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I'm preparing early for MacWorld so I'm already in transit to the US. I'm at Narita right now in the middle of my five-hour layover.

Narita is impresive. The staff are super helpful and polite. The food's great (well, I love Japanese food to begin with). The place is clean. Everything's flowing smoothly.

One thing that made me laugh though is the bookstore in the middle of the terminal. Two Mac-themed magazines (and some PC mags too) were just beside the girly magazines! I don't know what classification they followed.

Pictures will come soon. I'm in a public terminal and it's not that easy to attach my TH55 to it.

I'm preparing early for MacWorld so I'm already in transit to the US.

Posted by Joel at 02:14 PM | Permalink |

Version 0.73 (12/26/04) is out. Here's what's new...

- Fixed issues with leading/trailing newlines for contact list Extended Status display
- Fixed issues with applescript filters when messaging applications which have been quit and relaunched
- Fixed issues with custom dock icon selections not being reflected in the Finder and the Dock
- Fixed issues with logging messages from Sametime contacts with LDAP strings for usernames
- Fixed issues with the link editor sheet
- Fixed issues with Announcer speaking messages in the message preferences
- Fixed a crash related to Systemwide Proxy Settings in certain situations
- Fixed a potential crash when deleting an account
- Fixed a memory leak
- (AIM) Fixed a crash when canceling file transfers
- (Gadu-Gadu) Fixed a crash when sending certain messages
- (MSN) Fixed issues with idle states
- (Sametime) Fixed issues with away messages and away states
- (Yahoo) Fixed issues with away messages
- Improved date display when receiving queued messages from previous days
- Improved handling of links in the Get Info window
- Improved logging of autoresponses
- Updated to libgaim 1.1.1

Posted by Joel at 03:17 PM | Permalink

v2.6 will be the last freeware version of MacJournal. Beginning with v3.0, MacJournal will be shareware and will cost $30.

There are big changes afoot for MacJournal. For the past three years, MacJournal has been a freeware product with no marketing. It has survived on word of mouth and a good review here and there. But that doesn't reach a large portion of the potential users.

Read more at Dan Schimpf's site.

Posted by Joel at 06:19 PM | Permalink

NewsFire's latest update includes chained smart feeds -- a nice feature if a more detailed filter needs to be setup.

Posted by Joel at 12:34 PM | Permalink

Virtue is a free virtual desktop manager for Mac OS 10.3 providing an unlimited (configurable) number of virtual desktops.

Posted by Joel at 10:14 AM | Permalink

I was just about ready to sleep when I saw this at Engadget. I couldn't stop laughing after I read it. Now it's gonna take a a while to get sleepy again. I know... I'll just read one of those freebie ebooks from eReader!

Posted by Joel at 01:05 AM | Permalink

I found this PDF tech guide almanac earlier this month.

Here's a free tech-buying guide I wrote not for Boing Boing readers, but for their *parents*. Hand this PDF (look how nice it prints out) to any of your non-geek friends, and they'll know exactly what technology to buy - for themselves, or for gifts this holiday season. P.S. There's also an Almanac section where I put all the rants I've stored up over the past year. I make absolutely no money on this guide and do it only to help spread some basic tech knowledge.

@boingboing by Mark Hurst

Posted by Joel at 10:18 PM | Permalink

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is now complete. Scholastic will be announcing the release date on Tuesday.

Posted by Joel at 02:21 PM | Permalink

Apple AirPort Extreme 5.5.1 driver:

* Hard reset behavior is improved. With this firmware version pressing and holding the reset button for more than 5 seconds will cause the LED to flash rapidly. This visual feedback lets you know you’ve held the button long enough to trigger a hard reset
* Resolves a potential problem with PPPoE configurations when updating from 5.4 or earlier
* Improved reliability of WDS networks when using WPA security. If you had a WDS network secured by WDS and then removed any of the WDS nodes, this could cause a memory leak resulting in the need to reboot your WDS network nodes
* Resolved an issue with inbound passive FTP to a port-mapped computer on the network
* Resolved an issue with certain printers which were no longer recognized by the base station after the 5.5 firmware update was installed. With the 5.5.1 firmware these printers are again recognized by the base station.

