Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard: Cocoa Finder and 64-Bit Changes: “With the broad seeding of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, a few more details have been revealed about the direction Apple is going with Snow Leopard. According to the seed notes, Apple is migrating more towards Cocoa (rather than Carbon) and continues …”
(Via MacRumors.)
PocketMac iCalScreenSaver – “Never Miss Another Appointment. Ever. Again.”: “PocketMac Releases “The Original Screensaver for Busy People”…
San Diego, CA–October 28, 2008–Information Appliance Associates,
creators of unique Macintosh sync solutions, announces the release of
PocketMac iCalScreenSaver, the first screensaver to attractively
display iCal appointments.
“The flying toasters are fine for folks who aren’t that busy,”
said Terence Goggin, CTO of Information Appliance Associates. “But
the truth is that there are a whole bunch of us who want our
screensavers to do more. With PocketMac iCalScreenSaver, users can
now make sure they never miss another appointment again.”
PocketMac iCalScreenSaver leverages IAA’s iCal sync technology to
produce an attractive, clear and simple screensaver that cycles
through users’ calendars.
Goggin continued, “iCal users rely very heavily on their
calendars and with this screensaver, they can take their data further.
Now even if busy Mac users are taking a quick break in front of their
Mac, they’re guaranteed to see everything that’s coming up on their
day, their week, and their month.”
PocketMac iCalScreenSaver runs on Mac OS X (10.5 Leopard) and
retails for $9.95.
“Not only is PocketMac iCalScreenSaver useful,” Goggin concluded,
“but we’ve also made it very appealing to look at. We’ve created 4
beautiful, color-coordinated themes that are the backdrop for your
iCal appointments.”
For a complete demo of PocketMac iCalScreenSaver, users can visit
the following YouTube Demo Video:
More information about the PocketMac iCalScreenSaver can be found
at http://www.pocketmac.com/iCalScreenSaver.html
“
Manage Files On Any Machine With MuCommander [Featured Download]: “
Windows/Mac/Linux: If you’re not a fan of your system’s tools for managing files on your computer, check out MuCommander. The free, open source download will run on nearly any operating system, including Windows, Mac OS X and your favorite flavor of Linux, and in 21 different languages. Drag and drop between two panes visually, or hack away in the command shell. It also supports most network file transfer protocols, such as FTP, and will even let you browse the contents of archives like ZIP and disk images like ISO without having to uncompress or mount them, respectively. Pictured is an image file viewed directly from an SFTP server — handy! MuCommander is a free download for all platforms.
(Via Lifehacker.)
Boinx Software announces FotoMagico 2.6: “
Munich, Germany – Boinx Software announced today FotoMagico 2.6, an update to its award-winning photo presentation software for professional photographers. The new 2.6 version of FotoMagico Pro now also supports Adobe Lightroom 2 libraries and comes with an plug-in for Aperture, enabling photographers to select their photos from within Aperture and to export them directly to FotoMagico.
‘FotoMagico always was the premier photo slideshow tool on the Mac. Professional photographers treasure its fine-granular controls for creative storytelling’, says Oliver Breidenbach, co-founder of Boinx Software. ‘With the new version 2.6, which is a free update for all FotoMagico 2 users, we further deepend the integration with the two leading photo workflow solutions from Adobe and Apple.’
‘The Aperture Plug-in provides the missing link in my workflow’, says Derrick Story, Author of The Photoshop CS4 Companion for Photographers. ‘Now I can select the images for my slideshow in Aperture, and the plugin automatically creates a FotoMagico document with them. Very nice.’
Adobe Lightroom 2 Support:
In addition to iPhoto, Aperture and Lightroom 1 libraries, FotoMagico 2.6 (Pro version only) now also supports libraries of the new Adobe Lightroom 2. With the integrated iMedia Browser users can also seamlessly access GarageBand songs, iLife sound effects and media libraries from iTunes or media files from any other folder on their hard disk.
