Technology

Things that catch my geeky interests that don’t fall into a more specific tag.

Thoughts on the keynote

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Just a couple quick thoughts I had regarding some of the news from Steve Jobs’ keynote speech today at MacWorld.

  1. Apple plays nice

    Apple is continuing to support the Open Source software movement. Not only have they been utilizing the Open Source community to help improve the code for OS X, but they’ve done the same with Safari, the newly announed browser. On top of that, after dramatically improving the code base that Safari uses, they are sending the improved code back into the community for public use. Very nice move.

  2. Apple plays nice, part 2

    I noticed a nice little feature in Safari during the few moments I was able to play with it before I left for work. In the main Safari menu, just underneath the ‘Preferences…’ option, is an option to disable popup windows. While the option has been around in most Mozilla-based browsers for a while (sometimes easily available, sometimes not), it’s nice to see Apple including the functionality right off the bat in their browser.

  3. Open format files

    The announcement that Keynote (the new presentation application) uses XML for it’s saved project files really got my interest. While I haven’t played enough with XML to be able to take advantage of this right off, I can think of some very interesting scenarios that could make this very useful.

    Say, for instance, a script that weekly (or monthly, or daily, or whatever) pulls the Apache logfiles from your OS X webserver, extracts whatever key data points you want to extract from them, and plugs the resulting data into the right spots inside the XML file of a predefined Keynote template. Bingo – an automatically generated weekly professional presentation of your website’s traffic, most visited pages, most frequently used search terms, etc., ready for presentation to your boss, board of directors, whatever. Or, since Keynote can export to PowerPoint, you could have the report ready to send off to those Windows-based heathen. Or just export the report to a PDF file or QuickTime movie for posting on a website. All automatically generated, without the need for any interaction beyond the initial setup.

    Pretty damn cool, I think.

In the meantime, I’ll just go drool over that 17\” Powerbook now…

MacWorld Expo '03 Keynote

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My schedule actually works out so that I can watch Steve Jobs’ keynote address at MacWorld Expo 2003. I’ve got the live streaming webcast going now, watching people filter in…everything’s scheduled to get started at 9am, so in theory, Steve should be hitting the stage any time now. Okay — I had a hard time getting the stream going after it stalled, but I’m back in now.

