Aug 26, 2008 Aug 28, 2008 Wednesday August 27, 2008
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Mac OS Ken: 08.28.2008
CNBC Host Cramer: Apple Will Get Past iPhone 3G Problems / TechCrunch: iPhone 3G to Hit 6M Sold Next Week / Report: iPhone 3G Fourth Biggest Selling Mobile Phone in Japan / UK Authorities Pull iPhone 3G TV Ad / TechRadar: Ratings Confusion on Movies and iTunes UK / Microsoft names September 9 for Its Own Announcement / âRain of Madnessâ: Is Hollywood Getting The Promo Power of iTunes? / Computer Chopper: Readying Gold Plated iPhone 3G
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VueScan now supports over 1,200 scanners
Posted by Dennis SellersHamrick Software has released Vuescan 8.4.82, a new version of the VueScan software for Mac OS X that's designed to let users produce better digital images from color snapshots, negatives, slides and documents. It now supports over 1,200 scanners and 24 languages.
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University of South Australia to support the iPhone 3G
Posted by Dennis SellersThe University of South Australia, South Australia's largest university will support the iPhone 3G as one of its official corporate mobile handsets, the institution revealed yesterday, reports ZDNet Australia.
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The Inside Deets on iPhone 2.0.2 and Dropped Calls
Daniel Eran Dilger The mysteriously terse synopsis of the improvements made in iPhone 2.0.2, listed only as “bug fixes,” didn't shed much light on why Apple's Jennifer Bowcock could tell USAToday that “the software update improves communication with 3G networks.” However, our source close to AT&T helped illuminate why the update was necessary, what the problem was, and why the update didn't immediately impact users equally. The iPhone 2.0.2 update “fixed power control on the mobile,” the source told RoughlyDrafted. UMTS, the technology used to deliver AT&T's 3G network, refers to phones and other client devices as “UE” for user equipment, and the base transceiver station towers as “Node B.” Why the iPhone 3G dropped calls “In UMTS,” the source said, “power control is key to the mobile and network success. If the UE requires too much downlink power then the base station or Node B can run out of transmitter power and this is what was happening. As you get more UEs on the cell, the noise floor rises and the cell has to compensate by ramping up its power to the UEs.” “If the UE power control algorithm is faulty then they will demand more power from the cell than is necessary and with multiple users this can cause the cell transmitter to run out of power. The net result is that some UEs will drop their call. I have seen the dropped call graphs that correspond to the iPhone launch and when the 2.0.2 firmware was released. The increase in dropped calls,” the source said, were the result of “dropped calls due to a lack of downlink power.” Why the iPhone 3G suffered poor data throughput “The power control issue will also have an effect on the data throughput, because the higher the data rate the more power the Node B transmitter requires to transmit. If the UEs have poor power control and are taking more power than is necessary then it will sap the network's ability to deliver high speed data.” “This is one of the reasons why AT&T has been sending text messages to users to persuade them to upgrade to the 2.0.2 software. In a mixed environment where users are running 2.0, 2.0.1, and 2.0.2, the power control problems of 2.0 and 2.0.1 will affect the 2.0.2 users.” “It is not the network that is fault but the interaction of the bad power control algorithm in 2.0 and 2.0.1 software and the network that is at fault. The sooner everybody is running 2.0.2 software the better things will be. Having seen the graphs the 2.0.2 software has already started to make difference.” That explains why some users saw no immediate impact after installing iPhone 2.0.2, and why tests of individual iPhone 3G models showed no significant difference between the 2.0 and 2.0.2 software: the problem was only evident when a critical mass of phones all acted in concert to run a given cell tower out of power. This also explains why users in locations such as San Francisco and New York were seeing bigger problems than users in less densely populated areas where fewer iPhone 3Gs were in use.
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iPod Converter updated to version 1.7
Posted by Dennis SellersMacvide has updated its iPod Converter, the video to iPod MP4 conversion utility for Mac OS X, to version 1.7. It's a maintenance update and free to registered users.
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Opcodes releases fifth public beta of Toolbox
Posted by Dennis SellersOpcodes has released a fifth public beta of Toolbox, a visual programming language for constructing digital art. Among the new features in this release, Toolbox is now a single window program.
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Why Apple Plays God with the iPhone SDK
Daniel Eran Dilger AppleInsider's article “Why Apple keeps its iPhone 2.0 SDK under NDA” presented several reasons why developers are frustrated with Apple's tight control over the iPhone platform. Another facet behind Apple wanting to maintain a centralized position of control over iPhone development, where developers are bound by NDA to interface only with Apple but not each other, is to head off tangent hacks that might complicate Apple's ability to lead its platform in the direction it wants. One obvious recent example of this is OpenClip, a student developer's plan to add copy and paste features to the iPhone by allowing third party apps to copy pasteboard data from other applications' private directories. This works under the current iPhone 2.0 software, but only because Apple hadn't yet finalized all of the details of its application sandbox security enforcement. With the iPhone 2.1 SDK betas, which started shipping before OpenClip was released, the iPhone 2.1 software no longer allows apps to peek at each other's files, the implementation of a policy Apple originally announced to developers in the “iPhone OS Programming Guide” with the original iPhone 2.0 SDK. There are many other examples of how hobbyist efforts to graft unofficial APIs into mainstream iPhone development could cause problems for Apple and for users. Daring Fireball: Raining on the OpenClip Parade iPhone OS Programming Guide: Security Software Chaos This isn't a new problem; third party developers also worked to enhance and extend the Classic Mac OS of the 1980s using INIT patches that changed how the System Software worked at a low level. Apple gave developers an expanded, officially sanctioned mechanism for doing this in System 7 with System Extensions. However, this turned out to be chaotically difficult to manage. INITs or Extensions frequently ran into conflict with each other and destabilized the system. They also served as a vector for viruses. Once an Extension grew popular among users, it became difficult for Apple to work around any problems it might cause or to deliver new features that might run into conflict with existing Extensions. In Mac OS X, Apple intentionally provided no mechanism for broadly patching the OS in the manner of System 7's Extensions. Third party developers have still managed to find ways to hack into the OS however. Mac OS X's Input Managers, a mechanism NeXT originally designed to serve a controller for adding language support for complex character sets across