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The Portland (Maine) Herald has a story saying how much the teachers like the Apple laptops and how they would hate to give them up. There are some issues, like what to do about lost or damaged computers, and how to get computes refunded after 2005 when the current program ends. Full story
Wonder which seat is the best on a commercial flight? WFAA-TV, here in the DFW area had a report on SeatGuru.com. It actually has specifies which seats are good and which are bad. The only catch I can see is when the airline substitutes a different aircraft at the last minute. See the story at: WFFA , or Seat Guru dot com.
I know that Apple Corp of Dallas had a terrific new SIG last summer and fall by showing how to do digital photography. But the first step for most of us is getting a camera. What camera do you need. Here is a web site that is an independent guide to purchasing
Apple has been talking up their digital hub for some time now. But they have pretty much meant multimedia from various devices can be connected to the Mac.
The Home Hub from Salton, looks like a clock radio, but actually is a control center for networked kitchen devices, such as the microwave, coffeemaker and a breadmaker. For example, it can let you know that you didn't put water in the coffeemaker or can be used to set the microwave for perfect timings. Sounds pretty interesting and I am sure that most of us will want it someday. Not sure about just right at this moment though. Especially since it appears that you have to purchase the "iCEbox to control the whole thing. (Not Macintosh compatible.) Check out the network
It seems that more and more people are wanting to share their digital photos. And since not everyone has a .mac account there appears to be a really good market for doing so. Some of these were shown at DEMO in Scottsdale, Arizona last week.
One of these is a new service called ShareALot. Which is basically folder sharing via the Internet. A similar product is called OurPictures. A third one is called PhotoSite and actually stores the pictures on their servers and uses a simplified uploading technique.
ShareALot is a free download. (Mac & PC) If you want to share your photos with someone that doesn't have the software, the e-mail will include a link and it will ask the other user to download the software. More details at: www.sharealot.com, ourpictures.comPhotosite
Not sure if is official, but apparently Apple is opening their first European store in London. One comment from another reseller is that they aren't worried because there is no parking near the store and thus will make it difficult to sell computers. Read the full story.
Recently PalmOne announced that they would not be supporting Macintosh in their syncing software. But all is not lost. MarkSpace.com has announced that they will fill the gap as they have with Windows CE devices in the past. So don't give up on Palm yet. Although they are going to have a very tough market against all those smart phones. Read the full story.
These cards should start showing up at Target, apparently along with the iPod Mini and a kiosk to help sell them. The kiosks will allow hands on. Apparently they are only available in $15 increments. However, this will allow teens and younger access to the music they want. Get the full story.
SCO has been threatening a number of companies with lawsuits over their use of material that SCO has was theirs after they purchased rights to Unix from Novel. Novel had gotten those rights from AT&T. Basically they were claiming that any changes made to Unix where also theirs. But Novel released a newsletter that was issued in 1985 by AT&T, "$ echo", that clarified that they were making no claims for derivative-works. This may have given SCO pause as the lawsuits were suppose to have been filed by now. And they haven't been. Read more...
To strength their market share, Yahoo "fired" Google this past week and started to use their own search engine. Of course, Yahoo started out as a directory service, and was one of the early leaders of finding things on the Ônet. But now they have a new search engine and apparently in many cases will find even more pages than Google. But then do we really need another 1500 pages when we already get 3000? Anyway, you might want to give them a try.
Fire Instant Messenger, an instant messenger client for Mac OS 10.1 and above supporting AIM, Yahoo, MSN, Jabber, ICQ, and irc. Fire Instant Messenger now supports the new Yahoo Authentication scheme which was last changed by Yahoo on January 8, 2004. Thanks to some awesome work and cooperation in the Open Source community, this issue has been resolved, and we have released a new version of Fire which allows you to connect with Yahoo again.Read more...
TimeSlice for Mac OS 9 through OS 10.1, and TimeSliceX 2.7 for Mac OS 10.2 and greater, are easy-to-use time-tracking and billing applications used every day by small and large businesses, consultants, and contractors to track billable time spent on clients, business projects, specific jobs! You can add documents and applications you want TimeSlice to track -- TimeSlice then starts and stops tracking time for you, automatically and in the background. It even creates graphs of your time records. Pretty slick.
Well, here appears to be someone who has come up with a use for the handscanner type device we remember form 10 years ago. This time however, instead of software that helps you edit graphics, it reads barcodes and puts them into a data base. Especially useful for those hundreds of CDs, LPs and books that many of us have. In some ways, it looks up data from the web like iTunes does with CDs, but in other ways it is more of a customizable database. Some people were doing these types of things with the DigitalConvergence's cat a few years ago. But they were never doing it legally, although, I could see where that might have inspired this device. The complete package sells for less than $200. More details
Rick, the president of the Maui Mac user group, told us n the AUGD mailing list about their success of decreasing the average age of their group. He said that he nearly left after his first meeting, but then decided to get involved commenting,
"the group has created an atmosphere that would accept anyone who loved Macs. The key I have learned is when people inquire about the group, is to make sure to tell them that this is not a "Geek Fest" and that the skill level of members range from beginner to advanced. We have taken that attitude and have no problem getting younger people and women to our meetings. Something else key to do. If you get youth involved in your group, put them into leadership positions. É"
That of course is the key to get anyone to stick around. Give them something to do. It gets boring pretty quickly just sitting in your seat and watching others do things. Especially for young people, but also true of us 50-somethings. Most groups can always use more help. The key is to get them working in small tasks early on. This certainly makes them feel wanted. Not everyone is a proactive in volunteering as most of the current crop of officers.
