Briefly: Beer for Bags; Feral competition...

In brief: Crumpler is holding its Beer for Bags Week in New York City beginning June 9th, Feral Interactive is holding a second caption competition for LEGO Star Wars II, Galbanum has unveiled its Archivecture Waveforms Cakewalk Edition, and Simig Media Records has released the solo piano record "13 Masks" by Tobin Mueller. Crumpler is set to exchange specific varieties and quantities of beer for its laptop and photo bags from in New York City from June 9th through June 17th at two Manhatten locations. The company will trade bags for beer at 45 Spring St. and 49 8th Ave, and will accept amber brew as tender rather than cash or credit orders during the sale. One case of Coopers and four Fosters Oil Cans are tradable for a Barney Rustle Messenger bag -- which retails for $100.

Allgood Spite and Malice goes Universal

Allgood Software has released Allgood Spite and Malice 4.0, bringing native compatibility to Intel-based Macs as a Universal Binary to the "Cat and Mouse" card game. The application is an implementation of the two player "Spite and Malice" patience game, pitting players against the computer with three levels of difficulty. Allgood Spite and Malice 4.0 offers seven unique options that players can mix and match to suite personal taste, and the game is priced at $15 for a single-user license. The software requires Mac OS X 10.2 or later.

Photoshop Action Pack 3.5 adds CS3 support

Apple software developer Ben Long has released Photoshop Action Pack 3.5, marking his latest Automator actions that let users control Photochop CS, CS2, and CS3. The pack enables users to build stand-alone applications, droplets, Finder plug-ins, and watch folders that automate operations that are normally considered tedious. "While Photoshop provides built-in automation in the form of actions, and an external interface to these batch processes through Adobe Bridge, the Photoshop Action Pack gives you far more capability," said Long. "With its unique filter and sorting operations, you can create automated workflows that have logic operations in them, allowing you to create a workflow that processes some images in one way, and other images in another." Photoshop Action Pack 3.5 is available for free.

Calcline 1.2 adds smart pasting, functions

Tension Software today released Calcline 1.2, an application designed to evaluate mathematical expressions with parentheses, nested functions, and variables. The mathematical tool is developed in Objective-C and Cocoa exclusively for Mac systems as an easy to use tool that serves as a substitute for the "ancient and obsolete" desktop calculator. Variable assignment and reference inside expressions are simplified via an interactive table, and Calcline supports high precision calculations using long double values. The latest release features smart pasting, new math functions, a result copy button, a fast decimal precision popup, and the ability to update via the network. Calcline 1.2 is priced at $20, and requires Mac OS X 10.4 or later.

VPN Tracker 4.9.2 adds new firewall support...

Equinux has released VPN Tracker 4.9.2, broadening the software's firewall support. VPN Tracker 4.9.2 introduces support for the DFL-200 firewall from D-Link, as well as SonicWALLs TotalSecure appliances TZ 180, TV180, TZ180 Wireless, TZ190 and TZ 190 Wireless. For German customers equinux now includes a device profile for the popular router FRITZ!Box Fon WLAN 7170 from AVM. The update is available for free to all existing VPN Tracker 4.x customers, with licenses of VPN Tracker 4.x available from $90 for the Personal Edition and from $200 for the Professional Edition.

3D camera utility gains Motion 3.0 support...

The Pixel Farm has released an update to its PFHoe/Pro tools for importing and working with 3D camera data, bringing support for Apple's Motion 3.0 softare. Used for tracking shots, PFHoe/Pro offers a series of wizards for importing, setting up footage, and extracting 3D camera information. PFHoe and PFHoePro are available as Universal Binaries from the company website, with prices ranging from $100 to $200. "PFHoe is delivering on something we always wanted to do - providing those who can’t afford our professional systems with a great set of tools to either learn about camera tracking or produce their own projects," said Richard Spöhrer, Managing Director of The Pixel Farm.

Risk/hazard assessment tool updated...

MACSOS has released "Risky Business SOS" 2007.051, a significant update to the hazard assessment and safe operating procedure aggregation tool. "Every organization has a legal obligation to the community and their employees to identify, assess, control and document the hazards, substances and procedures at their workplace. This software application is designed to aid compliance with these regulations." The tool allows companies to organize policies, procedures, substances, hazards, incidents, risk assessments and more. The software is priced at $1,500.

IBM's new Power6 CPU pushes 5GHz...