applications, were hacked into a general purpose way to patch into nearly every app on the system and inject code that could modify their behavior and user interface. It's easy to see why Input Managers also serve as a security hole and a destabilizing factor that cause applications to crash and system updates to fail. MacJournals News : Input Managers are not 'plug-ins' Security Enforced by Authority. As Apple progressively tightens down the system to enhance users' security, it has only asked developers not to use Input Managers inappropriately; it hasn't yet banned them. it also asks developers not to install code into the Mac OS X kernel unless absolutely necessary, and provides security guidelines to follow when installing applications and in other cases where sloppy behaviors could expose users to potential threats. In other areas, Apple has gone beyond just making suggestions and is enforcing rules that following known best practices in security. From the start, Mac OS X was compartmentalized into Unix domains, including a System domain for Apple's software, a machine domain for system wide Applications, and a User domain that segregated the settings and files of each user. User accounts and file permissions enforced the domain boundaries, to help prevent software from assuming more control that it should. In the iPhone OS, third party applications are further compartmentalized into sandboxes. There is no communal file system that all apps can share as there is on desktop computers. Instead, each app can only access its own files within its sandbox for security reasons. Apple also limits third party apps from lingering in the background after a user has dismissed them with the home button. This is both a power saving mechanism and part of the iPhone's security policy. The system also requires that all apps be signed by a recognized authority, so that malware vendors can't distribute untraceable software. Efforts to inject malicious software into distribution through the iTunes Apps Store on the sly can be remotely shut down by Apple using its “kill switch” of certificate-based security. Apple's heightened security enforcement measures on the iPhone are also making their way onto the Mac OS X desktop, in order to allow corporations to centrally manage the software installed on their computers and to allow parents to control the access their children are allowed. Apple's security efforts are being rolled out in incremental advancements. If the company allowed third party developers to fork its strategies and introduce frameworks that impeded or conflicted with its plans, it would dial the company back into the days of System 7, where Mac Extension conflicts caused crashes that Apple could do little about because it wasn't exercising its authority to enforce security on its platform. iPhone 2.0 SDK: How Signing Certificates Work iPhone 2.0 SDK: The No Multitasking Myth The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. With its Android smartphone platform, Google appears to be offering users and developers the tantalizing fruit of determining for themselves what they want, including a security model where developers vouch for their own apps on a handshake and users are free to initiate their own trust relationships with developers without any certificate-based security administered by a central authority. However, that kind of freedom has served as fertile ground for the viruses, spyware, and adware crisis of the desktop Windows PC. The web itself is another example of a platform where anything goes and security is an afterthought, with the result being egregious adware and the mass distribution of malware that exploits the freedom of Windows PCs to seed new replicants and spam. Microsoft contributed to the seedy nature of the web early on with its ActiveX technology, which gave developers wide open freedom to do things within the browser, with disastrous results. The only way to secure the web is to limit what can be done within the browser and rely upon external authorities to certify encrypted transactions where necessary. Android developers, hardware makers and service providers will also have the freedom to pick and chose which APIs, hardware, and applications they want to support, ostensibly giving users the freedom of an infinite number of choices to select from, a policy that has introduced chaos among Windows Mobile phones, where choice is often an impediment rather than a feature. Symbian phones similarly have three different UI layers to chose from. Linux on the desktop has two main desktop environments, KDE and GNOME, with incompatible behaviors and implementations. Will Google’s Android Play DOS to Apple’s iPhone? Will Windows Mobile Play DOS to Apple’s iPhone? Don't Trust Any Company Under 30. While some critics of Apple's security policies worry the company exercises too much control what software providers can offer on the iPhone, it's also true that the company's mobile platform has delivered a level of success and security for mobile software distribution that other platforms can't match, with tangible benefits for both developers and users. The iPhone's App Store prevents widespread piracy of developers' work, allowing them to sell their software in volume for just a few dollars a title rather than the $15 to $50 that mobile software commonly sells for on other platforms. Users can also be confident that applications they download through iTunes aren't infected with viruses, or spying on them via key loggers or other background tasks, and can't even access their location without asking permission first. Android, Windows Mobile, and other mobile platforms can only hope that malicious developers don't assault their users. Those vendors also lack a kill switch to do anything about it afterward. And despite all the freedom Android promises to provide in hardware variety (something Windows Mobile currently delivers), iPhone users have the actual freedom of knowing that titles they buy from the Apps Store will work on their phone. iPhone developers have the freedom to add accelerometer support into their apps because all iPhones have the hardware to use it. That's not the case with Windows Mobile, and it won't be true with Android either. While it's true other platforms offer features the iPhone doesn't, Apple's platform starts off from a secure foundation that will be easy to build new features upon; it's far harder to retrofit security into a platform that was designed to be full featured and impose few limits nor set any clear standards. Security requires a trustworthy authority. If Apple stopped playing God, it wouldn't be doing its job. Did you like this article? Let me know. Comment here, in the Forum, or email me with your ideas. Like reading RoughlyDrafted? Share articles with your friends, link from your blog, and subscribe to my podcast (oh wait, I have to fix that first). It's also cool to submit my articles to Digg, Reddit, or Slashdot where more people will see them. Consider making a small donation supporting this site. Thanks!
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Ambrosia updates Apeiron X, Bubble Trouble games
Posted by Dennis SellersAmbrosia Software has released updates to two of its games, Apeiron X 1.0.3 & Bubble Trouble X 1.1.0.
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Tabulatures gets zoom function, more
Posted by Dennis SellersTellini has updated Tabulatures 1.9, a Mac OS X editor for PowerTab tablatures, to version.
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Awwwwww, FREAK OUT!
