Fission v1.0.0
Company: Rogue Amoeba Software
Price: $32
http://www.rogueamoeba.com

Think !! quickly !! of the most life-altering third-party software tools you have that are affordable, easy to use, and that instantly enhance your computing experience. For Nemo this list is short: Roxio’s Toast, Micromat’s DiskStudio, Prosoft’s Picture Rescue, Netopia’s Timbuktu, SuperDuper from Shirt Pocket Software, StuffIt Expander by Allume, and Senuti by Whitney Young of Fadingred.org. Did I forget any of your favorites? Let me know in our Article Discussion area below, please.

Wait — what about Audio Hijack Pro from the talented team of six engineers and designers at Rogue Amoeba Software? MyMac.com uses Audio Hijack Pro every week to record segments of our podcasts. If you are not already a podcast listener, you can obtain info and links here.

Rogue Amoeba just released Fission, to help users edit sound files, without any loss of audio quality. Let’s say you download our latest MyMac.com MiniPodcast, and you want to get rid of one of my All Over the Mac segments or No Snooze Reviews, but leave the rest of the show intact. How to do it?

You open the ".mp3" audio file of our podcast into Fission, use its Select feature to determine the timing of the section to delete, highlight that section’s wave form, and press Fission’s Cut button. In reality it takes a minute or two to figure out where any given internal timing begins and ends, but the process can happen veryveryvery quickly once you are familiar with the interface.

Quick detour — why does it matter that lossless editing keeps files in their original formats? Paul from Rogue Amoeba explains:
"In almost every other editor, John, if you edit an MP3 or an AAC file, it decodes the compressed audio to AIFF to let you edit. Then, when you save it, it will re-encode to MP3 (or AAC) again. This causes a generational loss in quality, just like saving a jpg from a jpg, or making a copy of a copy on tape (or almost anything, really)."

While David Weeks and I were recording a conversation about iTunes 7′s new features, David paused to collect his thoughts, but didn’t press Audio Hijack Pro’s Pause button soon enough, leaving a space of dead air in the middle of our chitchat. Afterward I navigated to that part of his commentary, cut out the gap, and David sounds brilliantly coherent, without any clicks or pops as giveaways. A similar technique can be used to get rid of commercials for seamless content audio playback.

I record Dick Buckley’s three-hour jazz radio program from Chicago Public Radio every Sunday. See my blog on this subject. If I only want to keep the final hour, in which he features one jazz artist, I can do so using Fission, and then put that hour onto a single audio CD for future listening and archiving. If I make a major goof, Fission allows users to Revert to Original, thankfully.

If you are unfamiliar with the look and details of audio wave forms, Fission has an extensive manual to get you started, with tutorials that will make sense sooner rather than later. Topics include: Cutting Audio (Removing Commercials), Splitting A File, Using Smart Split, Editing Metadata (ID3 Tags), and Creating Ringtones. That last one will be popular, I predict.

You are either a person who wants to fade, split, and edit audio tracks or you aren’t, so if you’re scratching your head and yawning, I’m not offended. But if the opportunity to trim your trax gets your pulse racing, you are not alone. Fission is a blast.

This is our MyMac.com first look review of a version 1.0.0 release. As Rogue Amoeba adds features and functionality to Fission, we’ll come back for a deeper examination. Meanwhile, I’ll be tidying up self-created and recorded audio files until they are so clean they could reside in my grandmother’s underwear drawer.

Highest praise to Fission 1.0.0, with thanks to our friends at Rogue Amoeba for such great shareware utilities and help files.

Our MyMac.com rating is 4.5 out of 5 because there is always room for improvement. But not much with Fission!

I usually recommend freeware, or free software, in Macspiration. This week I’ve decided to stray from that path, and suggest three small pieces of shareware that are just fun. Not only are they fun, but they are cheap, too. You can buy all three of these programs for less than $30. All of these programs have downloadable demos, so try them out!


1. Voice Candy, by Potion Factory http://www.potionfactory.com/voicecandy/
Voice Candy is the audio version of Photo Booth. Make your voice sound like a mouse, a chipmunk, or even Darth Vader. Once you record your message, you can send it straight to an email or a file. Kids of all ages will love this program, and it is only $12.95.

2. iGlasses, by Ecamm Network http://www.ecamm.com/mac/iglasses/
iGlasses should be built into iChat. It is like Photo Booth for iChat. There are fun effects like night vision, black and white, and color changing. However, what sold me was the brightness feature for low light settings. If you use your iChat in a low light situation iGlasses is great. Using the pre-set brightness settings will make your low light image look a lot better. For $8.00 this is a must have. Download the demo and see for yourself. Seeing is believing.

3. 3D Maker by Sandy Knoll http://www.tabberer.com/sandyknoll/
3D Maker is exactly what the name makes it out to be. It gives you all the tools you need to make all kinds of three dimensional pictures. There are tools for making the pictures that require those super-cool blue and red glasses, and there are those that make you look cross eyed at a picture (stereograms)). There are also tools for making three dimensional text and more. You can’t go wrong for $6.95.

Download the show HERE (right click to download)
This week, all the guys are back for segments galore, including part three of Tim, Guy, and Chad in Grand Rapids, David Cohen, Nemo, and Levis pants? Yes, Levis pants!

Leave audio feedback by calling 801-938-5559

This podcast is sponsored by SmallDog.com, and Inno-Tech.com.

Get the show from these links:
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Show Links:
Levis
Kenpo Jacket for iPod

Download the show HERE (right click to download)

Even though Guy’s G4 keeps locking up during the show, we manage to put another podcast to bed. New MacBook Pros, updates to the MacBook, Stolen iPods, upgrading iMacs, Green Peace at London MacExpo, and much more.
Leave audio feedback by calling 801-938-5559

This podcast is sponsored by SmallDog.com, and Inno-Tech.com

Get the show from these links:
iTunes Link
Podcast-only RSS Feed

The London show is not directly Apple sponsored, like those in Paris or San Francisco, but they do have a good record of attendance, and this year is no exception.

When I attended last year, the show was abuzz with the new iPod Nano and iPod with video, which had been launched a few weeks previously, and the then G4 Powerbooks had just received an incremental speed bump and screen update.

This year, we again have new iPod Nanos, a bumper iPod with video, and the MacBook Pro has just been revised. Does this form a trend for the future?

Initial impressions were of a marginally bigger and slightly busier show than last year on the first day, though it is impossible to be definitive until the show is complete and the actual attendance figures are in.

Apple had the largest stand, as you might expect, though the actual product count on show was down on last year in favour of a larger theatre space. The seminars themselves were in my opinion not as attractive, being fairly generic affairs (overview of iTunes 7 and iPod, anyone?). No sign of the new iPod Shuffle yet, which was disappointing – Apple staff indicated a mid-November in-store arrival date, which is a bit of a slip from the Jobsnote announcement. Branding indicating the revised MacBook Pros was not overly apparent – perhaps the revision occurred too late to get it set up for the show?

As you would expect, there was plenty of iPod accessory retailing going on. However, one frustrating aspect was that there were several accessory manufacturers with stands – Griffin, Macally, Belkin to name three – but despite them all having product on show, all buying requests were being referred to the three big reseller stands. This would be fine, except that the resellers were not stocking all of the product being shown by the manufacturers! This was just stupid – not being able to buy product on show because of some sort of manufacturer/reseller politics at a major Mac event seems counterproductive bearing in mind the retail nature of the iPod market.

It was noticeable that the resellers were carrying more Mac accessories than last year – TV tuners and audio accessories being very prevalent, as well as laptop cases. I suppose the form factor changes in the laptop line make those lucrative.

Particularly interesting stands this year were:

• Google – a big stand, and through the day presentations on Google Maps, Google Earth, Sketchup and using Google services in your own web pages. Their strategy of attending computer shows and showcasing their non-search technology is gutsy…

• Greenpeace – what? They have a campaign going highlighting the chemicals in the current Mac lineup, and want Apple users to lobby the company to remove them, as they say they end up in Asian landfills or are recycled harmfully in the third world. They are claiming they are going for Apple because it is so innovative and progressive, and so is most likely to respond – but I can’t help feeling they would make more impact convincing a much larger volume manufacturer to change their practices. Of course, it is pretty easy to get Apple related press coverage in the media, particularly if it is negative…

• Adobe – showing Adobe Acrobat 8, which looked very nice on the collaboration front, and the CS2 suite, which was running suspiciously fast. I couldn’t get them to tell me what their demo platform was, PowerPC or Intel…

There was the usual set of high end photo and audio attendees, including Nikon showing their latest cameras. All of the major Mac magazines were present, too (we have four general Mac magazines and several other specialist titles in the UK, which has one of the world’s largest magazine markets), and MacWorld UK were doing their best to outdo our own esteemed publisher’s 100th podcast giveaway by offering at least a grand’s worth of product every hour by random draw!

One final stand of note was a London Bus featuring Capital Radio, who were offering podcast editing demonstrations on GarageBand. However, in my view the over-focussed on the post-production effort, and I saw them switch to Pro Tools on a couple of occasions too – which in my mind flies in the face of the ‘open to anyone’ aspect of podcasting. I guess you should expect no less from commercial radio, but perhaps next year the organisers might want to get some more real world podcasters involved.

Nevertheless, it was an enjoyable event, and I was glad I made the trip. Next year’s event is already booked in the Olympia calendar – and in mine.

