Mac notebook and other portable computing is covered in The 'Book Review. iPad, iPod, iPhone, and
Apple TV news is covered in iOS News
Review. All prices are in US dollars unless otherwise noted.
News & Opinion
Products & Services
Software
News & Opinion
AppleDesigner Jonathan Ive Knighted in Queen's New
Year Honours List
The Register's Iain Thomson reports that Apple's chief designer
Jonathan Ive, who is a British citizen, has been appointed a Knight
Commander of the British Empire (KBE) in Queen Elizabeth II's New
Year's Honours list.
The award, which will allow Ive - who was described by the late
Steve Jobs to biographer Walter Isaacson as his "spiritual partner,"
and who characteristically shuns the limelight - to call himself Sir
Jonathan, and will be bestowed personally on Ive by the Queen at a
future date.
Link: Jonathan Ive Is
Knighted in New Year Honours List
Why Sir Jony but Not Sir Steve?
Fortune's Philip Elmer-DeWitt notes that news that Apple's chief
designer Jonathan Ive being made a Knight Commander of the British
Empire (KBE) raises again the question of why his boss and closest
collaborator was never likewise honored.
Two reasons, says Elmer-DeWitt: Steve Jobs' birthplace, and,
reportedly, also due to a speaking invitation he blew off in 2009 after
nearly getting his own KBE a year before Ive, citing a Telegraph report
that Jobs was nominated for an honorary knighthood in that year, but
his candidacy was blocked by then Prime Minister Gordon Brown because
Jobs had declined an invitation to speak at the Labour Party's annual
conference.
However, Elmer-DeWitt explains that even had he not been blackballed
by Brown's apparent pettiness, Jobs would never been Sir Steve, since
KBE recipients who don't have the British monarch as their head of
state can append the letters KBE after their name, but not the
honorific Sir. Actually, some folks who do have the British
Monarch as their head of state can't be known as Sir either. QE
II is Canada's official head of state, but Canadians have been
effectively blocked from accepting British knighthoods, baronetcies,
and peerages since the so-called 1919
"Nickle Resolution" of Canada's parliament, which was carried but
never formally passed into law by the House of Commons.
Ironically, Americans are under no such restrictions, and US citizen
KBEs include Bill Gates, Billy Graham, and Rudolph Giuliani.
Link: Why Sir Jony but
Not Sir Steve?
Mac mini with Lion Server Ideal for Small
Office/Home Office
Macworld's John C. Welch says he was fairly positive in his review
of the original 2010 version of Apple's smallest server, and can now
say its very easy to be happy with the 2011 edition Mac mini with Lion
Server - not for big enterprise service of course, but for its primary
target markets; the small office/home office (SOHO) and small and
medium-sized businesses (SMB). Welch notes that the Mac mini Server is
bereft of redundant power supplies, hot-swappable components, and other
features found in enterprise servers, but for the same price as Apple's
discontinued Xserve enterprise server with the proper specifications,
you can buy several Mac mini servers and get your redundancy by
alternate means.
"...the only major weakness of the Mac mini with Lion Server is,
well, Lion Server (), which, as I noted in
my review of that product, is a good start on a major revamp, but
has some serious issues."
Link: Mac mini with
Lion Server (Mid 2011)
Is Technology Rendering the King James Version
Redundant?
No, the King James Version itself has nothing to do
with Apple, Macs, or even iOS, but almost every Bible app ever written,
whether free or commercial, includes a free copy of the KJV. With the
majority of modern translations under copyright and only available for
a fee, it's a starting point.
CTVNews.ca staffer Andy Johnson notes that invention of
the printing press in made it possible for the 1611 King
James Version (KJV) of the Bible to become the most widely
distributed book on the planet and the definitive English language
translation for nearly 400 years, becoming a cultural and social
unifier, widely regarded as the most influential piece of literature
ever written that has exerted profound influence on how
English-speaking people thought and viewed the world, and artists
interpreted it, and on development of the English language itself, with
many English speakers today unaware that popular idioms they use daily
are quotes from the KJV.