As you may have heard, everyone's favorite little phone that can has kind of a big bug that kinda sorta makes it, oh, seem like you might be protected when, in fact, your "hysterical" buddies poked holes in your entire pack of prophylactics with pins and didn't tell you until after spring break. So, yes, it's a bad bug and, yes, Apple needs to fix it post haste. Which, of course, is license for everyone to freak out. InfoWorld's Peter Sayer sagely notes: One way to avoid such unauthorized access to e-mail messages or Web favorites would be not to add e-mail addresses or URLs to favorite address book entries. Right. Another way to avoid such unauthorized access is to put the phone in a mason jar and bury it under your front porch. Or, if you're just lazy and don't like to get a little dirt under your fingernails, you could just change the setting for Home Button to, uh, Home. Which, if the Macalope's not mistake, is the default setting. Again, not arguing that this is a bug. It's clearly a bug. It's bad. It needs to be fixed. The Apple Blog's Bob Rudis, meanwhile, causes the hoofed one to scratch his furry head. As Alex Hutton points out, you can mitigate the threat by disabling the "home button double-tap" feature of your device. Well, no, you can't "disable" it, you can only select the behavior. And by changing the behavior you can "mitigate" the threat all the way down to a little number the horny one likes to call "zero". For the umpteenth time, Apple has a real security problem and needs to better address the issue and this is just another thing that make the company look stupid. In and of itself, though, it may not be worth phoning home about. Although, if you need to phone home, just hit Emergency Call and double tap the Home button and...
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Awwwwww, FREAK OUT!
As you may have heard, everyone's favorite little phone that can has kind of a big bug that kinda sorta makes it, oh, seem like you might be protected when, in fact, your "hysterical" buddies poked holes in your entire pack of prophylactics with pins and didn't tell you until after spring break. So, yes, it's a bad bug and, yes, Apple needs to fix it post haste. Which, of course, is license for everyone to freak out. InfoWorld's Peter Sayer sagely notes: One way to avoid such unauthorized access to e-mail messages or Web favorites would be not to add e-mail addresses or URLs to favorite address book entries. Right. Don't email your friends. Become a hermit. Put the phone in a mason jar and bury it under your front porch. Or, if you're just lazy and don't like to get a little dirt under your fingernails, you could just change the setting for Home Button to, uh, Home. Which, if the Macalope's not mistaken, is the default setting. So, you may not even have to get up. But Pete's idea is good, too. Living a life of solitude might be good for you. What with your sex addiction. Whatever. Again, the Macalope's not arguing that this is a bug. It's clearly a bug. It's bad. It needs to be fixed. The Apple Blog's Bob Rudis, meanwhile, just causes the hoofed one to scratch his furry head. As Alex Hutton points out, you can mitigate the threat by disabling the "home button double-tap" feature of your device. Well, no, you can't "disable" it, you can only select the behavior. And by changing the behavior you can "mitigate" the threat all the way down to a little number the horny one likes to call "zero". For the umpteenth time, Apple has a real security problem and needs to better address the issue and this is just another thing that make the company look stupid. In and of itself, though, it may not be worth phoning home about. Although, if you need to phone home, just hit Emergency Call and double tap the Home button and...
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Coda 1.5 adds Subversion feature
Posted by Dennis SellersPanic has updated Coda, its web development tool, to version 1.5. The upgrade adds a feature called Subversion, which allows users to check out code, make changes and check it back in. Version 1.5 also allows you to find and replace across multiple local files.
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Tinderbox 4.5 adds new visualization opportunities
Posted by Dennis SellersTinderbox, a Mac OS X app for storing and organizing notes, plans, and ideas, has been updated to version 4.5. The upgrade includes new visualization opportunities.
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Don’t Trust That Passcode
Ryan Naraine reported over at ZDNet Zero Day on a new iPhone vulnerability which lets anyone have full access to the majority of iPhone functionality despite your clever 4-digit passcode lock. As mentioned by “greenmymac” and covered by The Register, full access to contacts (and, hence, browser, e-mail, SMS…) is as simple as a press of the “Emergency Call” key from the passcode entry screen, followed by a double-tap on the home button, which – as The Register puts it – “takes the miscreant into favourites…” (why we in the States leave out the “u” is a sad mystery). As Alex Hutton points out, you can mitigate the threat by disabling the “home button double-tap” feature of your device. Ryan gave the CVE database a scan and noticed that this is not Apple's first encounter with this error. CVE-2008-0034, which was identified back in January and fixed in the 1.x series firmware, noted this issue and is yet-another sign of Apple's lack of commitment to security on the iPhone (guess they should have fixed more than just bugs in 2.0.2). It would be greatly appreciated if any readers in an enterprise configuration (i.e. with a stronger passcode and a centralized provisioning environment) would drop a note in the comments letting me (and other TAB readers) know if you are impacted by this vulnerability as well. All TAB readers are invited to post your your thoughts in the comments on Apple's latest security faux-pax.
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You can now log-in to Facebook chats with Adium
Posted by Dennis SellersThe Adium instant messaging client has been updated to version 1.3. The upgrade adds the ability to log-in to Facebook chats.
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MacFamilyTree grows to version 5.2.5
Posted by Dennis SellersSynium Software has released version 5.2.5 of MacFamilyTree. The update includes some fixes for MobileFamilyTree, the iPhone/iPod touch version of the product.
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Psystar Stares Down Apple With Antitrust Suit
Psystar has turned up the heat in its legal battle with Apple. The small computer vendor first burst on the scene several months ago by audaciously offering for sale a line of Mac computer clones called "OpenComputer." After a few weeks of silence, Apple unleashed its legal hounds on the startup, seeking to shut it down for good. Since then, Psystar has shown little sign of backing down from Apple -- a company that's seldom shy about using the legal system to protect its intellectual property.
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New Version of Xen Hypervisor Hits the Streets
Xen.org, the developer of the open source Xen project, on Wednesday announced the release of the Xen 3.3 hypervisor engine. The product is the result of a distributed development effort by senior engineers from more than 50 leading hardware, software and security vendors. Xen 3.3 includes enhancements that further advance its position as a fast, scalable and secure virtualization engine for a broad range of server and PC chipsets from supercomputers to PDAs.
