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John Brownlee - page 235

Wi-Fi Sync: Wireless Sync Coming To The App Store

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In an age when voice and video from half a world away can be sucked up from the soup of electromagnetic radiation invisibly swirling around us, plugging in my iPhone to sync with iTunes makes me feel like a caveman. I’ve been waiting for an app that would allow me to wirelessly sync my iDevices for awhile, and now, it looks like it might be here: Wi-Fi Sync by Greg Hughes allows you to pair your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch to your computer through WiFi, no wires required.

99 Year Old Limericist Loves Her New iPad

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99 year old Virginia Campbell just got her first computer… and it’s the iPad.

Emphasizing Apple’s own “it just works” mantra, Virginia was quickly able to make sense of the iPad’s operating system and use Pages in landscape mode to write the following limerick:

To this technically-ninny it’s clear
In my compromised 100th year,
That to read and to write
Are again within sight
Of this Apple iPad Pioneer.

My own limericks tend to be smuttier and focus on a strange Venusian improbably named Michael Hunt, but I admire Virginia’s: at the very least, it’s probably the best and sweetest advertising Apple could possibly get.

iPhone OS 4.0 Mail Trades Delete for Archive For GMail

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The latest iPhone OS 4.0 beta features a great new addition to iPhone Mail for GMail users: the ability to archive mail.

According to the good boys at 9to5Mac, it replaces the option to delete your GMail: just swipe on a message like usual and you now get the option to archive as opposed to delete.

I think replacing delete with archive on the iPhone makes a lot of sense. GMail, after all, has plenty of space, and the real reason to “delete” mail in Mail.app is to easily clear out the inbox. Sure, there’s going to be occasional moments when you’ll want to nuke an email from orbit in a fit of pique… but in those situations, you can still just log into GMail through Mobile Safari to carry out the vaporization. This change prevents people from accidentally deleting important mails. Well done, Apple!

Google Bringing Free Turn-By-Turn GPS Navigation to iPhone OS?

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One of the few real advantages Android has over iPhone OS is free turn-by-turn navigation: why spend $100 for the likes of TomTom when your smartphone already does the same thing for nothing? If you do a lot of driving, it’s pretty much Android’s killer app… except now it’s coming to the iPhone.

Or is it?According to a Google representative speaking at a London press conference, Google plans to bring free turn-by-turn satnav to the iPhone and other handsets soon, although they wouldn’t say when. But according to a spokesperson speaking to PC World, they have no definite plans.

I can understand Google’s confusion here. As a company, Google’s all about making information freely available, but free turn-by-turn navigation is a big reason why someone might choose an Android handset over the iPhone. They’re torn: on one hand, they want to get their services in as many hands as possible, but on the other hand, they don’t want to eliminate one of the advantages of the Android platform by offering it on a competitor’s device. It’s a pickle alright.

Apple Updates All MagSafes To MacBook Air Design

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Apple has finally seen fit to update the design of its 85-watt MagSafe Power Adapters to use an all aluminum tip instead of a plastic one, mimicking the design of the 45-watt MacBook Air’s adapter.

Not only will this minimize the 85-Watt MagSafe’s physical footprint, but ditching the plastic should prevent the occasional melting problems we sometimes hear about. It also happens to look a hell of a lot better.

The 60-Watt MagSafe Power Adapter hasn’t been updated yet, but all things in good time. Hey, look at that! As Charli points out in the comments below, they just were.

[via TUAW]

Desktop for iPad allows you to split screen multi-task

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When Jobs announced the iPad, declared the netbook to be dead and claimed that the iPad was a decent productivity machine, I was cynical. Lustful for an iPad I was, but as a blogger, the ability to type in one window while referencing a source in another is invaluable. Simply put, my netbook allowed me to do that, but the iPad didn’t… and until it did, there was little chance I’d ever do serious work on it.

I should have taken account the ingenuity of app developers though. Desktop for the iPad essentially allows you to split screen your iPad. You can specify what functionality you want each split screen panel to have, but for my purposes, I could browse a page in Safari on one side of the screen while using the “Email Composer” on the right side to type in text.

What a perfectly elegant little solution, especially for just $0.99.

The Mint is the WALL-E Jr. of Mopping

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This adorable little device looking something like the offspring of EVE and WALL-E is the Mint, a robot mop for your floors similar to the Roomba, but unlike the Roomba, the Mint complies with Jobs’ own requirements for absolute silence in his devices.

Since it lacks a vacuum or spinning brushes, the only noise you’ll hear as the Mint whisks across your floors is the a barely audible squeegeeing.

The tiny robot uses NorthStar Navigation to prevent it from mopping the same spot twice. It costs $250, which doesn’t necessarily beat the alternative — a Polish maid scrubbing your floors in a tank top — but is certainly cheaper in the grand scheme of things than the resulting temptation, and the lawsuits that might follow.