  • Apparently he’s got about “two MacWorld’s worth of stuff to show today.”
  • 130 countries are watching the keynote live via the Web.
  • Some Apple Store facts and figures.
  • 51 stores, \$141 million in sales last year.
  • Going over the updates to iCal and iSync that were released last week.
  • Talking about .Mac now.
  • 250,000 paying .Mac subscribers since they added the yearly price (I’m one).
  • iPods have been around for 14 months, over 600,000 have been shipped (one every minute since introduction).
  • iPod #1 .mp3 player in US and Japan, with 42% market share in Japan.
  • Apple has teamed with snowboard equipment/apparel maker Burton to create a skiing/snowboard jacket with a pocket for the iPod and remote controls built into the sleeve.
  • Jacket is \$499 only from the Apple Store this year, should be more widespread next year.
  • Moving to Mac OS X (still pronounced Jag-Wire according to Steve).
  • 5 million active users of OS X.
  • Expecting to get to 9-10 million users in ’03.
  • “We’ve got a few laggard apps we still need to get released — we all know which one we’re talking about.” (Quark Xpress?)
  • QuickBooks Pro 5.0 just started shipping a couple weeks ago (the most requested app).
  • Other quick application mentions.
  • Dave Lebolt from DigiDesign coming onstage to demo Digidesign ProTools professional audio app, which will ship this month.
  • Pro audio and MIDI creation and editing support finally available for OS X.
  • Next featured product — FinalCut Pro, the top pro video editing app.
  • Introducing Final Cut Express — FCP with a lighter feature set.
  • Phil Schiller taking stage to Demo FCE.
  • FCE uses same interface and file format as FCP.
  • Quick demos of built-in transition effects and color correction tools.
  • FCP is \$999 — FCE is \$299.
  • 5,000 native OS X apps available now.
  • Starting today, no new products will boot into OS 9 — Classic layer is still there, but will boot OS X only.
  • Moving to the Digital Hub concept.
  • All-new versions of all Hub apps being released, all rewritten to be more completely integrated.
  • iTunes 3 has some “hidden features” that will be revealed today.
  • iPhoto 2 comes out today.
  • iPhoto integrated with iTunes.
  • Adds 1-click enhance, retouch brush, and ability to archive photo albums to CD and DVD.
  • When creating an iPhoto slideshow, the iTunes music library is available for a soundtrack.
  • New iDVD 3 button in iP2 automatically transfers an album into iDVD for burning as a DVD slideshow.
  • Quick demo of iPhoto one-click enhance for automatically color-correcting photos.
  • Retouch brush demo — being used to automatically remove bruises and freckles, etc. from photos, just by “scrubbing” over the area.
  • Next — iMovie 3.
  • Fully integrated with other iApps.
  • Added most requested feature — Chapters, which are automatically read by iDVD.
  • Also added the “Ken Burns Effect”, named after the documentarian, and precise audio editing.
  • Updated UI, iMovie interface combined into a single window.
  • Again, iTunes music library integrated into iMovie.
  • Library of sound effects by Gary Rydstrom of Skywaker Sound and Pixar in iMovie.
  • One-button transfer of projects from iMovie to iDVD, automatically moves everyting into iDVD including chapter markers.
  • iDVD 3 released today.
  • 24 new menu themes integrating menu choices with user movies.
  • Steve is demoing various combinations of film clips, menu themes, and background music imported from iT3.
  • Blank DVDs from Apple lowered to \$3 each.
  • Recap — all four Digital Hub apps integrated into iLife — available Sat. Jan 25th.
  • iLife will be bundled with all new macs.
  • iMovie, iPhoto, and iMovie will be free downloads, iDVD will be sold (in a package with all iLife apps) for \$49.
  • “Buckle up — I’ve got something totally new for you.”
  • New App — Safari, a “turbo browser for OS X”.
  • First major new browser in 5 years.
  • Why? Speed — fastest browser on Mac.
  • Tested against Internet Explorer, Netscape and Chimera (latest versions of each) — 3 times faster than IE, faster than all others.
  • Second reason — to innovate.
  • Google integrated into toolbar, new Snapback feature, new bookmark system, ease of use.
  • Minimal UI, brushed metal window interface.
  • Fully supports CSS, Quicktime, Flash, all other standard technologies (this should be the browser built from the Chimera/Mozilla codebase).
  • Bookmarks easily dragged around on toolbar to reorder, or dragged off to delete.
  • Bookmarks library based around same interface as the iTunes or iPhoto libraries.
  • Snapback button brings you back to a Google results page after multiple click-throughs deep into a site.
  • Snapback also available on other search sites (Amazon is demoed).
  • Bug reporting built into Safari to submit problem reports to Apple.
  • Safari is standards-based, built on an Open Source rendering engine.
  • Apple started working with the code a year ago, improved the code dramatically to create Safari, and is re-posting their improved code to the Open Source community today.
  • Safari beta release starts today, free download.
  • Next brand new application — Keynote.
  • A presentation app “when your presentation really counts”.
  • Jobs has been using early versions of Keynote for every keynote address in 2002.
  • Full anti-aliasing for text, Quartz graphic functions (opacity, etc.), all major graphic file formats.
  • Lots of effects for charts and graphs.
  • Many high-quality built-in themes.
  • Lots of transitions between slides that utilize the Quartz 3D engine, allowing for 3D flips, rotations, etc.
  • Keynote imports and exports PowerPoint presentations.
  • Also im/exports PDF and Quicktime.
  • Uses an XML-based open file format.
  • Keynote for sale for \$99, available today.
  • Expo keynote attendees got free copies of Keynote.
  • Brings up the TiBook ad from its introduction two years ago.
  • Apple aiming to replace more desktops with notebooks, want to make 35% of their shipped computers notebooks.
  • Introducing a new 17\” PowerBook.
  • Uses same 17\” widescreen ratio display as the 17\” iMac, built into a PowerBook chassis — 1\” thick, slightly thinner than the original TiBook.
  • 1440 x 900 widescreen 16:10 aspect ratio display.
  • Keyboard keys are backlit with a light glow for use in low-light situations.
  • Ambient light sensors detect room lighting to automatically adjust keyboard brightness.
  • Only 6.8 lbs.
  • Built using a new material — aircraft grade Aluminum alloy (AlBook?).
  • 1Ghz G4, superdrive, GeForce graphics, Firewire 800 (twice as fast as current FireWire), Gigabit Ethernet, S-Video output, VGA/Digital video output, USB ports on each side, PC Card slot, line in and headphone jacks.
  • Bluetooth built in, Airport built in.
  • Introducing Airport Extreme — 54Mbps (up from 11Mbps) based on 802.11g wireless standard.
  • Wireless antennas in 17\” PowerBook built into the screen, equals wireless range of the iBook.
  • New Airport Extreme basestations handle up to 50 users, allow wireless bridging across multiple basestations.
  • USB printing built into basestation — plug a USB printer into the basestation, all wirelessly connected clients can print.
  • New basestations sell for \$199.
  • Battery for 17\” Powerbook allows for 4.5 hours runtime.
  • Quickbooks will come bundled with new Powerbook.
  • \$3299 for new 17\” Powerbook, shipping in February.
  • One more thing…
  • Introducing a new 12\” PowerBook — smallest full-featured notebook in the world.
  • 1024×768 display, 867Mhz G4, slot-load combo drive, wireless (Bluetooth built-in, Airport ready), 5 hour battery life.
  • \$1799 for new 12\” Powerbook, shipping in about 2 weeks.
  • \$1999 with added SuperDrive.
  • 2003 is “The Year of the Notebook” for Apple.
  • Cute quote from BT when getting a demo of the lit keyboard — “When do you guys stop thinking of cool stuff?”
  • Two new TV ads being shown (Jeff Goldblum is still doing the voiceovers).
  • Second ad is wonderful, contrasting the size of the notebooks — you’ll just have to see it.

