The first of four main services I’m going to highlight is the simplest: Delicious social bookmarking. This is a free service that lets you first put all your current bookmarks online for easy access anywhere, then once you’ve done that You’re ready to start using Delicious for what it was really designed for. This service is widely popular and has plugins for every major browser that make this new way of bookmarking as simple as your usual command-D or “New Bookmark” button. Here’s how it works, you bookmark a site with Delicious and you can add tags to the site to help you remember what type of content it had, then you can search those tags later on to find some bookmark you made years ago to find that perfect italian restaurant in Little Italy, San Diego. The next fun part about Delicious is now you have your bookmarks online so you can easily access them anywhere, not only that you can add bookmarks to Delicious from any computer, even if it’s not yours and even if it doesn’t have a plugin installed!

Next up is Evernote! This is a note taking and bookmarking application that lets you organize information for a project, or even just keep a list of wines in your cellar. Your Evernote notes can include text, pictures, links, whole web pages, pretty much anything you want to save for later. The saved notes can be accessed on your local computer, online, or on your iPhone.

Dropbox is as simple as it gets for syncing files across computers anywhere in the world! You literally just sign up online, download the application, and then you are all set to go. Put any files you want to sync across to another computer or just backup online. Simple and easy!

Last but most definitely not least is Google. Google apps are easy to use because if you have a Google account, you already have free and easy access to all of the services they offer. The list of services they offer is out of control, they offer everything from calendars to a photo sharing resource Google has a wide gamut of choices of awesome and helpful applications that can all be used anywhere and saved right to your account online for access anywhere.... for free!

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Save each calendar to the desktop then head on over to Google Calendar. First thing we need to do is make the same number of calendars in Google Calendars as you want to import. To do this click “Create” on the left side:

Then once, you’ve made your new empty calendars, you’re ready to import. On the bottom of your current calendars you will see a link to “Add” the select “Import Calendar.”

Select each calendar individually and import them to the corresponding calendar you just made.

Now just go back to your Google Calendar page to see all of your calendars imported to Google! Now that the hardest part is over, lets get the syncing part set up! Download the Google Collaboration sync tool for iCal. Just open the application and plug in your Google name and password and select “Add to iCal.”

Just delete your original Calendars so you don’t have doubles of all your events, and you’re all done!

Now whenever you edit, add or delete anything on your calendars they will automatically update both on your computer and on Google Calendars. If you’re in a place with no available internet, no worries, the next time your computer sees a connection it will update!

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Notice the flatness and lack of shadows on the coins in the left photo when the flash is pointed directly at them. Now look at the right photo and take note that when we place the flash behind the coins we get much more natural lighting leaving us with shadows that help define the coin faces. Also when we use the aperture priority function to focus in properly we get great depth and definition of the coins!

This is a lighting technique that every professional photographer utilizes to give the subject a ‘natural light’ look by not eliminating all shadows, but actually creating them. This helps us recognize the fine details in the photo.

How do you take your flash and put it elsewhere you might ask? Well, this process is easy and pretty cheap! You must have following three things to utilize this technique yourself:
• a camera that has a sync cable jack (or you can buy a hot shoe to sync cable adapter for $9.95 dollars at Adorama)
• an external flash (any old flash will work just fine, if you don’t have one, this external flash is really great!)
• a pc sync cable

All you have to do now is connect the flash to your camera with the sync cable, turn your camera on to any of the priority modes (Program Auto, Shutter, Aperture, or Manual), and shoot!

I decided to make my own hot shoe connector and cable to save some money. To do this I soldered a hot shoe connector together with a piece of pc board and some resistor wire. Then I opened up my external flash and soldered the wires that lead to the terminals on the hot shoe connector, then I put ethernet jacks at each end so I can just use any standard ethernet cable to connect my camera to my flash!

An additional perk to making my own cable is that now I have a cheap and extendable cable since we all have spare ethernet cables laying around!

Want to learn more? Check out the Strobist blog, it’s an amazing resource that I’m still learning from all the time! For more examples check me out on Flickr!

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Simply quit iTunes, if it’s open, then open up Terminal (Macintosh HD/Applications/Utilities) and copy and paste in the following command:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes allow-half-stars -bool TRUE

Your result should look something like this:

Now enjoy the ability to rate your music with 1/2 stars! This increases the variety you can rate how great a song is!

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This is all fine and dandy... except when I opened up the new µTorrent Beta for Mac it seems to be missing the one thing it does best, the RSS handling. :( Oh well, a future update someday will hold what I so desire.

Here’s where one of this week’s company come in... Big Huge Labs is a site that aggregates a whole slew of Flickr tools and toys all on one page.

Now on my more important photos I always add a link to “View This Photo On Black” so if someone wants to see the photo in the raw without all the Flickr tools and options that take away from the experience. Instead, the viewers gets the following experience.

Some other cool tools Big Huge Labs provides for your photos are adding a digital matting, puzzles to purchase, mosaics, calendars, movie posters, magazine covers, CD cover, blog headers, or maybe you would like to add cartoon bubbles to a photo with captions.

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Now that you have the two essential components needed to create the best ‘automatic’ RSS downloader let’s start the configuration!

Step One: Open up Transmission and go to the Preferences window and the ‘Transfers’ tab.

Now copy my settings into your prefs window and make sure to check the ‘Auto Add’ box at the bottom and select a folder where you want Transmission to always watch for new torrent files.

Step Two: Navigate on over to tvrss.net and find an rss feed that fits your liking and copy the url. (example, here’s an rss feed for one of my favorite shows: right-click on Dexter and copy link)

Step Three: Open up NetNewsWire and click into the pref pane. / ‘Downloading’ tab / ‘Downloads Folder’ tab

Now, choose the folder you made before to download your files to.

Step Four: Now just hit the subscribe button on the top left and paste in the RSS url! Then select an episode and hit the download button at the bottom left of the window and it will download the torrent file to the folder Transmission is watching which will cause Transmission to start downloading the episode to your desktop. Ta-daaaa!

