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After Facebook and Google, the EU tackles... daylight savings
After holding tech giants to account with fines and legislation, the European Commission (EC) sights are now trained on a new target. The commission is polling EU residents to figure out whether it's time to reconsider daylight savings.
MEdiaCOre sofaside Digital Lifestyle PC now on sale
When you think coffee table PCs, you probably think Savant. You probably also think: "I can't afford that." At least with the MEdiaCOre Digital Lifestyle PC, you can possibly pretend it's within reach, as creator Pearing Core Systems has it starting well below five figures. After digging a bit, we found that this HTPC / AV rack conglomerate starts at around $6,100, and obviously, you can take that figure about as far north as you please depending on configuration. A fairly novel concept, sure, but one we figure only a select few will realistically consider.[Via eHomeUpgrade]
PictureSync 2 screenshots posted
The crew at Holocore have seen it fit to begin teasing users of PictureSync, a slick app for both Mac and PC that makes it easy to upload pictures and videos to various social media sites, with screenshots of a forthcoming update to version 2.0. The app has clearly taken on a very i-App UI, placing image and video sources such as iPhoto in a left sidebar, with any services you upload said media to just below that list. The scaling slider in the lower right is a very nice touch, as the current version only displays fixed thumbnails that can sometimes make it difficult to pick out images in a lineup. These new features are, of course, in addition to PictureSync's present abilities which include turning your iPhoto keywords into tags for most services (including Flickr and Vox), as well as being able to edit extensive amounts of metadata, even in batches, and grab geolocation data from Google Earth.PictureSync at present is free when used with one online service at a time, but its real power comes from spending a mere $15 for a license which enables uploading to as many services at once as your heart desires. An alpha of this v2 update is expected to be ready for Windows by the middle of next month, with a beta shortly thereafter. The Mac version will apparently follow a little later.
Valet - a flexible application launcher with Parallels integration
Valet is a new kind of application launcher that brings some interesting innovations to the table. First, upon activation it offers a heads-up display containing application icons, organized into categories of your choosing. This is a rich visual departure from competition like LaunchBar and Quicksilver. Second, Valet is heavy on voice control, though you apparently still need to activate it with a hotkey. Perhaps most interesting is Valet's ability to also open Windows applications inside of a Parallels virtual machine. That's right: you can create a category containing Windows apps like Internet Explorer, Access or even shortcuts to Control Panel items. Calling these things from Valet will start Parallels, open your virtual machine and fire up the Windows app of your choosing. Does anyone else see the line between OSes getting thinner with new apps like this? Valet doesn't stop there though; other tricks up its sleeve include Growl support and automatic detection of new apps. If you want to see Valet in action, its developers have put together a nice demo (QuickTime link) of the voice activation and heads-up display features. Valet is a Universal Binary. Licenses are $25, and volume licensing options are available upon request.
Spanning Sync announces public beta
Charlie Wood from Spanning Sync, the 'missing link' software we mentioned back in November that can keep iCal and Google Calendar n'sync, just let us know that a public beta (version 1.0b11) is now available (zip download link). Getting started with iCal + gCal syncing bliss is simple: Download the aforementioned zip file Install Spanning Sync, which runs as a System Preference pane Enter your Google Account credentials, or go get one (they're free, and if you already have something like a Gmail address, you're good to go) Select which calendars from iCal you want to sync with Google Calendar (and if you haven't signed into Google Calendar at least once, do so now) Press "Sync Now" Sit back and marvel at the wonders of desktop + Google Calendar syncing I've been participating in their private beta for the last couple of months, and Spanning Sync has shaped up pretty well. The ability to keep my desktop synced with Google Calendar has been quite a life-saver for me, and I definitely recommend taking it for a spin, as I couldn't find any viable alternatives. The one catch that Spanning Sync has run into so far is alarm/reminder syncing. Since Google Calendar only supports alarms in your main, personal calendar, Spanning Sync can't include this feature until the gCal team shape up and fly right. Still, while I find myself using reminders for some of my key events, I didn't find this quirk to be a deal-breaker.As of this writing, a price is yet to be announced, though there will be two plans. The first is an annual subscription rate, while the second is a one-time, lifetime purchase for those who want to get past all the riff-raff. Stay tuned for more details.[Update: Woops - looks like servers fall down, go boom. Spanning Sync has temporarily closed the public beta to new users due to the veritable river of interest overrunning their servers. If you recall your 'Internets 101' lessons, water and server hardware don't mix well. However, users who got set up before they closed the beta are still in - the doors are simply closed to new users until Spanning Sync can add some equipment to handle the load. Their blog post announcing the bad news also states that they hope to re-open the public beta by Wednesday, so we'll keep our eye on things and let you know when new users can begin signing up again.]