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UK Watchdog Nixes iPhone Ad Over 'All Parts of the Internet' Claim
Less than a week after a representative for Orange in Poland revealed that actors were paid to stand in line the night the iPhone launched there, another kerfuffle has arisen over Apple-related marketing, this time in the UK. The UK's Advertising Standards Authority has pulled an iPhone commercial after it received complaints from two viewers that the ad was misleading. "[Apple is] having two issues -- one probably more important than the other," said Mary Beth Kemp, a Forrester Research analyst.
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My Favorite Mac Apps: Erica's Take
Filed under: SoftwareSo Victor comes to us and says, "Quick, what are your favorite apps?" Without pausing to breathe or think, the words "OfficeCreativeSuiteQuickeys" tumble out of my mouth. That's because these are the three software packages for Mac that I cannot live without. These three apps are where I spend 80-odd percent of my working life. By the time I can pause and reflect, I realize that I have picked three apps that provide the least Mac-like user experience. With all the rich and beautiful OS X software landscape out there, I've picked the plain but reliable dinosaurs. They're ugly. They're ported (at least Photoshop and Office are). They work. This isn't to say that I'd change my list upon further thought. Between Word, Excel, Illustrator, Acrobat, Photoshop, and Quickey's Macros (so I rarely have to actually touch a mouse, eek), these packages get the job done. Throw in the equally ugly Eudora mail program (the original, not the almost unusable open source update that's floating around) plus Apple's cadre of less beautiful utilities, namely Terminal, Safari and TextEdit, and we're talking maybe 90% of my work time. Sure, I've used Apple's Mail, Preview, iPhoto, iWork, Pages and so forth but I always end up going back to the more capable name-brand power-houses. The user experience might not match the slick Apple software but my efficiency goes way way up. As for the built-in Keyboard prefs or QuickSilver, QuicKeys gives me all the programming control I need for creating and executing my macros. If I'm going to do a job more than once, I'm probably going to write a macro, whether it's sorting my mail or writing my TUAW posts. In the end, I'm really happy with my paleo-software. One of the big reasons that I'm still (still!) using my 733 G4 Mac as my primary computing machine is that I know I'll have to re-buy these programs should I switch fully to Intel-based computing. Instead, I'll hang with my favorite dinosaurs and keep getting the job done.Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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UK Yanks a Commercial from the Yanks
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Apple Gazette 335 - Spore on iPod - then not, Sept. 9th speculation and more!
podcast sponsor link:Click Here to check out Blogflux Groups! Today's Show: Spore on iPod - then not, Sept. 9th speculation and more! You can subscribe via iTunes, or by RSS feed, or… you can listen to the episode right here: In addition to that, you can also download the Apple Gazette Daily Widget and listen to every episode of the show right on your Dashboard. Click Here to download.
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Passcode exploit (and fix) found for locked iPhones
Think your iPhone is safe if it's locked? Think again. An exploit has made the rounds today, allowing anyone to gain access to your personal info on a locked iPhone very easily. Luckily, there's also an easy way to prevent it, although Apple should patch the hole ASAP.Read More...
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Passcode Pandemic?
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PCalc for iPhone 1.0.2
My favorite App Store app keeps getting better. New in version 1.0.2 is a very nifty multiple-undo implementation — just swipe the numeric display to go back one level in the undo stack. (In addition to being a better calculator than Apple’s, PCalc is a full-fledged unit calculator too.) ★
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Psystar finally answers to Apple's suit by suing right back
Psystar claims that Apple's EULA, which prohibits installing Mac OS X on non-Apple hardware, is "an anticompetitive restrain of trade." The company filed its response to Apple's lawsuit this week with a lawsuit of its own, which it hopes will make Mac OS X "more accessible."Read More...
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Why Apple should stop chasing rainbows
That little Swirly Rainbow Circle Thingy on MacBooks is driving people crazy.
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iPhone Password Lock Can Be Bypassed With Double-Tap of Home Button
The worst part is Apple fixed this months ago for the 1.1 OS. ★
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Coda 1.5 lands with Subversion, better editing tools
Big changes for working on site projects with a group, better syntax coloring, and customizable reference material make us wonder why the new version is free.Read More...
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Security hole opens up password protected iPhones
Users report serious security flaw in iPhone 2.0.2 that exposes mail, texts, voice messages, and browser to strangers despite the device being password-protected.
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'Macsimum Recommended Reading' for Aug. 27
Posted by Dennis Sellers“Too many temptations out there? iPhone on call with health tips: Cell phones can't actually get hot enough to pop popcorn, regardless of what you may have seen on YouTube. But some do have other unexpected abilities that just might help improve your quality of life.”—Chicago Tribune
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Bursting the iPhone bubble
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Software, Apple, Developer, iPhone, App Store, SDKJohn Casasanta has written up a pretty damning condemnation of the vulture venture capitalists (VCs) hovering around the iPhone's App Store lately. While many developers are smelling a lot of potential in the iPhone and its SDK, VCs are smelling lots of money, and unfortunately, as was apparently the case between Mike Lee and Tapulous recently, sometimes those smells lead the two in different directions.It's not that there isn't money to be made in the App Store -- there are some great programs coming out of there, and those programs are certainly worth paying for (even if a lot of them are offered for free anyway). But Casasanta describes a situation where venture capitalists are willing to pay out in spades even for shovelware, and in that kind of environment, no one profits. Not the VCs and developers who lose their money because no one wants their crappy programs, not the consumers who have to sort through a flood of terrible apps, and not the platform -- the Mac, as Casasanta says, is thriving because of the quality of the software, and the iPhone (though it will likely always be a popular phone) will thrive as a platform for the same reasons.Casasanta's solution is for the developers to do things on their own, and that's a possibility everyone has to consider for themselves. Even well-funded developers can create valuable pieces of software. Whether you receive funding from a VC or from your own bank account, the focus while developing should always be on quality. And any developer pushing out 100 apps by the end of the year (as Casasanta's VC asked) lacks that focus.Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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Images: IE 8 rising to the competition
Second public beta for Internet Explorer 8 offers similar features currently found in Opera, Safari, and Firefox, plus a few extras.
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iTunes Store is back online in China after Tibet song leaves front page
The iTunes Music Store was blocked in China two weeks after an album released by Tibet activists appeared, but after the Games concluded, it was available once again.