The other great thing about IMAP is you can see and edit all your online folders that Gmail provides from your desktop and your mobile device. The downside is these folders really clutter up your inbox... also I don;t want to see my spam email, that’s why I have the spam filter in the first place... so the solution comes with Google Labs!

Scroll halfway down and look for “Advanced IMAP Controls” and click enable. Then go to your settings and the labels tab (or just click here). Now you have complete control over what folders are visible when you access your IMAP email!

Now your iPhone can be much less cluttered, and when you delete emails on the road you won’t have a full inbox when you get home!

Along with being really cool it can be controlled with some pretty basic key commands that make it even more fun!

Check it out:

• • + and -: Increase or decrease the intensity (brightness) of the particles; multiple presses further increase or decrease the intensity.
• A and S: Add or Subtract particles to the visualizer. You can make the visualizer as complex (or sparse) as you wish.
• R: Reset the intensity and particle count to their default values.
• E: When in nebula mode (press N), this greatly accentuates the nebula clouds, making them very easy to see. (If you’ve used the M key to change modes, you may find that the nebula clouds aren’t visible; it seems they’re only used in certain modes.)

Chrome is smooth and simple to use. The url bar doubles as a search bar, the tabs are above everything and out of the way, but they don’t feel out of place. Bookmarks are imported from Firefox automatically, including the toolbar bookmarks. My favorite part is that Google thinks of everything... when you open a new tab the window shows you your most visited sites in thumbnail form and has a list on the side of recent sites. How cool is that?

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If you’re used to normal digital point-and-shoot cameras but you want to get a much better picture quality and a more organic feel to shooting photos this is the perfect camera to help you transition from a general point and shooter into the world of amateur photography.

The learning curve is very minimal if you’ve ever used a standard 35mm SLR film camera, digital SLR cameras work almost exactly the same. Anyone can easily pick up a D40 and take amazing pictures, it’s as easy as learning how to use the zoom and then the rest is generally the same as any other digital camera.

The main reason to step up to a dSLR of course is to get better picture quality. The D40 is a 6.1 megapixel camera, which seems low for a high end consumer camera/low end professional camera when compared to some Olympus 10.2MP camera you can find at Target for $250... but the megapixel rating has nothing to do with quality, just physical picture size. When you take a picture with a dSLR your camera actually opens a shutter and looks through an aperture for a given amount of time which exposes a certain amount of light in, and that image information is recorded digitally to an SD card just like a film camera would record that information to the mylar film.

The colors dSLRs are able to capture are simply amazing! Where you really notice the difference in your photos is in the saturation and clarity of colors and shadows. This seems basic, but the ability to capture black as ‘black’ and not just ‘dark grey’ is absolutely crucial to presenting colors as they look in real life.

For instance: the photos below are cropped from larger versions to accentuate the differences. On the left the photo was taken with a standard point-and-shoot (Canon PowerShot). Notice how it looks grainy and the colors are dull. Whereas the photo on the right was taken with a dSLR (Pentax K100D) and you can right away see how much more clear it is and how the colors really pop out. You can see how shadows really make a difference if you look at the difference between the boy’s hair in the two pictures; the dSLR lets you really see the true colors and definition of everything in the photo, where with the standard camera everything just looks dull and flat.

The next thing that worries people often times with dSLR cameras is they think they will be difficult to use or figure out all the different settings... well the Nikon D40 takes all of that frustration and throws it out the window! You can just throw it in automatic mode and it will figure everything for you except how close to zoom in; that includes ISO, shutter speed, aperture, focusing, flash, white balance, and the list goes on!

When you do get to a level where you want to experiment a little the camera has built in pointers to help you shoot perfect pictures too. So say you’re in a dark room and you need a flash, the camera will tell you that you should turn on the flash because of low light. Also, when you are changing settings like ISO you are shown examples of what the different setting should be used for. This makes the Nikon D40 not only easy to use, but much more fun when you can get professional quality photos without even opening up the manual or taking a photography class!


Pros: High quality ‘prosumer’ level dSLR camera with interchangeable lenses, very cheap ($475 on Amazon) for a dSLR with a kit lens included, can shoot in RAW, high quality 6.1 megapixel sized photos, very easy to use as a beginner, excellent color capturing capabilities.
Cons: The msrp of $499 for this camera is not cheap by average camera standards, it can’t even compare to the size of a simple point-and-shoot camera

The Bottom Line: The Nikon D40 is for the aspiring photography hobbyist, not the layman nor the professional. This is a perfect stepping stone from general picture taking to the world of professional digital photography. It’s cheap, comes with everything you need right in the box (except an SD card), and it’s very easy to use and catch amazing photos with. This is a great buy, DEFINITELY check it out if you want to capture life’s very best memories to remember for the rest of yours... just as you lived them!

Overall: 8.5

Usability: 7 This is a very easy dSLR to use if you know anything about cameras, but it’s not for the layman
Customizability: 8 Interchangeable lenses, the ability to add on filters, and external flashes is awesome, some old lenses won’t fit properly without expensive adapter rings though
GUI: 9 very appealing indeed, beautiful screen that tells you every pertinent piece of information you’d need to know to take simply amazing photos
Coolness: 10 This camera turns heads left and right... and it takes photos that do the same!

These screen often show deep blacks as dark grey. I’ve posted my screen calibration profile though, that seems to be quite accurate and true at presenting colors in a realistic light. Just downlod the zip file, unzip it, and place the calibration .icc file in the path included, then choose it from the display color settings in the system preferences.

You will notice a lot of iPhone-like features, which is awesome because why not use ideas that are already great and work well, but Android steps it up and takes iPhone features and improves upon them in a way that makes the device much more fun and easy to use.

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You do have to do some pretty serious surgery to your walls... but if you're handy, determined, crafty, or think you are any of the above ;-), then this is a definite must check out product!

Weird and kind of creepy if you ask me. All I did was mention Comcast and they are right there trying to help me, I didn't say I had a problem, all I said is that I was trying to find a local store... I'm not one to usually care about privacy issues, but this is pushing it.