FotoMagico Plug-in for Aperture:
The new FotoMagico Plug-in for Aperture allows photographers to select the pictures in Aperture and export them to FotoMagico to create stunning animated photo presentations with transitions, titles and more. A photographer can now access his Aperture library from the iMedia Browser from within FotoMagico, or the other way around – send a selection of pictures from Aperture to FotoMagico. The FotoMagico Plug- in for Aperture is part of FotoMagico 2.6 and also available as a free download at the Boinx Website.
Availability and Pricing:
FotoMagico 2.6 is available immediately for download from the Boinx Website. A built-in assistant will guide users through the process of aquiring the proper license. The update to FotoMagico 2.6 is free of charge to current FotoMagico 2.x license owners at their current license levels. FotoMagico 2.6 Express is available for $49 (USD) and FotoMagico 2.6 Pro is available for $129 (USD) via Kagi. For all purchase options see the Web site. Commercial multi-user license discounts are available upon request.
About FotoMagico:
FotoMagico, winner of two Apple Design Awards – ‘Best Mac OS X Leopard Graphics and Media Application Runner-up 2008″ and ‘Best Mac OS X User Experience Runner-up 2006″, is a presentation tool for photographers. It is easy to use and produces impressive slideshows that makes the audience want more.
Boinx Software
FotoMagico 2.6
Download FotoMagico
Purchase FotoMagico
Media Resources
Boinx Software Ltd. is located in Puchheim, near Munich, Germany. Boinx Software develops and publishes fun and easy to use applications for the creative user. Boinx iStopMotion is the leading solution for stop motion animation and time lapse capture for your digital hub and won the O’Reilly Mac OS X Innovators Award in 2003. Boinx iVeZeen turns your webcam into a digital camcorder. Boinx Mousepose is the essential mouse pointer highlighting tool for everyone doing presentations, trainings or demos and those individuals with huge and high resolution displays.
Replace MobileMe with an open source server: “Instead of using Apple’s MobileMe account and losing control over your data, you can instead use dotmac for data synchronization and iDisk-like storage space. It requires a machine running either Linux or OS X with Apache and some Perl modules installed. It works fine here with OS X 10.5.5.
[robg adds: I hadn't heard of this project before, and it looks intriguing, claiming to support data sync for any app that uses .Mac (iCal, Address Book, etc.), iDisk-like remote storage, and support for Backup. Note that the setup process requires a fair bit of work in Terminal. Also, if you want the true benefits of .Mac (offsite hosted storage available anywhere), you'll need to set up your replacement server in the same manner. I haven't tested this one.]
(Via MacOSXHints.com.)
Cocktail 4.2 (Leopard Edition) has been released: “
Maintain has announced Cocktail 4.2 (Leopard Edition). Cocktail is an award winning general purpose utility for Mac OS X. This version adds ability to search and delete corrupted preference files, adds a searchable database of Mac OS system error codes, adds a list of commonly used network ports, improves the clear log files procedure, fixes a number of minor bugs discovered in the previous release, contains some interface improvements as well as updated Help files and Automator actions.
The update is strongly recommended for all users of Cocktail (Leopard Edition).
Cocktail 4.2 (Leopard Edition) is distributed as a Universal Binary and runs natively on both PowerPC and Intel Macs. Cocktail 4.2 (Leopard Edition) requires Mac OS X / Mac OS X Server 10.5 or later and is tested for compatibility with Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server 10.5.5.
Cocktail 4.0.2 (Tiger Edition) for Mac OS X 10.4.x and Cocktail 3.7 (Panther Edition) for Mac OS X 10.3.x are available for download from our website.
Cocktail is an award winning general purpose utility for Mac OS X. It is a smooth and powerful digital toolset with a variety of practical features that simplifies the use of advanced UNIX functions and helps hundreds of thousands of Mac users around the world to get the most out of their computers.
The application serves up a scrumptious mix of maintenance tools and interface tweaks, all accessible via a comprehensive graphical interface. Most of Cocktail’s major features are arranged in five basic categories. In addition, a Pilot lets you clean, repair and optimize your system with one click of the button.