In a bid to regain some lost ground to chip making industry-leaders Intel and AMD, IBM has announced that its dual-core POWER6 microprocessor -- due to ship next month -- will top out at 4.7GHz, but draws about the same amount of power as the company's previous generation processors. The new processors, designed for high-end servers, push IBM to the forefront of performance computing: while others have focused on multiple cores, IBM is offering megahertz performance in a dual-core chip. According to the company, the new processor boasts bandwidth of 300GB per second, offering the ability to "download the entire iTunes catalog in about 60 seconds – 30 times faster than HP’s Itanium."

EMI staves off pro-DRM Warner in buyout...

Major record label EMI announced today that it had been taken over by Terra Firma, a private equity group. The $4.7 billion deal would see the group receive official control but would leave the music publisher essentially intact, rather than splitting off some of its business as had been suspected by some experts. Terra Firma had reportedly won an intense bidding war as its deal posed the least risk. EMI is said to have welcomed a potential buyout after struggling with falling sales, which cut its most recent profit by 60 percent.

Cineon/DPX Pro 2.5.1 for QuickTime updated

Glue Tools has released v2.5.1 of its Cineon and DPX QuickTime Components, an update to the company's plugins for film professionals that adds support for multiple processors. Keeping slower systems in mind, the company has also added support for "scrubbing" on older Macs. In addition, the update offers a new "Anamorphic Scaling" feature, now available in un-squeeze frames that were shot in aspect ratios, such as 2.35: "The feature can allow Final Cut Pro Artists to import ranges of DPX frames, and adjust them to aspect ratios including 1.33, 1.778, 1.85, 2.35, and 2.37. The original image is left untouched, and all the data is preserved," the company said in its release. Other new features include improved Final Cut Pro Tools and a new Final Cut Pro Demo mode as well as performance boosts for 3D-LUT conversions, Log-Lin conversions and Alpha Channel support.

Apps: Advanced Link Manager, Emailchemy

• Advanced Link Manager 3.5 ($60) improves the tool designed to help manage incoming website links. The latest release adds a keyword analysis report, a printable referrers information report, and the ability to use the Java look and feel. The update also enables users to select the extension as well as the separator for use in CSV reports. [Download - 14.1MB]


• Emailchemy 1.9 ($30) is a utility that reads email from the closed, proprietary file formats of most popular email clients and converts them to a standard and portable format that any application can use. Emailchemy 1.9 adds a converter for Outlook for Windows, as well as detailed conversion trace in the Forensic Edition. [Download - 514KB]


• Power Manager 3.6.2 ($30) includes bug fixes for the uninstaller portion of the utility designed to save energy by automating Mac systems. Users can configure the software to start up or wake, sleep, switch to the login window, log out, shut down, or restart at specific specific times. Power Manager also includes Automator Actions to ease the process of accessing and manipulating the active schedule. [Download - 2.7MB]


• xSort 1.5.2 ($30) enables users to model and construct a card sorting exercise in a graphical view that simulates a table with physical cards. The software supports dragging cards around on the table, and the update fixes some bugs in the exercise table view. xSort 1.5.2 also displays session durations in the sessions tab. [Download - 6.1MB]


• FxFactory 1.0.5 ($400 for Pro) is a free update to the visual effects package, adding compatibility with Apple's Final Cut Studio 2 software and offering 18 new plug-ins alongside various major improvements. FxFactory works with a numerous user-created plug-ins, and an initial purchase includes the Motion Pack (40 plug-ins) as well as the Editing Pack (40 additional plug-ins). [Download - 56.7MB]


• Style Flocker 1.0.1 (free) manages character, paragraph, and object styles within Adobe's InDesign software. Users can group and apply all styles within a single palette, and can see the currently applied style or styles within a document. Style Flocker negates the need to visit three different palettes to apply and view styles, offering users improved control over document creation. [Download - 545KB]

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars coming to Mac...

Aspyr Media today announced that it will publish id Software's Enemy Territory: Quake Wars for the Mac later this year. The much anticipated title is licensed by Activision and is being developed by its in-house Aspyr Studios game development team. Built using id Software's MegaTexture rendering technology, Enemy Territory: Quake Wars features strategic team play, persistent character promotions, and powerful weapons and vehicles in heroic objective-based battles as the Global Defense Force faces off against the alien Strogg invasion.

