotta go. -- Wired.
Scott Stollburg is a photographer who has put up a site with some of his work. It is all Flash and has some very beautiful photos. The only down side is everyone else is looking at them too.
No more database-dependent SQL queries, no more external library integration. At last, PHP developers will not dream of Lucene anymore. They can develop their own search engine, with results ordered by relevancy and smart indexing. Take a look at this fifteen-minutes tutorial from the symfony project.
The movements of all vehicles on the roads in Britain are to be recorded. A new national surveillance system will hold the records of scanned number plates of all cars that use the roads. 100% Appalling. -- The Independent.
X11R7.0 is the first release of the complete modularized and autotooled source code base for the X Window System. First major release in over a decade! Many new features, including EXA Acceleration. -- Linux Edge.
The latest updates to all Soundtrack Pro applications: Soundtrack Pro and Compressor 2.
HP is preparing to reengage in the digital music market, following the termination of its exclusive deal with Apple to distribute HP-branded iPods. -- Macworld.
Do you have a lot of stuff in your mailbox? Never clean it out? Well, if you leave too much stuff in there you might find yourself saying, "My stuff! It's... GONE?!" -- AppleCare Knowledge Base
Security-Protocols is reporting that there is a possible security problem in QuickTime and iTunes for both Mac and Windows users. The security risk, called a Heap Overflow, affects Mac OS X 10.4.3 and Windows PCs capable of running Win32 code. The flaw was tested with QuickTime 7.0.3 and iTunes 6.0.1, but the report claims that all version are at risk.
Apple is the fastest growing site on the Web, beating out Google, Amazon, and even Microsoft, according to a recent Nielson/NetRatings study. -- The Mac Observer.
Here's how I installed Apache2 (version 2.0.55) and MySQL5 (Standard 5.0.16 for Mac OS X 10.4) on OS X 10.4. -- Mac OS X Hints.
A group of PC and consumer electronic companies announced that they are working on a specification for a new display-connector called UDI.
UDI stands for United Display Interface and is intended to serve as a next-generation digital display interface standard for PCs. It is expected to replace the old VGA analog standard connectors as well as providing compatibility with both the DVI and HDMI standards presently used in High Definition consumer products.
UDI will also support HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) which is also supported in the HDMI standard. The Special Interest Group includes a number of industry leaders, including Apple and Intel Corp.
According to this TG Daily article, UDI will be the graphical interface "for the next ten years" by providing added bandwidth at least twice the capability of the largest displays today.
The final specification is expected to be finalized in the second quarter of 2006.
A few weeks ago MacFixIt ran coverage on the ability to use some purportedly unsupported (Windows-only) OEM devices with Mac OS X -- a topic that prompted response from a number of readers who have had similar success. -- MacFixIt
Many users run into a problem where documents are opened using the wrong application, or the wrong version of an application. In most cases, this problem can be resolved simply by deleting the undesired version of an application. Mac OS X should automatically recognize that the discarded application no longer be used to open documents and switch to the proper application by default. Duplicate applications can also be left over from Archive and Install, and can actually cause problems in current versions of applications. -- MacFixIt.
SearchDataCenter reports on the resurgence of liquid cooling in large-scale computing centers. "Shinpaugh runs the Terascale Computing Facility, which supplies Virginia Tech's research department the computing resources for molecular modeling and other high performance computing functions with thousands of Apple computers. Shinpaugh said the facility has one hot aisle and two cold aisles, 40 feet long. And when the system is running at full CPU load, it's over 95 degrees in the hot aisle."
A new FileMaker updater brings both Pro and Advanced versions to 8.0v2. The fix includes improvements in several areas, including scripting, calculations ODBC/JDBC, file options, printing, PDF, import, text editing, find, indexing custom menus (FileMaker Pro 8 Advanced only), and tool tips (FileMaker Pro 8 Advanced only). Please see the Read Me file included with the free downloadable update for more details.
With Microsoft's elimination of support for IE for the Mac, it has been asked what alternative browsers were available for Mac OS 9. (IE for the Mac is still going to run folks. There is just not going to be any support from Microsoft. Like there was any. And no one should be using IE on the Mac anyway! It's a dog!) I don't know why after all these years you are still using 9 but if you are then these browsers are for you. Doesn't mean they will work on all sites though.
A MacInTouch reader offered a helpful tip about PowerBook battery problems:
I had a similar problem with my PowerBook G4 battery as that Rob Wyatt had discussed in his post dated 8 July 2003. One night, thinking that my power adaptor was plugged into my G4, I left the computer running for several hours which depleted the battery. After that night, my computer didn't completely recognize the battery. There was an "x" in the battery icon in the upper left hand corner of the computer screen. Initially, I thought it was a graphics issue. I realized that the battery wasn't being fully charged one day when pressing the indicator key on the battery itself and noticing that only one of the five indicator lights lit up. To solve the problem I did the following:
This solved the problem. The battery percentage indicator indicated that the battery was previously only charging to 24%. The light on the power-adaptor changed from green to amber and the battery started to fully recharge. For information on how to reset the PMU, refer to the following link: Resetting PowerBook and iBook Power Management Unit (PMU). Thanks to all who provided input in previous posts.
Among the many milestones in the tech world this last year, one occurred almost without notice. The Bay Area NeXT Group, an important user group formed 15 years ago around Steve Jobs' second great computer design, slipped into history in 2005, even as the technology that sparked it reached millions of users under a new name: OS X. -- Wired.
The Firefox extension NoScript gives the World Wide Web back to the users. If you open up the Console utility and leave it in the background while you browse around with NoScript installed, you'll see a message every time a script is blocked. It's very satisfying to see line after line scroll by; I imagine tiny screams of agony as they are crushed. If I happen across a site that I actually need to have scripting enabled on, I can choose to do so, white-listing the site temporarily or permanently. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
John Rayl tells Steve what he thinks of Aperture after installing it on his Mac.
In the modern day world of technological advances, isn't it about time we replaced Santa Claus with an algorithm? -- O'Reilly Developer Weblog.
In the light of yesterday's comments, I'm giving a Finder alternative a try. Will I survive in the jungle of file sorting options? -- O'Reilly Developer Weblog.
Researchers are working to make the Internet smarter -- but that could make it even slower, warn experts like Google's Vinton Cerf. -- MIT Technology Review.
Psychologists at the University of Liverpool have found that people still find it difficult to understand how mirrors work. -- physorg.
For now I am enjoying this, not so amateur, radio that is easily downloaded directly to my PC and walkman. In my opinion, these are the 10 best podcasts from 2005. -- Ben Bishop.
When you browse the Internet, Safari stores information about the websites you visit on your computer. That information can include the contents of the webpages you've viewed and any information you've entered at a site, such as usernames, passwords, and credit card numbers. Other people who use your computer may be able to view that information.
If you don't want Safari to store this information, you can turn on private browsing. When private browsing is turned on
To turn on private browsing, choose Safari > Private Browsing.
To turn off private browsing, choose Safari > Private Browsing again, and close any windows you've used to view private information. (Other users can view pages you've visited in any open window by using the Back and Forward buttons.)
Private browsing is always turned off when you open Safari, even if it was on when you last quit Safari.
If you have an administrative account on a computer, you can control which websites users can view in Safari. Users will be able to view only those websites that are in the bookmarks bar. In addition, they will not be able to enter web addresses in the address field, use the Google search field, or modify any of the bookmarks.
