News Archive for 01/01/15

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USA Today: Best Super Bowl commercial

01/15, 11:15pm

USA Today: Best Super Bowl commercial

Several readers note that USA Today is running a poll that asks users which of ten chosen commercials is the best Super Bowl advertisement ever. Among the choices is Apple's "1984." The winner will be announced when the television show "Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials" airs on January 27.

Apple.com inches up a spot

01/15, 11:14pm

Apple.com inches up a spot

For the week ending January 13, apple.com was the third most visited computer hardware site, according to PC Data, up from fourth the week before. Readers should note, however, that PC Data does not include Mac users in its polling.

Appleholics-Anonymous memorial contest

01/15, 11:13pm

Appleholics-Anonymous memorial contest

Appleholics-Anonymous has kicked off the Scott J Gray Memorial Desktop Contest, which commemorates Gray, who re-launched the site last May and passed away unexpectedly this past December. "The Scott J Gray Memorial Desktop Contest is a chance to restart the Appleholics-Anonymous site, to send it once again forward in the direction that Scott was taking it." Three prizes are available, including a Wacom Graphire tablet. The contest runs until February 16.

eGroups Extractor 1.0 released

01/15, 11:12pm

eGroups Extractor 1.0 released

MacTechnologies Consulting has posted eGroups Extractor 1.0, a $20 shareware application that automates downloading of binaries (pictures and other attachments) from the free eGroups mailing list service. Both Mac OS Classic and Mac OS X versions are available.

REALbasic applications top 900

01/15, 11:11pm

REALbasic applications top 900

REAL Software has updated its list of applications made using REALbasic, which has now topped 900 entries. REAL Software asks that creators of software that does not appear in the listing contact the company to get listed.

Audiocorder 2.0.2 improves support

01/15, 11:10pm

Audiocorder 2.0.2 improves support

Audiocorder 2.0.2 adds improved support for older versions of the Mac OS to the audio recording application.

GameSpy: Master of Orion III Dev. Diary

01/15, 7:26pm

GameSpy: Master of Orion III Dev. Diary

GameSpy.com recently published the fourth developer diary for Master of Orion III, which was announced for the Mac by MacSoft at last week's Macworld Expo San Francisco 2001. This diary entry, written by developer Quicksilver Software's David Craft, covers the importance of diplomancy in the game.

The real key to improving diplomacy lies in the fact that the player has considerable flexibility in the types of options available. All of these "goodies" can be traded in combinations of up to five items per side. This makes for a lot more interesting detail, and some tough decisions: is it really worth going to war with the Sakkra in exchange for the Vox system and a couple of dozen third-line Trilarian ships? Should I settle for a couple of thousand AU in order to accede to Evon demands that I stop supporting the pirates that are affecting their trade, or should I try to squeeze some mineral concessions out of them as well, or perhaps instead their vote on my upcoming Orion Senate bill to expel the Klackons from the Senate?

Heroes III Complete Help Guide

01/15, 7:06pm

Heroes III Complete Help Guide

Fan site Mac Heroes has posted a Complete Help Guide for those who are frustrated at the lack of a tutorial or any assistance when attempting to play the recently released Heroes III Complete Demo for the Mac. The guide covers the adventure map, heroes and the heroes screen, skills, combat, the magic system and more.

Bare Feats: Mac Quake III Breaks 100 FPS

01/15, 6:56pm

Bare Feats: Mac Quake III Breaks 100 FPS

A Bare Feats report compares the new Power Mac G4s with Nvidia's GeForce2 MX with machines using the ATI Radeon Mac Edition using Quake III: Arena as a benchmarking tool. The conclusion shows a dual 500 MHz G4 with ATI Radeon running on Mac OS X running at 133.3 frames per second.

More RPGs from MacPlay?

01/15, 6:50pm

More RPGs from MacPlay?

A Macworld Expo San Francisco 2001 report at Mac Baldur includes a paraphrased quote from an unnamed MacPlay representative hinting that the company planned to bringing more role-playing games to the Mac beyond Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn. "...Macplay would be more inclined to try to bring new RPGs to the Mac on a similar schedule as their PC counterpart than to work on older games/expansion packs that have already been released for the PC."