[via Gadget Lab]

Video: Steam for Mac Beta

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKPxl5qdYhU

Steam for Mac is finally available in private beta form, bringing the popular gaming delivery system to OS X for the first time.

It’s looking pretty good compared to the PC version, although that charcoal color scheme is as dreadful as ever, and like most of the initial forays into Mac software development made by PC guys, the UI’s not quite up to Snow Leopard snuff.

None the less, Steam for Mac looks good enough and seems to work pretty well. I’m really excited about this: I really think a good delivery platform is exactly what is needed to galvanize more serious OS X game development.

[via 9to5Mac]

Imaginary Email from the Engineer Who Lost The 4G iPhone

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No matter where you fall on the 4G iPhone story, I think we’re all united in feeling bad for poor old Gray Powell, otherwise known as the most unlucky S.O.B. in the universe. Heartless automaton that I am, even I tear up a little bit when I think of what he must be going through right now. I think all of us — Powell most of all — need a dose of levity right about now.

Courtesy of McSweeney’s, then, comes this wonderful imaginary email from Gray to his colleagues at 1 Infinity Loop on the morning after he lost the iPhone.

If I could give back those last five beers, I would do it in a heartbeat. I don’t know why I let that girl look at it. That was a total disregard of our phones before hos mantra. Worst mistake of my life. I should have never taken the prototype out of its case, or taken the case from the protective cover, or taken the protective cover out of the lockbox. I should have never taken the lockbox out of the safe and I definitely should never have signed the contract that requires your right testicle if you lose the phone. It was a pretty painful morning, and I’m not referring to a hangover, though that didn’t help.

It’s worth a few chuckles, especially for this line “Mr. Jobs screamed at me so much that his turtleneck was totally drenched with sweat.” Somehow I doubt that’s very far from the truth.

Jailbroken iPhone Hacked To Dual Boot Between iPhone OS and Android

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It’s way buggy still, but hats off to jailbreak hacker David Wong who not only figured out how to get the iPhone to dual boot, but to actually run Google’s Android operating system.

Of course, the entire exercise is one of utter futility — why would you run Google’s inferior Android operating system when you can tool around in iPhone OS (my only tentative answer: maybe tethering?) — but even so: this takes some brain meats. Well done, sir.

Early Review Says The HP Slate Is No iPad Killer

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Even HP’s aware that they’ve got a tough fight on their hands convincing consumers that they want to give them their $500 bucks for an HP Slate tablet as opposed to the iPad… but the PC manufacturer may still be be too optimistic.

If an early review of the device is anything to go by, it’s not going to be a fight… it’s going to be a slaughter.

HTC HD Mini 2 Would Be The Would-Be iPhone Nano If It Could

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With the fourth-generation iPhone making the display even bigger and more pixel dense, it looks increasingly unlikely that Apple has any plans for the much rumored iPhone Nano… but that’s not stopping just the scuttlebutt of a potential Apple product from inspiring competing phone manufacturers to release their own iPhone Nano clones.

The HTC HD Mini is just such a clone. It takes the 4.3 inch touchscreen on HTC’s HD 2 handset and squishes it down to a compact 3.2 inches, while also packing a 600MHz processor. It’s being touted as a budget version of the HD 2, and it could find its way to AT&T or even sold unlocked.

I definitely see the market for a tinier touchscreen phone, and the HD Mini is a cute little smartphone, but here’s where the bile rises: the Mini’s running the crapusculent Windows Mobile 6.5.1 operating system. Not even Android! I think I’d rather hold on to the fever dream of an iPhone Nano someday creeping out of Apple’s labs than ever sully my finger swiping it across a Windows Mobile homescreen again.

Apple.com Is No Longer Updating Its OS X Software Downloads Page

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Over at TUAW, TJ Luoma made note of something I wasn’t aware of: about a month ago, Apple quietly removed the “Downloads” tab from the Apple homepage. The page continued to exist, but it appears that Apple is no longer updating it.

On the one hand, Apple’s own Downloads page was always inferior to the likes of VersionTracker, I Use This or MacUpdate. The editorial resources they were employing to keep it up to date probably didn’t make sense when there were better repositories.

On the other hand, though, Apple’s Download page served an important role: it was an software repository that Apple neo-nates could easily find the first time they booted up Safari, offering a quick library of all the cool software they could use on their new Macs. The other, third-party Mac software repositories don’t have that sort of visibility to new Mac owners.

My guess is that Apple eventually intends to employ their App Store strategy with Mac software, but I wouldn’t expect anything like that to happen until either the next major version of OS X or iTunes. In the meantime, I think a lot of new Mac owners will acutely miss the presence of an updated Downloads section on the Apple homepage.

