Iphone Updates

Travel to Montana’s Glacier National Park, and you’ll find the greatest Grizzly Bear refuge in North America. To better understand the species and its range, researcher Kate Kendall has collected more than 10,000 hair samples using barbed wire traps. The subsequent DNA analysis of the hair has allowed her to create the first ecosystem-wide survey of the population. And may help save the keystone species.

The eagerly awaited sixth film in the Harry Potter series opens in the US on July 15. Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, and Sir Michael Gambon reprise their roles as Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, respectively. Watch the exclusive new film clip for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on the movie trailer’s site. And check out the trailer for the new Harry Potter game, as well.

Saying it’s “primped and primed for Mac OS X Snow Leopard, Windows 7, and professionals of all stripes,” Tom Yager (inforworld.com) lavishes the new 15-inch MacBook Pro with praise. “A five-year machine, by design and track record,” the “newest, fastest 15-inch MacBook Pro is also the coolest (in temperature) and quietest notebook I’ve used.” It is, Yager concludes, “the best of the tier-one commercial notebooks, full stop.”

Digital Kitchen has a history with vampires. The agency created the opening credits for HBO’s runaway hit True Blood. And as an encore, it produced “a series of fang-in-cheek” promotional ads. “The True Blood campaign is done on software and hardware that you can get at the Apple Store,” says Mark Bashore, Digital Kitchen’s creative head. “The tools are easily accessible and easy to learn, which allows us to focus on being creative. That’s why we use the Mac.”

Filed under: Cool tools, WWDC, iPhone, App Store, iPod touch

We’re winding down the last of our WWDC video demos this week, and today we’re looking at Flogger, a simple but powerful flight logger for iPhones and iPod touch handhelds (despite a name that might make you look twice). I’m not a pilot, but some of the features sounded pretty nifty, including a method for exporting your logs to Google Docs, right in the app. Other nice options include a huge database of airport codes, the ability to flag entries as simulator flights, and a fast method for adding crew members from your Address Book.

Flogger (iTunes link) is currently $9.99 in the App Store.

TUAWWWDC Demo: Flogger, a flight logger for iPhone originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 14:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Rumors, Freeware, Internet Tools

Yep. Zip. Zero. Nothing. Fortune Magazine is reporting that Microsoft will announce a free, web based version of Office to be available sometime next year.

Before you ask, it appears the online version will support Firefox and Safari, as well as the ubiquitous Internet Explorer.

Is Microsoft nuts? Maybe not. The software giant is fighting free versions that do pretty much everything Office does. Microsoft apparently believes it can hook people on the free version, while getting them in the tent and anxious to upgrade to the application version that will work better and faster and have some more features.

On the Mac side, Apple sells the iWork package for US$79.00 which is cheaper than any Mac version of Office available. There is also Neo Office (free-donation requested) and Think Free Office ($49.95) along with Google Docs – which is not as feature rich as Office but it is offered at no cost. Open Office (free) is also a possibility. There is a version for both Intel Macs and PowerPC hardware.

TUAWFortune: Microsoft about to offer online version of Office for free originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 13:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Mac 101

If you’re switching from Windows you may be familiar with an old friend, the Task Manager. Apple provides a similar tool, with an easy way to force unruly applications to quit. I’ll get to why you’d want to do this in a moment. To access Force Quit, you can either go to the Apple menu in the top left corner of your screen, and choose Force Quit… Alternately, you can press three keys at once: Command + Option + Esc.* It’s sort of the Mac version of Ctrl-Alt-Delete.

Why would you want to force an application to quit? Sometimes applications get “stuck” for whatever reason and can’t recover. If you notice the “rainbow wheel” spinning when you try to access the application and it just won’t do anything, check the Force Quit tool and see if the name of the application is red and there’s a parenthetical warning “not responding.” This is your cue to use Force Quit — just be aware that sometimes an application might not be responding, but might still be “alive.” Typically what I do is go grab a cup of coffee, or stretch, and give the app 2-5 minutes to get itself together. If it is still stuck, I force quit.

For more on Force Quit, check out this Apple tips article on “Knowing When to (Force) Quit.” And knowing is half the battle.

*Fixed, thanks to the handy commenters!

TUAWMac 101: Force Quit originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Hardware, Rumors, Apple

Rumors about an Apple “netbook” or “tablet” have been rampant for years, but if a report today on the Taiwanese news site Info Times is any indication, a touchscreen Mac may finally be coming to market in October of this year. This would put the new device in stores in time for the prime holiday buying season.