Of course once you get them started, you also have to have a varied program. More on that at a later time.
Join O'Reilly and NCMUG for a special Mac User Group Day in Sebastopol, California on Saturday, April 24 from 2-6pm. Speakers include Derrick Story ("Digital Photography Pocket Guide, 2nd Edition," "iPhoto 2: The Missing Manual"), Chris Stone ("Mac OS X Panther in a Nutshell"), Tom Negrino & Dori Smith ("Mac OS X Unwired"), and Scott Fullam ("Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks"). For more information and a complete schedule of events, download the PDF file: macugday_hi_res.pdf Please RSVP to let us know you will be attending at mugevent@oreilly.com.
Mac User Group Day
2:00pm-6:00pm
Sebastopol, CA
800-998-9938 Ext. 7103
For directions, go to:For directions, go here!
Mike Langberg writes, "Most of us look at a toaster and see a kitchen appliance for crisping bread. Scott Fullam looks at a toaster and sees an engineering challenge...," in this "Mercury News" book review of "Hardware Hacking Projects for Geeks."
Having more control over how your home operates isn't just a geek fantasy. You can lower energy costs, improve security, and enhance the overall ambiance of your humble abode. Alan Graham shows you how to leverage your Mac OS X computer and get started. (From O'Reilly)
Backing up your hard disc is the job nobody wants to do--and even more so, no one wants to spend a lot of money doing it. Fortunately, Apple gives you everything you need in Mac OS X. You just have to pull it together. Peter Hickman shows you how
The new Eclipse Foundation was recently announced at EclipseCon, and the Eclipse project is moving toward a June release of Eclipse 3.0. O'Reilly will publish Steve Holzner's "Eclipse: A Java Developer's Guide" this summer. A beta preview of Chapter 5, "Building Eclipse Projects Using Ant," is available online as a PDF download AntEclipse.pdf
Enthusiasts and professionals are invited to attend 3rd annual 802.11 Wi-Fi Workshop on April 2, 2004 -- a one-day conference and workshop on Friday, April 2, 2004 in Edison, NJ at the Clarion Hotel. This all new workshop covers the latest in 802.11 wireless technology including: emerging standards like 802.11b/a/g and Bluetooth securing Hotspots with 802.11 monitoring techniques and equipment antenna alignment with high precision receivers optimizing WISPs using RF spectrum and Multipath analysis detecting RF interference from hackers to microwave ovens mapping W-LAN coverage using software written for any iPAQ PocketPC Upon completing the workshop, students can expect to receive their BVS Installers Certification. Workshop registration is $500Wi-Fi Workshop
"Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past."
- George Orwell
"While we have the gift of life, it seems to me the only tragedy is to allow part of us to die--whether it is our spirit, or creativity, or our glorious uniqueness."
- Gilda Radner
"Everything should be as simple as possible, and no simpler."
- Albert Einstein
Dan East says "While this might LOOK like just a stock replacement keyboard, it is so much more" in his review of the Tactile Pro Keyboard
This is a fun, simple to use logo creation tool that brings great looking results to any level of designer. Great for home business, ad design or just for fun. Reviewed by Dan East, MaMugs
Fred says: "Whether you are a beginner, or you are just sick and tired of having to clean up after Dreamweaver and GoLive. You owe it to yourself to at least check out CreativePage a low-cost, W3 compliant web page authoring program for under $30
Granite Digital Announces the first "FireWire 800" 1394b Hot-Swap "Disk-To-Disk" Backup Storage System capable of speeds up to 80MB/s. Huge, hot-swap storage limitations are a thing of the past. FireWire 800
Lava Software PC-Mac PasswordVault v2.1 password manager securely stores website usernames and passwords on Windows 95/98/NT/ME/2000/XP, MacOS X and MacOS classic computers. Password Vault
Over 100,000 pre-orders already in for the world's smallest 1,000-song music player the iPod mini -- and it's engravable! Read more...
Xupport -- the clean Graphical User Interface for Mac OS X has been upgraded including several unix command to optimize and secure your Mac, and activates other features that are disabled by default.Read more...
AppleWorks users can now enjoy live scrolling and proportional thumbs -- sheesh, what a concept: the document moves while you drag the scroll bar thumb, and the thumb shows which part of the document is displayed. Smart Scroll X
download and upload files via FTP, SFTP and FTP/SSH in Mac OS X with tabbed browsing (just like Safari) and Icon view... and do it faster!
Have a great week...
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