When I first started writing this column in July I said we weren’t going to strictly do a help letters column. I say we, of course, because without your letters there is no help. This one’s going to be more of a commentary, partly because the letters are a bit thin this month (need help? click here!) and partly because an idea popped in my head. Something that’s been bugging me for a while.

AppleWorks 6 has been my main productivity application ever since I switched from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X. I also have Microsoft Office 2004, but it doesn’t have a database and FileMaker Pro is too expensive, and overkill, for an individual. The only reason I have Office 2004 is because "everybody" has it. I get documents emailed to me from the city (I’m on the Planning Commission) in Word format, and from the schools. People always ask for everything in Word format. I only use it when I have to. It can’t replace AppleWorks, and something needs to.

AppleWorks has been my primary productivity application since version 1.0, originally named ClarisWorks, was released in late 1991. At the time I was using MacWrite II for word processing, SuperPaint for drawing and painting, a little known, weak spreadsheet called CellMate, and no database. I couldn’t afford the more expensive software like Microsoft Word & Adobe Illustrator. When I saw everything that ClarisWorks could do for the price of MacWrite II I jumped. Finally I had a decent spreadsheet that did more than I needed. I could do a database if I wanted to. A draw module almost as good as MacDraw II. All this and the word processor was nearly as powerful as MacWrite II. It also included a communications terminal, but I was already using ZTerm.

The tight integration was unheard of at the time, but is now taken for granted by AppleWorks users. Not only could you have a spreadsheet document, but you could put a spreadsheet frame in a word processing or draw document. Or a draw frame in a spreadsheet, and so on. Using text frames in a drawing document provided PageMaker-like functions. Anyone who still uses AppleWorks 6 knows what I’m talking about. 15 years after its debut as ClarisWorks, no other Mac OS X application is as versatile as AppleWorks 6.

On January 7, 2003, Apple introduced the Keynote 1.0 presentation package, 3 years to the day after AppleWorks 6. This was the first step, although no one knew it at the time, in a long and slow process to replace AppleWorks. Pages 1.0 was introduced as the word processing part of iWork ’05 (along with Keynote 2.0) two years later on January 11, 2005. Apple billed iWork as the eventual successor to, but not immediate replacement for, AppleWorks 6. This was the official beginning of the end for AppleWorks, but there are still missing pieces.

What I depend on AppleWorks for the most now is a spreadsheet for my major finances, and a database that keeps track of all my software. iWork currently has no database capabilities and no real spreadsheet functions, although iWork ’06 did add the ability to turn tables into limited mini spreadsheets. I don’t do as much word processing as I used to, and I don’t do much page layout either so Pages hasn’t appealed to me yet. Email has replaced most of what I used to use word processing for. iWork also doesn’t have draw or paint applications. The drawing tools in Pages make up for some of that, and there are inexpensive graphics applications such as GraphicConverter and ColorIt! that are far superior to the weak AppleWorks paint module.

For iWork to replace AppleWorks, it is imperative that Apple create database and spreadsheet components or a database/spreadsheet combo. These applications must be able to open their existing AppleWorks counterparts just as Keynote and Pages can. This is especially important for databases, which have design layout capabilities like FileMaker Pro. AppleWorks 6 word processing documents can be exported out in other formats or opened by Pages. Presentations can’t be exported but can be opened by Keynote. Spreadsheet, draw, and paint documents can be exported. Databases can only be exported as ASCII text, which loses the layout and all the graphical elements such as buttons, menus, and the multimedia field (which I use).

No application I am aware of can open an AppleWorks 6 database other than AppleWorks 6, and no other inexpensive database application has the layout capabilities of AppleWorks 6 and the availability of a graphics/audio/video field. No rumors exist about an iWork database application but a spreadsheet, referred to as Numbers or Charts, has been talked about for over a year. Hopefully there is a secret database application as well for iWork ’07, or maybe the spreadsheet will have a layout mode & can also be used as a database.

AppleWorks needs to be replaced. Microsoft Office, unless you can get it for the education pricing, is too expensive for average users and has no database. Office is meant for businesses and iWork needs to develop for the lower end of the market. The final iBook G4s and iMac G5s included AppleWorks 6 on the bundled installation discs, but it was not pre-installed as it had been. The transition to Intel based Macs saw AppleWorks 6 disappear from the install discs. AppleWorks 6 is still available for sale (Apple hasn’t discontinued it yet) and runs fine on Intel based Macs, even though it hasn’t been updated in nearly 3 years. Having gone so long without an update, it’s a little disconcerting there is still no clear replacement from Apple or anyone else. Hopefully iWork ’07 will change all that.

Moving iPhoto

Tom,
My wife’s iMac is two years old, and the hard disk is completely full. Lots of photos in iPhoto. She bought an external hard drive, 160GB, to hold all the overflow, but when she copies the photo folders intact to the external, all the info gets lost in iPhoto. There seems to be no way for iPhoto to be redirected to the same folders/files on the external hard drive. All the albums she’s made have lost their content photos, crops and all.

How can we move our pictures to the external hard drive without losing the albums and other info?. The built-in help is no help here, nor does this issue seem to be mentioned in any of the Apple forums. Most of her internal hard drive is taken up by these photos, and she seems to be stuck with that configuration. Any ideas?

thanks,
Roger in California

Hi Roger,

I keep my iPhoto library on a FireWire hard disk so my work & home Macs can use just one together. This will work as long as she hasn’t deleted anything, just copied. It’s very simple to do:
1. Copy the iPhoto Library (/Users/yourname/Pictures/iPhoto Library) to anywhere on another volume.
2. Delete the original, or move it to the desktop to be a little safer.
3. Launch iPhoto. Since iPhoto can’t find the original, it will throw up a dialog asking you to find it or create a new one. Click the Choose Library… button & show iPhoto the new location.

4. If you did not delete the original in step 2, do do once you are sure iPhoto is working ok with the moved library to free up space on your startup disk.

This can also be done with iTunes and Virtual PC (move the disk image file, then put an alias to it back into the Virtual PC List folder), and probably other programs as well.

——————————

Send your questions to tom@mymac.com. I will personally reply to each message when received and select letters will be included in the MyMac.com Help Desk column.

Owen’s great article on essential shareware and freeware got me thinking about my must have software. I welcome your comments, rebuttals, and additions in our Article Discussion area below (registration is free).

Stating the obvious, Apple’s iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, and Garage Band should be here, as could iChat, Mail, Preview, Dashboard, and DiskUtility, not to mention Timbuktu, Skype, or StuffIt. The list below is more a psycho-emotional one than a fully-comprehensive catalog.

Here we go:

APPLE WORKS. I don’t use it as much as in the past for word processing, now that TextEdit is so handy and versatile. But AppleWorks and ClarisWorks have been my one-stop-software-shop since the first day using a Macintosh.

In my professional capacity as private computer tutor, many of my clients, not to mention my wife, rely on AppleWorks 6 as their primary writing and spreadsheet software, with some people using it also for drawing and painting. Apple will abandon AppleWorks when iWork has a spreadsheet module, but until then AppleWorks is still the best integrated suite of components from either the Cupertino’s Mother Ship or the Redmondians.

Did you know Apple promotes AppleWorks on its main "Software" web page? Or that it continues to chug along without hardly ever freezing or crashing in OS X, 9, 8, and earlier? Or that AppleWorks User Group is alive and well? Many power users abandoned ClairWorks/AppleWorks years ago, and then sweated and cursed over Micros**t Office — you get the point.

Here in Arizona we have a town called Tombstone, with a motto "too tough to die." I hope AppleWorks is still kicking and capable of performing its humble wonders for years to come, until iWork buries it with a suite that has a cleaner interface, a more versatile set of components, and a learning curve so gentle that people don’t even know how powerful the coding is underlying everyday work that can be exceptionally ordinary or genius. Nuff said.


ROXIO TOAST. One of my other vocations is as private music instructor — mostly piano, keyboard, and guitar. Even if every student has an iPod (they don’t), there is no substitute for CDs when teaching people to play music along with a recording. I have 1,001 uses for Toast, ranging from archiving data to transferring photos to duplicating music to custom audio mixes to iDVD slide shows. Toast Lite is okay for most data and music recordings, but for DVDs and professional work Toast Titanium is the gold standard.

Apple went a partial way toward kicking Toast off Macintosh computers when File -> New Burn Folder appeared a couple of years ago. This works fine for your basic burn, but for full control, and especially for multiple session burns, Toast has no equal. I use Toast every week of the year, often several days in a row, and to call it indispensable is the truth, not an overstatement.


AUDIO HIJACK PRO. I have written about this great live and streaming recording application several times, and its stature on my computers grows with each use. Just like AppleWorks and Toast, I can not live without Audio Hijack Pro.

Tim and Chad use Audio Hijack Pro to record faraway interviewees and our own Guy Serle, for our weekly MyMac.com Podcasts. David Weeks and I will try a similar setup once we get our "Two Captains" dialogs in full swing for the All Over the Mac segment on Monday’s MiniPodcasts.

Developer Rogue Amoeba Software keep adding features and functions to Audio Hijack Pro, and its fans are paying attention, but not paying additional shareware fees. Version upgrades are frequent, but are provided free of charge. Audio Hijack Pro has a competitor, but I’ll stick with the original.


