News Common PC Linux Mac CUCUG
The next CUCUG meeting will be held on our regular third Thursday of the month: Thursday, March 15th, at 7:00 pm, at the First Baptist Church of Champaign in Savoy. The Linux SIG convenes, of course, 45 minutes earlier, at 6:15 pm. Directions to the FBC-CS are at the end of this newsletter.
The March 15 gathering will be one of our split SIG meetings. The PC SIG will have Jon Bjerke presenting the new Vista OS. Jon said he'll be showing the new Aero interface, which requires pretty hefty hardware. He'll also turn off Aero to show what your system will do if it only has a Vista Capable rating. He'll focus on the UAC, the differences in the network settings and the wireless protection. The Macintosh SIG is open for anything anyone wants to bring in.
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We'd like to thank renewing members Selena Kay Douglass and Jim Lewis for their continued support.
We welcome any kind of input or feedback from members. Run across an interesting item or tidbit on the net? Just send the link to the editor. Have an article or review you'd like to submit? Send it in. Have a comment? Email any officer you like. Involvement is the driving force of any user group. Welcome to the group.
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by Richard E. Rollins, President, CUCUG
This is a sad day for me. One of my best friends just passed away.
Jeff Stevenson was one of our founding members. He was the first treasurer and newsletter editor for our club. When after 4 or 5 years the club was almost out of money and could not have lasted out the year, Jeff along with others set up a raffle of an Amiga 500. Jeff did all the work on making tickets and handling the money. Because of that raffle we are still a club today. Even though he has not been with us for many of the last few years, the things he set in motion still are there. He was able to come back to the 20th year meeting and he really enjoyed seeing old friends.
Jeff has been a personal friend of mine since I met him here at a meeting of the club back in 1984. He was a former U.S. Air force fighter pilot, having flow over 100 missions in Vietnam in the 60's. He meet his wife Ellen on a blind date and they were married several weeks later. It seemed to stick as they were married for over 35 years.
He owned the Hobby shop just outside the base entrance in Rantoul. Later, when the base was closing, he went into business with another of our founding members, Steve Gast. They opened a hobby and pet store called Leisuretime Pet and Hobby now located on Mattis Avenue in Champaign. He retired from the store about two years ago and went into another of his passions, driving. He tried to rebuild a Mini and then traded it for a Mazda Miata. He joined the local Miata club and loved going on rally's and autocrosses.
Jeff passed away on Thursday March 8, 2007 at 5:15 pm. He died from complications from the chemotherapy for his treatment of Leukemia. He is survived by a wife, two daughters and six grandchildren. Personally, for me, he will be missed greatly.
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Written and produced by John Anderson (mediaminutes@freepress.net)
Audio: http://freepress.net/mediaminutes/archive/mm021607.mp3
Text: http://freepress.net/mediaminutes/transcripts/mm021607.pdf
The FCC fudges the numbers with regard to the availability of broadband Internet access in America. A newly-released report claims that broadband penetration grew some 54% from mid-2005 through June of last year. But the problem with the claim lies in how it's defined. For starters, the FCC defines broadband connectivity as any connection with a speed higher than 200 kilobits per second - hardly a quick figure, considering it's less than one-seventh the speed of today's DSL or cable modem lines. Secondly, the FCC uses zip codes to measure broadband penetration, and classifies an entire zip code area as wired if just one customer is connected there - even if that connection involves something like satellite-delivered broadband service.
But the most egregious distortion behind the claim is the FCC's counting of 11 million mobile broadband - aka cell phone - subscribers as evidence of increased service. Never mind that cell phone networks, with their proprietary and metered architecture, don't even come close to resembling a bona-fide broadband Internet experience. The real bottom line? It's 2007, and just under 60% of U.S. homes still do not have easy, affordable access to broadband.
With little fanfare, Sony has reached a settlement agreement with the Federal Trade Commission over an investigation into copy-protection software embedded in some Sony CDs. A year and a half ago, Sony got into hot water when it came to light that some of its music discs surreptitiously installed software onto Windows-based computers that increased their vulnerability to hacker attacks. Under the FTC settlement, Sony must disclose up-front what sort of copy-protection mechanisms reside on its content and give users, quote, "a reasonable and effective way" of uninstalling such software. Those who may have Sony media infected with the potentially dangerous rootkit software are still eligible for a company replacement program through June.
Just how good has merger-mania been to the new AT&T? The company closed out 2006 with a 17% rise in profits in the final quarter, a large part of the gain due to its full assimilation of the Cingular wireless phone network, which in its final quarterly report tripled its profits over the course of a year. Net income at AT&T in the last three months of last year nearly hit $2 billion. The financial impacts of the company's acquisition of BellSouth have yet to be felt. In the last 10 years AT&T has acquired 13 companies in its race to reassemble Ma Bell for the broadband era.
However, the company is facing problems with its self-proclaimed next-generation broadband service, dubbed "Project Lightspeed" or "U-Verse." The technology, which delivers phone, data, and TV over a combination of fiber optics and plain old telephone wires, has been slow to launch - technical glitches delayed its rollout to 11 markets last year, while the company's target was 20. And there are significant questions about whether twentieth-century twisted-copper phone lines can really provide the capacity to deliver the vaunted triple-play of services, especially with regard to high-definition television.
Related Links:
FCC Fudges Its Broadband Report - but finally Gets One Thing Right!
Consumers Must Be Able to Uninstall Copy Protection
Gains in Wireless Customers Help Lift AT&T's Earnings
Internet Technology Tests AT&T's Bid for TV Subscribers
Lightspeed's Slow Start
U.S. Broadband Market Still Coming Up Short
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by Kristen Sackley
Posted: 2/12/07
URL: http://media.www.dailyillini.com/media/storage/paper736/news/2007/02/12/News/Ui.Alumni.Crucial.In.Creating.Transistors-2711636.shtml
Intel announced two major breakthroughs in computer processor technology on Jan. 27, with multiple University [of Illinois] alumni to thank for their contributions to the project.
Mark Bohr, a senior fellow at Intel and University alumnus, led the team of process engineers that created the new 45 nanometer transistor processor. Bohr said the new transistors will reduce leakage, meaning battery leakage, related to the length of battery life.
"(The transistors) provide for performance but in a much more energy efficient manner," Bohr said.
These 45 nanometer chips are the first to have the gate insulator and the gate electrode made without silicon, which had been used for the past 40 years.
Intel developed a new material with a "high-k" property for the gate insulator, and a combination of metals for the gate electrode. But the make-up of "high-k" and the precise combination of metals are being kept secret by Intel so they can have a leg up on the competition. Most of the details regarding the project have been kept secret until now.
From the changes made to the gate insulator, gate electrode and the elimination of silicon, Bohr said Intel's announcement was key in progressing transistor technology.
"Those three components remained unchanged in the past 40 years." Bohr said. "So our announcement in January was a big change where we converted the gate insulator from silicon to hafnium."
Not only is Intel's new transistor technology energy efficient, but it is also extremely small and solves the problem of Moore's Law, at least temporarily.
Gordon Moore, inventor of Moore's law and co-founder of Intel, said that the number of transistors should double on a processor every 18-24 months, eventually leading to a limit. This limit was approaching, Bohr said, but this new technology may have delayed the end of Moore's law.
"Over the last five, six years experts have admitted that we are running into fundamental limits." Bohr said. "We have made transistors as small as possible. If we make them smaller they won't have good performance."
According to Intel, with the new technology approximately 400 of Intel's 45 nanometer transistors could fit on the surface of a single human red blood cell.
Michael Hattendorf, University alumnus and process engineer who has worked on the new Intel chip, said that it was a great feeling when Intel made the announcement because he had been working on the project for so long.
Hattendorf said that the University got him interested in computer engineering, and he worked a lot with transistor technology as an undergraduate.
While at the University, Hattendorf said, "I had some opportunities to do some hands on work, making devices and doing measurements, learning about the way these kinds of devices work."
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Grant Gross, IDG News Service Wed Feb 28, 3:00 PM ET
URL:http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/20070228/tc_pcworld/129465
A new bill in the U.S. Congress aimed at protecting the fair use rights for consumers of copyright material would "legalize hacking," the Recording Industry Association of America said.
The Freedom and Innovation Revitalizing U.S. Entrepreneurship (FAIR USE) Act, introduced Tuesday by U.S. Representatives Rick Boucher (news, bio, voting record), a Virginia Democrat, and John Doolittle (news, bio, voting record), a California Republican, would allow customers to circumvent digital copy restrictions in six limited areas when copyright owners' business models are not threatened, Boucher said in a press release. So-called fair use doctrine allows customers of copyright works to make limited numbers of copies, particularly for reviews, news reporting, teaching and research.
The bill would allow exemptions to the anti-circumvention restrictions in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), passed by Congress in 1998. The bill is revamped from similar bills introduced in the last two sessions of Congress, Boucher said.
"The fair use doctrine is threatened today as never before," Boucher said in a statement. "Historically, the nation's copyright laws have reflected a carefully calibrated balanced between the rights of copyright owners and the rights of the users of copyrighted material. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act dramatically tilted the copyright balance toward complete copyright protection at the expense of the public's right to fair use."
But the RIAA said the bill would effectively repeal the DMCA. The bill would "allow electronics companies to induce others to break the law for their own profit," it said in a statement. Advances such digital music sales, online games, on-demand movies and e-books can be traced to DMCA protects, the RIAA said.
"The difference between hacking done for non-infringing purposes and hacking done to steal is impossible to determine and enforce," the RIAA said in its statement.
The Boucher bill would limit the availability of statutory damages against individuals and firms who may be found to have engaged in contributory infringement, inducement of infringement, or other indirect infringement. The bill would allow libraries to circumvent digital locks or secure copies of works that have been damaged, lost or stolen.
The Consumer Electronics Association applauded the bill, saying it would give protections to consumers, educators and libraries. Without fair use protections, consumers couldn't use devices such as VCRs and digital TV recorders, the trade group said.
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Telecom Can Now Lure Broadband Customers Without Paying Others
By DIONNE SEARCEY, KEVIN J. DELANEY and DENNIS K. BERMAN
The Wall Street Journal, March 9, 2007
URL: http://money.aol.com/news/articles/_a/as-power-shifts-atandt-may-alter-yahoo/20070309071409990001
In November 2001, Yahoo Inc. and AT&T Inc.'s predecessor, SBC Communications Inc., announced a partnership they touted as a "landmark strategic alliance" that would link the telecom and Internet worlds. SBC showcased the relationship by painting field-crew vans with Yahoo's logo and brash purple color.
Under the deal, the companies successfully sold Internet access together to millions of U.S. consumers. The partnership offered a way for the stodgy phone company to tap into Yahoo's Internet aura. For Yahoo, it provided extra revenue and access to AT&T's big customer base.
But today, the arrangement is looking like a relic of an earlier Internet era. The companies are negotiating potentially sweeping changes that could scale back their partnership, which expires in April 2008, says a person familiar with the matter. AT&T has quietly painted over its colorful vans, expunging the Yahoo logo; the vans now sport AT&T's new blue insignia alone. The fraying of the alliance could be a blow to Yahoo, which gets roughly $200 million to $250 million of revenue annually from AT&T, according to two people familiar with the matter. It also shows how AT&T itself is much stronger, and less reliant on Yahoo, than during the early days of their alliance.
The potential unraveling illustrates how high-profile partnerships by Internet companies to reach consumers can quickly become fragile: Big alliances can rapidly fall apart as partners' interests diverge and the Internet evolves. The shift in the relationship of AT&T and Yahoo is partly a result of changes in the economic structure of the Internet industry. Most significantly, Yahoo's rival Google Inc. has begun offering rich payments -- approaching $1 billion in some cases -- to partners, causing players such as AT&T to question their existing deals.
At the same time, AT&T no longer needs Yahoo the way it did nearly six years ago, when it was struggling to coax consumers to sign up for high-speed Internet service. Today, with the huge popularity of downloading video and music and other services on the Web, broadband is in demand.
The partnership's troubles also underline the Web era's slowness to deliver on one of its big promises: that, by working together, companies like AT&T and Yahoo would be able to offer Internet services over a broader range of tech gadgets -- not just over PCs but also through cellphones and TV sets. After they announced their deal in 2001, both sides believed Yahoo could play a big role alongside the phone company's wireless unit, as well as the television service AT&T hoped to launch. But Yahoo's services for mobile phones, such as Web search and a photo offering, have since had only limited distribution on AT&T's cellular carrier.
AT&T now wants to overhaul its Yahoo deal, according to a person familiar with the issue. Instead of paying Yahoo a percent of the revenue from its broadband business, AT&T wants to offer Yahoo only a cut of revenue from the sale of products Yahoo provides, such as from its music and photo services, this person says.
One reason AT&T now believes it shouldn't have to share broadband subscription revenue is that the phone company has been approached by other Internet companies offering to pay to reach its broadband customers, says the person. Google over the past year has played a high-profile role in paying companies that help expand its online services and advertising. Those offers, bankrolled by Google's Internet ad success, have roiled the market for deals structured like Yahoo and AT&T's -- as Google pays partners rather than charges them.
In a written response to questions, AT&T and Yahoo said they collaborate frequently and have "the most successful partnership in the industry." The statement added, "That success is rooted in the open and ongoing dialogue we maintain." One person familiar with the matter says a renegotiated partnership could potentially involve increased cooperation in areas such as services or advertising for mobile phones.
When the two first struck their partnership, AT&T -- then the regional Southwest phone company named SBC -- hoped Yahoo's Internet luster would help it catch up with cable operators' broadband offerings and compete with Time Warner Inc.'s America Online unit. Before that, AT&T had faced problems with its broadband rollout including regulatory hurdles that so frustrated Chairman and Chief Executive Edward Whitacre he had said he was reluctant to spend the money to expand high-speed Internet service throughout the company's territory.
Now, in the wake of its December acquisition of BellSouth Corp., AT&T is the country's largest phone company with more than 12 million high-speed Internet subscribers and is outpacing some cable companies in signing up broadband customers. Yahoo, meantime, has lost some of its buzz as it operates in the shadow of Google and grapples with slowing revenue growth.
"It's fair to say that as the industry has evolved and as the company has grown and the broadband marketplace has grown, AT&T shouldn't be in the position of paying them for attracting [broadband] customers," says one person familiar with AT&T's thinking. "It comes down to money."
The roughly $200 million to $250 million in annual payments from AT&T is a small fraction of the $5 billion to $5.5 billion in revenue that Yahoo is forecasting for 2007, when certain payments to partners are factored out. But people familiar with the matter say the fees paid to Yahoo by AT&T have profit margins as good or better than the rest of Yahoo's business, because of the relatively minimal resources required of Yahoo under the deal. Losing the revenue from AT&T's broadband access could dent Yahoo's net income, which was $751 million in 2006.
The relationship currently directs millions of AT&T customers to Yahoo, and changes could potentially reduce their usage of Yahoo's sites. That could lower Yahoo's online ad revenue more broadly, including revenue related to Web searches the AT&T customers conduct. The Internet company shares some ecommerce and ad revenue with AT&T under their arrangement.
The roots of AT&T and Yahoo's partnership stretch back to a March 2001 state dinner for Mexican President Vicente Fox where AT&T's Mr. Whitacre and Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang were seated next to each other. After the two companies announced an agreement in November 2001, Messrs. Whitacre and Yang took some of their executives on a trip to Hawaii to celebrate.
AT&T, then known as SBC, began selling high-speed Internet access coupled with Yahoo services such as email with extra storage. Subscribers to AT&T's broadband service got Yahoo's Web search engine and other services on their default AT&T Web site. The phone company back then bought a 3% stake in Yahoo for $300 million.
At first, the high-flying dot-com and the staid telephone company weren't an obvious fit. But the two teams warmed up to each other. AT&T staff began instant messaging with their Yahoo counterparts, and top AT&T executives began leaving their ties at home when they traveled to Yahoo meetings. The AT&T-Yahoo agreement quickly began helping AT&T make up for lost revenue from its traditional phone business. The partnership became so successful that the two sides explored numerous collaborations, including some never made public.