In addition to the basic features, you can also monitor your calls on your computer as they come in, listen to the calls as they are being recorded to voicemail, block callers, record calls, one number that can ring different phones depending on who's calling, switch to another phone in the middle of the call if you need to be on the run but aren't ready to hang up, special rings, and ringback tones too.

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Cork'd can also log all the wines in your cellar for you with vintages, varietals, scores, average prices, reviews, and quick easy to use tasting tags (for example: cherry, honeydew melon, raspberry, apple, et cetera). Once you have an account, get some drinking buddies and recommend wines to each other! It's a great way to find the best wines at reasonable prices, let someone else try them first... :)

Afloat is an app that lets you make windows transparent and adds various other superfluous effects to all cocoa apps.

A quick FREE download and you'll all ready to go! Just open up any cocoa application (Safari and iChat for example) and click on the "Window" menu item. Any option with a little cloud next to it is a special Afloat add on.

You could always see who was on Facebook right now by going to "Friends > Who's Online" but now you can go one step further and talk to those that are online right away. The chats are instant messages just like AOL Instant Messenger so there's no need to wait for a reply like in a personal message or wall post. Want to check it out? Go to Facebook right now, look on the bottom right corner of your window and you'll see the new chat box. Neat huh?

This recorded data is then sent by satellite back to home base and is actually posted on their website every 10 minutes!!! Wicked cool!!! The information that is recorded is ridiculously in depth too, the best parts are the height of the swells, the length of the period between swells, the water and air direction, water and air temps, et cetera. Check it out, there's even an RSS feed!

Here's what the site looks like


Here's what that looks like in google earth with a photo selected

As an additional note, you can also hold down the shift button while pressing the volume keys to mute the "pop" that you hear when pressing the volume key.

If you want to permanently silence the volume-adjust beeping, uncheck "Play feedback when volume is changed" in the Sound Effects preference pane and it won't bother you again (helpful for podcasting or other situations when you might need to adjust your volume on the fly)."

Macworld has this slightly old, yet still accurate article on how to set up your screen quickly and accurately. It was a great help when trying to match my two screens so they were similarly and accurately displaying color.

Or you could write an Applescript that says the following:

This is what I do because I use the scripts menu item and I can access and run this and other commonly used scripts with just a quick click. I like menu items a lot, what can I say? :)

With the Flickr account you are given unlimited storage, unlimited photo sets, a permanent online archive for your photos, ad free browsing and sharing, account and photo statistics, and the photo quality has essentially no resolution limit.

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In short, it's a gorgeous application that lets you organize and edit your photos, create awesome slideshows, prints, or webpages to show off your photos. This video will show you what Lightroom is and the quality of photos you can make and edit.

Click here for some cool video tips on how to get started and use some of the more advanced features.

Oh, you see a few distros of Linux up there you say? Yeah, Fusion can handle any OS you throw at it... 32 or 64 bit! That includes any distribution of Linux, Windows 3.1 to Vista plus server editions, Solaris, Novell NetWare, Free BSD, and pretty much any other OS that can run on an Intel processor.

With VMware Fusion you can enable Unity, which lets you run Windows apps right on your Mac desktop right along side your Mac apps. You can then minimize them to the dock, use them with Spaces and Exposé. You can actually save programs to your dock just like normal Mac apps and when yo want to open them you just click on it like a regular application and it opens on your desktop just like normal. Above you can see my desktop running the Windows version of Firefox and Minesweeper right alongside with Apple Mail, Adium, and iTunes.

You should really check it out, there's a free demo on the VMware site, and I found my copy for $39 on Amazon.

Some tv shows come with commercials, but they are 30 seconds or less, so you're back to your show in no time. Plus the ads that I have seen are usually not too bad, I've seen only Chevrolet and Saturn commercials, both cleaver ads that show how economically sound their hybrids are. definitely no "as seen on tv" ads here!

With a nice clean slick player, Hulu really has done it right. I have moused over the video so the controls are shown in the screen shot above, but normally you would just see the video playing in a nice black gradient surrounding, or you can view in fullscreen with nothing but your video on the screen. It's pretty awesome, go check it out for yourself!

If you're on a Mac check out either the full featured awesome Twitterific ($15), or the barebones, stripped down, widget app, Twitgit (free!) and you can update your Twitter feed in seconds just as if you were updating your aim status, it's that easy.

This app is really awesome and the only thing I wish they would add is support for more applications.

Above is what this what you see overlaying the desktop when you hold the menu button for 2 seconds. You get a global menu that gives you access to a whole bunch of the Finder native options. (i.e. dashboard, exposé, front row, screensaver, sleep timer, shut down, restart, also you can open any application or file).

So I knew that I could pair my computer to my remote so I tried doing what Apple says, hold the menu button and next/fast forward for 5 seconds in front of your IR sensor... nothing. I try it again... nothing. finally I found out that if you hit menu and select for 5 seconds it works great! Apparently, Apple doesn't know all there is about their own products though, a little weird.

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You just have to head to over to LeopardDocks.net or Dockulicious.com, and download any theme you like, then click the import dock button and select the .zip file then select it and hit set dock. Couldn't be easier!

The 17" now comes with an LED backlight screen option. Both 15" and 17" models support gesture tracking, and sport the new NVIDIA 8600M GT 512MB graphics card. I can't wait to get my hands on this newly updated 6MB cache 800MHz frontside bus over my 5 year old 167MHz FSB 2MB cache 1GHz PPC with 1 GB ram... :( soon he will have a new home.

Other than the new Leopard-metal-rounded look, other features include: the newest version of Gecko (1.9) which is the rendering engine, cool new add on manager, the address bar also will now search your bookmarks and history as you type, and my personal favorite... over 350 memory leaking issues were fixed! As with most pre-releases, this version breaks a lot of add-ons, but the most important ones still work for me. Everyday developers are updating their add-ons to work with the most current versions too, so that's a plus. Download your copy here.

Your options are at an interval of specified hours, once a day at a given time, once a week at a given day and time, or once a month on a given date and time.