When you add a page to the Bookmarks Bar, the user will be able to visit any page on that site. For example, if you add a bookmark for http://www.apple.com/index.html, the user will be able to visit any page at apple.com, and not just index.html.
While you're still logged in as the user, try to access the sites you want that user to view, so you can make sure the user can still view them. For example, some web pages don't display content but transfer you automatically to a page on a different site. If you want a user to view that content, both sites (the original site and the site you're transferred to) must be in the bookmarks bar.
Parental controls does not prevent a user from viewing websites in other browsers. To prevent a user from using other web browsers, use the Accounts pane in System Preferences to set up the parental controls for Finder & System, and choose the applications the user can open.
You can use parental controls to create an account for a user with safe limits on the applications they can run, what files they can access, and how they use the internet.
With parental controls you can:
To setup an account with parental controls:
Apple provides a site and a video on this topic.
The latest updates to all Final Cut Pro 5 applications: Final Cut Pro 5, Cinema Tools 3, LiveType 2, Compressor 2.
In a best effort to meet demand for its top-selling iPod nano this holiday, Apple Computer is building and shipping 100,000 of the ultra-slim digital music players each day, reliable sources tell AppleInsider.
Lost in the wilderness of motherboard-related terms and acronyms? Ars is here to help. In Part I of the Ars Technica Motherboard Guide, Hannibal introduces you to the basic components, layout, and functioning of the motherboard.
At the close of this last full holiday shopping weekend before Christmas, we thought we'd go a little Toy Technica on you, and delve ever so briefly into a spotty history of toys, with a little Roman flavor added into the mix.
Adam Engst, TidBits Publisher, announced on Tuesday that the venerable Info-Mac Network is closing down. Info-Mac has the distinction of being the oldest mac related service on the Internet.
This guide serves to provide information for users who are new to or want to know more about the Mac platform. If you are interested in learning about software, media players, shortcuts and would like to find out some useful tips, tricks and hints then this guide should prove valuable. It is not supposed to be exhaustive, but rather to give you a head start and a better insight into the world of Mac.
This workaround, and others, can be found in MacFixIt's tutorial "Improving AirPort reception, avoiding dropouts/lost connectivity, working around card/Base station recognition issues."
NewsFactor asks why, if Apple's Xserve G5 offers significant processing power, notable storage capacity, and robust remote-management capabilities, making the server perfect for corporate environments, more businesses aren't trying them? "Despite the lack of corporate adoption, Apple does seem to be finding success with getting the Xserve into universities and research facilities. This is not surprising because Apple has had a firm grasp on the education market through its desktop and notebook products for a long time."
An ABA Journal article, "The Top 10 in Tech," reviews some advantages of Macs in the legal profession. There are at least one sentence that is in error. Since there are relatively few Apple users in the country, there are few viruses written to cause problems with Apple computers. 35 million is not exactly "relatively few" and there are NO viruses on the Mac.
It's been a banner year from Mac products - just take a look at the 31 winners of Macworld's annual Editors' Choice Awards. From breakthrough products to great Mac tools, Macworld is celebrating their favorite Mac hardware and software of 2005. And they're letting their readers pick their favorites as well.
Adobe's Camera Raw is arguably the most popular RAW-format converter available today. In this video, Deke McClelland introduces you to this tool and shows you tips for making image adjustments. -- O'Reilly Digital Media.
We can't keep patching the Internet's security holes. Now computer scientists are proposing an entirely new architecture. -- MIT Technology Review.
A look at printing digital photos and buying a printer. -- TidBITS.
The French have some proposals to revise copyright law, changes that could affect programmers. The government seeks to adopt a European Union directive intended to regulate digital commerce over the Internet while protecting intellectual property rights. -- International Herald Tribune.
Apple Computer has sold out of its higher-capacity iPod digital music player and doesn't plan to restock until next year, according to a message on its Web site. -- AppleInsider.
"A revolution is quietly taking place in music education," says eSchool News. With the help of programs like GarageBand, students who don't even play an instrument can compose music and learn more about music theory in the process than ever before possible.
Panther (10.3) was able to install perfectly on the older iMacs and Power Macs(Blue & Whites). Now, because a FireWire port is required, you cannot install on those machines. There are, however, two ways you can install it on unsupported machines. You can either clone a drive that already has Tiger running, or you can burn a compatible copy of the install disc. I will only cover how to re-burn the DVD in this tutorial. -- Mac OS X Hints.
The standard way to delete a file is to:
However sometimes this message might appear when you try to empty the Trash: "The operation could not be completed because the item '(item name)' is locked." And because of permissions you may not be able to unlock it.
The way around this is by using the Terminal.
$ /Users/mam/.Trash/39567_v1_4689.pdf
$ sudo rm /Users/mam/.Trash/39567_v1_4689.pdf
$ sudo rm /Users/mam/.Trash/39567_v1_4689.pdf
Password:
sudo rm -rf
A ZDNet blog entry identifies Sirius and Apple as the "little guys" with viciously effective marketing strategies.
Marketing is like alchemy, and figuring out the right combination is difficult. Some companies get it, others don't. Apple gets it. I've always been astounded how effective Apple marketing is. There is an eight story "dancing silhouette" iPod advertisement right outside the Chateau Marmont on Sunset. Those ads are everywhere, and are distinctively identified with the Apple brand. You wouldn't need to have the Apple logo on the ad to know what it was about.
Apple is also really good about product placement. In movie-land, you'd think everyone uses a Mac. Why? Because Apple makes sure they get product placement.
So what does all this mean? If you are the little guy, yes, it's harder to get your message out. However, marketing is one heck of a powerful tool, and if used correctly, can turn the little guy into Godzilla. It takes imagination and message innovation. It is VERY doable, though.
Just ask Apple and Sirius.
Illustrated directions for a homemade iPod desk stand constructed from a single 34-inch Grip Twist. It actually looks like a tiny lounge chair to us: Let your iPod relax while it plays.
PC Magazine's latest computer reliability survey shows a decline in Apple quality for desktop computers [which we assume is largely attributable to iMac G5 defects], but Apple scored well in laptop reliability compared with PC notebooks.
Ingenico, a creator of secure transaction products, says its research teams have demonstrated an iPod-based payment system. The demonstration uses an iPod with Griffin Technology's iTrip FM transmitter to communicate with Ingenico's i5100 terminal. An FM data extraction module from Atlantic Radio System enables the terminal to capture data from the iPod.
Microsoft last week quietly announced that will officially discontinue support for Internet Explorer (IE) for the Mac at the end of this year, as noted by Macworld UK. The company updated its website, saying that the IE browser was support for 30 months following the announcement in 2003 that the company would discontinue development of IE for the Mac.
Apple Computer Inc, buoyed by the iPod effect and its new range of stylish, light notebook models, is set to take control of that market, researchers predict" -- Taipei Times.
The battle for the living room is heating up according to the Associated Press and in 2006 we can expect over one billion dollars to be spent promoting technologies aimed at bringing mainstream computing into our living rooms." -- TMCnet.
So, the thing that makes Apple better is not the design, OS, or a mouse button less, it is not playing the same rules that govern PCs. It is more a willingness to do the right thing, not the cheap thing. Because Apple doesn't play, it wins, and that really is the better way. -- The Inquirer.
The Power Mac G5 Quad is, simply, the most powerful Mac workstation to date. Offering four 64-bit 2.5 GHz processors (in a dual dual-core configuration), this top of the line system also sports numerous other improvements in architecture and various components, such as dual independent gigabit Ethernet interfaces, PCI Express and support for the workstation-class Nvidia Quadro FX 4500 512 MB graphics card. -- Creative Mac.