Maintain Website
Cocktail Website
Direct Download Link
Purchase Link
Screenshot 1
Screenshot 2
Maintain develops tailored applications for Mac users. We work towards creating technical solutions which maintain your computer and make it as efficient and easy to use as possible. In addition, we offer comprehensive consultancy and support services which cover everything from operation of existing systems to purchase and implementation of new technical solutions.
(Via MacMegasite.)
Mac Mini to be Discontinued?: “Gizmodo believes that the Mac mini may have already been discontinued by Apple. According to the site’s European retailer sources, Apple has stopped orders for the low end Mac and has reportedly told the retailers not to expect any more.
(Via MacRumors.)
The new MacBook trackpad and Multi-Touch gestures: “In this Macworld Video, Roman Loyola takes a close look at the new trackpad and the Multi-Touch gestures. Roman talks about the new four-finger gestures, as well as the previously released gestures.
(Via MacCentral.)
New iMacs to launch in November: “Reports speculate that new iMacs will launch in November
Apple may be preparing to launch an updated range of iMacs before the end of the year, probably in mid November.
(Via Macworld UK.)
New Mac ads criticize pricy Microsoft campaign: “Apple suggests that $300 million Microsoft ad campaign was a mistake
Apple is having a snipe at Microsoft with two new Apple commercials, one of which comments on Microsoft’s$300 million advertising campaign.
(Via Macworld UK.)
Finder rewrite for Apple’s Snow Leopard: “Apple sets about rewriting Finder in Cocoa
A hint that Apple is rewriting the Carbon-based Finder and other Apple-authored applications in Cocoa, seems to be suggest that the company is doing its own housekeeping behind the scenes with the launch of Snow Leopard.
(Via Macworld UK.)
“Here’s an exercise for you Mac gamers out there: try and buy the full version of the Spore Creature Creator. Having downloaded and played around with the free version a while ago, I immediately decided to buy the full version. It’s just too much fun assembling weird creatures.
No, I’m not serious, don’t try it. It doesn’t work.”
I contacted the EA store support, didn’t get a reply. I posted on the EA forums, without any reply from EA representatives other than them deleting my thread… presumably, my wording didn’t sit well with the moderators. I contacted the billing company that processed my paypal payment about a refund, didn’t get a reply. I contacted the EA support again, and got the following, well over a week later:
(Via unwesen.)
Roll Your Own Nike+ iPhone for Free [IPhone]: “
As an iPhone owner who runs for exercise, my biggest disappointment at Apple’s recent iPod event was the lack of Nike+ support for the GPS-sporting 3G iPhone. Instead, the second generation iPod touch has Nike+ built-in, and the iPhone still has nothing. I would be disappointed, but the power of the iPhone App Store pulls out a big win on this front, as several free Nike+ alternatives are already leveraging your 3G iPhone’s GPS capabilities to provide you with many of the same functionality as you can already get from Nike+ and then some. Keep reading for a look at some of the best free Nike+ alternatives.
I tested two different iPhone apps: Fitnio and RunKeeper. Both of them are free from the iTunes App Store, and both automatically upload your running stats to a web site à la Nike+. (There are actually tons of similar apps in the App Store, but these are the two that caught my eye.) I took each on run side-by-side with my girlfriend, who was wearing her Nike+ kit with an iPod nano, for comparison. Here’s how each worked:
RunKeeper is a beautiful iPhone application—in fact, it’s exactly the kind of app you’d expect a real Nike+ solution to be. It tracks your speed, pace, time, and distance, displays that blow-by-blow information directly on your iPhone while you’re running, and has a great history feature that lets you browse through your recent runs and delete a run if you don’t want it. That’s all completely awesome.
To add to the fun, RunKeeper automatically uploads each run to the RunKeeper web site, where you can browse your run history on a Google Map and view a great speed and elevation vs. distance graph.
