News Archive for 05/02/18

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"Office 2004 for Macintosh: The Missing Manual"

02/18, 5:35pm

Office 04 \"Missing Manual\"

"Office 2004 for Mac: The Missing Manual" provides a detailed guide to Microsoft's Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage applications. The $30 book is published by O'Reilly, and written by authors Mark H. Walker and Franklin Tessler. "Office 2004 doesn't come with a single page of printed instructions," but this new book promises to "help readers use all four programs in Office 2004 to do their work and organize their lives more quickly and easily than ever before." Walker and Tessler deliver on their promise to use "very little jargon or nerd terminology" in this "funny and friendly" reference.

PowerBook 100, iPod, Newton among "Top Gadgets"

02/18, 5:05pm

Top Gadgets of All Time

Apple's PowerBook 100 is ranked first in Mobile PC's list of the "Top 100 Gadgets of All Time." The article says, "until Apple unveiled this 5.1-pound machine, most 'portable' computers were curiosities for technophiles with superior upper-body strength ... the first PowerBooks captured an astounding 40 percent of the market, but more important, they turned notebook computers into mainstream products and ushered in the era of mobile computing that we're still living in today." Additionally, The PowerBook 500 ranked 22nd, the Newton MessagePad 120 ranked 39th, and the iPod ranked 12th: "the original iPod cracked the portable audio market wide open with its ease of use and to-die-for aesthetics. Some estimates peg Apple as now claiming an astounding 92 percent of the mobile audio market." Other popular products among the list include the original Pilot 1000 from U.S. Robotics, and the Rio 300 from Diamond.

Apple to rename Rendezvous as part of copyright deal

02/18, 3:30pm

Apple to rename Rendezvous

In the coming months, Apple will change the name of its Rendezvous networking technology to "Bonjour," according to documents shown to AppleInsider. Last year, Tibco Software entered into a trademark dispute with Apple over its use of the Rendezvous name, alleging that the Apple technology, used in products such as Mac OS X and the iTunes Music Store, infringed on its exclusive rights to the Rendezvous name. In July 2004, the two companies agreed to end the dispute through a mutual out of court settlement. Sources close to the negotiations said that, as part of the deal, Apple agreed to phase out its use of the "Rendezvous" name in time.

Document Palette allows easy document creation

02/18, 2:10pm

Document Palette

Document Palette allows users to create new documents directly in open folders, using a keyboard shortcut. It holds document types that frequently created and allows users to create documents without launching an editor and without "fumbling around in awkward save panels." Users can add any type of document to the palette. Simply create a blank document using an editor, then use the add button in Document Palette's Preferences window. The trial is fully functional, but can only create 15 documents. The full version costs $15 to register. The current version is a beta release. It requires Mac OS X 10.3 or later.

Apple offers more refurb iBooks, PowerBooks, eMacs

02/18, 11:55am

Refurb iBooks, PowerBooks

Apple has added more refurbished 12-inch iBook G4s ($800), previous-generation 12-inch PowerBook G4s ($1,100), and 1.2GHz 14-inch iBook G4s ($900) to the special deals section on its online Apple store, but no longer offers refurbished iMac G5 models. The 12-inch PowerBook is also available with a SuperDrive for $1,300, while Combo ($1,500) and SuperDrive ($1,800) versions of the 15-inch PowerBook are also available and faster 1.33GHz versions of the 14-inch iBook G4 are available in Combo ($1,100) and SuperDrive ($1,300) models. Apple has also added dual-processor versions of both its 2GHz ($2,100) and 1.8GHz ($1,700) Power Mac G5s. The configurations of the eMac are also available: CD-ROM ($550), Combo drive/modem ($650), and SuperDrive ($800).