Update on Altivec Q3:A

01/15, 6:32pm

Update on Altivec Q3:A

Graeme Devine of id Software has posted an update to the Quake3World forums concerning his progress on the Altivec enhanced version of Quake III: Arena. Devine notes that a bug with the Metrowerks compiler and certain Altivec code means that the Altivec enhancements will likely only be available in the Mac OS X version until the compiler bug is fixed by Metrowerks. "Considering Apple's pride in the Altivec," notes Devine, "it's somewhat frustrating to not be able to show it off!"

Cro-Mag Rally 1.0.7 Released

01/15, 6:21pm

Cro-Mag Rally 1.0.7 Released

Pangea Software has released version 1.0.7 of Cro-Mag Rally, the company's 3D prehistoric kart racing game for the Mac. The new version, available for both the demo and retail versions of the game, adds a tweak for ATI Radeon card and some 3Dfx cards to prevent graphic anomolies with hardware pageflipping, supports analog input devices such as joysticks and steering wheels and changes tournament games so they are now saved incrementally rather than upon completion of the tournament.

Mac Mafia petition opens

01/15, 6:15pm

Mac Mafia petition opens

DemandMac.com has opened a petition to bring Mafia to the Mac. The third-person 3D action game includes 20 action-packed missions with subquests, over 12 square miles of a fully interactive city to explore, weapons such as the Tommy Gun, Colt 1911 and pump action shotgun as well as advanced graphic effects such as motion captured animations, lip syncing, facial animations, environmental mapping and bump mapping.

Myth Village unveiled

01/15, 6:08pm

Myth Village unveiled

Michael Sheets has unveiled Myth Village, a site dedicated to the newly announced real-time strategy game from Mumbo Jumbo Studios and Gathering of Developers, Myth III: The Wolf Age. The site contains the logo for the game as well as some of the first images of the game's characters.

Hang3000 1.0 Released

01/15, 6:03pm

Hang3000 1.0 Released

Ken Winograd and Space-Time Associates have released Hang3000 1.0, a $25 shareware word guessing game for the Mac. Hang3000 includes a "knowledge area", which offers information associated with the guessed word or phrase, and multi-level winning streak score boards. The game also offers full support for what's often known as "accented characters". Hang3000 supports the entry and display of words in many languages, including Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, Flemish, French, German, Italian Norwegian, Spanish and Swedish.

Macworld Expo coverage continued

01/15, 6:00pm

Macworld Expo coverage continued

Continuing our Macworld Expo San Francisco coverage from last week, we have posted two additional photo essays: Photo Essay II (Aspyr Media, Bunch Media, Game Studios, GraphSim, MacPlay, MacSoft) and Photo Essay III (Canon, Radialogic, Casady & Greene, Epson, Keyspan, Virtual Ink, SMART, Sonnet).

MWSF Photo Essay II

01/15, 6:00pm

MWSF Photo Essay II

We have published the second of our Macworld Expo San Francisco Photo Essays which covers the gaming companies present at the show: Aspyr Media, Bunch Media, Game Studios, Graphic Simulations Corporation, MacPlay and MacSoft.

Game Center: Monopoly and Shadowbane

01/15, 5:55pm

Game Center: Monopoly and Shadowbane

We have added Monopoly, the classic board game from Parker Brothers recently released for the Mac, and Shadowbane, the upcoming persistent online role-playing game for the Mac and PC, to our continually growing Game Center.

Hot Forum Topics: Driver tricks and more

01/15, 5:54pm

Hot Forum Topics: Driver tricks and more

Popular topics in our Mac Games forum area include hacks and tricks for the Driver Demo, Graeme Devine's work on an AltiVec-enhanced version of Quake III: Arena and continued discussion on Oni and whether it's a game worth buying.

Roundup: Heroes III Complete Demo and more

01/15, 5:54pm

Roundup: Heroes III Complete Demo and more

Last Friday, id Software's Graeme Devine announced his intent to do a more comprehensive overhaul of the Quake III: Arena code with AltiVec enhancements, Spiderweb Software release version 1.0.1 of Avernum 2 for the Mac and The 3DO Company released the Heroes III Complete Demo for the Mac. We updated Custer's Corner with the final entry in the Macworld Expo San Francisco 2001 Journal and released a new desktop picture, Lawful Good, featuring the Paladin from Diablo II.