SENUTI. I know it’s shareware, not payware. Senuti allows me to archive and transfer songs in and out of iPods, hard drives, flash drives, CDs, and DVDs. Challengers are lapping at its shores, but Senuti remains the best and easiest utility for the essential job it performs.

MyMac.com interviewed solo developer Whitney Young, who remains a college student. Simplicity and power are terms that don’t usually cohabit descriptions of contemporary software, and Senuti is a mighty exception. Here is one shareware app that people gladly pay for, because without it their iTunes would be stuck in their iPods, with no way to escape to external storage media. Thanks, Whitney.


SUPERDUPER! It’s another shareware utility, to help you duplicate entire or partial hard drives. Carbon Copy Cloner is good, but SuperDuper is better. I’m relatively new to SuperDuper, so singing its praises will be sotto voce for now. Best thing about SuperDuper is its trial mode, that you can use forever for basic archiving and duping from one volume to another, with only a friendly nudge toward registration and payment. You’ll be sensible to pay Shirt Pocket Software a modest fee for full functionality, and your data sets will be happy for that.


ADOBE PHOTOSHOP ELEMENTS. I teach digital photography, and that’s my third way of earning a living. Every Nemo student now must have Elements 4 installed on their personal Mac or PC, for consistency of instruction, but Elements 3 is darn good and Elements 2 is one of the great applications of all time. It has a single CD installer for either/both Mac/Windows, plus a thorough printed manual and handy standalone reference cards. Version 2 works fine in every rendition of OS 9 and X, and it’s a lean, mean, photo and art software machine.

Photoshop Elements 4 for Mac was released long after v4 for Windows. The Mac version is superior, because of its integration with iTunes, instead of using Windows edition’s dreadful and impenetrable Organizer. Elements Win v5 was just released, but we won’t pay much attention to it until we need to (rumors are the Mac release is far in the future). As value for money, Elements is praised for having "90 percent of the features of professional Photoshop for 10 percent of its price," or thereabouts. Seeing is believing, and I believe in Adobe’s Photoshop Elements. Great app indeed.

WHAT’S MISSING?

Real Player was a pain for many years. Now it’s more or less stable and functional, but still a little ornery. Real’s dominance make its free player something we perhaps can’t live with and can’t live without, so get over your grumbles and do the best you can with it, or follow Owen’s advice for an alternative. Ditto for Windows Media Player.

America Online is what power users love to hate, and hating got easier with AOL’s putrid OS X edition plus recent overall decline in service and support. Free AOL is better than nothing, when you need to maintain an AOL and/or AIM (AOL Instant Messenger) presence. But now you, just like my family, have no excuses for not using free Gmail from Google (let me know if you need an invitation for it) and Apple’s free iChat, even if the latter depends upon your prior registration for an AOL or AIM screen name. The case is closed on this one, folks.

As a new member of the MyMac.com staff I have come to know, if only casually through their articles and blogs, some of the great writers and talents that make our publication such a compelling organization. Some of these folks spend oodles of their time behind a computer in order to contribute their knowledge and expertise for all the world to see and hear. They do this voluntarily, with no expectations or grievances. And this is after working for many hours, in most cases, at jobs that put them behind that same computer.

Nowadays it’s common for a lot of people to spend several hours daily sitting at a desk, doing work that needs to be done, rising only to eat, or use the bathroom.

My wife is an example. She works for a very busy insurance office, answering phone lines, scheduling, tracking, writing letters and binders, and so much more. Out of her nine hour day she will occupy at least seven hours at her desk using the computer. I have spoken with her about the sedentary experience and asked her to try and get some exercise, or at least take breaks from time to time.

I’ve seen what a seat-potato lifestyle can do, especially as one gets older, and softer. The muscles become weak and tire easily. Skin takes on a pasty look, eyes don’t twinkle, and the respiratory system can stand little if any exertion. Just walking up a short set of stairs can cause a person to sit down, breathless.

As a massage therapist and lifetime musician (drummer and singer) I have some easy techniques which can reverse some of those negative effects and give a boost to your health. Before you roll your eyes into their sockets (your face is gonna freeze that way) ask yourself some questions and answer them honestly:

1. Do I easily tire walking up or down stairs?

2. Does my neck/upper back often feel stiff?

3. Does my lower back ache?

4. Do I munch on junk while I’m working?

5. Is it hard to get up from my chair?

6. Do I resent having to get back into my chair?

7. Does my lunch consist of fast food?

8. Have I gained weight over the past few years?

9. Why can’t I lose the weight I’ve gained?

10. Am I too tired at the end of the day to deal with my family?

I could go on but you get the idea. The reason you may feel some of these things is that you’re getting no exercise and you’re eating food that has no nutrition. I’m here to help.

To make your diet better:

1. If you have to snack, try dry roasted no salt peanuts, or nuts, raw preferably, with no salt. They are very nutritious and tasty. Yes, they contain some fats, but they’re the ones you need. Carrot sticks, celery, and other fresh veggies can help too.

2. Stay away from fried food. Period!

3. Do not eat white bread. Choose whole grains, as often as possible.

4. No margarine. Most are not as good as real butter. Try Earth Balance buttery spread, or another of comparable quality. Read the label. No saturated fats.

5. Stay away from anything with refined sugar. To sweeten your coffee or tea use Splenda or a sugar substitute of your choice. You may find, after a while, that you can do without the sweetener entirely.

6. No french fries or potato chips.

7. Do not stuff yourself. Eat slowly and quit eating when you’re satisfied you’ve had enough.

8. If you have desert try a piece of fruit. No cakes, cookies, or candies.

9. Drink water all day. At least 6 glasses. You’ll pee a lot and that’s good. It’ll also fill you up so you won’t eat as much. NO SODAS (soft drinks). All of them, diet included, are garbage.

10. Try to eat your largest meal at lunch and make dinner smaller. You’ll sleep better and feel better in the morning. No midnight snacks.

Begin with baby steps and proceed slowly. I know this may seem like a lot to change for some of you but it really isn’t. It’s common sense and the food actually tastes better once you loose the need for so much salt and sugar. If you require more help than this column provides, try the South Beach Diet Book. It is the best one of its kind and will help you with your health and weight better than any fad diet could even dream about. FAD DIETS DO NOT WORK!

The three principles of health are diet, exercise, and rest. The ten tips I gave you about diet are easy and fun to do. The exercise part can be too.

To get some exercise while working:

1. Take a break every fifteen to twenty minutes for just a minute or two. Get up, stand in front of or beside your chair, raise your arms above your head and stretch. Not too hard at first. If you haven’t done this in a while you could pull a muscle if you begin too eagerly. Feel the tendons begin to let go. They’re stretching (muscles don’t really stretch, tendons do). Bring your arms perpendicular to your body. Stretch, gently. Put your arms in front. Stretch again. Swing your arms in circles beside you. Change direction. Now sit down and go back to work.

2. On your next break try to bend down and touch your toes. Don’t worry if you can’t. It’s not important. Keep your knees bent slightly to take pressure off your lower back. Ease into it. Do not bounce! Easy does it. You’re not in a hurry or in a contest with anyone. This is all for you. After “touching toes” for a minute step back from the desk/table and put your hands on the edge in front of you. Keeping your back straight squat down, slowly, holding on to the front of the desk. When you reach the bottom feel your knees and quads stretching. Rise again. Do this a few times. Now get back to work.

3. While seated at your desk hold on to the bottom of your seat, where the arms of the chair would be attached. Sit up with a straight back. Pull up, pulling the seat into your seat. Then slowly ease off and let go. Do this several times. You’re exercising the biceps, shoulders (lateral deltoids), and traps (trapezius) and levator scapulae muscle groups. This should take maybe a minute or less.

4. If your desk is heavy enough try this: put your hands, palms up, under the desk in front of you. Sit up, straight back. Try to lift, slowly, and feel your biceps (biceps brachii) and abs (transversus and rectus abdominis) respond. Let go slowly and repeat. This should not take more than a minute.

5. Stay seated, push away from your desk, hold on to the bottom of your seat (like in #3) and raise your legs, one at a time, straight out in front of you. Make sure you’re sitting straight up. Lift, hold for a count of five, slowly lower. Do it with the opposite leg. You can do both legs at the same time but if you have lower back problems I don’t recommend it. Wait until you strengthen your hip flexors (psoas major and minor, iliacus) and quads (rectus femoris, vastus lateralis, vastus intermedius, vastus medialis) a bit before attempting both legs together.

6. Try gripping your hands together at the fingers and pulling them away from each other while you hold them together. You can change the angle by keeping your hands close to your body, moving them way out in front, or raising them above your head or lowering towards your legs. You’ll see that you can experiment and make several exercises out of this one technique. These moves will strengthen back (rhomboids), rear delts (posterior deltoids), and triceps. You can also “push in,” strengthening the pecs (pectoralis major).

One could write a book about all the easy little exercises one can include in their daily routine but you wouldn’t read it. After all, you’re already tired of reading this. But you’ve come this far so hear me out.

When you begin to use some of these techniques in your routine I will guarantee you will, in only a couple of weeks, feel better, be stronger, sleep better, and be more raring to go at your job than before you began. The next step is much easier. And that is to make your lifestyle one that is more healthful, sensible, and causes a feeling of well being that you forgot is your right to feel. Remember how you felt when you were a kid? Bulletproof.