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Favorite iPhone apps: Robert's take
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, iPhone, App StoreNow that Steve, Victor, and Mike have all made their opinions clear, I get to tell you what apps I use most on my iPod touch. My first favorite is Exposure, an app that lets you browse Flickr photos. Personally, my favorite thing to do in a boring phone meeting is to browse Flickr's "Featured" category, and find new wallpaper for my iPod. Which leads me to my only feature request: it doesn't let you save images to the local "Saved Photos" album. (What you can do, however, is open the image in Safari, and save it from there.) Exposure does much more than this, too -- browsing photos taken nearby, or searching for photos by keyword. Exposure is a great image browser all around, and it's free, but ad-supported. A premium version (sans ads) is $9.99. The second is time:calc. It may seem a little strange, but I've always wanted a calculator that figures time instead of decimal numbers. As a freelancer, some of my contracts are retainer-based, so I have to calculate how much time I have left for a particular task after work has been done. time:calc does this effortlessly: just enter hours, minutes and seconds, and use mathematical operators as you would a normal calculator. For video editing, it also includes support for time code in a wide variety of frame rates. time:calc is $1.99, and well worth it. Last but not least is my new favorite timewaster: Trism. Mike wrote about Trism in February, and I remember wanting it really bad when I first saw the video. It's an extremely fun Tetris-like game using three-sided tiles, and uses the device's accelerometer to determine which way is "down." It's not unlike Burning Monkey Puzzle Lab, for those that remember that game. Trism has three game modes, and a training mode. It's $4.99. App Store Links: Exposure (free) Exposure Premium time:calc Trism Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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Garmin's Nuvifone teases its way through another trade show
Filed under: Cellphones, GPS, Handhelds Oh, Nuvifone, how you disappoint us. Over here at IFA we just managed to get a Garmin rep to whip out his Nuvifone prototype for a quick look, but sadly, almost a year after the device was first announced, there really wasn't anything new to see. We still aren't allowed to take video of the interface, or really see much of the phone other than the home screen, and when the rep tried to show us how the Nuvifone kicks the iPhone's ass in navigation, the Nuvi promptly crashed -- so at least those two have that in common. Not that we should be surprised, Garmin mentioned last month that the phone had been delayed into 2009, but we're quickly running out of patience, as well as any scrap of remaining hope for this thing to actually matter when it does arrive. Peep the gallery for a little bit of iPhone 3G versus action.Gallery: Garmin's Nuvifone teases its way through another trade showPermalink|Email this|Comments
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News: iPhone app offers 3D views of Earth, Moon, & Sun
iPhone developer Nicolas Sloan has released Earth3D, a new application for the iPhone and iPod touch that presents the user with 3D views of the Earth, Moon, and Sun. The application allows users to drag one finger to rotate the Earth; multiple fingers stop and start the rotation of the camera. Earth3D is available now as a free download from the App Store. ...
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Control pads for gaming on the iPhone
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, Hardware, Developer, iPhone Ever since games first started running on the iPhone, the issue of controls has always been at hand (so to speak). While the multi-touch screen allows for some very flexible control schemes, it doesn't provide any tactile feedback, and so more delicate controls like a directional pad or buttons aren't always doable (not to mention that they often take up valuable screen space).Enter the iControlPad, a device that wraps itself around your iPhone and provides some tactile controls to software (we posted about it back in May, but we're closer to seeing an actual release than ever). Touch Arcade's got more on how it works, and pictures of another rumored device (though no manufacturer is mentioned). Button presses are delivered via the serial port, and jailbroken apps already support the pad, with full code and SDK support to come.Pretty interesting -- iControlPad wants to sell theirs for less than $30, and of course if the idea takes off, they'll have some competition (maybe even from Apple?). The iPhone is already a great gaming device -- would a button-based peripheral make it even better? Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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iPhone 3G antenna blameless in reception deaths
Who killed iPhone 3G's reception? Not the antenna, which was found innocent and fully functional after testing.Read More...
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Will we ever have Mac clones?
Posted by Dave MertenBy Dan Blacharski The battle between Apple and Psystar will have an easily predictable outcome. Apple will triumph of course, not because they are right, and not because they have superior technology, but because they have money and enough lawyers to bury the small Psystar and anybody else who threatens...
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Report: Orange backs off iPhone 3G throttling
Orange's decision to limit the download speed of the iPhone 3G sparked a predictable outcry from French users, and they appear to have produced a retraction from the carrier.
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Psystar Fights Back for Unauthorized Mac
Unauthorized Apple Clone maker, Psystar struck back at Apple's complaint that the tiny company is violating its OS X end-user license agreement by selling non-Apple hardware with OS X on it. read more
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Favorite iPhone apps: Schramm's take
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, Freeware, iPhone, App StoreAs you might imagine, my iPhone is more littered with games than useful stuff like Steve's or Victor's. Sure, I've got Twitterific and NetNewsWire, but my most-used apps are of the video game variety.The game that's really grabbed is Aurora Feint. When it was first released, I didn't get much out of it, but since it's been updated a few times, Aurora Feint has turned into a pretty deep puzzle/RPG. There have been some security scares, unfortunately, and the game's "MMO" promises haven't yet come to fruition. But for sheer matching puzzle gameplay (it's similar to the great Poker Smash on Xbox Live), it's probably the most addictive game on the App Store.My second favorite is Characters (I originally wrote about it on WoW Insider). If you play World of Warcraft and have an iPhone, this is the closest thing you'll find to an official Blizzard app. It lets you see every bit of information on the Armory in a very nice-looking iPhone app format. We're still waiting on Blizzard to provide us with an iPhone version of the in-game Auction House or mailbox, but until then, this is a great way to look up the WoW characters of folks you meet.And finally, I've been really impressed with Midomi (and also the similar Shazam), a music recognition app. Hit the app, let it listen to a song you're hearing (or even you singing the song or saying the lyrics), and it'll tell you exactly what that song is. And once you've find it, you can listen to it, find it in iTunes or on Youtube, or see band pictures and reviews. Midomi is the kind of app I've never had on any other devices I've owned, and yet I've put it to great use a few times.Honorable mentions go to Freeverse's (renamed) Moto Chaser, which is consistently the game that most impresses people playing with my iPhone; Trism, which turned out to be an excellent game, and Frotz and Sketches, both of which I've written about here before.And I'm still waiting for two things: some great persistent pet gameplay (Wil Shipley, what happened to all of those ideas?), and some great location-based MMO gameplay as well. There's good stuff out there, but we're still just getting started in the App Store.Permalink|Email this|Comments
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OPIS puts iGas in your iPhone, iPod touch
Posted by Dennis SellersOil Price Information Service (OPIS), a supplier of retail gasoline and diesel fuel pricing information, has launched a new service, iGas, on the iPhone that will help millions of users shop for the cheapest fuel.