Apple's FY O1 1st-quarter results

01/15, 4:55pm

Apple's FY O1 1st-quarter results

Apple will announce its fiscal 2001, first-quarter results during a conference call with media and analysts at 2 p.m. PST (5 p.m. EST) Wednesday, Jan. 17. Apple will also provide live audio streaming of the conference call.

PDF Handshake 2.0 now shipping

01/15, 4:53pm

PDF Handshake 2.0 now shipping

HELIOS Software is now shipping its PDF Handshake 2.0, a prepress workflow solution for Adobe PDF files. It supports Adobe's PDF specification v1.3/Acrobat 4, color separation to create CMYK and spot-color plates and ColorSync/ICC color management where RGB/Lab colors are converted to CMYK.

Free Photoshop seminar in Atlanta

01/15, 4:52pm

Free Photoshop seminar in Atlanta

Sterling Ledet & Associates is offering a free Photoshop seminar in Atlanta's Apple Market Center Feb. 9 from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Public beta of The Free Memory Show 2 posted

01/15, 4:51pm

Public beta of The Free Memory Show 2 posted

A public beta of The Free Memory Show 2, a shareware tool for displaying free memory and to quit applications, has been posted. This version uses a free-floating window to display he free memory, adds a preferences window and can quit all applications to defragment memory.

PhotoCat 3.4, PhotoCat Player 2.4 posted

01/15, 4:50pm

PhotoCat 3.4, PhotoCat Player 2.4 posted

PhotoCat 3.4, a tool for building catalogs of pictures, and PhotoCat Player 2.4, the companion application, have been released. This version fixes some bugs and offers new update functionalities. PhotoCat is $25. The suite is fully OS 8 and 9 compatible.

Afternoon tech news

01/15, 4:45pm

Afternoon tech news

Afternoon tech news: 3Com plans to lay off workers as part of a plan to save at least $200 million a year; Sony will double its PlayStation 2 production in the next trhee months; and RealNetworks will buy Aegisoft Corp., a digital rights-management firm, for approximately $12.2 million in stock.

Follow-up info on Mac OS X Server 2.0

01/15, 1:49pm

Follow-up info on Mac OS X Server 2.0

Scott Stevenson has updated his original Mac OS X Server v2.0 report from Macworld (originally posted to the Omnigroup mailing list): "I've incorporated all the information from my original post about OSX Server 2.0, added in answers to the questions that people sent me to ask the Apple reps, and tossed in some other stuff." [We first noted OS X Server 2.0 late last year and then noted its quiet update last week.]

Shareware periodic table updated

01/15, 1:42pm

Shareware periodic table updated

The Atomic Mac 4.6 from Black Cat Systems is an update to its $25 shareware periodic table of the elements and nuclear database. It adds additional nuclear information, such as atomic masses, and alpha and beta particle energy.

TCP port utility updated with proxy support

01/15, 1:27pm

TCP port utility updated with proxy support

Ekim Software has released Socket Sifter 1.8, an aupdate to its $10 utility that can communicate, listen or connect, through TCP on any port. Version 1.8 adds native support for SOCKS5 proxies and the ability to display invisible characters.

Mac Crypto Conference takes place Jan 29-30

01/15, 1:06pm

Mac Crypto Conference takes place Jan 29-30

The Second Millennium Mac-Crypto Conference on Macintosh Cryptography and Internet Commerce takes place at DeAnza3 auditorium at the Apple R&D campus from January 29-30th. The conference is free and does not require any formal registration.

Mac OS 9.1 compatibility notes

01/15, 1:03pm

Mac OS 9.1 compatibility notes

Michelle Steiner forwarded a note from Power On Software's tech support noting a compatibility issue between Rewind and Mac OS 9.1 that causes a system freeze when trying to mount a remote, networked volume:

You've run across the only known issue with Rewind and Mac OS 9.1. We are working on a solution to this problem, which will be released shortly. As it stands, Rewind will not allow a Mac OS 9.1 Mac to mount anything on a network, AppleTalk or TCP/IP. Thank you for your patience. [there are dozens of other Mac OS 9.1 issues noted in our forums area]

USPS helper application for Mac OS X

01/15, 12:48pm

USPS helper application for Mac OS X

P.O. Toolbox, due in February for Mac OS X, is an "advanced package management utility suite for shipping with the U.S. Postal Service [that] calculates domestic and international rates, generates Delivery Confirmation barcodes and preprinted addresses, determines transit times, and provides detailed tracking information for your packages."