MacRumors has published a translation of an Info Times article that states that Taiwanese manufacturers Foxconn, Dynapack, and Wintek have all received orders from Apple for components or (in the case of Foxconn) finished product with respect to a 9.7″ diagonal screen tablet device. Foxconn reportedly lost out on much of the manufacturing of the new generation of MacBooks, but has been tapped for the touchscreen netbook due to the success they had working with Apple on designing and manufacturing the iPhone.

Earlier this year, TUAW reported that Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster expects Apple to release a touchscreen device. However, his prognostication pointed to a release in 2010.

Several updates have been posted to the MacRumors translation. The first notes that the manufacturers have all denied being involved with Apple on a netbook. In all cases, the manufacturers have company policies that prohibit disclosure of client information. Another update reports that several British reporters have received confirmation from Foxconn employees about the device, while a third mentions that the screen size choice was based on that of the Amazon Kindle DX.

Due to the integration of touchscreen technology into the device, it is expected that it will retail for more than traditional netbooks at around $800. As with all rumors dealing with new Apple devices, take this with a very large grain of salt, and don’t put off any purchase decisions based on what could once again be wishful thinking on the part of Mac fans.

TUAWRumor Watch: Apple touchscreen netbook on tap for October originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Hardware, Rumors, Apple

Rumors about an Apple “netbook” or “tablet” have been rampant for years, but if a report today on the Taiwanese news site Info Times is any indication, a touchscreen Mac may finally be coming to market in October of this year. This would put the new device in stores in time for the prime holiday buying season.

MacRumors has published a translation of an Info Times article that states that Taiwanese manufacturers Foxconn, Dynapack, and Wintek have all received orders from Apple for components or (in the case of Foxconn) finished product with respect to a 9.7″ diagonal screen tablet device. Foxconn reportedly lost out on much of the manufacturing of the new generation of MacBooks, but has been tapped for the touchscreen netbook due to the success they had working with Apple on designing and manufacturing the iPhone.

Earlier this year, TUAW reported that Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster expects Apple to release a touchscreen device. However, his prognostication pointed to a release in 2010.

Several updates have been posted to the MacRumors translation. The first notes that the manufacturers have all denied being involved with Apple on a netbook. In all cases, the manufacturers have company policies that prohibit disclosure of client information. Another update reports that several British reporters have received confirmation from Foxconn employees about the device, while a third mentions that the screen size choice was based on that of the Amazon Kindle DX.

Due to the integration of touchscreen technology into the device, it is expected that it will retail for more than traditional netbooks at around $800. As with all rumors dealing with new Apple devices, take this with a very large grain of salt, and don’t put off any purchase decisions based on what could once again be wishful thinking on the part of Mac fans.

TUAWRumor Watch: Apple touchscreen netbook on tap for October originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Accessories, Odds and ends, iMac, Macbook Pro, MacBook, MacBook Air

Since Apple made the design decision to forgo glare-free screens on MacBooks, iMacs, and Cinema Displays, a common problem for lots of users is reflection of light off of displays. It seems to be particularly bad if you sit with your back to a window, and it can cause both figurative and literal headaches.

RadTech has come out with some cool products for Macs over the years. For example, I’ve owned at least one of their ScreenSavrz “LCD Display protection, cleaning, and refinishing systems” for each MacBook I’ve had. The company is always in touch with the pulse of the Mac community, so it didn’t entirely surprise me when they recently started selling ClearCal Anti-Glare films for MacBook, MacBook Pro, 24″ iMac, and the 24″ Cinema Display.

ClearCal is similar to the films you can get for iPhone and iPod touch screens, but in addition to protecting your screen, it also provides a solution for those pesky reflections. As you can see in the marketing shot to the right, it appears to do a decent job of making your Mac screen anti-glare. You can even remove the ClearCal a few times, wash it, and re-install it.

RadTech has an installation video if you’re interested in seeing how easy or difficult it is to apply the ClearCal film to your display. Pricing starts at US$19.95 and peaks at US$25.95 for the 24″ iMac and CInema Display. As soon as I replace my old iMac with a new 24″, I’m installing a ClearCal so I can see more of my screen and less of the glare from the picture window behind me.

