software - page 4

About a month ago, right after the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, Disney held a small, invitation-only press conference in Los Angeles where they revealed their ambitious, stunning new cross-platform Infinity game universe. They invited us, of course. Only problem was, Infinity had practically nothing to do with anything Apple.

After all the fanfare, when the event was almost over, I pulled aside one of the Disney folks and asked why the heck they’d invited me; turns out iOS is why I was there, and that they had a big mobile-related announcement coming — and this picture just might be its enigmatic messenger.

Everything has a downside. As Macs grab more market share, we’re beginning to see developers take the Mac more seriously (witness AutoCAD returning to the Mac after an 18-year absence, and the resurgence of Mac gaming). Unfortunately, Macs are also beginning to find themselves more often in the crosshairs of hackers and virus developers.

So it’s no surprise that there’s a flurry of activity on the antivirus front. In fact, one of the clearest signs that viruses have become a real danger for Macs is that Intego says they’ve revamped their line in order to make it less expensive and less technical, and more user-friendly for everyday Mac users.

MacPhun makes a boatload of photo editing apps for iOS and the Mac; for the next two days, their meat & potatoes Mac app, FX Photo Studio, is half off at $10.

We’ve got lots of love for the LEGO series games. They often have an uncanny ability to capture the feel of their parent titles — in a way that’s cuter than a basketful of kittens, but much more fun. The Lord of the Rings is the latest title to join the collection, and it’s coming to OS X next week.

If you’ve been waiting for Apogee’s pro, multichannel Quartet to finally become iPad-compatible since we mentioned%20it%20last%20month,%20time’s%20up%20—%20it’s%20ready.

McAfee has told customers of its antivirus applications for Mac to “just allow untrusted certificates” after a company administrator accidentally revoked the digital key used to certify its software. For more than a week, users have been unable to install McAfee products on a Mac, and the company’s only workaround so far is to allow untrusted certificates, which could pose risks to its customers’ machines.

That’s right — along with the news today of the Hammerlock DLC release, Aspyr announced that Borderlands 2 has gone cross-platform, meaning you can now play the game online with those who own the PC version of the game.

This is a pretty big deal, since there simply aren’t nearly as many Mac players as there are on Windows machines, and forming parties with other players adds a huge chunk of fun to the hybrid RPG/first-person shooter.

Borderlands 2 is unequivocally the best first-person shooter available for the Mac. Right now it’s half off at the Steam store, making it $30, meaning you can snag a deal better even than the Mac App Store price of $45.

like its predecessor, Borderlands 2 combines fast-paced combat with role playing concepts like a skill tree, a witty, well-written storyline and a staggering degree of weapon selection. The Steam version also includes multiplayer, something the Mac App Store version doesn’t currently support. Better hurry if you want to catch the deal, though — Borderlands 2 is back at full price tomorrow morning.

I grew up on a farm, and it wasn’t exactly a riot — so I’m surprised anyone would want to simulate farm-life for fun. Then again, we never had a 10-ton Lamborghini tractor. And if we did, I probably wouldn’t have been allowed near it.

Anyway, that’s exactly the sort of thing you can tool around in with Farming Simulator 2013, the latest in a long line of Farming Simulator titles, which just hit the Mac App Store today.

We say this often here at Cult of Mac: “This new whatsagizbob will change your life!” Perhaps we say it too often. But I can think of very, very few things I’ve seen where the phrase would ring as true as it does with Rabbit.

Rabbit is a videochat app and platform for Mac unlike anything you’ve seen, designed for immersive video socializing in groups, created by four ex-videogame developers, with mind-boggling attention to detail. You can even screencast movies, and share images and webpages over Rabbit.

And today, it’s been released as a closed beta (but read on to find out how to get your hands on a copy).

Some have the mad iPhone movie-making skillz of an Anderson or a Scorsese. Others, not so much. If you fall in the latter category, don’t worry — just jam some fancy graphics in there with the free Jollyfy app and you’re good to go.

It’s a pretty simple process. Fire up the app, pick a theme (the app’s App Store page says there are hundreds to choose from) and start shooting.

Apple has been improving Siri since the intelligent assistant first made its debut on the iPhone 4S back in October 2011, and has also been working to expand its availability; it’s now available on all the latest iOS devices, and some older ones, too. It seems inevitable that Siri will one day be introduced to the Mac as well, and that day could be getting closer as Apple searches for new engineers who will be tasked with bringing it to the desktop.

This may be a first: The iOS game Can Knockdown 2 is coming to arcades as a fully-sized, coin-operated console — complete with a massive, 42-inch touchscreen.

The game — developed by masters-of-3D Infinite Dreams — is a hot item at the App Store, racking up over 11 million downloads, according to its developer.

If you don’t want to wait for the game to hit the arcades, it’s a buck at the App Store. Or try its predecessor, Can Knockdown, for free.

Apple is on the hunt for two senior software engineers that will join its iLife development team to “re-imagine how user interfaces should be built and work.” Both positions, which were posted to the vacancies page of Apple’s website, are based at the company’s Cupertino headquarters, and indicate Apple is working to overhaul the iLife software suite, which consists of GarageBand, iMovie, and iPhoto.

When Minecraft Pocket Edition first launched, it wasn’t anything like the desktop (and now Xbox 360) versions; it was a neutered stub of a game. But with each update, the PE version gets more and more awesome as it adds the cool features of its big brothers. This update brings wearable armor, craftable signs, new renewable resources in the form of baby livestock and makes gravel and sand follow the rules of gravity.

