Iomega, an EMC company has entered into a strategic partnership with MSI-ECS (Phils.) Inc. to market and distribute Iomega’s consumer, SOHO (small office/home office) and SMB (small-medium business) storage solutions for the Philippines market. Under the agreement, MSI-ECS will market and sell Iomega’s full range of smart storage solutions, including the portable and desktop drives for both Windows and Mac users, multimedia and optical drives, and desktop and rackmounted network storage solutions. Shown in photo are (from left) Ronnie Latinazo, country manager, EMC Philippines; Rajeev Mukul, vice-president for Asia Pacific and Japan, Iomega; Jimmy Go, president and CEO, MSI-ECS (Phils.) and Victor Francisco Jr., channelsmanager, EMC.

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By James Galbraith
Macworld.com
February 16, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - The Strobe 500 marks the return to the Mac by scanner maker Visioneer after an 11-year absence. The Strobe 500 is a document scanner that features a removable dock that, when removed, allows it to operate as a USB bus-powered, portable scanner. It can scan color or black and white and scan both sides of a sheet of paper simultaneously at a resolution of 600 dpi.

The beige and black Strobe 500 is a portable scanner about the size of a box of Saran wrap. The scanner can use power from USB (using two USB cables) and scan one sheet at a time, or you can attach it to the included black docking station with its 20-sheet capacity feeder, which requires an external power supply.

Instead of creating its own Mac drivers, Visioneer turned to ExactCODE GmbH and their proprietary scanning driver, ExactScan. Not TWAIN compliant, the software will allow you to scan to an application like Preview or Acrobat, but you can’t pull scans into these applications with the Strobe 500 (or into the bundled Presto PageManager application, for that matter).

The ExactScan software does offer presets to let you scan to Mail, iPhoto, or to a printer. The Strobe 500 ships with a “lite” version of ExactScan 2 that supports only PDF and compressed PDF; there is no OCR functionality built-in, and scanning to JPEG or TIFF files isn’t supported. Also not supported in the lite version is the image rotation or the ability to skip blank pages.

Visioneer says that an upgrade to the standard version will soon be available, for a fee, from the Visioneer Web site. The standard version allows for blank page skipping, rotation, and scanning to JPEG, TIFF and PNG file types. OCR is not offered in the standard version, only in a Pro version, which the company also hopes to make available for purchase shortly.

To test the speed of the Strobe 500, we ran it through a series of timed tests. Compared to recently evaluated sheet-fed scanners, the Strobe 500 was an average performer, taking 14 seconds to scan a single-sided page at 300 dpi to a file folder on our Mac Pro, and 18 seconds to scan the same document into Adobe Acrobat Professional. It took 58 seconds to scan ten images from a mix of single and double sided sheets.

The resulting scans unfortunately were underwhelming, with the Strobe 500 scans containing weird rectangular patches overlaying the scans-an interesting effect, but those shapes weren’t in the original document we scanned. Colors in some of our scanned documents came out undersaturated and soft and when we scanned our text document into Acrobat Professional, a good amount of editing was necessary, more so than with competing scanners.

Macworld’s buying advice

The Strobe 500’s clever docking station allows it to server as both a desktop and a portable scanner. And while we’re happy to see Visioneer back in the Mac business, the Strobe 500’s bundled software and scanning quality leaves a lot to be desired.

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By James Galbraith
Macworld.com
February 9, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Fujitsu’s ScanSnap S1500M is an easy to use, attractive sheet-fed scanner. Its automatic document feeder can hold up to 50 sheets, and it can scan both sides of a document simultaneously at a resolution of 600 dpi.

The compact silver and white S1500M is solidly built and connects to your Mac via USB 2.0. Its fold-up design allows it to take up little desktop real estate when not in use.

Fujitsu’s ScanSnap Manager software offers a colorfully pleasing interface, with intuitive controls and easy to recognize icons. The S1500M doesn’t ship with a TWAIN driver, which would let you initiate a scan from Snow Leopard’s built in applications like Image Capture and Preview, or into TWAIN compliant apps like Acrobat Professional 8, a powerful, and expensive, application which the Scan Snap actually includes. You can, however, use the ScanSnap Manager to send the scanned files to these applications.

The ScanSnap Manager software comes with presets for scanning to a printer, to a folder, or to e-mail. The ScanSnap Manager also shows presets for two bundled applications, CardIris business card scanning software, and Abbyy Fine Reader. The CardIris software worked fine, though a bit of editing cleanup was required. Two of the Abbyy presets, Scan to Word and Scan to Excel, did not work under Snow Leopard during the testing for our April 2010 print issue. We called Fujitsu representatives and pointed me to their Snow Leopard update. I downloaded the ScanSnap update, but still had problems. Fujitsu told me they’d look into the problem.

Before posting the online version of this review, I went back to check on updates and found an Abby FineReader for ScanSnap update for Snow Leopard. After downloading the update, version 4.2, up from version 4 that came with the scanner, the software worked exactly as you’d expect.

In terms of speed, the ScanSnap wasn’t the fastest document scanner we’ve tested, but was still impressively quick, taking just 36 seconds for our 10-page test and 18 seconds for our scan to Acrobat test. Its one-page test result, at 17 seconds, was the slowest score of four recently tested document scanners, which had scores between 7 and and 15 seconds.

In our scanning quality tests, we found the S1500M to be a solid performer, earning Good ratings in all three of our evaluation categories (detail, color and OCR accuracy).

Macworld’s buying advice
For those looking to reduce the amount of paper in their life, the space-saving, easy to use ScanSnap S1500m offers competitive price and solid performance.

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By Sharon Zardetto
Macworld.com
February 1, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - It’s easy to never go beyond the basics of Open and Save dialog boxes, despite their being perhaps the most-used feature of the Mac interface. Instead of simply working with the basics, make these dialog boxes work for you. (The last two tips here are Snow Leopard-only.)

1. Use Spotlight to search for missing files

You go to open that Quarterly Report you just copied over from a thumb drive, but you’ve totally forgotten where you put it. Let Spotlight come to the rescue, right in the Open dialog box. You don’t even have to reach for your mouse: Activate the Spotlight field by pressing Command-F, and then type in the search term for a file or a folder that you’ve misplaced. (There’s a Spotlight field in the Save dialog box, too.)

Using Spotlight keywords makes searching from within these dialog boxes even more efficient. These special terms limit your searches so that you don’t get as many unwanted results. For example, instead of typing quarterly in the search field when you’re looking for that report, type name:quarterly so you won’t find documents that simply contain the word quarterly. (When you use keywords, make sure there’s no space between the keyword and the colon that follows it; you can leave a space after the colon.)

The two keywords I use most are name and kind. Use name to limit a search to only file names (instead of also looking through a document’s contents). Use kind to specify the file type. When I’m looking specifically for a folder, I type kind:folder FolderName or FolderName kind:folder to avoid scrolling through a long list that includes files with similar names.

2. Customize your sidebar on-the-fly

The Finder’s sidebar gives you one-click access to items you use frequently: Click on a sidebar folder, and the folder opens. You’ll find the same click-and-you’re-there convenience in every Open and Save dialog box. But it’s there I often notice a sidebar organizational problem. (”I need this new folder in the sidebar”; “This folder should be at the top now because I’m using it so much”; “I haven’t used that folder for weeks, it’s in my way.”)

Fortunately, the sidebar in an Open/Save dialog box is not merely a static reflection of the one you set up in Finder windows. Redesign the sidebar’s Places category from within a dialog box just as you would in the Finder. Add a folder by dragging it from the window’s list to a spot in the sidebar. Reorder items by dragging them up or down to new positions. Remove an item by dragging it out of the sidebar and letting go.

3. Save time by opening multiple items at once

You need to open three items in Microsoft Word, or two in Adobe InDesign, or any number in some other application. Unfortunately, you’re already in the Open dialog box and don’t want to switch into the Finder. No problem. If you can see the items you want to open, select all of them, and then press Return or click on the dialog box’s Open button to open all the files at once.

How you select multiple items depends on what Finder view (Icon, List, and Column) you’re using in the dialog box. (Change your view by clicking on the small buttons at the top of the dialog box, or by pressing Command-1, Command-2, or Command-3.) If you’re in List or Column view, you can click on the first item and then Shift-click on the last to select them and everything in between. Alternatively, Command-click to select noncontiguous items. In Icon view, you can also drag a selection rectangle around icons to select them, using a Shift-click afterward to add an item to, or remove it from, the selection.

Tip If you’re in the List view, you can select and open multiple items that aren’t even in the same folder, as long as you can expand the folders to a level that displays all the items you want.

4. Take advantage of Quick Look

When you want to preview a file without opening it, nothing beats Quick Look. Luckily, you can use Quick Look when you’re in an Open dialog box. This is especially helpful if you need to see a file that the application you’re in doesn’t open, such as when you’re placing a document into InDesign or a graphic in a Word document.

In Leopard, you need a special Automator droplet described in Mac OS X Hints (now available for download here). But in Snow Leopard, you can use Quick Look the same way you do in the Finder. Just select an item in the dialog box and then press the spacebar. If you select multiple items, the Quick Look window provides a slideshow option. But, as in the Finder, you don’t need the slideshow to easily see a sequence of files: use the Up or Down Arrow key to select the previous or next item in the dialog box’s list, and the Quick Look window updates immediately.

5. Customize the columns you see in List view

Feeling restricted by the same old three-column setup in your Open and Save dialog boxes? Although the default columns–Name, Date Modified, and Size–are useful, sometimes you’d benefit more from a Date Created or Last Opened column. You can have these columns, and a few more, in Snow Leopard. With the dialog box in list view, Control-click on a column header for a contextual menu of column choices.