Apple UK has launched its new IT Pro site, a resource for IT Managers, technology professionals and system administrators.
The site offers a selection of written features profiles, how-to articles, links and other resources. It also offers links to articles from sites other than Apple, and a selection of video seminars and discussions exploring Mac OS X 10.4 Server and Xserve use.
Apple makes its pitch at the top of the page: "Combining the power of Unix with industry-leading ease of use, Apple offers a unique value proposition for IT managers. It begins with our commitment to open source technologies and open standards, making it easy to fit Apple products into your existing environment."
Feature articles look at security on wireless networks, asset management, intrusion protection, and a selection of high-performance computing and education-focused articles.
The company has also launched an emailing list for IT pros.
Common Criteria Certified - Apple has augmented its commitment to security by becoming Common Criteria certified for both Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server.
Security Guide for Mac OS X (3.1MB) - The US National Security Agency has released a Security Configuration Guide for Mac OS X.
Security in Mac OS X - Apple is working to ensure that your Mac is safe and secure by implementing a security strategy that is central to Mac OS X.
Trans Intl. today announced the immediate, worldwide availability of SwiftData200R. This new version of the popular Swiftdata 200R is engineered to give Dual and Quad-core Macintosh G5 users over 2 terabytes of internal SATA storage.
Through innovative engineering the SwiftData200R neatly fits an additional 3 drives inside a Macintosh G5 Dual and Quad-core computer. Combined with the two drives already in the Macintosh G5's SATA internal drive bay -- that's a total of 5 internal hard disk drives. This will give the user over 2 Terabytes of storage -- enough for over 140 hours of uncompressed DV video -- for audio professionals, this translates to over 3000 hours of stereo PCM audio. These drives can be used as RAID Type 0,1,5,10 or JBOD. One free PCI express slot is required for the SATA PCI express RAID card to control the additional drives.
Apple's just-released Broadband Tuner is supposed to let Mac users take advantage of very high-speed Internet connections. But what does that mean, exactly? This MWJ excerpt delves into the new release and whether you'll benefit from it.
Despite its many faults, the Finder remains at the heart of every Macintosh and appeals to my wish to make the process of organizing my work as simple as possible. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
The Mac OS X Finder routinely comes under attack. But is it justified? And if it is, what can be done? -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
All I want for Christmas is an Apple PDA, but not an Apple iDoEverythingInOneUnit. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
Introduced in Mac OS 9, Keychain Access is an API and an application designed to provide secure storage for all your sensitive information. It has continued to evolve in Mac OS X, and Giles Turnbull helps you unlock its mysteries. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
"callto:" URI to initiate a Skype call must be formatted differently in Safari. -- .
The Net's basic flaws cost firms billions, impede innovation, and threaten national security. It's time for a clean-slate approach, says MIT's David D. Clark. -- MIT Technology Review.
Five years ago, Apple Computer Inc. was barely an afterthought in the halls of electronics companies. Not anymore. -- Associated Press.
A timeline of significant 2005 events for Apple Computer Inc. -- Associated Press.
To shed some light on this recent round of updates, MacJournals takes a look at Security Update 2005-009, the most significant and widely relevant one of the bunch.
Steve Wozniak, the technical brains in the early days of Apple Computer, built a large, unusual custom home in Los Gatos, California. That home has been completely remodeled and is now for sale, according to this ad that ran in the United Airlines in-flight magazine (pdf).
Intel Corp. said on Tuesday its next-generation platform for laptop computers will use 25 percent less power while boosting performance, helping it stay on top of the fast-growing market, Reuters reports.
With Apple Computer now showing signs that it will fall far short of meeting overall holiday demand for the 4GB iPod nano, consumers eager to obtain the ultra-slim digital music player in time for Christmas have shown a willingness to pay over $350 (or 40-percent above retail). -- AppleInsider.
One of my favorite Mac OS X features is the ability to create ZIP compressed files from within the OS (basically, this shrinks the file size, ideal for files you're going to email - smaller file sizes mean faster file transfers). To create a compressed file, either Control-click on the file and choose Create Archive (which is Apple-speak for "make a compressed ZIP file"). Or you can click on a file, then go to the Action menu (the button that looks like a gear up in the Finder window's toolbar), and choose Create Archive from there. Either way, it quickly creates a new file, with the file extension ".zip." This is the compressed file. You can also compress several different files (like three, for example) into one single archive file - just Command-click (or Shift-click contiguous files) on all the files you want included, then choose Create Archive of X Items from the Action menu. A file will be created named "Archive.zip" (that's it!). By the way, if someone sends you a ZIP file, don't sweat it - just double-click it and Tiger will automatically decompress it.
It's been a long, strange trip for the personal computer over 30 years. Ars takes a look back at the comings and goings of players in the PC market, from Altair to Zeta OS, to see how we got where we are today. -- Ars Technica.
Ever been frustrated with Mail's simplistic new message count in its Dock icon? You get one number, representing only the messages in your inbox. But if you use rules to filter messages, you probably have unread mail in a number of folders, too. Enter DockStar. This Mail plug-in lets you view the unread count for up to five different mailboxes in Mail. I'm on a number of mailing lists, and I find this little tool is quite helpful for tracking new activity on four of them (in addition to my main inbox). -- Mac OS X Hints.
I wrote the other day about a problem I was having with Apple's Mail application. I use Charter's pop mail server and all of a sudden I was unable to use Mail to read my mail. I can send and I can login via the web and I can get my mail with Entourage. I have tried a lot of things, which I won't go into, without success.
Today I read on MacFixIt about "SBC Global/Yahoo: Problems with passwords when checking e-mail" a similar situation. I think it is time for me to call Charter.
I found that the problem was a change in server. I was going to the wrong one. I had to call to find out what it was. It wasn't listed on their web site. I swear I had not changed that. (Isn't that what all users sat?) I don't care, as long as it works. One more thing, I can't download mail from the Charter account if any other account, say UT, is active. If I turn off the other accounts Charter works. Anyone else run into that?
Bloomberg News is the latest to throw its hat into the burgeoning speculation about early Intel-based Mac announcements. "Seven analysts, including Citigroup Inc.'s (C) Richard Gardner, expect Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs to unveil the systems at Macworld Expo next month, instead of waiting until June. They cited unidentified industry sources and declined to say whether they received the information from Apple or Intel employees. 'It's signature Jobs to pull an effort like that forward by half a year,' said Roger Kay, president of researcher Endpoint Technologies Associates in Wayland, Mass., and one of the people expecting a January release."
The new laptops are based on Intel's new Napa platform that will enable the biggest upgrade in two years for portable technology. An Apple laptop with the technology could address the pent-up demand among the Macintosh faithful who have been disappointed with Apple laptops that run on Power PC chips. Apple said this year it would switch to Intel by mid-2006. -- San Jose Mercury News.
In Ryan Faas's last look at Macintosh security, he wrote about the importance of configuring individual workstations to make their local resources and data more secure (see "To secure a Mac workstation, remember the users.") In this installment, he offers a look at additional ways to tighten security on workstations, from disabling peer-to-peer sharing to limiting SSH access and securing local NetInfo data. -- Computerworld.
A French Macintosh user, Elie, has managed to connect an Apple PowerBook G4 to the navigation/display system in his Audi A6. -- Leftlane News.
On Dec. 8, the US Patent & Trademark Office revealed that Apple filed patent application 20050273591 titled "System for real-time adaptation to changes in display configuration." -- Macsimum News.