Unfortunately, there might also be a bug that destroys your entire world.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VSuJ5HOE42M&list=PLgqaIbvtBHtSwsxcRw4941vIoxMhY0DpN&index=1

A year ago I was working on a pretty large project with a buddy. We were hundreds of miles apart, but since we both had iPads, we figured, hey, no problem — collaboration will be easy.

But it wasn’t. Despite the wealth of iPad apps, none of them were quite the collaboration tool we wanted; too expensive, or lacking a particular feature, or not easy enough to use. I wish Moxtra had been around a year ago.

For all those unilingual schmos who’ve thought they were telling some lucky foreigner “hey, I like the cut of your jib” in another tongue, but instead said something like “you chicken dance the burning planets,” I sympathize. And also laugh. To make up for the laughing, here’s a tip — a trick app to pull out next time: Sendboo. It’s a free app that automatically translates your “hey, baby” to “olá, bebê” — or into 29 other languages besides Portuguese. Fantástico.

Want to build an amazing website but don’t want to spend any time learning to code? Or are you a coding veteran who wants something simple and effective in your toolbox for those times where you just want to create something stellar and tweak with lines of code where you see fit? Then this Cult of Mac Deals offering is for you. That’s because we’re offering MacFlux 4 for 73% off the regular price – that means it is only $35 – so you won’t have to spend a ton of money to create a ton of terrifically designed websites.

MacFlux has an amazing WYSIWYG rendering engine, which means you can drag, stretch, and move objects like you can in a desktop publishing application, and your webpages will look exactly how you intended. It will generate all the code for you, with no unnecessary tags.

Following a last minute Friday release of developer beta 5, Apple has officially released the final iOS 6.1 for all compatible devices… which, of course, opens the door to the imminent iOS 6.1 Jailbreak.

The headlining new feature of iOS 6.1 is that it adds LTE support to 36 iPhone carriers and 23 iPad carriers around the world. You can also purchase movie tickets through Siri now, and the Apple TV gets new Bluetooth functionality, iTunes 11’s Up Next functionality, and iTunes in the Cloud support. There’s also a host of new bug fixes.

Most excitingly? The official release of iOS 6.1 heralds the long delayed availability of an untethered iOS 6 jailbreak for all devices short of the Apple TV 3.

iOS 6.1 final is the same as iOS 6.1 Beta 5, so if you downloaded that over the weekend, you won’t have to install anything more. Press release and direct download links are after the jump.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy was created. (OK, so it wasn’t that far away, but Wisconsin, apparently home at the time of developer Raven Software, is an alien world.) But now this classic first-person shooter is available at the Mac App Store — so you can experience how much fun your PC friends were having a decade ago.

Although Mozilla has stated that it won’t produce hardware for its upcoming Firefox OS, the company has teamed up with Spanish startup Geeksphone to offer a pair of developer devices. Called Keon and Peak, the devices are designed to provide developers with the opportunity to “tap the future of mobile” and get to grips with the platform that will soon be trying to steal marketshare from Android and iOS.

LOS ANGELES — It felt like a wrap party for a big-budget Hollywood flick at Disney’s El Capitan Theatre, complete with fancy food and big names like Pixar chief John Lasseter in attendance. But Disney’s Infinity announcement on Tuesday was a massive project in which Pixar, the Disney-owned digital animation studio that once belonged to Steve Jobs, played only one of the major roles.

As it was revealed, Infinity is an amazing, massive, cross-platform, multiplayer game system based on figurines from the Disney catalog of movies — right now most of them specifically from Pixar titles.

“It will be global, and it will live across all platforms: console, mobile and online,” Lasseter said on Tuesday.

All platforms? Unfortunately not. Perhaps Disney has forgotten that Steve helped build Pixar into the powerhouse it is today; because while a Windows version will be present along with versions for all the major console systems at Ininity’s June launch, there won’t be a Mac version — at least, not at first.

Borderlands 2 from Aspyr is now available to download at the Mac App Store, almost exactly a month after it debuted on Steam — and there’s good news and bad news.

Microsoft is looking for a handout.

Microsoft told AllThingsD this week that the company has insisted that Apple lower its 30 percent cut for Office 365 subscriptions sold through Microsoft Office for iOS.

Microsoft probably assumes that since they have such an iron grip on the office suite market — in most industries, you’re essentially required to use office, or at least share Office-compatible files — that they’re “special,” and deserve a better deal than tiny software and app companies that aren’t massively profitable corporations.

I think that not only should Apple stick to its current position of saying no to this request, they should go further. Much further. They should try to replace Microsoft Office as the de facto standard for Office software with iWork — to kill Office as the global standard.

The late Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs used to talk a lot about “changing the world.” And he did. But what has Apple done for the world lately?

I’ve got a great new way for Apple to truly make the world a truly better place: Kill Microsoft Office.

First I’m going to tell you why Microsoft Office deserves to die. Then I’m going to tell you how Apple could do it.

Ever since 2008, when its first smash-hit, Ocarina — an app that turns your iPhone into a playable flute — debuted, Smule has proved itself over and over again as a magical outfit guaranteed to drop jaws with every release. Their newest app, Strum, is out today, and it’s no less wondrous an app than any of their previous efforts. But there is one very big difference: Instead of sticking to their musical background (one of Smule’s founder is, after all, an assistant professor of computer music at Stanford), they’ve taken their music fairy dust and sprinkled it on the world of video.