AppTrap is free, open source, and installed as a system preference pane.
AppTrap
AppTrap is free, open source, and installed as a system preference pane.
OmniFocus Plays Nice with iPhone
This is awesome news, even if you don't have an iPhone. The code monkeys over at The Omni Group have announced a spiffy new web interface for OmniFocus that can be brought up remotely on an iPhone (or in any other browser). The remote service will be driven by an integrated web server built into the copy of OmniFocus running on your home machine. Users will be able to manipulate their data directly, with no syncing required.Submit Your iPhone Bugs to Apple
Gallery: Park Meadows Colorado iPhone line
While Pourhardi is camped out an hour ahead of me in Chicago, and will inevitably get his iPhone first (Grr!), I'm sitting here with an Optimus Prime sized iPhone display sending out its reality distortion field from above my head. There are about 10 people in line so far, and I've been able to snap some photos of our band of merry geeks. I'll keep updating the gallery as the day goes on, so check back often to make sure you're up on all the excitement that goes on in a suburban mall.
If you're planning on stopping by this particular store, come up and say hi. I'll be podcasting off and on with various people, maybe even you! I'm first in line and wearing my Daring Fireball t-shirt.
If you're planning on stopping by this particular store, come up and say hi. I'll be podcasting off and on with various people, maybe even you! I'm first in line and wearing my Daring Fireball t-shirt.
Gallery: Park Meadows iPhone Line
Lining up for Charity
Out of all of the hype surrounding the imminent launch of the iPhone, this is the first story to warm my cold socialist heart. Johnny Vulkan of NYC ad agency Anomaly is first in line at the Apple Store SoHo, and has special plans for his iPhone. Instead of coveting his precious new toy like the rest of us, his iPhone will go right up on eBay where all proceeds from its sale will go to AIDS charity Keep a Child Alive.If game console launches like that of the Wii and PS3 are any indication, early iPhone sellers on eBay stand to make a killing, and it's nice to see that some of that money will be going to an organization working to stop a nasty virus from doing the same.
[via BoingBoing]
Mystery Solved? 10.4.10, Yahoo!, and the iPhone
The addition of a Yahoo! sync framework in 10.4.10 certainly seems a bit puzzling on the surface, but after some grinding of my mental cogs, I think I've figured it out.If you will think back to MacWorld 2007 and the announcement of the iPhone, you'll remember that Steve Jobs brought three special guests on stage. Stuffed between Eric Schmidt and Stan Sigman (of Google and Cingular, respectively) was Jerry Yang from Yahoo! who used his time to talk about the free Yahoo! IMAP "push" email that will be bundled with every iPhone.
With an email account comes a contact list, and in this day and age of do-everything service providers, a calendar usually comes with it. It makes sense then that Apple would make it possible to edit and sync these things from your desktop– thus the new framework. Sure, I can do all that from my iPhone, but do I really want to enter and tweak 300 address book entries on such a small device?
Obviously, this is just idle postulation, but I'd be surprised if something like this didn't get announced before the release of the iPhone later this month.
TUAW Review: Higher Ground Shuttle
As a bag geek, I'm always excited to see something new and novel kinds of cases. While walking around the show floor at Macworld back in January, I was delighted to come across something I've been looking for as long as I can remember– a soft sleeve with rigid protection. The case in question turned out to be the Shuttle from Higher Ground, and I've had the chance to use and review it for the past month or so.
Apple Design Awards 2007
Apple has announced the winners of the 2007 Apple Design Awards, and as always, the winners are a selection of the very best of OS X applications. While a good deal of the winning developers tonight received their second or even third award, it's nice to see a bunch of smaller and lesser known first time winners mixed in. Results after the jump.
WWDC Party: The Delicious Generation
Those crazy kids behind MacHeist and My Dream App are at it again, this time bringing you a night of drinks, demos, and developers. The Delicious Generation party will feature live demos of upcoming software from prominent Mac developers including Austin Sarner of AppZapper and the Pixelmator team. Mac Media and Developers get in for free, and a select few of us unwashed masses will be admitted to mingle amongst the Mac digerati. For those who don't make it in, there will be a live screencast of the demos, as well as archives of the video for those of you who have more important things to do on the night of the 13th.Scott and Victor will be there representing TUAW, and maybe even giving away some schwag. Party on!