Adobe says Lightroom ships mid-February, thanks beta testers
Adobe has announced a shipping date of February 19th for Lightroom, their new toolbox for professional photographers that's been in beta for the last year. Lightroom carries a final retail price of $299, but until April 30th, Adobe is saying thanks to everyone who participated in the beta (and lowering the bar for early customers) with a price of $199. The current beta expires February 28th, so either way it's decision time for those who have found a place in their hearts (and workflows) for this professional managing, adjusting and presenting photography software.For more details on Lightroom, we've been following the betas since Lightroom's introduction, and Macworld also has a nice summary of the latest improvements to the shipping version. Adobe, naturally, also has an official product page with demos, feature tours and interviews with photographers on the beta experience and what it's like to see Lightroom get all growed up, ready to make a difference in the (wide-angled) world of professional photography.
Import del.icio.us bookmarks into Yojimbo via AppleScripts
Kenneth Kirksey has posted two AppleScripts on the Yojimbo mailing list for importing your del.icio.us bookmarks into Yojimbo, complete with all your tags. You can get these scripts from the mailing list archives of course, but Kenneth gave me permission to host both of them here on TUAW to make things easier on you readers.The first script, titled All del.icio.us to Yojimbo, imports all your del.icio.us bookmarks into Yojimbo, bringing along all of your tags to boot (If you're a messy tagger, I highly recommend tidying up your del.icio.us tags before you run this script). Per Kenneth's instructions, you simply need to download the text file we've zipped for you, copy all the code from the file into a Script Editor window, and then edit the "set delAccount" and "set delPassword" lines to add your account details in quotes.The second script, called Last del.icio.us to Yojimbo, simply imports your most recent del.icio.us bookmark into Yojimbo. Same instructions apply. Since these scripts make use of Yojimbo 1.3's new tag feature, I'm pretty sure these won't play well with previous versions. Feel free to share your experiences with the scripts here, and be sure to hit up the Yojimbo mailing list if you need more help with them.
WordPress 2.0.6 supports HTML quicktags in Safari
We typically don't post about updates to WordPress (that's Download Squad's job), one of the most popular install-it-yourself blogging platforms available, but this latest v2.0.6 is a little different. Amidst some security updates and other goodies for plug-in and theme developers is HTML quicktag compatibility for post authoring in Safari. As you can see in the screenshot Safari users can now enjoy more powerful editing in WordPress post and page creation windows. Though this isn't quite full rich text/WYSIWYG editing, there are plenty out there who would make the argument that you shouldn't be blogging that way with WordPress in the first place.Text formatting aside, this should offer the Safari-slinging WordPress users out there some browser-hopping relief when drafting their next diggable post.
TUAW predictions for Macworld 07
It's the new year boys and girls, which means (amongst other things) that Macworld will soon be upon us. As such, it is only fitting that we dust off TUAW's crystal ball to envision what we think will be unveiled both on and off stage. Now we don't have any insider information - this is all simply logical deduction sprinkled with some wishful thinking, so don't bet the bank on any of this. That said, we present you TUAW's predictions for Macworld 07, in order of blogger's last name:Victor Agreda Jr. Google integration (iTV + YouTube) API's for iTV (for El Gato, in particular). Maybe that's a wish; I really, truly doubt Apple and El Gato will play in the same sandbox HD content on iTunes ('07 is the true year of HD) A gold nano - for Steve, as he announces retiring in 2008 Some sort of Spreadsheet addition to iWork 07 .Mac will "somehow get better" David Chartier I agree with everyone else: iLife and iWork 07 are a sure thing No Apple iPhone - mostly because, if true, it could possibly go down in history as one of the most hyped yet never announced fanaticware products of all time I've been hoping for a video update to the AirPort Express, but it seems like the iTV more or less kills that idea; I predict it ships at Macworld On Leopard: I again agree with everyone else on a ship date being announced Laurie A. Duncan The Mac mini will get a Core 2 Duo upgrade - although not necessarily across the line. I wouldn't put it past them to keep the sub-$600 model a single Core Duo A major iTunes-related content announcement Hopefully a new stand-alone iSight camera because as much as I dig the convenience of having one built in to my iMac and MacBook, it's not terribly convenient for scanning my many shelves of books into Delicious Library, for instance (I still have my old FW iSight for such occassions, but a shiny new one would be nice) I am fairly certain we'll get to hear what the "iTV" will actually be called, along with a ship date and I'm pretty sure we'll hear a Leopard ship date I'm not seeing an iPhone(y) (aka iVox in the pretend world where I am in charge of such things) in my crystal ball, although I suspect there will be a number of jokes about it Mat Lu Leopard released earlier than expected iTV finalized revised iPods no iPhone CS3 released earlier than expected Dan Lurie Release date and complete feature set for Leopard iLife/Work '07 iTV release date and complete feature set. iPhone (You have no idea how much I want this one to be right) Scott McNulty iLife and iWork 07 Refreshed Cinema Displays Leopard ship date announced Michael Rose Likewise on Leopard release date Minimum of three additional studios for iTunes movie store "iTV" official announcement, integration with Elgato products for capture Major digital asset management product announcement for pro video space, stemming from Proximity acquisition One more thing: 8-core Mac Pro One MORE more thing: iPod Phone - multi-service chat presence included Erica Sadun iLife and iWork 07 iTV ships Leopard ship date iPhone announcement iDogCow - because every good prediction should have an absolutely wrong item in it. Viva Clarus. Moof! There you have it - we'll just have to see next week which of our crystal balls is the clearest. What do y'all think? Are we off the mark, or did we miss anything you're betting the house on? Gambling habits aside, feel free to share your own predictions in the comments.
