Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Software, Bugs/Recalls, Snow Leopard

Ahhh, Labor Day - the weird U.S. holiday that celebrates work by encouraging people to take the day off. Since it also coincides with the beginning of September, many Americans associate Labor Day with the end of summer, which isn't until 3:18 PM on September 22nd. Since the colder temperatures of the Northern Hemisphere will soon mean no more picnics, it's a great day to get out and have one more al fresco meal.

Like a picnic, where a good time can be spoiled by a group of aggressive little ants, my first ten days of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard have been a lot of fun, interspersed with some tiny, nagging annoyances:

• Preview, an app I use constantly to resize screenshots for TUAW, crashes way too frequently
• Without having changed any preferences, the OWC Mercury Elite Pro 1 TB drive I have attached to my iMac now spins down between Time Machine backups (this actually saves power, so I'm not complaining -- I just find it strange that it didn't happen before!)
• An unexplained kernel panic the other morning when I woke up my MacBook Air by opening the "lid"
• Having to reset the synchronization between my two Macs, MobileMe, and my iPhone after duplicate calendar entries began to multiply
• Occasionally having to physically remove and plug back in the USB receiver for the Logitech wireless mouse on my iMac when the mouse refuses to work upon waking up from sleep
• Exports from iMovie '09 to YouTube aren't working properly for me

There are no real show-stoppers here, just those little oddities that have kept life with Snow Leopard from being pure bliss. What are the ants that are showing up at your Snow Leopard picnic? Leave a comment below.

TUAWThe few ants at my Snow Leopard picnic originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 07 Sep 2009 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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With Apple holding an iPod-themed press event this week, Technologizer's Harry McCracken considers the possibility that the iPod classic has reached the end of the line.

E’ HardMac a pubblicare un nuovo rumor che riguarda la produzione degli iPod Touch 3G, per i quali potrebbero esserci dei grossi problemi.

Stando alle voci di corridoio, il problema dovrebbe risiedere nel modulo della fotocamera dei primi 1000 dispositivi prodotti che sono stati prontamente “scartati”. Non sappiamo se nel frattempo il problema è stato risolto oppure se anche tutti gli altri iPod dovranno essere “rivisti”. C’è comunque chi pensa che il lancio verrà posticipato oppure che i nuovi iPod verranno rilasciati in quantità molto più basse del previsto.

Aggiornamento: Anche AppleInsider ha ricevuto la stessa informazione da una fonte che reputano affidabile.

Vi terremo aggiornati.

[Via - fonte]

Free your photos from the printed album by turning them into videos, magnets, wallpaper, scrapbooks, or collaborative online galleries.

This app, which lets you insert your face onto covers from the Weekly World News supermarket tabloid, is a pleasant diversion. But the fun can wear thin quickly.

Categories, l’utility che consente di organizzare le proprie applicazioni in cartelle predefinite, subisce un nuovo aggiornamento. Ecco i dettagli.

Con questo nuovo update ora l’applicazione nasconde le icone mediante “Libhide”, la stessa libreria utilizzata da SBSettings, pensionando così “Spotbright“.

Spotbright ora, comunica BigBoss, può essere tranquillamento cancellato, per poter così beneficiare di un aumento prestazionale da parte di Spotlight.

Categories è disponibile in Cydia tramite la repository di BigBoss.

Si ringrazia Darkman per la segnalazione

Filed under: Accessories, Software, Internet Tools, Snow Leopard

Dear Auntie TUAW,

I love GrabUp. GrabUp is my BFF. It automatically uploads my screen shots to the GrabUp web site and copies the URL to my clipboard. If GrabUp were a girl, I'd marry her like *snap* that. But Snow Leopard has killed GrabUp. It doesn't work. My darling is dead.

I tried TinyGrab as well and that isn't working either. Frankly, between you and me, TinyGrab has issues. It's slow and does not work all the time. I miss GrabUp :(

Love and kisses,

Your Nephew J.

Darling J,

My heart goes out to you. I too am a GrabUp aficionado! Because I love you (and all my nephews and nieces) and because I really needed to get GrabUp working again for my own use, I put together a work-around for you! (Here is the zipped command line utility) Download, unzip, switch off GrabUp, and run this at the command line.

Grabupper looks for new screen shots on the Desktop using the Snow Leopard screenshot naming standard. When it finds them, it uploads the data to the GrabUp website, copies the URL, pastes it to your clipboard, and lets you know when the URL is ready to use.

The grabupper utility uses a few shortcuts for expedience. It only looks on the Desktop, and it only looks for names starting with "Screen shot". The reason I mention this is because you can change the screen shot prefix using defaults write com.apple.screencapture name prefix, but if you do so, you'll have to update the utility source code to match that prefix.

You'll find the source code over at GitHub. It works like this. A notification observer looks for com.apple.carbon.core.DirectoryNotification events, which are associated with the screen shot updates. When these events trigger, the file manager searches for new screen shots that are less than 5 seconds old. When it finds one, it converts the file to JPEG format (Auntie loves using non-compatible TIFFs for book illustrations), and uploads them to GrabUp.

Once GrabUp returns a successful upload response, the code extracts the URL string and writes it to the system pasteboard. It then spawns a system process to alert the user (system("say 'You Are Ell is ready'");). Isn't that just adorable?

Here's hoping this will hold you until GrabUp becomes Snow Leopard ready!

Hugs,

Auntie T.

UPDATE: Based on suggestions by TUAW co-blogger Joachim Bean, the source and executable have been updated to use the defaults written to com.apple.screencapture, both name and path. Thanks, Joachim!

TUAWDear Aunt TUAW: Snow Leopard killed GrabUp, Auntie fixes it originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 07 Sep 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Come saprete, alcuni dei ragazzi di Macitynet si trovano all’IFA di Barcellona ed è proprio li che hanno avuto modo di provare la nuova versione del Navigon che vi mostriamo in questo video insieme a tutte le novità che verranno apportate:

• Nuova funzione Text-To-Speech che risulta utile per l’orientamento nelle aree urbane. E’ in grado di leggere i nomi delle strade, permettendo al guidatore di non perdere la concentrazione distogliendo lo sguardo dalla strada.
• Aggiunta l’integrazione con l’applicazione iPod che permette di ascoltare la musica tramite l’applicazione stessa. Il volume della musica si abbassa automaticamente quando il navigatore dovrà segnalarci le direzioni.
• Nuova funzione Location Sharing, per inviare un punto di interesse via email. Il destinatario riceverà un link che una volta cliccato aprirà l’applicazione ed avrà già impostata la location di destinazione.
• Cambiamento automatico tra modalità notturna e diurna. Una funzione già presente negli altri software di navigazione che regola automaticamente i colori ed il contrasto per non abbagliare e garantire la massima chiarezza sul display.

China Unicom and Telefonica agreed to jointly invest in each other and work on several initiatives, including network development.