TUAWBlinded by the light? RadTech’s ClearCal may save your eyes originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 13 Jul 2009 07:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’ve been sending one another postcards for nearly 150 years, and thanks to frog design, we now have a thoroughly modern and eminently mobile way to send them. Using Postcard Express, you can snap a geo-tagged photo at your favorite vacation hotspot, add a personal note, then send your digital postcard to friends and family around the world. With no postage or MMS fees.

City Slicker has four travel apps on the App Store, each offering step-by-step tours of popular tourist destinations. But to promote it’s very first app — Charleston City Slicker — the developer did something truly different. As Jim Dalrymple (loopinsight.com) explains, City Slicker just opened a brick-and-mortar location to promote the app to Charleston visitors.

In his Computerworld review, Ken Mingis takes us through all the great features in the new 13-inch MacBook Pro. That includes faster processors, “a major improvement in battery life, an SD card slot, a FireWire 800 port, a better LED screen and, debuting in the entry-level version, Apple’s highly regarded backlit keyboard.” For Mingis, its light weight and small size also makes it “perfect for toting around in a backpack on campus or at work.”

Praising the “superb colour-accurate displays” found on the new MacBook Pro computers, Rob Galbraith (robgalbraith.com) indicates that the revamped lineup “offers the best displays for photographers we’ve ever seen from Apple.” Singling out the 13-inch MacBook Pro, he adds it “could well be the more enticing option,” a great choice “for Mac-based photographers wanting to pay less and carry less.”

The largest library in the world, the Library of Congress has “millions of books, recordings, photographs, maps, and manuscripts in its collection.” And now you can enjoy part of that vast collection on iTunes U. Watch early films from Thomas Edison and Westinghouse. Hear the oral histories of African Americans who served as slaves. Enjoy lectures from researchers exploring the links between music and the brain.

For archaeologist Julie Schablitsky, the MacBook is a perfect storytelling tool. “The Mac is what I put my experiences and interpretations into,” she says. “It receives all of my thoughts, all of the stories that are given to me by the artifacts. I use it to turn those stories into visual representations that I can show people, the public, and academic colleagues. You can help people time travel with the Mac.”

When inspiration struck, indie rock group The 88 used iPhone to record their new single Love is the Thing reports Jefferson Graham (usatoday.com). “The band recorded directly into the iPhone’s built-in microphone,” Graham explains, using FourTrack from the App Store. “‘The great thing about this is that anyone can do it,’” says keyboardist Adam Merrin. “‘You don¹t need expensive recording equipment or instruments.’”

“When it comes to recording, I don’t want to be a technical person,” says Alex Kapranos, lead singer/guitarist for Franz Ferdinand. “The studio should be a creative place. So I like a system that is really straightforward, visually appealing, and simple.” He found that system, writing most of the songs for Tonight: Franz Ferdinand on his MacBook Pro using GarageBand and Logic Pro. The result? A sound “different from everything we’ve ever done before.”

To train the next generation of professional journalists, Arizona State University built a state-of-the-art facility for its prestigious Walter Cronkite School of Journalism. There, student journalists write, shoot, edit, and broadcast their own stories on Mac computers using Final Cut Pro. “Among the most critical decisions we made,” says News Director Mark Lodato, “was choosing Final Cut Pro as our editing tool, and I don’t think we could be more pleased.”

While writing his new book on iPhone 3GS, David Pogue (nytimes.com) discovered some features he couldn’t wait to talk about, one of which is part of the accessibility features built-in to iPhone. “You’d never suspect,” Pogue remarks, “that the iPhone 3GS, which has no physical keys at all, is one of the easiest smartphones in the world for a blind person to use. But now it’s true, thanks to VoiceOver.”

Filed under: iPod Family, Bad Apple

Apple always seems to have a lot of fire-related news. Overheating iPhones, power adapters melting down, and now we have word from Sweden that a 2007 Saab burned to a crisp, and the experts there suggest an iPod as the culprit.

It as been determined there was no technical problem with the car, but the owner had an iPod, a mobile phone and a digital camera in the car. The iPod was on the front seat, and that is where the fire apparently started. The Saab was not even running when the fire broke out. It’s not known if the iPod was charging, or just sitting there by itself.

The investigation is ongoing. We all know Apple makes some hot products, but this one may have been a little too hot.

Here’s a link to the Google translation of the original Swedish article. We’ll let you know if we hear more.