Microsoft believes a future with more than one open document standard is preferable to a single standard. It'll be up to third-party vendors to supply the necessary converters and filters so that users can move between Microsoft's proposed Open XML specification and the OpenDocument standard supported by the likes of IBM Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc., according to a Microsoft executive. -- Macworld.
Twelve manufacturers entered this fifth annual camera cook-off. Each submitted the one sub-$300 camera (online price) that it felt took the best pictures. -- New York Times.
The Personal Computer's biggest enemy is Personal File Sharing. Without File Sharing, the word would be bigger, better, brighter -- and full of cotton candy. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
With the excitement around ruby on rails and other "web frameworks", Apple has a chance to be involved in web development in a big way. But this new framework development is community driven, Apple has to be more open to take advantage of it. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
Are your users getting the most from value your feeds? In the course of working on the design for several RSS/Atom-enabled applications, I have become increasingly dissatisfied with the typical form of syndicated feeds. These feeds are so easy to generate that we can readily squirt out all sorts of information from applications without any regard to usability. I believe that such feeds shouldn't just be informational, they should actually be usable. -- O'Reilly XML.com.
Nature magazine recently conducted a head-to-head competition between Wikipedia and Britannica, having experts compare 42 science-related articles. The result was that Wikipedia had about 4 errors per article, while Britannica had about 3. However, a pair of endeavoring Wikipedians dug a little deeper and discovered that the Wikipedia articles in the sample were, on average, 2.6 times longer than Britannica's - meaning Wikipedia has an error rate far less than Britannica's." The story available on the BBC too.
Faster, cooler-running consumer PCs are coming. The key: two, four, eight, or even a hundred CPUs on a single microprocessor. -- MIT Technology Review.
A research breakthrough duplicates the security benefits of quantum cryptography using conventional electronics and copper wires. Making it practical is another matter. -- Wired.
Several computer hardware and software manufacturers, including AMD, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Microsoft and Sun, have gotten together and created a chip that will be built into computers that will, for all intents and purposes, broadcast a unique identifier that anyone will be able to read when you access the Internet. -- MSNBC.
MainMenu is an easy-to-use menubar item that allows you to run a large set of Mac OS X maintenance, cleaning and optimization tasks. MainMenu can repair permissions, update prebindings, clean system and users caches, empty many browsers caches/history, force empty the trash, clean logs, repair disks, and much more. Most tasks provide feedback in the log window during execution. The batch task function allows you to run many routines at once. Bug reports, feature requests, feedback (positive as well as negative) and anything else are welcome. MainMenu is currently free.
PiXel Check is an application that assists you in visually inspecting your LCD flat-panel display for bad or "dead" piXels.
Apple Mail plug-ins and tools is a repository of plug-ins and tools that extend the functionality of Apple's Mail.app (v. 2.0 and above). New plug-ins and tools are periodically notified on the site update notification list.
John Foerster writes in the Jul. 22, 2005 MacInTouch Mail.app Readers Report:
Paul Higginbotham wrote in 3/31/05 that he was experiencing problems connecting to his mail server using Mail.app. The application repeatedly brought up the password dialogue box, and the mail was never sent. I've had the same problem, and solved it using a rather obvious approach: I eliminated the old account and recreated it.
There's a bit more to the story: After confirming that the problem was on my end (my Windows XP machine worked fine with the same IMAP account, and my web host confirmed everything was fine on their end), I made numerous attempts to solve the problem, without success. I tried changing the password on my server (and Mail.app), changing the mail server port (as per my host's instructions), creating a dedicated port on my router (port 143), and other measures. Nothing worked.
I finally decided to eliminate all traces of the mail account and then recreate it. This worked. I used the following steps:
When restarting Mail.app, you will be prompted to create a new account (if the one eliminated was your only account). I use an IMAP account, and my mail immediately begin reloading. To my delight, the problem was fixed. Interestingly, it worked without designating my mail server as needing authentication (which was supposed to be necessary). It now seems to work with or without server authentication.
I read up a little more, and found that the Keychain First Aid is built into Mail.app with 10.3 and later (in the Keychain Access app, go to Window and choose Keychain First Aid). I found this after already getting things working, so I didn't attempt to use it, but it seems like something worth trying first.
More home and entertainment software is available for Windows computers than for Macs. Apple's computers, however, have attractions of their own. The brand repeatedly scores at or near the top in tech support and has been reliable. Our most recent survey of desktop computer users, in fact, rated Apple more than 20 points ahead of all the other computer manufacturers for technical support. Viruses and spyware are also far less likely to target Macs than Windows PCs, judging by the number of viruses estimated to target each computing platform--a ratio of about 1,000-to-1 [This is incorrect as there are NO viruses on OS X. -- mam] -- ConsumerReports.
I've noticed a tension in most Aperture discussions. The comments to my posts, reviews on other sites, and even personal conversations have revealed an undercurrent of edginess regarding Apple's professional photo management tool.
This is an application that I find interesting. It has innovations that merit exploration, in spite of its flaws. I want to keep exploring and documenting what I discover. I thought that now might be a good time to provide a place for readers to post general comments about Aperture. That way I can stay more on-topic with my upcoming pieces focusing on specific areas. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
There are myriad ways to control and manipulate information on a MySQL server -- some are stand-alone GUI apps, some are web-based, and of course the venerable (and powerful) command-line option is always available. Robert Daeley shows some of the most useful tools. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
If you can't manually (or via an application) adjust the brightness or resolution of your PowerBook display in Mac OS X 10.4 through 10.4.2, or if Displays preferences only shows the native resolution of the built-in display, download and install the Mac OS X 10.4.3 Update, or later.
In Mac OS X 10.4.2 or later, Address Book might fail to import information from a .txt or .cvs file if the file contains a line break. No alert message appears when this happens, but the data from the file will not appear in Address Book. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
Adobe has released two significant maintenance updates -- one for InDesign CS and the other for InCopy.
MacVideoPro has a tutorial for getting video on the iPod. "Well, what passes for science on these pages, anyway. Theoretically, there's no magic to transcoding video for the iPod , since Apple is quite forthcoming about the video specs of the new iPods. In a nutshell, you can encode to MPEG -4 video or to Apple's flavor du jour, the snappily named H.264."
MacInTouch's Mac Justification has an interesting perspective today about PCs and large organizations, another from a print production veteran and a third from a Mac tech, along with others, while Marginalization comments on Apple vs. Microsoft content-control systems.
Jason Parry has managed to upgrade his iPod mini to 8 gigabytes of storage. He upgraded the now-discontinued music player by installing an 8GB "Seagate Photo Hard
On Dec. 6, the US Patent & Trademark Office revealed that Apple was granted Patent number 6,973,585 for the patent titled "Conserving power by reducing voltage supplied to an instruction-processing portion of a processor." The sole inventor listed on the patent is Lynn R. Youngs, for application number 103911 dated April 2005. -- Macsimum News.
We've looked at each and every Mac product released between November 1, 2004, and November 1, 2005. The results of our search? A list of 31 winners of all shapes and sizes that have one thing in common - they all packed a big punch in the past year. -- Macworld
I figure with enough time and effort, anyone could be a System Administrator. Really, it's not hard, it just takes practice, methodology, and trial and error. A lot of trial and error. These truths will certainly get you on your way. Let's get started. -- The Search for a Good Story.
Before long your car will stay up-to-date with your entire iTunes library. SimpleDevices is working with auto-components company Delphi on an in-vehicle media system that synchs the media from your PC via a wireless link. -- Wired.