Posted by Joel at 01:53 PM | Permalink

I can't help but laugh when PC users declare a Mac as one of their worst products of the year. Just take a look at how this article was worded... it shows how a person uses a PC not a Mac. As a Mac user, I still recommend an eMac.

Desktop PC: For Apple, the entry-level eMac really does represent Think Different. That's because for a company that prides itself on quality, this computer is different. As in bad. On the plus side, it's stylish. On the downside, it's slow, underpowered, and pathetic. The 40GB hard drive will fill up quickly, the lack of a DVD burner makes offloading files impossible, and the Radeon 9200 graphics card won't even run this fall's hot Mac games. And at around $800, this eMac ain't cheap. If you're considering a home Apple, think different. Buy a Dell. Or be prepared to spend a lot more for an acceptable Apple computer. Our Desktop Product Guide can lead you to the best Apples, along with the best of the rest.

@PCMag

EDIT: I think the author contradicted himself when he offered a PC as an alternative -- he offered something worse! Now if he recommended another Mac, it would be another story.

Posted by Joel at 08:06 AM | Permalink

VLC has long been my default video player. Going through the VLC site, I was surprised to see a multi-format VLC Howto now available.

Posted by Joel at 07:56 PM | Permalink

Matinee is out. Used to be known as PlayPal, Matinee is a VIDEO_TS movie launcher.

Posted by Joel at 10:03 AM | Permalink

This latest version of NewsFire offers authenticated feed support. NewsFire just keeps on getting better. Once in a while, I still run NewsFire just to see how everything flies around inside its interface. Functionality and style at work... just what a true OS X application should be.

Posted by Joel at 09:35 AM | Permalink

QuickImage is a context menu item I've installed a while back. I've forgotten about it and just remembered when I saw this update. I've been using Photoshop Elements 3 to change file formats but QuickImage does these tasks, and more, quickly and conveniently.

Contextual menu plugin for MacOS X that displays graphic image files without launching any application. It also has some other feature like adding/removing thumbnail icons, copying image to clipboard, moving to trash, enlarging/reducing view size.

@VersionTracker

Posted by Joel at 09:17 AM | Permalink

I've just tested a new RSS reader and it looks great. I can't make it work with ecto though, but nevertheless, RSSOwl is one of the better free RSS readers out there.

RSSOwl is a free RSS / RDF / Atom Newsreader in Java using SWT as fast graphic library. Supported OS are Windows, Mac, Linux and Solaris. Some features are export of news to PDF, Import / Export with OPML and the full-text-search with syntaxhighlight. For easy execution, a exe-file is provided on Windows, a shell-script on Linux / Solaris and the Mac version is deployed in an application bundle. RSSOwl comes with a huge list of sample favorites.

@VersionTracker

Posted by Joel at 09:02 AM | Permalink

New offers for .mac subscribers!

Apple has added a handful of new perks for subscribers of its .Mac Internet suite. Members can now download HipSoft's Holiday Express (US$19.95 value), an action arcade game in which you "travel across the country loading the train with beautiful pictures--including your own custom images." Also offered is a 25 percent discount on any HipSoft Mac game. In addition, .Mac members can now download two chapters from "Robin Williams' Cool Mac Apps," and get 30 percent off the entire book. All of the offers are good until March 9, 2005.

@MacMinute

Posted by Joel at 08:33 AM | Permalink

I've just found my name in the New York Times Ad. It's a good thing that they've decided to do it alphabetically and not randomly as originally planned. Thankfully, Mozilla decided to post the PDF version of the ad. Downloading it was no problem but opening and rasterizing the whole thing took some time.

Though I'm an Opera user, it's still good to know that I did my part in supporting Firefox.

(The other highlighted name by the way, is my friend, Rommel).

Posted by Joel at 03:09 PM | Permalink |

A recent game that has caught my attention in OS X is Gish. Created by Chronic Logic, Gish is a 12 pound ball of tar. It sounds unbelievable but when I tried it out, I was amazed with what I saw.