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Tech companies at Democratic convention push for free trade
The Consumer Electronics Association, which represents technology companies like Apple, Microsoft and Oracle, is pushing hard at the Democratic convention for legislators to embrace free trade. They've got a lot of competition for the Democrats' attention
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"Misleading" Internet claims lead to ban of iPhone ad in UK
The Advertising Standards Authority in the UK has decided that, because the iPhone doesn't support Flash or Java, one of Apple's ads for the device is misleading and cannot be aired ever again. Because we know you were dying to run all those cutting-edge Java apps on your iPhone.Read More...
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First Looks: RF3 iFit Earhook RF3-212s
Developed by a previously unknown company named RF3, the iFit series of Earhook-style earphones are billed as healthy cellular phone earphones, designed with six-way adjustable earpieces and a shielding technology to reduce emitted cell phone radiation to low levels. One of the versions, the RF3-212s ($40), is a single earphone with an integrated microphone, the pieces connected by an odd bit of surgical-style wireless blue tubing, while the other…
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Curio Back to School special
Filed under: SoftwareIf you're looking for a creative application to collect and organize notes, ideas and more, check out Curio. Curio provides a free-form interface for collecting pages which can contain notes, images, links to files, mind maps, sketches -- just about anything you'd need to get ideas and notes out of your head and into your computer. Zengobi, the makers of Curio, are celebrating the "Back to School" season with TUAW and offering 20% off the academic price of the software. The Pro version retails at $149USD, but it's only $69USD in the academic store. With the discount, students can pick up a great app for about $55USD. Enter TUAWBTS at the academic store to take advantage of the offer, and hurry, it's only good for today (August 27th).Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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SugarCRM now iPhone compatible
Posted by Dennis SellersSugarCRM, a provider of commercial open source customer relationship management (CRM) software, has announced the general availability of Sugar 5.1, which includes new reporting and wireless capabilities for SugarCRM.
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First Looks: H2O Audio Surge Waterproof Headphones
To say that we've been waiting for H2O Audio's Surge ($60) for a long time would be an understatement; while competitors have released in-canal earphones, these waterproofing specialists have for years focused instead on neckband-styled water-safe headphones. Now Surge has arrived as a 12-foot waterproof in-canal design, complete with five sets of rubber eartips to fit your ear canals, and also includes a carrying case. H2O notes that Surge needs…
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Tests clear iPhone 3G antenna as cause of reception problems
Swedish tech publication GP tests the iPhone 3G's antenna to see if that part is to blame for the phone's reception issues, and finds no obvious problems.
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News: Sony rolls out new iPhone-ready car stereo, others
Sony has introduced three new iPod-ready car stereos. The CDX-GT630UI features the ability to connect directly to both iPods and iPhones via USB, and Passenger Control which allows passengers to control the connected device while being charged. Other features include front, rear, and subwoofer preamp outputs, a flip-down detachable faceplate, and a 13-segment, LCD with black LED display. The CDX-GT430IP comes with a 1.5 meter cable featuring a 30-pin…
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First Looks: H2O Audio Amphibx Waterproof Armband
While it's not H2O Audio's first water-ready armband, Amphibx ($80) is the company's first to be both iPod- and iPhone-agnostic, as well as the first not to require a separate hard plastic case for the device inside. While the large version is made to fit the iPhone, iPod touch, and full-sized iPods, the medium version is designed to fit the iPod nano and similarly small devices, holding them loosely inside of a watertight, touch- and see-through…
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iPhone Hacks: refocusing your camera
Filed under: Cool tools, Hacks, Mods, iPhone Like most phone cameras, the iPhone's lens is focused for the most general possible use, i.e. nearly at infinity. TUAW reader Daniel Forsythe modded his iPhone to focus a bit closer up so he could use it to read bar codes that he shoots from magazines and equipment labels. The mod involves breaking the glue that holds in the camera module and rotating the lens to bring the focus closer to the camera. With this hack, he can snap photos of close-in subjects. Check out his Flickr photo set for samples and discussion. He writes that he plans to make a full mod guide should readers express interest in it. The photo seen here is focused to 0.25".Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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[Sponsor] Drobo by Data Robotics
Have a big iTunes, iPhoto, Aperture, or Final Cut library? Need more storage and a way to keep your invaluable data safe against a hard drive crash? Sure you could go with any old external hard drive or RAID box, but then you might as well throw your Mac out the window and buy a PC. The second-generation Drobo with FireWire 800 is the world’s best storage experience for the Mac – hands down! With data redundancy, instant expansion, and incomparable ease of use, nothing could be easier. Need more convincing? Drobo received 4.5 mice from Macworld and an Macworld Editor’s Choice (“Eddy”) award. Visit www.drobo.com/fireball to learn more and save $25 instantly on your Drobo purchase.