Collection of wonderful articles/tricks about CSS. Really useful. -- CSSBeauty.
Apple is making "great progress" on the Intel version of Mac OS X 10.4 "Tiger," says one analyst who also predicts the first Intel Mac systems will include PowerBooks, iBooks and Mac minis. -- AppleInsider.
As universities begin podcasting courses, concerns over unintended consequences arise. What if you held a class and no one came? -- Ars Technica.
Two interesting events took place while I was distracted with Google over the past couple weeks -- events that give us just a bit more information about where the future of digital media distribution is likely to end up, and the risks companies are willing to take to be part of that future. -- I, Cringely.
As 2005 comes to a close, Apple (and Pixar) CEO Steve Jobs is racking up the kudos and honors, with BusinessWeek naming him one of the best business leaders in the world. Indeed, the magazine said that, "No one in techland had a better year -- or a broader impact -- than Apple Computer CEO Steve Jobs."
SoCal Tech reports that San Diego-based DivX has release an upgraded tool for creating DivX encoded video on the Mac platform. "DivX said that it has released DivX 6 for Mac, including DivX Converter for Mac, a stand-alone DivX encoder for the Mac platform. The new DivX Converter software provides drag and drop encoding into the DivX format. The release also includes a Quicktime codec plug-in for playback and export of DivX video. The new software supports Quicktime 6 and 7, and Mac OS X 10.3 or later. DivX markets its own video compression and decompression scheme which compresses video files to a very small size compared to industry standard MPEG compression."
Microsoft Windows computers use the Server Message Block (SMB) network protocol to share files and printers with other computers, including both Windows and Macintosh computers.
If a Windows client gets an error when trying to copy files from an Apple share point using SMB, it may be because the file name contains characters that don't adhere to Windows file naming conventions. If you can't see or share a Mac OS X share point, this could also be caused by illegal characters in the server's share point name. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
FireWireDirect.com today unveiled the HSB12-RM, its FireWire 12-bay rack-mount system offering up to six terabytes of storage with support for paired RAID level zero.
Finding music on the internet is getting easier by the week as legit and less-than-legit file-trading services show up by the dozens. Given all of the options, the number and variety of file formats can be ultimately confusing for the uninitiated. Today we'll study the most popular audio formats and the players that support them. -- Wired.
I love the OS X interface. But sometimes it is faster to use the keyboard. Here are just X of the many keyboard shortcuts for OS X:
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and with that in mind you might be interested in David's list of best shareware and freeware of the year which excludes any commercial applications.
Once again another Macintosh backup strategy from Bob Snow over at O'Grady's PowerPage. I don't care which one you use, but you should have one.
Google a topic, and the results are based on popularity, right? Wrong. Inside the shadowy world of 'SEOs.' -- Newsweek.
For too long, I was being too fussy. Every time I tried Thunderbird, I abandoned it scant hours later, unable to forgive it for not fitting, precisely, the way I work. Turned out that by making a few adjustments to my established working pattern - or, put another way, just relaxing a little bit - I started to see a side to it that I could work with. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
It looks like Google Earth. It smells like Google Earth. It has "Google Earth" written in the Menu Bar. Guess it must be Google Earth for Mac OS X, then. Well there's a thing. You don't often see leaked software from Google or Apple. What exactly has been leaked, though? -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
Palm devices were once the model of simplicity for Mac users. Giles Turnbull, late-'90s PDA geek, picked up a new Palm TX after a lengthy mobile device hiatus. But he soon discovered that syncing feeling that accompanies Palm/OS X connectivity these days. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
As everyone knows by now, podcasting has taken off in a big way. But over the past week, several tech journals and The Daily Source Code have reported on the threat of 'podjacking,' the creation of an alternate RSS feed without the consent of the podcast's owner. I'm the host of a podcast, which has the dubious distinction of being the first widely-publicized victim of a podjacking. To teach others from my experiences I have posted an article entitled Preventing and Surviving a Podjacking. This article sets the record straight on what really happened, and shows the simple steps every podcaster should take to protect their shows from podjacking.
With a new version of the open-source browser out, we offer our guide to the nifty, fun Firefox extensions that will change your life. -- Wired
Last night I had dinner at the Foothills Milling Company. They have a small focused menu that is wonderfully prepared. The service is very good and the restaurant is very nice inside (white table cloths and real napkins.) It is not a large place and is about 8 miles out Wears Valley Rd. from Pigeon Forge. It is A la Carte. Cost per person (appetizer, salad, entree, dessert) is $40-$50/person. Everything I had was very good but my salad was to die for. We will go back. You should go. If you want wine with dinner you will have to bring it with you.
Google Inc., the world's largest search engine, is developing a beta version of its fascinating Google Earth geographical satellite imagery and mapping application for Apple Computer's Mac OS X operating system, sources tell AppleInsider.
An education advocacy group has performed a state-by-state evaluation of science education standards. Their conclusion: we're mostly treading water, which just isn't good enough these days. -- Ars Technica.
Engineer says performance per watt of today's computers needs to improve, or electricity may cost more than the hardware. -- c|net.
In rare circumstances, Disk Utility may display the following message when you try to repair a disk:
"The underlying task reported failure"
The Disk Utility log will also display a -9972 error code. This indicates that your disk volume has issues that Disk Utility cannot fix. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
Learn how to restore bundled applications-or Mac OS 9-on computers that shipped with 10.2 to 10.3.3. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
You can sync your Mail rules and accounts between different Macs using .Mac in Mac OS X 10.4. However, you may get an inaccurate alert that states more changes are going to take place than are required. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
Apple Computer co-founder, Steve Wozniak, thinks software manufacturers have lost their focus on the needs of users, according to an interview with The Cardinal Inquirer. The early days of the Macintosh, he feels, offer a model for developers to follow.
The BBC reports that Apple could be in for a bruising legal fight with rival Creative over the technology used in iPod music players. "Creative boss Sim Wong Hoo has told the BBC he plans to 'pursue aggressively' a US patent it owns on a system used to navigate music on digital players."
Well, here's the problem, at least for Apple. Both rumor sites and industry analysts expect Apple to introduce the first Macs with Intel processors in January. They might not be for sale immediately, but the expectations are high enough to make you wonder whether putting a Mac on your holiday shopping list is a terribly good idea. -- The Mac Night Owl.
HTML isn't a very good language for making Web pages. However, it has been a very good language for making the Web. In this two-part series, Edd Dumbill examines the various ways forward for HTML that Web authors, browser developers, and standards bodies propose. This series covers the incremental approach embodied by the WHATWG specifications and the radical cleanup of XHTML proposed by the W3C. Additionally, the author gives an overview of the W3C's new Rich Client Activity. -- IBM.
Any unanswered questions tickling your discerning audiophile eardrum? Perhaps one of our knowledgeable readers has answered it. -- Wired.
Tyler Hall has come up with a clever way to streamline edits for CSS constants (same styles repeated in different ids and classes) using PHP.
This guy wrote a java applet that allows you to encrypt messages you type in using the german designed "The Enigma Machine." By choosing different letter combinations to seed your key, you can write secret messages almost impossible to decrypt.
Once you have Exposé invoked (you pressed either F9 or F10), you can toggle through your open applications and Finder windows by pressing the Tab key. Press the Tab key once and the next open application and its miniaturized windows come to the front. Press Tab again, it goes to the next open app. Want the previous app? Press Shift-Tab.