We'll just have to wait around a little longer for a 3G version though I guess :(.

Enter in, for instance, "House" into "Show Name" and check the "Exact" check box so that the search does not include shows like Desperate Housewives or Run's House. Then hit return, or click search. You will see a list of what shows they have available.

For most circumstances you'll want to choose a feed that is not 720p quality, so choose a file that is any other option as listed under the "Quality" column. Then click on the file you'd like to download, and save the file to your desktop. The file should look like the following:

If the file looks like that just double click on the torrent file from the desktop and it will open Transmission and It will start downloading the actual file. If it looks different, right click on it and select "Open With" and select Transmission.

For optimal downloading go to Transmission in the menubar and then click on "Preferences" click on the bandwidth tab and set your settings like this:

This will ensure that your internet speeds won't go down while you're downloading, which will keep everyone else on your network happy :). Any further questions? Contact me!

Although on the pricey side of $59 bucks, this is awesome for keeping your desk clean and the your screen at the right height, plus easy access to 4 USB 2.0 ports! Not to mention it is a very study aluminum to match the metal of the display of the cinema displays and iMacs.

These guys have done a great job at creating something that looks great, not customizable at all, but looks awesome!

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This group of young musicians are currently working on their debut album as Jaye Drew and a Moving Train.

Hopefully Apple will embrace this processor series in their new MacBook Pro they will release on January 15th, that'd make me just about the happiest man ever!

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It's true, I'm a fan of the Opera, but certain things such as not conforming to certain web standards has made me decide to go back to my gold standard: the reliably slow... Firefox. When I went to digg often times Opera wouldn't let me digg an article, the script would "fail to initiate" so it told me. I will miss the very speedy browsing, and built in scripting, rss feeds, and torrent client, but not enough to keep me an Opera user until they make it more compliant with today's web 2.0 standards. I must say as a final note though, the pc version of Opera runs like a dream, and I'd highly recommend it to any Windows user out there!

For more info check out the unofficial Google news and tips site.

To install: open your hard drive/Library/QuickLook and put the component file from inside the zipped file in this folder and log out. When you log back in QuickLook into a folder and check out the goodies!

If you use a client such as Azureus, Transmission, Xtorrent, or even the torrent downloader built right into Opera(my current favorite 'cause it works well and it's wicked easy) you most likely won't even notice a difference on your network because they are set up to work optimally right out of the box. These modern clients don't aggravate your network with constant tracker updates and they have the options to limit upload speeds. Check out the difference in ping times from when I had Bit Torrent running downloading a file without an upload limit and when I quit the application, which is necessary to making sure the client isn't still running. When you hit "pause" it doesn't stop the client from slowing the network at all, you need to actually quit to be sure.

Network Ping times (the time it takes for information to get from your computer to a site, in this case Google, and back, in milliseconds:
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=855 ttl=115 time=4053.799 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=856 ttl=115 time=4099.037 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=857 ttl=115 time=4055.384 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=858 ttl=115 time=4033.114 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=859 ttl=115 time=4195.999 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=860 ttl=115 time=4137.639 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=861 ttl=115 time=4139.862 ms

Here is what happened when Bit Torrent is quit... we magically get normal ping times again:
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=862 ttl=115 time=19.645 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=863 ttl=115 time=13.137 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=864 ttl=115 time=15.742 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=865 ttl=115 time=14.918 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=866 ttl=115 time=17.739 ms
64 bytes from 68.87.60.144: icmp_seq=867 ttl=115 time=16.239 ms

Moral of the story, make sure your bit torrent client (and your room mates!) is set up to work optimally to keep your internet running like normal, not to mention so as not to piss off your friends on the network.

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Try to beat your friends with a game that helps everybody at the same time by helping Google label their images.

• RSS support. An awesome reader in fact.
• Ad blocking with selective blocking capabilities.
• Advanced pop-up blocker that only blocks unwanted pop-ups.
• Widgets like on iGoogle. This is an AMAZING feature! I have my Pandora player, weather, Google Maps!!!, etc... these can be accessed anytime, not just from a webpage.
• Mouse gestures
• Notes for marking up webpages for future review
• Smart auto-fill
• Skin flexibility
• Downloader that works like DownThemAll!
• Mail and chat built in. Which is awesome because you can sync your Opera browsers on multiple computers so your mail and chat goes with you wherever you go!

The more I use Opera the more I like it, it's getting dangerously close to making me switch it over as my default browser, which is a big deal.

Although the product is a little odd shaped and designed, the feature set of the Kindle is impressive enough to more than overcome the downfalls of the hardware. Built in WiFi for access to all of your favorite blogs, that update all day long! Also you can purchase subscriptions to most major newspapers and journals and have them delivered each morning before they even hit the newsstands. Access to wikipedia via WiFi and a built in dictionary for any concept or word you might be misunderstanding. Check out the Amazon page linked above for a full feature set.

1. Create a folder called “Scripts” in the “Users/you/Library/iTunes/” directory.
2. Open the Script Editor located in “Applications/AppleScript/” folder.
3. Type the following code:

Tell application “iTunes”
Delay 3600
Quit
End tell

*note that you can change the delay time to any other time in seconds.
**also note that you can change the "Quit" to "Pause" if you like.
4. In the File> Save As… menu save the script as a application, deselecting the Startup Screen and Stay Open options. Save it to your newly created “Scripts” folder with whatever name you want.
5. Open up iTunes. You’ll see a new menu that will give you access to all your iTunes AppleScripts.
The only issue with this little trick is that once you tell iTunes to start a script it won't let you do anything within the program until the script is done. So if you change your mind, you'll have to force quit iTunes.

Here's how you do it:
Navigate to: /System/Library/LaunchDaemons. There you'll find a file named com.apple.backupd-auto.plist. Copy this file to your desktop and then open it with any text editor (or Apple plist editor if you have it!) and look for this section:

Change the 3600 number to some other time interval in seconds, Save and quit, then replace this file back into the LaunchDaemons folder, you'll need to be an admin. Restart your machine you'll have a new Time Machine's backup interval!