Once you have the columns you need, sort, rearrange, and resize them the same way as in a Finder-window list view. When you need more room in the dialog box to see all your columns, drag the bottom-right corner to resize it. These changes are application-specific, so you have to design your dialog boxes for each program; but, once you set them, they remain that way until you change them again.

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By Dave Rudden
GamePro (online)
February 1, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - GamePro is reporting live from Apple’s press event–check out our feed here. At the event, the company has just announced a device called the iPad, which seemingly merges two of the company’s most popular products–the iPhone and the Macbook. The half inch thin, one-and-a-half pound heavy device looks like a large iPhone–there are no buttons on the device, just a nine-and-a-half inch wide screen with multi-touch capabilities. The product uses Apple’s 1 GZ A4 processor and comes with flash memory totals of 16, 32, or 64GB. In terms of connectivity, it boasts WiFi (including 802.11n), as well as Bluetooth capabilities–some models will include 3G, while others won’t. Those who choose to use 3G can pay $15 a month for up to 250MB of data usage, while an unlimited data plan runs $30 a month.

In terms of games, the iPad is engineered to work with almost every iPhone app and game, displaying the app in different ways–either at its original size in a black box, or in full-screen with the app being run in “pixel double” mode. While the company obviously cherry-picked it for the event, iPhone game Snowcross still looked sharp on the iPad’s screen. But don’t expect the suite of games on the iPad to be relegated to up-rezzed iPhone leftovers–Apple also announced that the iPad will have it’s own development kit that is now available to app developers, allowing them to play to the iPad’s better processing power, larger screen, and higher resolution.

Some game developers have already had access to the SDK. One such company was EA, who created a version of Need for Speed Shift exclusively for the iPad. Taking advantage of the large screen by allowing the player to steer the wheel by gliding your fingers over it and check the rear-view mirror by tapping it, the game currently does not have a price. GameLoft also showed a new version of Nova, its first-person shooter franchise that has been garnering some acclaim on the iPhone. Nova will be available later this year, while Need for Speed Shift wasn’t denoted a date. Neither game’s price is known yet.

On a (potentially) GamePro-related note, the iPad will also have a new app called iBooks, an electronic reader that allows you to fill your virtual bookshelf with books (and perhaps magazines) that are displayed just as they are on the printed page. Just like music has iTunes and games have the app store, iBook will have an iBook Store. The iBook app uses the ePub format, one of the most popular electronic reader formats in the world.

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By David Dahlquist
Macworld.com
January 25, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO - Mary Bogdan is a New York-based artist whose work has been exhibited at the New York Museum of Modern Art. She also claims to have an obsession with Steve Jobs that spans back 30 years. In olden times, that’s the sort of thing one might keep to one’s self. But in the Internet Age, the obvious course of action is to not only declare such obsessions publicly but to also commit them to video.

So naturally, Bogdan has produced a video called “Steven Jobs & Me”, which features one of PodBrix’s lovable Steve Jobs plush dolls in a number of settings around the house–some Mac-related, some not.

The video–a slideshow more than anything–is equal parts charming, touching, and just a tad bit creepy. The Mac paraphernalia in many of the shots illustrates just how much Apple has affected Bogdan’s life. A Power Macintosh 7500, a first-generation iMac, a Macintosh Plus, and stacks of old Mac software boxes all make brief cameos. The soundtrack by Kenetic Music adds a dreamy, nostalgic flavor to the mix.

There’s no word on the Apple CEO’s reaction to the video or whether he’s started varying his routes to and from work.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
January 7, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - There was a time when Microsoft ruled the Web, when its Internet Explorer (IE) browser enjoyed a supremacy only exceeded by its Windows operating system.

That was no coincidence, of course: IE has been bundled with Windows since 1995.

But the days of IE owning a 95% share of the browser market are long gone, assaulted first by the appearance, and then success, of Mozilla’s open-source Firefox, followed by a resurgence of Apple’s Safari on the back of gains in Mac share, the efforts of a small Norwegian developer, and the entry last year by Google into the fray.

Now IE seems to be on the ropes. In the last five years, it’s lost nearly a third of its market share as the once-dead browser space has been reinvigorated with faster, smaller and more flexible rivals.

It looks like the trend will be tough, very tough for Microsoft to turn around.

How tough? Computerworld asked a pair of browser experts, including an executive from Net Applications, the California-based Web metrics company most often cited for browser standings, to explain why IE will lose even more ground in 2010.

That’s what the numbers say. The erosion in IE’s share of the browser usage pie shows no sign of abating, and in fact is accelerating, according to data from Net Applications.

IE lost 7.8 percentage points during 2009, ending the year at a new low of 62.7%, an annual loss rate of about 11%. In 2008, IE lost 8.3 points, for an annual loss rate of 10.5%. That’s a pretty clear trend line.

More troubling for Microsoft is evidence of a quickening in IE’s decline. IE lost an average of 0.94 of a percentage point in each of the last six months of 2009, nearly triple the 0.36 of a point average decline during the first six months. (The difference in 2008 between first half and second half was less dramatic: IE lost an average of 0.6 percentage point each of the first six months of 2008, dropped 0.8 point each of the six months in the second half of the year.)

In fact, if the loss rate of the last three months of 2009 continues — IE fell by more than 3 points from October through December — IE will become a minority browser about a year from now, sometime in January 2011.

The EU makes Microsoft go to the polls. After a year-long battle, antitrust regulators in the European Union last month approved a deal with Microsoft that requires the company to add a browser ballot screen to Windows. The ballot, which appears on any PC that has IE set as the default browser, lets users pick one or more rival browsers to download and install.

The ballot screen will add to IE’s troubles, argued Sheri McLeish, an analyst with Forrester Research. “Certainly another reason [for IE's continued decline] that you can point to is the EU’s browser menu,” said McLeish.

Vince Vizzaccaro, executive vice president with Net Applications, agreed that the ballot’s potential for change was real, but was less sure that IE would be affected. “This was a long, drawn out battle with extremely high stakes,” he said. “What this means to future browser usage market share in Europe is unknown now, but the bet here is it will be significantly different than it would have been otherwise.”

The browser ballot screen will begin appearing on European users’ desktops in mid-March.

Chrome’s a threat. In the 16 months since Google launched Chrome, the browser has captured an impressive 4.6% share, according to Net Applications’ newest data, and in the process has grabbed the No. 3 spot from Apple’s Safari.

In fact, Chrome boosted its usage share last year more than any other browser. In the stretch from December 2008 to December 2009, Chrome’s share grew by 3.2 percentage points, more than the second-place Firefox, which increased its share by 2.9 points.

Although it’s unclear which rival has been most affected by Chrome’s hard charge, both McLeish and Vizzaccaro said that Google was one factor in IE’s slide. “Given the inroads Firefox has been making in the past few years, the maturation of Chrome, and uptake [of] Safari, Microsoft will be hard pressed not to lose market share, particularly on the consumer side,” said McLeish.

Vizzaccaro noted that Google only flexed its marketing muscle late in 2009, and assuming it continues to do so, will likely grab even more share this year. “Chrome showed up in ads on Google’s search page, which almost never happens,” he said. “[And] Google also announced the ongoing development of Chrome OS to up the battle with Microsoft and Apple.”

Chrome OS , which won’t appear on netbooks until later this year, is based on the Chrome browser; any gains Google’s operating system makes this year will be accompanied by increases in Chrome’s share.

IE8’s fails to hold on to Microsoft’s users. Microsoft may have sat on its haunches, and its laurels, for far too long, long enough to let Firefox and Chrome and Safari and Opera make inroads on IE’s once-mighty share, but it told users throughout 2008 and early 2009 that Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) would change all that.

It didn’t work out that way.

Although IE8 is now the most-used version of Internet Explorer, its growth hasn’t offset the contraction of IE6 and IE7, says Net Applications’ numbers.

Last year, IE8 increased its share by 20 percentage points, but in the same period, IE6 lost 13 points and IE7 dropped 20 points. Net loss to Microsoft: 13 percentage points.

In other words, although Microsoft’s made headway in its campaign to convince people to abandon IE6 and IE7 for the more modern IE8, it’s shedding users along the way.

McLeish put forward one theory to explain the situation. “We should see more migrations to IE8 as people upgrade to Windows 7, but in businesses there’s still a reliance on IE6 because of legacy apps that only work in IE6,” she said. “In these instances an alternative to IE like Firefox may be more attractive because they can run at the same time, whereas IE6 and IE8 cannot coexist.”

Mobile browsing IE has never played much of a role in the mobile space — Opera Mini is the leading browser on phones — and with a recent jump in mobile browsing, it looks like Microsoft will be left even further behind.

“Mobile browsing usage share exploded in December 2009,” said Vizzaccaro, who added that during the month, mobile devices accounted for 1.3% of all those that were used to surf the Web.

Although mobile hardware accounted for a relatively small share, with their individual shares even smaller — the iPhone, for instance, had only a 0.44% share, phones powered by Google’s Android an almost infinitesimal 0.02% — month-over-month increases were dramatic. Android phones, for example, increased their share by nearly 56% between November and December, while RIM and the iPhone boosted theirs by 22% and 20%, respectively.

Windows Mobile — Net Applications tracks it as Windows CE — meanwhile, stayed flat from November to December, at 0.05%. With zero mobile momentum, IE’s won’t be able to take advantage of what looks to be a banner year for mobile browsing.