Users who have made the happy transition to the Firefox browser will find that there is a newsreader extension to Firefox known as Sage. Click Tools_Extensions and then "Get more extensions". This will take you to the Mozilla website from which all Firefox extensions can be found. Click the News category to find "Sage", the name of the Firefox newsreader, and install it. To use it just click on the Extensions menu and select Sage.
On Dec. 6, the US Patent & Trademark Office revealed that Apple was granted Reissue Patent number RE38,911 for the patent titled "Modular digital image processing via an image processing chain with modifiable parameter controls." This is the second reissue patent in the last week pertaining to the same area of technology relating to digital images. -- Macsimum News.
MagneticTime software allows you to convert E-mails and Word documents into audio files. -- InformationWeek.
Windows' days are over. The time for a switch to a reliable, user-friendly operating system is now. Bye bye, Bill. -- Geek.
Since the advent of MP3s, music lovers must choose between quality and portability. Keith Axline reports that a new generation of digital media could bring the two together. -- Wired.
USB drives comes in thousands of designs and colors, but these 10 are extraordinary weird. -- fosfor gadgets.
Apple Computer's reputation rose significantly in 2005, according to the annual Reputation Quotient ranking published by Harris Interactive of Rochester, NY. Apple climbed seven spots in this year's survey, landing as the company with the 27th best reputation in the U.S., up from #34 in 2004.
Apple Computer's refusal to license FairPlay, i.e. allowing iPods to play downloaded music from services other than iTunes and allowing iTunes downloads to play on players other than iPods, amounts to "pigheadedness" on the part of Steve Jobs, according to RealNetworks CEO Rob Glaser. As reported by c|net News, Mr. Glaser made the comments at the Digital Living Room conference, where he also said that Apple's refusal to cooperate with other online music services promoted piracy.
c|net provides an interview with Michel Mayer, CEO of Freescale Semiconductor. The company's best-known client is Apple Computer, which is under contract to use Freescale chips to build its G4 PowerPC computers through the end of 2008.
Last month, in Parts I and II of this tutorial series, we began our exploration of the world of preference (.plist) files. I explained what .plist files are, what they do, and where on your drive you can find them. Finally, I described how to open and view the contents of these files. With this installment, we detail with the answers to the critical why question about .plist files. -- MacFixIt.
Writing for ZDNet, Paul Murphy says Apple should consider porting a Mac OS X environment to run on top of Linux. As a strategy this is win-win for all the good guys.
MacInTouch received an unconfirmed report that Printer Setup Repair 5.0.3 incorporates a hidden and dangerous anti-copying mechanism, and the company responded to our follow-up with an explanation:
[MacInTouch Reader] Printer Setup Repair, the widely-used utility for Mac OS X printers, has taken a malicious approach to combating software piracy. With version 5.0.3 for Mac OS X Tiger, if the user enters a pirated serial number known to the program, the program will immediately and without any warning remove all user preferences and the user keychain, and possibly do other unknown damage to the user's system. [...]
[John Goodchild, President, Fixamac Software, Inc]
Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We have examined our code and discovered an error in the area that rejects pirated registration codes. The original objective was to delete the Printer Setup Repair preferences but a misplaced space in the code allowed the entire user preferences folder to be erased. This would only occur if a pirated code was used. The error was probably overlooked since there was a need to block a new batch of pirated codes quickly. There was no such error in the area that handles legitimate registration codes and in no way can occur if a legitimate registration code is entered incorrectly since the user name is also a part of our internal tests. We have fixed the problem and posted an update.
This was not a malicious act on our part, rather an effort to protect our product from software pirates, and we regret any damage that may have been caused by the use of pirated registration codes.
Anyone who downloaded Printer Setup Repair 5.0.3 between 11-05-05 and 12-06-05 should download the current release from our web site.
A computer-science grad student with a flair for reverse engineering matches wits with the recording industry whenever it releases a new copy-protection scheme. Guess who's winning? -- Wired.
Dashboard is a great container for your Web 2.0 application. In this tutorial, Luke Burton walks you through a Dashboard implementation of Virtual Earth, highlighting the various components and showing you what they do. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
With a little work and the right software, you can get your digital music collection humming. -- Wired.
For over 30 years, Barry Fox has trawled the world's weird and wonderful patent applications each week, digging out the most exciting, intriguing and even terrifying new ideas. His column, Invention, is available exclusively online. Scroll down for a round-up of previous Invention articles. -- NewScientist.
From Eric Raymond's "The Art of Unix Programming" Ronny De Winter picked 17 rules described as the Basics of the Unix Philosophy. For Ronny these are also rules for writing high quality software.
Apple Computer last week began shipping the first of its new high-end Power Mac G5 Quad systems that include Nvidia's GeForce 7800 GT graphics card. -- AppleInsider.
Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN cable sports network is mulling a deal to distribute some television programs on Apple's iTunes music and video service, possibly joining its corporate cousin ABC in a landmark deal, according to Reuters.
Many architecture firms are known for concentrating on niche markets. Not Jackson & Ryan Architects. This Houston-based firm specializes in not specializing. From museums to churches, from private homes to hotels, they've built their reputation on innovation, flexibility and diversity. And they've built their office entirely on Macs. -- Apple PR.
First ABC, then Fox, now ESPN is now contemplating a distribution deal with Apple. Surely some revelation is at hand. -- Ars Technica.
Real Networks migrates their Rhapsody music service to a web-based app and adds support for Linux and Mac users. What else do they have planned? -- Ars Technica.
A new kind of fraud, dubbed "spear-phishing," has emerged and raised alarms among the digital world's watchdogs. -- c|net.
Quicksilver is an evolving framework for accessing and manipulating many forms of personal data. The Finder is a reasonably good tool for getting a visual overview of the contents of your disk, but it isn't ideal for quickly locating and manipulating files, especially if you have a deep and complicated folder structure, or if you prefer keyboard navigation to using the mouse. Quicksilver allows you to find what you need quickly and easily, while keeping your hands on the keyboard.
Walt Mossberg says that no Windows-based desktop computer can match the functional superiority of Apple's iMac G5 with built-in iSight.
MacInTouch's full iMac G5 (iSight) review digs deeper into the new Apple computer, following their earlier "first look" review, as Robert Mohns examines Front Row, the built-in video camera, design and features, performance and suitability for various applications. His conclusion, "After a month's use, we really couldn't be more pleased with this latest iMac. Its flaws are minor or irrelevant to its mission of being an affordable, versatile desktop computer. It's fast and adequately equipped with memory, storage and connectivity, with a beautiful display, elegant design and amazing attention to details."
NBC Universal and Apple today announced a new television content deal for Apple's iTunes. The lineup includes prime time, cable, late-night and classic TV shows, including prime time hits such as "Law & Order" and late-night favorites such as sketches from "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno".
The iPod has meant big business for Apple-$1.2 billion in revenue in the last quarter alone. And the company clearly intends to keep its flagship music player in the public eye, launching a new online guide and support site aimed at iPod owners.
The site, iPod 101, is aimed at introducing new customers to the popular handheld device while helping existing owners max out their iPod. The site walks users through all types of iPods as well as the accompanying iTunes software.
Years ago, Salon Transcripts created the precursor to STX, their industry-leading salon management software, for both the Macintosh and Windows platforms, but now the company is a Mac-only vendor. This naturally leads to the question: What is it about the Macintosh platform that Salon Transcripts finds so compelling? Here, Salon Transcripts Chief Technology Officer Aaron Conti provides some answers; you may find some of them surprising, and they may lead you to think in new ways about how you develop for the Macintosh platform. -- Apple Developer Connection.