I won't give anything away because Gish is THE game to try out for OS X. It's also available for Windows and Linux adding yet more props to the developer for being simply aware of other OS's.

Gish is a 15.8MB download. (Windows 11.3MB, Linux 13.2MB)

Posted by Joel at 08:02 AM | Permalink

The New York Times Firefox Ad is out!

Posted by Joel at 06:17 AM | Permalink

PC Photo Printers Challenge Pros:
zebadee writes "A survey carried out by PC Pro magazine looked at which of 100 home photo printers offered a better deal than handing your snaps to a photo lab. The tests found that images from top PC printers kept their colour longer than professionally produced photographs. In the report at the BBC it claims that the new generation of printers produced images with brighter colours and that were less likely to fade than many High Street developers or even some professional wedding photographers."

It's been ages since I've printed out photographs. I do print text but not photographs. The closest I've been to print outs were the 300 dpi posters I did in school which were printed out in a colored Xerox. As for personal photographs, I either post them at flickr or just file them away in iPhoto.

Posted by Joel at 09:11 PM | Permalink

Just a quick note on Cocktail... I use this basically monthly or after a major update like 10.3.7.

Cocktail 3.5 Cocktail 3.5 is the latest version of the general purpose utility for Mac OS X.

Posted by Joel at 03:31 PM | Permalink

William Ray Jr. has a review of 18(!) mini tripods over at The Gadgeteer.

Posted by Joel at 02:01 PM | Permalink

The 10.3.7 Update delivers enhanced functionality and improved reliability for Mac OS X v10.3 "Panther" and is recommended for all users.

Key enhancements include:

• improved AFP support for saving documents with long file names
• improved OpenGL technology and updated ATI and NVIDIA graphics drivers
• improved FireWire device compatibility
• updated Preview application
• improved compatibility for third party applications
• previous standalone security updates

For detailed information on this Update, please visit this website: http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n300385
For detailed information on Security Updates, please visit this website: http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n61798

Posted by Joel at 08:54 AM | Permalink

When it rains, it pours... several of the apps I use regularly have been updated over the past few hours.

Opera 7.54u1 - mostly security fixes based on Secunia advisories
Alarm Clock Pro 7.0 - lots of enhancements and new features
MacJournal 2.7b1
ecto 2.1.2

Posted by Joel at 08:48 AM | Permalink

Cocktail 3.5 is now available. Cocktail is a must have application that I run once in a while if I notice that my Powerbook is becoming too sluggish.

Cocktail 3.5 (Panther Edition) is a new major update to Cocktail. Version 3.5 includes lots of new features, changes, improvements and bug fixes.

Posted by Joel at 06:12 AM | Permalink

iCal 1.5.5 includes improvements in iSync synchronization on computers running Mac OS X version 10.2.

iCal 1.5.4 or later includes security enhancements to help protect your computer when subscribing to calendars or importing events with alarms that open files or applications.

Posted by Joel at 09:16 AM | Permalink

X-mas Tree is a freeware, highly configurable application for the desktop. It shows how many days to go before Christmas (11 days!) and sits in the lower right part of my desktop

Posted by Joel at 08:43 AM | Permalink

Here's an alternative drive. However, I don't have to guts to open up my Powerbook... yet.

The FastMac 8x DVD±RW drive burns DVDs at 8x speed and rewrites DVDs at 4x speed. It also writes to DVD-RAM discs at 3x speed, CD-Rs at 24x speed, and CD-RWs at 10x speed.

Posted by Joel at 07:45 AM | Permalink

MarsEdit is the new blog editor by Ranchero. It looks great and if it's the first time I'm looking for a blog editor, no doubt I'd choose MarsEdit. I've been so spoiled by ecto that I think I don't like to learn new commands in a new app.

MarsEdit is free for registered owners of NetNewsWire, otherwise it's $24.95 for a single user license. There's a 30-day demo available.

The screenshot is from Ranchero.