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By Carrie-Ann Skinner
PC Advisor (UK)
January 7, 2010

LONDON - More than 25 million new strains of malware were created last year, says PandaLabs. According to the security vendor’s Annual Malware Report, the number of new versions of malware identified has topped the 15 million identified throughout the company’s 20-year history.

PandaLabs said that 66 percent of the new malware identified were banking Trojans, and the next popular type was scareware, also known as fake antivirus software that encourages web users to part with their hard-earned cash to download hoax security software that serves no purpose.

The security vendor predicts that the amount of malware in circulation will continue to grow during 2010.

“Windows 7 will surely attract the interest of hackers when it comes to designing new malware, and attacks on Mac will increase. While we are likely to witness more politically motivated attacks the report concludes that, once again, this will not be the year of the mobile phone virus,” said PandaLabs.

The report also revealed that 92 percent of all emails sent in 2009 were classed as spam, and social networks such as Facebook and Twitter became popular with cybercriminals as a distribution channel for malware.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
January 4, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Apple will report selling another record number of Macs in the final quarter of 2009 when it unveils its financial figures later this month, a Wall Street analyst said Thursday in a note to clients.

Brian Marshall, of BroadPoint AmTech, estimated total Mac sales at 3.3 million units for 2009’s fourth quarter. If Marshall’s calculations are accurate, it would mean Apple broke the record sales of 3.05 million Macs set in the year’s third calendar quarter by 249,000 machines, an increase of 8.5%.

Year-over-year, Marshall’s estimate of 3.3 million Macs would be a 31% increase from the 2.3 million systems Apple sold in the fourth quarter of 2008. That kind of gain would be a return to Apple sales trends during 2008, when the company racked up impressive year-over-year increases ranging from 21% in the third calendar quarter to a whopping 51% in the first quarter.

Assuming Apple beats the industry average growth again in the fourth quarter of 2009 — as seems certain, even if Marshall’s estimate is on the high side — Apple’s sales will have outpaced the average in 20 out of the last 21 quarters. The one exception: The first quarter of 2009, when Apple failed for the first time since 2003 to boost Mac sales year-over-year.

According to Gartner Research, global computer sales will grow by just 2.3% during 2009.

Marshall also joined other analysts in predicting a resurgence of Apple’s desktop sales by pegging the company’s sales for the fourth quarter at 865,000 units, a year-over-year increase of 19% and a quarter-over-quarter gain of 10%.

Earlier in December, retail research firm said that sales of Apple’s desktops — the iMac, Mac mini and Mac Pro lines — were up 74% during October and November in the U.S. At the time, analyst Stephen Baker of NPD credited the revamped iMac for the sales surge.

Apple unveiled the new 21.5- and 27-in. iMacs — the latter available with quad-core Intel processors for the first time — on Oct. 20. Since then, however, questions have cropped up about the 27-in. iMacs’ graphics cards and displays, with large numbers of customers reporting flickering screens , a problem multiple authorized resellers said resulted in Apple’s decision to delay shipping the largest, most expensive models.

Apple will issue its official sales numbers for the fourth quarter in the second half of January during an earnings call with financial analysts.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
January 4, 2010

FRAMINGHAM - Microsoft’s Windows resumed its usual losing form last month as the operating system’s usage share dropped by about a third of a point even as the new Windows 7 posted a second straight month of impressive gains, Web metrics firm Net Applications said Friday.

Although rival desktop operating systems — Mac and Linux — essentially remained flat, mobile OSes, including Google ’s Android and Apple ’s iPhone OS, took up the slack created by Windows’ dip. Mobile operating systems, said Net Applications, now power 1.3% of all the hardware that surfs the Internet.

Windows finished the year with a 92.2% share, down 0.3 of a percentage point. It was the eighth month in 2009 during which Windows lost share.

As it did in 2008, Windows’ decline again accelerated in the second half of the year, when it lost 1.2 points of share. That compared to a drop of just 0.5 of a percentage point in the first six months of 2009. In 2008, Windows also lost more than twice as much share between July and December as it did in the preceding six months.

But the slip doesn’t mean Windows is in any danger of losing its grip on the operating system market anytime soon: At the pace of the last 24 months, Windows would retain a majority share for another 27 years.

As in November , both Windows XP and Windows Vista lost share in December, while Windows 7 gained ground. Unlike in November, however, Windows 7 was unable to make up for the decline in Microsoft ’s older operating systems.

Windows XP slid 1.3 percentage points in December, its second-largest one-month decline ever. (The record remains November, when XP lost 1.4 points.) Vista, meanwhile, lost 0.7 of a percentage point, a single-month record, to end at 17.9%. December was the second month in a row that Vista lost share, and the third in the last four months, a trend that points to a permanent decline as users abandon it for Windows 7.

Still, the bulk of Microsoft’s losses since the Windows 7 launch on Oct. 22 have been from Windows XP; the eight-year-old OS has lost 2.7 points in the last two months, while Vista has lost only 1 point.

Microsoft’s newest OS, on the other hand, boosted its share by 1.7 percentage points to end December with 5.7%, meaning that approximately 1 out of every 18 machines on the Web ran Windows 7 last month. If it can keep up the pace of the last 60 days, Windows 7 will crack 7% this month, beating Vista to that number by six months.

Windows 7 also reached a milestone on Jan. 1, 2010, when it posted an 8% share for the day. The previous one-day record of 7.6% had been set on Dec. 27, 2009.

Apple’s Mac OS X dipped for the second month in a row, finishing December with 5.1% after a decline of a statistically insignificant 0.01 of a percentage point. Most months, however, Mac OS X posts gains, not losses: December was only the fifth month of 2009 in which Apple’s operating system lost share.

The winner, according to Net Applications: mobile operating systems, which accounted for 1.3% of all OSes powering devices that browsed the Internet in December. Although their shares remained small — the largest was Java Platform, Micro Edition, with just 0.53%, followed by the iPhone OS with 0.44% — month-over-month increases were dramatic in some cases. Google’s Android operating system, for example, increased its share by nearly 56% between November and December, while RIM and the iPhone boosted their shares by 22% and 20%, respectively.

Net Applications measures operating system usage by tracking the machines that surf to the 40,000 sites it monitors for clients, which results in a pool of about 160 million unique visitors each month. It then weights share by the estimated size of each country’s Internet population.

December’s operating system data can be found on Net Applications’ site.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
December 21, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - Mozilla on Thursday issued a fifth beta of Firefox 3.6 rather than move on to a release candidate, a decision that will push the final code ship date into early 2010, a company executive said Friday.

Firefox 3.6 Beta 5 was released as an update to current testers early Thursday, and can also be installed by others who download it from Mozilla’s site.

Beta 5 includes nearly 130 fixes from the last beta , which Mozilla released in late November. The fixes resolved numerous crash bugs, including a major crash problem in the Mac edition’s TraceMonkey JavaScript rendering engine , and other bugs in Firefox’s private browsing mode, the automatic password retrieval component and the fast startup module.

The release of the new beta was up in the air last Monday, when Mozilla said it was only one option for the week. “Beta 5 builds are being tested by QA now, targeting a Thursday release unless we get to RC [Release Candidate] first,” the company said in a weekly status meeting . “We are really, really close to being code-complete & only need 8 more patches and a TraceMonkey merge. If we can go to build today or tomorrow, QA will scrap Beta 5 and we’ll release RC to the beta audience ASAP.”

The appearance of Beta 5 means that Mozilla has pushed back both the Release Candidate — typically the last preview milestone — and the final, finished software.

“Mozilla released a fifth version of Firefox 3.6 to its more than 600,000 beta users as part of its continuing program to gather feedback and get fixes into the hands of the people evaluating the preview,” said Mike Beltzner, director of Firefox, in an e-mail Friday. “We expect to be able to issue a release candidate before the end of this year, but we’ll likely hold off on the official release until early in the new year.”

As recently as September, Mozilla was planning to deliver the final of Firefox 3.6 by early November. Subsequently, Mozilla began using a by-year’s-end window to describe its release plans for Firefox 3.6.

Such delays are not unusual. Last year, for example, Mozilla originally shot for a late-2008 release of Firefox 3.5, but eventually postponed the ship date to mid-2009 in order to add features and quash troublesome bugs in the then-new TraceMonkey.

Firefox controls about 25% of the global browser market, according to the most recent data from U.S.-based metrics company Net Applications. Over the past week, however, Firefox’s share slipped slightly as users tried out Google ’s Chrome, which made beta for Mac and Linux on Dec. 8.

Firefox 3.6 Beta 5 can be downloaded from Mozilla’s Web site for Windows, Mac and Linux. People using an earlier preview of Firefox 3.6 should see upgrade notices shortly if they haven’t already.

