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TUAW's Daily iPad App: Sadun's Collage
To start off this new series of daily apps, I thought I'd pick something close to home -- an app by TUAW's own Erica Sadun. The free, ad-supported app is called Sadun's Collage, and it produces fun photographic collages of pictures taken with the cameras in your iPad 2. Sadun's Collage is very intuitive to use. When you launch the app for the first time, you see a corkboard with a live image frame on it, as well as a group of buttons that are at the top of the screen. The buttons fade out, but are summoned back with a tap on the corkboard. To take a photo with Sadun's Collage, you tap on the live image frame. Once the photo is "pinned" to your corkboard, you move it by sliding it around with your fingers, use the pinch gesture to make it bigger or smaller, and rotate it by twisting it clockwise or counterclockwise with two fingers. Every photo has a white Polaroid-like frame, and displays shadows for a feeling of depth as you layer the images. To take another photo -- there doesn't seem to be a limit to how many you can place on the corkboard -- just tap on the corkboard and then tap the + button that appears in the toolbar. If you've been snapping photos of your friends with the rear-facing camera but want to add your face to the board, there's a button for toggling between the cameras. You're not stuck with just the cork background; there are also slate, marble, sandstone, and limestone to use as backgrounds. Once you've captured, sized, and placed images on the background, a tap on a "photo" button sends the collage (sans advertising) to your iPad photo library. Another button opens a blank email with the collage attached for sending to friends. Any individual image on a collage may be removed by tapping on it to display a minus sign (-), and then tapping the minus sign to confirm the deletion. If you decide to erase the entire collage and start over, a tap on the "recycle" button offers up a clean slate to start with. I asked Erica why the app doesn't let you place images from your iPad photo library into the collage. Her response was that the app is designed for spontaneous fun with groups of people more than after-the-fact collage creation. It's also possible that the standard iOS photo browser was omitted because it tends to be a bit slow and is a memory hog, but that's just my opinion. While you're hanging around at a picnic, hiking in the mountains, or waiting for the fireworks to start over the Independence Day holiday in the U.S. this weekend, be sure to download Sadun's Collage, have a little fun passing around the iPad 2, and enjoy those holiday memories in a clever photo collage that you created.
TUAW's Daily Mac App: AppCleaner
Last week on the Daily Mac App we featured the infamous uninstaller AppZapper. Today we've got a fully-featured free alternative, AppCleaner. Available from FreeMacSoft, the freeware (donations accepted) AppCleaner does what it says on the tin. Just like AppZapper, you can drag-and-drop the offending application onto AppCleaner to locate and delete all the associated files. Alternatively you can hit the Applications, Widgets or Others tabs to find and delete things directly from AppCleaner. "Others" thankfully includes Preference Panes, so you can get rid of any unwanted additions to your System Preferences with ease. So far so good, it does exactly what AppZapper does, but it's free. AppCleaner does have one unique feature, however, and that's "SmartDelete." An option in the preferences, SmartDelete allows you to carry on deleting apps the way Apple intended by just sending them to the trash, but with the added benefit of trashing all the associated files automatically. While SmartDelete is running, AppCleaner is supposed to detect that you've trashed an app and offer to find the associated files for you. I couldn't get it to work, but free's free right? If you want to get rid of some applications you've installed but never use, AppCleaner does the job fine. It may not be the most comprehensive Mac cleaning app out there, but as uninstallers go, AppCleaner is free and works great. Perhaps with Lion landing soon, now is the time to start clearing out the cobwebs and get your Mac ready for the shiny new OS X 10.7. Thanks to brijazz for the suggestion.
VideoSurf brings its recognition virtues to Android, expects iOS to follow shortly (video)
If you haven't heard of VideoSurf before now, you'll be forgiven. The company has existed for a few years as a web service, but it wasn't until CES 2011 when it made waves in the mobile arena by demoing its video recognition software for Android. Now it's ready for prime time in the Android Market, where the free application promises to deliver a Shazam-like experience for movie and television viewers. If you're not wholly familiar with the process, VideoSurf attempts to identify what you're watching and who's on screen after capturing only a few seconds of video. From there, you can follow the rabbit hole and learn more about the actors, find other roles they've played, and receive recommendations based on your interests -- seems to be what everyone is doing these days. Although there's nothing for iOS yet, if you watch the video (after the break), you'll see the company is rather confident about what's on deck.