In 2004, Yahoo and AT&T plotted an acquisition of Walt Disney Co. after Comcast Corp. launched an unsolicited Disney takeover plan, said two people familiar with the matter. Microsoft Corp. was rumored to be entering the contest and Yahoo wanted to block it, said the people familiar with the discussions. Time Warner was also considering entering the fray, these people said. Yahoo and AT&T went as far as lining up bankers to prepare the joint bid. In the end Microsoft's move never materialized, AT&T and Yahoo backed away and the Comcast deal collapsed.
Yahoo and AT&T in the past have seriously discussed making joint bids for other major Internet assets, said another person familiar with the matter. By winter 2004, Yahoo and AT&T staffers were working together on new projects beyond the scope of their initial agreement. After several months of negotiating, top executives from Yahoo and AT&T agreed on the outlines of an expanded partnership agreement over lunch in a private suite at the Bellagio hotel in Las Vegas.
The two companies announced their expanded tie-up in November 2004. The new agreement gave Yahoo a central role in AT&T's plan to offer a range of new features that combined voice, video and Internet services. Customers were to be able to tap into a Yahoo portal via a cellphone, PC or TV to do things such as route phone calls, check email, order TV programming and set parental-content controls for the Internet or television. Yahoo also would provide software for AT&T's planned TV service, as well as for cellphones for AT&T's wireless unit.
But by early last year, many of the reasons AT&T and Yahoo came together in the first place had changed or disappeared. The phone giant had amassed roughly seven million broadband subscribers, and no longer faced intense competition for Internet customers from AOL, which had made much of its services freely available on the Web. Yahoo's popular email service was still a core attraction for AT&T subscribers. But Google had started to offer a competitive, free email service.
AT&T also saw that Google had started to pay companies, such as computer maker Dell Inc., hundreds of millions of dollars over several years to distribute Google software and set consumers' default settings to Google's search engine. Google subsequently signed a deal under which it promised a minimum of $900 million in advertising revenue to News Corp. sites including MySpace for using Google search technology and carrying ads brokered by Google. Among the companies getting checks for using Google's search service were other broadband providers, such as cable giant Comcast. Complicating matters, AT&T was getting offers from Internet companies to put their search services on AT&T's Web sites and share in the advertising revenue. Not only was AT&T paying Yahoo, under their exclusive deal, the phone company also was precluded from pursuing these offers, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Meanwhile, efforts by AT&T and Yahoo to jointly provide Internet-based services for devices such as TV sets and cellphones have been bumpy. Yahoo had hoped that AT&T's wireless unit would push Yahoo's "Go for Mobile" software, which links cellphone services such as photos and email with consumers' Yahoo accounts. But AT&T has only shipped the software with one device, which it no longer sells.
AT&T lets consumers access Yahoo's Web search on mobile phones, but it's listed alongside four other search providers. Some of the original features the two companies said they might offer to span devices have yet to materialize. Customers can't, for example, route phone calls or set parental controls for AT&T's TV service using the two companies' joint site.
Internet policy issues have pitted the two companies against each other. AT&T's Mr. Whitacre a year-and-a-half ago said he wanted to charge Internet companies to deliver content such as video clips to consumers at higher-than-usual speeds. He named Yahoo as one such company. Since then, Yahoo has attached its name to groups that lobby for so-called "net neutrality" laws to preempt such fees. Their positions on opposite sides of the issue were especially awkward last year when AT&T was trying to persuade regulators to approve its takeover of BellSouth and net neutrality emerged as a potential stumbling block to the deal.
People familiar with the matter say Mr. Whitacre has at least once raised the idea of AT&T and Yahoo merging when Yahoo's stock has swooned. Last summer, Mr. Whitacre pitched such a deal to executives at the Internet company, according to one person familiar with the approach. But Yahoo wasn't keen to do it, people say. Yahoo executives have subsequently expressed confidence that the company would remain an independent concern. "We and our board see tremendous opportunity for Yahoo as a public company," Chief Executive Terry Semel said in an interview in January, when asked about rumors that it could be acquired.
These days, AT&T's management is focusing more on other services, such as its wireless company, which is the biggest in the U.S. in terms of customers. And the company doesn't have trouble selling consumers on faster Internet connections anymore.
AT&T's Mr. Whitacre has made no secret that he's on the prowl for another acquisition. The company invested $500 million in EchoStar Communications Corp. in 2003. Some industry executives think AT&T eventually could try to acquire an international wireless carrier. AT&T had no comment on future merger and acquisition activity.
While a change in its relationship with AT&T would likely hurt Yahoo financially, the Internet company has been pursuing its own initiatives to expand beyond the computer to cellphones and TV sets. In January, the company unveiled a new version of its Yahoo Go software that it is marketing to consumers to install on mobile phones themselves, even if AT&T isn't doing that. Yahoo separately offers free software for PCs called "Go for TV" that consumers can use to access Yahoo services such as photos and music on their TV sets.
[Editor's Note: Article submitted by David L. Stevens.]
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I, Cringely - The Survival of the Nerdiest with Robert X. Cringely
The Pulpit, Weekly Column
January 19, 2007
URL: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007/pulpit_20070119_001510.html
I spoke recently with an old friend who is a bandwidth broker. He buys and sells bandwidth on fiber-optic networks around the world. And he told me something that I found not completely surprising, but I certainly hadn't known: Google controls more network fiber than any other organization. This is not to say that Google OWNS all that fiber, just that they control it through agreements with network operators. I find two very interesting aspects to this story: 1) that Google has acquired -- or even needs to acquire -- so much bandwidth, and; 2) that they don't own it, since probably the cheapest way to pick up that volume of fiber would be to simply buy out any number of backbone providers like Level 3 Communications.
Google loves secrecy. That they've been acquiring fiber assets hasn't been a secret, but the sheer volume of these acquisitions HAS been. Why? One thought is that it kept down the price since people didn't really know it was Google snatching up this stuff (they've done it under a number of different corporate names). But if price was the issue, then why hasn't Google just bought the companies that own the fiber? It made no sense until I scratched my head and thought a bit further, at which point it became obvious that Google wants to -- in its own way -- control the Internet. In fact, they probably control it already and we just haven't noticed.
There are two aspects to this control issue, but let's take the legal one first. If Google bought a bunch of Internet backbone providers, such a move would of course get the attention of regulators from the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, the two federal agencies charged with looking at large corporate mergers for signs of anti-competitive activity. But simply acquiring legal control of those same assets through leases and other long-term contracts doesn't trigger such an examination, though perhaps it should. By renting instead of buying, Google was able to acquire its fiber assets primarily in secret. The game was over before most of us even knew there WAS a game.
The second aspect of this is the whole idea that the game is already over for control of the Internet. I touched on this concept back in 1998 when I wrote my first column about PayPal, which at the time had been offering its core service for less than a year and already had eight million members. I wrote then that PayPal had already won the Internet payments race, which time has since showed they had. PayPal's confidence was based on analysis of its own growth. Understanding the potential range of growth, looking at the rate of subscriber acceleration, and using second derivative analysis of these data, PayPal was pretty darned sure, even back in 1998, that its competitors at the time would never be able to catch up.
Topix.net founder Rich Skrenta recently took a similar approach to argue that Google, like PayPal, has already won the game and represents to most users the face of the Internet. Skrenta (in this week's links) argues that Google's dominance of search and advertising is so profound that most competitors -- especially Yahoo -- would probably be better off NOT even attempting to compete and simply let Google handle search and advertising while Yahoo provides content. He's probably correct. Skrenta argues that even if services come along that are superior to Google's, in order to become dominant they'll have to overcome Google's brand recognition with users, which is almost impossible to do. So just being better than Google isn't enough.
All this is prelude for understanding what Google intends to actually DO with all this technology, which I have only lately begun to figure out.
I live in South Carolina, a state that I can argue qualifies as a technology backwater despite being the shrimp and grits capital of the world. Why, then, are the local business pages filled with stories about Google preparing to build massive data centers here? Google is apparently negotiating to build data centers in Goose Creek, a town not far from Charleston, where I live, in Columbia, the state capital, and a third location across the border in Georgia. To read the papers, Google might choose one or another of these locations, but according to people I have spoken with who are fairly close to the action, Google actually seems intent on building in all three locations.
Why?
Why would Google need two data centers in a state with only four million residents? Why would they need to buy 520 acres in a Goose Creek industrial park when that's probably 100 times as much land as any conceivable data center would require?
Google is building a LOT of data centers. The company appears to be as attracted to cheap and reliable electric power as it is to population proximity. In Goose Creek they bought those 520 acres from the local state-owned electric utility, which probably answers the land question posed above. By buying out all the remaining building sites in an industrial park owned by an electric utility, Google guarantees itself a vast and uninterruptible supply of power, much as it has done in Oregon by building a data center next to a hydroelectric dam or back here again in Columbia by building near a nuclear power station.
Of course this doesn't answer the question why Google needs so much capacity in the first place, but I have a theory on that. I think Google is building for a future they see but most of the rest of us don't. I'll go further and guess that Google is planning to build similar data centers in many states and that the two centers they are apparently preparing to build here in South Carolina are probably intended mainly to SERVE South Carolina. That's perhaps 100,000 servers for four million potential users or 40 users per server. What computing service could possibly require such resources?
The answer is pretty simple. Google intends to take over most of the functions of existing fixed networks in our lives, notably telephone and cable television.
The Internet as we know it is a shell game, with ISPs building their profits primarily on how many users they can have practically share the same Internet connection. Based on the idea that most users aren't on the net at the same time and even when they are online they are mainly between keystrokes and doing little or nothing when viewed on a per-millisecond basis, ISPs typically leverage the Internet bandwidth they have purchased by a factor of at least 20X and sometimes as much as 100X, which means that DSL line or cable modem that you think is delivering multi-megabits per second is really only guaranteeing you as much bandwidth as you could get with most dial-up accounts.
This bandwidth leveraging hasn't been a problem to date, but it is about to become a huge problem as we all embrace Internet video. When we are all grabbing one to two hours of high-quality video per day off the net, there is no way the current network infrastructure will support that level of use. At that point we can accept that the Internet can't do what we are asking it to do OR we can find a way to make the Internet do what we are asking it to do. Enter Google and its many, many regional data centers to fill this gap.
Looking at this problem from another angle, right now somewhat more than half of all Internet bandwidth is being used for BitTorrent traffic, which is mainly video. Yet if you surveyed your neighbors you'd find that few of them are BitTorrent users. Less than 5 percent of all Internet users are presently consuming more than 50 percent of all bandwidth. Broadband ISPs hate these super users and would like to find ways to isolate or otherwise reject them. It's BitTorrent -- not Yahoo or Google -- that has been the target of the anti-net neutrality trash talk from telcos and cable companies. But the fact is that rather than being an anomaly, these are simply early adopters and we'll all soon follow in their footsteps. And when that happens, there won't be enough bandwidth to support what we want to do from any centralized perspective. A single data center, no matter how large, won't be enough. Google is just the first large player to recognize this fact as their building program proves.
It is becoming very obvious what will happen over the next two to three years. More and more of us will be downloading movies and television shows over the net and with that our usage patterns will change. Instead of using 1-3 gigabytes per month, as most broadband Internet users have in recent years, we'll go to 1-3 gigabytes per DAY -- a 30X increase that will place a huge backbone burden on ISPs. Those ISPs will be faced with the option of increasing their backbone connections by 30X, which would kill all profits, OR they could accept a peering arrangement with the local Google data center.
Seeing Google as their only alternative to bankruptcy, the ISPs will all sign on, and in doing so will transfer most of their subscriber value to Google, which will act as a huge proxy server for the Internet. We won't know if we're accessing the Internet or Google and for all practical purposes it won't matter. Google will become our phone company, our cable company, our stereo system and our digital video recorder. Soon we won't be able to live without Google, which will have marginalized the ISPs and assumed most of the market capitalization of all the service providers it has undermined -- about $1 trillion in all -- which places today's $500 Google share price about eight times too low.
It's a grand plan, but can Google pull it off? Yes they can.
[Editor's Note: My thanks to Odd Sandvik for pointing out this piece.]
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by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8868>
URL: TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
Google has at last opened up its well-regarded Gmail email service to all comers, eliminating the need to receive an invitation from an existing user before signing up. It's been two years since the service launched, and it's still branded beta. The primarily Web-based Gmail remains free to use and currently offers over 2.5 GB of storage for each user, an amount that grows every day as Google brings more storage online.
<http://www.gmail.com/>
<http://mail.google.com/mail/help/intl/en/about.html>
Gmail provides POP3 access for people who prefer using traditional email clients over the Gmail Web interface, but still lacks IMAP, a popular alternative to POP3. The service has good spam filtering that accepts reports from its users, attachment viewing within the Web interface, and support for mobile phone email - you can read and reply to messages. Google Talk, the company's instant messaging and voice chat program, can be used within the Web interface, too.
Gmail can also forward incoming mail to another email address, send messages and replies using another return address, and fetch mail from up to five other non-Gmail accounts via POP.
What sets Gmail apart from other email services and clients is how rapid-response searches sit at the core of message archiving and organizing. Instead of filing messages in a folder, you apply one or more labels to incoming messages that exist in a general archive. The labels are the search equivalent of folders, and show up in a list in the left navigation bar. It's very much like the Smart Mailboxes feature in Apple Mail, only faster. You can also search quickly through your entire message archive; Gmail provides a list of matches with search terms highlighted, and messages threaded across an entire set of conversations so you can easily follow what was said and by whom.
<http://mail.google.com/mail/help/intl/en/why_gmail.html>
Gmail funds itself through what text ads that are theoretically relevant to the content of the message you're reading - a behavior that can be a little disconcerting. The ads are never inserted into the body text of either incoming or outgoing mail, however, unlike free mail from other firms.
Since I run my own mail server, I have only dabbled with Gmail. But reports from friends and colleagues who rely entirely on the service are highly positive, with them experiencing minimal downtime and speedy access. The main reason I haven't looked more seriously at Gmail is that I already have 2.3 GB of stored email, and I don't want to lose access to that archive. Gmail does enable import of contacts to provide access to laboriously created address books.
(The only way to import mail into Gmail that I can see is to redirect to the Gmail account, which isn't practical with hundreds of thousands of messages. Although utilities like Mark Lyon's free Google GMail Loader and Cheah Chu Yeow's free gExodus exist to automate the process, date stamps are lost in the transfer, rendering them useless for an email archive that spans 15 years.)
<http://www.marklyon.org/gmail/>
<http://blog.codefront.net/archives/2004/06/21/gexodus-a-graphical-gmail-import-tool>
Because Gmail is an extremely interactive Web application, it works only in a subset of common Web browsers, including (all version numbers are the earliest supported version) Safari 1.2.1, Firefox 0.8, Mozilla 1.4, and Netscape 7.1. Web-based chat requires Firefox 1.0 or later. Gmail does offer a basic HTML view for other browsers, but, honestly, there's not much point in using Gmail if you can't take advantage of the full interactive interface.
If you've been looking for another email service, it's worth giving Gmail a try. You can even set up multiple addresses using your own domain using the Google Apps for Your Domain service. In particular, if you've been having trouble receiving TidBITS due to overactive spam filtering or other delivery problems, Gmail could be a good alternative. (Our new bounce processing code sends you warnings when your account has bounced too many messages, and you can manage your subscriptions and addresses with our new Manage Mailing List Subscriptions interface.)
<http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/overview.html>
<http://www.tidbits.com/list/>
URL: http://www.onthemedia.org/transcripts/2007/03/02/04
Cell phones allow you to run your world from the backyard or the back of a cab. But there are still simple things that you just can't do.
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/08/AR2007020802169.html>
Columbia law professor Tim Wu says that if wireless carriers wanted to, they could give customers much more. Industry rep Chris Guttman McCabe disagrees.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: In the U.S. today there are two hundred million cell phone subscribers. The wireless industry has grown up in the last decade, so it's a good time to ask, how's it doing? Columbia law professor Tim Wu says, not so good. Yes, we have service at competitive prices, but we could have so much more.
We don't, says Wu, because the big wireless carriers, Verizon, Cingular, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile have a stranglehold on product design. In a paper he presented to the Federal Trade Commission, Wu details many of the improvements we could enjoy if the wireless carriers let us.
