Catalog
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Google catalogs brings all of your holiday perusing to your Android tablet
Looking for a way to stay up to date on your favorite retailers this holiday season without amassing a mountain of soon-to-be trash? Google has announced Catalogs, an app that keeps all of your favorite look books current and in one place. The tablet application is now available for Android slates and the iPad, giving you another option when shopping from the couch. You'll be able to curate product collages that can be shared (we'd presume via Google+) with whomever you see fit. Content is pulled from over 125 brands spanning more than 400 digital catalog issues -- so you should be able to find enough to fill out that wish list. If you're looking to give it a spin, hit the source link below to download the app. Update: Well folks, while the Google Catalogs app is new for Android, the iPad verson's been around for a couple months now. [Thanks, TUAW]
Netflix, MGM strike licensing agreement ahead of launch in the UK, Ireland
When Netflix makes its debut in the UK and Ireland next year, it'll do so with MGM Studios by its side. Today, the two companies announced a new licensing agreement that will give Netflix exclusive regional streaming rights to "most first-run feature films from MGM." Included on that list of movies are The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, the prequels to Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings trilogy and 21 Jump Street, among others -- all of which will be available across multiple platforms within one year of their theatrical release. Netflix will also stream a selection of catalog MGM titles, including Fargo, The Usual Suspects, and (snap) West Side Story. Netflix has yet to announce a launch date more specific than "early 2012," and exact pricing remains a mystery, but we'll be sure to let you know as soon as we hear more. In the meantime, you can find more details and delectable delights in the full PR, after the break.
Google Catalogs iPad app digitizes catalogs, no more coasters
We all know what catalogs are good for: starting fires in the fireplace, light reading in waiting rooms and makeshift placemats. Oddly, Google has decided to take these perfectly useful glossy dead trees away from us with the introduction of Google Catalogs, a free iPad app. Like most shopping apps, users can zoom in, learn more and purchase products through a company's website, but this one adds a slick little twist: collages. Put together a particularly sweet L.L. Bean ensemble and want to share it with Mom? No glue stick or scissors required. Check out the video after the break.
PSN's missing Super Street Fighter IV costume 'Catalog' add-ons explained
One difference between the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Super Street Fighter IV can be hard to see: Opponents' DLC costumes are invisible to PlayStation Network players who haven't also purchased the outfits. On Xbox Live, there's a simple solution in free "Catalog" add-ons that install the DLC assets on a user's hard drive, in order to show them worn on online opponents who have purchased and dressed up in the alternate costumes. To date, the free updates have not been offered on PSN. They likely never will be -- and Capcom tells us why. "When you add new data to an existing product, there are significant costs to do so charged by the first parties," Capcom community shepherd Seth Killian explained in a forum post on the topic of the "invisible" PSN costumes. "On XBL, those costs were covered by Microsoft," and thus the Catalog DLC is free to download. "For Sony, those significant costs are not covered," Killian added. "The story is a bit more complicated because the costs of adding new data vary by region in some cases, and some additions are free, or free within a certain timeframe, etc., but the bottom line in this particular case is that Sony would [have] charged Capcom significant fees for distributing the new costume data to users that hadn't actually bought the DLC." The story is indeed more complicated: In a sense, the Catalog updates aren't free, since the only Xbox Live users that benefit from them are Gold members who play SSFIV online. And, of course, Gold subscribers pay a fee for that privilege, which in turn allows Microsoft to cover the costs of updates like the costume data. Do we sense a new Plus perk in the making?
Studio 1558 Touch sneaks into Dell catalog with Core i5
Well looky here: an unannounced Studio Touch laptop making its debut on page 5 of Dell's on-line catalog. The Studio 1558 Touch is flanked by the multitouch Studio 17 Touch. You won't find any details about the 1558 on Dell's website or retail channels so what you see above is what you get: Core i5 processor underpinning a Windows 7 Home Premium OS and 320GB hard disk for a $999 starting price. Expect this one to get official soon enough. [Thanks, Erik D.]
Telltale Games may be releasing all games for Mac
Telltale Games has been rocking the retro lately, doing great things like bringing Secret of Monkey Island and Sam & Max back in new forms, and releasing new episodic classics like Strong Bad's Cool Game for Attractive People. Now they might be doing so on the Mac: rumor has it that they'll be releasing their whole catalog on the Mac as soon as next month, just in time for an appearance at Macworld Expo. Apparently there are many Mac fans both on the team and in the customer base, and they're just figuring out a way to do it. Sounds awesome to us -- Telltale's stuff is already available on a few other platforms (both PC and consoles), but they have a history of putting fans first, so we might even expect some goodies to come with a Mac release. We'll have to wait and see what they've got planned. [Via IMG]
Is this Palm's revamped App Catalog?