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By Erik Larkin
PC World (US)
December 21, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO - A dangerous vulnerability in Internet Explorer 6 and 7 became publicly known before a fix was available, raising the specter of a high-risk zero-day attack.
The bug involves the way IE handles Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) objects, and could let an attacker run any command on a targeted Windows XP, Vista, Server 2003, or Server 2008 PC. Bad guys have already posted sample attack code online. IE 8 is not affected. For more information, see Microsoft Security Advisory 977981. Meanwhile, a bug in the way Windows handles Embedded OpenType could allow a baddie to take over vulnerable Windows XP, 2000, or Server 2003 computers via malicious Websites or poisoned Office documents. The bug can’t harm Vista or Server 2008, and doesn’t affect Windows 7. Read Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-065 for details.
Office File Flaws

Two other patches repair Office flaws in Excel and Word affecting Office XP and 2003, and Office 2004 and 2008 for Mac.
The Excel bug endangers Office 2007, Office Excel Viewer 2003, and the Office Excel Viewer Service Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007 File Formats. The Word flaw also affects Open XML File Format Converter for Mac, Office Word Viewer 2003, and Office Word Viewer. Microsoft rates the flaws as im­­portant; see Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-067 (Ex­­cel) and Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-068 (Word). Microsoft has also released two critical fixes for business networks. One closes a hole in the Web Services on Devices application programming interface; it’s critical for Vista and Server 2008 (see Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-063). The second flaw affects only Windows 2000 systems running License Logging Server (see Microsoft Security Bulletin MS09-064).
Java and Opera Bump Up

Sun’s Java Runtime Environment (JRE) and Java Development Kit (JDK) Update 17 closes a number of holes, including a serious flaw that allows attacks via Web pages. Java will check monthly to see whether updates are available, but you can check manually, too: Open Control Panel and double-click the Java icon. On the Update tab, click Update now. After updating, you may need to remove old Java versions manually with Add or Remove Programs. For details, or to download the latest Java, head to Sun’s Java SE Downloads page.
Version 10.10 of Opera’s Web browser fixes numerous bugs, including one that might let malicious JavaScript on a Web page launch an attack. Click Help, Check for updates to confirm that you have the latest version of Opera; if not, you can download Opera 10.10 from PCWorld’s Downloads Library.
Fix Shockwave and Mac OS X

An attack on critical vulnerabilities in Shockwave Player versions prior to 11.5.1.601 could “run malicious code on an affected system,” Adobe says. Check your Shockwave version at Adobe’s special testing page, and get the latest iteration (Shockwave 11.5.2.602) from our Downloads pages.

Finally, the Mac OS X 10.6.2 update corrects various problems involving PDF files, H.264 movies, TIFF images, and other things. Get it via Software Update, and read more at About Security Update 2009-006.

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By Ken Gagne
Computerworld (US)
December 21, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - Despite the recession, Mac sales continue unabated. Whether it’s a result of the Windows XP-to-Windows 7 upgrade debacle, the hip “Get a Mac” ads, or a halo effect from the successful iPod and iPhone lines, many consumers are probably celebrating their first holiday season as Mac users.

My sister-in-law is one such convert, and as a dutiful relative, I’ve tried to reflect her new status in my holiday shopping. But what do you get a new Mac user? My own power-user needs are very different from hers, but I eventually realized that regardless of the level of tech-savviness, every Mac user has the same basic needs.

Cool stuff

With that in mind, I’ve compiled this list of gifts for the new Mac user and checked it twice. I’ve chosen software, hardware, books and more that are all under $100, with many costing less than $50. You’ll find something here for the switcher in your life — or you can forward this list as a gentle hint about what you might like to find in your own stocking.

(Also don’t miss Computerworld’s 2009 holiday gift guide and ourvideo gift guide for the gadget generation.)

Easing the transition

Despite the Macintosh’s reputation for being easy to use, it’s still a foreign machine to someone accustomed to working the Windows way. However, ever since Apple switched to Intel inside, the Macintosh can run Windows as well as any Dell. It takes a bit of extra software to do it, though.

Each Mac now comes with Boot Camp, which lets users choose their start-up operating system du jour, be it Mac OS X or Windows. A more seamless experience is offered by Parallels Desktop for Mac ($80) and VMware Fusion ($80), both of which run Windows software in the Mac environment. For an extra $20, the Switch to Mac edition of Parallels includes cables, software and tutorials for migrating data and applications from a Windows machine to a Mac.

But the main benefits of the Mac are found in its native operating system, so the sooner your new user makes the transition, the better. Switching to the Mac: The Missing Manual, Snow Leopard Edition ($30), released just this month, describes familiar Windows processes and their Macintosh equivalents, including how to translate data from one to the other. Users interested in the Mac’s tools for producing, editing and organizing digital media might benefit from Visual QuickStart Guides for iPhoto and other programs in the iLife suite.

And for ongoing news of new Mac developments, there’s always Macworld, Seth Weintraub’s blog AppleInk and (need we mention it?) Computerworld’s own ongoing coverage.

Games

Though few people buy a Macintosh for the games, there are some great titles that have made their way to Mac OS X and provide a pleasant diversion for anywhere from a few minutes to an entire weekend.

Peggle ($20) is a casual game akin to The Price is Right’s Plinko, where players drop pellets from the top of the screen and see how many bricks they can hit on the way down. World of Goo ($20) is a physics-based point-and-click puzzler in which imprisoned blobs of goo are assembled into structures that their fellow goo balls can scale to freedom. And Braid ($10) is a 2-D platformer like Super Mario Bros. but with fluid temporal mechanics that send the player backward and forward in time. Each of these games has a free playable demo.

More involved games that would appeal to hard-core gamers include The Sims 3 ($50), Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3 ($30), and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare ($55).

Storage

Mac OS X has a better built-in backup utility than almost any other operating system — simply connect a backup drive and Time Machine will do the rest. For a new Mac user to take advantage of this feature, he’ll need the hardware to go with it — usually an external hard drive.

Since Macs come with hard drives ranging from 160GB to 1TB, an external hard drive should accommodate that volume while leaving room to grow. A 1TB Western Digital MyBook for Mac comes in at just under $100, depending on where you shop.

If you have a spare hard drive lying around, perhaps from a previous upgrade, you can be even more economical — sticking it in an external case will cost just a few dollars and put an old drive back into service. Be sure the enclosure is the right one for an IDE drive or a SATA drive.

Gloves

If your new Mac user is a student, chances are he or she got a free iPod Touch with the purchase, courtesy of Apple’s annual back-to-school promotion. Mobile devices with capacitive touch screens aren’t the easiest to use during these cold winter months, though — unless you have the right gear.

Tavo Gloves ($30) have specially designed fingertips that conduct electrical impulses to an iPod’s or iPhone’s screen without exposing the user’s hands to the cold. For a less elaborate but more affordable alternative, try Freehands Gloves (starting at $20, although they range up to $70 for cashmere), whose fingertips simply fold back, revealing the finger while keeping the rest of the hand warm.

Gift cards

If you’re not sure what your favorite Mac users want, why not let them decide for themselves? Apple offers three kinds of gift card: an Apple gift card, good for any product in its online or retail stores; an iTunes gift card, which can be redeemed for music in the iTunes Store (all new Macs come with the iTunes software preinstalled); or an iPhone gift card, which can be applied to the purchase of a new iPhone.

The gift of time

If you’re reading Computerworld, chances are you already know a thing or two about IT. Make yourself available as a resource to new Mac users by volunteering your time and expertise. Arrange a day to sit down together and review each piece of software they’re using and might be having trouble with. This could be the most affordable gift of all — or, depending on your patience, the most expensive.

Apple offers a similar support program, One to One, that costs $99 a year but is available only as an add-on with the purchase of a Mac.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
December 9, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - As anticipated, Google today launched the beta of the Mac version of its Chrome browser.

Last month, Google said it would deliver a Mac beta of Chrome in early December.

The browser, which has been in development for more than a year, was joined today by a beta of a Linux edition , as well as betas of browser extensions for Windows and Linux. The Mac edition does not yet support extensions, as Google dubs the add-ons it and third-party developers have created for the open-source browser.

Chrome for the Mac takes the same approach as the one used by the Windows edition, which debuted in September 2008, and until now, was the only version available as a non-developer build. “We returned to the core principles of the Chromium project and focused on delivering rock-solid depth in a few critical areas for the browser, rather than a breadth of features that are rough around the edges,” said software engineers John Grabowski and Mike Pinkerton in a post to Google’s Mac-specific blog .

Grabowski and Pinkerton also spelled out what didn’t make it into the beta, including extensions, bookmark synchronization, and either a bookmark or cookie manager. The omissions had been detailed earlier by Google in a list of bugs and features that had been pushed to a post-beta build. Pinkerton, in fact, had tweeted about the Mac edition’s lack of support for extensions two weeks ago.

In lieu of those features, said Grabowski and Pinkerton, “We focused on features such as sandboxing our renderer process to help provide a safer Web experience for our users.”

Chrome accounts for approximately 4% of all browsers used worldwide, according to the most recent data from Web metrics company Net Applications. In comparison, Microsoft ’s Internet Explorer has a 64% share, while Mozilla’s Firefox — like Chrome, an open-source browser — owns a 25% share.

“In the short term, I can’t see that it will be significant,” said Sheri McLeish, a Forrester Research analyst who covers browsers, talking about the beta release of Mac and Linux editions. “But Chrome is critical to Google’s long-term strategy, and a sign that they’re continuing to invest in technology that’s widely accessible, like a browser.”

Previously, Google had set aggressive market share goals for Chrome of a 5% share by September 2010 and a 10% goal for 2011. “That’s achievable,” said McLeish, “But Google needs to get even more visibility for Chrome. The barrier they face is the inability of people to change habits — Chrome’s market share now is insignificant compared to Internet Explorer, or even Firefox — so they need to take even more drastic steps.”

McLeish compared Google’s current place in browsers to Apple ’s position when it launched its game-changing iPhone. “So far, Google hasn’t been able to seize on the kind of fervor Apple’s gained with the iPhone,” she said. “But that’s not to say that they can’t, as long as they continue to invest outside their core search business.”

Rival Mozilla welcomed Chrome for the Mac. “As always, it’s great to see more choices available for people who want to make informed decisions about the software they use to browse the Web,” said Mike Beltzner, the director of Firefox.