As you can see the clock at the top right with the iCal logo is MenuCalendarClock. You can set a key to automatically make the calendar come out and in if you like, or just click on it. If you click on the list icon at the bottom your to do's will come up and you can check them off as you complete them. When you hover over a date scheduled in your calendar (colored blue) a small text tip bubble comes up to tell you what's scheduled, if you double click on a date it will open iCal to that date!

Well, that looks daunting huh? Well, it wasn't too bad... just a lot of steadyness and being static-free.

After I replaced the hard drive (bottom left in the picture), I restarted onto the Leopard disc and chose the restore from backup option. This lets you restore a system from a backup, such as time machine.

It actually lets you choose any saved state to restore from. I chose the most recent backup version. Nevertheless it took around 4 hours to transfer the 70 GB from my backup drive. Now everything is EXACTLY the way it was before my drive stopped working!

Now you can just stop at the station and print out directions to yoru next location, how convenient? You'll never be embarrassed asking for directions again!

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Get your dock looking like this by going to the Goodies page!

Guests can login and are allowed to do only the things you predefine. But instead of restricting your friends, you can pretty much let them do whatever they want because when they log out the account is expunged, and the next time it's logged into it's as if it's a brand new account again. Apple reinstalls the user each time you log into this special guest account, that way no matter what your guests mess with, they'll never do anything to your computer!

Next we have a screen shot of an add-on to Quicksilver called Constellation Menu, it lets you see things much more graphically for certain applications, such as iTunes, seen below.

Quicksilver has a plug-in for just about any application you use, and the repository works much like a Linux distribution system. You just go into the preferences and check off which plugins you want to be installed and they automatically download and install, no hassles. Hopefully Apple will take notice and add some of this functionality right into spotlight when Leopard arrives... or maybe later on. They do need to have things to upgrade too, they can't start with everything.

Apple's got a great selection of the greatest iPhone and iPod Touch Web Apps for all to check out and bookmark!

Go to about:config and filter down the results and look for browser.display.focus_ring_width, then click on the on the parameter on the right and set the value to 0 (zero). This will get rid of that annoying dotted line and make your browser much nicer on the eye when clicking links!

Although Safari has wonderful RSS support that Firefox couldn't hold a match to, I just can't have my Facebook bar with buttons for sharing links or getting notifications when someone messages me. I can't have a built in downloader that works like a dream (DownThemAll!). I can't have the weather forecast(ForecastFox Enhanced) in my status bar for me to check at any time. I sure as hell can't use StumbleUpon features, or even my latest addition... Grab and Drag.
This extension lets you physically drag the screen up and down just like how the iPhone uses multi-touch. You can even turn on momentum features so when you drag and let go the screen will keep going and slow down to a stop with a friction that you set. You can alter how and where Grab and Drag works, for instance you can set it up so that whenever you click and drag only where there are no links or text the screen will move with the curser, this way when you highlight text the screen won't move around on you. So if you fancy Firefox, check this out and you'll find yourself trying to scroll with ease in tons of other applications wishing the feature was available there too!

So I guess Gateway is really stepping up and trying to grab away the market that cares about what their system looks like. The Gateway One priced from $1,299 for the base model and $1,799 for the high end model. It boasts Intel's Core 2 duo processor and a 19" widescreen display. It also has 8 channel (7.1 Dolby Digital) audio, 8x DVD±R/RW, built in 5 in 1 card reader, 802.11n draft wifi, GET THIS... 7 usb ports!!!, 1 firewire port, 1.3Mp camera built into the screen, media remote control, up to a 500GB hard drive and up to 3GB of ram (2GB is standard!).

If you're in the market for a computer and you hate Macs (how could you though?), this would be my #1 choice.

Further more, check this out... (It's crazy to see how genius some people are.)

"I had doodled a few spirals in the corners of my graph paper, and in doing so made the first important connection to Lateralus. I knew that if the tracks were in fact intended to be heard in a different order, "Parabol" and "Parabola" would have to go together. In drawing my spirals, I had begun with a vertex and 'spiraled' outwards. After writing the numbers 1 through 13 linearly, I could immediately see that Parabol and Parabola would have to be the middle of my spiral (in that 13 / 2 = 6.5). I drew a simple arrow between 6 and 7 and then pondered the next pair. At first, I actually drew a spiral connecting pairs of numbers whose sum equaled 13 (the number of songs on the album). This, however, left the last track in the same position and without anything to connect to. At this time, I had used my copy of Lateralus and Cool Edit Pro to take out the silences between tracks and put the songs in the following order: 6,7,5,8,4,9,3,10,2,11,1,12,13. The transition from Parabola into Schism blew my mind, as the plucks, probably dismissed by listeners as a drawn out rant of an ending, perfectly transition into the beginning of Schism. When you count out beats as the strings are plucked, Schism resumes with the same time signature and tempo - mirroring the progression of notes. The transition from Schism into Ticks & Leeches is equally intriguing. Schism ends with strong double-kick bass and tom smacks, and Ticks & Leeches begins with what many would call a 'tribal' drum beat. The beat at the very start of Ticks & Leeches is slightly different every subsequent time it is repeated - the measures are two beats longer. Yup - you guessed it - those two beats are ACTUALLY the last two beats of Schism."

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This one time fee is $399, it includes the main "Hub" for your home that controls all the calls. The Hub looks like an answering machine but can do so much more. This service uses a broadband connection, sort of like Vonage and Skype, but unlike the other guys, the Ooma system uses your current regular phone system in your house with the addition of a $40 box called the "Scout" that goes in line just before your phone. These Scout boxes give you access to voicemail at any phone in the house.

Hub ------------------------------------------ Scout

With Ooma you can even hold two separate conversations with two different people. This feature works like call-waiting, except you can put one person on hold and call another while the first is on hold, or switch between the two calls, all just by pushing on the number pad on the first line or second line buttons.