We know that Palm's hard at work implementing desperately needed payment infrastructure for its App Catalog, and we might now be getting some of the first glances of what it -- and the non-beta App Catalog as a whole -- will look like. Major new features include the aforementioned support for credit card payments, some sort of tag cloud that appears to show up when searching, and integrated app management, while many other screens have been gently tweaked from the early release Pre owners are using today. Last we'd heard, Palm had been targeting mid-September for e-commerce to make its grand debut, which is like... now, so we're thinking we won't be waiting long to see this out and about. [Thanks, Mitchell R.]
Rumor: Walmart catalog lists $100 price cut for Xbox 360 Elite
Oh, man. This ish just got real, son. Last week, a supposedly leaked Meijer's catalog revealed a $100 price cut for the Xbox 360 Elite SKU -- we weren't sure what to make of it, but a recent Walmart catalog (due to hit stores on August 30) revealing the same exact discount adds a hefty amount of credence to rumors that Microsoft is dropping the price on the console's 120GB SKU. You can see the full ad posted after the jump, courtesy of one of our readers (thanks, Patrick). A few sites have gotten the ad, presumably from different sources, leading us to believe it's not just a high-quality fake.If it is legitimate -- and the rumors of an Elite price cut end up being true -- then the flames of console war are likely ready to flare up once again. For the first time this console generation, Sony and Microsoft would have two SKUs available at the same price. The resulting struggle for market dominance would be brutal.
Rumor: Meijer's catalog lists $100 price cut for Xbox 360 Elite
Kotaku recently got their hands on a catalog from retail superstore Meijer's which is supposedly due to hit ... catalog stands(?) on August 30. The clipping of interest from this ad book is for a "new lower price" for the Xbox 360 Elite model -- it seems they're slicing $100 off the price of the system, bringing it down to the $299 price point shared by the Pro version.This fits in nicely with the grand design foreseen by the Ars Technica mole back in June, which claimed Microsoft would completely replace the Pro model with the Elite sometime in September. However, we called nearly a dozen Meijer's locations to try and confirm the cut -- only one Media Center employee had heard about it, and explained that it would be a "week-long sale," and not a permanent price drop.We're certain to find out more in the near future -- either on August 30, when the catalog (and Elite price) is supposed to drop, or perhaps next week during GamesCom, which some believe will provide a veritable cornucopia of startling announcements. [Image]
First Look: FontShuffle puts FontShop in your pocket
If, like me, you do a lot of your font shopping at FontShop, you're sure to love FontShuffle. FontShuffle is like having a copy of the indispensable FontShop catalog right on your iPhone or iPod touch. I know my dog-eared copy from 2002 needs to be updated and/or retired: FontShuffle is a nifty, free replacement. It's ideal for situations where you know what look you want, but don't know what font to use. FontShuffle lets you choose from six major classifications of type: sans serif, serif, slab serif, script, blackletter, and display. Tap one, and FontShuffle shows you six more sub-categories to choose from. Tap one of those, and you're presented with six selections from the FontShop catalog based on the look you selected. If none of the fonts fit the bill, press "Shuffle" or simply shake the device to get six more fonts. Tapping a font lets you view a customizable string of text in that font, and even save a picture of the text to your device's camera roll. Rotating the screen displays a specimen. Unfortunately, FontShuffle can be frustrating if you know what font you're looking for, as there's no search tool. You have to shuffle through page after page of fonts until it comes up in a random selection. Also, FontShuffle doesn't contain FontShop's entire catalog. They promise to add more fonts in upcoming versions. FontShuffle is free, and available from the App Store. It's a must-have for any type geek or designer that needs a font reference handy. %Gallery-39918%
Best Buy's "doorbuster" Black Friday deals probably won't result in the literal busting of doors
We apologize for the cloying headline, but just wanted to point out to Best Buy that the whole point of insane deals and "doorbuster" savings is, well, those things. We're sure there are a couple things in this new Black Friday catalog to make a seven hour wait in below freezing temperatures -- to be followed by frantic hand-to-hand combat with other recession-hit shoppers who may or may not be Arnold Schwarzenegger -- totally worth it, but we'd really love to meet the person for which a $12 Guns N' Roses CD qualifies as such a purchase. If you're looking for a $380 laptop, a lame $300 Xbox 360 bundle or a decent deal on a crappy LCD TV, knock yourself out.