The downside: For whatever reason, RunKeeper was terrible at mapping my run to Google Maps correctly. The actually distance measurements were on the money, but the route was way off. I’d give the folks at RunKeeper the benefit of the doubt that they’ll get this one worked out, but right now it’s a bit off the mark.
Fitnio is a little less polished all-around than RunKeeper, but it also outshines RunKeeper on a few key points. The Fitnio interface on the iPhone is nice, with big readable text you can quickly decipher while your iPhone is bouncing around in your running case (it beats out RunKeeper in readability). Unfortunately it doesn’t log all of the blow-by-blow pacing and speed information that RunKeeper does, which is unfortunate—especially since this is one of the nicer features that you get with Nike+. It also doesn’t have as many built-in options as the RunKeeper iPhone app, so you can’t browse recent runs or anything fun like that. Instead, the only thing you can do with the Fitnio iPhone app is track your run. Give the app your weight and height and Fitnio also outdoes RunKeeper by tracking the calories you’ve burned. Admittedly, this feature will probably be trivial for RunKeeper to implement, but it’s the kind of information you love to see when you’re sweating it out.
Another point at which Fitnio bests RunKeeper is with its pseudo-lock mode. Since your iPhone’s GPS won’t work when your iPhone is locked, you have to keep both of these apps running and your iPhone unlocked during the entirety of your run. Fitnio is smart, though, and displays its own slide-to-unlock screen after a few seconds of inactivity so you don’t accidentally bump a button and stop tracking mid-run. It also has a cool down mode for tracking your cool down work separate from the run.
Things are very much the same on the web front—Fitnio is much more spare at the moment, but what it does, it does well. For example, where RunKeeper’s mapping of my run to a Google Map was erratic and just plain wrong, Fitnio mapped my route with impressive precision. On the other hand, Fitnio doesn’t sport the cool Flash graph displaying your pace and elevation over the course of your run.
The distance and speed measurements matched almost perfectly with the readouts we got from the Nike+ iPod we were running with. As the Fitnio web site points out, these apps and web sites are just getting started. Where the Nike+ iPod site is slow to innovate and add new features, these dedicated little sites are much more likely to push the limits and give you everything Nike+ can and then some.
Granted, it may still be just a matter of time before the Nike+ iPhone GPS app hits the App Store, but by the time it does, you may already be hooked on one of these alternatives. The one thing these apps can’t have that an official Nike+ app would is tighter integration with your iPod. You need to play your iPod before you start your run, and you can play, pause, or advance tracks using either your headphone button or by double-clicking the home button, so you can still get most of the functionality from your iPod. But you don’t get the motivational soundbites of encouragement that Nike+ offers from the likes of Lance Armstrong (Congratulations, that was your best run yet!), and you can’t set a super-motivation-song or whatever it’s called to kick in when you need an extra boost.
But hey, these apps are here right now, they’re free, and as long as you have a decent GPS signal, they work. Since Apple doesn’t seem to be moving anywhere on GPS-enabled Nike+, I’ll gladly accept these free and promising alternatives.
If you’ve tried these or any other fitness tracking iPhone app from the App Store, let’s hear how they worked for you in the comments.
(Via Lifehacker.)
A Hands-on First Look at Google Android [Android]: “
As an open source advocate and developer with a serious love/hate relationship with my iPhone, I couldn’t wait to get my paws on a device running Google’s brand spankin’ new open-source mobile phone operating system, Android—and I haven’t been disappointed. I’ve spent the last four days using an HTC G1 phone running the first release of Android, and while it is not an iPhone-killer, it is a killer device for heavy Google users (like you and me). Let’s take a look at why Android does—and doesn’t—live up to its hype.
Note: Since the iPhone I use as my primary phone is my sole experience with a touchscreen smartphone operating system, I’m going to base my Android observations on it, even though the iPhone is not the only touchscreen OS out there. (Sorry.)