Don’t sell these simple steps short. If you’re out of shape and getting worse this could be an easy way to find your real, healthy self again. The next phase is to begin a light program of easy exercises set up as your daily routine to be done before you go to work. When you begin to feel better you will want to get more exercise. The action becomes self perpetuating.

One more thing. All of us Mac-o-philes love Macs because they work so well. There is real integrity in the way they’re made and how they operate. Should we not make an attempt to keep ourselves operating well, too? Dare I make a comparison here? Get some exercise, eat well, rest well, be like Mac. Sit, don’t move, eat crap, be like PC. Your choice.

REALbasic 2006 Release 4
Company: REALbasic
Price: $99 (Standard Edition); $500 (Professional Edition)
http://www.realbasic.com

Programming in REALbasic essentially consists of designing an interface and then applying snippets of code to the various interface elements such as buttons and menus. The incentive effect of seeing a standard Mac interface appear simply by dragging and dropping elements like buttons cannot be underestimated, and the relative ease with which the basic coding can be learned is just as significant. As a result, REALbasic is easily the most popular rapid application development tool on the Mac, and has been for many years, at least since the demise of HyperCard.

REALbasic is not without its critics though. It can be expensive: REALbasic 2006 Professional edition costs no less than $500, though it does include a slew of high end features and allow programs to be created for Macintosh, Windows, and Linux platforms. On the other hand, the Standard edition, which limits the user to exporting programs to a single platform, comes in at a much more manageable $99. Regardless of the edition purchased, users get a six-month update program but no printed manuals or CDs (though these can be bought separately).

REALbasic sports a single window interface within which all the key commands and tools can be accessed.

REALbasic also has a reputation for being a bit buggy; the release notes that come with REALbasic 2006 Release 3 described no fewer than 477 bug fixes and tweaks over Release 2! Whether this is actually any worse than any other big, commercial program is difficult to say, but it has tended to colour the way experienced programmers view REALbasic generally. Among the bugs still present in the application is the improper handling of the “brushed metal” look, with some objects having the metallic finish applied properly, but others not.

A less obvious change, but perhaps more important, is the addition of Intel processor support. REALbasic can now export OS X applications as Universal Binaries or as applications tailored for either Intel or PowerPC processors.

Adding menu bar items is easy, and their appearance and keyboard shortcuts can be previewed for Mac, Mac Classic, Windows, and Linux platforms.

REALbasic 2006 shares the same interface as REALbasic 2005, something that has divided long-time REALbasic aficionados. Older versions used traditional windows and palettes alongside the interface of the program being developed; REALbasic 2006 places everything inside a single big window, the integrated development environment (or IDE). Tabbed windows within the IDE appear for all the different parts of the project as they are added: one for the interface, another for menu bar items, and another for code, and so on.

On the plus side, the user can create multiple IDE windows for a single project, allowing simultaneous editing of different parts of the project. It is also possible to have the IDE windows for different projects open at the same time, something that is undeniably useful when comparing earlier and later versions of a given project. This was impossible with REALbasic 5.5, where only a single project could be worked on at any given moment.

The new IDE interface generally works well, but it is slow to resize and redraw, and occasional visual glitches do appear.

But on the downside, the IDE windows devour screen space and force the user to work in a relatively confined space. Instead of being able to open, close, or minimise palettes as was possible in the earlier version, REALbasic 2006 has a cramped, cluttered feel that makes all the various options and settings much more difficult to find and use. The IDE windows also tends to resize and redraw rather slowly, with periodic visual glitches adding to the impression that REALbasic 2006 is a bit more sluggish than its predecessor.

Another big change touted by the REALbasic website is the ability to check code without needing to actually build and run the application. No mention is made of this useful feature in the manuals currently supplied with the program, and for a headline item, it is remarkably well hidden (it’s one of the optional extras for the Editor menu). Of interest to those working on collaborative projects is the option to save projects in a version control format, making it possible to use REALbasic alongside industry standard version control systems such as CVS.

Though well hidden, the Check tool gives programmers a way to quickly verify code without having to build the program.

Notable gaps in the REALbasic feature set include the absence of icon building tools and graphics for things like toolbar buttons. On the other hand, an impressive array of objects, from HTML Viewers and Spotlight commands through to ODBC and MySQL database queries give the enterprising programmer plenty to play with. All in all, REALbasic 2006 remains one of the nicest ways to create programs, despite the slightly objectionable interface. The Standard Edition package is particularly good value, and the supplied documentation is clear and well written, making it relatively easy for novice programmers to get off to a flying start.

Rating: 4 out of 5
System Requirements: 600 MHz G3, OS X 10.2.8, 512 MB RAM

ShadowClipboard 3
Company: StupidFish Programming
www.stupidfish23.com
Price: $15

Have you ever had something copied into your clipboard and accidentally replaced it by copying something else to the clipboard before you were able to paste it? Now you have to go back and find the original item you copied, copy it again, and paste it to its destination. Before you do that, you have to paste what you have in the clipboard already, so you don’t lose that too. Sound complicated? ShadowClipboard 3, by StupidFish Programming, is just the utility to help you out.

ShadowClipboard extends your clipboard range to from one to one hundred (in advanced mode) items on a clipboard. Plus, you can have multiple clipboards, which extends this number even more. So now when you accidentally copy something before using something else on your clipboard, ShadowClipboard will have that previous copy stored for you.

The greatest thing about ShadowClipboard is its ease of use. By default, it runs from the menu bar. As you copy items, they are stored by ShadowClipboard. Pasting an older item is a few clicks away. First, you click the ShadowClipboard icon to bring up the display, which has a widget-like feel to it and is out of sight until activated.

Next you find the item you want to paste, and click it. It is instantly pasted into your document and becomes the current item in your clipboard. You can even preview the items in the clipboard in a little window that appears under the interface.

ShadowClipboard will store text, images, and files. So far, anything that I have been able to copy has successfully been stored in ShadowClipboard. I was even able to copy and retrieve multiple files which were copied a the same time!

If your ShadowClipboard is full, you can go in and delete select items from the clipboard, or you can delete them all.

One of the cooler features of ShadowClipboard is that it even stores the items it has saved when you reboot the computer. Was there a section of text you were pasting over and over again for a project that you are continuing the next day? Just access your ShadowClipboard and start using it again.

As I mentioned earlier, there is an advanced mode. The advanced mode lets you hold up to 100 clips in each set versus 15 in the simple mode. That can be limitless clipboard storage, or at least enough for most people. The advanced mode has a more traditional window display, instead of the graphical interface.

You can even share clipboards over a network. What a convenient way to share files and/or text.

I wasn’t sure how often I would use ShadowClipboard once I started testing it. However, I find myself using it more and more, as I remember I have it. A typical instance goes like this: I copy something before I paste what previously copied. I get annoyed with myself, and say a few bad words. I than realize that ShadowClipboard is installed and I can easily get access to the clipping I thought I lost. I access ShadowClipboard, and the day is saved.

ShadowClipboard is one of those utilities that should be included in OSX. Once you start using it, you can’t live without it. For only $15, it is a steal. For only $30 you can get a group license for 10 computers. Download the thirty day demo and you’ll see what I mean.

MyMac.com rating 5 out of 5

Pros:
Easy to use
Sit in the background, out of the way
Great price
Almost limitless clipboards

Cons:
None that I see

If you are new to a Mac, for whatever reason, you might thing why write an article about ejecting media on a Mac? You only have to pull out a thumb drive or push the button on the CD tray to eject it, right? Wrong. Ejecting media on a Mac is a little more complicated than that, especially if you are used to using a PC.

First, by media I am referring to any external storage device or item you might connect to the computer. This would include thumb drives, CDs and DVDs (internal and external drives), external hards drives, iPods, and sometimes cameras.

Let’s start with thumb drives, since they are the easiest to get wrong. One would think you could just pull a thumb drive out of the USB port when you are finished with it. However, if you do this on a Mac you’ll get an error message saying the device was removed improperly and you might have put the data on the device at risk.

I wouldn’t worry too much about the data. I have never seen any data damaged due to removing a drive the wrong way. However, I wouldn’t risk it. To remove a thumb drive properly from a Mac, you first need to drag the drive’s icon to the trash. The trash will turn into an eject symbol while doing this. Once over the eject symbol, release the icon, and it should disappear from the desktop. You can now safely remove the drive from your computer. Some thumb drives have a light on them to indicate they are in use. If your drive does have a light, follow this process and wait for the light to stop blinking before removing it.

A second method for ejecting the drive is to click the little eject symbol next to drive’s icon in the toolbar of any finder window. This will serve the same person as dragging the icon to the trash. Once the icon disappears, remove the drive.

iPods, some digital cameras, and external drives need to be ejected the same way as a thumb drive. However, iPods and some cameras can also be ejected with the little eject icon from iTunes and iPhoto.

I said some cameras above, because not all cameras need to be ejected. None of my Kodak cameras need ejecting from my computer. I can just disconnect them as soon as I am done with them. However, if I do the same with my friend’s Olympus camera I get the error message mentioned above. If you get the error message with your camera, make sure you eject it first.

Like all the other devices mentioned CDs and DVDs need to be ejected from the computer also. You can’t just open the CD drive by pushing a button. If your Mac has a drive tray with a button, try it out. It won’t open unless the drive is empty.