TweetDeck for iPhone updated additional image uploading options
TweetDeck, whose fate is currently up in the air, just received an update. Specifically, version 2.0.1 for the iPhone adds the following features: Support for image uploading via Twitpic and Mobypicture. Added the ability to create a column with your own tweets and edit the title of custom-made columns. Various bug fixes TweetDeck 2.0.1 is a universal app and is now available via the App Store. TweetDeck 2, the major overhaul of the app, was released in late April. Twitter has apparently purchased TweetDeck for a tidy sum estimated to be between 40 and 50 million dollars. The app has a loyal following across platforms. We'll have to wait and see what the future holds for the popular app.
New Wired for iPad issue out now, Adobe's picking up the tab
Want to try out Wired Magazine for iPad, but you're not too thrilled about paying US$3.99 for the latest issue? In an attempt to encourage potential subscribers to push the buy button in the future, and to show off some new features in the app, Wired 19.05 (otherwise known as the May 2011 edition) is being offered for free. To get the free issue, simply download the free app and visit the Wired Library once you've launched it. You'll see an issue at the top marked Free Download, and with a tap you can download the 380 MB file. Conde Nast, publisher of Wired, isn't going to lose money on this proposition. Adobe has sponsored the issue, much like how Lincoln has paid for up to 200,000 passes for The New York Times paywall. As usual, the magazine is chock-a-block with ads, but many of the ads in this issue are showing Wired's commitment to making advertising both more interactive and more social. The interactive ads range from one that has you search for four Lexus hybrids to a rather boring Ameritrade ad that plays a teaser for an iPad app when touched. In some ads, you can brag about your achievement by tweeting friends or updating Facebook. There's also animated content; in a one page article titled "Why Soda Goes Pop," the equation for Henry's Law appears in animated carbon dioxide bubbles. There's a video about lawn darts, and in an article about earbuds, a small info pop-up appears when you tap on each brand of bud. I actually found most of the ads to be more compelling than the content in this issue, which is why I haven't had a subscription to Wired since the late 1990s. Playing "Where's Waldo?" in ads is more interesting than the "Pat the Bunny" type of interactive content that the magazine seems to be dredging up. However, it's worth the time and bandwidth to give the Wired for iPad app a look while it's still available for free. The app is currently getting awful reviews in the App Store for losing previous issue purchases that readers had made, but if you've never bought an issue before, you'll be safe. Be sure to check out the gallery below for some screenshots of some of the content and ads. %Gallery-122453%
Sony's Crackle app for iOS approved by Apple
A few months ago, we reported on how Apple rejected the Sony Reader app from the App Store, seemingly singling out the electronics and media company for punishment when similar apps like Amazon's Kindle and Barnes & Noble's Nook readers for iOS were untouched. Sony appears to have decided to follow the old maxim that "if you at first don't succeed, try, try again," since they have had a new app for iOS approved by Apple. The free Crackle app gives access to hundreds of movies in the Columbia Pictures, Screen Gems, Sony Pictures Classics, and Tri-Star libraries, as well as thousands of TV series episodes. Available for free are movies like Ghostbusters, series like Seinfeld and Married ... With Children, and The Three Stooges. According to Crackle's App Store description, you can build and manage your viewing queue on the app or online, and video streams over Wi-Fi and 3G. More new movies and TV episodes will be added on a regular basis. So how is Sony making money on this? There are short ads that appear during the video, but most reviewers in the App Store are saying that they're so short that they're almost unnoticeable. It's a free app with free content, no subscription fee, and good quality, so it looks like a winner. [via MacStories]
DEVONtechnologies offers four free Mac utility apps
Like anyone, we always appreciate free stuff. While it's important to be aware that sometimes you get what you pay for, sometimes you get more. Such is the case for a batch of Mac utilities from DEVONtechnologies. For anyone that makes a living sitting in front of a computer screen, little tools that help speed your way through various tasks are always welcome, and at least one of these apps might be just what you've been looking for. When you have a bunch of windows open for various tasks and you need a file or application, using Exposé to get to a Finder window is one approach, but you might find Xmenu to be a more efficient path. Xmenu adds a menu extra to the right side of the Apple menu bar that provides quick access to files and folders on your drive. If you're not sure where the item you want is located, EasyFind supplements Mac OS X's built-in Spotlight with the ability to search for hidden files, search inside packages, and even allows the use of Boolean operators to narrow searches. ThumbsUp enables batch operations on clusters of images to switch formats, resize, sharpen and more. It's not quite like creating a Photoshop action, but for some quick and dirty operations it will do. PhotoStickies is less productivity oriented, but it allows you create an automatic collage of images that you select from your drive. The sticky images can even include live webcam feeds that automatically update. You can grab all four utilities for free at DEVONtechnologies.