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UK's Advertising Standards Authority yanks iPhone ad for being misleading
Filed under: CellphonesApple's iPhone 3G ads paint a pretty cheery picture of the device in action, but just as many of you have noted, the omission of Flash and Java means there's a big difference between what the "the real internet" and what's on the iPhone -- enough so that the UK's Advertising Standards Authority has pulled one of Apple's latest ads from the airwaves because it claims "all the parts of the internet are on the iPhone." At least two people complained to the ASA that the ad was misleading because sites that use Flash and Java don't work on the iPhone, and the board agreed, saying that "We concluded that the ad gave a misleading impression of the internet capabilities of the iPhone" because "viewers were likely to expect to be able to see all the content on a web site normally accessible through a PC rather than just having the ability to reach the website." If we had to guess, we'd say this decision is more likely to prompt Apple to be more careful with its ads in the future rather than ever bring Flash or Java to the iPhone, but you know Adobe is feeling pretty smug right about now. Check the ad after the break.[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]Continue reading UK's Advertising Standards Authority yanks iPhone ad for being misleadingRead|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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Alien Skin announces Blow Up 2 resizing plug-in for Photoshop
Posted by Dennis SellersAlien Skin Software has relesaed Blow Up 2, the new version of its photo resizing plug-in for Adobe Photoshop and Photoshop Elements. The software handles resizing, cropping, and sharpening.
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PCalc 1.0.2 for iPhone released, 3.3 for Mac OS X coming soon
Posted by Dennis SellersTLA Systems has announced a new release of the PCalc calculator for the iPhone and iPod touch. It's available to download today from the Apple App Store for US$3.99.
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Google gooses Apple's Safari with Gears beta
With a new beta version of Gears for Safari, Apple's browser joins Firefox and Internet Explorer with support for Google's augmented browsing abilities.
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Repeat tests show iPhone 3G doesn't suffer from faulty hardware
After lab results demonstrated that the iPhone 3G's antenna actually functions normally, critics complained that the tests didn't represent their own experiences. So the tests were performed again on two phones that had been experiencing severe problems for some users; the verdict was the same: no hardware problems found. Eva Wieselgren, a journalist in Sweden, originally presented the findings of a study by Bluetest earlier this week which confirmed that the iPhone 3G's antenna and its 3G reception were functioning normally. When readers complained that the tests didn't properly single out a problematic phone, Wieselgren asked for volunteers who owned a bad iPhone 3G to offer their unit for additional testing. Continues: Repeat tests show iPhone 3G doesn't suffer from faulty hardware
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iPhone 3Gs now outnumber originals
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Apple Financial, iPhoneBlogger Michael Arrington at TechCrunch pointed out an amazing, yet somewhat obvious, thing yesterday -- at some point next week, the number of iPhone 3Gs in use around the world will exceed the number of first-generation iPhones. The statistics are astounding: 6 million original iPhones were sold in about one year It took 74 days for the first million first-generation iPhones to sell A million iPhone 3Gs were sold the first weekend they were on sale Sources estimate anywhere from 750,000 - 800,000 iPhones are being made each week Apple is on track to sell more than 40 million iPhones in the next year This is all happening despite concerns about iPhone 3G network connectivity and battery life. If you're not an iPhone App developer now, you might want to consider signing up to join the gold rush![Via MacDailyNews]Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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Epson introduces Artisan all-in-ones
Posted by Dennis SellersEpson has introduced the Artisan 800 and Artisan 700, two new all-in-ones. The Artisan 800 (which has an estimated street price of US$299) features Wi-Fi, Fax, an Automatic Document Feeder (ADF), and Ultra Hi-Definition photos.
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M Cubed Software releases Lighthouse Keeper 1.0 for Leopard
Posted by Dennis SellersM Cubed Software has released Lighthouse Keeper, a Mac OS X 10.5 (“Leopard”) desktop client for the Lighthouse issue tracker. It costs approximately US$44 and offers support for multiple Lighthouse accounts.
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Plum Record turns iPhone into digital audio recorder
Posted by Dennis SellersPlum Amazing has released its second iPhone application: Plum Record, which turns your iPhone into a digital audio recorder which tags sound files with photos and text. It's available for US$5 at the Apple App Store in English, German, Spanish and French.
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IntelliScanner Corp. introduces Custom Asset Tags
Posted by Dennis SellersIntelliScanner Corp. has introduced Custom Asset Tags, personalized asset tags for tracking home and business items with IntelliScanner's line of home and business scanners.
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Microsoft schedules announcement for Sept 9th…will Apple do the same?
Sept. 9th has become the rumored date for the big Apple Special event. The company normally doesn't announce this time of thing until the Friday before. Today, however, Microsoft has announced that they will be making a special announcement on Sept 9th featuring the tag line “say goodbye to laser”. It's fairly obvious that they're talking about the laser mouse, and further investigation by Engadget has revealed that a “Blue Track” mouse is already in the Amazon.de store. So it's likely that's the announcement. The question now is, will Apple have a special event on the same day as the Microsoft announcement and the DEMO Conference?
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Eye-Fi collaborates with Nikon on 'Eye-Fi connected' digital camera
Posted by Dennis SellersEye-Fi, makers of a wireless memory card for digital cameras, has collaborated with Nikon to deliver enhanced integration of its Eye-Fi cards with Nikon's newly announced digital SLR camera, Nikon D90.
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SanDisk boosts SD card speed
Posted by Dennis SellersSanDisk says it's increased the speed limit on digital photography by upping the speed of SD flash memory cards to 30 megabytes per second with the new SanDisk Extreme III 30MB/s Edition SDHC card.
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Immersion to pay Microsoft $21 million, Sony groans
Filed under: Gaming Immersion, the company that owns virtually every vibration and haptic tech on earth, is getting a taste of its own medicine now that it owes Microsoft $21 million. You may remember back in 2003 when Microsoft floated an unknown sum of cash in the direction of Immersion in order to include patented vibration technology in its Xbox 360 controllers. Around the same time, Sony told us all that we don't need no stinkin' vibration and passed on paying up. Las year, though, Sony bowed to customer pressure and paid Immersion $121 million in order to unleash the Dual Shock 3. Immersion was supposed to share some of that Sony booty with Microsoft -- and they didn't. So there we have it: we all got a piece of Sony and we have the DualShock 3. Everyone happy now?Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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‘All the Parts’
iPhone commercial banned in the U.K. for claiming “all the parts of the Internet are on the iPhone”. Flash and Java are cited as exceptions. ★
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Kenbushi update now syncs music and movies to most portable media players
Posted by Dave MertenKenbushi—a free digital media jukebox software—can now help you quickly and easily load your MP3 player, multimedia player, mobile phone, USB stick, SD card (for playback on a PSP) or portable hard disk with media from the Kenbushi media library, with this latest update. 'Media Space Limits' can be set...