So for most homes your look at around $500, but since that's a one time rate and you will get free calls anywhere in the us whenever you want... forever... you will easily recoup that money and it will start paying for itself in under 2 years even if you are paying as low as 20 bucks a month! So after 2 years, at the longest, you will be essentially making money off your investment.

There are two new iPods added to the arsenal: (from left to right) iPod nano(4 or 8GB), iPod classic(80 and 160GB, and the new iPod touch(8 or 16GB.

The iPod nano sports a shorter body and wider screen that can play video, the iPod touch is an iPhone without the phone or camera, and the iPod classic is a slightly redesigned version of the 5th gen ipod. No more glossy finish for the iPods!

As for prices...
4 nano $149
8 nano $199
80 classic $249
160 classic $349
8 touch $299
16 touch $399

Also, there is only an 8GB model of the iPhone now. The prices were dropped by 200 dollars! Now it's only $399!

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This service is a replacement for your regular voicemail your cell phone currently uses. Callwave receives calls just like your regular voicemail, but when you get missed calls or voice messages you can have notices emailed to you or you can also have your voicemails texted to you. Texted to you, but they are auditory messages from your friends? Yep, Callwave actually takes what the person said and converts it into text. This works about 90 percent of the time. The point of this service is to ultimately give you the option of listening your voicemails in whatever order you'd like.

Above is the OS X widget that you can use that will show missed calls, even play voicemails right from your computer!

Well, now you can just have your favorite shows automatically downloaded to your computer with iTunes or any other audio-RSS reader. Then you can listen to the Car Talk brothers whenever you get some extra time to laugh! Here's a link to all of the NPR shows, check 'em out!

The new iMac design is awesome...

The new iLife and iWork '08 suites are awesome too...

:)

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Here's my only concern is that Intel will soon be releasing their new processor in the Core 2 Extreme line code-named Penryn. This will support a 45 nano meter form factor, which makes it cooler, more efficient, and saves battery. It will be sporting up to 2.8GHz of independently overclocking dual core processor that lets you run single threaded apps at screaming speeds. Here's the problem, its release date has been rumored to be not until Q1 2008 :(. This means that it will most likely be released in MBP's at Macworld '08 in January. We'll just have to wait and see what Intel's next move is!

If that doesn't do it for you, PandoraJam also lets you record and pause the Pandora channels, so you can listen to recorded songs on your iPod or in iTunes any time!

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The Mighty Mouse, for those of you that don't know, has a small grey ball instead of a scroll wheel. It's awesome because it lets you scroll in any direction and the scroll resolution is MUCH higher than that of your standard scroll wheel. The only problem with this amazing mouse is that the scrolling sometimes actually stops working in one direction. This happened to me last year and I got Apple to replace my mouse, but that's only because it was under warranty, now my new one is way beyond that, and it was having the exact same problem.

I once again scoured the internet for a solution and nothing I tried seemed to work... except for one tip I came across that explains how to clean the ball with 97% isopropyl alcohol and Q-tips. If you want to learn how to do it check out my Helpful Hacks page.

All you have to do is choose the "Create Library..." button and you are given the option to choose a place and a name for it.

What you need to know about what this means: This gives you the ability to have two separate libraries on one computer under one user. You can NOT open iTunes and use both libraries at the same time. This option simply lets you make, or choose am iTunes library where your music is kept. Preferences for each library are kept completely separate. The only downside I see with having multiple libraries is that whenever you open iTunes you will have to hold option and choose your library.

For those of you with more than one person using the family computer, this is a rather viable option if you don't want to have different user accounts.

Personally I'm waiting for the LED screens and hybrid hard drive based MacBook Pro's to get released this summer, but any upgrades are good upgrades!

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You just say the city and state you want to search in, then say any business or category. For instance I called and said: Bath, Maine. Then said Southgate Restaurant, it responded asking me if I wanted to connect for free. Also I was given the option to get information about the location sent t me via text message, so for instance just by saying text message at any time while they are talking about Southgate, I will sent the name, number, and address of the location.

If you're in a loud busy environment where you won't be heard accurately, or if your in class or anywhere else where you don't want to be loud, you can navigate everything using your keypad. The service even has smart recognition so if you want to search for toys you can just enter in "8697" and it will figure out that you meant toys.

Got so much junk in your dock that it's hard to keep things in order? Well I came across this genius (pure genius!) way of separating your apps up. Essentially all you do is take any file and change the extension to .app and ignore the warning, apply anyways. Then just drag the file into your dock where you want to divide apps. Confused? Look at the picture below and you'll see an example.

If you can handle making your dock slightly smaller or handle it being a little longer to accommodate the separators, this is an excellent way of dividing your dock up so that it's much easier to remember exactly where an app is on your dock. If you would like these and more separators, you can download them from here.

Once you download the .zip file open it, then put the separators file in your applications folder. Then if you have a dock on the bottom on your screen use the v-dockseparators folder and choose which separator you like best. Then duplicate the file as many times you need separators. For the separators to have no name when you roll over it on the dock just label the name with spaces. Have Fun!

Well here's a wicked cool Firefox extension, Stylish is to CSS (what websites look like) what Greasemonkey is to JavaScript (how they react), and unlike other methods of using user styles, styles take effect almost instantly. (Here's a direct install link!)

Here's just an example of a user style I have installed that makes google searches 100 times easier on the eyes...

Once you have Stylish installed if you like this user style you get it, and more like it, at userstyles.org.

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This little guy can fit in the palm of your hand, and yet it has the capability to surf the web, send and receive email on the go, listen to your favorite tunes, keep all your appointments, and of course... the best phone functionality, all with the most of ease that you've come to expect from Apple.

So here are the gritty details: 2 models, a 4GB model that's starting at $499 and an 8 GB model starting at $599. Both models have identical specs other than internal storage. As of right now the launch date is set for June for Cingular customers only. Rumors are all over the place though saying that we might see it in stores as early as late April, and nobody knows if Apple will support the rest of the wireless providers sometime next year or not.

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Check out the OS X Tips page!

