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Apple Now Accepting iPad Apps, Planning “Grand Opening” of iPad App Store

Apple is now accepting iPad apps for a “grand opening” of the iPad App Store, according to an email just sent to registered developers.
“iPad will begin shipping soon and your opportunity to be part of the grand opening of the iPad App Store starts today,” the email says.
There’s no details about when the store’s grand [...]

Security Expert: “Mac OS X Is Safer, But Less Secure”

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Tech site H-Online has an interesting story today, quoting security expert Charlie Miller about his forthcoming talk at the CanSecWest conference next week.
He says OS X is full of security holes. There are lots more than in Windows, he claims.
And yet: OS X is a safer system to use. Why? Because, in the words [...]

Apple Devotes Entire Home Page To Jerome York Obituary

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If ever you needed a sign that Apple was a different kind of technology company, this is it.
What other computer manufacturer would remove its top-selling, hype-inducing, industry-altering new product from the prime spot on its website home page, and replace it with an obituary to an investor?
This is one of those “Here’s to the [...]

Coming Soon: Steve Jobs, the Sitcom

Fake Steve creator Dan Lyons just signed a deal to bring Steve Jobs to another small screen near you.
The half-hour series called “iCon” is billed by the presser as “a savage satire centering on a fictional Silicon Valley CEO whose ego is a study in power and greed.”
Making sure the barbs prick will be the [...]

Your iPhone is Better than You at Solving a Rubik’s Cube

Is there anything an iPhone app cannot be programmed to do?

CubeCheater is an amazing app for iPhone and iPod Touch that, given the current state of your Rubik’s Cube, will tell you how to solve the puzzle in just a few moves.

You can either input the cube’s state using the color palette and tapping in the colors, or you can just take a picture of each face of the cube and CubeCheater will use advanced computer-vision techniques to recognize the cube for you. (The camera feature is obviously not available on iPod Touch)

The app uses the famed Kociemba algorithm to find a solution quickly. It finds optimal or near-optimal cube solutions in only a few seconds. Even a really mixed-up cube will only take about 20 turns to solve, compared to hundreds of turns for a typical human algorithm.

By getting all Beatles Revolution #9 on it, you can also use CubeCheater to put your cube into pretty-looking patterns. Start with a solved cube, input the pattern you want, and solve it. Play the solution backwards to put your cube into that configuration.

The app’s most recent update adds support for different styles of cubes, such as the Blue-opposite-White cubes sold in Japan. You can also specify your own custom cube configuration if you have a non-standard cube.

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About the author

Lonnie Lazar

Lonnie Lazar is a writer, musician, web designer attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie's photos on Flickr.

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18 comments

    [...] here to feature the rest: Your iPhone is Better than You at Solving a Rubik’s Cube | Cult of Mac Leave a comment Comment RSS Previous: DIY iPhone Stand: Time to Raid the Supply Cabinet [...]

    Computers have proven faster at solving logic problems than humans are. News at 11.

    The iPhone: Solving problems that just don’t exist.

    [...] Reality Helps Solve the Rubik’s Cube Posted on January 26, 2009 by Ori Inbar The Cult of Mac just uncovered the new iPhone app: [...]

    Holy Mother Of God that is *so* beautiful ….

    The animation ….
    The graphics ….
    It looks so …. “futuristic” lol

    The iPhone is truly a must-have device & when the $99 IPhone nano comes out. it will *truly* be ubiquitous .

    8^ ]

    [...] [via Cult of Mac] Tags: App, Awesome, iPhone [...]

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