For example, we could more easily transfer photos or browse the Net, or even keep track of how much we talk. We can't, because the carriers are engaged in what Wu calls "feature crippling."
PROFESSOR WU: There's often cases where a phone is technologically capable of doing quite a bit, but carriers, because of their business model, a fear of losing revenue or potential fear of losing control, won't let the feature be on the telephone and will force the equipment manufacturers not to allow the telephone to do something. That's crippling.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And you give us a couple of examples in your paper. I have to say, when I was reading through it, I got angrier and angrier, so let's go through a couple.
The first, call timers on telephones--what are they, are why don't we have them?
PROFESSOR WU: Well, you know, some of the device manufacturers think it would be handy to have something that keeps track of how much time you've used per month, you know, per day. You can monitor your own usage.
Phone carriers have acted to prevent consumers from having their own records of how long they've been speaking on their telephones.
It's a little bit like, you know, when you're in a casino in Las Vegas, they don't really want you to know how long you've been there, and so there's been a lot of crippling, or disabling, of phone timers for the full capabilities they could have.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And why don't they want us to know?
PROFESSOR WU: Well, there's I guess the possibility you could generate an independent record of your billing, and you could compare that with he bill you're sent, and you could say that, you know, I actually didn't talk this much on my phone, and you know, why would a carrier want that?
BROOKE GLADSTONE: That's why I got so angry. And you also talked about access to WiFi and web browsers and GPS and Bluetooth technology.
PROFESSOR WU: Ah! Bluetooth was promised to make it easy for phones to communicate with other things, computers, printers. It's really hard, believe it or not, just to get your cell phone to talk to your computer, for something as simple as just backing up your address book, so if you lose your phone, you've got a backup.
Under a lot of carriers' constructions today, Bluetooth is almost completely crippled. You can't send music back and forth. It's very hard to send photos from your phone to your, all, again, because there's a fear of losing control and there's a fear of crippling some potential business model that revolves around charging you to do something with your phone.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: I would assume that a lot of these technological advances are being hatched at the places where they make phones--Motorola, Nokia. Why aren't they putting some pressure on the carriers?
PROFESSOR WU: You know, they try, but they're sort of living in a state of fear, because they depend on being sold by the carriers. You know, the carriers have an almost complete grip on the retailing of phones in this country. They're responsible for over 90 per cent of the retailing of phones, and so, you know, people actually did talk to me secretly [LAUGHS].
I'll quote a developer. "The carriers have all the power in this area. What they say goes."
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Now, you say that in the world of wired phones, the policies of these carriers would be, in some cases, not just outrageous but possibly illegal. So could you take us back to the era before the mobile phone, when a similar battle was being fought over land lines?
PROFESSOR WU: Sure. So in the 1950s, 1960s, the Bell Company would not allow you to hook up anything to their phone network. You know, you had to use a Bell phone and only a Bell phone. There was no such thing as consumers hooking up an answering machine, a Mickey Mouse telephone. This was not allowed.
There was a large revolution in the late '60s, along with other revolutions. [LAUGHS] The outcome of this consumer revolution was something called, technically, the Carter phone Rule, but more clearly, as a consumer's right to attach anything they want to their phone network, whether it's a strange phone, whether, more importantly, it's a modem, whether it's an answering machine.
And consumers don't have that right, in the wireless world. You don't have the same consumer right to attach. It may sound very technical [LAUGHS], but that consumer right to attach modems in the 1970s and '80s is what led to the birth of the entire Internet in the first place.
But I'm suggesting that if consumers have that right to use their mobile service for what they want to use it for, we will see a similar revolution and a similar blossoming that we saw in the Internet in the 1990s.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Even if you're not technically inclined, you can see the limitations of this lockdown. For instance, if you buy a phone that you really like and you change carriers, your phone is locked up. You have to buy a new phone. You can't take it with you, and you wrote in your paper that it would be very easy to unlock these phones. They're simply not permitted to.
And that leads to a question that I think a lot of consumers have had about Apple's much bally-hooed iPhone. You can't use it, unless you subscribe to Cingular, an AT&T service, right?
PROFESSOR WU: I think that's right, and I think it was a surprise to a lot of people. You know, you think Apple had this great new product and, you know, it turns out it's locked to Cingular's network.
Now that may change. I'm hoping the consumer pressure will lead to a world where you see your phone as something that you own [LAUGHS], not the carrier. You own. I mean, you pay for it, and then you can bring it and say, listen, I've got this great phone, or this great device, and I want to use it.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Now, back before the Carter phone decision, AT&T was saying if you don't have a unified system, it just won't work. And that system is AT&T.
Now the carriers are saying, you don't need to be re-regulating us, you don't need to be telling us what to do. There's so much competition in the mobile phone market that this situation will correct itself. Well, isn't there? And won't it?
PROFESSOR WU: I think there's always a role for consumer rights, no matter how competitive an industry is, and the truth is, it's not a truly competitive industry in any case.
The spectrum that they depend upon is government property, which they lease. There's really only four major players who have the tens of billions of dollars required to be in this market in the first place.
We're not talking about the vodka market. We're not talking about blue jeans. We're talking about a government supervised spectrum-based oligopoly, which is doing things that are not good for consumers, and I think, you know, to say, well, we've got competition, forget about it, is just not an answer to the things we've identified in this study.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: But you've also said that comprehensive legislation should only be used as a last resort, so what do you recommend in the short term?
PROFESSOR WU: The most important power is consumer pressure. The industry likes to say everything is competitive, everything's fine. You know, they love to keep things as they are. They like the current model.
The only thing that pushes them, besides government, is consumer knowledge, consumer pressure, and if people get more and want more out of their cell phones, they will eventually get more. That's the most powerful force out here, is the force of the educated consumer.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Tim, thanks so much.
PROFESSOR WU: It's always a pleasure.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Tim Wu is a professor at Columbia Law School. We'll link to his paper, Wireless Net Neutrality, from our site onthemedia.org.
<http://www.timwu.org/log/archives/92>
So we just heard Tim say that phone developers have told him, off the record, that they're hamstrung by wireless carriers who shun certain kinds of upgrades. So I put it to Chris Guttman McCabe, the vice-president of regulatory affairs for CTIA, The Wireless Association.
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: You know, I haven't seen any of those statements on the record. We haven't seen any complaints like that, but what I would say is that we have an industry where there are constantly new carriers entering the market. So in addition to the four large carriers, we just had three other carriers spend several billion dollars to enter a market that is competitive.
We just saw a new handset manufacturer, Apple, move into this space, so I would challenge, you know, you or your audience to find an industry that is more competitive, particularly in the telecommunications space, than what we have here in the wireless industry.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: But why do we have to pay extra for text messages, or for sending photos? Why aren't our cell phones in fluid conversation with our computers, via Bluetooth?
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: When it comes to things like text messaging and use of pictures, carriers charge different things and they are completely subject to the market.
If they are pricing outside of where the market is, then they're going to lose customers.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: If competition really were the solution, it would have brought forth the kind of services that people say they want every day.
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: You know, in a perfect world, from a consumer's perspective, you would be able to get every product and service that you want at no cost. But the reality is, in a competitive environment, you let the market dictate.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Chris, if the Carter phone decision regarding land lines made sense--of course, we should be allowed to buy any phone and answering machine we like and plug them into a phone jack-why should any other standard be justified for mobile phones?
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: I would start from the premise that there isn't a need for regulation unless there's a failure, a market failure. When you had the Carter phone decision, you had a vertically integrated monopoly, so you had one provider providing both the network and the service offerings, but also providing the technology that you use, the phones and the handsets.
In this case, you have multiple providers using multiple handset manufacturers, within and outside the United States. You have, for all intents and purposes, exactly what government wants. You have an ultra-competitive industry.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Why can't we have call timers?
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: You know, if that is something that's wanted, then that will happen. Carriers didn't have cameras in their phones two or three years ago. Now almost every single phone has it.
So you know, our carriers absolutely listen to the customers. They do surveys. They reach out. And the reason they do is because it's in their best interest to serve their customers.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Customers want call timers, and despite the confusion among the various cost plans, they would be able to use their call timers to compare their usage with their bills. The carriers don't want them on the phones, and so the manufacturers don't provide them.
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: And I would argue that, as I said, that in a competitive environment, if something is wanted by consumers, someone will provide it, either a niche service provider or one of the large providers.
T- Mobile's service offerings are different than Verizon's, which are different than Cingular's, which are different that, you know, Sprint Nextel's and Alltel's. And each of them try to identify where consumer wants and requests and needs are, and they try to fill it.
And if they're not, the consumer will move. They'll leave, and they'll go to another carrier.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Chris, thank you very much.
CHRIS GUTTMAN McCABE: Brooke, I appreciate it. Thank you.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Chris Guttman McCabe is the vice-president of regulatory affairs for CTIA, The Wireless Association.
[Editor's Note:
Tim Wu
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Wu>
Tim Wu is a professor at Columbia Law School and a writer for Slate Magazine. He is best known for popularizing the concept of network neutrality. Professor Wu's specialty is copyright and telecommunications policy. He has a well-known series of articles on network neutrality, and is often credited with coining the term. For his work in this area, Professor Wu was named one of Scientific American's 50 people of the year in 2006.
Tim Wu's Home Page
<http://www.timwu.org/>
Why You Should Care About Network Neutrality: The future of the Internet depends on
it!
By Tim Wu
<http://www.slate.com/id/2140850/>
Chris Guttman McCabe
CTIA, About Us entry
<http://www.ctia.org/aboutCTIA/leadership_team/index.cfm/AID/10280>
Since joining CTIA in 2001, Chris Guttman-McCabe has worked on a wide range of issues involving spectrum, regulatory mandates, and homeland security. Guttman-McCabe became Vice President for Regulatory Affairs in September, 2005, and in that capacity coordinates the association's regulatory policy advocacy.
Paul Thurrott
URL: http://www.wininformant.com/
For the first time since September 2005, Microsoft will issue no patches on its regularly scheduled monthly patch day, set for March 13. This is interesting, since the software giant is currently investigating almost a dozen vulnerabilities in various products. Microsoft explains: "There are many factors that impact the length of time between the discovery of a vulnerability and the release of a security update, and every vulnerability presents its own unique challenges," a Microsoft spokesperson said. "Microsoft continues to investigate potential and existing vulnerabilities in an effort to help protect our customers. Creating security updates that effectively and comprehensively fix vulnerabilities is an extensive process involving a series of sequential steps. All updates need to meet testing standards in order to be released. This ensures that our customers can confidently install these updates in their environment." There you go.
Apple Ships iTunes 7.1 with Partial Vista CompatibilityApple this week shipped a slightly updated version of its iTunes digital music jukebox, version 7.1, that addresses some (but not all) of the compatibility issues the software has with Windows Vista. Apple iTunes 7.1 might be enough for Vista users who were frustrated that the software wasn't working properly before (especially with iPod synchronization), but there are still a few issues, including iPod ejecting from Windows Explorer, incorrectly displayed graphics and text, contacts syncing, and 64-bit support. Hey, at least they're trying. It's not like Vista has been out for months or anything.
Corel Treads Where Microsoft Dares NotMicrosoft has zealously resisted migrating its popular office productivity suite to the Web in recent years, but its competitors are showing a lot less resistance. Case in point: This week, WordPerfect owner Corel announced the public beta of WordPerfect Lightning, a free, downloadable office productivity suite that tightly integrates with online collaboration and storage services. WordPerfect Lightning is a hybrid suite with components that exist on both PCs and the Internet. (Microsoft Office, by comparison, is purely a traditional desktop PC suite.) WordPerfect Lightning isn't a full office productivity suite per se, but it's an interesting start. It's also something Microsoft should have done, oh, four years ago.
Tackling Some Stupidity About Vista's Success in the MarketThere's been a weird set of stories making the rounds this week noting that Windows Vista retails sales are off considerably when compared to XP sales in the same time period after each products' launch. Does this mean Vista is off to a bad start? Of course not: Vista is that all-important gift to the entire PC industry, a feat of marketing we haven't witnessed since Windows 95. Put another way, Vista is causing people to buy new PCs, so most people aren't upgrading, they're simply getting new hardware. Bill Gates, responding to these ridiculous sales claims this week said, "I don't know what you mean. Vista's had an incredible reception." Sounds about right to me.
ToC
Author: Kyle Pott
Posted: Wednesday, March 7th, 2007 at 10:00 am
URL: http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/top-10-firefox-extensions-to-improve-your-productivity.html
Firefox is the browser of dreams for many people (myself included). One of the great perks of Firefox is that there are tons of extensions that enhance the functionality of the browser. With over 1500 extensions in existence, there are many that can be used to improve your productivity. The following is my take on the top 10 extensions that will keep you focused, reduce distractions, streamline your daily work flow, and improve your productivity.
1. Customize Google (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/743/)Customize Google is a very robust extension that lets you customize many features of the services provided by Google. Customize Google lets you block advertisements on pretty much any Google page (including Gmail). It remaps Google Images search results to point directly at the images (no longer will you need to click through the originating site). Customize Google lets you add links from other search engines directly into your search results. It can also block Google click tracking and allows you to connect to Google Calendar and Gmail securely (https). Give it a try, you wonât be sorry.
2. Gspace (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1593/)Gspace is a content management extension that lets you turn your Gmail account into an online mass storage device. Gspace integrates nicely into your browser and lets you drag and drop files into Gmail for backup or storage purposes without interrupting your work flow. If you use Gspace, I recommend adding a tag in Gmail to your files so they can be filtered and accessed quickly. The following is the description of Gspace from its homepage: "Gspace turns the 2GB of your Gmail account into free online storage. With Gspace you can manage unlimited Gmail accounts to store all type of files within its simple, user friendly interface. Listen to your favorite stored music directly from your Gspace, view your collections of pictures and manage your Gdrive files as well. Download Gspace now and transfer files between your computer and Gspace at anytime, from everywhere!"
3. Flashgot (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/220/) / DownThemAll (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/201/)The default download manager built into Firefox is very handy; however, there are many occasions that you'll find that you need more flexibility with your downloads. This is where Flashgot or DownThemAll comes in handy. The features of Flashgot and DownThemAll have their differences; however, they generally provide finer-grained control of your downloads. My personal preference is Flashgot. I recommend trying at least one of them.
4. Greasemonkey (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/748/) + Stylish (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/2108/) + Ad blocking per Gozer (http://userstyles.org/style/show/629)Greasemonkey is an extension that lets you add scripts that alter the web pages you visit. Using Greasemonkey and Stylish and Ad blocking per Gozer together will block pretty much every advertisement from any Web site you visit.
5. Flashblock (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/433/)The Flashblock extension by default blocks flash from playing when a Web page is first opened. Most (distracting) advertisements are written using flash. Flashblock is particularly useful because it replaces the flash from a Web site with a "play" button so you can watch the flash if it something useful (like a video at Youtube) and leave it blocked if it is an advertisement.
6. Download Statusbar (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/26/)Download Statusbar manages your downloads in the status bar instead of the Firefox Download Manager. I find that the download manager that comes with Firefox to be very intrusive. Download manager tucks your download progress bars into the generally unused status bar of Firefox. This lets you download care-free without the Firefox Download Manager popping up and interrupting you.
7. URL Fixer (http://www.efinke.com/addons/url-fixer/)URL fixer will replace the common typos you enter when typing a Web site into the URL bar (i.e., http://www.lifehack.rog, htp://lifehack.org). The auto correct feature of URL fixer is very helpful. "[URL Fixer] will correct common misspellings of .com, .net, .org, .edu, .gov, and .mil, as well as the protocol (http:, https:). It will also correct errors in country code TLDS such as .com.XX, .net.XX, and .org.XX."
8. Tab Mix Plus (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1122/)Many of the features of Tab Mix Plus were incorporated into the release of Firefox 2. However, Tab Mix Plus allows you to add finer-grained control of your tabs. The following is a description of Tab Mix Plus: "Tab Mix Plus enhances Firefox's tab browsing capabilities. It includes such features as duplicating tabs, controlling tab focus, tab clicking options, undo closed tabs and windows, plus much more. It also includes a full-featured session manager with crash recovery that can save and restore combinations of opened tabs and windows."
