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Michael Rose

New York City - http://www.tuaw.com/bloggers/michael-rose

Mike Rose, The Unofficial Apple Weblog -- a 15-year Mac and magazine publishing veteran.

Filed under: iPod

New iPod commercials now on Apple.com and YouTube


You saw them in the keynote today, now watch them again in the privacy of your own home: the new iPod touch and iPod nano television ads are live on Apple.com and on Apple's YouTube channel. "All kinds of fun," indeed.

(If you're a fan of NBC's Chuck, like some of us are, you may appreciate that Cake's Short Skirt/Long Jacket -- the show's theme song -- is featured in the new nano ad.)

[via MacRumors]

Filed under: iPod

FCC dissects the new iPod touch


The public servants at the FCC are earning their keep today, favoring us with several PDFs full of lovely, detailed images of both the internal and external design of the soon-to-ship iPod touch.

Check out the gallery below for several of the pictures, and consider how much nicer it will be when you actually have the new hotness in hand.

[via Engadget, their video hands-on of the new iPod is after the break]

Read more →

Filed under: iPad, iOS

iPad OS will be revved to 4.2 in November, unifies the line

During today's Apple event, Steve Jobs announced that the next version of the iPad flavor of iOS, 4.2, will be available as a free update in November 2010. The iOS 4.2 version will support the iPhone and iPod touch (4.0 friendly versions of those devices) in addition to the iPad.

Among the new features in 4.2 will be folder organization for apps on the iPad, bringing parity with the 4.x smaller devices.

Innovations include AirPlay, which will allow you to stream video and audio from iTunes to your iPad or from your iPad to the newly-announced Apple TV. Also added: printing! The iPad will be able to print to networked printers or printers connected to your computer, details TBD.

Filed under: Odds and ends, Apple

Event streaming to stress-test new datacenter

Not much of a surprise, but nice to have some details: Cult of Mac cites a source close to Apple saying that the live stream of today's iPod event will be used to put some real-time load on Apple's new North Carolina data center. The facility isn't all the way operational quite yet, but it's apparently ready enough to play a major role in today's festivities.

The NC datacenter is five times the size of Apple's similar facility on the West Coast and is officially intended to support the iTunes music and app stores. Obviously there's a lot more horsepower needed for streaming content, so here's where you'll find it.

As noted last night, today's live stream is intended for Intel Mac OS X 10.6 users in Safari, iPhone/iPod touch users running iOS 3.1 or higher, and iPad users. Support for the HTTP Live Streaming methodology is included in the current version of the ffmpeg open source library, so in theory apps like Mplayer should be able to handle the stream; VLC may also work.

Filed under: Apple

Did you catch that? Event livestream is Mac and iOS only

Most of you noticed something a bit... oddly specific about Apple's streaming announcement for the 9/1 event:

Apple® will broadcast its September 1 event online using Apple's industry-leading HTTP Live Streaming, which is based on open standards. Viewing requires either a Mac® running Safari® on Mac OS® X version 10.6 Snow Leopard®, an iPhone® or iPod touch® running iOS 3.0 or higher, or an iPad™. The live broadcast will begin at 10:00 a.m. PDT on September 1, 2010 at www.apple.com.

What's missing from this picture? About nine-tenths of the Internet; specifically, anyone using a Windows PC. As pointed out on ReadWriteWeb, there is no QuickTime X for Windows yet and no client supporting HTTP Live Streaming. I'm not sure why RWW's Adrianne Jeffries is convinced that it's up to Microsoft to implement QuickTime X (hint: it's not), but Apple's engineering team is still working to flesh out the new QuickTime stack on the Mac -- no surprise that the Windows version is lagging behind.

Yes, HTTP live streaming is an open standard, but that doesn't help much without a working implementation (as Adobe's John Nack is pointing out). Having a fallback stream of plain old RTSP wouldn't just be a nice gesture for the rest of the world -- it'd also be welcomed by the millions of PowerPC Mac users who won't be able to watch the stream, either. Yep, that requirement specifies Safari on Mac OS X 10.6 -- no Intel, no joy. Of course, even if you can't tune in for the video goodness, you can still come here for our lively and informative liveblog.

Update: MacRumors points to this test stream and also suggests that VLC may be able to watch the stream, at least in fits and starts.

Filed under: iPhone

In Brief: Hurricane for iPhone on sale

As the Atlantic storm season heats up and US East Coast residents warily eye Hurricane Earl's projected path, the team at Kitty Code has put their flagship iPhone app -- Hurricane 3.3 -- on sale for US$1.99 through September 5. The separate iPad version, Hurricane HD, remains priced at $3.99. We've checked out both the mini and mega versions previously.

There are scores of hurricane-related apps on the store, so if the Big Kahuna isn't to your liking you have some other options too. Stay safe!

