Applelinks Tech Web Reader - Friday, January 4, 2008
Apple Patents An Integrated Monitor And Docking Station For Portable Computers
iMac At Home, MacBook On The Road… In One Package
Steve Jobs Is The Most Powerful Man In Business
Intuit Bug Resurfaces At Public Wi-Fi Hotspots
The Ethics Of "Stealing" a WiFi Connection
First Look: Microsoft Office for Mac 2008
How Does MS Office for Mac Compare to Office for Windows?
Office:mac 2008 offers Apple computer owners a host of special features Windows Office users will envy
Classic On Intel
2008 - Year of the Mac?
Apple MacBooks - Consistently Good, But Where's The "Wow"?
Are Lenovo's laptops beating Acer and Apple to the punch?
Antitrust Lawsuit Charges Apple With Monopolizing Online Music
PC Mag: Hitachi Announces 500GB Notebook Drive
Apple Patents An Integrated Monitor And Docking Station For Portable Computers
Remember the PowerBook Duo?
The Abstract for United States Patent Application 20080002350 reads:
A docking station is disclosed. The docking station includes a display and a housing configured to hold the display in a manner that exposes a viewing surface of the display to view. The housing defines a docking area configured to receive a portable computer; The docking area is at least partly obscured by the display when viewed from the viewing surface side of the display at an angle substantially orthogonal to the viewing surface.
To check it out, visit here.
iMac At Home, MacBook On The Road… In One Package
PCJoint.com says:
I always hate the need to switch/synchronize between my home/work and portable computer set-ups. But there's nothing I can do about it....
Unless Apple goes on and makes a real product from the idea of merging the iMac and MacBook into a single package:
For the full commentary visit here:
http://pcjoint.com/imac-at-home-macbook-on-the-road-in-one-package/
Steve Jobs Is The Most Powerful Man In Business
The Inquirer's Nick Farrell says:
FORTUNE magazine has named Apple's spiritual and temporal leader, Steve Jobs as the most powerful man in business for 2007.
The naming of Steve is fairly strange given that there are CEOs of bigger and more powerful companies, however Brent Schlender of Fortune claims that Jobs has up ended the computer, Hollywood, music, retailing, and wireless phones market.
To read more, click here.
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/01/03/steve-jobs-powerful-man
Intuit Bug Resurfaces At Public Wi-Fi Hotspots
ZDNet.co.uk's Richard Thurston reports:
Users of a popular accounting package have been warned not to use the software at public Wi-Fi hotspots, such as those found in coffee shops, airports and hotels.
Users of the 2006 Mac version of Intuit's QuickBooks software could find that a serious bug manifests itself again under certain conditions in Wi-Fi hotspots.
For the full report visit here:
http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39291857,00.htm
The Ethics Of "Stealing" a WiFi Connection
Ars Technica's Eric Bangeman says:
Network security firm Sophos recently published a study on what it terms WiFi "piggybacking," or logging on to someone's open 802.11b/g/n network without their knowledge or permission. According to the company's study, which was carried out on behalf of The Times, 54 percent of the respondents have gone WiFi freeloading, or as Sophos put it, "admitted breaking the law [in the UK]."
Amazingly, accessing an unsecured, wide-open WiFi network without permission is illegal in some places, and not just in the UK. An Illinois man was arrested and fined $250 in 2006 for using an open network without permission, while a Michigan man who parked his car in front of a café and snarfed its free WiFi was charged this past May with "Fraudulent access to computers, computer systems, and computer networks." On top of that, it's common to read stories about WiFi "stealing" in the mainstream media.
It's time to put an end to this silliness.....
[Editor's note: I wholeheartily agree with that assessment. CM]
To read more, click here.
First Look: Microsoft Office for Mac 2008
Ars Technica's Jonathan M. Gitlin says:
In the following review, I'm going to take a brief look at the Office 2008 versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage to give you an idea of how the MBU has spent the past few years.
Unlike past versions of Office, where installing was almost as simple as dragging and dropping the folder into Applications, Office 2008 has an actual installer. Once the applications are installed on your hard drive, the installer then searches for previous versions and handily removes them for you. Any existing Office identities (i.e., your settings and e-mail) will then be migrated, but the existing data is not deleted. So if you decide you don't like the future, then you can revert back to living in 2004.
For the full review visit here:
http://arstechnica.com/reviews/apps/mac-office-2008-review.ars
How Does MS Office for Mac Compare to Office for Windows?
Wired's Scott Gilbertson reports:
After numerous delays, Microsoft Office for Mac 2008 will arrive just in time for an official launch at Macworld in San Francisco. The new Office for Mac 2008 is the first update in nearly four years, and has native support for Intel-based Mac hardware. The update (available the week of January 14 in three editions) brings a number of enhancements and new features to the Mac version, and improves on features found in Office 2007, the latest Windows release....