The beta of Chrome for the Mac can be downloaded from Google’s Web site. It requires Mac OS X 10.5, aka Leopard, or later, and runs only on Intel-based Macs.

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By Glenn Fleishman
Macworld.com
November 26, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO - It’s that time of year when travelers brace themselves to suffer the many small indignities of the road. Why can’t it be easier to print on networks that you don’t have regular access to or transfer files among mobile devices like iPhones? Why is it such a pain to create secure, robust networks with colleagues or friends on the fly using 3G mobile broadband as the Internet connection?

A new wireless networking system, Wi-Fi Direct, will soon help Mac users do all that and more. It lets any wireless device maintain a connection to a network base station while also communicating directly with other devices that aren’t on the same network. And it’s (probably) coming soon. 

The Wi-Fi Alliance announced Wi-Fi Direct in October. The technology will start showing up in hardware and software by mid-2010. Operating system makers like Microsoft and Apple–though they sit on the board of directors of the trade group responsible–haven’t yet signaled their support or a firm timetable for including the technology in new equipment. It’s possible that adapters in a lot of 2008 and 2009 computers and mobile devices will be upgradable, but we don’t know for sure yet. Here’s what we do know:

It’ll be a big improvement over what we have now
In the current scheme of things, Wi-Fi networks come in two flavors: infrastructure, which relies on one or more base stations connected to the Internet, and ad hoc, where two or more computers join together over short ranges. (You can turn a computer into a software base station, too, but the OS X 10.2 to 10.6 implementation can’t do much when compared to a hardware base station.)

Ad hoc Wi-Fi’s flaws

An ad hoc connection would seem to do what Wi-Fi Direct promises. But this kind of connection has a host of flaws, starting with poor security options, low speed, and incompatibility. Ad hoc mode has never been standardized or put through a testing and certification program like infrastructure mode has. This can make it difficult or impossible to use the mode between computers running different operating systems or even different wireless networking hardware.

In ad hoc mode, computers broadcast the same network name with a flag that indicates it’s a computer-to-computer network. With no central coordinating hub, each computer has to listen for broadcasts. That means file transfers and communication tend to crawl along at a fraction of the possible speed.

Apple’s version of ad hoc networking–available from the Create Network item in the AirPort menu–doesn’t allow you to use robust security. It instead relies on the outdated WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) encryption standard. (WEP keys can be cracked in between one and fifteen minutes by someone using free software. Once the person is in, he or she can intercept all data on the network or connect to the network.)

Further, you can only select from 2.4GHz Wi-Fi channels. The 2.4GHz band is the only band that the original AirPort (802.11b) and AirPort Extreme (802.11g) adapters and base stations can use. This band is full of interference. Many other communications devices use it–anything using Bluetooth, cordless phones, base stations, and even some baby monitors. Microwave ovens use a 2.4GHz signal to heat food, emitting noise while active. Industrial, scientific, and medical devices also use the 2.4GHz band. The 2.4GHz band is often known as a “junk” band because of all this jostling and crowding. (For more on spectrum choices, see “Understanding Wi-Fi’s two spectrum bands.”)
Software base station’s flaws Apple also offers a software base station, which was added way back in the Mac OS 8 days, but which disappeared between OS X 10.0 and 10.1; it returned in 10.2. To configure and turn on the software base station, open System Preferences, click on Sharing and select Internet Sharing.

If you choose to share a network connection via AirPort, Mac OS X turns on a software base station and your computer becomes a central Wi-Fi hub. However, the AirPort Options dialog box presents nearly identical options as you’d see for an ad hoc network. And you can’t be connected to a Wi-Fi network and share it with other Wi-Fi clients at the same time.

The technology promises a lot
Here’s a common scenario: You’re traveling with one or more people. You have a fast 3G USB modem for your computer and you’d like to share that 3G connection. Today, you could use either ad hoc networking or the software base station to let your colleagues or friends hook up. But you’d suffer from all the problems I’ve talked about here. With Wi-Fi Direct, other people can connect to your laptop with a high degree of security and simplicity.
Easy connections The protocol includes “service discovery.” In other words, when you try to connect with a Wi-Fi Direct enabled device, you’ll see a connection menu that sums up what it can do. For instance, you might see “printing” or “Internet access” listed as options next to a network name. Today’s Wi-Fi networks only show the network’s name.

Strong security Wi-Fi Direct supports the modern Wi-Fi Protected Access 2 (WPA2), the full wireless security standard that Apple has supported for Wi-Fi infrastructure purposes since 2005. All 2003-and-later base stations and all AirPort Extreme Cards in Panther or later could be updated for WPA2 if they weren’t shipped with such support already turned on. (The original WPA was backwards compatible with older gear, and AirPort Cards could be updated, although not the original 802.11b base stations. WPA2 required additional hardware, limiting support to 2003 and later cards and base stations.)

When you select a network to join, Wi-Fi Direct will initiate a special simplified security connection using Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS). A typical scenario will have you press a button on a printer or click a button in onscreen software on the device to which you want to connect to confirm access. Then a secure process exchanges strong WPA2 keys. (It may be implemented the other way around, too: press a button in software or hardware on the device to which you want to connect, then try to join the network; that’s not clear yet.)

Versatile connections One of the key differences between existing Wi-Fi connection methods and Wi-Fi Direct is that a single Wi-Fi adapter can maintain a connection to a base station while also connecting to other devices in this peer-to-peer fashion.

While some of these features may sound a lot like Bluetooth, Bluetooth is a slow way to connect. It’s designed for peripherals that have very little room for batteries, and is already found in hundreds of millions of handsets worldwide. Bluetooth will become faster in mid-2010, using 802.11g for up to 25Mbps for data transfers. But even that new version is keyed more towards device-to-device and peripheral connections rather than network connections or very large transfers. 

Speed Wi-Fi Direct will work with the far less frequently used 5GHz Wi-Fi channels, which can carry data at much higher rates than 2.4GHz because of a lack of interference and the ability to employ “wide” channels that use twice the frequency range. (Technically, you can have wide channels in 2.4GHz, but the lack of spectrum in that band makes it impractical. Apple doesn’t even include the option.)

Glenn Fleishman is a regular contributor to Macworld, and the author of Take Control of Your 802.11n AirPort Network, recently updated for Snow Leopard

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Now here’s a multi-tasking tablet with a youthful style. Sporting a clean white finish with an orange outline, the Genius EasyPen i405 is both professional and trendy. A graphic tablet especially made to make drawing and painting easy with a working area measuring 4″x5.5″, the EasyPen i405 is convenient for writing, sketching and even signing emails.

EasyPen i405 works with both PC and Mac. It features 1024 level pressure sensitivity with the pen tip moving precisely with your hand so you can control the thickness to suit your purpose. The pen is storable. There’s a clip on the right side of the tablet where you can attach the pen when you’re not using it.

EasyPen i405 has 28 programmable shortcut keys, which you can set to do instant-access on your Office or Internet functions. So whether for creative design or for signing important documents, EasyPen i405 is perfect for you.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
November 9, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - Just a week after it last updated Firefox, Mozilla has rushed out a new version of its browser to fix a crash bug that programmers inadvertently introduced.

Firefox 3.5.5, which Mozilla posted for download late Thursday, fixes a small number of what the company called “stability issues” in the release notes that accompanied the update. Unlike almost all interim updates that Mozilla issues about once every six weeks, version 3.5.5 did not patch any security vulnerabilities.

The main bug quashed Thursday was one that was causing a high number of crashes in the Windows version of Firefox 3.5.4, the update that Mozilla launched Oct. 27 to patch 16 flaws.

“We’re seeing lots of crashes in the GIF decoder,” noted Mozilla developer Joe Drew in the message that kicked off the discussion on Bugzilla, the company’s bug and change tracking system. Only the Windows edition of Firefox 3.5.4 was crashing, others reported on Bugzilla. The GIF decoder is the component that parses .gif image files embedded in Web pages.

“This bug was actually caused by bug 514776 which removed the check for null mImageFrame,” said another Firefox programmer, Jeff Mulzelaar, on Bugzilla. “I don’t know why that check was removed.” Information about the bug Mulzelaar mentioned is password-protected and not available to the general public.

Firefox 3.5.5 also fixes a stability bug in the Mac version, and another crash problem in the Windows and Mac editions.

Mozilla’s older browser, Firefox 3.0, was not affected by the bugs. The most up-to-date version of that edition is Firefox 3.0.15, which was also released Oct. 27.

Firefox accounts for an estimated 24% of all browsers worldwide, according to data from U.S. Web metrics company Net Applications.

Firefox 3.5.5 can be downloaded for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux from the Mozilla site; current Firefox users can call up the browser’s update tool or wait for automatic update notifications to appear.

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By Lex Friedman
Macworld.com
October 26, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO - Amazon announced Thursday that Kindle reader software was on the way for PCs. Fortunately for those of us who live a bit better than our Windows-suffering brethren, Amazon has now hastily added that a Mac version of Kindle software is also on the way.

Amazon’s Kindle, of course, is the slim white e-book reader with access to over 350,000 books and counting. (Though, personally, I’d hate to be the guy whose job was to do the actual counting.)
But soon after launching the Kindle device, Amazon quickly bastardized its own noun, releasing Kindle for iPhone and iPod touch. That software offers access to that massive library of digital books, without needing to buy the $260 hardware Kindle. With desktop software, one imagines you’ll be able to read books right on your bright computer screen while you’re supposed to be working.

Desktop Kindle software–whether for Macs or PCs–will mark the first time consumers can buy and read books from Amazon’s library without owning some other pricey hardware. Except for, uh, the computer itself.