Western Digital begins shipping 250GB Scorpio

Western Digital has begun shipping an upgrade to one of its laptop hard drives, the 2.5-inch Scorpio. Though it is available in other capacities ranging from 40 to 160GB, the new flagship model is 250GB, putting it in direct competition with Samsung's Spinpoint M5. Like the M5, the Scorpio is rated at 5,400rpm, and has a 1.5Gbps SATA interface; Western believes it has an edge with its "WhisperDrive" technology, which uses special seek algorithms to keep noise down, and reduce power consumption by up to 60 percent. It should be priced at about $227. [via Pocket-lint]

Epson's Imaging WorkShop takes on Aperture...

Epson today unveiled Imaging WorkShop, a new workflow application designed for use with high-end printers that will compete with Apple's Aperture post production photography software. "Imaging WorkShop is a software package designed to greatly enhance the efficiency of the printing workflow of advanced amateur and professional photographers, who handle a tremendous volume of photographs as a result of the growing use of digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) cameras." Imaging WorkShop is scheduled for release at the end of this month, requiring Mac OS X 10.4.3 or later. The software is priced at $200 until July 31st of this year, after which pricing will rise.

Blackmagic update supports ProRes 422

Blackmagic Design has released a new software update for its DeckLink and Multibridge series capture and playback video cards that adds support for the new features in Apple Final Cut Studio 2. The latest revision adds support for ProRes 422, open format timelines, new easy setup management, and video output from Color. ProRes 422 support allows real time capture directly into a compressed video format for a sizable reduction in disk space requirements, and all Blackmagic Design cards use an uncompressed video link to the Final Cut Studio real time effects renderer that negates the need for FireWire recompression. The update also supports the new Open Format Timeline technology that allows users to play various video format files in the editing timeline. The software is available for free.

AT&T confirms iPhone key to new brand...

The iPhone is instrumental to the change from Cingular branding to AT&T, according to the US cell provider. In announcing a switch on Monday to the new company name for the logos within all of its 1,800 stores, company spokesman Michael Coe was adamant that the Apple device be associated with AT&T and not Cingular, as the expected popularity would be essential to generating goodwill for the company's future rather than its past.

Corripio 0.7 iTunes companion released

nClass Software today released Corripio 0.7, the latest revision of its open source iTunes music library companion program. The software fetches artwork for iTunes tracks, offers Growl support, enables users to fix tags by filling in missing or corrected information, and allows users to edit song lyrics. The latest release of Corripio supports plug-ins for creating and using custom scripts. The application is designed to locate songs quickly, and works with multiple file types via a simple user interface. Corripio 0.7 is available for free, and requires Mac OS X 10.4 or later.

Panasonic intros 12MP cam with HD video...

Panasonic on Monday morning upgraded its Lumix compact cameras with a single model, the FX100. Like the Casio Z1200 also revealed today, the FX100 features a 12-megapixel sensor for extremely sharp images, and includes similar image stabilization as well as automatic ISO compensation for dark or fast scenes. Unique to the Panasonic model, however, is full HD video recording: owners with enough SD or SDHC storage can capture video up to 1920x1080 (1080p) or at the more common 1280x720 (720p) by cutting the recording speed to 15 frames per second. This helps show captured footage at an HDTV's native display, says Panasonic.

Blizzard announces StarCraft II for Mac...

Blizzard Entertainment has unveiled StarCraft II, the sequel to its award-winning real-time strategy game StarCraft, at the 2007 Blizzard Worldwide Invitational event in Seoul, South Korea. Blizzard said it is developing StarCraft II for simultaneous release on the Windows and Mac platforms. The announcement took place inside the Olympic Gymnastics Arena, where the company demonstrated StarCraft II cinematic trailer along with gameplay in front of thousands of attendees. StarCraft II will feature the return of the Protoss, Terran, and Zerg races, overhauled and re-imagined with Blizzard's signature approach to game balance. Each race will be further distinguished from the others, with several new units and new gameplay mechanics, as well as new abilities for some of the classic StarCraft units that will be making a reappearance in the game.

Casio intros 12-megapixel Exilim cam...

Casio today launched a new range-topping model for its Exilim Zoom series. As suggested by its name, the Exilim Z1200 is the company's sharpest compact camera with a new 12.1-megapixel sensor that captures up to 4000x3000 images with a 3X optical zoom lens. The same sensor also includes an auto-ISO Best Shot mode that can raise sensitivity for fast-moving subjects. The compact camera also comes with sensor-shift image stabilization to correct shaking and face detection to help create portraits.