Posted by Joel at 05:57 PM | Permalink

Eugene wrote me an email about the release of the PSP in Japan. Some excerpts:

At one time, there were 1,500 people in one queue at the Yodobashi Kamera in Shinjuku. SCEJ's CEO Ken Kutaragi gave an unexpected appearance as well.

Some pictures to give you and idea how was the lauch. Most shops sold out after 3 hours. Some shops did not even sell today as their PSPs have not completely pre-ordered.

I don't read nor write Japanese but the pictures are enough. I don't believe I saw this kind of consumer reaction when the Nintendo DS was released. Here are the articles (J) and pics...

Shinjuku

Ikebukuro

Shibuya Tsutaya

Famitsu.com

Posted by Joel at 01:42 PM | Permalink

I've just been to our local Bose showroom and couldn't help but test the Soundock. I tested it with a variety of music (pop, jazz, classical, hiphop, deep base, and audiobooks) and I'm very impressed. I walked across the room and controlled my iPod with the remote (which I was surprised that the Soundock came with one) --- the sound quality was great.

I didn't buy it but they're offering a 12-months interest-free payment scheme. To top it off, the price here is the same as in the mainland USA.

Posted by Joel at 10:01 PM | Permalink |

Google adds yet another feature as it suggests sites in real time, while you're typing. The suggestions appear in a dropdown box under the search box.

Posted by Joel at 09:45 AM | Permalink

A big boost for Paypal! Apple and Paypal have announced that iTMS music downloads can now be paid for thru Paypal.

Posted by Joel at 09:29 AM | Permalink

Joseph DeRuvo Jr. dismantles two iBooks and creates the i-Tablet.

As a Photographer and a Dyslexic the idea of being able to use a Tablet as a platform for showing photographs, editing, and an extension of my badly organized memory is very appealing. I had purchased an early QBE, which I was happy with, except for the problem of going between the QBE and all my other desktops which are Apples, it was always the odd man out, in addition to the frustration of finding cross platform software. So taking matters into my own hands I cut into a Dual USB iBook and didn't look back.

@MacMod thru Engadget

Posted by Joel at 09:07 AM | Permalink

I agree that after reading this quote at enorgis, I'm also set on getting the PSP. Now this experience is based on playing Ridge Racer. Imagine how it would feel like playing Gran Turismo!

I have this little flutter of excitement in the pit of my stomach that I’ve not felt since I first saw the PS2…Lots has been written about how mind-bendingly good the PSP screen is, but it wasn’t until I played Need For Speed for a while that I really understood it…It’s not like squinting down at your phone, it’s a big wide window into the game that’s big enough for you to let your eyes tune out anything else you’re looking at. The result is complete and total immersion…Screw the movies and the music, the PSP is a kick-ass games machine, and already looks like it will be as significant culturally as the iPod.

Posted by Joel at 08:51 AM | Permalink

More news about the iPod flash.

Toshiba has reportedly agreed to supply Apple with flash memory chips that could be used in the rumored flash iPod. Yasuo Morimoto, senior executive vice president at Toshiba, said his company will begin selling the chips to Apple "early next year." As reported by MacMinute, Merrill Lynch analyst Steve Milunovich expects Apple to introduce a flash memory-based iPod at January's Macworld Expo in San Francisco. Toshiba currently supplies Apple with the 1.8-inch hard drives used in the fourth-generation iPods.

@MacMinute

Posted by Joel at 08:47 AM | Permalink

The Apple Developer site features more information about what Widgets are and how they work. I'm already excited to see the first wave of widgets that will come with Tiger. I just hope that these widgets will become for functional and offer less clutter than what Konfabulator currently offers.

Posted by Joel at 08:41 AM | Permalink

An alpha version of MacJournal is now available at VT. No list of what's new was listed but upon downloading, an included readme lists many, many improvements and bug fixes.

This is an alpha version so despite the improvements, expects some rogue bugs.

Posted by Joel at 08:19 AM | Permalink

Delicious Library has been updated. This is the best audio/video/text collections database I've seen. Nothing comes close to its functionality, useability, and presentation. I'll say it again -- this is one app that I immediately bought when it was released.