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
October 19, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - Apple and Mac clone maker Psystar traded barbs last week in federal court as they simultaneously asked a judge to end the case that began more than 15 months ago.

Florida-based Psystar took the unusual step of conceding to an injunction, saying that it would agree to stop using Mac OS X 10.5, aka Leopard, on the machines it sells.

The two companies have been battling since July 2008, when Apple sued Psystar over the latter’s practice of installing Apple’s Mac OS X operating system on generic Intel-based computers.

Last week, lawyers for Apple and Psystar submitted motions for summary judgment to U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup, asking him to effectively award them the legal victory because enough evidence had accumulated through discovery to warrant a decision before trial is to begin Jan. 11, 2010.

“Psystar Corporation makes and sells computers containing pirated copies of Mac OS X that Psystar has altered to circumvent Apple’s technological protection measures,” Apple argued in its motion. “In so doing, Psystar seeks to appropriate Apple’s enormous investment in Mac OS X and trade on Apple’s hard-won reputation for excellent, highly reliable products.”

Because the motions for summary judgment were essentially reviews of arguments already made, much of the ground had been covered before. As it did in September 2008, for instance, Apple again denied that it controlled a monopoly, a charge Psystar has leveled by claiming Apple ruled the market because it illegally tied its Mac OS X to Mac hardware.

Apple, in fact, again downplayed its market power. “All the evidence contradicts any contention that Apple wields power in a relevant market,” said Apple in its motion. “For example, sales of Mac computers in the first quarter of 2009 represented 7.6% of all new personal computer sales in the United States while the market shares of Apple’s major competitors, Hewlett-Packard and Dell Inc., were 27.6% and 26.3&, respectively, during the same period.”

This week, the research firms IDC and Gartner estimated Apple’s share of the U.S. personal computer market for the third quarter as 9.4% and 8.8%, respectively, still significantly behind HP and Dell.

Apple also argued that Psystar’s reasoning would mean that Apple would be forced to work for a rival , a line it used a year ago. “Psystar is free to compete with Apple — as do scores of other companies — by developing its own operating system, by using open source code or by licensing a system available from other vendors,” said Apple. “But Psystar is not free to copy, modify and distribute Apple’s software in violation of the copyright laws and Apple’s software license.”

For its part, Psystar said it would agree to an injunction preventing it from using Mac OS X 10.5, aka Leopard. “Psystar will happily submit to an appropriately tailored injunction … limited to Psystar’s allegedly illegal activities involving OS X Leopard, since it is only OS X Leopard that this case concerns. Since neither Psystar nor Apple sells OS X Leopard any longer, it is no great burden for Psystar to agree to such an injunction,” its lawyers said in the competing Psystar motion.

That concession, however, is meaningless, since as Psystar noted, it now sells Mac OS X 10.6, or Snow Leopard , with its computers. Snow Leopard is the upgrade to Leopard that Apple launched Aug. 28.

Last month, Psystar won a minor victory when Alsup denied Apple’s motion to stop a separate lawsuit filed by Psystar in a Florida federal court two months ago that accused Apple of tying Snow Leopard to Mac hardware. Then, Alsup chastised Apple for timing Snow Leopard’s release to take place after an important deadline had passed in the case he oversees.

Major sections of both motions were redacted at Apple’s request, primarily those parts that discussed the technology Apple uses to block Mac OS X from running on non-Apple hardware, and Psystar’s resulting work-arounds. Subsequent to the motions filed last week, Apple has demanded that the redacted sections remain private, while Psystar has argued that they should be made public.

Last week, Psystar upped the ante on that front when it announced it would license its technology to other clone makers so they could also build Mac knock-offs.

Alsup has slated a Nov. 12 hearing to take oral arguments from both Apple and Psystar on their motions for summary judgment.

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By Nick Spence
CIO (UK)
October 12, 2009

LONDON - A version of Google’s Chrome browser for Mac is likely to be available by Christmas, earlier than initially reported.
Google chief executive Eric Schmidt broke the news at a New York press conference responding to a question about Chrome’s market share, which some have claimed is disappointing.

“I see a lot of Macs in this room, and a lot of very sophisticated people are using Macs now and we need to get a version of Chrome out for that, which we’ll have in a couple of months. The key to browser strength is speed.”

Google Chrome is billed as a browser that combines minimal design with sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer and easier.

The Mac version was expected sometime in 2010.

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By Dan Moren
Macworld.com
October 5, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO - It’s been a long time coming, but after promises, previews, and unexpected leaks, BlackBerry officially released the desktop Mac client for its popular smartphone platform on Friday.
Prior to this application, Mac BlackBerry owners had to rely on third-party software such as Mark/Space’s The Missing Sync for BlackBerry, or PocketMac for BlackBerry, which RIM had included along with its handsets.

BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac allows users to sync their contacts, calendar, notes, and to-do data between their Macs and BlackBerrys as well as installing and managing applications for the phone. On the Mac side, data can sync with iCal, Address Book, Mail, or any other applications that use Mac OS X’s SyncServices, such as Microsoft Entourage.

In addition, BlackBerry owners can also make encrypted backups of their devices and update the BlackBerry system software when new versions are available. And if you live in a household that has as many BlackBerrys as I have iPods, then no worries: BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac allows you to sync multiple devices with the same Mac.

Among the most interesting features of BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac is that it lets you sync your music and playlists from iTunes. Your mind might immediately conjure images of Palm and its cat-and-mouse games with Apple. How did RIM succeed where Palm failed?

The key here seems to be that RIM doesn’t try to inject support for the BlackBerry into iTunes or have its devices pretend to be something they’re not. Rather, BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac just references the iTunes library stored on your hard disk and shows you your list of playlists in its own application–something Palm could no doubt have done as well, had it been willing to spend the time. In fact, RIM released BlackBerry Media Sync, allowing Mac and PC users to sync with iTunes and other media software, in December of last year.
BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac is a free download and requires Mac OS X 10.5.5 or later, a BlackBerry running version 4.2 software or higher, and at least iTunes 7.2.

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By Tom Kaneshige
CIO.com

Let’s face it, you’re pretty much on your own when it comes to supporting Macs in the enterprise. Apple isn’t going to give you much of a hand. Windows vendors offering Mac products aren’t really geared up to support the Mac. And the number of Mac experts out there pales in comparison to those of Windows pros.
But don’t lose faith. The good news is that Mac people help each other out, more so than the fragmented PC user community. “Typically, Mac people have their own network for support, tips and best practices,” says Jon Oltsik, analyst at the Enterprise Strategy Group. “There is a lot of good advice on the Apple website, as well as others.”

Which ones? We asked IT leaders of Mac-Windows shops where they go when they get stumped or are looking for the latest developments on the Apple platform. When it concerns specific software, of course, they go to that software’s user community. But they also regularly visit a few websites, too. Here are some of their favorites:

Apple Support
http://www.apple.com/support/

While Apple enterprise support itself might be spotty, the user community on the Apple discussion boards is pretty helpful. “There are lots of very experienced Mac heads on there,” says Brad Kugler, CEO of DVA, a distributor of video and audio equipment. DVA is currently undergoing a makeover from Windows to Mac.

Brian Hubbard, senior IT engineer at TMP Worldwide Advertising and Communications, also visits Apple support. But he’s quick to point out Apple’s shortcomings. “I haven’t found Apple support from the standard Apple Care to be too helpful in enterprise situations,” he says. “They have been great, though, on broken hardware and minor OS issues.”

Mac Enterprise
http://www.macenterprise.org/
This very technical, non-profit website helps Mac pros bring OS X clients and servers to a mixed environment. “The enterprise Mac website has a lot of bright people integrating Macs into their enterprise,” says Alex Morken, IT manager of Chris King Precision Components, a manufacturer of bicycle parts, and an all-Mac shop. “They are very vocal, very helpful.”

Version Tracker
http://www.versiontracker.com/
This award-winning Cnet site was founded by a former Mac systems admin nearly a decade ago and quickly became one of the most popular Mac sites helping people stay current with Mac updates. The website has evolved over the years, of course, yet remains a powerful tool in the Mac enterprise toolbox.

Bombich Software
http://www.bombich.com/
Michael Bombich, an engineer who works for Apple, provides some neat and useful tools and scripts on his site, TMP’s Hubbard says. Bombich also has documented the process of integrating Apple’s Open Directory with Windows Active Directory.

Mac Rumors and World of Apple
What’s Apple without a wildly spinning rumor mill? Given the silent treatment from Cupertino, enterprise Mac users turn to rumor websites in hopes of gaining a glimpse of the future. After all, knowing what’s coming can help CIOs plan better. Be sure to take rumors with a grain of salt. The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart recently slammed Mad Money’s Jim Cramer, who was caught on tape showing how to spread Apple rumors to game the stock.
Other enterprise Mac support sites receiving honorable mentions:

Mac OS X Hints
http://forums.macosxhints.com/

Make Mac Work
http://www.makemacwork.com/

MacWindows.com
http://www.macwindows.com/

AFP548.com
http://www.afp548.com/
While all of these sites can help companies manage their Mac environments, integrate with Windows and stay abreast of the latest Apple rumors, Tony Lin, manager of desktop services at TMP, says it’s important to thoroughly test all community advice. In fact, Hubbard runs tests on a dedicated machine before rolling out anything to a production machine.

User communities shouldn’t be the first place to look to solve Mac problems anyway, says Lin. “Our first actions, after performing our own troubleshooting steps, are still to contact the vendors and hope to get solutions from them,” he says. “Taking advice or following instructions from the Internet forums is risky, as no one is accountable for what could happen.”