Pete Wright: "My Microsoft career is now officially over"
Coming to the rescue once again, digg's users have highlighted a fairly prominent Windows coder's testimony of a switch to Mac OS X and Ubuntu Linux. Pete Wright, a (former) Windows developer who made Microsoft's 'influencer' lists by working for such clients as American Express and Enron, has said goodbye to Redmond. "Today, I've resigned to leave that world behind forever, and I couldn't be happier," Pete exclaimed in a fairly lengthy blog post back in September. Pete cites Microsoft's inability to innovate and Vista's aura of 'Service Pack 3-ness', as well as "buggy, overpriced and stress inducing" software for the switch (amongst other things), but I have a sneaking suspicion his new work environment of t-shirts, sandals and nerf guns had *some* influence. Still, chalk this up as another prominent switch to Mac OS X by a developer fairly high on the Windows totem pole. One can only guess as to how desirable Mac OS X Leopard will be, once Mr. J and company lay all their cards on the table at Macworld 9 days from now.[via MacDailyNews]
Time Magazine 'Person of the Year' cover redux, courtesy of that iSight trick
As you may know, Time Magazine recently declared you as the person of the year. While this is a mighty nice gesture on their part, Dan Wood has created a redux of the cover for iSight-enabled Mac users that truly resembles you as Time's award-winning person of the year. He's using that slick iSight trick that can turn on your iSight camera and place its feed on a web page, but remember: it isn't a security flaw, it's an actual feature. The trick doesn't send any video from your iSight over the web, it simply plays that video back through your web browser locally.As a side note: do any Mac users out there have a non-iSight webcam they can try this trick with? It would be interesting to see if it works only with Apple's camera or if everyone else can play along. That way, users with some kind of webcam have an easier way of adding themselves to Flickr's personoftheyear tag.[via Ranchero's blog]
Mac OS X hacked to run on UMPC, tablet fans rejoice
For those who don't obsessively refresh Engadget, UMPC stands for 'Ultra-Mobile PC' - an emerging hardware form factor for a device smaller and more mobile than a notebook, but nowhere near pocketable (by any stretch of the imagination) like a PDA or iPod. For now it's definitely a niche device (most don't even have built-in keyboards), but that didn't stop Engadget from finding 'Igor', who managed to get a hacked version of Mac OS X 10.4.7 installed on an Asus R2H UMPC. Play the video above for a demo of this home-grown Mac OS X tablet, complete with Safari, iChat and iTunes action, with support for the Apple Remote to boot.Come on Apple! If DIYers can whip this together at home, where's my Mac OS X Tablet mini? Update:Removed incorrect video. Thanks to all who pointed that out.
Twitter widgets, plugins and scripts - oh my!