As with these devices, these discs can be ejected in the same manner mentioned above. They can also be ejected with the eject key on the keyboard. If you have a Mac keyboard or a laptop, this key will be the key in the top right of the keyboard with the eject symbol on it. Push this key, and the disc will be ejected from the drive.

Of course, if you have been using a Mac for a while this is not news to you. However, I see newbies to the Mac have problems ejecting media all the time, especially with those thumb drives. Hopefully, this will help those people out.

It’s true. I write about the Mac, but my wife lives it. It is in every part of her day. She is a teacher, and also a student getting her final degree, so her trusty iBook goes with her everywhere, and often when she is home, she is in front of her new iMac, working away.

Being a teacher means long hours, full weekends, and often little sleep. Grades have to be entered, and tests and homework needs to be graded, curriculums written, and so on. But, she loves her work, and I am happy that she does. She excels in about everything she does, and she is also about the most organized person I know.

Not that I am prejudiced or anything, you understand.

On the Mac, I use a word processing program, a browser and some games. Once in a while I do a little HTML coding, or use an illustration program or Photoshop.

My wife however, makes excellent use of iDVD, iMovie, iTunes, iPhoto, iWeb, InDesign and GradeKeeper, as well as Excel, Word, and a host of other apps. She is also a talented and award winning photographer, and she employs those photos of hers very well in accenting her media presentations.

Its fun to watch her quickly create a class website in iWeb, where her sixth grade students can go to get their assignments and check on stuff for class. Or she will make a quick DVD with photos from a class outing, along with music, to show at parent’s night. LINK

I said she was organized, but not on her Mac. She never seems to put stuff in folders, and her desktop has over 200 documents and icons all over it. Her screen is completely full. However, she can always find anything right away, using Spotlight, so I guess a messy desktop on the Mac doesn’t matter that much.

She wasn’t always this way, however. When I first met her, nearly 30 years ago, she was a single mom, making it on her own, working in a county office, as a secretary. She didn’t do well in high school, and hated to study or read much, but she learned Shorthand in a secretarial school, and was quite adept at taking full annotated notes at the speed of speech.

When I met her, I knew she was very intelligent, and could do a lot more, but she did not believe in herself. She just never thought she could go to college, or take classes. It did not appeal to her because she thought it was all beyond her. She was a product of her generation and the school system.

But, because of my deafness, in 1990, she got an opportunity at the local community college to take an Adult Ed class in sign language. Who knew she would like it so much, and be so good at signing? She went on, taking more and more classes in American Sign Language, as well as English, History, Math and Algebra, and she soon got her AA degree.

Then she accepted a job at Cypress college, working as an adjunct with the large Deaf population there. By then, she was teaching sign language and interpreting for the deaf, and she was wonderful at it.

Me? I was the deaf one, and I also took classes in sign language, but I was never any good at it, and to this day my signing is rudimentary and minimal compared to hers.

We had a Mac back then – a MacII, brand new, with a 12-inch color monitor, which I used to create technical art for aerospace manuals and illustrations for court cases. My wife used a PC running the new Windows 3.02. It wasn’t that she didn’t like the Mac, but she was a Windows person, using the prehistoric Microsoft Office at her work and school. It was from her that I learned about all the horrors and pitfalls of Windows, and often had to come to her rescue when her crude computer lost her work.

Much later, quite on her own, she discovered that the Mac was not only much easier to use, but much more reliable, secure and productive. Somehow, she couldn’t learn that from me, a self-appointed Mac guru, writer and evangelist. Go figure.

But all those things are water under the bridge, and they don’t matter, really. When you love someone, those sorts of things are non-issues, aren’t they?

Later, when she was working at Pacific Christian College, a place that she respected and cared deeply for (and one where she coveted a place on their staff), she got the opportunity to complete her degree. It was something really new – a Degree Completion program, where students go one night a week, don’t take tests, and complete their Masters degree in a year and a half.

She liked it so much, and was so excited about it, that soon she had me signing up for it. My only ‘degree’ was from a local business college, in drafting, but with a couple of CLEP tests, and credit for years of work experience, I was in the program too.

So we both went to school together, one night a week, and we got our MBAs. What a kick! (Oh, she hated how I studied! She would study all night for class. Not me. I rarely cracked a book, but we both got the same top grades.) Once she graduated, she was able to be on the staff at that college, soon to be Hope International University. I said she was smart. She graduated Magna Cum Laude. I would have gotten that too, but I got really sick during the last few months, and missed out. But then I had the privilege of telling her what the Latin meant in her honorarium.

She went on with her education, of course, since it was sort of free (Federally funded student loans), and she is now in the process of completing her Doctorate in Education, as well as successfully completing her California teaching credentials, again with exemplary marks.

Me, I went on to get another MA, in early church history, which was really free to me because she worked at the college. I got it to help with my writing and research in history, which I also teach part time on line. I don’t just write about the Mac, you know.

It was during all this schooling that she learned to use the Mac. That was a tough thing, for I had to timeshare our aging MacII with her, but she wrote on it, both for school and for her own edification. She also explored MacroMind Director for animations and presentations. She is actually a much better writer than I am, but she rarely writes, since she is so busy teaching all the time.

But now she uses the Mac and nothing else. She has her own Macintosh. And I have mine.

Of course, there is much more to the story. My wife does not have a lot of self-esteem. It seems she never had much, from her troubled upbringing. She is smart and intelligent, but she doesn’t think that way about herself. She is beautiful, truly so, from her awesome blue eyes, to her showgirl legs. But she doesn’t see herself that way. She is much too critical of herself. Perhaps that is a failing in our culture today, where women are made to think of themselves and their bodies in a demeaning way, by every media and advertisement that seems to exist.

She is also like most every other woman, when compared to men. Life is tough, and I always talk about how we will be just fine, regardless of our sometimes dire circumstances (something about trusting in the Lord), and that we have always been well provided for, and will continue to be. But she has a hard time believing me.

Her faith is much different, and stronger in different ways. She anonymously provides food and clothing for her sometimes needy charges – those students whom she so loves. So you see, I talk about having faith, but she acts on it. Are all women this way?

She is also faithful in another way. Here is a woman who will never lie, nor will she ever leave me. I knew this of her from the beginning, for we were friends for a year before she got me under some mistletoe at a Christmas party.

Funny, that. After I kissed her, I never let her go, nor let her out of my sight. We were married five short weeks later, and we have always been together. It will be 28 years next March. And, yes, I am crazy in love with her, and am just as faithful to her as she is to me. What have I ever done to earn such a rare and wonderful treasure, I am sure I will never know. Just lucky, I guess.

A lot has happened over those years. Twelve years ago I contracted cancer, a slow growing one, and I have been in and out of chemo ever since, except for a year I took off to have open heart bypass surgery (a complication of the first heavy metal Cisplatin I was given). So I was forced to take an all too early retirement – something that is very hard to do when you have a strong work ethic, and have always been the breadwinner in the family. But then I found time to write, and I also found it is something I love to do.

My wife takes all these things a lot harder than I do. I am philosophical about it all, and sort of low key in how I handle and view things. My wife is not.

Her self-perceived insecurities drive her sometimes. "What will happen to me once you are gone? How will I survive? How can I afford to live on my own?" – that sort of thing.

So I patiently go over things with her. She has her degree. She is a successful teacher who is well respected by her peers and beloved by her students. She loves to teach and she is very good at it. She can retire with good benefits, which means she will be well provided for, even if I am not there. Above all, there is one greater than I who will always provide for her and watch over her. And even more than this, our grown sons love her and are determined to take care of her, regardless.

But, this does not completely alleviate her worries. Why do women worry so much?

I also remind her that she is a very good writer, and that she should take a sabbatical from teaching one year soon, and just write. She would write textbooks, of course. Her graduate university would help her get published. I even predict for her that if she writes about her own Critical Pedagogy (the holy grail for teachers), she would likely pay off all her student loans at once. It would be fitting and proper that she should be published before me.

The one solid thing I rely on here, in the midst of all of this, is the Mac. Having the Mac in your life means that you can be much more productive. You can quite easily write a book, make a movie, create a presentation, and do reliably so many more things with a Mac than any other computer. You can be creative and have the freedom to express yourself in ways that you could only imagine. The Mac is a true gift for my beloved wife, for I know that as long as she sticks to the Mac, it will make her time incredibly much more useful and productive, and her thoughts that much more accessible and interesting to everyone else. She even uses the Mac to make all our Christmas presents, making those uber-cool personalized and professionally printed iPhoto Albums that you can buy on line at the Apple Store.

So that’s my Mac wife. And I am three times blessed and incredibly lucky to be living in the land of the free, at peace with everyone, and getting to have and to hold an amazing woman, whom I dearly love and rightly admire.

Download the show HERE (right click to download)
David Cohen, John Nemo, David Weeks, Robert Hazelrigg, Tim Robertson, Guy Serle, and George Bush. Can you guess which of these people are not on this weeks podcast?

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DAC-200

smcFanControl
Author: Hendrik Holtmann
Price: Free – Donate-ware
www.http://www.conscius.de/~eidac/index.html

Since I started using the MacBook Pro as a replacement to my 1GHz PowerBook G4, I have been complaining of heat issues with this new machine. Not that the PowerBook was a cool running laptop by any means, but this MacBook Pro simply runs HOT. I have called the MacBook Pro, during our weekly Podcast, the perfect solution for do-it-yourself male sterilization. This puppy just gets HOT.