[via Engadget]

TUAWDid an iPod toast a Saab? originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 10 Jul 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Use Microsoft Word on your Mac or PC? Now you can take your documents with you on iPhone. Documents to Go from DavaViz offers a mobile productivity suite. Using it, you can view, edit, and create Word documents on the road. Documents to Go also supports iPhone OS 3.0, allowing you to cut, copy, and paste among documents, email files, work full screen, and much more. And Excel support is coming soon, too.

For restauranteur Patrick Albrecht, the recipe for success includes an extra helping of iPhone. Using iPhone, his 15 managers “can instantly look up, enter, and revise information about menus, banquets, employee schedules, point-of-sale transactions, and daily reports — from anywhere.” iPhone even allows Albrecht to book reservations for customers he meets on the street. How else does iPhone help Albrecht offer unique customer service?

“One of the factors feeding the App Store’s growth,” explains Philip Elmer-DeWitt (fortune.com) “is the size of the installed base.” That would be the 40 million iPhone and iPod touch customers with a healthy appetite for games and other applications. “The other is the variety and sheer quantity of applications,” now more than 65,000 strong, more than 58,000 of those in the U.S. App Store alone.

In just one year, customers have downloaded more than 1.5 billion apps from the App Store, Apple today announced. The largest application store in the world, the App Store now contains more than 65,000 apps. It provides the 100,000 developers in the iPhone Developer program an easy way to reach iPhone and iPod touch customers in 77 countries around the world.

Do you use Safari, Mail, iTunes, or other Mac applications every day? Did you know that Mac OS X Leopard can automatically open your favorite applications for you when you start up your Mac? To find out how, watch the latest Mac OS X Tip in the Business Theater.

The sales executives at software startup ArtusLabs spend a lot of time traveling. And wherever they go, everyone of them carries an iPhone. “It’s one of the most useful pieces of technology we take” with us, says founder Robin Smith. He and his staff use iPhone to manage all their travel details: meetings, schedules, weather, rental cars, meals. keeping in touch, falling asleep, even books to read on the plane.

Travel to Montana’s Glacier National Park, and you’ll find the greatest Grizzly Bear refuge in North America. To better understand the species and its range, researcher Kate Kendall has collected more than 10,000 hair samples using barbed wire traps. The subsequent DNA analysis of the hair has allowed her to create the first ecosystem-wide survey of the population. And may help save the keystone species.

The eagerly awaited sixth film in the Harry Potter series opens in the US on July 15. Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, and Sir Michael Gambon reprise their roles as Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, respectively. Watch the exclusive new film clip for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on the movie trailer’s site. And check out the trailer for the new Harry Potter game, as well.

Saying it’s “primped and primed for Mac OS X Snow Leopard, Windows 7, and professionals of all stripes,” Tom Yager (inforworld.com) lavishes the new 15-inch MacBook Pro with praise. “A five-year machine, by design and track record,” the “newest, fastest 15-inch MacBook Pro is also the coolest (in temperature) and quietest notebook I’ve used.” It is, Yager concludes, “the best of the tier-one commercial notebooks, full stop.”

Digital Kitchen has a history with vampires. The agency created the opening credits for HBO’s runaway hit True Blood. And as an encore, it produced “a series of fang-in-cheek” promotional ads. “The True Blood campaign is done on software and hardware that you can get at the Apple Store,” says Mark Bashore, Digital Kitchen’s creative head. “The tools are easily accessible and easy to learn, which allows us to focus on being creative. That’s why we use the Mac.”

We’ve been sending one another postcards for nearly 150 years, and thanks to frog design, we now have a thoroughly modern and eminently mobile way to send them. Using Postcard Express, you can snap a geo-tagged photo at your favorite vacation hotspot, add a personal note, then send your digital postcard to friends and family around the world. With no postage or MMS fees.

Filed under: Software, iPhone, App Store

For some, the recently released iTennis game in the iTunes App Store looked extremely familiar — that’s because it was a rather blatant ripoff of code provided by the iCodeBlog, a site known for its free iPhone coding tutorials. The original tutorial, written by Brandon Trebitowski, was apparently compiled and submitted by Peter Sheen of BlaBlaIncTech and placed on sale for $.99USD on iTunes in late May.

Trebitowski revealed the theft through iCodeBlog yesterday, and Jonathan Siegel got in touch with us regarding the situation. As response has gotten out through iCodeBlog, there has been a backlash through both BlaBlaIncTech’s site and the App Store. As a result, around 4:45 Pacific Time, the game was pulled from iTunes.