First, a quick tour around the G1 handset itself. The first thing an iPhone owner notices is that there are a helluva lot of buttons before you even flip out the keyboard: five, to be exact, plus a rubber trackball (that I have come to love, more on that later). Love affair aside, at first all those buttons are confusing and look kind of low-rent next to the iPhone’s sleek how-did-they-DO-that single button.
The phone is also fatter, and unlike the iPhone, it has a slight bend at the bottom of it (pictured right). This can become a usability problem for people who like to slide their phone into the front pocket of their jeans. The iPhone slips in there easily; the G1, on the other hand, bulks up your thigh a bit more and that rubber trackball can rub and roll on the fabric inside your pants.
However, despite its tendency to catch on the inside of my jeans pocket, I absolutely love the rubber trackball for scrolling on the G1. From a pure economy of motion standpoint, it’s much, much faster to scroll and click using the trackball versus swipe and tap using your finger on the screen. After just a few days, I love the rubber trackball in a kind of scary, illegal-in-some-states way.
The reason for the extra bulk, of course, is the flip-out full QWERTY keyboard on the G1. Having never had a Sidekick or any other phone with a full keyboard, this was a new experience for me—but one I came to enjoy pretty quickly, because with a full keyboard comes context-insensitive keyboard shortcuts and launcher combos. (More on that below.) I wasn’t so thrilled with the idea of a big hinge on my phone, but in practice, the G1′s screen flips out to display the keyboard in a really smooth, solid motion and it snaps into place with authority. The keyboard buttons actually don’t stick out as much as I expected, so pressing them doesn’t have that tactile feedback I was hoping for. Still, I make less typing mistakes on this keyboard than the iPhone’s touch keyboard.
Unlike the iPhone, the G1 screen is not multi-touch. You can only use one finger to swipe your screens or scroll up and down. This is a bummer for iPhone owners used to the two-finger pinch and expand to zoom in and out, especially during web browsing.
For a closer look at exactly what the hardware’s like, see Gizmodo’s photo-laden hands on. (Those guys try out phones for a living, so they’re assessment on the hardware is far more informed than mine.) As far as my size complaints, see Gizmodo’s ‘Sizemodo’ post which compares the G1 to other handsets out there. In short—it’s chunky, so you’ve got to decide if the keyboard makes the bulk worth it.
But let’s talk about the main thing we care about here at Lifehacker: the software.
Android’s huge advantage is its tight integration with the Google services you use most—Gmail, GCal, Google Talk, Maps, and YouTube right now, though it’s still missing Google Reader, Docs, Bookmarks, and the rest of the long list of GOOG apps out there. Assuming you’re already an established Google app user, you pop in your Google Account username and password, and (as Jobs would say) BOOM!—you’ve got your email, contacts list, calendar events, the whole shebang on your phone, over the air, synced with the cloud, no contact with your computer necessary. This wasn’t even close to the experience I had with my iPhone, which has required several email account setups and re-setups, and not a small amount of tinkering with my address book and syncing to my computer to get everything as it should be.
In the course of four days, I still haven’t connected the G1 to my computer—everything I need is in the cloud at Google and on the phone, period. This is why heavy Google apps users will want Android.
The software has a lot going on in it, but instead of running through every detail of how you do things, let’s look at just a few perks Android on the G1 offers that are worth mentioning.
Never have I had a better experience reading email—specifically Gmail—on a mobile device as I have with Android. Android offers an interface very similar to the web front end of Gmail, with conversations threading, labels, stars, archiving—all the functions you expect from genuine Gmail. You can also specify, on a per-label basis, what gets synced real-time. To move through conversations you can roll the trackball or flick your finger; typing messages is obviously easy with the QWERTY keyboard and you can set up email signatures as well. Much to my dismay, Gmail’s web-based keyboard shortcuts do NOT work on the G1. Hopefully in a future iteration, you can hit J or K on the keyboard to move forward and back through Gmail conversations.
In addition to the Gmail client, there is a straight-up email client for your other POP and IMAP accounts.