How hot? Up until recently, I never really measured the heat level. I didn’t really feel I needed to, I knew too hot when it is on my lap. Ouch. Bur a recent post at the TUAW.com website made mention of a fan speed control program for the MacBook Pr, smcFanControl.

smcFanControl is an application that will allow you to adjust the speed of the internal fans on your MacBook Pro. By default, my fans were running at 1146 rpm or so. Was that fast enough to cool the machine? Well, after downloading the software and giving it a try, I would have to say no.

I set the fan speed a little less than half, at 3031 rpm. The difference in heat was amazing.

To rest it, I started the Mac from a cold start, and let it run for a half-hour. The first graphic below shows just how hot the Mac was running with the fans set to the normal, factory settings. 163.4′.

I then shut down the MBP, waited two hours, and booted it up. This time, I let the machine run for another half-hour, but with the smcFanControl software running the entire time, and the fans set to 3031 rpm. The difference in heat is simply amazing. See the picture below.

Note that in the first picture, the slider speed control is set to 3035, but you can see that they had yet to actually speed up yet, as the application had just been started

The software works, but there are some unknowns here. Are the two internal MacBook Pro fans alright running at this higher speed? Will it cause the fans to fail sooner than usual? Any other inverse affects that may crop up by running the fans faster? I can’t honestly answer those questions, but they do make me nervous. This laptop cost a lot of money, and I would have to think I am doing something that would shorten its life-span. That said, I am finally able to use my MBP more fully than I was before, and I no longer have to worry about that whole sterilization thing.

While I won’t use smcFanControl if I only plan on using the MBP for short durations, I do plan on using it more often than not. I don’t know if running the fans at a higher speed is bad for it, but I feel that these machines run too hot, which itself is not good for the computer. So pick your poison: burn your lap and possible the innards of your MacBook Pro, or crank the fans up a little and get a usable machine, but risk burning the fans up. Me? I will take the later.

MyMac.com rating: 4.5 out of 5. I would prefer this to be a system preference, rather than a stand-alone application, but other than that, no problems at all.

Download the show HERE (right click to download)
Red Nanos, a little blue language, and infected iPods attack Windows. Tim, Chad, and Guy look at the quarterly financial results from Apple released this week, plus some listener feedback. All that, and a ton more, on this weeks MyMac Podcast.

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TuneCenter
Company: Griffin Technology
www.griffintechnology.com
Price: $129.99

If you can’t wait for Apple’s iTV (or whatever it is called when released), you might want to try Griffin’s TuneCenter. TuneCenter will allow you to take iPod and play it through your television. What makes that different than using Apple’s iPod cables? Well, read on to find out.

TuneCenter is what Griffin calls a “Home Media Center for iPod.” Basically, it is an iPod dock on steroids. When you connect your iPod to the TuneCenter, and connect the TuneCenter to your TV, you can control most of your iPod functions through the television via an iPod-like menu and the included remote control. Your iPod will also charge when docked, but you cannot sync your iPod through the TuneCenter.

You can access any audio file on your iPod through the on screen menu. Just like the iPod there are menus for artists, playlists, genres, podcasts, audiobooks, etc. Once selected, your choice plays through the television with a display similar to the iPod display.

The time display only shows how long a track has played, not how much time is remaining. There is no album art shown. Griffin’s support page explains that this is because album art is not transmitted through the dock connector.

What about video and photos? These will display through the TuneCenter also, but without the onscreen display. To access these files you click the “Video” button on the remote, and you than have to use the iPod’s display to find what you are looking for. The TuneCenter remote will still control the menus on the iPod, but you have to get close enough to the unit so you can read the display. You can’t use the remote to scan through video. According to Griffin, these annoyances are due to the way the iPod is made, and were unavoidable. It won’t play the new iPod games either, but I didn’t expect it to (even though I tried).

The TuneCenter packaging does not mention this, and I think it should. Many people will be disappointed that they can’t control the video through the TuneCenter display, and there is no full video control. Until I tried it, I was under the assumption that I could control video just like I can control audio.

The TuneCenter remote is very simple. It has controls similar to the iPod clickwheel. Play, forward, scan, volume, etc. You can control the volume through your TV and/or the TuneCenter. I found it best to set the volume through the television, and make minor adjustments with the TuneCenter remote. The remote also has a power button, a menu button, a page button for faster searching, the video button, and a settings button.

The settings button gives you access to familiar iPod controls like shuffle, repeat, and equalizer. The equalizer will not work with newer iPods that have been updated to the latest iPod firmware via iTunes 7. This was the case for me. Griffin has informed me that this is a known bug, and they are working on a firmware update.

Another feature of the TuneCenter is internet radio access via an ethernet cable. A wireless model is in development, but has not been released as of this writing. Internet Radio is accessed through the main menu and will give you access to tons of radio stations (I counted about one hundred).

The TuneCenter itself is a nice solid unit, done in a brushed metal look. The back of the TuneCenter is where all the connections are. There is the power connector for the included adapter, the ethernet jack, a switch for NTSC or PAL, an A/V out plug for connecting the included A/V cable, and an S-Video jack (cable not included).

The box contains the TuneCenter unit, the power cord, the A/V plug, the remote control and battery, and dock adapters for older iPods. If you have a Nano or 5g iPod you will need to use the dock connector that came with your iPod . It would have been nice if Griffin included dock adapters for the newer iPods as well. You might be using yours already, or even lost it. It would be a real annoyance to have to move the connector between two docks.

I have been using the TuneCenter for a couple of weeks now, and I am really enjoying it. I like being able to exercise and listen to my iPod without headphones. I have speakers for my iPod, but I can’t control the iPod the way I can with the TuneCenter remote. Not being able to fully control video is annoying, but I can deal with it.

The main issue I had with the TuneCenter is that the remote is not sensitive enough. I found myself have to press buttons several times before seeing a result. You also have to be in direct line of sight of the remote’s receiver. Using the remote a little off to the side of the TuneCenter and it will not work. Forget about being in another room.

It would also be nice to have some type of screen saver like display while songs are playing. The display is kind of boring, and this would also avoid any concern of screen burn-in on different displays. I would be happy with the words just bouncing around the screen, although an iTunes type of visualizer would be really nice.

The TuneCenter is compatible with the iPod Mini, the 4th Generation iPod, the U2 iPod, the iPod Photo, the iPod Nano (1st and 2nd generations), the 5th generation iPod, and the new 5th Generation iPods.

Overall, I really like the TuneCenter. It is a great way to bring iTunes to your TV without having to wait for iTV or paying the estimated $300 price tag. However, $129 is a little pricey. A below $100 price would be a lot easier to accept.

MyMac.com rating 3.5 out of 5

Pros:
Plays audio, video, and photos from your iPod through the television
Easy setup and easy to use
Familiar iPod-like interface and display for audio
Internet radio access
Everything you need is included
Compatible with older iPods

Cons:
Remote receiver is not sensitive enough (or the remote is not powerful enough)
I’d like to see a screen saver
Equalizer feature will not work on iPods with the latest firmware update (fix in the works)
Even though these are unavoidable, you have to control video and photos through the iPod display and not the TuneCenter display and this should be mentioned on the packaging
Only dock adapters for older iPods are included
$129 seems a little pricey, under $100 would be better

I had to reformat my PowerBook recently, and that meant putting back all the software I normally use. Of course I had to put back my word processor, a spreadsheet program, an email program (Ok, I admit it, I use Office), and all the cool Apple programs that originally came with my machine (ever try and restore these?) But I also had, and wanted, again, a handful of what I term “gadget software”, popularly known as shareware and freeware, programs that I just have to have on all my Macs to make them even easier to use. These are typically not full-fledged applications, but rather smaller applications, utilities, extensions, add-ons, or background tasks and enhancers for your Mac.

What follows is my list of what I believe are some of the “must have gadgets” for the Mac. I do not include some of the more obvious smaller programs like BBEdit, Stuffit Deluxe, Timbuktu, Virtual PC (or Parallels), or programs like them, because I consider them to be “full apps” and not fun “gadgets.” This list is only for gadgets and fun, smaller applications only.

Of course, you list will vary, and I hope you will post below this article what your favorites are and why you like them (please stick to “gadgets”,) but here is my list and a brief review of each. These are in no particular order of importance, but rather in the order as I remembered them and I reinstalled them onto my PowerBook. Also note that almost all of these can be downloaded for a free (good) or a free trial (another requirement to be on this list), so you can see if you like it before you buy it, which I feel, is essential for ANY software. If I cannot try it first, I typically will not buy it. So on to my list:


• Little Snitch by Objective Development
http://www.obdev.at/products/littlesnitch/index.html
$24.95

This may not be important to you, but I really want to know when one of my running applications decides it wants to talk over the Internet. Too many apps these days “phone home”, basically telling the publisher of the software many things about you, the computer user, that you may not wish to actually share with these people. Things like what apps are running on your machine, your IP address, both public and private, your MAC address, your registration number, what files you opened, etc. etc. Personally, once I buy a piece of software, I do not want it calling back home to report what I am doing. Enter Little Snitch. This small program runs in the background, and watches for any application or process that tries to connect to the Internet. When that happens, a dialog will pop up , report what app is trying to send data and where, and give you the ability to allow it to always communicate, communicate only once, or only communicate this time until the app quits.