Delicious Monster Software today released Delicious Library 1.0.6, a free update to its application that creates a stylish electronic card-catalog of all your books, movies, music, and video games, right on your Mac. Version 1.0.6 includes improved support for the company's Bluetooth wireless barcode scanner, and "a handful of bug fixes that will make using the application even more enjoyable." Delicious Library costs US$39.95

@MacMinute

Posted by Joel at 10:53 AM | Permalink

1src Podcast One is now available.

We talk about the PalmSource announcement this morning, that they'd release a PalmOS based on Linux and that they'd be bringing the PalmOS interface and core PIM applications to low-end "dumbphones".

We also discuss why this isn't bad for Cobalt, the similarities between PalmOS on Linux and Mac OS on Unix, how this helps device and platform compatability and other potential form factors for PalmOS for Linux (think $500 laptops for college students).

We also talk about why it's important to put the PalmOS UI, Contacts and Calendar on entry-level phones, the foothold this gives PalmSource into the overall cell phone market and why this vaults them past Windows Mobile and give them ammo to poke Symbian right in the eye.

Jeff Kirvin would be handling the 1src Podcast. I'm pretty excited about this because podcasting has interested me ever since Engadget came out with theirs. I use iPodderX to get my podcasts downloaded to iTunes which in turn is synced to the iPod. Now that 1src has its own podcast, we can offer even more content options for our regular visitors.

EDIT: Here's the 1src Podcast RSS

Posted by Joel at 06:36 AM | Permalink

Secunia reports on a new browser vulnerability. This is not limited to Internet Explorer as I thought but rather on other browsers. So far, I was able to verify this on Opera, Firefox, and Camino but not on Safari.

EDIT: I was able to make the vulnerability work on Safari. It must be noted though that Opera and Safari were able to block this vulnerability if the popup blockers were activated.

My tests are not that accurate so I'm waiting to hear from Apple, Mozilla, and Opera about what they think about this latest vulnerability.

Posted by Joel at 02:52 PM | Permalink

Want to change the system images in your iPod? Here's how...

But first let me quote, iPodWizard, the person who figured out the whole thing...

First, big disclaimer - proceed at your own risk - I'm not in any way responsible for anything - this is pure hacking...

So if you're still feeling adventurous, find out everything at iPodHacks. (...found this actually at Engadget.)

For the record, I'm an iPod purist. I will never go through hacking with this device because I think it's perfect the way it is. Doing that brushed metal thing is as far as I'd go.

Posted by Joel at 01:19 PM | Permalink |

Apple has a new start page at http://www.apple.com/startpage/

The old start page at http://livepage.apple.com now redirects to the new one.

Posted by Joel at 01:07 PM | Permalink

I was entrenched with the Clie (well in everything Sony actually) that for a while I lost touch of the palmOne devices and their development. When Cliesource morphed into 1src.com, I was, honestly, overwhelmed with various news and sites that were literally thrown into my RSS feed reader.

PalmAddict is one site that I happily discovered. Earlier based in Blogger, it has "grown up" and moved to TypePad. PalmAddict is run by Sam McLoughlin and the site features more real-world experiences of many, many Palm users from various parts of the world that have discovered this fantastic site.

Sammy is often up and about updating PalmAddict with user experiences and news.... even when Sammy is in a vacation, PalmAddict never seems to run out of new entries! (Take a look at the screenshot I included... that's a typical day at PalmAddict)

Posted by Joel at 12:22 PM | Permalink

PlayPal is something useful for people who backup DVD movies for later viewing.

PlayPal is a 1-Click movie launcher for Mac users who rip their DVD's to their hard drive. This application does not rip the DVD but it provides a clean interface for accessing all the titles you have available to watch.

Posted by Joel at 09:33 AM | Permalink

Daring Fireball has found a site that lists "essential" OS X apps. The list looks good and I'm mentioning it here for later exploration and experimentation.

Posted by Joel at 08:48 AM | Permalink |

I question the functionality of Windowshade with Exposé around and I think I've outgrown skinning effects. But for those who are after eye candy and pre-OS X nostalgia, Unsanity has released updates for these two apps.