And that’s it…

Searchling

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I just stumbled across Searchling, a very cool little mini-application for OS X. When running, it adds a system-wide search field that allows you to search Google, Slashdot, or a few other sites.

The coolest bit, though, is that the search options are defined by a simple XML file. So, I did a bit of digging, figured out the syntax (which really wasn’t all that hard), and added djwudi.com to the search options!

Searchling djwudi.com screenshot

On the off chance that another OS X user might want to add me to Searchling, here’s the code to add:

<dict>
<key>name</key>
<string>djwudi.com</string>
<key>types</key>
<array>
<dict>
<key>type</key>
<string>Web</string>
<key>url</key>
<string>http://www.djwudi.com/cgi-bin/search/search.pl?
nocpp=1&Match=1&Realm=All&Terms=</string>
</dict>
</array>
</dict>

(Note: the string between <string> and </string> is one continuous line, a linebreak has been added here for readability.)

Update: As I’m no longer weblogging at djwudi.com, the above XML snippet won’t actually work. I’m leaving it up here, though, as a handy example of how to add things to Searchling.

Wireless in the classroom

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In response to this article about the pros and cons of wireless ‘net access on campus, Robert Scoble presents a list of suggests as to how teachers can adapt. Rather than panicking and denying all ‘net access across the board, why not come up with ways to involve use of the ‘net in class?

So, teachers, why not turn it around? Why not see [wireless internet] as a fact of life, both in school, in your community, and in the work world, and see if you can use it to make your (and your students’) experiences better? Here’s some ideas:

Own yourself

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An excellent article from Anil Dash on some of the side effects of Google’s ability to find anything — and anyone.

Every time there’s a resurgence in general-audience (non-techie) interest in Google, as after Newsweek’s recent Google fawning, the issue of privacy in a presence of a pervasive and permanent record rears its ugly head. People who aren’t technologically savvy don’t realize that statements don’t fade away or remain in confidence on the web; The things we say only get louder and more widely known, unless they’re completely trivial.

We’re all celebrities now, in a sense. Everything that we say or do is on the record. And everything that’s on the record is recorded for posterity, and indexed far better than any file photo or PR bio ever was. It used to be that only those who chose career paths that resulted in notoriety or celebrity would face having to censor themselves or be forced to consciously control the image that they project. But this faded as celebrity culture grew and as individuals are increasingly marketed as brands, even products.

Google’s ability to track people down often can be truly amazing, though admittedly, it does pretty much require you to have a somewhat unusual name or e-mail address to use for the search. For instance, Googling for ‘michael hanscom‘ does find me, but not until the sixth link, and even then it’s just my name buried within Phil‘s FOAF file. However, Googling for my online pseudonym of ‘djwudi‘ brings up link after link related to me, either posts here on my site, or comments I’ve left in various other places around the web.

What to do about this ability to be ‘found’ on the ‘net? Well, the best things to do may just be to accept that nothing you put on the web is truly private, and become active in taking control of what information is out there, as much as possible.

I own my name. I am the first, and definitive, source of information on me.

One of the biggest benefits of that reality is that I now have control. The information I choose to reveal on my site sets the biggest boundaries for my privacy on the web. Granted, I’ll never have total control. But look at most people, especially novice Internet users, who are concerned with privacy. They’re fighting a losing battle, trying to prevent their personal information from being available on the web at all. If you recognize that it’s going to happen, your best bet is to choose how, when, and where it shows up.

