The Raging Tech

Free Productivity Apps at Lifehacker

Productivity and time-saving site Lifehacker has posted a comprehensive list of all the free software applications written by Lifehacker staff and released under the GPL for free download. There are apps there for Windows, Mac, and even Linux!

I personally have been using several of Lifehacker’s Firefox extensions and Greasemonkey scripts to enhance my browsing experience and to make G-mail and YouTube straighten up and fly right, so to speak.

Lifehacker’s productivity apps include a text-replacement tool, to-do list manager (text-based!), a window auto-minimizer, and more! Check them out today and download to your heart’s content, because it’s all free. And free is nice-ah.

MacWorld 2008: AppleTV Software Upgrade

With the announcement of the AppleTV upgrade to allow for iTunes movie rentals also came some exciting news: a complete redesign of the user interface. Another issue some people are up-in-arms about is the fact that the HD movie rentals will only be available for the AppleTV. Which is fine with me - standard definition looks great on my widescreen LCD monitor.

The new user interface keeps all the major features on one screen without a lot of scrolling. Apple has made over 50 million YouTube videos available for viewing now.  Overall, the new UI has the slick hotness of OS X Leopard’s Front Row program.

Oh, and as for the movie rentals: Apparently the deal is you get 30 days to begin watching your rental. Then, you will have 24 hours within that time period to watch it as many times as you’d like. Some sources are saying you won’t be able to copy these rentals to your iPod or iPhone, but I think they’re confusing that with just the HD rentals which, as I said earlier, are only available on the AppleTV. Also, the price on the AppleTV is dropping down to $229 - making it a very affordable network-connected media center.

MacWorld 2008: Updates, Movies, and Macbook Air

Steve Jobs came onto the stage to the cheers and clapping of all the major tech blogs and magazines and attendees at MacWorld today. Among the excitement of the keynote address were four major announcements. I’ll give Steve credit, he’s succinct in his keynotes. The four major announcements are:

1) iPhone Apps on the iPod Touch (or iTouch). Those of you with iPod Touches who know people with iPhones have probably been pretty jealous of the missing apps that were previously available only on the iPhone, unless you used the hack to get them on there already. The bad news: unless you’re buying a new one now, you’ll have to pay $20 for an upgrade to get the new features. WTF, Apple?

2) iTunes Movie Rentals. Apple knows no one wants to rent their music - that’s why they chose a different business model than Napster or Real Rhapsody. But movies - consumers often rent movies, and are doing it in so many ways these days. So Apple has now made movie rentals available via iTunes. $2.99 for library titles and $3.99 for new releases. Fox was among the major studios to partner with Apple to bring movie rentals to iTunes. Also, Warner, Universal, Paramount, and others were on board.

3) Free Software Update. With Apple’s new movie rental system on iTunes, you will now be able to (thanks to a free software update coming in about two weeks) watch those movies on your AppleTV, iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch, and your Mac. For new purchases, the software should already be included effective today. Also, the UI for the AppleTV has been completely redone and looks amazing.

4) Macbook Air. As if end users didn’t have enough name and brand-recognition to deal with, the MacBook Air seeks to fill the Apple void in the thin notebook market by being less than an inch thick at either end. It’s so small you can fit it in a manila envelope and weighs less than 3 pounds. It’s touch pad also has multi-touch sensing, and uses patented gesture technology like the iPhone and iPod touch to let you use two fingers to navigate, zoom, and manipulate photos, documents, and more. Main downside: no optical drive, but Apple has new software to let you share optical drives from another Mac for installation. Of course, at the conclusion of the MacWorld Expo 2008 keynote address, tutorials and videos appeared on the Apple website.

MacWorld 2008 Keynote Address Today at Noon

Hello there, sports fans! If your head hasn’t been under a rock or you own a TV, you’ve either been converted to the cult of Apple, or been watching the company with enthralled anticipation.

Since the age of iPod came upon us, Apple has been blowing up the scene with newer, hotter desktops and portables than almost any other company. There are flame wars upon flame wars about the specs of certain manufacturer’s Windows PCs being better - but bar none, Apple is a software-hardware synergy dynamo with no sign of stopping anytime soon.

Today at Noon (12pm Eastern Standard Time), Steve Jobs will give Apple’s MacWorld Expo keynote address. Rumors abound everywhere, but every year we get a treat with new software to play with, or a new line of iPod, or major OS upgrades, or announcements of new partnerships that bring cool stuff to us Mac users.

Who knows exactly what to expect today? I’m going to be tuning in at Apple’s website, and then after the keynote is over I’ll go ahead and post here later this afternoon with the major points of interest, so come back!

Use Leopard’s Time Machine Over the Network

Via Lifehacker: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard came with a new, easy-to-use back-up program called Time Machine. For people with an extra external hard drive, this was a godsend. If you also happened to have an AFP share over the network, you could backup to one of those as well. But if you’re like many of us who have completely abandoned AppleTalk, Time Machine was pretty much useless until now.

iTimeMachine is a program from Xiotios Software that lets you use network shared drives in Leopard’s Time machine. Simply mount the network disk (don’t just browse it; actually mount it using the “Connect to Server” dialog in the finder), and then it should show up in Time Machine as a backup location.

I Got a New Gadget - Now What?

It would be ageist for me to assume that a lot of older folks aren’t getting into the new technology as much as the younger folks. As time passes, I think more and more people are realizing that older generations are receptive of new technology if they receive them as gifts, because technology is usually a significant amount of money spent.

That being said, a lot of you probably received new technology gifts this holiday season: iPods, iPhones, mp3 players, cellular phones, video games / systems, PDAs, and more. I won’t be the one to volunteer to teach you all the nifty things your new toys do, but one of the first things a new “iGift” needs is a protective case. You may have a warranty on your item, but you don’t want it to get all scuffed and scratched up, right?

PDOstore.com has the latest iphone accessories and hard / leather cases for your new tech gadgets this season! There has been an incredible number of these “i” gadgets sold this holiday, and PDOstore has the gear you need to protect your “i”! Also of note, they don’t just sell cases; they sell chargers and other accessories, too.

Christmas 2007 Survived!

Aside from the stomach ache I got from eating way too much food at Christmas dinner, Christmas 2007 has been pretty good. I wanted to post pictures to brag about what I gave and what I received, but my camera phone got smashed! It works, but not very well. The inner screen on my LG VX9900 (Verizon enV) got smushed in my pocket when I fell, and my replacement should be in the mail tomorrow.

So here’s a breakdown (Part 1) of what I gave:

• Dad - Relational Technologies fleece blanket. In my defense, yes, it was free from the conference I went to, but he is in a nursing home and can’t use his limbs or speak plainly, so he’s hard to shop for.
• Mom - Diamond stud earrings from Zales. She nearly lost the back of one within about five minutes of trying to put them on. Several crazy minutes later, she had them on.
• Sister - iPod Shuffle and $15 iTunes gift card.

I also stuffed our stockings with miscellaneous schwag from the vendors at UNC CAUSE. Mom seemed to like her mini computer mouse from Time Warner Business Class.

Since Dad can’t speak plainly anymore, I thought it would be a good idea to give a gift to Mom from him. So I found an mp3 of my Dad singing “You are My Sunshine” to my Mom a few years back, and I burned it to an audio CD and labeled it “To: Mom From: Dad, Merry Christmas!” and played it for her this morning. She started to cry - I hate to see her cry. I thought I had made her upset, but she really did like it.