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Malkinware introduces Reference Tracker for Mac OS X
Posted by Dave MertenMalkinware has introduced Reference Tracker, their academic reference manager and research tool for Mac OS X. Reference Tracker documents store all the citations and references in an essay, research project, or book and automatically create Harvard or APA formatted reference lists when needed. Features include lookup of book details using...
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Apple Imperfect
For Apple Computer these are the best of times and the worst of times. The Cupertino, Calif.-based consumer electronics firm is on a tear like never before. It’s stealing market share from Microsoft, enough to persuade the software giant to embark on a costly ad campaign that’s being described as a belated response to Apple’s Vista-baiting [...]
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InfoLogic celebrates its 10th anniversary of MathMagic
Posted by Dave MertenInfoLogic is delighted to celebrate their 10th anniversary of MathMagic. First introduced as a Quark XTension at the 1998 Seybold Expo in San Francisco, the award-winning MathMagic Series has expanded into a product line that continues to embrace its heritage of quality. The folks at InfoLogic wish to take this...
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New MacUpdate software bundle
Posted by Dave Merten MacUpdate today launched a new software bundle promotion, delivering up to 10 first-rate applications valued at more than $600 for $49.99. The Back-to-School-themed bundle runs through September 10 and is as equally well suited for students and educators as it is for home users and professionals.
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Back to School: An Apple for the teacher
Filed under: Software, Cool tools, EducationTUAW's going Back to School! We'll be bringing you tips and reviews for students, parents and teachers right up until the bell rings in September.Going back to school isn't all about the students; the educators are often just as excited or stressed out as the kids about the beginning of a new school year. What can make life easier on the poor teacher? Great Mac software! Read on for information on a grab bag of Mac and web apps to help out your favorite educator.Continue reading Back to School: An Apple for the teacherRead|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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iPhone 101: Save Images from Safari and Email to phone
I emailed my brother a picture of us when we were little to use as the picture that pops up when I call him, but when he received it he wasn't sure how to save it to his iPhone (which you need to do to assign to a picture to a contact). To save a picture to your iPhone library from Safari or an email: Click and hold on the picture you want to save to your iPhone Click “Save Image” Now when you navigate to your photo album your newly saved picture will be there to do with it what you please
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ParticleIllusion products get Leopard compatibility
Posted by Dennis SellersWondertouch has announced that new versions of its particleIllusion 3.0 and particleIllusion SE line of product offerings on the Mac OS X are now available.
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iPhone 2.0.2 security flaw makes private data accessible
Filed under: Security, iPhoneWhile we make great hay about the security built in to OS X, there is apparently a tiny hole in the iPhone that allows someone to access your data and certain apps -- even when you have passcode protection turned on.Here's how it works:1. You'll have to have some contacts set up with Favorites. If you don't have any favorites, looks like you'll be OK (I went in and added only one favorite, and that's all that appeared when replicating the issue).2. Each contact setup as a Favorite would likely have an address, phone, email and possibly a link to their website, right? Those are the vectors of entry to the corresponding apps. So, when you get access (described next) using those features will launch those apps completely bypassing the passcode.3. So you open the phone, and on the passcode screen you click "Emergency Call"4. Now double-tap the Home button5. Hey look, your Favorites! Clicking the blue arrow will take you to the contact info. Depending on what that contact has (email, website, etc.) you can access the corresponding applications, free of the concerns of passcode protections.Gizmodo has a video if you can't stand to read about it.UPDATE: Commenters are noting that if you set your Home button to access something else (like iPod functions) you won't be able to get to anything else. So it's a kludge, but better than the alternative, I guess.Thanks to everyone who sent this in!Read|Permalink|Email this|Comments
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Sync Outlook, iCal, iPhone, and Google Calendars
For a while now, I have been looking for a way to keep my iPhone calendar in sync with my work Microsoft Outlook calendar. Now I've found a way!Part 1: MobileMe, iCal, and iPhone:At home, I sync my iPhone calendar with iCal on my Mac. Now with the new MobileMe, my iPhone stays in near constant sync with my MobileMe calendar. My Mac at home also stays in sync (syncs every 15 minutes) with my MobileMe calendar.Part 2: Spanning Sync - iCal and Google CalendarThere is a program called Spanning Sync that syncs iCal on my Mac with my Google calendar. This program also runs every 15 minutes. (The downside is that this program costs a whopping $65.)Part 3: Google Calendar Sync - Google Calendar and Microsoft OutlookGoogle has released Google Calendar Sync, a program that syncs your Google Calendar with Microsoft O...
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Back up a UNIX box (or folder) to a DMG image file
To back up a local UNIX serving box (ALIX1C motherboard with FreeBSD), I wrote a simple but efficient bash script to save all or part of it in a DMG image disk file. This backup should be used as often as required (launching with cron needs a password-free RSA login). This backup is a differential one, and an exact replication is done assuming the RSA user has sufficient privileges to do so.Why save in a DMG?To avoid my Mac managing another file system deep tree.To simplify moving the backup.I'm aware I'm losing Time Machine benefits with such a solution, but the script is very easy to modify to sync to a simple file system local folder. Personnaly, my DMG is placed on my Time Machine disk, to avoid filtering the Apple Backup system.Prerequisites:For security and convenience, I use ssh transfering protocol with a shared RSA key. If you do not know how to set this up, you should look at that kind of se...
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Make Apple TV work with Checkpoint VPN
Maybe I should have known, but I recently had my Apple TV just stop showing up in iTunes. After following all of the troubleshooting tips at Apple's Support site, it crossed my mind that my new Checkpoint VPN might be the problem.After some searching, I found this page that describes turning off the Checkpoint VPN SecureClient Security Policies. In your Checkpoint VPN SecureClient menubar drop-down menu, select Tools » Disable Security Policy.I guess the security policy put in place pretty much blocks all incoming traffic to your Mac, including many Bonjour requests such as those from the Apple TV.