Filed under: Software, Internet Tools
Possible Solution to the notMac Challenge
Late last year we mentioned the notMac Challenge. Basically they were offering a largish sum of money (now upwards of 8 grand) for anyone who could duplicate the functionality of .mac for free. Now finally Ben Spink of CrushFTP has stepped to the plate with a possible solution, and they're calling for testers. The initial reports (including from one of our tipsters) seem promising, but more real-world testing is needed to assure that Ben has met the challenge conditions (with slight modification). So if you need .mac functionality, but balk at the price, this may very well be worth checking out.The file for testing is available (dmg link) from Ben's server. Be sure to check out the discussion thread first, however.
Just for the record, Mark/Space offers a similar commercial product SyncTogether, but it sells for $49.95.
Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Chuck said 1:30PM on 9-27-2007
I agree that everything should always compete with FREE, there's a honesty to doing things that way you just can't beat. But for the record, for my $99.00 plus iLife I am very happy with what I can and actually do do (haha)
Reply
mungler said 10:43AM on 9-27-2007
"Just for the record, Mark/Space offers a similar commercial product SyncTogether, but it sells for $49.95."
... which doesnt damn well work. (Never *ever* did it work on the numerous occasions i've tested it).
Fingers crossed notMac will be better :)
Reply
Kwahnoom said 11:01AM on 9-27-2007
And SyncTogether doesn't sync keychains, which is a deal-breaker for me...
Reply
Mitch Greenfield said 11:02AM on 9-27-2007
A mirror is now live at Ben's approval at http://collegedealhunter.com/NotMac.dmg
Reply
bas Wijnands said 11:04AM on 9-27-2007
can u use this when you have a netgear router?
Reply
Mitch Greenfield said 11:31AM on 9-27-2007
You can use this with any router..you just have to know how to open ports on the router
Reply
Audun said 11:57AM on 9-27-2007
Interesting! I didn't know about this challenge, but I will certainly try the app if it's working.
Reply
Michael Sternberg said 12:19PM on 9-27-2007
For those trashing SyncTogether: With all MacOS updates in place, it works well enough, in particular over tunnels, and syncs Smultron and Yojimbo items (a killer feature). IIRC, the predecessor (MySync, no longer available) *did* do Keychain items, but I stayed away from it, not to mix security domains.
Reply
apz said 1:05PM on 9-27-2007
where on that forum discussion page should I look for good instructions?
Reply
Brady J. Frey said 1:10PM on 9-27-2007
"Just for the record, Mark/Space offers a similar commercial product SyncTogether, but it sells for $49.95."
Link to the product Mat, you just wasted my time again by internal linking when that's not in the context of your writing. I keep reminding you guys this is an idiot SEO method, but at the expense of your readers.
Regarding SyncTogether, I thought that was a local network sync though - I'm looking for a server level untrust to trust.
Reply
Mitch Greenfield said 1:17PM on 9-27-2007
instructions are included in the DMG
Reply
umijin said 2:28PM on 9-27-2007
Yeah - Mark/Space does offer SyncTogether, but it sure as hell doesn't work.
I've spent countless hours trying all the things their Tech Support suggested, but never got it to work and stopped trying. If you got it to work at all, I'm stunned.
It's too bad, because the apps predecessor, MySync, (bought out by MarkSpace) actually worked well. Too bad it was time limited.
Reply
Mikael said 4:08PM on 9-27-2007
"Just for the record, Mark/Space offers a similar commercial product SyncTogether, but it sells for $49.95."
Do you have a deal with Mark/Space Mat? :) Is M/S losing sales because of their crappy software and are now trying to get some more cash by some advertising?
Reply
Kramer said 2:07AM on 9-28-2007
While .Mac clone is very appealing idea, It's very well known that every Mac OS update changes the .Mac protocol.
What does that mean?
Even if .Mac opensource clone works perfectly. Once you update OSX to, say, 10.4.11, it will stop working and you'll have to wait for developer to update it. If protocol is changed, update require reverse-engineering protocol and it's not an easy or fast to do task.
Reply