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By Tom S. Noda
Published in the CWP September 2009 issue 

After years of ignoring the needs of the enterprise, Apple Inc. seems to be making a concerted push into the business world—but are businesses biting?

Once identified only among graphic artists and so-called “liberal” and more “open-minded” IT users, the deployment of the Mac in small-and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is on the rise, as users are finding ingenious ways to work with Apple’s platform, says Melvyn Chen, desktop product marketing manager of Apple Asia.

Chen says Mac’s industry usage span home offices, start-ups, firms that have a large number of mobile professionals, finance, accounting and architecture firms, healthcare, real estate, retail and science and technology institutions.

“Enterprise users of Apple’s XServe server highlight our solid hardware reputation, low running costs due to the unlimited Mac OS X Server client access license, and versatility as a virtualization platform, or the ability to run virtually on any OS like our latest advanced operating system the Mac OS X, even Windows and Linux,” says Chen.

He shares a mid-2008 survey by Yankee Group among 750 senior IT executives which shows that nearly 80% have Macs onboard, an increase of 47% since 2006. “Nearly a quarter of these or more use Macs. Usability features such as Safari browsing, iChat videoconferencing, FileVault encryption, Back To My Mac remote control, Spotlight search, and Time Machine backup were cited as primary user attractions.”

Citing reports from analyst firm NPD, the Apple executive says that Mac today is fiercely dominating the high-end computer market. NPD numbers last June reveal Apple captured 91% of the market for personal computers over US $1,000.

Angeline Tan, Apple Asia’s marketing manager for portable products, believes that some of the factors that make the Mac attractive to enterprises are simplicity, ease of use, integration of hardware and software, graphics architecture, design aesthetics, robustness and, more importantly, the software suite of applications such as the iLife ’09 and iWork ’09 that are available for Mac users.

“Macs are designed with user needs and requirements in mind. We develop not just the hardware but also the software to cater to needs of consumers, businesses as well as the education segment,” she says. “A lot of thought, attention to detail and R&D goes into minute details and features of the product – right from a simple application icon, to the insides of the Macs and even to the packaging.”

MAC’S APPEAL
Tan says compared to PCs, Mac’s advantage—more than the look and feel—is definitely on the OS and software side.

“When you buy a PC, you’re buying hardware from one company and an operating system and software from other companies. Whereas when you buy a Mac, Apple builds both the computer and the software that comes with it. They’re literally made for each other,” she claims. “And Mac OS X resists most viruses, so you can do anything — without worrying about losing everything.”

Justin Zhang, Apple Asia’s marketing manager for the Mac OS product, shares that the latest version of the Mac OS X is what attracts SMEs and educational institutions.

“The Mac OS X has many powerful features like Cover Flow, Quick Look, Stacks, Spotlight and Time Machine, which help users get work done more quickly with our legendary easy-to-use user interface,” Zhang says.

He notes the Mac OS X is built on open, industry-standard protocols and the latest networking security standards which make the product easily integrate with existing IT infrastructure.

“Macs have long been able to work easily with PC-based clients, connect to PC-based networks, share files with PC users, and use the same peripherals,” Zhang says. “Now with Boot Camp in Mac OS X Leopard, businesses can even run Mac applications side by side with Windows applications.”

Designed with security in mind since day one, Mac OS X provides layers of protection that are built-in and not bolted-on.

“Right out of the box, Macs resists most viruses. And with automatic software updates, it’s easy to keep a Mac secure. Plus, with many security features like library randomization, built-in firewall, signed applications and others, Mac OS X is like a nice, warm security blanket for the organization,” Zhang says.

Yet the Mac’s popular adoption among a variety of users is attributed to its wide range of portable computing machines.

“We have a wide range for portables ranging from our most popular notebook among students, the MacBook and the thinnest and lightest of Mac notebook – the MacBook Air – and the desktop level performance MacBook Pro,” Tan says, adding the MacBook Pro 13-inch, 15-inch and 17-inch are popular among mobile professionals because of its portability features, easy network access, and performance.

COLLABORATION CHARM
Tan elaborates that collaboration is one of the Mac’s significant attractions to businesses today.

“Mac OS X server equips businesses with the power of collaboration through group calendaring, instant messaging, wikis, blogs, RSS feeds, mail server and other features,” she says, adding all such services are included at no extra charge with Mac OS X Server that delivers the reliability, stability, and performance of Unix for the most demanding applications and services.

What the Mac OS X does is that it leverages the computing power of 64-bit Intel processors and offers an advanced networking architecture that ensures compatibility and integration with IP-based networks. Standards-based directory support, Tan notes, makes all of the services available in Mac OS X Server easy to set up and manage.

Tan says products like Parallels Desktop for Mac, Parallels Server for Mac, and VMware Fusion give Intel-based Mac and Xserve users the ability to run almost any operating system and its accompanying applications concurrently.

“With an Xserve running server virtualization software, your organization can eliminate the need to maintain outdated or redundant hardware – reducing the load on IT administrators as well as server support costs,” she says.

APPLE SERVER UPDATED
According to Chen, Xserve is a versatile 1U server that fits into a variety of workgroup and business deployments. Mac OS X Server v10.5, with an unlimited client license, is included with Xserve. “With this, you don’t need to worry about hidden fees or per-client charges.”

Chen says that, right out of the box, users can offer file, print, mail, iChat, and do calendaring services; set up group wikis; or quickly produce podcasts. He describes Xserve as “stable, secure, and expandable.” He adds that the Xserve setup software makes it easy to deploy the server into an existing network.

“Xserve supports Mac, Windows, and Unix clients with cross-platform features and industry standards (both hardware and software). It reduces operational costs and has no annual fees like competing servers,” Chen says.

He says the 1U form factor allows customers to add many servers in a small space (increasing computational density).

Among the latest features of the Xserve is the next-generation Nehalem server architecture, wherein each Xeon processor provides three channels of fast 1066MHz DDR3 ECC RAM for up to a 2x improvement in performance compared with the previous generation. And two x16 PCI Express 2.0 slots deliver massive bandwidth for expansion cards.

Chen explains the Xserve also has internal graphics, solid state drive option, and improved energy efficiency. With the latter, Xserve works hand in hand with Mac OS X Server to maximize energy efficiency.

“The high-efficiency power supply of about 89% average makes the most of its energy use. The result is a system that reduces idle power consumption by 19% and delivers 89% better performance per watt than the previous-generation Xserve,” he says.

Although there are no exact figures, the executives claim that there are a growing number of businesses, broadcast and production houses and educational organizations that have deployed Macs in the Philippines.

For example, Apple’s iWork ’09 are being used by businesses because it can run on both the Mac and Windows operating systems. Another Apple software, the Final Cut Studio, is being used by TV stations, the broadcast industry, and film and production houses.

The company officials claim that Apple’s multimedia and creative software are used among local media houses, creative and advertising agencies, and specialist firms like retail, architecture, legal, finance, and healthcare (doctors), among others.

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by John Mark V. Tuazon
Computerworld Philippines

For the duration of its existence, Apple’s claim to fame has always been user experience and design. Steve Jobs’ multi-million empire has easily dominated the multimedia electronics world through intuitive gadgets and elegant devices. But for the same reasons, Apple’s offerings have appealed mainly to the consumer market. With the introduction of Apple devices built with Intel chips and the impending release of the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard, is Apple gearing up to take a larger bite of the fruit by entering the corporate market?

Jude Buyco, IT supervisor for global advertising agency McCann Erickson, seems to think so. As IT head of a company that has been using Apple Mac computers for close to 10 years, Buyco is confident that Apple has what it takes to enter the enterprise scene.

“There are Apple Macs right now that use Intel chips, so Windows operating systems can be installed on dual boot,” he explains. “And there are programs today that allow for Windows applications to be ported to the Mac OS X.”

A changing landscape
The enterprise innovation landscape over the past few years has seen a lot of changes brought about by the need to cut costs while maintaining productivity during the recession. Innovations such as virtualization, consolidation and unified communication have enabled firms to be grounded even as the financial storm raged on.

One such technology—that Buyco sees as the deal breaker for those companies wanting to switch to Macs—is cloud computing, which allows users to access applications through the Web browser. “With enterprise software being ported to the Internet as Web applications, it’s very possible that some companies may opt to switch to a Mac,” he says.

The interoperability of applications has long prevented companies from making the big switch to Apple Macs, Buyco says. “Macs are durable, reliable and very secure, but not a lot of applications—especially those designed for the enterprise—are available for its operating system,” he adds, saying that support from software developers is needed in order for this goal to be realized.

Despite this, Buyco continues to praise Macs for its solid security system. “For the ten years that we have used Macs, I’d say we never had to deal with a single virus targeted at our Mac units in the entire history of McCann Erickson,” he proudly narrates. “Getting hacked on a Mac is likewise a very remote possibility,” he adds.

Not quite there yet
Regardless of these top-of-the-line features, Buyco believes the entrance of Macs into the corporate zone will be won in a very hard-earned battle over PCs. “Macs are generally multimedia computers. They were really built for multimedia and graphics, which sets it apart from the rest.”

Computing power and some utility applications are already accessible through the Mac, Buyco says. “But right now, using a Mac for enterprise purposes is like buying a Volvo car and using it as a jeepney,” he reiterates, citing unique features of Macs that make it suitable only for certain purposes.

“We use around 100 Apple Mac units at McCann Erickson mostly for the Creatives and Design departments, because graphics is really native to the Mac,” he explains. “We use it for graphic design and multimedia editing, among others, because of the clarity and crispness of the graphics.”