Briefly: iPod mini, iMac, shuffle availability

02/18, 9:25am

Apple Store updates

In Brief: The online Apple Stores in the US, France and Germany have abruptly extended their estimated ship times for all iPod mini models--up to 8 days, suggesting that a refresh may be imminent; in addition, iMac availability suddenly has been extended to 3-5 days, after recent reports of 'same business day' delivery. The Chicago Sun-Time says that Apple's compact Mac Mini is sure to lure Mac-phobic buyers.... IconBase's iToolBar Stock Icons ($360) is a new Aqua-styled icon collection with over 153 icons available in all native Mac OS X, Windows and Linux formats an in all normal sizes up to 128x128.... iPod shuffles will be soon available Target retail stores and are now available in both 512MB shuffle and 1GB shuffle versions at Circuit City's online store.

Apps: Conference Recorder, Xj3D, ID Font Catalog...

02/18, 9:15am

Conference Recorder, Xj3D

Conference Recorder 1.0 ($15) allows users to easily record and save your iChat AV video and audio chats. Conference Recorder saves chats as QuickTime movies for future viewing. [Download - 616KB]
Xj3D M10 (free) is an open source toolkit for X3D (the XML and network-savvy successor to VRML). The M10 release is the first version for Mac OS X, completely written in Java and using OpenGL for hardware acceleration. [Download - 10.1MB]
InDesign Font Catalog 1.0 ($10) is an application for makimg compact grouped font samples using Adobe InDesign CS. Font Catalog is different from other font sample generators because it displays the "regular" version of the font family as the large primary sample in one line/sentence, and groups the remaining styles in a short, name-only listing (in the style's style) below the main sample of characters. [Download - buy]
Sound Byte 2.4.0 ($24-$100) turns a Mac into a" cart machine" for playing sound recordings, aimed at DJs, radio stations and audio productions. The latest version of Sound Byte adds the ability to display fewer but larger carts, offers fade times for individual carts, and allows carts to be set to be disabled after being played. [Download - 529KB]
FmPro Migrator Enterprise Edition 3.02 ($100) has been updated to add a new Microsoft Access 2003 to FileMaker 7 conversion feature, and offers a new drag and drop interface for Access to FileMaker 7 migrations. FmPro Migrator converts FileMaker Pro databases to MySQL, Oracle, and more. [Download - 240KB]
Capture One 3.6 ($100-$500) allows users to open and edit RAW files from the most commonly used DSLR cameras and convert them into TIFF or JPEG. Version 3.6 supports Konica Minolta 7D, A1, A2, Olympus C8080, Fuji S3 Pro, and Canon 1Ds MKII, 20D, Pro 1, G5, G3, G2 cameras. [Download - 55MB]

Apple's mini-stores not living up to expectations

02/18, 8:10am

Apple\'s mini-stores review

Gary Allen of the ifoAppleStore, a site that closely follows Apple's retail efforts, says that Apple's mini-stores are not living up to expectations: "The stores seem to have been hastily rolled out, are expensive to build, have nearly-useless point-of-sale machines, and suffer from a sterile design. The stores were inspired by the Mini Cooper auto, Apple said. 'This design will help us carry our philosophy to even more people,' Steve Jobs said at the official unveiling at the Stanford Shopping Center (N. Calif.). The 'cool' and 'hip' design was intended to attract a younger and hipper visitor, the company said. But in reality, the stores don't live up to any of that."

Class action lawsuit filed against Apple

02/18, 7:50am

Class action lawsuit

A new class action lawsuit filed on Thursday against Apple alleges that the company has engaged in acts of unfair and unlawful business practices, breach of contract, and misappropriation of trade secrets. The lawsuit was filed by three firms and five defendants as a class action on behalf of both resellers and consumers in the San Francisco County Superior Court. The 26-page complaint includes allegations of violations of the Consumers Legal Remedies Act and Song Beverly Act, warranty abuse, unfair and unlawful competition related to delivery and pricing of goods to resellers, improper repair/warranty costing, unfair price competition, and more. The suit seeks injunctive and compensatory damages as well as legal fees and punitive and exemplary damages for some violations.