Study: Apple gaining corporate traction

Apple is beginning to pave significant paths into the corporate world, says the research firm Yankee Group. Following a recent web survey of 750 global IT administrators and C-level executives, the firm says it has discovered that approximately four out of every five businesses have Macs running on their network. In general, says Yankee analyst Laura DiDio, adoption of Apple computers is said to be growing at a "steady and sustained pace not seen since the late 1980s."

Snow Leopard shows modest performance gains

At its current stage of development, the Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard beta is not outperforming 10.5 Leopard by any wide stretches, as developers dive into the new OS with GeekBench. The Netherlands' Mac Zone writes that benchmarking numbers indicate that 10.6 performs better than 10.5, but only by a small margin. This hardly is conclusive of the final product, however, given that 10.6 Snow Leopard is still under early development – early betas of 10.5 Leopard had a very Tiger-like interface and poorer performance than the final build.

Logitech rolls Mac-ready high end webcam

Logitech this morning made one of its rare webcam offerings for Macs with the advent of the QuickCam Vision Pro. A close cousin of the QuickCam Pro 9000, the USB camera is targeted at Mac mini and Mac Pro owners whose computers don't already have built-in iSight cameras but who want a better-than-average replacement for iChat, Skype, or other video apps. The Vision Pro not only has true glass optics from Carl Zeiss, rather than plastic, but also has a voice coil motor for autofocusing which is much faster and more fine-grained than the stepper motors on most webcams.

Remote Management exploit found in Mac OS X

A new vulnerability connected to Mac OS X's Remote Management feature has been discovered, says the security firm Intego. The issue is specifically associated with ARDAgent, a component of the feature, which has a "setuid" bit set. Running an executable of this type gains root control, and so ARDAagent may potentially be used to gain access to base functions without a password.

Apple issues critical updates for Tiger, Leopard

Apple on Wednesday released dozens of security updates part of its Mac OS X 10.5.3 update for Leopard and Security Update 2008-003(PPC Tiger client, Intel Tiger client, PPC Server, Universal Server) for Mac OS X Tiger, including critical bugs for remote shutdown, arbitrary code execution (multiple including JPG2000 issues), denial of service (via viewing PNG files), private information information disclosure (via SSL, Tiger Mail, Unicode, malicious BMP/GIF files and Image Capture) as well as a critical code execution bug for the continually updated Adobe Flash plugin. Apple also updated its Single Sign-On feature (CVE-ID: CVE-2008-1578) to prevent passwords from being supplied other local users.

Apps: FmPro Migrator, Sitemap Automator

FmPro Migrator Developer Edition 4.14 ($200) for migrating FileMaker databases. The new release as been enhanced with an automated 2-pass dependency resolution feature for FileMaker table consolidation conversion projects. Additionally, the XML code defining each layout can now be exported as a raw XML file, containing all of the embedded images, and layout object definitions. Layout XML files can be post-processed separately and used for projects in which FileMaker Layouts need to be re-purposed for other development projects. [Download - 16MB] Google Sitemap Automator 1.9.5 ($30) helps web-masters get their web site listed in Google, Yahoo and MSN search. XML Sitemap files were first introduced by Google in 2005 and adopted by all major search engines, including Yahoo, MSN/Live and Ask.com shortly after. With version 1.9.5 RAGE Sitemap Automator can now find every single web page on an iWeb created website and automatically publish your XML Sitemap file to your iDisk. [Download - 7.9MB] EarthDesk 4.2 ($25) replaces the static desktop with an image of the Earth showing current sun, moon and city illumination, as well as real-time global cloud coverage, allowing users to track hurricanes and other weather systems. EarthDesk 4.2 adds an option to allow use as a screen saver only rather than strictly a desktop, and is fully compatible with Leopard (and Tiger). It also improves communication between the EarthDesk prefpane and the rendering engine. [Download - 6.9MB] VideoDrive 1.4.4 ($15) a new application to easily add your video collection to iTunes. VideoDrive supports all current video formats and will import your videos fast and without reconversion, so you can easily manage and watch them from within iTunes and Front Row, or export them to iPod, iPhone and AppleTV. VideoDrive will analyze your videos and browse online for metadata and cover art, cleanup file names, merge multiple video parts and add season and episode numbering to TV Shows. [Download - 5MB] Agenda 4.0.1 ($40) an application that keeps track of your events and tasks, lets you enter your thoughts, and easily create calendar or journal websites. The new release includes fixes and improvements when exporting to and importing from iCal files and also fixes a character encoding issue in the iEvents feature when building or previewing a calendar or journal website. [Download - 4.4MB]

Major security update fixes AFP, CUPS, more

Apple today unveiled Security Update 2008-002, which provides a number of fixes for several system vulnerabilities found in AFP, CUPS, AppKit, and several other system-level resources. Most of the vulnerabilities revolve around maliciously crafted URLs granting access to system-level privileges, while others allow users to bypass system security. The majority of fixes are for Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and Tiger Server users, while some apply to the 10.5 Leopard equivalents.

Tiger, Leopard flaw an "enhancement"?

Similar to the Office 2008-related permissions problem reported earlier today, Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard users may be susceptible to additional vulnerabilities. MacNN reader Robert Myers reports that when using a standard user account to copy software in to the Applications folder, the authentication that takes place not only allows the software to be inserted in to the folder (as it should) but also changes the owner of the application to the current user.

HighPoint adds Leopard support to RAID adapter

HighPoint Technologies today updated its RocketRAID 3120 to support Apple's Power Mac G5 and Mac Pro systems under both Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger and 10.5 Leopard. The RocketRAID 3120 is a PCI-Express x1 dual port SATA RAID controller featuring the Marvell 5182 (400MHz) hardware RAID engine and with 128MB of DDR2 local memory. The RocketRAID 3120 is available for $170.

Java for Mac OS X 10.4 hits Release 6

Apple has officially released a new Java client, specifically tailored to Mac OS X 10.4. Release 6 requires that a Mac be updated to Mac OS X 10.4.10, specifically, and is an 80MB download. The update is said to improve "reliability and compatibility" for Java SE 5.0 and Java 1.4; the former shifts to v1.5.0_13, while Java 1.4 has been patched to v1.4.2_16. The download is a Universal Binary; as of press time, Apple has not properly updated its release notes page to document all changes.