9. Scrapbook (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/427/)Scrapbook is extremely useful for researchers and students. Scrapbook saves blurbs from Web pages to your hard drive along with the URL of the originating Web site. It allows you to organize and categorize your blurbs in a format similar to your bookmarks so that when it comes to creating a bibliography or works cited, you won't waste any time.
10. IE Tab (https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/1419/)I find myself using this extension less and less as more Web developers code their Web sites following standards. However, occasionally you will find it necessary to open a Web site using Internet Explorer in order for it to render correctly. Rather than taking the time to launch a separate browser, just choose "View Page in IE tab" and an Internet Explorer tab opens in Firefox. This is very useful if you like to have multiple Gmail accounts open and active on one computer.
That's my take on the extensions that will improve your productivity. Like I previously mentioned, there are tons of Firefox extensions. What extension didnât I mention that you canât live without? Please tell us about your favorite productivity-enhancing Firefox extension in the comments.
ToC
Panda advises protection
By INQUIRER newsdesk: Thursday 08 March 2007, 17:55
URL: http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38101
INSECURITY FIRM PandaLabs reported registering a 62 per cent annual increase in rootkit activity in 2006, and says the outlook for 2007 is bleak.
The firm reckons amount of malicious code using rootkit techniques is already up 25 per cent on last year and predicts an overall increase this year of around 40 per cent.
According to the Panda league of the most dangerous threats, February's malware includes three rootkit horrors: Bagle.HX, Abwiz.A and Nurech.A.
"Rootkits are becoming increasingly popular among malware creators, particularly for spyware and banker Trojans," said a spokesPanda.
Rootkits can evade detection by traditional antivirus and anti-spyware security systems, and are therefore right dodgy, he said.
Proactive protection is needed to block the threats based on the malicious code, he recommends. Like the stuff Panda makes.
ToC
Paul Thurrott
URL: http://www.windowsitpro.com/windowspaulthurrott/Article/ArticleID/95367/windowspaulthurrott_95367.html
With Apple teetering towards bankruptcy in 1997 and in desperate need of financial aid and help from its partners, top executives at Microsoft reviewed an upcoming version of Mac Office (which eventually shipped as Mac Office 98) and made impassioned pleas for its release, despite Apple's declining market share and falling revenues in Microsoft's Mac Business Unit (MBU). These details came to light in recent court disclosures related to Microsoft's Iowa class action lawsuit. And they paint a decidedly unfamiliar portrait of a corporate super giant who is more infamous for stepping on competitors than aiding them.
Of course, that's not how the Mac community sees things. And it's time for this silliness to stop.
According to Computerworld, these documents have resulted in "yet more criticism of Microsoft's business practices" because they demonstrated that Microsoft "considered abandoning Office for Mac in order to cause 'a great deal of harm' to Apple." That sounds sensational, damning. Let's see what the documents really say.
In a June 1997 email exchange between then-Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and MBU chief Ben Waldman, Gates thanks Waldman for showing "the kind of passion about great products that has made Microsoft successful." "I admit we have neglected the Mac business," Gates wrote. "Although the Mac is declining if we move ahead on this product we should ask for the [subsidiaries] with localized product to make a real effort."
If you think Gates come off as a real jerk, consider what he was responding to. Waldman had told Gates previously that the pace of discussions with Apple had frustrated many at the MBU, who were eager to get the next Mac Office out the door. "The threat to cancel Mac Office 97 is certainly the strongest bargaining point we have, as doing so will do a great deal of harm to Apple immediately," Waldman said. "Regardless of the outcome of these discussions, though, I believe we should ship Mac Office [98]."
Waldman then describes why, in length, and it's obvious he's quite proud of what the MBU had accomplished with that release. Mac Office 98 was "a good product ... one [Microsoft] can feel good about, and that will be well received by customers, press, and analysts" Waldman explained. It included dramatically better performance, "FAR" simpler deployment and maintenance thanks to a drag-and-drop installer, good migration support for Mac Word 5.1 (then considered the last decent Mac version of Word), support for various Mac-specific technologies, integration with Microsoft's Mac-oriented Web browser and email products, and other features. It was, in other words, an exceptional Mac product.
"We are close to shipping," Waldman continued, and "the team is motivated." He noted that previous attempts to cancel Mac Office had had a terrible effect on the MBU, and that canceling it at the time of the email exchange would be "devastating." And while he admitted that a lack of plans for the future created a morale issue, "People are enthusiastic and believe in our vision of creating a great product and making a difference."
As you can see, Waldman, too, comes off as a real jerk. You know, the kind of guy that wants to stick it to the Mac community.
Wait, you didn't get that from the email exchange? Odd. Because every Mac-oriented publication on earth, from what I can tell, has cited this email exchange as an example of Microsoft's ongoing efforts to keep Apple down. Computerworld, for example, also reported that Microsoft was using Mac users as "guinea pigs" to test features that would later appear in Windows versions of Office, as if getting features first were somehow a bad thing. (Microsoft actually promotes these features as its "Mac-First" innovations.) Other publications and Mac news sites played up the threat to shut down Mac Office, which frankly would have made good business sense given that revenues from Mac Office fell from $200 million to $150 million between 1996 and 1997 as Apple teetered toward a bleak finish that, ultimately, never happened.
What did happened is that Microsoft invested $150 million in Apple about six weeks after this email exchange, announced its intention to develop an OS X-based version of Mac Office going forward, and pledged to keep making new Office versions for five more years. Today, Microsoft is working on yet another version of Mac Office that will ship late this year. (And Apple, of course, rebounded, partly because of help from Microsoft and others, partly because of the iMac, and, years later, thanks to the iPod.)
Now, Microsoft's actions on behalf of Apple were somewhat self-serving: As part of wide-ranging set of agreements with the struggling Apple that year, Apple agreed to bundle Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser with Mac OS. And I have little doubt that Microsoft was propping up its sole viable OS competitor during a time in which its antitrust troubles were heating up. But Microsoft is a publicly held company, not a charity: Obviously, it would bargain with other companies as effectively as possible. To not do so would be negligent. To suggest that their actions were anything less than prudent is, therefore, naive.
More important, we have that email record that everyone is so excited about. What it shows to me is a company dedicated to making great products and, yes, supporting then-struggling Apple with the best version of Office Microsoft had yet created. Don't believe me? You can read it yourself. My guess is you'll come away with a less dramatic version of history than the Mac fanatics are pushing.
ToC
[Editor's Note: My thanks to Kevin Hisel for the contributions to this section of the newsletter.]
ToC
By Anne Broache
Story last modified Mon Jan 29 06:51:48 PST 2007
URL: http://news.com.com/Did+Microsoft+want+to+whack+Dell+over+its+Linux+dealings/2100-1014_3-6153904.html
Barely a week after a U.S. judge approved a landmark antitrust agreement with Microsoft, company executives were swapping e-mails suggesting Dell deserved a beating for its growing interest in Linux, according to documents filed with a state court.
But Redmond representatives said Friday that the 2002 exchange, made public this week as part of an antitrust suit unfolding in Iowa state court, only tells part of the story. They said it omits evidence that Microsoft executives were simultaneously seeking legal advice on how to ensure they were responding to such competitive threats without shirking their antitrust responsibilities.
The e-mail thread (PDF), which occurred over three days in November 2002, showed up in the latest batch of court exhibits posted to a Web site maintained by attorneys representing a class of Iowa consumers embroiled in an ongoing antitrust suit against the Windows maker. It was reported earlier by Bloomberg News.
In the first e-mail, Bill Veghte, now a company vice president, described a panel discussion he had recently attended in which a Dell executive boasted that the company was the top distributor of the open-source operating system among equipment manufacturers and was "committed to seeing that position grow."
Veghte and others went on to express concern about the competitive threat potentially posed by Linux and Red Hat.
"We should whack them, we should make sure they understand our value," wrote Paul Flessner, a senior vice president in Microsoft's server applications unit.
U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in Washington, D.C., had approved most of the federal government's antitrust decree with Microsoft about a week before the exchange began.
Microsoft spokesman Jack Evans on Friday downplayed the messages.
"While this may sound provocative, what counts at the end of the day is what actually happened," he said. "Looking at subsequent portions of this e-mail thread, which the plaintiffs chose to exclude from their exhibits, it's evident that we didn't take any retaliatory action against Dell. In fact, we very clearly increased our investment with Dell."
Participants in the same e-mail thread also sought confidential legal advice about how to proceed in such situations where competitive threats existed, given the limits imposed by Microsoft's antitrust agreements, Evans added.
The Iowa suit, filed in February 2000 on behalf of a businessman in the state, is one of the last remaining state antitrust proceedings against Microsoft. The company has already reached settlements in 17 states and had class-action suits dismissed or decertified in 18 others.
The Iowa case is unique because it allows consumers, as opposed to just equipment manufacturers, to sue Microsoft directly. The class, which is made up of the so-called "indirect" purchasers of Microsoft's operating-system software and of its applications software including Word and Excel, seeks $330 million in damages. The trial, which began in December, is expected to last at least six months.
Microsoft has reportedly turned over 25 million pages of documents to Iowa prosecutors, and it has already had to do some explaining to the public about what they contain.
In December, the blogosphere took note of a 2004 memo (PDF) in which retiring Windows chief Jim Allchin professed, "I would buy a Mac today if I was not working at Microsoft." (He later said he was being "purposefully dramatic.")
The plaintiffs have already uploaded thousands of pages for public consumption. A spokesman for the plaintiffs said more are likely to be on the way, as the court admits them as evidence.
[Editor's Note: My thanks to Tony Cooke for the contribution of this article to the newsletter.]
ToC
Could HP be approaching factory-loaded Linux desktops or notebooks? With several thousand custom orders coming in for such configurations and an obvious open community (as seen by Dell's public feedback forum), it's a definite possibility. Management at HP has commented on the situation, saying they are considering offering standard systems with a preloaded distro of Linux, which would be an industry first for desktops and notebooks. - TechSpot
<http://www.techspot.com/news/24571-hp-considering-factoryloaded-linux-desktops-and-notebooks.html>
ToC
Most believed Associate General Counsel Thomas Rubin's speech before a book conference -- as well as his opinion piece in the Financial Times -- had a lot more to do with Microsoft's vicious competition with Google than about solid legal arguments. - Law.com
<http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1173175410197>
ToC
Thursday, March 08 2007 @ 12:43 AM EST
A U.S. judge ruled that Google's 3D modelling software, which gives Web users an astronaut's view of the earth and allows them to zoom down to street level, does not infringe the patent of a rival.
Judge Douglas Woodlock of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in Boston denied a complaint by Skyline Software Systems that the Google Earth mapping software of Google's Keyhole infringed Skyline patents. - Reuters
<http://uk.reuters.com/article/technologyNews/idUKN0727910320070308>
ToC
Wednesday, March 07 2007 @ 02:14 PM EST
Bowen said he's in talks with the aviation safety agency's main hardware supplier, Dell Computer, to determine if it could deliver Linux-based computers capable of accessing Google Apps through a non-Microsoft browser once the FAA's XP-based computers pass their shelf life. - Paul McDougall, Information Week
<http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=197800480>
ToC
Wednesday, March 07 2007 @ 02:14 AM EST
The songs will only be free through the first few downloads, and will start to rise after that. But even at full price, listeners are getting quality music, DRM-free. Let's hope other labels follow Nettwerk shortly. Market driven prices and no DRM = Music Nirvana. - Tech Crunch
<http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/03/05/barenaked-ladies-new-album-free-no-drm-now/>
ToC
Monday, March 05 2007 @ 07:47 AM EST
How would you like to study at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) for free? It has been nearly six years since MIT first announced their MIT OpenCourseWare (OCW) program. More recently, MIT announced that the OCW program, a free and open educational resource (OER) for educators, students, and self-learners around the world, is online and will be completed by 2008. The OCW provides open access to course materials for up to 1,550 MIT courses, representing 34 departments and all five MIT schools. The goal is to include materials from all MIT courses by next year.
MIT provides just one of the 10 open source educational success stories detailed below. Open source and open access resources have changed how colleges, organizations, instructors, and prospective students use software, operating systems and online documents for educational purposes. - Online Education Database
ToC
[Editor's Note: My thanks to Allen Byrne for the contributions to this section of the newsletter.]
ToC
by Glenn Fleishman <glenn@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8892>
We often wonder how many of us there are. While Apple occasionally shares the number of active Mac OS X users, it has been a while since the last update. Eight months ago in August 2006 at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, Steve Jobs said there were 19 million active Mac OS X users. Keith Bachman, an analyst at Bank of America Securities, now quotes a higher number in an AppleInsider article: 22 million users of all versions of Mac OS X. Bank of America Securities estimates an increase of 6 million Mac users since the release of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger in June 2005. It's also highly likely that there are uncounted millions of users still using Mac OS 9 and earlier.
<http://www.engadget.com/2006/08/07/live-from-wwdc-2006-steve-jobs-keynote/>
<http://www.appleinsider.com/article.php?id=2541>
by Glenn Fleishman <glenn@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#868/26-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8877>
Apple and Cisco have reached an agreement on the use of the iPhone name. Cisco surprised the Mac world when their Linksys division released and rebranded a variety of Internet Protocol (IP) phones under the name iPhone in December 2006. Cisco had acquired the trademark via a company they purchased in 2000, and claimed to own the term in the realm of phones. The iPhone name was widely rumored for years to be attached to a project of Apple's devising.
Then, Apple likewise surprised everyone by announcing an iPhone at Macworld Expo in January 2007 (see "iPhone Seeks to Redefine the Mobile Phone," 2007-01-15). Almost immediately, Cisco filed a lawsuit, saying that it had been in negotiations over Apple's use of the name and asserting its rights. Apple called the lawsuit "silly."
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8810>
<http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2007/corp_011007.html>
Both parties entered into settlement talks quickly. The agreement announced on 21-Feb-07 states that both parties recognize trademark rights that have been granted, and both can use the iPhone trademark on their products worldwide. Both Apple and Cisco will dismiss all legal actions against each other, and will work on interoperability, without any specific agreements.
<http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/02/21iphone.html>
No mention of actual cash money was mentioned, and it's entirely possible none was involved. This is pure speculation, but Cisco may have used the opportunity to force a bit more light into Apple's crevices to achieve better compatibility for its wide array of consumer and corporate gear, which could benefit its customers and bottom line.
What this deal means is that Apple's iPhone gets to be the Apple iPhone, although, due to the vagaries of how trademarks work, we might see it more commonly called - at least by Apple - "the Apple iPhone cell phone, music player, and Internet communicator."
ToC
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#866/12-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8856>
In an unprecedented move, Apple last week posted on the company Web site an open letter from Steve Jobs entitled "Thoughts on Music." That Apple chose the open letter approach is interesting, but sensible, since there isn't really a conventional format for a company to express an opinion or take a position other than a press release, and the letter was aimed, as we'll see, at many audiences other than the press. I'm a bit surprised that Apple didn't choose to film Jobs talking instead (or at least in addition to posting the letter). Why not harness the Reality Distortion Field when your CEO controls it? Such a video would have become an instant hit via iTunes and YouTube, further spreading Apple's message.
<http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughtsonmusic/>
Video or no video, you can and should read the full letter, which makes a number of interesting and relevant points about the current state of the music industry, digital rights management (DRM), and Apple's role in the world.
First, Apple was forced to create and use FairPlay DRM when selling music on the iTunes Store because that was the only way the big music companies would agree to license their music to Apple. However, perhaps due to the music companies not realizing the potential size of the online market, Apple was initially able to negotiate pretty good terms, which accounts for FairPlay-encrypted tracks working on up to five computers and unlimited iPods, enabling burning to audio CDs from the same playlist some number of times, and so on. (Also, iTunes ran only on Macs at the time, so Apple was able to convince the music companies that the platform's small market share ensured that if the experiment were a failure, they wouldn't have lost much.) Apple may have benefited early on from the way FairPlay locks iTunes Store users into using iPods, but Jobs claims that on average, only about 2 percent of music on iPods was purchased from the iTunes Store (of course, that's a weak argument for any individual who happens to have purchased a lot of music from the iTunes Store, but no one was forced to buy from Apple). Plus, remember that before the opening of the iTunes Store, Apple was running its "Rip, Mix, and Burn" commercials, which were widely seen as tweaking the recording industry.