That’s the future. Own your name. Buy the domain name, get yourself linked to, and put up a page. Make it a blank page, if you want. Fill it with disinformation or gibberish. Plug in other random people’s names into Googlism and paste their realities into your own. Or, just reveal the parts of your life that you feel represent you most effectively on the web. Publish things that advance your career or your love life or that document your travels around the world. But if you care about your privacy, and you care about your identity, take the steps to control it now.

To that end, I think I’ll be picking up www.michaelhanscom.com soon, most likely pointing it here. Comments to other sites, where previously I’d use ‘djwudi’, I’ll probably start using my real name now. As long as I’m me, in a world where incredible amounts of information can be found with just a few clicks of a mouse, I might as well take control of who I am.

Mac fun and games

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Heave Ho!

Amsterdam Mac users certainly come up with entertaining ways to amuse themselves — creating Mac porn, having an Ellen Feiss Lookalike Contest, and tossing PC’s across a parking lot.

The picture shown here was by far my favorite of the PC-tossing pictures. While it’s most likely just an ‘elephant picture’, it looks either incredibly fey, or good ballet form.

Or both. In any case it made me laugh.

(Thanks to this Wired article about the lookalike contest.)

Microsoft switchers – oops!

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So Apple‘s had their ‘Switch’ campaign going on for a while now, touting stories from ex-PC users who have switched to Macintosh computers. Apparently the campaign is doing fairly well — at least well enough for Microsoft to start a similar campaign of its own.

Unfortunately, since they (apparently) couldn’t find any customers that had actually made the switch from the Mac to Windows, and were happy about it, and willing to talk about it — they had to combine fictional accounts a hired freelance writer’s story with stock photography, as pointed out on /. earlier today.

Apparently, this isn’t a rare practice, either. I especially like the page where the people in the photograph are using a Mac 6100.

Methinks Microsoft’s marketing folks need to work on their game a bit.

Thanks to Scripting News for this one.

Wired goes CSS

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I’ve occasionally babbled here about my continuing efforts to create a modern, standards-compliant site, using CSS, ensuring that my site validates, and most recently, adopting current accessibility standards. In doing so, I’ve joined an ever-growing group of sites across the ‘net working to follow current web standards.

As is typical for movements like this, it’s the ‘little people’ that start the ball rolling (in this case, primarily weblogs and personal sites), then the ‘big boys’ follow. Today, one of the first major, heavy-traffic sites has unveiled their new standards-compliant design — Wired. They detail their decisions to move to the new format in their article “A site for your eyes“, and web guru Jeffrey Zeldman gives his thoughts (and praise) on his site today. Congrats Wired!

Who says the Mac doesn’t have any software?

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One of the constant things I get from Wintel people is that “there isn’t any software for the Mac” — in fact, I heard this just the other day, talking with someone at work. I got to thinking about this this morning after…

  • Creating two .eps files with Adobe Illustrator 10 (Mac OS X native)…
  • Importing those .eps files into Adobe InDesign 2.0 (Mac OS X native)…
  • Exporting the file to a .pdf readable by Adobe Acrobat reader (Mac OS X native)…
  • Browsed the headlines from 46 different websites with NetNewsWire Lite 1.0 (Mac OS X only RSS reader)…
  • Read further on a few of the stories with Chimera (Mac OS X only Gecko-based web browser)…
  • And made a few posts to The Long Letter using EspressoBlog (Mac OS X only application for posting to MovableType or Blogger powered weblogs).

Anyway, that’s it. Just amused me.

Nobody’s going to understand this one…

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…but every time I see one of the recent tech weblog posts about “RDF in RSS” (which, to be honest, I barely understand myself), I keep thinking that RDF stands for Steve Jobs’ Reality Distortion Field:

reality-distortion field n.

An expression used to describe the persuasive ability of managers like Steve Jobs (the term originated at Apple in the 1980s to describe his peculiar charisma). Those close to these managers become passionately committed to possibly insane projects, without regard to the practicality of their implementation or competitive forces in the marketpace.

No matter how many times I see it, it always takes a slight moment for my brain to switch tracks after that.

The funniest thing is how some of these posts read if you use the incorrect definition. You don’t need to understand the technobabble — I often don’t — just reading RDF as ‘Reality Distortion Field’ lends a whole different feel to some of the suggestions.

They say the [Reality Distortion Field] in RSS 1.0 will let people do cool things. They say the [Reality Distortion Field] in RSS 1.0 will allow for unexpected connections.

— Phil Ringnalda

I’m not trying to downplay other’s concerns or existing work or effort, and I realize that I have a better understanding of [Reality Distortion Field(s)] than most of you (not bragging, but give me this as an accepted for discussion purposes at this moment) and that this gives me an edge when working with [Reality Distortion Field(s)].

— BurningBird

Keeps me amused, at least.