DOS emulator for iOS released, runs Windows 3.0
This seems like the kind of thing that Apple wouldn't want on the App Store (and indeed, it may soon disappear when they figure it out), but then again, after the relaxing of the rules, maybe they're OK with this one. Touch Arcade has discovered iDOS on the App Store -- it's a DOSbox-based disk operating system emulator that runs on iOS. And it apparently does everything that DOS does, including, as you can see in the picture, running Windows 3.0 complete with the Solitaire game. The app is a 99 cent universal app for iPhone and iPad, and unfortunately, it's not user friendly at all -- if you don't remember your old DOS commands, the app's not set up to make things easy for you. The app also includes what the description calls "freeware/abandonware" like Ms. Pac Man PC, and DigDug, but you can upload other games and files through iTunes. Honestly, this is awesome, but it seems a little too open for Apple's tastes. I can't see how it would ever hurt the iOS device (you're running everything from within the app, and Apple could simply assume that you own any copies of software that you install on there), but this is one app that may have snuck through the gates. At any rate, iDOS is now available on the App Store -- if it disappears later on, we'll let you know. Update: We're getting reports that it's been pulled, not unexpectedly so. We'll have to see if the devs want to fight to try and keep it up. It's certainly possible to release an emulator app on the App Store, but Apple's touchy about the subject, to say the least.
Fan-made Duke Nukem 3D remake green-lighted by Gearbox
Project lead Frederik "Fresch" Schreiber has received a non-commercial license to proceed with Duke Nukem: Next-Gen, his Unreal Engine 3-powered Duke Nukem 3D remake. Fresch secured the license in just under three weeks after his first announcement -- a credit to rights holder Gearbox's openness to share the franchise with the community -- and has aleady assembled a team of nine other contributors (though he is still "hiring" for a number of positions). Fresch, who abandoned similar "next-gen" remakes of Daikatana (too unpopular) and SIN (shut down by MumboJumbo), has plans to release a public multiplayer demo of Duke Nukem: Next-Gen "sooner than you think." Of course, the full version will be released "when it's done" -- and he notes that "Duke Nukem: Next-Gen" is, wisely, just a codename. Check out the freeware project's first test video after the break.
NASA's free Moonbase Alpha now available
If the Army can release a free video game to drum up some attention for its cause, why not NASA? That seems to be the argument behind Moonbase Alpha, a free game developed along with NASA that's now available on Steam. With up to six players at a time, the game allows you to experience the surface of the moon while trying to "repair and replace equipment in order to restore the oxygen production to the settlement," after a meteorite causes system failure. The official page calls it a "First Person Explorer" title, and shows players fixing equipment connections and even building and controlling a Wall-E style repair robot. The graphics even look good, too -- exactly like that television studio NASA filmed those "moon landings" in. Nice try, NASA, but everybody knows it's nothing but green cheese up there.
Open source BitTorrent application Transmission updated to 2.0
Transmission, the lightweight, open source, and free BitTorrent client we've written about in the past, recently released version 2.0. Transmission was already one of the leanest BitTorrent clients on OS X, and the new version makes it even faster, with improvements to startup time, local data handling, and optimization of how you connect to peers and download requests. Transmission 2.0 will also search for and discover peers on your local network to connect with for even faster speeds. While Transmission is a cross-platform, open source application, the developers continue to focus on making it feel like a native OS X app, and Transmission feels right at home with all of the other Mac-only applications I use every day. Mac users can now paste trackers into the Create window, magnet links will open the Add Transfer window, and the Compact View replaces the Minimal View to use less screen real estate. Thanks to both its lightweight nature and its adherence to OS X design conventions, Transmission is one of the easiest torrent clients I've used. It accomplishes this ease-of-use without sacrificing the power features like scheduled bandwidth limiting, a Web interface for remotely controlling torrent activity, and port configuration; all of these features can be found in the well-organized Preferences.