Win a license for video catalog tool Frameline 47
If you're like me, your professional or personal efforts toward video organization nirvana have been less than fruitful over the years. With video files spread across multiple formats and multiple storage locations, keeping everything readily available and tagged for reuse is a giant pain. On the consumer level I've tried iDive, iView Multimedia (now Microsoft Expression Media), even plain old iPhoto, and I'm checking out FootTrack; moving up the ladder, there are high-end choices like Cumulus/Mediadex and Final Cut Server. Finding that midrange, prosumer & network-enabled video cataloging tool, with options for MPEG-7 metadata, dynamic clip creation and embedded Spotlight comments in files -- well, I'm still looking, but Frameline 47's new version 3 seems to come pretty close to what I want. Frameline 47 is a $139 app that works both for an individual and as a networked tool, with Bonjour sharing and the ability to do the aforementioned Spotlight embeds, so your tags, comments and metadata travel with the files instead of with a master catalog; the full Workgroup edition is due at Macworld Expo, with additional capabilities for shared data. All your video files, on all your attached drives, in any QuickTime-readable format (plus WMV and more with Flip4Mac and Perian) can be scanned and thumbnailed into Frameline's search browser; once there, you can add annotations, identify clips for reuse, export your edited files, create webpage galleries, or pass along edit lists to Final Cut. There's a lot in Frameline to explore; probably more than I'll use for my personal projects, but if you have to wrangle a large collection of clips for your editorial work it's definitely worth a look. You can download a 14-day trial from Frameline's site... but we've got a special offer for TUAW readers courtesy of Frameline: 10 licenses to give away, free of charge. Read on for details on how to enter and win. P.S. Extra credit if you suss out why the app includes the number '47' in its name.
Media Catalog 4.0 faster, supports Quick Look
People who are religious about backups, especially those who use removable media like CDs or DVDs as backup media, often find themselves in a world of hurt when they try to find individual files on a pile of discs. It's worse than finding the proverbial needle in a haystack!Developer Robert Kuilman released version 4.0 of his Media Catalog application today (July 7, 2008). Media Catalog makes quick work of cataloguing all of those archive CDs, DVDs, and external hard drives. While test-drivng Media Catalog, I popped in a few old backup CDs. The application catalogued hundreds of files in a few seconds, then popped the CDs out. You can also drag-and-drop volumes onto the application to add them to the catalog. Searching is extremely fast, and you can use Quick Look to preview documents as long as the original media is mounted.Kuilman rewrote his indexing code and speed has improved up to 770% over version 3.9. You can try out Media Catalog 4.0 for free (limited to five media), or purchase it for $24.95.
The SkyMall Index: measure the iPod ecosystem
If you fly, you know the airborne retail experience: the SkyMall catalog, sitting in the seat pouch, reminding you that you really should have brought something to read. The compilation of useful household products (fake rocks to cover unsightly yard objects!), kitschy health & gadget items, and clothing (Carabella Collection, which my wife refers to as "the slutty clothes catalog") also includes plenty of iPod-related gear. In an effort to avoid direct in-flight childcare responsibilities, I decided to audit the iPod appearances in the current SkyMall catalog and contrast them with the number of vintage prop Macs used to demo computer furniture, as a proxy for Apple's past.iPod-compatible items advertised: 11, including chargers that support multiple devices but used an iPod in the catalog picture. Coolest: Icuiti iWear-1A video goggles.Macs used as props: 6, with two current and four old. Most egregious old Mac prop: a tie, between a WallStreet PB G3 on a telescoping desk, and a rolling CPU stand that appeared to contain a Power Mac 8100 -- both sent a cold shiver down my spine.The result: for the early spring 2007 Skymall Index, an iPod rating of 1.83 -- not bad! The iPod is easily the most visible single brand in the catalog, and shows up nearly as often as cellphones do. Now, I'd better get my order in for that pair of adult footie pajamas I've always coveted.Thanks Heidi!
For the authentic Virtual Console experience: old Sears catalogs
Now for a reminder of what gaming looked like when the Virtual Console was a collection of actual consoles: these scans of old Sears Roebuck catalogs almost have us printing them out, circling the TurboDuo, and sending the page to our parents just in case they still need any Christmas shopping ideas for Christmas 1992.These catalogs looked cheesy to us back then too, but there's really a magic about them that is lost in game retail materials these days. Maybe it's just because the early 16-bit "system wars" were one of the most amazing periods in gaming history. Which side did you take in Genesis vs. Turbografx-16?[Via NeoGAF]
HistoryHound - full text search of browser histories, NetNewsWire, more
HistoryHound is a handy search utility for anyone who does a lot of surfing and RSS reading between multiple apps. It offers a full text search of most of the major Mac OS X browsers including Mozilla's, OmniWeb and even Opera, as well as two of the more popular RSS readers: Pulp Fiction and NetNewsWire 2. It can be called with a keyboard shortcut, or a small search panel can be left to float above other windows, always waiting to do your bidding.How HistoryHound searches is customizable, as is how far back into the history it shines its spotlight. If you don't like bouncing between applications HistoryHound also includes its own WebKit-based browser for previewing any of your search results.This swiss army knife of a history utility has also recently been updated to a Universal Binary, along with a few other minor but useful feature tweaks. A fully-functioning 30 day demo is available, while a full license is $19.95.