Unsanity today released maintenance updates for two of its popular Mac OS X enhancement utilities. Tweaks, bug fixes, and minor enhancements have been added to ShapeShifter 2.0.1, the customization software that allows users to change the overall appearance of their Mac using themes, and WindowShade X 3.5.1, the utility that brings the familiar window-collapsing effect from Classic Mac OS into Mac OS X, and allows users to control window shadow settings.

@MacMinute

Posted by Joel at 08:46 AM | Permalink

This has gotten me quite a bit excited:

Apparently some of his associates had been telling him earlier in the week about an Apple branded phone that had been circulating around the office at Motorola. The phone had Motorola components, but most certainly had Apple brandings on it. He said that he did not have a chance to handle the phone, but that his direct supervisor did. The phone was “sleek and sexy” in her words. He mentioned that there was talk amongst the people who had seen it that iTunes and iPhoto would factor into this device somehow. They also said that the phone had a slot on the top (media slot?) as well as what looked to be a USB 2.0 port on the bottom.

@Engadget

Posted by Joel at 08:38 AM | Permalink

It's sad to see that gorillas pay more respect to their dead than some humans do.

BROOKFIELD, Illinois (AP) -- After Babs the gorilla died at age 30, keepers at Brookfield Zoo decided to allow surviving gorillas to mourn the most influential female in their social family.

One by one Tuesday, the gorillas filed into the Tropic World building where Babs' body lay, arms outstretched. Curator Melinda Pruett Jones called it a "gorilla wake."

Babs' 9-year-old daughter, Bana, was the first to approach the body, followed by Babs' mother, Alpha, 43. Bana sat down, held Babs' hand and stroked her mother's stomach. Then she sat down and laid her head on Babs' arm.

@CNN

Posted by Joel at 07:49 AM | Permalink

Though the ATI-powered Gamecube is still my choice for quality games, the next wave of console games should prove to be interesting. Here's what came out at Engadget a few hours ago:

It’s been confirmed that the PlayStation 3 is going to use a Cell processor jointly made by Sony, Toshiba, and IBM, have built-in WiFi support, and use Blu-Ray discs (25/50GB), now Nvidia makes the big score and has announced that they will be powering the graphics in Sony’s next generation gaming console. behind it with a new There’s no solid specs on what Nvidia is throwing in there yet, but it should basically be a new GeForce GPU designed specifically to work with the Cell processor.

Posted by Joel at 05:41 AM | Permalink

I discovered Seashore earlier today. I played with it for a while and it's turning out to be a great drawing program!

Seashore is an open source image editor for Cocoa. It features gradients, textures and anti-aliasing for both text and brush strokes. It supports multiple layers and individual channel editing. It is based around the GIMP's technology and uses the same native file format.

Posted by Joel at 08:50 PM | Permalink

Thunderbird is now at v1.0.

Thunderbird makes emailing safer, faster, and easier than ever before with the industry's best implementations of features such as intelligent spam filters, built-in RSS reader, quick search, and much more.

Posted by Joel at 10:22 PM | Permalink |

Disk Inventory X is a disk usage utility for Mac OS X (10.2+). It shows the sizes of files and folders in a special graphical way called "treemaps". If you've ever wondered were all your disk space has gone, Disk Inventory X will help you to answer this question.

I've been able to locate files which has been occupying space and which I have forgotten all about. This is my kind of application and it just confirms that I'm a visual learner.

Posted by Joel at 04:34 PM | Permalink

If you need an alternative wordprocessor then look no further than AbiWord. "AbiWord is a free word processing program similar to Microsoft® Word. It is suitable for typing papers, letters, reports, memos, and so forth."

There are no drawing tools this is basically a text/image program. It cannot open Appleworks files but can easily open Word files though the formatting (especially if there are drawn items in Word) is not perfect.

AbiWord is free and is available for the Mac, PC, and Linux.

Posted by Joel at 06:18 AM | Permalink

MenuShade darkens the menubar to make it easier on the eyes. Earlier versions were too dark but this latest one is in a preferable shade. It's free!

Posted by Joel at 07:34 AM |