Another New iPhone Ad: Dog Lover

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Apple’s most recent iPhone ad, “Dog Lover,” is pretty clearly some Cupetino employee’s excuse to get their cute new dog some face time while simultaneously appealing to squealing canine lovers country-wide. That’s okay though. That pooch is pretty cute.

Adobe Abandoning iPhone Support in Flash CS5

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And that’s the bloody towel flying into the middle of the ring.

Software makers Adobe, mercilessly pummeled on the release of their Adobe CS5 suite by a new provision in Apple’s iPhone Developer Program License Agreement that prohibits apps made with translation tools, have just announced that they officially intend to abandon their iPhone app building technology included in the upcoming Flash CS5 software.

Starcraft II Beta Coming To Macs Next Week

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If you’re itching to Zerg Rush with the Windows world, great news coming from Blizzard: the beta to their sequel to the award-winning and still wildly popular space RTS, Starcraft II, will be coming to Macs next week.

It’s a bit belated, since Blizzard released the Starcraft II beta for PC users over two months ago, but welcome all the same. Blizzard is one of the few game developers who take releasing native OS X ports of their games seriously… a strategy which is looking increasingly prescient as Mac marketshare soars.

Apple’s Latest iPhone Ad: Backpacker

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Apple has just unveiled a new iPhone app that, as usual, focuses on taking existing iPhone apps and functionality and applying them to a relatable real-world experience, as conveyed by a pleasant and unassuming narrator.

The “Backpacker” ad follows a young traveler in Barcelona as he uses his iPhone 3GS to find hostels with the free Hostelworld.com application, email pictures to his mom and use the $24.99 Jibbigo app to translate for him on the fly.

Not covered in the commercial? The kidney the narrator had to sell to afford the AT&T 3G international roaming charges he incurred when he returned from his trip. You should have switched to WiFi only, my son.

Californian Woman Sues Apple Over Faulty iPhone Moisture Sensors

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Inside every iPhone is a moisture sensor: a small dot of liquid-sensitive material that turns bright pink if the iPhone’s insides have been exposed to being submerged. It’s the method Apple uses to protect itself from having to replace iPhones that clumsy customers have dropped in a puddle, their beer or a toilet.

Now a California woman is suing Apple over these moisture sensors, claiming that two separate iPhones died and were then denied replacement by Apple because the moisture sensors had been triggered. The woman, Charlene Gallon of San Francisco, claims otherwise.

Gorgeous Docking Stations Allow You To Easily Use Your MacBook As Your Main Work Machine

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I use my MacBook Pro as my main work computer thanks to a Logitech notebook keyboard stand and an external monitor, but I’ve often wanted something cleaner: a simple and elegant docking solution without any need to manually connect DVI cables and USB umbilicals.

Henge Docks’ line of MacBook docking stations seems to be just solution. All you do is slap your MacBook into the docking station and it’ll drive an eternal keyboard, mouse, printer, hard drive, stereo and any FireWire or USB hard drives you care to connect to it… all in a clean, compact and efficient design. It even uses your existing MagSafe charger.

Very nice indeed, and with prices starting at $59.95, this looks like an easy product to recommend to any Apple fan who uses their MacBook as their main work machine.

Facebook Address Book Integration Coming in iPhone OS 4.0?

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When it was first unveiled at CES 2009, one of the things I really liked about the Palm Pre was its integrated Facebook functionality. Instead of merely adding contacts to your phone manually, you had the option of subscribing to their Facebook contact details, which would automatically merge their phone numbers, email addresses and profile pictures into your local address book.

To me, it represented a much welcome paradigm shift in the way contacts are handled: instead of entering contact details manually, you subscribe to them and have them automatically updated on your handset.

So I’m delighted to see that the Pre’s approach to Facebook / Address Book integration looks like it will be heading to iPhone OS 4.0 too, at least if this rogue PLIST file in the SDK is anything to go by.

Apple Will Replace Faulty Earbuds for Third Generation Shuffle Owners

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Apple’s perverse obsession with miniaturizing the iPod Shuffle doesn’t seem likely to stop until they bring it down to the size of a nanoangstrom, but one of the biggest drawbacks of making a music player smaller than the controls needed to use it is that the user interface needs to be offloaded to a peripheral: in the third generation iPod Shuffle’s case, the stock ear buds.

It’s a bad approach. The Shuffle was already small enough, and since ear buds tend to be easily damaged, it meant that anyone who owned a Shuffle who lost or damaged their stock ear buds would have to lay out for a replacement pair instead of just plugging in another set of cochleal cans.

From Apple, though, comes slightly encouraging news for third-gen Shuffle owners: they will replace your ear buds free of charge for up to two years if they stop working. Just call up Apple or drop by an Apple Store and they’ll send you off with a new pair of ear buds.

Personally, though, I’ll stick to my second gen Shuffle: an MP3 player the size of a box of matches (as opposed to the matches themselves) is plenty small enough for me already, thank you.