TUAW Tip: Mac OS X can verify itself now
Disk Utility is a great maintenance and troubleshooting tool for those times when your Mac starts acting up. Repairing permissions can sometimes be handy (even though its true validity is in question as of late), but using the Verify and Repair Disk operations is often a more useful tactic. However, until Mac OS X 10.4.3, you had use Disk Utility to verify or repair your Mac's drive from some sort of an external source. You either had to plug into another Mac in Target Disk mode, or reboot and use the install disks that came with your Mac - not the most friendly process to your workflow. But now, With 10.4.3 and later, you can start up Disk Utility right from within Mac OS X and chose the verify option to make sure system level elements like your file catalog are all in order. One warning though: it is completely normal for your Mac to temporarily freeze or 'seize up' at the beginning of running this operation (you should get the infamous beachball), as this Apple support document explains. After a little while, depending on your Mac's speed and all that jazz, it will come out of its daze and you can continue working/chatting/surfing while it finishes the disk verification process.This is a really handy tool, perhaps even more valuable than checking permissions, and should be a welcome addition to any Mac maintenance arsenal.
Beatles will sell music online, join rest of us in 21st century
iLounge is reporting that the Beatles catalog is currently being remastered in preparation for (finally) selling it through online music services (yea, plural). A Reuters article states that Neil Aspinall, a former Beatles road manager and witness in the Apple vs. Apple trademark lawsuit, is apparently working on remastering the Beatles' catalog and doesn't think it would be right to offer downloads of the old masters, and then release the remastered versions at a later date. Good call Neil.Presently, there is no ETA on when the remastering process will be finished or when the online music services could finally sell one of the most highly-anticipated online music catalogs in history. Who wants to place bets that, once the Beatles finally go digital, the catalog will be an iTunes exclusive?
Quicksilver basics: shake hands with your preferences
Yesterday Quicksilver started acting a little goofy, and I wasn't surprised; I have just about every beta and extra turned on as I just can't stop exploring all the neat stuff this app can do. During my troubleshooting efforts I resorted to the simple trick of quitting Quicksilver and simply moving its preference file (located with other preference files in ~/Library/Preferences) to my desktop, forcing Quicksilver to re-create a clean new preference file. This fixed the issue, but it also forced me to dive back into my preferences to tweak, toggle and change some of the options I use to make Quicksilver do what I want.That experience made me realize, however, that part of the Quicksilver learning curve for new users really is to get to know its preferences, since they act as a handy springboard into what Quicksilver is capable of. A lot of fantastic tutorials, like those at 43 Folders and Blacktree's own site (the makers of Quicksilver), sometimes assume that you already know what you're doing with Quicksilver. Another complication is that the actions (and sometimes plugins) used in these tutorials are not installed or enabled by default. Some of the email actions - for example the "send item immediately" action that allows you to email an item to someone without ever touching a mail composition window - are oddly not enabled in a default Quicksilver installation, which means a user has to open Quicksilver's preferences (once invoked, a quick cmd - , does the trick) and dig around in the Actions section to find what they need. Ultimately, I figure there are three key areas of Quicksilver's preferences that might help new or aspiring but confused users get their feet grounded: Catalog, Actions and Plugins, and here is a brief explanation of each: Catalog - this is a pretty straight-forward list of everything Quicksilver keeps track of on your Mac. Looking through the Catalog and the Actions preference panel should help you get a grasp of what items Quicksilver can find and manipulate, and then how you can manipulate them. Actions - this is a list of the defining ability that separates Quicksilver from mere seek-and-find applications. Actions allow you to do something with the item you have found, far above and beyond simply opening it. Actions are (loosely) categorized to help you find your way around: Address Book actions allow you to do more with your contacts, Text actions (an optional plugin) allow you to do things like looking up word definitions right from within Quicksilver and appending text to a file buried somewhere, etc. If this panel doesn't excite your inner productivity geek, you should consider consulting your physician. Plugins - Quicksilver is highly, highly plugin-able, which is where even more of its beauty radiates from. Plugins for Backpack, alternative browser bookmarks, the Mac OS X Keychain, NetNewsWire headlines, a multiple-item clipboard, hundreds of web search engines and much, much more all have your name written on them. Go wild. Quicksilver is one of the few apps that is so different and powerful that the classic "just open and play with it" phrase might not be enough for some users to grasp what's going on. If you are one of these users, I hope this brief explanation will help you to take your first step into the wide, wonderful universe of Quicksilver.