However, in the 400th anniversary year of the KJV's
original publication, Johnson reports that technology is dramatically
changing the way the Bible is read and interacted with, and even the
way Christians interpret their faith, with one commentator observing
that "technology is taking the Bible to new levels of convenient access
and interactive understanding" via online sites, computer applications,
e-readers, tablets, and smartphones, and with many other translations
as easily accessible as the KJV, predicting that electronic Bibles will
become even more interactive and integrated, with links to interactive
resources and social networks.
But will the KJV's influence
as a cultural unifier be lost?
Publisher's note: Redundant is the correct term, as the KJV,
while a literary masterpiece, can be as difficult to read and
understand as Shakespeare's plays, which were contemporaneous with the
translation. There have been several attempts to update the archaic
English of the KJV and even more attempts to create fresh new
translations based on more authoritative Greek and Hebrew manuscripts
discovered since 1611, each with is strengths and weaknesses. But as
long as some hold that the KJV is the only true and accurate
translation, it's going to stick around. And it's influence on our
daily speech is never going to vanish - which can also be said of
Shakespeare. dk
Link: After 400 Years,
Is Technology Rendering KJV Redundant?
Products & Services
Insync: 'It's OK to Cheat on Dropbox'
ZDNet's Charlie Osborne says that free Cloud storage and file sync
service Insync's reopening
includes many improvements to its Google Docs storage locker, and the
company is also using cheeky slogans to entice Dropbox users to switch.
Insync, a Google-oriented alternative to Dropbox, has been
completely revamped. It has now reopened for registration as a free
storage facility.
Philippines-based Insync uses your Google account as a storage
locker and offers a desktop application so you can access your files in
the same manner as you would with a local directory or folder.
Insync's homepage displays insouciant slogans to entice users to
defect from Dropbox. These include: It's OK to break up with
Dropbox, It's OK to cheat on Dropbox, 10x 8x cheaper
than Dropbox, and resistance is futile. In the updated
Insync 2.0 version, synchronization limits have been completely
removed.
But is switching from Dropbox a sensible move?
Osborne thinks it could be if you rely heavily on Google Docs, but
there are some limitations both on allowable file sizes (unlike
Dropbox), and only 1 GB of free storage capacity (with Google) -
while Dropbox gives you 2 GB, and you can boost your free Dropbox
space via referrals.
Publisher's note: Dropbox has changed the way I work with my three
production Macs (running OS X 10.4 Tiger, 10.5 Leopard, and 10.6 Snow
Leopard), and thanks to referrals, my original 2 GB of free
storage space has ballooned to over 10 GB. Also, Dropbox supports OS X
10.4 and PowerPC Macs, while Insync is currently Intel-only. Insync
says it is considering PowerPC support. Insync does not appear to list
system requirements anywhere on its website, so it's going to be
hit-and-miss if you want to run it on older versions of OS X. Not
that Insync probably isn't a bargain at $5/year for 20 GB, but thanks
to bonus space from referals, Dropbox already provides more space than
I need and works with my older Macs. dk
Link: Insync: 'It's OK
to Cheat on Dropbox'
Software
Zoom It: View Your Screen Through a Magnifying
Glass Whenever Needed
PR: Appatit announces Zoom It 1.0 for OS X, their new utility
that allows users to easily view their Mac's screen through a virtual
magnifying glass. Ideal for artists, designers, engineers,
photographers, presenters, project collaborators, laptop users, and
those who wear corrective lenses, Zoom It is a simple Menu Item, which
for many Mac owners can significantly enhance the usability of every
one of their applications. Far superior in flexibility and convenience
to the screen zoom built into OS X, the app's virtual loupe can
magnify from 5-45% of the screen and up to a maximum of 5x.
The onscreen magnifier in Zoom It is always available to provide a
closer look at whatever the user is doing on their Mac. The magnifier,
with a circular or rectangular shape, can be effortlessly accessed
through simple keyboard shortcuts that do not interfere with any
shortcuts, commands, trackpad controls, or mouse buttons the user may
be accustomed to. Alternatively, the app's magnifying glass icon in the
Menu Bar can open to display a dropdown menu of commands and
preferences. Users maintain the ability to click, type, or select
inside the magnified area.