MacNN Review: FireWire Webcams

01/15, 11:45am

MacNN Review: FireWire Webcams

We have posted a comparative review between Orange Micro's iBot and ADS Technologies' Pyro1394, two FireWire Webcams.

LinuxPPC compatible with PBG4

01/15, 9:30am

LinuxPPC compatible with PBG4

LinuxPPC Q 4 is compatible with Apple's new PowerBook G4 Titanium. "The Linux kernel, X Windows and the LinuxPPC Installer all successfully boot from the LinuxPPC 2000 Q4 CD-ROM on the PowerBook G4. It is not known at this time if the internal modem or Ethernet work, but it is unlikely that they will not work."

Lazy Mountain introduces Hostal 1.0

01/15, 9:25am

Lazy Mountain introduces Hostal 1.0

Lazy Mountain Software has released Hostal 1.0, a shareware hosts file database and editor. Features include an easy-to-use interface, the ability to map or block any host instantly and the ability to resolve URLs to hosts.

Yves Pelletier introduces 2 physics simulatio

01/15, 9:25am

Yves Pelletier introduces 2 physics simulatio

Yves Pelletier has introduced YP ATWOOD and YP Geneva Mechanism, two physics simulations for the Macintosh. YP ATWOOD simulates a pulley driven by two suspended masses for studying the kinematics and the dynamics of rotational motion with constant angular acceleration and linear motion with constant acceleration. YP Geneva Mechanism is used to provide an intermittent rotational motion of the driven part while the driver wheel rotates continuously. Demos of both are available.

FETC 2001: Apple refocuses

01/15, 8:45am

FETC 2001: Apple refocuses

At last week's Florida Education Technology Conference, Apple reassured educators of its plans and offered some insight on the future. We have a complete report from the show.

Apple posts letter to educators

01/15, 8:05am

Apple posts letter to educators

Apple has posted a letter from Cheryl Vedoe, the newly appointed vice president of education marketing solutions. Vedeo has worked in Apple's education area before and "will lead the company's efforts to deliver technologies and solutions that meet the unique requirements of both K-12 and Higher Education."

Verbatim offers CompactFlash, SmartMedia card

01/15, 8:00am

Verbatim offers CompactFlash, SmartMedia card

Verbatim has unveiled two new product lines: CompactFlash cards with capacities ranging from 16 MB to 128 MB and SmartMedia cards with capacities of 16 MB to 64 MB. Adabpter and reader products lines are expected later in the first quarter.

Steve Jobs: purveyor of profanity

01/15, 7:45am

Steve Jobs: purveyor of profanity

According to a Wired article, Apple CEO Steve Jobs shocked attendees at Apple's resellers meeting last week with his foul mouth. "Every sentence [Jobs] uttered -- every single one -- contained an expletive."

MacBibble 1.3 released

01/15, 7:40am

MacBibble 1.3 released

MacBibble 1.3 is a shareware browser and file reader for .nef, .jpg, and .tiff files. This version adds FireWire support for direct tethered shooting, new file-management functions, fixes bugs, and more.

Summer 2000 iMacs reach end of life

01/15, 7:30am

Summer 2000 iMacs reach end of life

Sears, Circuit City, and other resellers recently designated current, Summer 2000 iMacs as "EOL," or end of life. With iMacs already in relatively short supply and Apple having launched an instant rebate program just this past weekend, new iMacs are expected to be released in the near future; most likely at Macworld Tokyo in late February.

Early morning tech news

01/15, 7:00am

Early morning tech news

Early morning tech news: William R. Hewlett, co-founder and former president of Hewlett-Packard Co., died at home in his sleep Friday of natural causes; a federal judge dismissed damage claims in 38 class-action antitrust suits against Microsoft, and a key group opposing the company hired Kenneth Starr; and the latest rumor about the mysterious "world-changing Ginger" device is that it may be a scooter.