Filed under: Software

Friday deal: 1/2 off Aquafadas VideoPier HD


If you're looking for a handy way to organize your AVCHD and MPEG-2 clips from your digital video camera, you've got about five hours to get a bargain. MacZOT is offering VideoPier HD today for US$39, versus the usual price of $79. The clip manager supports codecs and clip types that aren't natively handled by the QuickTime-based apps we know and love, allowing you to save time and disk space by only transcoding what you need when working in iMovie '08.

Check it out, and while you're at it take a look at PulpMotion, BannerZest and the rest of the Aquafadas product line -- all are charming apps with a different spin on media management.


Filed under: iPad

Found Footage: Sharp says 'sushi please' on iPad



Lots of visual content, quick transactions, and hungry customers: that's what Sharp has in mind with this proof of concept sushi menu application for iPad. Rather than putting diners through the chore of tracking down their favorite rolls and sashimi in a multipage laminated paper menu, the app puts dishes front and center.

The iPad app isn't for sale yet, although the DigInfo report quotes Sharp saying it may be commercialized if there's interest; it might also be ported to Sharp-built devices. If it does get rolled out, it would be included as an integrated piece of Sharp's POS system for restaurants, including billing and order management tools. We've seen systems like this tested before, but as far as we've heard, no one's actually using iPads in real-life restaurants and at least one Australian tapas joint has already gotten on the bandwagon. If you've seen a virtual menu in action, let us know in the comments.

[via Guy Kawasaki]

Filed under: Developer, App Store

App Store approval limbo boxes in Briefs

There are plenty of hurdles between a good idea and App Store success; even after your killer app hits the virtual shelves, the challenges of discoverability and competitors sandbagging your app with Astroturfed bad reviews add up to plenty of headaches. Still, once past the biggest stumbling block -- Apple giving a thumbs up or thumbs down -- things should get easier, right?

Unfortunately, some intriguing apps end up in approval limbo, the stranded state between all-clear and no-thanks that's reserved for some of the most innovative and paradigm-busting apps; the apps that make Apple go "Hmm..." and force the app approval team to exercise the pocket veto. Without a clear rejection (telling the dev what can be fixed), there's nothing to do but wait.

The most high-profile limbo case is Google Voice, which as far as we know is still being reviewed by Apple's team more than a year after it was submitted. The latest is Briefs, a well-regarded app prototyping tool which may be running afoul of the no-interpreted-code ban in section 3.3.2 of Apple's developer agreement, despite the assertion that Briefs doesn't work in a way that's forbidden by Apple's rules. Even though developer Rob Rhyne made a cogent case to Apple's team on the merits, and even with some high-level support from contacts made at WWDC, Briefs remains unapproved and unrejected.

Rather than wait indefinitely with his 1.0 growing stale, Rhyne has decided to offer the existing version as open source, which iPhone developers can compile and install on their testing devices. Rob's colleague Jeff Lamarche at Martian Craft voices his frustration here.

In many ways, this could be an App Store success story: developer dedication and innovation, open lines of communication between indies and Apple, an open source tool that can improve app development for scores of coders. The only problem is that darned silent treatment, and the missing timeline for escalation. If an app can't make it on the store, it seems the least Apple ought to do is say so and say why.

Filed under: Software

PPC Macs 'likely' to be unsupported by Firefox 4

While it may not come as much of a surprise, it's still going to aggravate owners of aging PPC Macs that the upcoming Firefox 4 browser is probably going to drop support for the older architecture. Mozilla program manager Mike Beltzner noted that the next version of the open-source browser, currently in beta, is not working on PowerPC machines now and the update will not be automatically offered to them.

Computerworld points to two separate technologies in FF4 that are standing in the way of a PPC build: the OOPP isolated plugin system, which prevents browser extensions from gumming up the works; and the JIT (just in time) compiler for the new JaegerMonkey JavaScript engine, which sounds like a drunken simian but is actually supposed to speed up JavaScript compilation manyfold. Neither have a functional equivalent on the PowerPC.

It's not clear if the Camino browser, which does work on both Mac processor platforms and is based on the Mozilla Gecko rendering engine, will be able to update to the Gecko 2.0 platform that powers Firefox 4. In the same message thread, Beltzner allowed that developers could certainly work on a PPC version that left out the two problematic components, but that it most likely would not be allowed to carry the Firefox brand (which has happened before with custom optimized builds for specific architectures). He also pointed out that there aren't development resources within Mozilla to extend support for OOPP and the JIT compiler to PPC, and that outside help has not been forthcoming.

[via Download Squad]

Tip of the Day

Did you know that you could use Command-A with text fields on the iPad? It's very handy when using an external Bluetooth keyboard. It selects all the text in the field and displays a touchable Cut - Copy - Paste menu, letting you easily replace the field text or copy it to the system pasteboard.

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