Second, if FairPlay were breached, Apple would have to fix it in a very short time or risk losing its ability to sell music on the iTunes Store. There have been several breaches of FairPlay that Apple has resolved quickly - thanks to the company controlling all portions of the media-purchasing and playing process - but on the whole, FairPlay's protections have remained intact. That may be in part due to it having reasonable conditions, unlike many other DRM systems. But with 70 percent of the market, Apple certainly isn't escaping attention by being a small player, as is often stated as a reason for the paucity of exploits aimed at Mac OS X. That said, Jobs unfairly equates the desire to break FairPlay to the desire to steal music, conveniently ignoring how many people are both philosophically and practically offended by DRM and how it limits their fair use rights.
Third, were Apple to license FairPlay to other manufacturers, the likelihood of a license-endangering breach and the difficulty of implementing a quick fix goes up, as the number of people in different companies with access to code and encryption keys increases along with the number of devices available to crack. That worry is not unfounded; it was by hackers disassembling the object code of the Xing DVD player that the Content Scrambling System (CSS) protecting DVD movies was broken. And while Apple could in theory license other forms of DRM from Microsoft and others to enable iPods to be used with other online music stores, the general consensus among industry insiders is that it would be a cold day in hell before that would happen (though you can never count out global climate change affecting the netherworld; see the linked picture). Plus, unlike releasing iTunes and the iPod for Windows, it's unclear how licensing Microsoft DRM would benefit Apple, given that most of the online music stores have significant overlap in their catalogs. The primary benefit to users would involve being able to choose an online music store that offers a subscription plan, which Apple has steadfastly avoided with the iTunes Store. (Of course, subscription plans require DRM, because otherwise you could keep forever everything you heard once, so eliminating DRM would also destroy that entire business model.)
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DeCSS>
<http://usdev01.esolutionnow.com/pub/jake/iTunes%20for%20Windows.gif>
Fourth, although Apple owns 70 percent of the online music market today, with companies like Microsoft and Sony entering the fray with similar proprietary music stores selling DRM-protected content that plays on only specific music players, Apple sees no problem with its dominant position (no surprise there). Jobs also points out that because only 2 percent of music on the average iPod has been purchased from the iTunes Store (the remainder being unprotected MP3s ripped from CDs or purchased online from unprotected sources), it's disingenuous to portray Apple as locking iPod users into using the iTunes Store. And something he doesn't say is that it's easy - if extra work - to remove FairPlay by burning protected tracks to an audio CD, after which they could be transferred to any other music player.
Fifth, and this is undoubtedly the most interesting point, Jobs states unequivocally that Apple would prefer that all music sold online was DRM-free, because it would be better for customers who want to use alternative music stores or alternative music players. What he doesn't say is that it would also be easier for Apple, which wouldn't have to maintain and update FairPlay constantly. It would also be better for competition, eliminating what little lock-in currently exists between a particular music store and its associated player. Given how Apple essentially created the portable music player market with the iPod (not the first, but so much better than its predecessors that it might as well have been) and the online music market (by integrating the iTunes Store into iTunes itself), I don't think Apple fears competition at all, and may even welcome it as an encouragement to innovation.
Sixth and lastly, Jobs points out that while fewer than 2 billion protected tracks were sold online in 2006, the music companies sold over 20 billion songs in completely unprotected form via conventional CDs. He uses this fact to point the finger of blame at the music companies themselves for furthering illegal music copying. This is in fact a tricky argument, because it can be used either to push for removing DRM restrictions on music sold online or for increasing restrictions on physical media. Efforts to use copy prevention technologies on CDs have failed, partially through technical ineptitude (they simply didn't work), and partially through utter stupidity, as in the case of the Sony BMG rootkit scandal, in which Sony intentionally installed spyware on Windows PCs when a protected CD was played.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_Sony_BMG_CD_copy_protection_scandal>
Response among our sources has been interesting. Many don't feel that Apple is saying anything new, but I'm not sure I agree. Apple has never before come out against DRM in music so plainly. Also, even if these attitudes aren't completely new, Apple hasn't previously shown such aggressiveness in promoting them and assigning the blame for DRM to the music companies. It's possible that the letter is in part a PR effort to paint Apple as a friend of the consumer, in contrast with the big bad music companies, thus giving Apple the high moral ground with customers and establishing Apple's position in advance of any large-scale movement on the part of the music companies to offer unprotected tracks via other online services, as EMI has done with Yahoo.
<http://news.digitaltrends.com/article11874.html>
Interestingly, video is never mentioned in the letter. Jobs has always seemed to consider music and video differently, perhaps because of his association with Pixar, and it's also certainly true that Apple is by no means in the same powerful negotiating position with the movie studios as it is with the music companies. Plus, all commercial DVDs are nominally protected against copying by CSS, and bandwidth limitations have slowed large-scale sharing of video content.
But again, why now, and to whom is the letter targeted? It's almost certainly a response to the Consumer Council of Norway's complaint against Apple with regard to the End User License Agreement (EULA) with which iTunes customers must agree. Among the criticisms (many of which are legitimate) is the concern about interoperability - songs purchased on the iTunes Store cannot be played on other devices (the conversion step I outlined previously is never mentioned). In essence, Apple is saying to Norway and the other European countries, "Look, this DRM wasn't our idea, and without it, we couldn't maintain the licenses that enable us to be in business. But we'd happily drop the DRM if we could; go talk to the music companies about that." If push comes to shove, Apple will simply pull the iTunes Store out of Norway.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITunes_Music_Store#The_Consumer_Council_of_Norway_EULA_challenge>
Another possibility is that the letter is meant to tweak Microsoft over that company's embrace of DRM, including the Windows Media DRM, the Windows Media DRM-incompatible Zune (on the sales of which Microsoft pays royalties to the music companies; see "Of the Zune, DRM, and Universal Music," 2006-11-13), and the extensive DRM support that's built into Windows Vista. Peter Gutmann, a University of Auckland computer science researcher who works on the design and analysis of cryptographic security architectures, has posted an exhaustive discussion of the problems that are likely to result from Vista's low-level content protection code. Jobs's letter never mentions Vista, but it seems entirely within Jobs's character to set Apple as an alternative to Microsoft with respect to DRM.
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8751>
<http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html>
It's also possible, though less likely, that the letter comes in part as a followup to a rather unflattering portrayal of Apple's attitudes about DRM in the New York Times. In that article, the head of the Nettwerk Music Group, Terry McBride, says that although Nettwerk's music is sold on the eMusic online service without DRM restrictions, Apple insists on adding FairPlay to the same tracks sold on the iTunes Store.
A challenge to Apple then: start selling unprotected tracks on the iTunes Store when the rights-holders request such an action. Apple currently makes many unprotected podcasts available for free in the iTunes Store, though I don't know if there are any unprotected podcasts or songs that are sold, or if Apple currently has back end limitations that require FairPlay on non-free tracks. And if Apple really wanted to put its money where Steve Jobs's mouth is, it could buy eMusic, which is the second-largest online music service, and which has about two million tracks from independent artists, none of which contain any DRM. (Of course, buying eMusic might draw unwanted attention from monopoly regulators.)
Coverage of the letter has been widespread, with a variety of responses. On Playlist, Jim Dalrymple has some interesting reactions from Real Networks and a wonderfully typical comment from the RIAA. Also on Playlist, Nancy Gohring of IDG News Service reports on the response from the Consumer Council of Norway, which admits that music companies have some responsibility but still claims that ultimate responsibility lies with Apple. The Economist concludes, "Mr Jobs's argument, in short, is transparently self-serving. It also happens to be right." Dan Moren of MacUser.com imagines a world without DRM, John Gruber of Daring Fireball reads between the lines of Jobs's letter, and as usual, John Moltz of Crazy Apple Rumors Site makes up the stuff you wish had been said.
<http://playlistmag.com/news/2007/02/07/drm/>
<http://playlistmag.com/news/2007/02/07/norway/>
<http://www.economist.com/daily/news/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8660389>
<http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/editors/2007/02/drm/>
<http://daringfireball.net/2007/02/reading_between_the_lines>
<http://www.crazyapplerumors.com/?p=785>
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8860>
Apple has released Security Update 2007-002, the second security update of the year that addresses bugs identified by the Month of Apple Bugs (MoAB) project. None of the bugs offered any chance for user action other than standard Internet precautions, so it's good to see Apple solving these problems in the Finder, iChat, and the UserNotificationCenter process. It's a bit more important than it normally is to install this security update because of the MoAB's publication of the exploits before informing Apple. As always, the update is available via Software Update most easily, though stand-alone downloads are available for PowerPC- (3.8 MB download) and Intel-based Macs (6.6 MB download) running Mac OS X 10.4.8 (Client or Server) and for anyone running Mac OS X 10.3.9 (1.4 MB download). (For more thoughts on this situation, see Glenn Fleishman's "MoAB Is My Washpot" later in this issue.)
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305102>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/securityupdate2007002ppc.html>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/securityupdate2007002universal.html>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/securityupdate2007002panther.html>
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8869>
by Glenn Fleishman <glenn@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8869>
Two hackers wanted to show the world that Apple's much-vaunted operating system wasn't as secure as it was cracked up to be. The Month of Apple Bugs (MoAB) ran from 01-Jan-07 to 31-Jan-07, with the final day promising a future serious bug. Instead, they may have turned the Mac smugness dial up a notch.
<http://projects.info-pull.com/moab/>
MoAB backers "lmh" (who does not reveal his or her real name) and Kevin Finisterre appeared to want to tweak Mac users, who often revel in the so-far absence of attacks on Mac OS X that are plausible, persistent (not quickly patched), and spreadable. In particular, the pair appear to take issue with the zealots and "fanboys" who, when presented with credible information that shows Apple or Mac OS X in a bad light, reject it out of hand. But lmh and Finisterre also seemed to have a chip on their shoulders before, during, and after MoAB.
The coincidence of the abbreviation MoAB and the biblical figure of the same name led me to Jeremiah 48:29-30: "We have heard of the pride of Moab, pride beyond bounds: His loftiness, his pride, his scorn, his insolence of heart. I know, says the Lord, his arrogance; liar in boast, liar in deed." (More famously, the poetry of Psalms disses the people of Moab by stating, "Moab is my washpot," Psalm 108:9, indicating a thing of low esteem, fit only for holding water that has cleaned one's feet - it's also the title of Stephen Fry's excellent autobiography.)
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1569472025/tidbitselectro00A/ref=nosim>
Now that seems a little harsh. The original Moab was a problem, no doubt, but this MoAB wanted to shake the Apple tree a bit, perhaps with too high an aim. I suspect the developers had a set of exploits up their sleeves, but hoped that other folks would come forward with goodies they'd been saving up, and no such luck emerged.
The zealots and fanboys that lmh and Finisterre railed against aren't strawmen. They exist. In fact, we at TidBITS occasionally get email from them, too. But it's clear that the vast majority of Mac users have better things to do than violently defend the platform and company against legitimate criticism. If anything, the average Mac user may have perhaps too great a belief that Mac OS X is completely secure, especially in contrast with Windows XP.
<http://www.crazyapplerumors.com/?p=664>
However, it seems that MoAB may have unintentionally given more ammunition to the extremists in the Mac faith, while making the larger community even more blase. None of the bugs released had any real potential of a vector - spreading from computer to computer as a worm through an Internet- or LAN-exploitable flaw - and as far as I have seen, no in-the-wild exploit was released for any of the bugs, despite the fact that MoAB refused to notify Apple or third-party developers before releasing the bug details to the public.
As of last week, Apple and the other developers who had exploits posted against their products had updated all but one matter. Timothy Luoma posted a rundown of his disappointment with the outcome of MoAB. The Macalope weighs in with his own, slightly surprised discomfiture at not seeing more serious attacks released. (The remaining Apple flaw relates to Software Update, which could be exploited by a local user or a malicious Web site visited via Safari with default download options checked.)
<http://tj.tntluoma.com/mac/moab>
<http://www.macalope.com/?p=158>
In fact, MoAB revealed one of the best aspects of the larger Mac developer community: generosity. Landon Fuller took it on himself to release patches to the vulnerabilities revealed at MoAB and ultimately received help from many others. While he couldn't fix every problem completely, nor do so on the same day the exploit was released, he and his colleagues had a remarkable track record.
<http://landonf.bikemonkey.org/code/macosx>
MoAB received the most criticism about its disclosure policy - the authors said that typically no notice was given to Apple or affected companies before they posted the details of their exploit. They wrote, "'Responsible disclosure' exists when the vendor doesn't deploy any harmful tactics against the source of the vulnerability reports, and requires confidence by all parties involved. At the moment, we don't trust Apple on these matters due to the track [sic] of incidents and unpleasant situations surrounding their policy on product vulnerability handling."
(Oddly, they offered to give only Fuller a heads-up each day in advance of the public; he declined, in a transcript the MoAB backers posted, to avoid the "appearance of collusion," since he enjoyed demonstrating that exploits could be fixed without any insider or advance knowledge about them.)
Apple has, at times, been criticized for its lackluster response to serious exploit reports, or its long delays in responding to known problems. But I haven't heard that criticism lately, with one exception. The MoAB project is clearly referring to how Apple allegedly treated David Maynor and Jon Ellch, two researchers who seem to have gotten stuck in a trap partly of their own devising. (We covered this in a series of articles we dubbed "To the Maynor Born: Cache and Crash" from August 2006 to January 2007.)
<http://db.tidbits.com/series/1268>
The short story is that Maynor and Ellch appeared to have said that they had a successful root exploit for Mac OS X, relying on a flaw in Wi-Fi handling that required a proximate user to launch the attack. Maynor and Ellch were apparently never allowed to release their proof directly, and Apple patched flaws similar to those described, but which Apple claimed were not based on any specific information provided by the two. In the security note accompanying the Wi-Fi fixes, Maynor and Ellch weren't acknowledged.
It's unclear whether the facts will ever be untangled in that case, and it appears that few people outside of Maynor, his employer, Apple, and Ellch have all the facts to make a judgment. Thus it's always frustrating to me to see unrelated parties make the assumption that Apple "deploy[ed] harmful tactics" when what happened is rather ambiguous.
In contrast to the Maynor/Ellch situation, even with no disclosure, Apple apparently decided lmh and Finisterre played by the rules, and MoAB and the two were credited in the several bugs that Apple has patched (see related story, "Security Update 2007-002 Squashes MoAB Bugs").
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8860>
What did the "pride of MoAB" lead to? Not much. I, for one, am fully aware that the possibility of a true, widespread, system remote exploit of Mac OS X remains. And almost all MoAB's exploits required either (or both) an attacker with local access or a computer owner who engaged in unusual behavior, such as downloading and opening an unknown file.
It's a testament to the Mac community as a whole that MoAB's irresponsible disclosure, coupled with childish taunts and tactics, was met with quick, civil responses by Apple and the other Macintosh developers. Generosity and cooperation will provide far more overall security than a bunch of ill-mannered hackers.
ToC
by Andrew Laurence <atlauren@uci.edu>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8862>
Apple last week released a set of updates which reflect the changes in Daylight Saving Time that go into effect this year in the United States and elsewhere (for additional information, see my article "Daylight Saving Time May Bite the Out-of-Date," 2007-01-29). The very welcome update for Mac OS X 10.3.9, Daylight Saving Time Update (Panther), updates the time zone and ICU data files, such that the system now correctly handles the new Daylight Saving time rules for 2007. The update for Mac OS X 10.4.8, Daylight Saving Time Update (Tiger), likewise contains a complete set of time zone and ICU files; it adds several new cities and various world-wide changes to the time zone information included with the previous Mac OS X 10.4.5 and 10.4.6 updates.
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305056>
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8832>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/daylightsavingtimeupdatepanther.html>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/daylightsavingtimeupdatetiger.html>
I'm pleased to see Apple do right by their customers who are running Panther. There was some discussion online of the "Y2K7" problem in late January, with Ian Ward Comfort's patch appearing on 28-Jan-07 at AFP548.com; a variety of other patches and methods have appeared in blogs and mailing lists. (I hope the authors of those patches will vet their solutions against Apple's updates, and indicate whether folks who have installed the former have any cause to worry from the latter.)