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Or how about maybe you don't know how to spell a word but you know what it starts with, well just start typing the word you want and then when you get stuck hit the 'esc' button and Apple will give you some suggestions. So type in sugg then hit 'esc' then you could select the first option in the list and you will get suggestions printed out on your screen. Pretty cool huh?

Want some more tips? Check out my OS X Tips section for a whole slew of other cool tips!

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So what you are looking at a set of three numbers; in this case they are 6.98, 4.93, 2.92. These numbers stand for the load percentage over the last minutes, 5 minutes, and 15 minutes respectively. What's that mean? Given the data above, over the last minute I was loading the processor 698% of the intended load over the last minute, 493% over the last 5 minutes, and 292% over the last 15 minutes.

A normal load set would be something like .42, .35, .38, meaning you haven't done too much that is processor intensive. It's very bad to stress your processor A LOT in a short time, but it's nothing to worry about every now and then. You generally don't want to make your machine have a higher load average than 5 for more than a minute or two at a time.

Moral of the story: try not to do too many things at once that are processor intensive (I.E. encode a cd while watching an H.264 video, while checking your email, while chatting away on AIM).

For more information on CPU Load Computing check out the Wikipedia article on the topic.

Here's some proof... I went to the Apple Developer site and got a nice big file to download with both downloaders. Well, here's what happened:

On top is the DownThemAll! download window downloading at 2.76 MB/second and on bottom is the standard Firefox downloader downloading at .54 MB/second. The standard downloader took 26 minutes to download the whole 938.2MB file, while DownThemAll! took only 6 minutes. Wow, literally over 4 times faster.

How is that even possible? Apparently DownThemAll! downloads your file in parts, in other words instead of tackling the entire file at once it downloads 5 different parts of the file at the same time(5 is standard but you can change it to anything from 1-10) and puts them all together after they are finished.

Moral of the story, definitely check out DownThemAll! Read more about it, or if you're using Firefox 2 right now and you want to try it, click here to plug-in the file.

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Check out the new zooming features in the mouse section of the system prefs! Hold down Ctrl and scroll with your scroll wheel/ball, or trackpad and you can zoom into your screen to get a close up!

As you can see from the results above, we are now able to get REALLY fast speeds with the Mac OS. Thank you Apple!

I'm taking a class right now called Digital Programming, which is just C and C++ programming, and I needed an IDE to work with. Of course I went right to the best software developers in the world, Macintosh, so I could get something easy, fast, and powerful to use. When I first starting looking around it appeared that only Apple Developers could get access to the goods, and that I would have to pay like 400 bucks to become a member, which I wasn't going to do, or torrent the file. I was browsing one night when I stumbled upon this site that said I could sign up for a basic membership for free! So I checked it out, and it turns out all I had to do was fill out a form that explained who I was and what I needed to use the developer's kit for and they gave me a free basic membership, which includes all the downloads they offer to the paying members.

If you think you would benefit these super geeky features, then check out the Apple Developer page!

----------------------------------------down ---------- up ---- ping delay

What you're looking at are the speed test results from speedtest.net (the coolest online speed tester we know of), the top result was from our Mac OS X running notebooks, and the bottom result is from a desktop with Windows XP. We were baffled to see that repeatedly we were getting the normal speeds on our Macs and somehow the XP machine was getting 17.3 Mb speeds, which is like downloading a file at over 2MB/s!!!

We think maybe the XP has some kind of hardware that is getting through the Comcast speed cap.

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These Core 2 duo processors provide up to 40 percent speed increase with are 40 percent more energy efficient, which means GREAT for notebooks.

Anyways, the moral is that if you ever have to call 1-800-APL-CARE, and you know you're right, just keep pushing them and they will eventually push you up to their next level support team, and each upper level is easier and easier on you and more apt to just send you out a new device asap!

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Still need more reassurance? Songbird runs on the Firefox engine!

If you want to check it out and you're running OS X 10.3.9 or higher, download it here! Then add it to the "Screen Savers" folder within either your root Library or user library folder. Then just go to the Screen Savers preference panel and select the file you just added.

For more: check out my new Goodies Page!

The updated speed boost is great, their new live updating bookmarks (RSS) work (I'll leave it at that), the browser is easily skinable now right though the tools menu > Add-ons, and finally now that most of the best extensions work in v2.

My final words are this: Officially you should wait until the full version of Firefox 2 is released to download it, but unofficially: just do it.

I post these iMixes to iTunes because it's an easy way to preview songs before you buy them, but if you don't want to spend money, or don't use iTunes, you can just download the songs using your favorite p2p or BitTorrent (Legal Stance).

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I don't really care if you can see all of my sidebar, but if you are experiencing some of these viewing issues then just think what other sites you may not be viewing properly either... Food for thought.

With Apple's next release of iTunes there will be support for HD video content. Starting with Disney they will be releasing full length HD movies. They already sell movies and this will just boost sales of video content, with the ability to store any videos you want on the huge hard drive, I think people will take advantage of this useful piece of hardware and someday soon we will see one in many homes!

In the new OS X Tips post there are over 100 useful key commands! Take a gander at them and I guarantee that you will see a few you've never heard of!

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This month's theme is chill music to mellow out to. Want to check it out? Click on the list or album cover to take you to the iTunes store so you can preview these tracks before either buying or downloading them!

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It's summer, get out there and wash and polish those cars!

]]>josephacote@gmail.comHome2006-05-06T03:28:04-04:00http://www.josephacote.com/files/3c41f32c55f24723388d8b45c824146e-79.php#unique-entry-id-79http://www.josephacote.com/files/3c41f32c55f24723388d8b45c824146e-79.php#unique-entry-id-79Do whatever you can, get podcasts into your life. They will make you laugh, more educated, hell you'll just plain enjoy technology for how well it works. This is an application of technology that anyone has to appreciate. Check out the Helpful Hack section for more information.

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Check out this month's playlist! The May Mix is a good flashback to some great tunes from the 90's! Click on either picture to go to the iTunes music store to preview these sweet oldies! Then either buy em or download em, but definitely give em a listen, they'll bring you back.