Through reverse engineering, a linux driver for the Broadcom 43xx series chipset has created. This chipset is used in the Airport Extreme, TrueMobile 1300 WLAN Mini-PCI Card, Wireless 1350 WLAN Mini-PCI Card, WL-100G, Linksys WMP54G PCI, Belkin F5D7010 54g Wireless Network card, etc. -- Broadcom 43xx Linux Driver.
This had to happen sooner or later. MacGuru Chris Tarnowieckyi sent me this. Seems that Daphne Kalfon, a classically trained piano player with several years of jazz, who has studied film scoring and orchestration, has written "I Love My Mac" and set up a web site for it. She creates her music using GarageBand, of course.
The Fountain City Art Guild is holding its annual show and sale at the old Fountain City Library at Fountain City Park. The show and sale runs from 10 a.m. - 5 p.m. December 2 - January 13. I attended the opening night of the show and there were some very lovely things. We enjoyed it very much. [Disclaimer: My mother-in-law is a talented artist and guild member. She took second place, should have been first, at the show.]
When Apple announced Aperture in October as a "all-in-one post-production tool for photographers," many have wondered how well done Apple's latest "pro" application would be. We got a copy, tested it extensively, and were surprised by what we found. -- Ars Technica.
More and more people are discovering just how great Macs are, but there is a blemish on all this shiny goodness: PCs still outnumber Macs nearly 50 to 1, and because of that, there are still far more accessories available for the PC than there is for the Mac, and I gotta tell ya, sometimes that really sucks. -- The Mac Observer.
c|net has an aggregation of blog posts reacting to speculation that Apple will soon release a true media-enabled Mac, and the impact such an announcement would have on Microsoft and the industry at large.
The New York Times has a roundup of software for storing, retrieving and generally making the best use of information for the Mac in its latest column titled "Mac Programs That Come With Thinking Caps On."
Car news site LeftLane News has a report on one Mac user's project to install a Mac mini in a Ford F-150. The user makes use of Apple's Front Row software and a Keyspan remote for easy navigation. He placed the Mini out of sight, and also installed a 10.2-inch LCD touch screen. The user also installed some GPS software to serve as a navigation system.
There are many companies that will help you connect an iPod to your car, but a small New York business wants to go one step further. -- c|net.
All Macintosh computers both desktop and laptop Macs use OS X (pronounced "OS 10") as their operating system. It's Unix and, as such, is inherently safer than Windows. -- Syracuse Post-Standard.
Guy Kawasaki took a break from his hectic speaking and venture-capital careers to talk about the state of the Silicon Valley start-up with Mercury News. Here are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Derrick Story finally had a chance to spend a whole day with Apple's new professional photo software, Aperture. As he had mentioned in an earlier post, he's using a 17" PowerBook for all of his photo work. This is the first in a series of posts describing his experiences with Aperture on a laptop. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
If you're like most digital photographers, a very small percentage of your photos will ever escape the confines your computer. After all, there are only so many places you can hang a photo. But if you think that 4-by-6-inch prints are all your photos are good for, it's time to think outside the frame. -- Macworld.
The real estate market is getting into the video iPod business, if an announcement by The Real Estate Home Show is any indication. The Web site - a database of real estate listings from around the country - now offers MPEG-4 movies of certain properties that can be loaded on to a video-capable iPod.
Properties listed on the Web site that feature iPod-compatible videos now sport an iPod symbol next to their listing; realtors can then download the videos and sync them to the iPod using iTunes.
The videos display the listing realtor's name, a written description of the property, then a video showing the property's highlights, with information provided by a narrator.
Most people don't realize that VNC support is built right into Tiger. VNC is a desktop sharing system which uses the rfb (Remote FrameBuffer) protocol to remotely control another computer. It transmits the keyboard presses and mouse clicks from one computer to another relaying the screen updates back in the other direction, over a network.
Translation: You can remotely control you Mac from another Mac, PC, Palm or Blackberry. However the functionality is a bit hidden. MacMiniColo has posted VNC control of a Macintosh under OS X 10.4, a simple tutorial for setting up VNC on your Mac. This only works on Tiger (10.4).
What happens when a talented amateur with a solid rig picks up Aperture? -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
The download is 129 megs, but definitely worth it if you're already a NeoOffice/J user. The major enhancements include support for the new Open Document Format (ODF), and under the hood rewiring to reflect usage of Cocoa APIs and Java 1.4.x APIs instead of so much Carbon and Java 1.3.1. OpenOffice runs on Mac OS X 10.2 or higher. -- O'Reilly Developer Weblogs.
Update: Since this is an Alpha release, we will release "patches" for any bugs that we fix. So after you download NeoOffice 1.2 Alpha, please visit the NeoOffice patch download page to download the latest patch.
What questions go through the mind of a first-time Mac user? -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
It's like a sound lab on your Mac -- with Audio Hijack Pro you can digitize legacy music, time-shift radio shows, and even repurpose your legally purchased music. Erica Sadun shows you five of her favorite AHP tips. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
IBM announced this weekend that early next year it will begin supporting the OpenDocument standard in its WorkPlace line of products. They're planning on pushing this widely accessible format and their products in developing nations. -- ZDNet
It's now common to build materials which can change colors depending on their surrounding environment because of progresses made in colloid chemistry. But now, German researchers have gone a step further. They've used ion bombardment and gold metallisation to produce new particles whose bonding behavior can be chemically tailored. This could lead to new shimmering car finishes which can change with temperature or humidity, new cosmetics, but more importantly, to new applications in optical data processing. -- ZDNet.
Once a hijacker has diverted the target podcaster's RSS feed, he or she can wait until a convenient moment when the victim's audience has grown sufficiently and then demand payment. The podcaster is vulnerable because the hijacker can divert the URL pointer to any other podcast and the podcaster's audience will disappear. -- NewsFactor.
The Internet telephone service company Skype has launched version 2.0 of its software, which includes video chat. Has the future finally arrived? -- Ars Technica.
You probably know how to open and save files and documents in a Mac OS X application's File menu (or with Command-S and Command-O keyboard shortcuts), but you might not know about some other useful tricks for opening or saving files. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
If you're using a computer with Mac OS X 10.4 to 10.4.2 and change a file's ownership or permissions in an Info window (select a file and then choose Get Info from the File menu), the settings will appear to change, but they aren't actually applied and saved. If you close and reopen the Info window, you'll see that the settings have reverted back to what they were before you made your adjustments. To resolve this issue, update to Mac OS X 10.4.3 or later. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
A reader on Mac OS X Hints posted the following:
An unhappy event happened to a cheese-maker friend -- he hadn't made any back-ups of his old G3 tower, and naturally the hard disk went down along with all the recipes of his award-winning cheeses. I tried all the usual -- TechTool, DiskWarrior, Disk Utility -- but they all just threw up their (figurative) hands in horror and simply gave up. (Disk Utility would see the disk, but not mount it).
In a fit of desperation, I told Disk Utility to make an image of the seen but un-mountable partitions. And quite surprisingly, it worked!
I have yet to verify that his important data is there (he lives a couple of hundred kilometers away, and won't be back here for a couple of weeks), but it all *seems* to be there. It reminded me of the good-old-Apple ][ days when a dead floppy could often be resurrected by simply copying it.
I hope that someone else may benefit from this simple fix.