<http://www.afp548.com/article.php?story=20070128143720897>
People still running Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar are out of luck in terms of an official Apple patch. However, a modified patch for those users is also available at the AFP548 Web site.
<http://www.afp548.com/article.php?story=20070128143720897>
At the same time, Apple released Java for Mac OS X 10.4, Release 5, which updates J2SE 5.0 to version 1.5.0_07, and Java 1.4 to version 1.4.2_12. The update primarily fixes handling of Daylight Saving Time in Java, but also delivers improved reliability and compatibility. For Panther users, Java for Mac OS X 10.3 Update 5 brings Java 1.4.2 to version 1.4.2_12, includes Java Advanced Imaging and Java 3D support, and also fixes a problem where some Java applications wouldn't open after installing QuickTime 7.0.4 or later.
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=304586>
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=304585>
It's impossible to draw a causal relationship between my original article and the appearance of these updates, now two weeks later, but I'd like to think I played a small role in their appearance.
ToC
by Glenn Fleishman <glenn@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8899>
Apple has released an update to QuickTime for Mac OS X 10.3.9 and later, Windows XP, and Windows Vista. QuickTime 7.1.5 fixes numerous bugs, along with a flaw that could enable a maliciously crafted file to crash a program employing QuickTime or to allow arbitrary code execution - a phrase that often means there's a potential for an attacker to gain control of a computer or, at least, install malware.
<http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=305149>
Affected file types are broad: 3GP videos, MIDI files, native QuickTime movies, images in the venerable PICT file format, and QTIF files. Apple's notes indicate that a user need only open a maliciously crafted file, which means that Web sites could be used to launch attacks by embedding QuickTime documents in the right format.
There have been no reports of this flaw being exploited in the wild. A previous QuickTime flaw related to handling of JavaScript was exploited, notably on MySpace. Apple claims to have provided a temporary fix to MySpace, but it's unclear if that fix has made it into QuickTime 7.1.5.
<http://www.securityfocus.com/brief/375>
<http://news.com.com/MySpace+to+Apple+Fix+that+worm/2100-7349_3-6141031.html>
by Joe Kissell <joe@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8891>
Parallels has now released the official update to the Parallels Desktop virtualization software that began public beta testing at the beginning of December 2006. Confusingly, the company doesn't use normal version numbers (like "2.0," which this would be in conventional terms), but the now-available Build 3186 is the first version since Build 3036 three months ago that the company considers a full, non-beta release. (Parallels advertises the build number on the download page.)
<http://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/>
Parallels hasn't added any major new features since we last reported on the beta version (see "Parallels Desktop Ups the Ante," 2006-12-04), but the company has enhanced and debugged the features that were added then. One of the new features I'd mentioned as being problematic in December was support for running a copy of Windows installed on a Boot Camp partition directly within Parallels; switching back and forth between the two modes of running Windows previously prompted repeated requests to reactivate Windows. Now the reactivation request should occur, at most, once.
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8769>
Among the numerous other new features is Coherence, a mode in which windows from Windows applications can intermingle with those from Mac applications, and even get individual icons in the Dock; Transporter, a tool for migrating an existing installation of Windows on a PC to Parallels; USB 2.0 support; an easy-to-use Installation Assistant; and the capability to copy files and folders between Windows and Mac OS X via drag-and-drop. Graphics performance is improved, but Parallels does not yet offer 3D graphics support, meaning that for now, users must still reboot using Boot Camp to play graphics-intensive games, or use the beta version of Fusion, VMware's competing virtualization environment, which has preliminary 3D support.
<http://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/ga/features/>
<http://www.vmware.com/products/beta/fusion/>
The new version of Parallels Desktop is a free update for registered users, who can obtain it either using the application's Help > Check for Updates command or by downloading it manually. The installer weighs in at 58 MB and can function as a 15-day free trial for those who have not yet purchased the program. Parallels Desktop sells for $80, but readers of "Take Control of Running Windows on a Mac" receive a coupon for $10 off. The current version of that book already covers the new features in Parallels, since it was released after beta testing began.
<http://www.parallels.com/en/download/desktop/>
<http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/windows-on-mac.html?14@@!pt=TB869>
by Joe Kissell <joe@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8863>
Microsoft last week released the Office 2004 for Mac 11.3.4 Update. In addition to providing improved spam detection in Entourage, this update "fixes vulnerabilities in Office 2004 that an attacker can use to overwrite the contents of your computer's memory with malicious code."
This update requires that you have already installed the Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac 11.3.3 Update, released last month. This latest update is a 12.3 MB download, available either as a stand-alone updater or by using the Help > Check for Updates command in any Office application.
ToC
by Jeff Carlson <jeffc@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8864>
Apple has released Final Cut Pro 5.1.3, a maintenance release that adds some missing commands to the default keyboard layout, makes render files work properly on PowerPC-based and Intel-based Macs, and fixes an issue where cross dissolves in nested sequences would not appear correctly. The update is a 42 MB download, requires Final Cut Pro 5.1 or later under Mac OS X 10.4.8, and is also available via Software Update.
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/finalcutpro513.html>
by Jeff Carlson <jeffc@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#868/26-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8874>
Last week's Final Cut Pro 5.1.3 Update barely had time to cool before Final Cut users discovered that it broke a number of third party plug-ins such as Conduit, Automatic Duck, and Magic Bullet Colorista. Now, Apple has released Final Cut Pro 5.1.4, which corrects issues with FxPlug plug-ins that use custom interfaces. It also fixes a bug with importing XML files with missing <pathurl> elements. The update is a 38 MB download and requires Final Cut Pro 5.1 or later running under Mac OS X 10.4.8.
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8864>
<http://www.dvgarage.com/prod/prod.php?prod=conduit15>
<http://automaticduck.com/>
<http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/magicbulletcolorista.html>
<http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/finalcutpro514.html>
by Matt Neuburg <matt@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#866/12-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8857>
If the Book of Ecclesiastes were written today, it might include some jaded commentary on the plethora and ephemerality of computer programs - something along these lines: "Software cometh and software passeth away, and countless as the sands are the reviews thereof." Nevertheless, those sands do conceal an occasional treasure; and one such is Martin Hairer's Amadeus.
<http://www.hairersoft.com/Welcome.html>
Amadeus is a sound file editor. I've been using it for over six years, for a variety of purposes, and throughout that time it has remained firmly and indispensably central to my sound-processing activities. It has an amazing breadth of abilities, combining serious power with delightful simplicity, at an astonishingly low price. To use it is to love it.
As of mid-January 2007, Amadeus comes in two versions. The program I've been using all this time, properly called Amadeus II, is a Carbon program. The current version of Amadeus II (3.8.7) runs natively under Mac OS X, and also works fine under Mac OS 9.2. (If you're still reveling in the retro experience, you can even obtain an earlier, unsupported version that runs under Mac OS 8.6.) The "II," by the way, was added to the name years ago, when the original Amadeus, which could run on a 68K Macintosh, was updated to version 2.0 and became PowerPC-only.
Amadeus II, however, runs under Rosetta on an Intel-based Mac. The developer recognized that an Intel-native incarnation was desirable, and took the opportunity to update the program to a Cocoa interface. This update has been released as Amadeus Pro, a universal binary with a somewhat broader feature set than its predecessor.
<http://www.hairersoft.com/AmadeusPro/AmadeusPro.html>
My affection for Amadeus is intimately bound up with how I came to start using it and the sorts of thing I've done with it over the years. Back in the days before Mac OS X, in December 2000, I looked sadly at my massive collection of cassette tapes, thought about all those little magnetic particles silently hydrolyzing or falling off or whatever evil deteriorative activity they were indulging in, and resolved to transfer all this music into a digital format before it evaporated forever.
My working method began with a play-through of the cassette, recording it onto the computer as an AIFF file, using a wonderful piece of freeware called Coaster. This turned each entire side of the cassette into a single sound file. But what I wanted were multiple sound files containing individual songs, and that's where Amadeus entered the story. (I use the word "song" loosely, in the way that iTunes does; on an audio CD these would be called "tracks," but the word "track" has another usage in Amadeus Pro, similar to its use in GarageBand or iMovie, so I'm deliberately avoiding ambiguity.)
So, I opened the file using Amadeus, which showed me the waveforms of the right and left stereo channels, along with an overview of the entire file. I could use the overview to help navigate. I could zoom in and out to see waveform details or to get the larger picture. I could click to start playing at a certain point, or play a selected region. I could insert a bookmark designating a point of interest in the file, and navigate to it easily later on. And of course I could cut and paste a selected section of the waveform. Thus, it was simple for me to work my way through the file, finding the start and end of each individual song on the tape, and marking those points. Then later I would use those bookmarks to select one song at a time, along with a little of the surrounding silence, and copy and save that selection as an individual song file.
Doubtless that sounds extremely simple - as, indeed, it was. What I didn't fully appreciate at the time, though, is that it was simple in part because Amadeus made it simple. Over the years since then I've used many other sound-editing programs, but none that lets me interact so directly and simply with a waveform. Certain acts and gestures are fundamental to working with sound files: play from a point, stop, have the insertion point either remain where you stopped or return to where you started playing from; zoom in or out; select; copy and paste; navigate within a large file. Every other sound-editing program manages somehow to make one or more of these acts difficult, clumsy, or frustrating. Amadeus has always been a model of sparkling ease and clarity in this regard; I find it nearly impossible to perform detailed editing of a sound in any other application.
Moreover, Amadeus has evolved since the year 2000, so that to perform that same task of recording a large sound file and splitting it into songs today is even easier. First of all, Amadeus now has the capability to record, and I often recommend it for that purpose. Second, Amadeus now has a feature allowing you to search your file for clips. (This feature, like several others, was added at my suggestion. A "clip" is a place where the recorded signal was too loud for the system and exceeded its maximum bandwidth, so that the top or bottom of the wave was cut off; it is crucial that your recording contain no clips, since when played they sound like little explosions and are bad for your equipment.) Third, Amadeus can split a file at its bookmarks, so it's sufficient to go through the file, mark the start and end of every song, and let Amadeus break it up for you. In fact, Amadeus can even help you isolate the individual songs by marking areas of silence automatically.
Now here comes my second major use of Amadeus. Having broken up the file into individual songs, I examine each song for clicks and pops. (Many of my tapes came originally from vinyl LPs, which often had scratches or foreign matter on the record surface.) You can find these by listening, or else you can let Amadeus search for them, selecting each spot that it thinks might be a click. When you find one, you use the Interpolate function; Amadeus smoothes out the jagged interruption of the selected click into something based on the surrounding sound, so it magically vanishes and becomes just part of the music (or, in more difficult cases, a barely audible glitch).
This feature alone is worth its weight in gold. I've tried many other programs, some of them quite high-end, for removing clicks and pops; none of them does the job as well as walking through the file with Amadeus. (Actually, an application called ClickRepair has recently emerged, and does a splendid job of automated de-clicking; even so, I find that my results are improved if I use it in combination with manual de-clicking in Amadeus.)
<http://wwwmaths.anu.edu.au/~briand/sound/>
The Interpolate feature is also great for joining pasted material smoothly. For example, I've sometimes cut out the coughing between songs in a live recording, or, in a recording of myself speaking, I've removed a verbal stumble, a breathing noise, or an overly long silence; after such a cut, the waveforms at the point of removal don't match up, until Interpolate turns the break into a smooth, undetectable join. Alternatively I might use, at such places, an Amadeus feature called Transition, where the material on the two sides of the discontinuity is shifted together so as to overlap along with a crossfade.
Often, as a song is about to achieve its final form, I use some additional features of Amadeus. If the recording has some hiss or other low-level noise, I might use Fade In at the start and Fade Out at the finish, so the sound doesn't begin and end abruptly. Typically, to avoid clips, my recording is a little softer than it needs to be; one would usually prefer to make the fullest possible use of the available bandwidth, with the loudest part of the signal nearly as loud as the maximum allowable. Amadeus's Normalize function takes care of that for me.
Also, there is Amadeus's capability to open and save a wide variety of sound file formats, converting as necessary. For example, these days I typically record in 24-bit AIFF format. If I want to make an MP3 file from such a recording, I have to convert to a WAV first, because my preferred MP3 compressor is LAME, which doesn't understand 24-bit AIFF files. Since I've typically been working in Amadeus anyway towards the end of the preparation process, I use it to save as a WAV. (You can save as an MP3 directly from Amadeus, which has LAME built in; but Amadeus II doesn't let me tweak LAME with the command-line arguments I prefer.)
<http://lame.sourceforge.net/>
Amadeus can also apply filters, including any VST or Audio Unit filters you have, along with some specialized equalization filters for processing files made from phonograph records. However, the crudeness of the interface limits the usefulness of these features: filter settings interfaces are presented in a modal dialog, which means that you can't select different regions of your sound to audition, and there are no facilities for adjusting the wet/dry mix, A/B comparison of different settings, and so forth. For this reason, I generally apply filters using a more advanced program specifically aimed at hosting them, such as DSP-Quattro.
<http://www.i3net.it/Products/dspQuattro/Asp/Index_EN.asp>
Features that I've used less often include Amadeus's capabilities to change a sound's pitch, with or without changing its speed; to reverse a sound; and to provide a graphic analysis of a sound's frequency components as a spectrum or as a sonogram.
Amadeus Pro introduces two major features. One is that a sound file can now contain multiple tracks, each with its own adjustable amplitude envelope. So, for instance, one track might be the two stereo channels of an accompaniment, while the other might be the single channel of a voice track. Thus, Amadeus Pro invites use as a mixing program. Such use would probably be limited to combining existing material, however, since you can't (except in the most rudimentary fashion) record one track while listening to another. The other new feature is batch processing, enabling you to do such things as normalize and convert the file format of multiple files with a single command.
Although I'm pleased to see Amadeus II modernized into Amadeus Pro, and although Amadeus Pro is a universal binary, sports a Cocoa interface, and is in some respects better behaved than Amadeus II (in particular with regard to its memory management and its use of the computer's CPU), I can't help feeling that something has been lost in the translation. The basic action of selection and repeated playback has become fussier and more confusing, in part thanks to a newly introduced differentiation between the playback head position and the insertion point. And Amadeus II's facility for letting you adjust the sensitivity parameters used when seeking suspected clicks and pops is completely missing in Amadeus Pro. For these and other reasons, I'll probably continue to stick with Amadeus II for a while yet.
When considering Amadeus, you must take into account, I think, four things: your own needs and experience; the breadth, variety, and downright generosity of the program's features; the interface; and the price. The combination is unbeatable, making Amadeus the single basic sound editor that every beginner should have. There are, and I have used, many other sound editors, ranging from freeware to high-end; but for basic editing actions, such as splitting a sound file into songs, adjusting and fading its endpoints, cutting out material and seamlessly joining the remainder, and converting from one format to another, Amadeus is the tool to which I always return. Add to that its unparalleled capability to detect and nullify individual clicks and pops, and you can see why it has been a staple of my sound-processing repertory since the day I first used it.
Amadeus Pro is $40 ($25 for registered Amadeus II users). It requires Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) or higher, and is a universal binary. It's a 12 MB download, and is available as a 30-day demo. Amadeus II costs $30 (free, on request, for registered Amadeus Pro users). It requires Mac OS 9.2 or higher, and runs natively on Mac OS X (under Rosetta on an Intel-based Mac). A 15-day demo is available as a 3 MB download.
<http://www.hairersoft.com/AmadeusPro/AmadeusProDownload.html>
<http://www.hairersoft.com/AmadeusDownload.html>
by Glen McAllister <glen.mcallister@gmail.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8888>
Until recently, I haven't been a regular visitor to Apple's Mac OS X Downloads page, but after coming across their latest featured download, I may make a point of checking more often. The program in question was a nifty iTunes plug-in called iConcertCal, which generates a personalized calendar of concert dates based on artists in your iTunes music library and your location.
<http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/>
<http://www.iconcertcal.com/>
After installing the plug-in and (re-)launching iTunes, iConcertCal appears as an alternative to the normal iTunes visualizer. Choose View > Visualizer > iConcertCal, and then activate the Visualizer by choosing View > Turn on Visualizer (or press Command-T). Enter your city, state (or country for those outside the United States), and a radius (in miles) from that city (it's not inherently obvious that you can type in those fields, but you can).
