News, Reviews and more from Australia's Macintosh Authority
News, Reviews and more from Australia's Macintosh Authority
This year must go down for me as "Conference Year". I've been doing some counting and I reckon that I've made at least six major conferences and workshops so far, and hey, it's only August! There's been the British Educational Technology and Trade show in London, Macworld Expo in San Francisco, NECC in San Antonio, the International Conference on Teaching and Learning with Technology in Singapore. the Cisco Directions in Enterprise Conference in Sydney and the The Association of Independent Schools IT Managers conference in Wollongong (can't forget the 'Gong).This year must go down for ...
Owing to a total lack of vocal chords on my part, this week's podcast is not going to happen. The good news is, this spares you the agony of trying to understand the husky remains of my voice (I hate Spring colds). The bad news is, this week's podcast was when we were going to announce the winners of our iPone 3G competition. Instead, you get to read about them here. We posted fifteen of the best to Youtube, but there can be only two. Congratulations to our winners, and many thanks to all who entered.
Matthew JC. Powell | Aug 22, 2008
There's nothing wrong with protecting your intellectual property if you're a business. On the other hand, leaving consumers high and dry when licences fail to work as they're meant to really sucks, even if the property in question is just a relatively minor game title. Thankfully, Apple does this a lot better than its biggest competitor. The future of software delivery, as we've been promised for some time now, is in digital delivery. Certainly, it's a model that's proven wildly successful for a number of shareware-style operators with applications that are easy to download and install, but what about larger applications? Well, that market's being tested out right now in the games world, and Apple is right in the thick of it, thanks to the digital delivery of games via the iTunes Store.
Alex Kidman | Aug 20, 2008
OK, maybe not humanity so much as phonemanity. Or something. Our iPhone competition -- whereby you can win one of two unlocked iPhones and an Altec Lansing speaker system and dock -- closes tomorrow afternoon at 5pm AEST, and more entries are as we speak being uploaded to our channel on YouTube. Some of them are brilliant, some are hilarious, and some are deeply, deeply disturbing. Some of you really don't like your phones much. Have a look and see what you think.
Matthew JC. Powell | Aug 15, 2008
The CocoaHeads provide a forum for developers using Apple Computer's Cocoa Framework for programming on Mac OS X. In plain English this means they provide a place to discuss how to write programs for the Macintosh. Initially this was just for developing applications for the Macintosh, but now they also cover development for the iPhone (and iPod touch) as the tools used are very similar.
Nicholas Pyers | Aug 14, 2008
Want a free Apple t-shirt? Get down to Chatswood Chase, where an hour before opening time the queue is easily outnumbered by Security. The Apple Store staff are, as with the George Street opening in June, chanting and clapping and getting geared up, but actual customers don't seem to have wanted to brave the cold Chatswood morning.
Matthew JC. Powell | Aug 9, 2008
Many of you will have been counting down to this weekend's opening of the Beijing summer Olympiad using Apple's own Dashboard widget, made by the official Games timekeeper OMEGA (If you haven't, there isn't much time now but you can find it here for your anticipatory pleasure). If, like most of us, you won't be so lucky as to attend the games, you can still technologically slake your desire to follow the athletes in the sports of your choice from Australia — whether on your laptop or your mobile phone.
Fleur Doidge | Aug 6, 2008
What happens when people see Windows Vista without realising it's Windows Vista? This was the question Microsoft tried to answer with the "Mojave Experiment", where people who had negative opinions of Microsoft's latest and "greatest" operating system while never having used it were told they were getting a look at the "next" Microsoft operating system, Windows "Mojave". Lo and behold, it appears they all had Road to Damascus experiences, loved "Mojave" to death and were suitably shocked when they discovered that "Mojave" was, in fact, Vista.
Sean McNamara | Aug 3, 2008
It's often hard to tell the difference between work and play on a Mac. And as Apple keeps piling on the goodies and making the whole experience more silky smooth and seamless — whatever that means — it gets harder. Or easier, if you're a glass-half-full person. I mean, give me a couple of interesting old photos to retouch for a friend and I'm definitely at play. Give me a hundred to do by day's end and it's work. Anyhow, what follows is a brief description of how I relax with my Macs.
Keith White | Jul 31, 2008
There’s been a bit of a ruckus lately on the Australian MacEd listserve about upgrading software. Essentially, the complainant’s beef was that, due to some new iMacs arriving in the school, there was now a mixture of iPhoto 6 and 8 in his labs, and one could not open the others’ photo library. There was also an implication that this wouldn’t happen with Microsoft products, as they can be updated. Apple offers educational institutions two options to stay current: one is the Apple Maintenance Program (AMP), and the other is a purchase of new software at discounted rates.
Martin Levins | Jul 28, 2008
By any reasonable measure the transition from .Mac to MobileMe was a debacle — a slapstick shambles of vaudevillian proportions. The only upside is that if Apple's claims that only one percent of users were affected are true, there's about 100 times as many MobileMe users as I thought. But there is another benefit: if users had been able to use the service, they'd have seen just how limited it actually is. Hardly anyone's noticed that even on a good day the default e-mail client on iPhone kinda sucks. There just haven't been enough good days.
Matthew JC. Powell | Jul 25, 2008
Rather subtly, in the middle of a crowded week and a somewhat overhyped launch, Apple managed to sneak a few other products out the door. One of them marks the company's first successful foray into the portable gaming market. Heck, I'll go further than that. It marks the company's first push with a computing device capable of playing cutting-edge games since the Apple II. I'm referring, of course, to the iPhone 3G. As I write this, seven of the top ten Apps available from the App Store are all games.
Alex Kidman | Jul 23, 2008
The transition from .Mac to MobileMe could have gone a little smoother. OK, a lot smoother. Let's face it, it was a debacle. When a company like Apple — notoriously reluctant to admit anything is wrong — is forced into two apologies in a week, something is definitely up. What's more, the time may well be ripe for a third. Apple has apparently decided the right way to win friends and influence people is to install software they don't want on their machines — software that advertises MobileMe.
Matthew JC. Powell | Jul 23, 2008
Australian free-to-air television guide IceTV is now available via the iTunes App Store for people to install on their iPhones. Usage of the free app requires registration with the IceTV service, which is free and provides a one-day TV listing. Paid subscribers to the IceTV service get a seven-day listing. Other features available to subscribers are the ability to record programs remotely using EyeTV, a personalised TV guide and recommendations based on shows you've previously recorded.
