LAUG 2.0 News

I just wanted to drop in really quick before the extended weekend to talk about my new favorite piece of software, Write Room. Basically the software is a simple text editor that allows the user to enter a full screen mode in which the distractions your computer presents i.e. IM, RSS, email, podcasts etc…disappear.

I really love this quote from the developers site;

For Mac users who enjoy the simplicity of a typewriter, but live in the digital world.”

The software is still in beta but it looks to be another great app from Hog Bay Software. I’m not going to give the software a “dog-cow” rating as it is still in beta, but it looks to be a great app. I hope everyone has a great Fourth of July weekend!

Via: Binary Bonsai

Every once in a while a product comes along that does one thing, and does it really well. The only question is “do you need it” With modern LCD screens and sleep/energy save modes, screen savers are virtually unnecessary. That’s really the point of Aquazone, it has no practical value, but it is very cool.

Before we got our little dog Tova, we had a fish tank for a number of years. I do miss some of the relaxing aspects of watching fish swim around and interact. Fish are generally low maintance and considered by many a key stress reducer. I think of this screen saver program as a virtual tamagotchi or a aquatic version of the Sims. You can do everything you would do with a normal fish tank: add and remove fish, feed them, tap on the glass (or the keyboard in this case). Even better, you can mix fresh water and salt water, no worries about two male Betas in the same tank Fortunately you don’t have to clean the tank and you don’t get algae. If you want fish not included in the tank, you can buy some more at www.aquazoneshop.com.

If you ( or someone you know) enjoys fish and want to buy something fun and rather frivolous, this is a great program. If you aren’t into fish, probably not worth buying

Pros: Does exactly what is says, creates a virtual fish tank
Cons: Probably a productivity waster at the office, gotta love fish to enjoy the program.

4 out of 5 dog cows

Ok, I may be dating myself, but does anyone remember that Saturday Night Live skit where they talk about something being a floor wax and a dessert topping? I think it was Dan Akroyd and someone else. Don’t confuse this with the Bassomatic…that was something entirely different (Mmm, that’s great Bass!).

Why is this relevant? CheckIt is just about everything you want rolled up in one package (technically 2 since it’s on 2 cds). If I were on a desert island and I was only allowed one utility program, it would be CheckIt.

First, Checkit includes Tech Tool Platinum. Tech Tool is the best all around utility for the Mac. If something isn’t working right on your Mac, odds are Tech Tool will find it. It incorporates all the functions of the old Norton such as disk defrag/speed disk and repair, data recovery, along with checking each and every aspect of your hardware—ram, motherboard, hard drive, and so forth This is the program every Mac user should own and keep in their laptop bag for emergencies on the road.

But wait, that’s only the tip of the iceberg! Buy Tech Tool as part of CheckIt and pay about $90.Buy Tech Tool from Micromat and it’s the same price. However Checkit includes a suite of other programs.

Included in the CheckIt Suite is the Spring Cleaning Suite. Sweet. There are about 25 different programs that let you clean up every aspect of your hard drive. For example, you can search for duplicate files, eliminate broken aliases, find the largest files. If you want to clean up your hard drive of unneeded junk and save yourself from having to upgrade, Spring Cleaning is the program to run. Personally, I used the quick compare to compare a backup of my iTunes folder and make sure my external and internal music libraries were synced up. I also freed up about 10% of my laptop’s hard drive by letting it eliminate a variety of unneeded and duplicate files. Since laptop hard drives are expensive, getting rid of waste is a big savings. If you were to buy just Spring Cleaning it would be $50.

And if that weren’t enough, they through in Retrospect which is considered an industry standard for backing up your Mac. Though many people can use the backup software included with a .Mac account, Retrospect makes backups as well as restores easier. In addition, you can restore your files to a computer that doesn’t have .Mac or Internet access. This product by itself costs $90.

Checkit Suite is probably the best bargain ever for Macintosh software. It helps you backup your computer, clean up the hard drive, as well as protect and diagnose practically any problem. Operators are standing by and quantities won’t last, so call today. Oh, I think I’m getting that confused with the Bassomatic again!

Pros: Perfect suite that includes every aspect of managing and protecting your computer.
Cons: Can’t think of a one.

5 out of 5 dog cows

If you are like most people, you have several web sites you check daily; sites that get updated frequently, such as blogs, new music release sites, or Mac rumor boards. If you are the obsessive type, you might even check some sites several times a day, just to see if something new got posted. Imagine how nice it would be if somehow all your favorite web sites notified you when something new came around. In a nutshell, that is the idea behind the program NetNewsWire, and if you surf the web more then five minutes a day, it will change your life!