In an attempt to contact someone from BlaBlaIncTech, I headed over to the site to find no contact information except for a support chat that was spammed with nearly 15,000 comments regarding the theft. While I was writing up this post, BlaBlaIncTech removed the link to its guestbook from the front page of the site. Ten minutes later, the game was gone from the App Store. Ten minutes after that, all mention of iTennis was gone from BlaBlaIncTech’s site.

TUAWLifted tutorial code winds up in $0.99 App Store tennis game originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 09 Jul 2009 20:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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City Slicker has four travel apps on the App Store, each offering step-by-step tours of popular tourist destinations. But to promote it’s very first app — Charleston City Slicker — the developer did something truly different. As Jim Dalrymple (loopinsight.com) explains, City Slicker just opened a brick-and-mortar location to promote the app to Charleston visitors.

In his Computerworld review, Ken Mingis takes us through all the great features in the new 13-inch MacBook Pro. That includes faster processors, “a major improvement in battery life, an SD card slot, a FireWire 800 port, a better LED screen and, debuting in the entry-level version, Apple’s highly regarded backlit keyboard.” For Mingis, its light weight and small size also makes it “perfect for toting around in a backpack on campus or at work.”

Praising the “superb colour-accurate displays” found on the new MacBook Pro computers, Rob Galbraith (robgalbraith.com) indicates that the revamped lineup “offers the best displays for photographers we’ve ever seen from Apple.” Singling out the 13-inch MacBook Pro, he adds it “could well be the more enticing option,” a great choice “for Mac-based photographers wanting to pay less and carry less.”

The largest library in the world, the Library of Congress has “millions of books, recordings, photographs, maps, and manuscripts in its collection.” And now you can enjoy part of that vast collection on iTunes U. Watch early films from Thomas Edison and Westinghouse. Hear the oral histories of African Americans who served as slaves. Enjoy lectures from researchers exploring the links between music and the brain.

For archaeologist Julie Schablitsky, the MacBook is a perfect storytelling tool. “The Mac is what I put my experiences and interpretations into,” she says. “It receives all of my thoughts, all of the stories that are given to me by the artifacts. I use it to turn those stories into visual representations that I can show people, the public, and academic colleagues. You can help people time travel with the Mac.”

When inspiration struck, indie rock group The 88 used iPhone to record their new single Love is the Thing reports Jefferson Graham (usatoday.com). “The band recorded directly into the iPhone’s built-in microphone,” Graham explains, using FourTrack from the App Store. “‘The great thing about this is that anyone can do it,’” says keyboardist Adam Merrin. “‘You don¹t need expensive recording equipment or instruments.’”

If you’d like to try something both delicious and healthy this holiday weekend, think about serving your guests Barbecue Glazed Alaska Salmon with Tomatillo Salsa Verde. That’s just one of the many tempting meals you can find in Whole Foods Market Recipes, a new, free app available on the App Store. The app, which requires iPhone OS 3.0, provides ingredients, directions, a store locator, and other handy features.

If you purchase and register a qualifying FileMaker 10 product between July 1 and September 18, you can get a free copy of the FileMaker Graphics Pack. The pack contains more than a 1,000 graphics you can use to give the databases you create using FileMaker 10 a polished, professional look. For more details, and to see sample images, visit the FileMaker site.

Ever forget your hotel room number? Then Steve Casimiro (adventure.nationalgeographic.com) wants to tell you about Room. It’s one of the iPhone travel apps Casimiro has come to rely on as he roams the world for National Geographic Adventure magazine. He’s also found apps that help him pack a better suitcase, phone home for less, find Wi-Fi hot spots, and lots more. Is your favorite travel app among his picks?

Its “fetching high-resolution screen and its portability make this an attractive notebook for professional designers,” reports Jonathan Rougeot (computershopper.com) of the new 17-inch MacBook Pro. In addition, Rougeot concludes, the new model’s “sleek design, impressive battery life, and reduced price will make this attractive even to less-demanding users who want a stylish laptop with a bit of muscle.”

Filed under: Software

The Missing Sync line of software from Mark/Space has been around long enough that just about every handheld operating system made can now sync data with a Mac. As a result, it’s not surprising that Mark/Space has announced Missing Sync for Palm Pre.