[via Phill Ryu]
One MacBook, Well Done
We've seen scorched Macs before, but nothing quite like this. After a devastating fire at their Boulder home last week, Gwen and Paul returned to find their formerly sleek white MacBook decidedly crispier. [via Wandering Stan]
Omni Group Unleashes OmniFocus Pre-Release
Many of us have been eagerly waiting to get our hands on a copy of OmniFocus, and it looks like that magical moment is finally here! Starting today, The Omni Group began sending out invites on a first-come-first-serve basis starting with users who signed up for the OmniFocus mailing list early on. For those of you who haven't yet had anything hit your mailbox, know that patience is a virtue, and that you'll get your turn in the next few days. The sneak-peek is only available to people on the mailing list, so if you haven't yet signed up, do so now.Insanely Great Tees Announces iPhone Ad Contest
As hinted at in David's post last week, Insanely Great Tees is holding a contest for which the grand prize is a shiny new iPhone. The details of the contest, released today, lay out a process by which entrants submit a funny 30-second iPhone ad which includes the phrase "I'm an iPhone." Readers can the vote on the entries and eventually choose a winner, who will be given a $500 gift card to the Apple Store in-leiu of the actual device, which obviously isn't out yet. The deadline for entry is 11:59PM on May 7th, so all you amateur directors and actors better get cracking. Good luck, and break a leg! (Better than breaking an iPhone, eh?)
[via Amit Gupta]
Quicksilver Trigger, Strip Clipboard Formatting
Sometimes even the best intentions of developers can't account for user preference, and after speaking with many other Mac users, this certainly seems to be the case with OS X's habitual tendency to preserve the formatting of text copied to the clipboard. For example:
I copy text from OmniWeb:
Pasted text before running the trigger:
Pasted text after running the trigger:
Quicksilver maven Dan Dickinson has figured out a sneaky way to strip out this formatting, and has turned the method into a handy Trigger. The trick works by pasting the contents of the clipboard into a terminal shell (where it loses all formatting), and then re-copying the text to the clipboard. For the trigger to work, you must have the Terminal Plugin installed. A full how-to is available on Dan's website.
I copy text from OmniWeb:
Pasted text before running the trigger:
Pasted text after running the trigger:
Quicksilver maven Dan Dickinson has figured out a sneaky way to strip out this formatting, and has turned the method into a handy Trigger. The trick works by pasting the contents of the clipboard into a terminal shell (where it loses all formatting), and then re-copying the text to the clipboard. For the trigger to work, you must have the Terminal Plugin installed. A full how-to is available on Dan's website.
Transmisison 0.71 Fixes Announce Issue
One of the things I love about OS X is the fact that for pretty much any conceivable task, there are multiple applications to choose from with which to do it. Unfortunately, this hasn't really been the case when it comes to BitTorrent clients. Yes, there may have been multiple native clients out there, but only two of them were really any good– BitRocket and Transmission– and for the longest time, Transmission was banned on many private torrent trackers. This left only BitRocket, a client lacking some key features such as the ability to view and set upload/download ratios. Until Today. Transmission 0.71 fixes the much hated multiple-announce bug which caused it's banning by many trackers. The new version also includes some other small bug fixes and interface updates. Transmission is Open Source and available as a free download.
Goodbye BitRocket!
[via CrunchGear]
Schoolhouse 2
School is a lot of work as it is without having to worry about how you're going to remember that you have an essay due next Monday for your Sub-Aquatic Fiber Arts class. Some people swear by the tried-and-true paper notebook, while others can't cope without their fancy PDA. While there are a few software options for those hardcore geeks (like me) who take their computers everywhere with them (including class), Schoolhouse is far-and-away my personal favorite. In addition to an almost totally redesigned interface, version 2 introduces some really handy new features including the ability to attach files to assignments, sub-tasks for multi-step assignments such as research papers, and a way to store all your class notes directly inside Schoolhouse. Schoolhouse is available as a free download– all the developer asks is if you enjoy and use the software, that you consider donating (unfortunately, the donate link is currently down).[via Lifehacker]