It seems that many applications do try and check for updates, and if you know this, you can allow it to talk one time. Some applications, like iChat, want to talk all the time, and these you may say it is OK forever. But what about that shareware program that you just downloaded? Is it reporting things back to the publisher? With Little Snitch, you, and not the application are in control of what these apps may and may not do.

If you are worried about companies knowing more about you than you wish to let them know, this is a must.


• FruitMenu by Unsanity

http://www.unsanity.com/haxies/fruitmenu/

$10

When OS-X replaced the Classic OS, I felt some things got left behind, especially around the Apple menu. For example, my Dock is already WAY too full of program that I wish to easily access, and I used to do this from Apple Menu. I also miss hierarchical menus in the Apple Menu, especially of my applications, utilities, and documents folders, which I also used to access under the Apple Menu in OS-9 for quick access to these folders and applications.

FruitMenu returns some of those things you might just miss from Classic and adds a few new things that make life easier too. For example, I can add almost any item to my Apple Menu I wish. For me, something I use almost every day is a display of my IP address. This is GREAT when I am roaming on wireless networks or switch from wired to wireless or back and wonder if I am truly connected. I simply click on my Blue Apple icon and I instantly see if I have a real IP address assigned or not by looking at the address now displayed in the Apple menu.

Features also include the ability to put any folders, files or complete disks in the Apple and Contextual menus for easy navigation; Speed up your system by disabling menu fadeout effect; Open any document with applications of your choice through new, user controlled contextual menus on documents and applications; Preview graphics right in the menu; Set the desktop picture with a single click from a contextual menu; Browse contents of selected folders in a menu; and organize the Apple menu in any way you see fit, adding items and separators, removing things you do not use, and adding contextual menus as well.

FruitMenu goes one step further by allowing you to have a custom menu for each and every application if you like, meaning that items appear and disappear depending on what app you are running.

For $10, this is some of the best functionality money can buy, and once you use it, you will want it.



• VLC Media Player

http://www.videolan.org/vlc/

Free

QuickTime is great, but it does not play everything I seem to get from the Internet. Forget about Windows Media Player, and there is little chance that Real Player will ever touch my machine. So how do I watch some of the newer content that I receive or download? I use VLC.

VLC is a fairly simple player for just about every platform out there. There are versions for Windows, Mac OSX, BeOS, Fedora Core, WinCE, Zarus and at least 9 flavors of Linux as well. VLC is a highly portable media player that can play, without any further downloads of codecs, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, mp3, ogg, plus others. It can also directly play VCDs, DVDs, CDs, and various streaming protocols as well. And, it can also be used as a server to stream in unicast or multicast in IPv4 or IPv6 on high-bandwidth networks.

In a nutshell, if VLC cannot play the video file, you do not need to view it. With few exceptions, it just works fine every time, and has of yet failed to play any Divx, DVD, or media file I have downloaded. The interface is fairly straightforward with the usual control buttons for play, skip forward and backward, fast-forward and back, Stop, skip to end, and volume. In addition, play lists can easily be created for a long set of items. Menus give you access to open a file, a disk, or a network steam, and if available, multiple video and/or audio stream selections are easily picked here as well. You can also select from multiple denterlace methods to improve picture quality, and VLC fully supports subtitle files as well, displaying the appropriate subtitle text over the video.

In a nutshell, this is the most complete and easy to use video player available for the Mac that will play just about anything. And for free, it is a bargain.



• Google Earth

http://earth.google.com/

Free

Essential? No. An amazing time sink and incredibly fun pieces of software with which to play? Absolutely! Now in Beta 4, for free, I highly recommend this little gem of a program be on your Mac (and of course, it is available for many other platforms too.)

So what can you really do? How about flying from space right into your neighborhood? Or just type in an address and Google Earth will zoom right into that location. Or, pick a local area and then ask Google Earth to search for schools, parks, restaurants, and hotels nearby. Once you find the place you want to go, it can get you driving directions as well and see them displayed right on the globe. It is cool to look at your work or home address from space, or in my case, to see that they people who bought my house removed the swimming pool in the last 10 years! Or look at the earth from space, then fly into a city and tilt and rotate the view to see 3D terrains. In some cases, you can even see building details, parked cars and sometimes people depending on the quality of images available for that area.

Google Earth allows you to save and share your searches and favorites as well as add your own annotations to those spots. It comes with an extensive API for add-ons, and even more fun, a number of advertisers have done advertising games with Google Earth. Mazda’s recent “Earth Search” contest where clues were given and using Google Earth, you had to find the location that they annotated onto the map. It was actually a lot of fun. See this blog for more details of how it worked, because I do not think the game is available any more: (http://www.gearthblog.com/blog/archives/2006/05/win_a_mazda_cx7.html)

For free, this program is educational, informative, and a damn lot of fun too.



• Konfabulator, now known as Yahoo Widgets from Pixoria
http://widgets.yahoo.com/ and http://www.widgetgallery.com/

Free

While I think Apple’s widgets are fine, it truly bothers me that I have to enter a whole different mode to see or use the widgets. Long before Apple put them into OS-X, there was Konfabulator. This was a product that you had to buy for around $25, and at that price, I found it very worth the cost. Now, since Yahoo has bought it it, it is free for Windows and Macintosh, so it is truly a steal.

With over 3000 widgets and growing (3191 to be exact as of this writing) there is probably a widget to do exactly what you want, and a fairly good developers guide to even write your own. Like Apple’s widgets, these are small programs that give you small functionality without running an entire application. But unlike Apple’s widgets, these can be placed on, above, or even as part of your desktop, basically giving you a dynamic desktop.

I have my favorites stuck into the desktop which run all the time, including a large battery image that shows my charge remaining or time to full (which freed up some seriously needed menu space), an analog clock (again, freeing up needed menu space) and something showing the moon phase, because one never knows when you might meet a werewolf. But I also have a widget that pops up a transparent window showing me when one of my buddies enters or exists iChat. This pop-up appear, “floating” over the desktop, is not clickable, and does not interfere with what I am currently doing at that time, but lets me know that someone has joined or left iChat. I also have the temperature of my processor displayed on my desktop as well. There is even a Widget to tell you the temperature of your networked TiVo if you like. Yahoo Widgets also includes the ability to display a Widgets only screen, much like Apple’s widgets.

Yahoo Widgets will work just fine along side of Apple’s widgets (they do NOT run each other’s widgets) and using them both gives you constant widget data where you need it, and windowed widget data where it makes sense.

If you are still not sure, go to the widget gallery listed above and have a look through the array of widgets. All this for free? Can’t beat the price of functionality. In my opinion, this is what Apple’s widgets should have been.



• Marine Aquarium by SereneScreen.com

http://www.serenescreen.com/product/

$19.95

What once started as a well-done simple screen saver is now one of my favorite screen “toys.” This product continues to give the most realistic looking marine aquarium on your desktop I have ever seen anywhere, with regular improvements and updates all the time. In fact, it is so good, that the Roku product (http://www.progressive-av.com/multi_room/roku_hd1000_digital_media_player.htm), a gadget to display photos on your high definition monitor, included this as their standard screen saver. And I own a 55-gallon salt-water marine aquarium tank at home, and this program is more fun to watch than my tank, and just as realistic, and a lot less work too. And it never needs cleaning!

Now with over 23 different fish, which are incredibly realistic, these fish are actual 3D Models, not some simple flat images dragged across the screen as in other screen savers. The latest version now supports multi-monitors, widescreen display, and it even properly conforms to custom aspect rations. And if you have used this software before, the latest version now incorporated the crystal clock as part of the same program. This can run as your screen saver, or launch the application to open an aquarium window on your desktop, or expand it to cover the entire screen. Realistic bubbles accompany the realistic fish, and a very well done lighting effect, complete with reflected ripples.

When stress rises, switch this on and just watch the fish. The life-like movements and rendering have the same effect as watching a real aquarium, and these you do not have to feed.



• Pacifist by CharlesSoft

http://www.charlessoft.com/

$20

Pacifist is a small program that attempts to do in Mac OS X what TomeViewer did in Mac OS 9. Basically, it allows one to open up installer packages (.pkg) and view, install or extract individual files out of these packages. Big deal you say? Well, if you never need it, you probably will not care. But when the time comes that you wish you could do this, this is the tool to have.

This is especially useful if, for example, you deleted one part of a full install and ONLY want to reinstall the component. For example, suppose you deleted Spotlight and need to reinstall it, but not the whole operating system? Use Pacifist to install just one file out of a package instead of the entire package. If you just want a little more control over the installation process, this gives it to you. Pacifist can also update pre-binding information for files that you install to optimize their performance, as well as verify existing installations and find missing or altered files when a program becomes damaged, and you would rather not reinstall it.

Pacifist is 10.4 compatible, and also works with Universal Binaries. Curious as to what exactly is inside those installer packages, and what will be installed, have a look now before you install.


• SlimServer by Slim Devices

http://www.slimdevices.com/su_downloads.html

Free

Slim Devices makes a VERY cool media player for your home that I reviewed quite a while ago (http://www.mymac.com/showarticle.php?id=1333) in 2004. The device has received many upgrades many times since then, and is one of the coolest music toys I have ever used. That said, you do not need to own their device to get their free software called SlimServer.