Applications with numerous palettes, tools, controls, and design
elements, such as drawing, painting, CAD/CAM, 3D graphics &
animation, and design & layout software will all benefit from the
ability to Zoom It, anytime. Project collaborators will especially like
the app's feature that allows saving and sharing detailed, close-up
screen shots. And presenters will find Zoom It's realistic, onscreen
magnifying glass the perfect means of highlighting any part of a screen
viewed by an audience. With 5-Star ratings from MacUpdate and
HotMacApps, this is one simple, inexpensive Utility that every Mac
owner should consider acquiring.
Feature
Highlights:
- Set the app to open when you start your Mac so that the magnifying
loupe is always available but stays hidden until you want to use
it
- Use all of your usual keyboard shortcuts, trackpad controls, and
mouse clicks at the same time as the loupe
- Show the loupe temporarily with a simple keyboard shortcut
- Keep the temporary loupe onscreen just by holding the Z key, and
make it disappear by simply releasing the key
- Use a simple shortcut to make the loupe stay onscreen permanently,
without holding the Z key
- Click, type, and select inside the magnified area
- Choose between a round or rectangular loupe
- Quickly change the size of the loupe
- Easily adjust the amount of magnification, up to 500%
- Customize keyboard shortcuts for all Zoom It functions
- Take a screenshot of what the Zoom It loupe is showing (with or
without the loupe border)
Appatit co-owners Joel Kraus and Moshe Samet recently commented, "We
are a couple of artists, strong believers in the Mac platform. After
doing graphic design for many years, we piled up ideas on how to make
life easier on the computer, from the end user's point of view. Zoom
It, a simple utility that does one thing very well, has become our
flagship app."
System Requirements:
- Mac OS X 10.5 or later
- 1.5 MB
Zoom It 1.0 is 99¢ and available worldwide exclusively through
the Mac App Store in the Utilities category.
Link:
Zoom It
Free Scribus 1.4.0 Desktop Publishing
Application
PR: Scribus 1.4.0 is a multiplatform, open source page layout
program that can produce press-ready output. It includes vector drawing
tools, rendering of markup languages such as LaTeX, color-blindness
emulation, CMYK support, spot color, ICC color management, PDF output,
and other features.
This release is based on the Qt4 application framework and includes
install files for Mac OS X 10.5 or later, enhancements for object
handling, extended support for text and typography, (including
character styles, optical margins, and glyph extension), a line style
editor and vector effects for vector objects, a Render Frame frame type
for rendering the output of other programs, export to PDF 1.5, and
more. Scribus is free for Mac OS X 10.5 and up (Intel), Windows, Linux,
and OS/2.
With Scribus' full-featured desktop publishing package, you can
create newsletters, brochures, greeting cards, CD covers and more.
Operating Systems: Linux, Mac OS X 10.5 or newer on Intel Mac,
Windows 2000, Windows 7 (32 bit), Windows Vista (32 bit), Windows
XP
Languages: English, Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Basque, Breton,
Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Chinese (Traditional), Czech, Danish,
Dutch, Esperanto, Estonian, Finnish, French, Galician, German, Greek,
Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Lithuanian,
Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Serbian, Spanish,
Slovak, Slovenian, Swedish, Thai, Turkish, Ukranian, Welsh
Free
Publisher's note: Jason Walsh took a
look at Scribus here on Low End Mac back in 2004.
Link: Scribus
Desktop Mac
Deals
Low End Mac updates the following price trackers monthly:
For deals on current and discontinued 'Books, see our 13" MacBook and MacBook Pro,
MacBook Air, 13" MacBook Pro, 15" MacBook Pro, 17" MacBook Pro, 12" PowerBook G4, 15" PowerBook G4, 17" PowerBook G4, titanium PowerBook G4,
iBook G4, PowerBook G3, and iBook G3 deals.
We also track iPad,
iPhone, iPod touch, iPod classic, iPod nano, and iPod shuffle deals.