NetNewsWire uses a technology called RSS (short for Really Simple Syndication) to work its magic. RSS feeds are simply special URLs that get updated whenever a particular web page is changed. NetNewsWire keeps track of these feeds automatically and lets you know when new information gets posted to a web site on your watch list. After initially telling NetNewsWire what sites to track (a process as simple as clicking a link in your web browser) the rest is automatic. When web sites are updated, NetNewsWire lets you know and if you are interested in reading the new posting, you can simply click a headline to view the new information. In practice,this is as intuitive and easy as reading email.

In fact, if you have ever used email, you’ll find NetNewsWire very familiar. It has a beautiful and easy-to-use interface, laid out similar to most popular email programs, with a list of sites you are watching on the left side (where an email application shows all the mailboxes). Clicking on any site name will show you a list of postings, with new posts showing up in bold, once again similar to how email works. Click any subject to view the full web page. NetNewsWire will actually display the web page itself, using the same technology Apple’s own Safari uses. NetNewsWire will check for updated web sites on a schedule you set and once you start using it,it will really change how you use the web. NetNewsWire lets you become lazy, in a good way. News and web sites come to you, automatically. Surfing the web becomes both more efficient and more fun.

If you only used NetNewsWire to keep track of favorite web sites, it would be well worth the shareware fee. However, as you become a more experienced user, you will likely find that many of NetNewsWire’s extra features really make your internet experience even better. NetNewsWire can keep track of podcasts (which are actually just a special kind of RSS feed) and send them to iTunes. A very useful synchronization function uses .Mac to automatically sync your preferences and subscription list between two or more computers. You can also create “smart lists” of web sites to track, which works similar to smart playlists in iTunes.

NetNewsWire is one of the finest shareware applications written for the Mac. Apple’s own RSS reader, built in to Safari, pales in comparison. You pretty much cannot go wrong with NetNewsWire; it will save you time and make your web experience much better. The software comes with a 30-day fully-functional demo period so you can try it yourself, and then wonder how you lived without it.

Pro: An elegant,well-written application that will change how you use your computer.
Con: None
$24.95

http://ranchero.com/

5 out of 5 dog cows

ELister and its predecessor, PreLister, have been my preferred auction programs for years. In my day, I was a high end eBayer and usually had about 20 auctions running at any one time. This program was essential in quickly and effectively getting items on eBay.

When I evaluated all the programs out there after deciding to put a bunch of stuff on eBay, eLister is the program I decided to use. Without a fancy interface or lots of extra features, it does one thing,and one thing very well: quickly creating auctions to be uploaded to eBay. The program loads extremely fast and is very reliable. In addition,this is the only program that works in Classic (though support is being discontinued). I use it on a beige G3 in the basement specifically dedicated to eBay auction posting, a great repurposing of an older machine.

This program is for someone who takes’ their eBay seriously, not for someone who only lists an item or two a month. You need to post an average of at least two items a week to take advantage of the key features.

Like many other programs, eLister allows you to avoid having to check the same options each time on every auction. The program lets you create defaults quickly and easy for your typical auctions such as: auction duration (number of days), minimum bid, payment types and shipping locations. In addition, eLister includes a live estimate of what my eBay fees will be as well as sounds indicating whether an option I choose will increase or decrease the listing fee. Unlike its competitors, almost every option I would care to set of ran auction fits on one screen. I can quickly and easily see what features are available and how much they cost.

The best feature by far is the ability to customize the menus. I can quickly select the eBay product categories I use most from the “favorites” menu. The “insert” menu allows you to add “clippings” that let you insert text that you specify. Personally I have ones specify what “sold as is” means or “DOA Warranty” depending on the features of the item. Again, this program is great for someone who sells the same thing over and over again and doesn’t want lots of repetitive steps. I rarely have to choose an item category that wasn’t in my menus, saving me valuable time in posting items. I simply write a sentence or two description and then everything else can be chosen from menus.

While the program excels at listing auctions, that’s pretty much all it does. You can’t track or leave feedback, take pictures of your items, nor follow the status of your auctions and bids. You can preview what your auction looks like in eBay, but that function is poorly implemented and doesn’t work well.

From a technical standpoint, this program is brilliant in its simplicity. Unlike other programs, each auction is saved as a separate file. Most other programs use a database format, which requires you to sort through all your previous auction listings. As your get more listings, the programs get slower and become harder to backup. Since eLister keeps each auction in a separate document, I can do standard Finder functions to backup, move, duplicate and rename my auctions.

