Over the 20 some-odd years that FileMaker has been around, there has been perhaps a handful worth of fingers of major upgrades. FileMaker 3 was one, FileMaker 7 was the latest. While there is little change to the internal database creation and/or design structure, the changes in FileMaker 8 are extensive and broad. FileMaker 8's main goal is to improve user productivity.

I've reviewed a few animation programs of varying capabilities over the years, the most notable of which is Toon Boom's Toon Boom Studio. Always a pretty cool program, it was also always pretty powerful, and it's one I've wanted to look into beyond my standard review period. To that end, I'll be writing a series of columns about my experiences with the newest release—Toon Boom Studio v3—rather than just write a one-off review. I'll talk about the tutorials, the online help (no manual to speak of), the program's capabilities, and my personal project. Hopefully, you'll get something out of it, as I'm quite sure I will.

More than ever the Mac OS X book to have if you're only having one

A lean, fast, and powerful challenger to MS Office

Automation vs. old school html authoring

Nowadays, the webcam is kind of like the bastard child of a digital camera and a digital video camera; one which can't really record movies as well as a video camera and can't take still pictures as well as a digital camera, and is permanently tethered to your Mac by way of the USB or Firewire cord that keeps it feeding continual information. And yet, somehow, the general prevalence of broadband Internet connections has managed to make the dumb things somewhat useful. Imagine that.

They're all good by historical standards, but some are better than others

New Multi-Button Mouse Features Innovative Scroll Ball

Lackluster by comparison with the iBook enhancements

Celartem, Inc. and its company brands—Extensis and LizardTech—have announced the sale of its popular Photoshop Plug-ins and QuarkXPress XTensions to independent software developer, onOne Software. Products included in this purchase are pxl SmartScale, PhotoFrame, Intellihance Pro, Mask Pro, PhotoTools and QX-Tools Pro from Extensis, and the Genuine Fractals product from LizardTech. Extensis and LizardTech will continue to support these products until July 31, 2005, when onOne Software will take control of all aforementioned titles.

New Features Include Built-in Wireless Networking & DVD Burning

New iBook Line With Scrolling TrackPad & Sudden Motion Sensor Starts at Just $999