Office 2008's Elements Gallery mimics the functionality of Office 2007's much-touted Ribbon interface by putting common tasks in an easily accessible spot near the top. But the user interface design and menu structure are significantly different. If you use Office 2007 at work and Office 2008 at home, the transition won't be seamless.
For the full review visit here:
http://www.wired.com/software/softwarereviews/multimedia/2008/01/msoffice_compare
Office:mac 2008 offers Apple computer owners a host of special features Windows Office users will envy
BusinessWeek's Stephen H. Wildstrom reports:
Office:mac, which goes on sale on Jan. 15, doesn't try to be a clone of the Windows product. For example, the developers chose not to adopt the "ribbon"—a new feature that replaces menus such as File, Edit, and View in the latest version of Office for Windows. Instead, Office:mac adds something called the Elements Gallery, a menu bar that provides various helpful shortcuts. In Word, the gallery includes an easy way to create tables of contents and bibliographies. Excel's gallery offers an assortment of preformatted worksheets for such purposes as budgeting and invoices. The gallery in PowerPoint includes slide templates, layouts, and transitions. Shortcuts for inserting tables, charts, and graphics are provided for all programs.
For the full report click here.
Classic On Intel
MacOSUser's Andrew Youll reports:
When Steve Jobs announced Apples transition to Intel's X86 processor line, a huge stir occurred among some Mac OS X users who depend on "Classic" the OS9 environment in Mac OS X for their day to day Mac usage, as Mac OS X on intel means no more "Classic" and they were right.
Rosetta allows PowerPC applications to run on X86 through JIT (Just In Time) architecture emulation, but its translation is not on a low enough level within OS X to allow "Classic" to work on X86 and as such those among us who use OS9 applications have been left out in the cold.
Until now that is; a project called "Sheep Shaver" was created to allow BeOS on PowerPC emulate the PowerPC architecture to run another PowerPC Operating System on top of BeOS, this application was ported to Mac OS X with the demise of Be Inc. and has since been ported to Mac OS X on Intel processors.
For the full report visit here:
http://macos-user.com/content/view/14/1/
2008 - Year of the Mac?
ZNet blogger Adrian Kingsley-Hughes says:
Data released by Net Applications for December 2007 tells us something that most of us already knew - that Mac is on a roll and gaining momentum every month.
While we should be careful about drawing market share conclusions from the Net Applications data (because this data only tells us what computers and operating systems are used to access a broad selection of web sites), month on month the Mac OS has seen stronger numbers. Back in January 2006 Mac stood at 4.21%, by December 2006 this had risen to 5.67%, and then to a robust 7.31% by December 2007. Either Mac users are surfing the web more, or the market share is growing. Given how Net Applications collects this data, it's safe to assume that market share has grown roughly in proportion with these figures.
Who are these people flocking to the Mac platform?....
For the full commentary visit here:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=1111
Apple MacBooks - Consistently Good, But Where's The "Wow"?
MacLife's Jennifer Berger says:
We hope you won't get too excited about these new MacBooks, because their changes are minimal since the last line. New, slightly faster CPUs, a change to the keyboard, and (of course) Mac OS X Leopard preinstalled don't seem like much. In general, this line is solid, but not as lust-inspiring as other Mac laptop lines in the last few years. (Ah, for the 12-inch PowerBook G4 days…)
For the full review visit here:
http://www.maclife.com/article/apple_macbooks
Are Lenovo's laptops beating Acer and Apple to the punch?
BetaNews's Jacqueline Emigh says:
By unveiling a new line of stylish laptops ahead of both CES and Macworld, Lenovo stands alone in the limelight today. But is there still room for another large player in the laptop space?
In unveiling a trio of design-conscious "IdeaPad" laptops for the consumer market, Lenovo today beat newfound competitors such as Dell and Acer to the punch by at least three days, and Apple by a couple of weeks.
To read more, click here.
Antitrust Lawsuit Charges Apple With Monopolizing Online Music
InformationWeek's Thomas Claburn reports:
An antitrust lawsuit filed against Apple on Dec. 31 charges the company with maintaining an illegal monopoly on the digital music market.
Plaintiff Stacie Somers, represented by attorneys Craig Briskin and Steven Skalet of Mehri & Skalet PLLC, Alreen Haeggquist of Haeggquist Law Group, and Helen Zeldes, alleges that Apple dominates the market for online video, online music, and digital music players and that its dominance constitutes a violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. The attorneys are seeking to have their lawsuit certified as a class action.
For the full report click here.
PC Mag: Hitachi Announces 500GB Notebook Drive
Hitachi says the Travelstar 5K500 is the world's highest-capacity 2.5-inch internal, notebook-class hard drive.
To read more, go to:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2704,2242877,00.asp
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
| 
|
|
|
|
| |