When I’ve had problems in the past with the program, the developer was quick to respond, usually within hours. Also,this was the only company
to give us an extended demo of the software, and I appreciate their support of the user group movement.

My biggest, and only, concern is that this program is what I like to call “pumpkinware.” After 3 or 6 months, the program expires and you have to pay to continue using it. This is a fair business model because the developer quickly responds to changes in ebay’s system. Other eBay programs you buy once and are supposed to get updates anytime eBay changes their system. In the past, some companies have been slower to respond and instead of changing their software, force you to buy an upgrade!

ELister is for a serious, committed eBay seller that posts an average of one item a week or more. A frequent seller will appreciate the simple and straightforward options in the program. Casual users of eBay should consider another program.

Pros: Simply the best listing program for power eBay sellers
Cons: Casual users won’t benefit from the program, has no other features besides listing.

5 out of 5 dog cows

If you’re looking for a great new way to organize your mounting pile of digital stuff, StickyBrain is just the swiss army knife you need. It provides an out-of-the-box experience,with tools you will find using more often than usual. StickyBrain is your universal note manager. Use it to store all of the miscellaneous information that doesn’t fit neatly anywhere else. It makes it easy to find and access your notes from any application.

I do a lot of work on my Mac. I also collect a lot of information that’s sitting in a lot of different places and formats. Tidbits from websites, emails and saved IM sessions. This info includes design ideas and tips, advice on finding a good doctor, online, receipts, passwords, schedules, etc. I’ve been struggling to develop a good system to keep all this stuff organized and useful, but my struggle ended when I installed StickyBrain from Chronos.

The focus of StickyBrain’s function is to be a powerful information collecting and organizing assistant. StickyBrain organizes notes in a mail-like interface. Folders and subfolders can be arranged in a side drawer any way the user sees fit, while notes are listed in the top pane and their content displayed below. Notes can easily be opened in their own window by double-clicking.

It comes pre-packages with a wide selection of notes. This helped to introduce the possibilities of StickyBrain’s purpose — it’s not another note app for those random phone numbers and address you collect.

Moving beyond basic notes and folders, StickyBrain’s true versatility shines in its ability to easily collect information from almost any other app in OS X and send it back out to almost any other app.

StickyBrain is your universal note manager. Use it to store all of the miscellaneous information that doesn’t fit neatly anywhere else. Throw all your notes and other information into it, then use the powerful note viewer to retrieve anything with just one click. Imagine life with all your digital notes — from reminders and alarms to pictures, URLs and text — instantly organized and searchable! You can increase productivity, save time, and gain unprecedented control over your information.

Try the free 30-Day full-featured demo and see if StickyBrain 3 is useful. If you decide that it’s right for you pay the $39 fee and never look back.

Pros: Full featured notes application with excellent Mac OS and other application integration. And you gotta love the intuitive way it lets you keep track of all the minutiae.

Cons: Interface is a bit overwhelming at first. Product Requirements: Mac OS X 10.3 or later.

5 out of 5 dog cows

For $50, Apple will gladly sell you a copy of iPhoto as part of it’s iLife suite. iPhoto is a great program;if you have a digital camera, it will easily let you organize, edit, and share your photos. For most people, this is all you will ever need. However,if you are a professional (or semi-pro) photographer, or if you are a graphic designer or web editor who needs to keep track of thousands of digital photos, clip art pieces, or graphics (and possibly share them with others in real time), iPhoto’s limitations will quickly become apparent.

Software developer Extensis has stepped into this void with their application Portfolio which is designed for the professional – or pack-rat amateur who has moved beyond iPhoto. Portfolio is not a replacement for the consumer features of iPhoto. It doesn’t include any editing functions (as a pro or semi-pro, you use Photoshop or something similar, right?), or the ability to order prints, or automatic easy web sharing with dot.Mac. What Portfolio does offer is the ability to easily classify tens of thousands of files in a wide variety of graphics formats, to share these files with others, and to quickly search and find files based on numerous criteria, including custom tags.

Portfolio is very fast, even with several thousand files. As a test, I imported about 2000 digital photos and about 3000 other graphics files, and the searching and moving among the various folders was much faster then iPhoto. Searching for a needle in this digital haystack is quite easy. You can of course tag files based on their type or subject, but Portfolio also tracks files based on several dozen other criteria, making it easy to create customized searches and find the exact file you are looking for. Portfolio also contains support for advanced functions such as integration with third-party SQL databases, workflow automation, file format conversion,and Adobe’s Digital Negative file format.