The $39.95 Mac application (also available in a two-license Business Edition for US$89.95) starts with the usual tasks of syncing contacts and calendars whenever you’re in Wi-Fi range of your Mac, but then adds syncing of music, videos, podcasts, and photos to the mix. There’s a built-in ringtone editor for creating your own ringtones from your music, and syncing PDF, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint documents is a snap.

If the screenshots of the application are any indication, Missing Sync for Palm Pre uses the tried and true user interface found on its siblings. Mark/Space has also announced that they are developing a Fliq app for Palm Pre (four Fliq apps are currently available for iPhone) to provide syncing of Safari bookmarks.

I’m sure there are a few Palm Pre owners out there who read TUAW; if you’re one of them, could you let others know how this product works by leaving a comment?

TUAWPalm Pre owners: Mark/Space has a Missing Sync for you originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 08 Jul 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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How do the batteries in the new MacBook Pro laptops measure up? Walt Mossberg (ptech.allthingsd.com) wanted to know, so “using my own harsh battery test,” he assessed the performance of new 13- and 15-inch MacBook Pro models. “The results,” he reports, ”were excellent. These two new Apple laptops scored among the highest battery lives between charges of any laptop I have ever tested.”

Love Jazz? So does Don Wolff, who brings us the “I Love Jazz!” program on Higher Education Channel Television. HEC-TV, “the leading producer of education, arts, and cultural” TV programming in St. Louis, produces award-winning programming that “makes you think.” And, in the case of “I Love Jazz!” encourages a greater appreciation of a uniquely American art form.

In just one year, customers have downloaded more than 1.5 billion apps from the App Store, Apple today announced. The largest application store in the world, the App Store now contains more than 65,000 apps. It provides the 100,000 developers in the iPhone Developer program an easy way to reach iPhone and iPod touch customers in 77 countries around the world.

Do you use Safari, Mail, iTunes, or other Mac applications every day? Did you know that Mac OS X Leopard can automatically open your favorite applications for you when you start up your Mac? To find out how, watch the latest Mac OS X Tip in the Business Theater.

Filed under: iPhone, App Store, App Review

Every so often I get the idea I’m living in some kind of parallel universe where iPhone apps are created that look great but just don’t do anything of value.

Such an app is Metal Detector [App Store] that for US$0.99 cents purports to detect metal around you. It requires an iPhone 3GS because it uses the built in magnetometer (compass) to work.

Well, it did discover my bird cage, but I could see that anyway. It reacted to a stop sign, and a fire hydrant when I was on my morning run. “Look Mom, the funny man from across the street is messing with the fire hydrant. Call the cops!”

It didn’t work on coins at all, wrong kind of metal, so any visions you had of crawling along the beach looking for treasure is out the window. It works on ferromagnetic metals only, like iron and steel.

The app did not cut off my iPod music when I started it up, but as soon as it beeped with finding something metal the audio shut down. Appropriately, I was listening to the Alan Hovhaness Symphony for Metal Instruments, but I guess most Heavy Metal bands would work too.

The Three Stooges used to have a routine where they talked about inventing a pen that wrote under whipped cream, and this seems like a similar fetish. It does work, but so what? What do I do with it? You have to be really close to the item for the alert to go off, and if I’m that close, I don’t need a metal detector. I tried it on in wall wiring, but no dice there, so I’m straining to find some utility for this thing.

The developers say this is a novelty item, but I think most of my friends would say I’m stupid, rather than entertaining. If you must satisfy your lust for searching for visible metal, I’d suggest you take a look at Metal Detector Pro [App Store], which does the same thing with a different interface but it’s free.

TUAWMetal Detector solves some problems you don’t have originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 08 Jul 2009 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Software, How-tos

Many years ago I started playing with AppleScript. For some reason, it failed to hold my attention, though I know you can do many cool tricks with it. Perhaps I’d still be at it if I had found an overview like the one posted at AppStorm.

This well-written guide starts with the basics and builds from there. I’ve seen entirely too many AppleScript guides that either go from the Tell statement right to masters-level stuff or that end entirely after creating the obligatory “Hello, world!” script.

Joshua, writing for AppStorm, covers variables, accessing dictionaries and walks readers through the creation of a handy Mail script. It’s not comprehensive, of course, but just right as an introduciton. Check it out and get scripting.

TUAWGreat beginner’s guide to AppleScript originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 08 Jul 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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