Ten tiny and amazing Mac apps you've never heard of
The following is a guest post from Tod Maffin, one of Canada's most influential web and technology commentators. Thanks, Tod! -Ed. Air Video Server (Mac app is free, iPhone/iPad app is $2.99 or free Lite version) This is a great little app that for people who have lots of videos on their computer, but want to watch them on your iPhone, iPod Touch, and an iPad. Previously what I had to do was to convert the videos to MP4 (often a very slow process), import them into iTunes, and tweak the metadata. Only then could I watch the movies I have on my iDevices. That still wasn't a great solution, since those videos then took up space on those devices. This app is really a tiny file server that runs on the same computer on which your videos are stored. You can point it to any number of directories containing your videos, including attached servers, and it'll stream them live to any of your iDevices. The other great bonus is it'll convert from basically any video format -- on the fly. Brilliant. [You might have heard of this one -- we covered it on TUAW back in April, along with workalike competitor StreamToMe. –Ed.] Appfresh (Free) I've always been an early adopter and, probably to my detriment, I always want to try the latest versions of programs. Appfresh will scan your Applications folder and compare your versions with the latest versions. Within a minute, it'll have a list of programs that need updating. You can always pick and choose which to update - it suggests beta versions, so if you're not up to a pre-release version, you can opt to not update that app. Keep vigilant, though, for big upgrades to paid programs (i.e., from 3.1 to 4.0) -- they may drop a new version that wants you to pay for an upgrade, leaving you to manually find and re-install the old version (if it's still available on the developer's site!). [TUAW post from back in ought-seven.] Click the link below for the rest of the list.
Designer clock for iPad available free for Earth Day
I love clocks. My house is filled with different digital and mechanical clocks. I've always loved the Alien Clock, and I have an Atmos Clock I picked up on eBay a few years ago. Now a nice designer clock has made it to the iPad and today only it is free to commemorate Earth Day. click.clock HD presents a striking display of time as the digits rotate around the screen. You can tap the screen and get iTunes controls. To skip from one track to another, drag your finger to the left or the right. Tapping and holding the screen will dim the clock, and if your are connected to external power the iPad auto-lock is disabled and you have a nice animated clock to display on your desk or a table. The clock works in either portrait or landscape mode. Negatives? I'd like to see an alarm clock function. I was surprised the Apple clock app didn't make it over from the iPhone. I liked the world clock, and the alarms on the Apple app. Even the timers were handy. Remember, click.clock HD is free today only in honor of Earth Day. Grab it if you 'have the time.'
Carry the Moon in your pocket with this free iPhone app
Last week I was pleased to suggest some free astronomy programs of interest to star-gazers. This week, I'm at it again hoping that space or science buffs get a look at Moon Globe. This very handy app gives you a complete map of our nearest space neighbor, showing you what is visible on any night and from any location. The on-screen display of the moon at the current phase is striking, and very detailed. You can zoom in or out with the usual pinch and stretch moves you are familiar with. It's easy to magnify up to 300 times with stunning detail. With a tap, you will see where spacecraft have landed on the moon and identify surface features like craters, mountain ranges and valleys. The mosaic of pictures that make up the presentation are seamless, and the app gives you the tools to exactly match what you might see in binoculars or a telescope. That's really helpful, because some telescopes reverse the image left to right, or up and down. You can duplicate those views, so it is easy to match up what you are seeing with the display. Clicking on surface feature or a spacecraft name will give you some information that is built into the app, or allow you to link directly to Wikipedia or launch a Google search. There's a lot to like with this app, and with the moon overhead this week, there's a lot to explore. Moon Globe runs on the iPhone and iPod touch, and requires iPhone OS 2.0 or later. The sky is no longer the limit. Check out some screen shots below. %Gallery-86426%
Freeware find: Smith Micro Photo A.K.A. bulk file renamer
While I'm saving my pennies for a new 27" i7 iMac, I'm finding that "free is good." Software development house Smith Micro made my day this morning when I received an email telling me about their free Photo A.K.A. application for Mac (site registration required). The app is a single-tasker -- it is a bulk file renamer, much like Dare to be Creative's Renamer (US$29). Like its more expensive competitor, you can rename any batch of files, not just photos. While I don't think that the user interface for Photo A.K.A. is as well-designed as Renamer, the former application does have several features that can't be found in the latter. For example, Photo A.K.A. can rename files, stuff them into an archive file, and then email the information to someone. There's also a handy built-in function to directly upload your renamed photos to Flickr or Picasa. But wait, there's more! Photo A.K.A. can also burn your renamed files to a CD or DVD, or create a disk image file containing the files. It can also do batch resizing of photo files, display the renamed images as a slide show, and even batch print the files. Finally, there's a sandbox mode for trying your renaming scheme without actually renaming the files. While Photo A.K.A. might not fulfill all of your file renaming requirements, it is free, and it has many features you may find useful.