When it comes time to share your database - either with other members of your team or potential clients — Portfolio gives you several options. At the simplest, you can export selected items to a web site, and Portfolio provides several nice templates and more flexibility in this task then iPhoto’s built-in reliance on dot.Mac. For a more sophisticated approach, you can publish a live version of your entire library or selected items to the web in real-time using a companion program, Portfolio Server, which does cost extra.

Finally,you can burn your library to a CD or DVD both for backup or to share with others. Extensis provides a free read-only version of Portfolio (useable on both Mac and Windows) to make sharing and distribution of your images easier.

Portfolio is not perfect. The user interface has some glitches and in many areas is non-intuitive, and it is missing many consumer-level features like the ability to order prints and do basic photo-editing. However, if you are a professional designer, photographer or artist with thousands of files to keep track of, Portfolio may be just what you need. Portfolio 7, published by Extensis (www.extensis.com) $200.00, Requires a G4 processor and MacOS X 10.3 or higher.

Pros: A powerful and full-featured professional image management application
Cons: Rough interface in spots, missing some beginner features.

4 out of 5 dogcows

I hate spam. I have lived on the Internet for years without it and then in the past year it seemed to explode on my desktop. I know my problem isn’t as bad some people’s but I get on average about 30 spam messages a day, including some really nasty stuff too that would make a sailor blush. While I like the spam filter in OS X’s mail program, I really love Eudora and have used Eudora for 15 years.I tried using a filtering system called Spamnix for Eudora and also Eudora’s own junk mail filter but found them difficult to use. The biggest problem with these programs was clearly sorting good mail from spam.

For this column, I first tried a program called Spamnix.I didn’t end up writing about Spamnix because I either couldn’t get it to work or couldn’t figure it out. Either way it didn’t work for me. Then I tried Spamfire and fell in love. Yes,I truly love this program. Spamfire runs with practically any email program because it puts itself between your email program and your ISP. Instead of having your email program retrieve the email from your ISP, Spamfire instead gets your mail and then your email program gets it from Spamfire.

Doing so prevents the spam from ever reaching your inbox.For me, it has the added bonus of sorting my spam while I’m on the road. I can leave Spamfire running and when I check my email via my cell phone or a website, no spam is wasting my time because Spamfire has already removed it from my mail server.

Spamfire scores each email based on Bayesian principles and it’s own proprietary filter system, which you can choose to pay for yearly updates. I noticed practically no difference in the amount of spam sorted after I paid for the updates. I’m not sure I’ll pay for them in the future. Spamfire sorts all your email in one of three basic categories: Good email, borderline email, and Spam. Spam is then subdivided into definite and probable. This allows you to quickly check the borderline and probable categories for any good emails that slipped through. I’ll check the definite folder every so often, and the probably and borderline once a day. Spamfire can either hold, delete, or pass along to the email program. I have mine set to trash anything it marks as spam and hold anything that is borderline. I like the fact it keeps me in complete control of how to deal with the mail, because in the beginning I didn’t let it trash anything until it got more accurate in determining what I personally considered spam. Most junk filters, like the one built into OS X mail, don’t give you that level of control. It’s either junk or not junk and life, like email, isn’t that black and white all the time. As I have used the program over the past few months, it has gotten much better at identifying the difference between spam and good emails, although when I started buying and selling on ebay, it got confused and some of the good emails got mistakenly marked as spam.

Right now, I get zero good emails marked as spam and maybe a spam message slips through every other week. Spamfire also has a revengefunction (with a screw icon believe it or not). It allows you to report phishing attempts to ebay or paypal and general spam to the FTC and the ISP. It’s a nice idea,but probably doesn’t do much good. My major complaint about Spamfire is it seems to take a lot of processor cycles. In activity monitor,it’s usually sucking up the most CPU time. I also think their system of paying for filters is a bit confusing. I bought an upgrade from an old version, and the upgrade didn’t come with filters, but the full version did. In the long run, I paid more for an upgrade and filters than I
would have for a full version. Tech support has been intermittent, sometimes I got responses, sometimes I didn’t.

Overall, anyone that is having a problem with spam should strongly consider the program as a way to regain control over their inbox. Price is $39.95 LAUGmembers $24.95 by going to : http://www.matterform.com/mugoffer/

Pros: Outstanding method to keep spam from my inbox.
Cons: Confusing costs and purchase options.