Once it knows your location, iConcertCal generates - within the iTunes window itself - an iCal-like calendar of concerts in venues within the area. What's truly neat is that it displays only concerts from artists already in your iTunes library. The calendar is generated by feeds from live music sites such as JamBase and is updated weekly. Clicking a concert link in the side list of upcoming shows or in the calendar itself takes you to the show's entry on JamBase. Pressing Command-T returns iTunes back to the normal view.
<http://www.tidbits.com/resources/2007-03/iConcertCal.jpg>
<http://www.jambase.com/>
If you're interested in concerts by artists whose music you don't already own, you can tell iConcertCal to expand its search by putting those missing artists' names in a text file called "iConcertCalOtherBands.txt" in ~/Library/iTunes/iConcertCal (one artist per line). It's more likely that you'll have songs from artists who you'd never want to see live (imagine the free weekly downloads from the iTunes Music Store; you might like a song well enough to keep it, but not well enough to attend a concert by that artist). To restrict iConcertCal's searches, create a playlist - it can even be a smart playlist - called "iConcertCal" that contains just those artists you want to see.
iConcertCal is only as good as its data source, which sometimes disappoints. It failed to report a scheduled concert I'm keen on attending - The National at London's Astoria on 22-May-07, which is by no means a low-profile show. However, you can join JamBase and add both artists and shows and, if accepted, they will show up next time your (and everyone else's) calendar is updated for that location. Then you will have the pleasure of making an already cool thing even cooler for everyone.
<http://www.americanmary.com/>
[While editing Glen's article, I decided to see if adding an artist to JamBase was onerous, and I'm pleased to say that it wasn't. So hopefully JamBase will start reporting shows by my current favorite jazz group, the New York City-based Dave's True Story. -Adam]
<http://www.davestruestory.com/>
iConcertCal is a universal binary requiring Mac OS X 10.3 or later in conjunction with the (encouraged) latest version of iTunes. There is also a Windows version. You can download the 340K installer from Mac OS X Downloads or the product's own page. It is freeware, but you can make PayPal donations on the iConcertCal site. I've already done so!
[Glen McAllister is a licensed busker on the London Underground and freelance IT consultant.]
<http://www.myspace.com/iamgam>
<http://www.tfl.gov.uk/tube/arts/busking/>
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#868/26-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8878>
Thanks to Bryan Phelan for alerting us to a potentially useful feature in Apple's Preview application. Bryan was noticing that other applications on his Mac were constantly distracting him from reading his Take Control ebooks until he stumbled on the Slideshow feature in Preview.
With an ebook (or any other PDF) open, just choose View > Slideshow (Command-Shift-F). Your screen immediately goes black and displays just the current ebook page. Click the Fit to Screen button in the transparent slideshow toolbar to expand the page to the full size of your screen. Unfortunately, you cannot see or click on bookmarks, but you can click on any link to follow it, and Web links load invisibly behind the slideshow rather than switching to your Web browser. You can hide the toolbar by clicking anywhere outside of it, but it returns to obscure the bottom of pages as soon as you move the cursor, so keyboard navigation is generally best.
To navigate between pages, press the left and right arrow keys or left and right square bracket keys. Press Escape to exit slideshow mode. The only other keys that do anything are F (for switching into full screen mode) and A (for switching back to actual size). Nearly every other key just beeps when pressed. Bonus points to anyone who can figure out what Tab, R, and L do, since they don't beep.
ToC
by Parrish S. Knight <psknight@verizon.net>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8893>
As wonderful as Mac OS X is, it has a grave defect that can have an immediate adverse impact on the computer's usability: the way it translates mouse motion into pointer movement. For many users, moving the mouse feels unnatural because of the peculiar way that Mac OS X performs that translation. In industry parlance, the translation is called the "mouse acceleration curve." What is a mouse acceleration curve, and how is its implementation problematic under Mac OS X?
Mouse movement cannot be translated into pointer movement at a simple one-to-one ratio. If it were, you'd need to move the mouse 17 inches (43 cm) across your desk to move the pointer across the diagonal of a 17-inch monitor. That would be highly impractical because you'd need a tremendous amount of space to move the mouse around, and your arm would tire quickly. (Either that, or you'd have to constantly pick the mouse up and put it back down, which would also be both tedious and wearisome, though possibly amusing to watch.)
Can you compensate by increasing the ratio so that, say, the pointer moves three inches for every inch the mouse moves? That simply trades one problem for another one. For example, on most displays, even at lower resolutions, the centers of the close and minimize buttons at the top of a standard window are typically about .25 inches (6.4 mm) apart (at higher resolutions, it's even less than that). With a three-to-one pointer-to-mouse movement ratio, then, you'd have to move your mouse about .125 inches (3.2 mm), no more, no less, to move from the center of the close button to get to the center of the minimize button. That's roughly the thickness of three credit cards. Moving a mouse with such precision is difficult for most people, and if it were regularly required, it would make the computer cumbersome to use. So a simple "X-to-one" acceleration ratio won't work because if the value of X were too low, you'd still need lots of space to move the mouse around, but if the value of X were too high, precise pointer movement would be impossible.
The solution is for the operating system to use both concepts: a higher X-to-one ratio for faster mouse movement, enabling the user to move the pointer across the screen quickly with little use of desk space, and a lower X-to-one ratio for slower mouse movement, enabling the user to move the pointer precisely without needing to be fantastically precise in moving the mouse.
With this solution in place, users get the best of both worlds. If a user is moving the mouse very slowly - say, doing detailed work touching up a photo - the mouse-to-pointer ratio might be one-to-one (or even less than one-to-one), enabling precision movement with ease. Conversely, if the user then starts to move the mouse more quickly, wanting to jump to the other side of the screen, the X-to-one ratio changes dynamically, increasing as the user continues to increase the mouse's speed, until it reaches the other end of the X-to-one ratio, which might be as much as nine- or ten-to-one. Finally, as the user instinctively starts to slow the mouse down as the pointer nears the desired target, the operating system reverses the process, gradually decreasing the ratio once more and enabling the user to place the pointer precisely at the desired spot. (The math behind all of this is quite complicated. You may never look at your mouse the same way again.) The whole process makes it possible for the user to move the pointer from the photo he's touching up in the lower left of the screen to an icon in the upper right of the screen by moving the mouse only a short distance.
If you were to take a sheet of graph paper and create a standard X-Y coordinate system - remember high school algebra? - with X representing the speed of the pointer and Y representing the speed of the mouse, and then map the ratio conversion process onto that graph, you'd end up with a sloping line, moving upward at first, and then flattening out with greater values of X. This line is called the "mouse acceleration curve."
So what's wrong with Mac OS X's mouse acceleration curve? Simply put, it's the wrong shape. For mouse motion to feel natural (at least for most people), the curve has to start by moving upward fairly moderately, then gradually flattening out as the value of X increases. Mac OS X's, curve, however, starts off by being too steep, staying too steep for too long, and then flattening out too abruptly. In practical terms this means that, frequently, as a user tries to use the mouse to move the pointer from point A to point B, the pointer motion feels sluggish. The user then tries to compensate for the sluggishness by moving the mouse faster, and the pointer suddenly goes flying across the screen and overshoots point B. A comfortable and useful curve is actually shaped like a curve. Mac OS X's curve, however, is shaped more like a cliff.
It wasn't always this way. Under Mac OS 9 and earlier, the curve was different and provided more natural mouse behavior. Then, for some reason, Apple apparently decided to fix something that wasn't broken and changed the curve. They made no announcement of the change and, to the best of my knowledge, it does not appear anywhere in their technical documentation. (Microsoft, conversely, explains how the Windows XP mouse acceleration curve works on a publicly accessible Web page.) For this reason, most people don't know about the change and are wondering "why the mouse feels funny" because they don't understand the esoteric details of the mouse acceleration curve. (And who can blame them? It's anything but simple arithmetic!)
I was one such person myself for quite some time, experimenting with different mice and a variety of mouse pads and other surfaces, trying to figure out how I could get the mouse to "work right again." It was only after many months of Googling on a variety of search terms that I finally found out about acceleration curves and learned that Apple had quietly changed theirs. I was fortunate in that I had several years of experience with the Classic Mac OS that told me there actually was something that needed to be fixed. People who have only started using the Mac in more recent years have no such advantage.
The unnatural motion of the new curve is troublesome for many users. User "Sludge" on the MacSlash Web site, for example, complains, "I can't believe how horrible mice feel on OS X compared to XP and Linux/XFree86." Scott Moschella of PlasticBugs.com opines, "[T]he mouse acceleration...makes OS X's mouse tracking feel like you're mousing through mud," referring to how the low end of the curve is too steep for too long.
Of course, not all users have this complaint. Some say they actually prefer the new pointer behavior, and some even claim they don't notice any difference. For those who do have trouble with the new curve, though, it's highly problematic - often in ways beyond just the difficulty in getting the pointer to move to the desired location.
When mouse movement feels unnatural, the user may subconsciously try to use hand and wrist muscles to compensate. At best, that's uncomfortable. At worst, it can be painful. In my own case, my wrist starts to cramp after only a moment or two. After about 20 minutes, most of my forearm is in extreme pain, and I have to stop using the mouse altogether.
Over time, users with this type of difficulty using the mouse can suffer from the permanent damage known as an RSI (repetitive stress injury). I am one such sufferer. An anonymous user on MacSlash rails about "the RSI-inducing unpredictable madness that is the Mac mouse acceleration curve." And on LifeHacker.com, user "PhotoHobo" complains, "One of my biggest annoyances with OS X is the horrible mouse acceleration. As someone who is constantly battling RSI, I find this intolerable." Web searches find a number of other users voicing similar opinions and having similar difficulties.
So the problem is certainly real and immediate - at least for some of us - but can anything actually be done about it? There is no setting in Mac OS X itself to modify the acceleration curve. Sometimes, well-meaning users suggest modifying the Tracking Speed setting in the Keyboard & Mouse pane in System Preferences, but that doesn't provide a complete solution. The problem isn't speed, per se, but the acceleration curve. Changing the tracking speed does not change the shape of that curve. It just makes the whole curve smaller or larger, rather like using a telephoto lens (or a wide angle lens) to take a photograph of the same cliff from the same location.
Apple has left a void, then, in Mac OS X's settings. Fortunately, many third parties have tried to fill that void, and most do the job quite admirably. For example, several mouse manufacturers, such as Kensington, include their own mouse drivers and software that can be configured to override Mac OS X's mouse acceleration curve. The only drawback is that the software is usually specific to the hardware.
For those who already have mice that they don't wish to replace, there are other solutions, each with advantages over the others. MouseFix (freeware) is a simple program that changes some of the numbers used in Mac OS X's mouse driver in an attempt to make the curve more natural. However, it can be difficult to install for the non-technically inclined, and its presets are not customizable.
<http://www.knockknock.org.uk/mac/>
USB Overdrive ($20) is shareware with no trial period, and it offers an extensive variety of options for configuring mouse behavior, as well as the behavior of other USB devices. You can even configure it so that the mouse will behave differently depending on which application you're using. Its chief drawback, as the name implies, is that it supports only USB devices - if you use a Bluetooth mouse, you're out of luck. (The author, Alessandro Levi Montalcini, says that Bluetooth support is coming, but offers no time frame.)
<http://www.usboverdrive.com/>
SteerMouse ($20) is also shareware that offers a wide variety of customization options for mouse behavior, and unlike USB Overdrive, SteerMouse supports Bluetooth mice. Its main disadvantage is that it was designed with Apple's Mighty Mouse in mind - it does work with other mice, but support may be more limited. Also, the trial period is only 15 days, which may not be long enough to fully explore the software, because finding the most comfortable settings can take a while. I ultimately chose USB Overdrive over SteerMouse for this reason. SteerMouse expired before I became comfortable with it, whereas USB Overdrive, having no expiration date, afforded me ample opportunity to find the mouse settings that worked best for me.
<http://plentycom.jp/en/steermouse/>
Hopefully, Apple will realize that changing the mouse acceleration curve was a mistake and revert to the old one. Better yet would be to add a setting to the Keyboard & Mouse preference pane to enable the user to configure the acceleration curve as well as the speed. The likelihood of that is anyone's guess, but in the meantime, we can save our hands, our wrists, and our sanity by having a clear understanding of what the problem is and working around it with third-party solutions.
Mac OS X, as we all know, is the Ferrari of operating systems. Unfortunately, the steering has a design defect, but with a little mechanical effort, we can modify it while we're waiting and hoping for the engineers to recognize the problem and fix it.
[Parrish S. Knight is a systems administrator for an IT consulting firm in the greater DC area. His interests include politics, film, fantasy, and science fiction. In addition to getting the word out about Mac OS X's mouse problems, his causes include activism in autistic advocacy and civil liberties.]
ToC
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8887>
For an impressive example of what can be done in a Web application these days, check out Picnik, an online photo site that provides - almost exactly - the same set of editing features as Apple's iPhoto, and some of iPhoto's sharing capabilities. Picnik offers, in its Edit tab, tools to auto-fix, rotate, crop, resize, adjust exposure, tweak colors, sharpen images, and remove red-eye. There's also a Creative Tools tab that provides special effects such as making a photo black-and-white or sepia, boosting color, softening the image, and applying either a matte or vignette effect. The controls are obvious and easy to use, and Picnik provides unlimited undo. You don't even have to feel constrained to the browser window; click the Picnik name in the upper left of the window to make the Picnik window full screen.
<http://www.picnik.com/>
<http://www.tidbits.com/resources/2007-02/picnik-interface.jpg>
Photos can be brought in from your account on the online photo sharing site Flickr, from your computer, from any Web site, from Yahoo or Flickr searches, and even from a webcam. And when you're done editing, you can save photos to Flickr, send it to someone via email, save it to your Mac, email it to a Web site (useful for sharing to Ceiva picture frames; see "Ceiva and the Mac," 2005-02-14, for more on that), or print the photo on your own printer. I don't see any options for ordering prints from a service yet, but perhaps the assumption is that you'd do that via Flickr and their printing partner QOOP for now.
<http://www.flickr.com/>
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/7985>
(To get Picnik working with an iSight camera, Control-click or right-click in the Picnik window, choose Settings, click the little video camera on the right side of the bottom icons, and choose either USB Video Class Video for internal iSight cameras or IIDC FireWire Video for external iSights from the pop-up menu; you may have to try choosing it several times.)
The most amusing part of Picnik? Cute little messages, like "Painting sky" or "Buttering sandwiches," appear when certain more lengthy operations are taking place. It's a nice touch.
Picnik's performance was extremely sprightly, and I didn't feel as though using Picnik within OmniWeb was problematic. It did crash OmniWeb once, but it is still in beta. Picnik recommends Mac OS X running on a Mac with a 1 GHz or faster processor; a relatively recent Web browser and Adobe Flash 9 are also required.
During its beta phase, Picnik is free, and they promise the basic editing capabilities will remain free after launch, when there will be a for-fee premium version with advanced editing, more tools, and additional features. For now, I suspect most Mac users will think iPhoto is easier and more powerful than Picnik, given that iPhoto is a full-fledged application integrated into Mac OS X. But Picnik's tight integration with Flickr may cause it to be more interesting to those who use Flickr heavily, and it's possible that being a Web-based application may enable Picnik to evolve much more quickly than iPhoto, which Apple updates approximately once per year.
ToC
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#868/26-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8881>
Ever spend a non-trivial amount of time working on something, only to find that you've almost completely wasted your time? That's what happened last week, when I spent about an hour testing a variety of old and new URLs to articles at the New York Times, attempting to find a reproducible method of linking to them in a way that provided free, permanent access. With help, I came up with a solution, but it hasn't turned out to be nearly as easy or clever as it could have been. (See "Create Permanent Links to the New York Times," 2007-02-19.)