MaComfort brings a little Mac back to your PC
Let's face it -- as much as we love our Macs, sometimes you've got to use a PC, whether that be for work or at a friend's house, or just for playing some games. But when you absolutely must use Windows, maComfort can make the transition easier. It's a free Windows application (with some premium options) that brings all of the nice software things you appreciate on your Mac back to your PC. It's got a QuickLook-style feature, translates the Windows key to all of your Command hotkeys, and even replicates familiar Mac features like one-button volume control and Spaces and Active Corners. And the app also has a add-on system, so you can download extra features like homemade Docks and shadows just like on your Mac back home. Of course, it's not perfect -- QuickLook only works in Explorer, not everywhere, and obviously all of the less-superficial features on the Mac (like Terminal and Stacks) will stay in OS X. But if you have to use a PC away from home and are frustrated that hitting what's supposed to be the Command key keeps popping up the Start menu instead, try a little maComfort. The app is a free download with limited functionality, or $20 for full use. [via LH]
Logitech gives away free wireless mouse and keyboard (it's an app)
Peripheral manufacturer Logitech has released a free app that lets you turn your iPhone or iPod touch (or probably even your iPad, if you're Stephen Colbert) into a wireless mouse and keyboard. The free TouchMouse app [iTunes Link] is perfect for those situations where you've connected your Mac to a TV and want a way to control it from the comfy confines of your favorite couch. There are actually two components to TouchMouse; the iPhone app and the Logitech TouchMouse Server software. The latter comes in Mac OS X and Windows (XP, Vista, and 7) versions, and must be installed on the Mac or PC in order to "host" the virtual mouse and keyboard created by TouchMouse. The "mouse" has three buttons for your "clicking" pleasure, and uses the majority of your iPhone screen as a touchpad. With the touch of a button, you can bring up a keyboard to type on your Mac or PC. There are other apps that can do the same thing if you're not a fan of Logitech. Air Mouse Pro [US$1.99, iTunes Link] is probably the most powerful and popular Wi-Fi mouse in the App Store, while Rowmote Pro [US$4.99, iTunes Link] has a large and vocal fan following. If you're looking for free (and who isn't?), Logitech's TouchMouse app can give you a taste of remote control at absolutely no cost.
Sikuli can automate any UI by taking screenshots
This is pretty impressive --of course there are already lots of ways to automate actions on your Mac, and odds are that you may have messed around with scripting or Automator more than once before. But Sikuli is a new app that makes automating as simple as taking screenshots. Instead of programming actions, all you have to do is put screenshots of the particular UI items that you want to automate in a list, and then the app will use visual cues to do whatever you want it to do. Not only does it make things much easier when actually writing scripts, but it also gives you countless options in terms of automation -- the app can automate any app that has a graphical user interface, because all it has to do is recognize that GUI on your screen. That includes web apps, too -- like I said, the possibilities are endless. And since it's developed with Jython, you Python experts can insert any Python code that you like in the scripts as well. The whole thing is an MIT project, so it's available for free across all platforms, including OS X, Windows, and Linux. If you've been looking for an automator that'll do any rote task for you, give Sikuli a try. [via LifeHacker]
Transmission 1.8 released, now featuring support for magnet links
Transmission, the venerable BitTorrent client for Mac, has just received an overhaul in the form of a "huge listen-to-the-users release." From the release notes the following enhancements are included: Added support for magnet links Added support for trackerless torrents Redesigned tracker inspector tab Quick Look restored for Snow Leopard users According to the release notes there are over 100 changes that have been sourced from the users. Transmission is free and open source and can be downloaded here.
SlipCover helps make case icons for your media
Here's a cool app we haven't mentioned yet here on TUAW -- SlipCover is an app that will help you put together some beautiful icons for your Mac's media files, from DVDs to video games or anything else that needs a cool looking icon. The app itself revolves around "case" files, which are basically templates like the Blu-ray, PS3, and Xbox 360 branding on their DVD cases, to which you can then drag and drop other media on to (for example, put a Watchmen movie poster on a Blu-ray "case," and you've got an icon that looks exactly like a Blu-ray version of the DVD), and then your media files on there to apply the icon automatically. No more hunting around through file names or weird previews of your media -- you can just browse through a Delicious Library-style set of thumbnails to find whatever you want to watch. Now, you may say that you just get all your media from iTunes, and that those come with thumbnails and covers already, and that's a fair point. But for those of us who obtain media from all over the place, it's nice to have a way to make it look all professional and purty. Slipcover is a free download over on their website. [via Lifehacker]