I seem to be going gaga over web services lately. After dropping my .Mac personal blog for Vox, Twitter is another new-ish service that has also weaseled its way into my daily activities (they launched this past summer). While there are a few explanations for what Twitter really is and does, I like to think of it as a 'status message for your life.' At Twitter's site you can enter a few words or a sentence or two about what you're up to (much like the status message in your chat app), and receive updates when your friends change their status. But it doesn't have to stay at the site. You can embed your Twitter updates in your blog and use them as your Adium status. Twitter lets you receive updates on your phone or even over IM, and you can use both of those to send your own updates back to Twitter. It might sound silly before you actually try it out, but it can easily become addicting if you let yourself surrender to the fun and sign up. If you're getting hooked like me, some users have started a Twitter Fan Wiki to round up all the fun tools that are coming out of Twitter's quickly growing community. While there is stuff here for everything from Windows Smartphones to WordPress widgets and even Ruby scripts, there are some great Mac-centric tools that I really like. The first is the Adium plugin I already mentioned, which lets you embed your Twitter message as your available/away status in Adium. If you want to be able to use Twitter for both an away and an available message, be sure to give them different names, like 'Twitter Away / Twitter Available.' The next two are Dashboard widgets, of course. Twitgit allows you to see a list of your friends' status and enter your own, while Twidget is a straight-up box that simply lets you enter a status. Finally, there's Celly, which seems to do nothing more than pull down random Twitter status messages from across the public channel.With these tools in your belt, you should be able to spend a lot less time when letting people know what you're spending your time on. Isn't redundant technology grand?
Microsoft copied the only iPod they could
John Gruber has penned an interesting observation of how Microsoft might very well have missed the mark from the get-go when they made the strange decision to take on the iPod and iTunes. Since the player's initial wiz-bang sales period is essentially over (as in: it more or less set a decent sales barometer, at least for now), John wrangles some interesting statistics from Amazon's charts on exactly where the Zune stands in comparison to Apple's players (including year-old models), as well as its ranking in the overall electronics category. To spoil the surprise: the Zune isn't doing so well. We've looked at Amazon's charts before, but as of this writing, a record player is beating out the best selling Zune on the electronics list, while iPods - specifically the small, flash-based nano and shuffle - dominate most of the top 10 spots.John then uses this data and good ol' fashioned people watching to conclude that Microsoft shouldn't have taken what could be their only swing at the plate in producing a hard drive-based iPod; they should have cranked out a flash memory model to go head-on with the nano - inarguably the home run slugger in Apple's lineup. While I tend to agree with John, I also see a problem with going down this road: Microsoft would likely have had even less room to maneuver, and even fewer things to market ('Beam your tunes') and invent lame, dead-end lingo for - they actually refer to sharing your music wirelessly as 'squirting'. Who wants to bet how excited Steve Ballmer's kids are to 'squirt' at school?Sure, when you look at what you're up against in the DAP market, Apple's iPod nano and SanDisk's respectable 2GB Sansa player (expandable via an SD slot, and at #11 on Amazon as of this writing) are the top dogs to beat - but what could they have offered? I highly doubt they could have fit their DRM-crippled and arguably worthless (though admittedly buzz-worthy) Wi-Fi sharing feature into a nano-sized player, even if they made it slightly larger and uglier like the Zune is to its 30GB iPod rival. A 'Zune nano' with nothing unique to offer would dry up on its own in a market already dominated by Apple, SanDisk and Creative, and Microsoft's exclusive, 3rd party bitch-slap of a music store would have even less of a leg to stand on.In summary: I think John's right - Microsoft made a bad move in copying the 30GB hard drive-based iPod, but it was the only move they had. In this light, it kinda makes you wonder why they bothered in the first place.
Disney releases Toontown for Mac OS X
Joystiq is reporting that Disney has released a Mac version of Toontown, an MMO cartoon game where users can create cartoon characters, join quests to save Toontown, race carts and even hurl wedding cakes at each other. The game seems to be fairly successful so far, as over 15 million Windows users have already been busy doing the online cartoon character thing. The Mac version is a Universal Binary so everyone on our side of the fence can play along, and the monthly subscription fee is $9.95. Of course a free, though short, three-day trial is available as well.Thanks Barb!
Windows Vista RC2 doesn't work on Macs via Boot Camp?
It appears the just-released Windows Vista RC2 and the latest Boot Camp 1.1.1 don't play well for some reason. I just tried installing it to round up that Vista + Intel Mac post I've been working on, but the Vista installation process kept telling me it wasn't happy with the drive Boot Camp creates, and thus wouldn't touch it even after formatting.This is extra strange, as the RC1 installed and worked on Intel Macs just fine, and as far as I know, Boot Camp 1.1.1 has been updated for full compatibility with the latest Intel Core 2 Duo iMacs like the one I'm typing this on. What broke since RC1, how and whodunit (it was Ballmer in the meeting room with the office chair!) are a mystery to me, but what about you guys? Anyone else know what's going on?