MacCentral summarizes Apple's recent Form 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission which provides an overview of the company's over the past fiscal year.
BusinessWeek chimes in with its own speculation on a potential DVR-enabled Mac. " Having built success on the audio front with the iPod family of products, Apple clearly has designs on the video-entertainment business, as the latest iPod already shows. But if the rumors are true, then I have a suggestion for how to make an Apple-branded DVR truly shine: Make it fully wireless."
Google Analytics tells you everything you want to know about how your visitors found you and how they interact with your site and it's free.
The X Lab has published "Troubleshooting Mac OS X, Tiger Edition," an ebook dedicated to preventing or resolving common problems with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Pricing begins at $20 for a single-user license. Multi-user licenses are also available.
123Macmini.com's Paul Stamatiou has compiled a list of 10 things every first time Mac owner, particularly Mac mini owner, should know about their new computer and operating system. "This article should answer some burning questions, enlighten you about some features you did not know about OS X and just all around be helpful."
This macosxhints.com article for points out a cool feature in the 10.4/Tiger version of TextEdit: a built-in outliner.
While in RTF mode, on any blank line, hit Option-Tab to create a list item. Hit Return for the next item and so on. Additional Option-Tabs will increase the indentation; a Return on a blank list line will decrease it.
It uses hyphens to indicate list items by default. Right-Click (or control-click) to choose all kinds of "List..." styles.
Fox Filmed Entertainment is open to a deal with Apple Computer's iTunes music and video service, its co-chairman said Thursday. "Of course, we'd be open to that. We believe it would be a great opportunity," James Gianopulos said at the Reuters Media and Advertising Summit. -- c|net.
iPod Updater 2005-11-17 includes new iPod Software 1.1.3 for iPod shuffle and contains the same software versions as iPod Updater 2005-10-12 for all other iPod models.
Apple Computer could introduce its first laptop computers based on Intel chips as early as January, which, together with robust sales of video iPods, should drive earnings higher, Citigroup said on Wednesday. -- AppleInsider.
For the Wall Street Journal, Walt Mossberg writes, "To put it simply: No desktop offered by Dell or Hewlett-Packard or Sony or Gateway can match the new iMac G5's combination of power, elegance, simplicity, ease of use, built-in software, stability and security. From setup to performing the most intense tasks, it's a pleasure to use. And, contrary to common misconceptions, this Mac is competitively priced, when compared with comparably equipped midrange Windows PCs; and it handles all common Windows files, as well as the Internet and email, with aplomb."
Do not use the Volume Structure repair function of Tech Tool Deluxe 3.0.3 on Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger volumes. It is not compatible with the file system. If you need to repair a 10.4.x volume, use Disk Utility instead.
A "Failed (Error = -64)" message may appear, and other issues can occur, such as a kernel panic message appearing during start up.
Tech Tool Deluxe 3.0.4 has been released and is compatible with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger volumes.
Important: If you received Tech Tool Deluxe 3.0.3 with an AppleCare Protection Plan, and are experiencing these symptoms after using Volume Structure repair, contact AppleCare for information about receiving version 3.0.4. -- AppleCare Knowledge Base.
A discussion and one solution (BlueHarvest) to those pesky ._ and .ds_store files that show up when you copy files and directories to Windows. -- Mac OS X Hints.
MacFixIt's latest Special Report on Troubleshooting the PowerBook G4 Double-Layer SuperDrive covers the following topics:
ComputerWorld praises Apple's recently refreshed PowerBook G4 line as one of the best sets of portables ever built. "In what may very well be the last of the G4 processor-based PowerBooks, Apple has created its best overall laptops yet. True, the processor speed is stuck at 1.67 GHz, something unlikely to change until the company moves to Intel processors over the next year or so. But no one buys a PowerBook expecting a speed demon. You buy it for Mac OS X, for the seamless integration of hardware and software, and for the elegance of Apple's industrial design."
Disclabel 3.0 creates and prints CD/DVD labels and related materials using predesigned or custom templates. It includes import of track/item lists from iTunes, iPhoto, and iDVD, support for LightScribe direct disc labeling, CoreImage filters, and more. This release adds folders for organizing designs, a design elements selector, easier matching of labels with designs, many new text templates, interface improvements, a sepia image filter, text improvements (outlines, baseline adjustment, superscript, subscript), and a Factory function for automatic generation of label designs. Disclabel is $29.95 for Mac OS X 10.2.5 through 10.4.x.
O'Reilly's Mac OS X Tiger in a Nutshell by Andy Lester is a complete desktop reference book on Mac OS X, including coverage of Tiger focusing on the BSD Unix layer. Among other topics, the book offers thorough coverage of Mac OS X's Unix commands, an overview of basic system and network administration features, an introduction to Terminal, and information on bash shell syntax variables. Mac OS X Tiger in a Nutshell is $39.95 [$26.37 Amazon].
AnandTech today published a review of Intel's Yonah dual-core CPU, the most likely candidate for Apple's new line of Intel-based PowerBooks to be released next year. The chips run surprisingly cool, and are said to be equal to, if not slightly slower than an Athlon 64 X2 running at the same clock speed without an on-die memory controller.
Which Web site provides the best computer buying experience, according to customers? Hint: the same company that makes a little device known as the iPod. Consumers rank Apple as online shopping fave, but what about service after the sale? -- CNN/Money.
Firefox 1.5 is finally out the door, and Thunderbird 1.5 won't be far behind. The new releases sport some interesting new features, including faster page navigation, redesigned preferences dialogs, a new update system, and much more. Let's take a look at what the Mozilla Foundation has been up in the year since the first major release of Firefox. If you're used to Firefox and Thunderbird already, the switch to 1.5 won't be much of a problem. The interfaces have not been radically redesigned, but there are quite a few changes that make it worth upgrading. -- NewsForge.
If I were an Apple executive, I'd be feeling very pleased with myself at the moment. As the company heads towards 2006, it seems to be riding a wave of good news and optimism about the future. -- O'Reilly MacDevCenter.
McAfee is perhaps still best known as a force in antivirus tools, but the company's offerings today range from antispam to host intrusion prevention. Network World Editor in Chief John Dix recently caught up with McAfee President Gene Hodges for a company update and his view of how security is evolving. -- Computerworld.
A pro guitarist and recording engineer puts this tiny audio marvel through its paces - in Hawaii. -- O'Reilly Digital Media.
INSTEON is a new home automation technology from the folks at Smarthome, Inc. But up until today, Mac users couldn't join the fun because all of the software support for the protocol was happening on Windows and Linux. Perceptive Automation has changed that with the release of a public beta version of Indigo 1.8.0. If you're ready to dive in, the best deal is the Insteon starter kit and the PowerLinc V2 USB computer interface.
Skwat is a Belgian T-Shirt designer who sells a range of Apple-themed "Wear Different" t-shirts featuring Japanese anime-style characters. The shirts depict chibi iPod users giving the thumbs up, and Steve Jobs holding an iMac. There's even Jobs and Steve Wozniak holding an early Mac. The site (Flash -- ugh) allows you to send some of the images as e-cards.
If you don't get an iPod this Christmas because they're all sold out, download and print out this gorgeous paperPod. This Japanese site also has a charming classic Mac. Just download the PDFs, a few folds and you're in business.
The London Underground map is famous for reasons of both design and ubiquity. This student, however, took a fresh approach and redesigned the map to illustrate journey time, not journey distance.
Shows you how to modify the about:config file so Firefox will run older extensions without having to manually modify each extension. -- Dan Cameron.