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____Now, wouldn't it be great to add to Apple's wonderful arsenal of beautiful products a built in DVR? Then you could automatically record all of your favorite shows that you're already paying for with cable and satellite and watch them at your convenience. Great, sounds awesome, but here's where this concept falls apart real fast: Apple makes tons of money off you buying tv shows at $1.99 a pop, why would they then make a device that lets you get your favorite tv shows for no additional cost to your existing cable bill? If Apple were to introduce a DVR it would cut out a major portion of their revenue. The only solution I have for why Apple would do this is to increase iPod sales.
____Only time will tell what Apple will decide to do, but for now I'm putting my money on no Apple branded DVR unless another major company (Dell, HP, possibly MS) came out with an integrated DVR component.

Behold the power of the new 17-inch MacBook Pro!

I'm just happy they brought back the Firewire 800 ports and increased the speed AGAIN! This is arguably the fastest laptop on the market today, and seriously, hands down the most beautiful and feature packed notebook available.

Last.fm looks at what I listen to in iTunes, Pandora, and their own IP radio player and makes charts and tags about my style of listening, pretty cool.

↑ Deskbar in action! ↑

Also, if you want to check out an awesome new iTunes replacement or in the case o Linux, it will be the only nice media player, check out Songbird. This app will be released for OS X and Linux in the next few weeks, so keep your eyes open for that release!

Google's latest web app is their calendar. If you use Gmail then you already have a Google Calendar, just go to google.com/calendar and have fun. This is a super powerful tool that lets you connect all your contacts with your everyday schedule. You can import the calendars you have all set up already from iCal or any other calendar application that exports vCard format.

Google put some good time into making this a really well developed application. It's AJAX based, so everything is smooth and fast. You can even have Google remind you about certain events by email, soon it will support SMS messaging of your schedules and appointments right to your cell phone. This cool app is still in Beta, but it packs a huge punch on other sites such as 30boxes.

____I'm installing Linux onto an old pc that I got from my girlfriend's parents this weekend. After looking around at the many different distributions of Linux I decided on ubuntu. I looked at a few others such as openSuse, RedHat, and Knoppix, however, ubuntu seems to be the best option because it comes with tons of helpful apps such as Firefox and OpenOffice pre-installed, it runs natively on a separate partition of your existing hard drive, and also, from what I've read ubuntu seems to have little to no issues with recognizing hardware.

____There are a few reasons I'm doing this: first reason is that I want a computer to stream music from Pandora to my stereo. Second reason being that this summer I'm probably going to load my iTunes music library onto the Linux box and use it as a server. This way my music can be streamed all over the house, and when I get my own house I'll already have a working system. Third reason being that by the time I have my own place streaming video will be a big deal. Video over IP is already catching on, in a few years it's going to be huge: I'll be ready.
____I'll let you know the install went later this weekend!

Safari started out with 44 MB of real ram while Firefox started with 82MB, after an hour they were both at 130MB. After 2 hours Safari took the lead and went up to 185MB, while Firefox had pretty much stopped going up at around 138MB.

I guess the moral here is to use Firefox (duh) if you want to keep your memory in control.

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I thought about it and how much the iTunes system needs a tagging system so you can have more than one genre. Well i bite the bullet and went through my 2430 songs and tagged each on by hand with a general genre in the designated area, and in the comments area I wrote in some tags that were meaningful to me. For example:

Artist/Song: -.Jack Johnson - Banana Pancakes
Genre:------.---Alternative
Comments:-.. Acoustic, chill, beach, laid back

Now, if I want to find music that is like this and I'm in a 'just relax and chill on a warm day' mood, I'll make a smart playlist with a filter on the comments looking for terms: laid back and chill. I'll get this song, and any other song that satisfies the search terms. I searched this and got songs such as Sublime-Santeria, Dispatch-The General, and Bob Marley-Stir it Up.

The guy in my Podcast pretty much explains what I'm getting at...

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__________________________
If you really want to know where you fit check out the full article over at my OS X Tips page.

Now Intel is trying to work the same magic with WiMax that they did with WiFi five years ago. WiMax provides a very wide range of access; we're talking around 10 sq. blocks fully covered with a wireless internet connection. This means miles of straight line coverage. This is a huge advance for the wireless community. If your local city were to invest in a few 802.16e routers your entire area could be covered. Look forward to seeing this technology later this year, but widely integrated in the next five years or so.

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Well this time my friend Sam and I are making a Hollow body wooden surfboard. We'll post pictures and entries as the project progresses.

Example: josephacote.com/wtfmate

This means you can now stream audio or video from other machines right through Front Row. Here are the steps!

1. Download the Front Row Update.
2. Download the enabler, then copy the .pkg file of the Front Row Updater to your desktop.
3. Run the enabler for installation.
4. Install Front Row Updater 1.2.1 then restart.
5. Run the enabler for Front Row 1.2.1 now and you're good to go!!!

After all, "It's hard out here for a pimp."

But hey, it's a new month and spring break is the week after next for us down in Massachusetts, YAY!!!

Look forward to some new features coming out later this month for JosephACote.com! No hints, sorry.

I also added a page with Essential Apps for any OS X user. Check it out, I'll add apps as I find new essential software.

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Want to visit Mike's piece of the internet? Here's Mike's Site.

If you missed out on previous posts you can get them from the archive in the sidebar ---->

I posted a page that has TONS of internet slang terms and their meanings.

Hey there, you should be seeing a few new pages, freshly updated today! New Support page that has a bunch of sites and products that I personally support. And I've done some reorganizing, added a new OS X tip of the week. Put my resumé right out on the front navigational bar. New College Post soon!!!

The Link: pcworld.com

For the whole story check out my Podcast page. You can download this video by subscribing to my Podcast with iTunes.

This cool Web 2.0 ajax app is awesome, check it out today to find new bands that play exactly the kind of music you like!

Click here for my full review.

Click on my picture and tell me what I need to add!

New to the site is a full featured Digg section, OS X tips, and RSS is right around the corner...

There's a whole lot more cool stuff coming soon!