iTunes song tagging redux
We reported a method for tagging iTunes tracks and creating on-the-fly playlists way back in January. However, it involved using Quicksilver and a couple of home-grown scripts, but we can dig it if some of y'all aren't down with a tool as broad-reaching as Quicksilver. Fortunately for the rest of you, a web designer and developer named Steven Campbell has written up a basic method for tagging iTunes tracks and creating playlists based on those tags. It more or less involves revealing the comments column in the song list for easy access, and using a simple system of comma-separated words to get your iTunes tagging on. This can work wonders for Smart Playlists, and Steven offers a few examples in his post.For those still interested in the aforementioned Quicksilver scripts and tools, the author has issued a bit of an upgrade and a new script since we first reported them. First of all, the scripts now live at their own domain name, TuneTag.com. The scripts still allow you to tag the song you're listening to on the fly and create on-the-fly playlists from those tags, but the author also added a new script that lets you select any number of tracks in iTunes and tag them all in one fell swoop. As a Quicksilver fan I'm already in love with the power of these scripts, but either method should work well for bringing the web 2.0 tagging craze to iTunes.
iMac 24-inch surprise: graphics card is upgradeable?
MacsimumNews broke down a MacGeneration post (a French publication) revealing that the new 24-inch iMac Apple introduced this week could quite possibly be the first iMac with a truly upgradeable graphics card. Thanks to a new Mobile PCI Express Module (MXM - originally designed for high-end notebooks) standard in the biggest iMac of 'em all, owners might be able to upgrade their own graphics card and (finally) ditch that old just throw it out when you want to upgrade stigma - if this is true, of course. You can also thank NVIDIA and their partnership with some of the industry leading notebook manufacturers (we would imagine Alienware and even Dell, believe it or not) for this standard that was quite a long time coming. Why this much-requested feature isn't getting any spotlight time on the new iMac's graphics page, or why the 24-inch is the only model to receive the coveted upgrade-ability treatment, definitely doesn't help our skeptical side. We'll be investigating this further, as it could easily be that Apple adopted the standard for one reason or another (like cheaper manufacturing costs), but still soldered the card (which will most surely cause an uproar, if true).We'd also like to echo MacsimumNews' observation that it would be stellar if Apple could work this standard into the next MacBook Pro revision, as the company kinda dropped the ball with their current lineup.Thanks Michael!
BitRocket walkthrough
Just yesterday we wrote about BitRocket, a new open source BitTorrent client for OS X. We also wrote about the fact that some people think that something is rotten in the state of BitRocket, however, after looking at the code myself I can rest easy recommedning the app.Some of you, I am sure, were craving a few more screenshots than the one that I included. Our very own David Chartier has posted a very nice walkthrough of BitRocket on our sister blog, DownloadSquad. Head on over there for a step by step look at BitRocket.
John Gruber issues open challenge to MacBook Wi-Fi hackers
Oh it's on now: criticism of the MacBook Wi-Fi hack has been mounting against the original hackers (David Maynor and Jon Ellch) and SecureWorks, while they have remained mostly silent. At least one passionate blogger has been defending the hack and the original statements, but John Gruber has issued an open challenge for Maynor and Elich to prove this hack once and for all: "If you can hijack a brand-new MacBook out of the box, it's yours to keep."From my understanding of the hack as it was originally explained and pseudo-demonstrated, Gruber's criteria and the actual nature of the challenge sound reasonable: he will meet Maynor and/or Elich at an agreed-upon Apple Store or Mac reseller, and he will purchase a brand new MacBook (but the true question is: traditional white, or $150-premium black? Update: he's already laid down a $1099 price; the base configuration). After taking the machine through a default setup with one administrator account, he will enable Wi-Fi (if it isn't turned on out of the box), but will refuse to join any open networks (since Mac OS X is designed to deny this by default, and the attack - understandably - can't be based on a user blindly joining just any open networks, especially one that might be created specifically by an attacking machine). John will then create a basic file on the desktop, with the default permissions assigned by Mac OS X (read/write by user, read-only by Group and the World). Maynor and/or Elich are then free to attack, and if the file disappears from the desktop - they win a (very slightly used, recently attacked) MacBook. If the file stands its ground, the hackers owe John the price of the MacBook. If the dynamic duo manage to only crash the machine or the current login session, John will call the challenge a tie, whereas he will keep the MacBook, and the duo don't have to whip out their checkbooks.I am admittedly no security expert, nor am I a 1337 h4x0r, but the challenge seems sound. Any readers who have been following this saga spot any holes? Feel free to sound off - and stay tuned: the challenge must be accepted by Friday, September 8th, and as John already deduced: the most likely outcome is that they'll only take the challenge if the know they can win.