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8867>
Thanks to Seth Theriault for sending me a set of test URLs that make linking to New York Times articles even easier. Let's say you want to link to this article about Steve Jobs's letter about digital rights management:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/technology/07music.html
That's an old article now, so following that link would take you to TimesSelect. But according to Seth, and he's right, merely appending "/partner/rssnyt" to the above URL (not to the TimesSelect URL that appears when you load it in your browser) will make it permanently available for free, as in:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/07/technology/07music.html/partner/rssnyt
That's great, since you can now access old articles for which you have only the base URL by merely appending the magic string to the end. Or at least that's the theory - Seth tells me that although it usually works, it's not guaranteed to do so, especially on older articles.
But that's not all. The New York Times requires registration, and while registration is free, some people prefer not to sign up. (Using the "/partner/rssnyt" links requires registration.) Seth notes that using the Permalink feature available while reading any article provides a URL that not only gives permanent free access to the article, it sometimes sidesteps the need to register. I say "sometimes" because the permalink to the article about Jobs's letter doesn't circumvent the registration requirement, whereas this permalink (to an article about Kodak printers) currently does:
Even more confusingly, I created a permalink to an article (Michael Pollan's must-read "Unhappy Meals," about what we should be eating) a few weeks ago that does require registration, and it's different from the permalink that I can create from the same article now. Both provide free access to the article, but for some unknown reason the article is also once again available for free at its plain URL. Plus, although I didn't keep detailed notes of my testing, I could swear that my permalink took me to TimesSelect for that article when I was writing this up last week.
<http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html>
All I can conclude is that the New York Times Web weavers have a variety of options available with regard to article access, and they can and do change those options at will. For now, though, the "/partner/rssnyt" string is all that's necessary to make a normal New York Times URL into one that will remain accessible for free.
ToC
by Jeff Carlson <jeffc@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#869/05-Mar-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8889>
At Macworld Expo in January, I delivered a session called "Graduate from iMovie to Final Cut Pro" as part of the Users Conference track. I thought it went pretty well, especially since public speaking doesn't come naturally to me (but I'm working on it).
As I was leaving, one man asked if the presentation would be made available online (and I'm sorry I didn't get your name, so I hope you're reading this). My plan was to take my Keynote file, export it as a movie, dump it into GarageBand, and re-do the session as a voiceover that could be downloaded. Unfortunately, I haven't had time to do that, but now I don't have to.
The folks at IDG have started a new service called Macworld Encore, where you can download individual sessions as iPod-compatible QuickTime video or audio files. The sessions aren't free, but they're pretty reasonable: the Users Conference sessions (mine included) each cost $5; the all-day Power Tools Conferences cost $30; Mac IT tracks cost $7 apiece; Market Symposiums cost $15; and the Hands-on Mac Labs cost $10. (A DVD-ROM containing everything is also available for $300.)
<http://www.macworldencore.com/>
My session includes the audio (and it seems as if they tempered the initial audio feedback we dealt with right at the beginning) plus everything that was shown onscreen.
If you attended one of the paid conferences and weren't able to sit in on a session you wanted to catch, this is an inexpensive way of getting it; and if you weren't able to make it to Macworld Expo at all, a few individual downloads are much cheaper than a trip to San Francisco would have been.
ToC
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8861>
Anyone who has helped a complete novice learn how to use a Mac, especially during a stint in a help desk environment, simply must watch this hilarious video, which demonstrates well that all interfaces must be learned. The audio is reportedly in Norwegian, with English and Danish subtitles.
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#868/26-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8879>
The day after I wrote it up in TidBITS (see "Early Help Desk Video," 2007-02-19), ZrednaZ, the user who posted the Early Help Desk Video with English subtitles removed the video, generating a flurry of squawks from TidBITS readers who wanted to see it. Some additional searching on YouTube turned up a handful of identical videos, all with Danish but not English subtitles. Then I noticed that one of the people leaving comments had found another copy with English subtitles, and shortly afterwards, ZrednaZ reposted the video, with a few additional seconds at the end (unfortunately, the reposted video is much darker than the other copies, though it has better subtitles).
<http://db.tidbits.com/article/8861>
<http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=ZrednaZ>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pyjRj3UMRM>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFAWR6hzZek>
Here's what happened. The original video aired in 2001 on a show called "Oystein og meg" ("Oystein & I") from the Norwegian television network, NRK, but it seems to have shown up on YouTube only recently. Another YouTube user recently posted a short clip from NRK News (with English subtitles added) that discusses the situation. It turns out that the version uploaded to YouTube became one of the most viewed videos on YouTube, generating about a million views. The news report goes on to say that it's illegal to upload NRK content and that NRK's lawyers are now investigating the case. Upon hearing about the NRK lawyers, ZrednaZ got cold feet and pulled the video from YouTube, but after numerous requests and seeing the many other copies elsewhere on YouTube, reposted it.
<http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/4389>
<http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv_arkiv/oystein_og_meg/>
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=py-lNeGfYjc>
It will be instructive to see how NRK's lawyers react. Yes, the reposts on YouTube were done without permission. But it's unclear who, if anyone, has been harmed. The work was done 6 years ago, and presumably entertained many Norwegians at the time, but my bet is that it has essentially been ignored ever since, neither making money for NRK nor advancing the careers of the creators. Now, thanks to YouTube and the viral nature of humor on the Internet, it's at least bringing the creators some attention. One of them is quoted as saying, "This is probably the closest we are getting to a world wide launch, and we are very pleased so far." The fact that NRK wasn't prepared to turn that attention into revenue or something constructive is a missed opportunity, but not a reason to employ heavy-handed legal tactics. The lesson is that you never know when or where lightning will strike, but if you can be ready for it or move sufficiently quickly, you just may be able to animate your very own Frankenstein with all that power.
Although I was a touch worried, I don't think we were responsible for the video coming to the attention of the NRK's lawyers. I heard about the video clip on 13-Feb-07 from a friend whose librarian sister-in-law sent it to her, and I posted the story to ExtraBITS on that day. The video had been making the rounds in the librarian community, apparently, and on 14-Feb-07 there was a post on The Chicago Blog about it. I suspect that many of the YouTube views came before my piece ran in TidBITS, given that the NRK News story about the situation apparently aired on 19-Feb-07, the same day as that TidBITS issue went out.
<http://pressblog.uchicago.edu/2007/02/14/helpdesk_for_the_book.html>
ToC
by Adam C. Engst <ace@tidbits.com>
TidBITS#867/19-Feb-07
article link: <http://db.tidbits.com/article/8870>
The pool of Macintosh software has become incredibly deep over the years, containing a vast number of applications for nearly every imaginable purpose. I was pondering that fact the other day when I started wondering just which of Apple's many technologies were the most important to the developers who create the programs we use on a regular basis. Rather than mull over this question in a theoretical fashion, I decided to ask a select set of developers: Which Apple technologies had proven the most important for your business, and why? (Some of these developers are current or past TidBITS sponsors; I chose them not because of that fact, but because I knew them well enough to ask them to respond on short notice.)
I wasn't looking for what someone might think was particularly cool. Instead, with this one question I hoped to find the technologies that have actually enabled the creation of new tools, new ways of working, or even new ways of thinking about what's possible. You may not recognize the names of all of these people, but I'm certain you'll recognize their products.
Paul Kafasis -- CEO/Lackey, <Rogue Amoeba Software> (Products: Audio Hijack Pro, Fission, Airfoil, Nicecast)
Although it's perhaps too obvious, Cocoa has had a big impact on our work, and the Mac world in general. All of Rogue Amoeba's products are built with it, and it has worked quite well for us. Cocoa has made it an order of magnitude (or more) easier to create software for Mac OS X, which has led to rapid development of new products and updates. That's very important for a small company with limited resources.
<http://developer.apple.com/cocoa/>
But more interestingly, I'd like to nominate the iPod. We don't make any software that works specifically with the iPod, nor iPod hardware, so how can it be so important to us? The trick is that the iPod has brought music to the masses and turned everyone into an audio user. The more people use audio, the more relevant our products become to them. If a user has an iPod and he wants new content, he can use Audio Hijack Pro to record just about anything. Fission will let him edit that audio before it goes on his iPod. And if he's playing audio around his house, Airfoil will be useful for enabling playback through the AirPort Express. As audio use becomes a bigger part of users' lives due to the iPod, our products gain potential users.
Julian Miller -- President, <Script Software> (Products: ChatFX, CopyPaste, iKey, iClock, iWatermark, KnowledgeMiner)
Cocoa is essential, but the most entertaining and useful technology from Apple for us at the moment is Quartz Composer, which is included for free with Apple's Developer Tools. It is a visual programming language for video, and deserves to be better known. Quartz Composer is embedded deep within Mac OS X, and it relies on OpenGL, Core Image, Core Video, and other core Apple technologies. With it anyone can create various Quartz Compositions that can perform magic on various types of video input. We use it in ChatFX, our video special effects software for iChat (and soon for Skype, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Messenger, iMovie, etc.), to add bluescreen, Photo Booth-type effects, 3D, and more to video conferencing. It is powerful, useful, and whole lot of fun even if you're not a developer. In fact our next fun application (unannounced) will also use Quartz Composer extensively.
Jayson Adams -- VP of Technology, <Circus Ponies Software> (Product: Circus Ponies NoteBook)
For us, the most important technology is definitely Apple's Cocoa Frameworks. The Cocoa Frameworks are collections of objects - everything from numbers and lists to buttons and windows - that application writers can use to build their Macintosh software products. These objects are so well written and well designed that one person can write an application that would take 10 programmers to cobble together on another platform. This leverage also means that in the end, developers have more time to focus on the code that makes their applications unique.
Jim Matthews -- President, <Fetch Softworks> (Product: Fetch)
Fetch wouldn't be the same program without any of at least a dozen Apple technologies, from AppleScript to Open GL (for the animated progress donut). But if I had to pick one essential technology it would be the Core OS networking services, from the AirPort and Ethernet drivers up through the TCP/IP stack and CFNetwork. All of our user interface work is aimed at making it easier to move data from one computer to another, and that effort is wasted without a robust networking infrastructure to put the bits on the wire (or radio waves). Apple was the first personal computer maker to build networking into their systems, and the first to have a standardized TCP/IP programming interface for accessing the Internet. In Mac OS X the networking infrastructure is more efficient, reliable, and flexible than ever before, and that's critical for applications like Fetch.
Greg Scown -- Founder, <SmileOnMyMac> (Products: PDFpen/Pro, PageSender, DiscLabel, TextExpander, BrowseBack)
Apple's adoption of PDF as the standard imaging model for Mac OS X has been the most important technology for our business. Enabling users to create a PDF of anything they can print makes it possible to share documents across platforms with great ease. It also creates a market for PDF manipulation and markup tools, such as PDFpen. Recently, we were even able to stretch the limits of the PDF's nature as a read-only format to offer our new Correct Text feature, which lets users actually replace existing text within a PDF.
Rich Siegel -- Founder and CEO, <Bare Bones Software> (Products: BBEdit, Yojimbo, Mailsmith, TextWrangler)
ToCOur products are more illustrative of your "deep and vast" premise, rather than a demonstration of using a single "most important" technology. We select from the system API sets (Carbon, Cocoa, or POSIX) that allow us to address our customers' needs most effectively (based on our assessment of a performance/scalability need or specific user-experience goal).
<http://developer.apple.com/carbon/>
<http://developer.apple.com/cocoa/>
<http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Cocoa/Conceptual/Multithreading/articles/ThreadPackages.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40001474-110124>Cocoa's Core Data subsystem provides the crucial data storage reliability for Yojimbo, our information organizer. Yojimbo also uses various Cocoa UI services to create its effortless user experience, and Sync Services to implement synchronization of data across multiple computers (through the use of .Mac or Mark/Space's new SyncTogether).
<http://developer.apple.com/macosx/coredata.html>
<http://developer.apple.com/macosx/syncservices.html>BBEdit and TextWrangler rely on ATSUI (Apple Type Services for Unicode Imaging) to put the text on the screen - where the rubber meets the road, so to speak. Both products' performance and scalability didn't originate with Apple-provided technology, but we used Core Foundation and the Multiprocessing API (basically, a wrapper on the POSIX threads API) to improve the user experience.
<http://developer.apple.com/documentation/Carbon/Conceptual/ATSUI_Concepts/atsui_chap1/chapter_1_section_1.html>
<http://developer.apple.com/corefoundation/>Our pro products are known for setting the standard in automation support, and to achieve this they rely on the AppleScript and Apple Event APIs, and Automator and the POSIX programming interfaces for running AppleScript scripts, Unix scripts, filters, and powering BBEdit's Shell Worksheets. Finally, many of BBEdit's features sit atop Cocoa APIs for doing the heavy lifting: spell checking, the Font panel, and live HTML previews.
<http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/applescript/>
<http://developer.apple.com/documentation/AppleScript/Conceptual/AppleEvents/intro_aepg/chapter_1_section_1.html>
<http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/automator/>So, as you can tell, our technology choices cut across a wide swath of technology disciplines - sometimes even within a single product - to address an equally wide range of customer needs.
reported by Kevin Hopkins (kh2@uiuc.edu)
Due to the "blizzard" of February 13 & 14, our meeting scheduled for the 15th was cancelled. If I'm not mistaken, this is the first meeting ever cancelled since our inception.
ToC
reported by Kevin Hopkins (kh2@uiuc.edu)
The February meeting of the CUCUG executive board took place on Tuesday, February 20, 2007, at 7PM, at Kevin Hisel's house. (For anyone wishing to attend - which is encouraged, by the way - the address and phone number are both in the book). Present at the meeting were: Richard Rollins, Kevin Hisel, Rich Hall and Kevin Hopkins.
Richard Rollins: Went by the church and the lot was still packed. Lot cleared Saturday night. Kevin Hopkins asked if we get a refund on the room rent, because we were unable to get in to it. Richard said he thought not, but he would check into it. All this led to a bunch of snow stories.
Check into a Vista demo for next month.
Second largest number of patches in Microsoft history on Tuesday.
Richard report for Emil, who was absent, saying Emil didn't have anything planned for this month nor for next month.
Kevin Hisel: Kevin had no new business.
Rich Hall: Rich had no new business.
Kevin Hopkins: Kevin had no new business.
ToC
The CUCUG is a not-for-profit corporation, originally organized in 1983 to support and advance the knowledge of area Commodore computer users. We've grown since then, now supporting PC, Macintosh and Linux platforms.
Meetings are held the third Thursday of each month at 7:00 p.m. at the First Baptist Church of Champaign in Savoy. The FBC-CS is located at 1602 N. Prospect Avenue in Savoy, on the NE corner of Burwash and Prospect. To get to the the First Baptist Church from Champaign or Urbana, take Prospect Avenue south. Setting the trip meter in your car to zero at the corner of Kirby/Florida and Prospect in Champaign (Marathon station on the SW corner), you only go 1.6 miles south. Windsor will be at the one mile mark. The Savoy village sign (on the right) will be at the 1.4 mile mark. Burwash is at the 1.6 mile mark. The Windsor of Savoy retirement community is just to the south; Burwash Park is to the east. Turn east (left) on Burwash. The FBC-CS parking lot entrance is on the north (left) side of Burwash. Enter by the double doors at the eastern end of the building's south side. A map can be found on the CUCUG website at <http://www.cucug.org/meeting.html>. The First Baptist Church of Champaign is also on the web at <http://www.fbc-cs.org>.
Membership dues for individuals are $20 annually; prorated to $10 at mid year.
Our monthly newsletter, the Status Register, is delivered by email. All recent editions are available on our WWW site. To initiate a user group exchange, just send us your newsletter or contact our editor via email. As a matter of CUCUG policy, an exchange partner will be dropped after three months of no contact.
For further information, please attend the next meeting as our guest, or contact one of our officers (all at area code 217):
President/WinSIG: Richard Rollins 469-2616 Vice-Pres/MacSIG: Emil Cobb 398-0149 Secretary/Editor: Kevin Hopkins 356-5026 Treasurer: Richard Hall 344-8687 Corp.Agent/Web: Kevin Hisel 406-948-1999 Linux SIG: Allen Byrne 344-5311
Email us at <http://www.cucug.org/contact/index.html>, visit our web site at <http://www.cucug.org/>, or join in our online forums at <http://www.cucug.org/starship/> .
CUCUG
912 Stratford Drive
Champaign, IL
61821-4137