Why should you care about the software when you do not have the device? Because this server, which runs in the BACKGROUND on your Mac (or a Windows machine), basically takes all your iTunes music (except Apple Store songs) and servers then up to ANY streaming media player, including iTunes and the VLC mentioned above.

If you have more than one Mac, or if you own some other device that will play streaming MP3s (maybe even your TiVo), then this free server will let you share ALL that music without having to move a single file. Completely controlled via a built-in web interface on any web browser, you can play one song, build a play list, and even play your existing play lists in iTunes. And, if you have streaming favorites in iTunes, those too can be streamed as a playlist to another machine. The built-in web system allows you to control ANY server connected to your machine from ANY web page anywhere.

So for me, my home machine runs SlimServer, and at work, I simply listen to my music collection via a stream, all controlled by a web page at work. No music to copy, no violating any music copyright laws by copying the music, and complete access and control over my entire library.

Set up of a player can be a little tricky, but the server includes excellent documentation all available via the web interface as well. And should you really like this and want to stream to your stereo system, you might consider the Squeeze Box. It integrates into this server via both web interface, and its own remote control and built-in display, to easily access all your music on your home system too.

And did I mention, the server is FREE!



• Remote Desktop Connection

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/otherproducts/otherproducts.aspx?pid=remotedesktopclient

FREE

Not to be confused with Apple’s Remote Desktop, this is, and I am sorry if I offend anyone, a FREE Microsoft product. This is included in Microsoft’s Office Suite of products, but can also be downloaded for free from Microsoft at the link above.

Becoming more of a reality every day, those of us who use a Macintosh are also often required to use or access a Windows machine as well. In my case, a Windows machine is required at my work, and I do not own an Intel Mac. That means I now have two machines at work, my Mac and their PC. They would like me to carry the PC home to do work in evenings and weekends, but because I carry my Mac to work, I will only carry one computer home. If I need to do some work from home, I simply VPN into the office network from my Mac, and use Remote Desktop Connection to remotely control my work machine right on my Mac.

I also must admit that I have an XP machine at home that runs some of my home security software, an email server and other services, and I often want to connect to this machine from work as well. Remote Desktop Connection allows me to do that as well.

Remote Desktop Connection is a small application that gives you full remote access to your Windows desktop. Similar to the software with the same name on Windows, simply put in the IP address of the target computer, and assuming that its remote services are turned on, you will be presented with a login screen for that Windows machine. Either full screen or in a scrolling window, the target screen is locked, and you have full control as if you were sitting at the machine. Sounds can be played on the remote machine, the locals Mac, or turned off all together, and the ALT key can be user defined locally. Right clicks can be sent from a two-button mouse or via a CTRL-Click function as well. You can also have your local Macintosh disks and Printers mounted on the remote machine for easy file copying, select the size of the remote screen, and even choose which display of you want to view the remote screen if you have multiple monitors. And a number of options allow you to optimize what is sent from the remote machine depending on the speed of your connection.

When I need something on my work computer, or need to access something on my headless Windows box (means it has no monitor) Remote Desktop Connection allows me to run those machines right from my Mac as if I were on those machines.

For a free application, if you need remote access to a Windows machine, this is something to seriously consider.

I originally planned to include Hardware Monitor by Marcel Bersink Software-Systeme as I think this is a cool little application to monitor all the sensors in your Mac, and Marcel has written some great apps in the past. Unfortunately, a company called element5, a German software distributor, controls licensing of this product. I have recently had problems with a piece of data recovery software I purchased through element5 which did not work and only crashed my Mac, and element5 would do nothing to aid in the refund of my money on this defective product, rather leaving me at the mercy of the publisher who also did little to help. Their customer service was poor, and as such, I swore I would not buy software form them again since they are eager to sell it, but not so eager to support it or you after the purchase. Consider this product at your own risk, as with any other software sold by element5.


• TinkerTool by Marcel Bersink Software-Systeme

http://www.bresink.com/osx/TinkerTool.html

Free

All that said above, another product by Marcel Bersink Software-Systeme is well worth downloading, and it is free. As I said, this guy makes great software, and one free item, TinkerTool is one of those items you did not know you needed until you try it.

There are a lot of hidden preferences and settings built into OS-X that Apple does not give you easy access to. With TinkerTool, you can activate hidden features of the operating system and also in some applications as well.

Here is just a quick sample of what you can change: In the Finder, you can switch on and off hidden file display, disable sound effects, disable Desktop features, disable the full list of users and groups in ownership settings, and add a Quit item to the Finder menu. You can also toggle showing animated effects when opening files, animated opening info panels and desktop icons, and when selecting info panel categories. You can also prevent the Finder from creating hidden .DS_Store files over a network, so you don’t leave little Mac “turds” when browsing Windows networks. Other options are available for the Dock, general, applications, fonts and font smoothing, permissions, and Safari. And one of my favorites, being able to turn on developer mode for Dashboard, allowing you to drag Apple’s widgets to the desktop.

You also should not need administrative privileges to use the tool to change settings, and the tool makes sure that changes only affect the current user and app, as the program will never change any component of the operating system. The integrity of your system is never put at risk, there is no negative impact on your system or any upgrades, and the settings can easily be altered and reset to either Apple’s default or the state they existed before you changed them.

OK, that is my list. Do let me know if you try any of these and tell me what you think, and also let me know what items you have on your own list as well.

Disko
Griffin Technology
Price: $29.99
www.griffintechnology.com

Ah, I love iPod cases. Each one seems to give new life to your iPod, or at the very least, it changes the personality of the iPod itself. A boring white iPod can look hip and fresh anew with a cool iPod case. And the hip and cool class of iPod cases is just what Griffin is going for with the new Disko.

The Disko brings what has always been missing to the iPod: flashing and chasing lights. I didn’t say you were missing this feature, just that the iPod was missing it.

This is a fun product, one that shows just how diverse the iPod market really is. It truly is the third-party developers of the iPod platform that has made the iPod what it is. The Disko, a Polycarbonate iPod case, does a decent job of actually keeping your iPod from getting scratched up. It is a two-piece iPod case, and ships with two different backs, one for the 30GB iPod, and one for the 60GB version. The front of the case is where all the action happens. It is a glossy-black in color, with tiny LED lights ringing the scroll wheel. The lights come in three colors, green, red, and blue, that flash in five different sequences.


Sound cool? It is, and it isn’t. While the LEDs look great in a darkened room, they are also easily seen in bright light. But the problem is not in the actual case itself, or the lights, which works fine as advertised; but in practice, this may be one of the worst ideas ever in iPod case design.

The iPod is built around an internal hard drive. Hard drives have very delicate moving parts. While they are generally okay walking around with, and even jogging, the practice of vigorously shaking your iPod is generally a bad idea. And that, I’m afraid, is where my problem lies with the Disko.

To activate the LEDs, you have to shake the case. In testing the review unit Griffin sent to us, I found that I had to shake the unit quite forcefully to get the lights to activate. Not good. I quickly decided to extract my iPod out of the case, as I honestly did not feel this was the healthiest of activities to put my iPod through.

The lights do not draw power from the iPod itself, but rather from two watch-type batteries from the bottom of the case. There is a clear plastic screen protector as well, allowing you to see the iPods screen very clearly. Ports at the top of the case allow easy access to both the headphone jack and hold button. Unfortunately, because the batteries are installed at the bottom of the case, you have to remove the iPod completely from the Disko to plug in the Dock connector. A real pain, as I found it quite difficult to take apart the Disko, as demonstrated during MyMac Podcast 102. For an iPod case that requires you to completely remove the iPod simply to charge it shows a lack of planning on the part of Griffin, something normally not the case with them. (As my forthcoming review of another Griffin iPod case, the very impressive CenterStage.)

All in all, the idea is a fun one, but the execution is sub-par, and potentially dangerous to your iPod. While I initially thought this would be a cool product appealing to younger iPod owners, the reality compels me to not recommend this case to anyone.

MyMac.com Rating: 1 out of 5

Every time I email a long website address (URL) from my Mac to a PC the URL link usually breaks. I have been trying to find a solution to this for a while now, and a post at Apple’s Discussions site many months ago got me nowhere.

The only solution I could figure out was to copy the URL into Safari and use the feature that emails the entire webpage. This works great. However, I don’t use Safari as my default web browser, and I don’t like bouncing between browsers.

I decided to try posting the problem on Apple’s Discussions site one more time. Shortly after posting, I got a solution, and an explanation. DWB replied to my post with the following, "This is a problem because many email clients place a hard return after X number of characters rather than letting the text flow."

DWB informed me that there are URL shorteners. He sent me to a URL shortening site for turning long URLs into tiny ones. The site worked great, but it had too many steps for the recipient using the tiny URL.

An internet search for "url shortener" turned up a bunch of similar sites. The most straight forward site I found is http://hort.net/+13JN. At this site, a link is produced that goes directly to the original site. No extra steps involved. Just copy and paste the new link into an email! The site even provides a shortcut link to drag to your Bookmarks Bar. When clicked from a webpage it will instantly produce the shortened URL for you.

I even found a widget for URL shortening called Shrink. While Shrink does the job, it has too many steps, and is a little confusing.

URL shorteners- Who knew? From now on no more links breaking in my emails!

If you have a URL shortening solution post it below, or email me. I’d love to find the easiest way to do this.