Like the iPhone, Android is location-aware, and puts Google Maps to good use. You get all the lovely touch panning, zooming, satellite-view, and pinpoint-my-current-location goodness on Android that the iPhone offers. The one eye-popping feature you don’t get anywhere else is Google Maps Street View—and a very cool Compass mode, that uses the phone’s accelerometer to adjust what you see on screen as you move. Here’s a quick clip of Street View + Compass Mode enabled. (The clip skips to the Compass Mode part automatically.)
The bad news is that Android was unable to determine my location from several different points in San Diego, which means that any kind of location-aware app won’t work as intended. That’s a problem—if you’re considering a G1, make sure you try it in your area first.
My one huge gripe about the iPhone (and my Nokia before it) was the inability to put a shortcut on the home screen to a new text message with my better half’s number filled into the To: field. Texting my spouse is the thing I do most often on my phone, so it should be a one tap/click affair, and it’s not in iPhone 2.0 or Symbian. It’s not quite that either in Android, but you can create a shortcut to a specific contact on your home screen, which makes texting my lady a two tap affair.
You can also add a shortcut to a Gmail label to your home screen, as well as a Google Gadget (yuck, I know—that’s what that bigass clock is), a music playlist, and any application or folder as well.
The ‘Google phone’ would be nothing if it weren’t search-centric. You can start searching in any context by hitting the Search keyboard button (it’s a magnifying glass, pictured right). From the home screen or inside the browser, you can just start typing text to invoke a Google search box and go.
When you install a new app, download a file, get a new text message, email, or voicemail, Android displays the information in a notification bar across the top of the screen. Here’s what an incoming SMS looks like:
You can tap and drag this notifications bar down to expand it and get more information (and clear the items).
Compared to the iPhone’s modal pop-up notifications, Android’s window shade definitely takes the cake.
The fantastic thing you get with a full QWERTY keyboard? Why, keyboard shortcuts, of course! Android lets you define keyboard combination to launch applications in the settings area.
Sadly you cannot assign a keyboard combination to anything other than an application (like a contact or Gmail label).
We haven’t even gotten to the Android Marketplace, where developers will start offering apps that run on Android. Right now Android’s apps offerings are pretty slim pickings, but there is an app pretty familiar to iPhone users: the iTunes Remote control app. Here’s a video demo of one of our favorite iPhone apps in action on Android.
Android iTunes Remote Control from Jeffrey Sharkey on Vimeo.
Android is in desperate need of a screenshot-taking application, by the way—which is why all the screen grabs in this review are from the emulator.
Unlike Apple with the iPhone, Google figured out how to do background tasks and a clipboard in Android. Have a look at how copy and paste works on the Gphone.
As you can see, Android on the G1 is a sweet setup, if a bit unfinished, and as my love/hate relationship veers more often into hate these days, it’s tempting to make the switch—but I’m not, just yet. Aside from the bulkiness issue mentioned above, T-Mobile’s 3G coverage in San Diego is absolutely atrocious. (I know we’re a second tier city, but really! We’re still a city!) As much as I drooled over Android’s location-awareness features (like Compass mode), no matter where I tried, in neighborhoods all over San Diego, Android was unable to pinpoint my location. Also, while Android does a great job of bringing your Google Account info to the handset, it doesn’t handle multiple Google accounts well. I use one for work and one for personal reasons, and there’s no way to easily switch personas in Android right now. All this on top of the fee I’d have to pay to get out of my iPhone contract means I won’t be purchasing a G1 with Android—yet. As the software matures, apps come out, and my contract comes to an end, there’s a great chance I’ll change my mind.
(Via Lifehacker.)
New trailer for MacHEADS movie posted: “
MacHEADS is a feature-length documentary about people’s unconditional devotion to Apple. Through a series of interviews (none of which with me, though I’m not hurt…much) with the Mac’s most dedicated followers, the film takes an in-depth look at the cult of Mac and the people (excluding me) who charted the machine’s rise to popularity, posing the ultimate question, ‘Is Apple losing faith as a community and becoming just a brand? …and where’s Rick?’
(Via MacMerc.)
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