4 out of 5 dogcows

First off I must say this was the most difficult company I have ever dealt with as a User Group Ambassador. They flatly and vehemently refused an extended demo. My average response time from sales or tech support was about five days. I can’t imagine what I’d do if I actually had to rely on this program for an auction. The company is based in Germany (in spite of having a US phone number) and I faced many language barriers in my questions. The answers didn’t match my questions and it took about three weeks to ask why the demo of the program wasn’t working.

I eventually gave up,installed it on my laptop, and was able to test the program. From reports on eBay, the registration process for the program is a nightmare and the program is not transferable from computer to computer and my questions about this to tech support were never answered.

ISale has consistently won design awards as for quality programming and implementation of Tiger’s functions.The interface is extremely intuitive and user friendly. It allows you to easily upload your pictures to your .mac account or to use eBay’s listing service. No eBay experience is required to use the program.

iSale considers itself part of the iLife suite. It integrates with iPhoto and shares many of the common interface elements. To add a auction,you simply click the Plus icon in the auctions column. Adding pictures to your auction is a breeze! You don’t need to know anything about webhosting. You can pick a photo from your iPhoto library, drag an existing picture into your auction, or even hold it in front of your iSight camera and take a picture. In addition, if you have a .Mac account, iSale will put your pictures onto your iDisk saving you money from eBay’s picture hosting service.

iSale’s preview function is excellent and the preview you get is a identical representation of what your auction would look like. This is great for new users to check that they didn’t make a mistake or forget anything. However, the preview doesn’t show you the fact iSale includes its icon on every auction. A paid user should not have to deal with a vendor’s ad in their auction, and I thought it was sneaky not to include it in the auction preview.

Managing draft auctions, current auctions, and completed auctions uses the familiar iLife interface and smart folders. You have an auction “Library” and then individual play lists—some created by iSale, and others you can custom create. For example, iSale automatically sorts which posted auctions resulted in sold and unsold items.

When the auction is complete, iSale allows you to enter information to track the auction and the buyer. You can indicate whether the buyer has paid, whether the item is shipping, and whether feedback was left. I was disappointed there wasn’t enough in the post auction features. Windows eBay programs generally let you leave feedback from within the program. Sellers generally leave the same feedback for everyone and iSale should have done the extra effort and added that in.

While there isn’t a backup function, you can export an auction. Considering how well rounded the program is, I would expect them to include an easy backup function.

I wouldn’t recommend this program if you are relying on eBay as more than an occasional hobby. The slick interface slowed me down and there wasn’t an easy way to backup individual auctions.

ISale is a good purchase for someone who wants to test the waters in making ebay into a hobby Starting eBayer’s should simply use eBay’s free website to post items. Once you start posting enough items that you get bored of typing the same information over and over again,that’s the time to move to iSale. ISale is great for the non-technical end user (as some books might call a “Dummy”), because it handles all the behind the scenes aspect of posting an auction.

If you can type a letter in Appleworks, you have all the skills necessary to use iSale. And if you need any support…just say “nein”to this pro- gram (that’s German for no).

Pros: Very user friendly, no eBay skills required, handles almost every aspect of an eBay sale. Great for most eBay hobbyists.
Cons: Very user unfriendly support. Not for someone who posts just a few items a year or for someone who posts a few items a day.

4 out of 5 dog cows

If you regularly search for a wireless networks,this I the product for you!
While the bundled airport software with OS X, can only give you a rudimentary determination of what networks are available and their signal strength. IStumbler is designed for the nerd that likes to know as much as possible what type of signals are floating in the neighborhood. It gives you the network name and a numerical value of the signal strength. It also tells you what kind of security the network has, the chipset/vendor of the wireless access point, as well as it’s Media Access Controller (MAC) address.

For those that war-dial, the program can also log the connections, thought that option is off by default. Finally,iStumbler can also help you determine and manage your Bonjour (the technology formerly known as Rendezvous) network.

Personally, I use it a lot when I’m in a cybercafe. Knowing the signal strength and noise ratios at a particular spot lets me find that sweet spot where I can both use my laptop on the internet, and effectively keep from spilling it on my Pismo.

In my work as a consultant,I find knowing the channel the base stations
are operating on is critical. Moving your network to a different channel often fixes networking problems and conflicts. Same is true with the chipset. Some routers don’t get along with certain wireless access card, and being able to track down those conflicts really helps. The interface is clear and easy to read. I used to use MacStumbler, but that program started showing it’s age and wasn’t as easy to read as iStumbler with it’s modern brushed metal interface.

The cost of the product is a $10 donation. The author describes it as “subscriptionware” you pay to help the product development continue. The product is not crippled in anyway but not having paid the fee, which is nice of shareware writers. IStumber can be downloaded at istumbler.net.