Buyco said one could only take a single look at an image produced with a Mac and a PC and not find it hard to tell the difference. “Macs have better color synchronization between the screen display and the actual print output,” he says. “Being in the advertising industry, our clients focus mainly on the color of our outputs.” This, he says, is better achieved with Macs.

Aside from impeccable graphics capabilities, Buyco says they also trusted Macs for their durability. “We have Mac G4, G5 and Macbook Pros in the office,” he narrates. “The Mac G4 is the equivalent of a Pentium III PC, which is already obsolete. Ours is still operational till now,” he quips.

But is their choice to shift to Macs—after using IBM PCs prior to it—a logical step towards improvement, considering the high cost of Apple Macs? “We consider it an investment, because clients are satisfied with the results,” he says. “Otherwise, we consider it as something that generates income and saves us costs, considering the durability and reliability of the units.”

Shifting Perspectives
McCann Erickson’s use of Macs, though beneficial and smooth-sailing at the time being, is not met without a few kinks that needed to be ironed out along the way. “Most of our issues are work-related, such as loads becoming too heavy, units needing upgrade or normal end-of-life problems of components,” Buyco enumerates.

“But one of the main issues with the shift is managing user perceptions,” he clarifies. Buyco says Macs call for a special training course for employees to be able to grasp the new system. “Good thing our artists and designers prefer Macs, so they have a grasp of it already,” he adds.

Buyco advises companies looking to shift to a Mac to think twice before jumping the gun. “There’s a possibility of employees having learning curves, especially if they’re used to operating a PC,” he warns. “It slows down productivity and, strictly speaking, not everyone is prepared or armed to use a Mac.”

SIDEBAR:
CIOs: No Macs for now
Jonas San Luis, assistant vice president for MIS at Insular Life Health Care, thinks Apple has carved an all-too-stable niche that it would be hard to deviate from it. “If your business is more on web, web design and graphics, then Apple has an advantage,” he claims. “But if your business is highly dependent on applications that run only on windows, then shifting to Apple is definitely a no-no.”

Meanwhile, Jorel Montoya, IT group manager for FullerLife Direct Selling, believes the shift shouldn’t focus on the brand, specifications or marketing. “It has always been a perception that Apple Macs are better off used in desktop publishing. All it needs is a change in perception and perhaps competitive pricing,” he explains.
Despite the consensus that Apple has what it takes to become an enterprise computer, both CIOs agree that they would not shift to Mac units now or anytime soon, given its current limitations. “Apple cannot compete with the clones’s which are also present in most companies. If Apple where to get back to the enterprise space, it would take time,” Montoya says.

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By Tom Kaneshige
CIO.com

FRAMINGHAM (03/03/2009) - How hard is it managing Macs in the enterprise? Harder than you might think. Expect lackluster enterprise support from Apple and its horde of Mac developers, for starters. Enterprise savvy Windows developers rushing poor Mac components to market bring frustration, too.
In the corporate world, a shortfall in Mac management can have real impact on worker productivity. Swapping a 20-terabyte file sharing system with one that isn’t native to the Mac, for instance, can spell disaster for Mac folks who suddenly are locked out of critical files.

Such tech nightmares surely will become more common as the Mac makes its way to the enterprise. Apple recently unleashed a hardware refresh, including a rare update to its powerhouse desktop, Mac Pro. New iMacs also came to market, and its popular MacBook Pro received a small speed boost.
In a recent survey of some 700 companies by Information Technology Intelligence, a whopping 68% of respondents said they will allow Macs in their environment within the next 12 months. The survey also found that nearly one out of four companies had at least 30 Macs in their businesses.

“Although Mac’s market share in business is still extremely small, it’s been growing,” says Gartner analyst Mikako Kitagawa. Now Macs are at a tipping point: Many companies are having to hire a Mac engineer for the first time to manage the swelling ranks of Macs. Last year, Gartner began formally evaluating Macs for enterprises.
So what is Gartner’s Mac analysis? “We don’t really recommend Apple,” says Kitagawa, adding, “Apple doesn’t provide standard enterprise support like image service and lifecycle support nor has a global account-management umbrella.”

Nightmare No. 1: Apple’s eye not on businesses

Apple has traditionally turned a blind eye when it comes to supporting Macs in the enterprise-and that’s bad news for Mac engineers trying to keep up with the PC counterparts.

When Dell, for instance, plans to release a new PC to the market, the computer maker will give the machine to its enterprise customers a month earlier. Systems management engineers can test and certify their standard Windows build, VPN and third-party applications. When the new PC hits the market-and business users want it-the engineers are ready to support it. Mac engineers, on the other hand, get their hands on a new MacBook Pro along with everyone else.

To be fair, Apple does provide good support for enterprises in a small slice of industries, such as broadcasting, advertising and graphic design, says Gartner’s Kitagawa, yet there are no signs that Apple will support the Mac in enterprises more broadly. So the burden falls on the internal IT department, often a lone Mac pro, to find alternative Mac solutions and support.

Nightmare No. 2: Windows developers deliver weaker Mac options

It’s very tempting to use third-party Windows tools for the Mac. Chances are you already own the optional Mac feature in, say, an existing Windows desktop management suite. Just flip the switch, right? The promise of a single tool that manages both Windows and Mac platforms and delivers a single view can be enticing but may run into problems, say Mac engineers. Getting good enterprise-class support for Mac features from Windows developers can be problematic at times, too, they say.

Nightmare No. 3: Small Mac vendors struggle with enterprise support

Given poor Mac options in many Windows management suites, Mac pros often turn to Mac-only management tools. For the most part, the tools work well. The problem comes when these small Mac vendors that are mostly geared toward small Mac shops need to provide enterprise-class support.

These vendors might take a day to respond to a support query. Rarely will the enterprise Mac engineer talk to the same support technician twice, and so the engineer will have to rehash his history, environment and current problem. This just doesn’t work in an enterprise IT setting.

Most Mac vendors don’t have technical account managers dedicated to enterprise clients; they simply don’t have the resources or enough enterprise customers to justify the cost. Yet technical account managers who know a customer’s environment inside and out are a staple of enterprise-class support.

On the upside, some Mac vendors like JAMF Software, which makes client management software for Macs, are helping to wake up from this management nightmare. JAMF says it is working with customers to set up a technical account manager system, such as possibly filing the ranks with freelance technical account managers who specialize in Mac support for the enterprise.

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By Michael Gowan
Macworld.com
August 7, 2009

SAN FRANCISCO - When you get right down to it, small businesses face the same everyday essentials as any working stuff–get paid and pay bills.

Accounting software has long been available to try to make these daily duties as painless as possible. Mac-based businesses have several options–both as native applications and Web-based options–that bring varying abilities to the party. While the list below certainly isn’t meant to be comprehensive, it gives you a pretty good idea of what your options are, if you’re on the lookout for Mac-based accounting and business management offerings.

Software
MYOB AccountEdge: One of the more robust accounting software for the Mac, AccountEdge is available in both single-user and network editions. Time tracking, invoicing, bill pay (including electronic payments), and report generation are all included.

Add-on applications can integrate with and expand AccountEdge’s capabilities–data transfer automation, customer relationship management tools and other products. (Acclivity; $299)

QuickBooks 2009 for Mac: Intuit’s small business accounting software is slightly more affordable than AccountEdge. It also includes time tracking, invoicing, bill pay, and reporting capabilities. It’s single-user only. Other nifty features include the ability to back up data using MobileMe, and integration with iCal. (Intuit; $200).

MoneyWorks Gold: A comprehensive accounting package for Mac-based small businesses, MoneyWorks Gold provides cashbook and general ledger support with departmental accounting, purchase and sales orders, accounts receivable, accounts payable, contact management, project database and inventory control, support for multiple currencies, custom reporting, multi-user networking and access control, and more.

Cognito Software also offers other MoneyWorks-branded products, if your needs are more modest or specialized, ranging from “Cashbook,” a basic general ledger app, to “Express,” an invoicing and ledger app, and “Datacentre,” a network server aimed at businesses that want to use Gold in a full-blown network environment. (Cognito Software; $599)

Billings 3: Marketcircle’s Billings 3 is a bargain, provided your needs are a bit more basic. This software’s specific focus is in time and expense tracking. It also generates invoices, lets you send statements, view accounts, set up recurring payments, and soon, track time and expenses on your iPhone. (Marketcircle; $40 )

iBiz 4: Another handy tool for keeping track of billable time, iBiz 4 lets you create customizable invoices, generate reports and statements, integrate contacts with Address Book and a lot more. The new version 4 release features iCal sync, animated graphs, and expense tracking; you can also manage a simplified backup and restore system. (IGG Software; $50)

Web-Based

Your accounting doesn’t have to be chained to one machine. These Web-based options let you access your information from anywhere you can get on the Internet.

QuickBooks Online: Intuit’s online version of QuickBooks offers a lot of options, even at the free level. All versions provide you with the ability to create and send invoices, charge sales tax, track payments, print checks, and track expenses, for example. Some of the more sophisticated features, like creating estimates, time-tracking and billing by customer, and importing data from the desktop version of QuickBooks are limited to the $35 per month QuickBooks Online Plus product. It’s also accessible on smartphones including BlackBerry devices and iPhones. (Intuit; prices start at free and range up to $35 per month)

Freshbooks: Freshbooks is an online invoicing service that’s available in three tiered versions. You can use it to create invoices, manage contractors, track expenses, and track time online–you can use an iPhone app when you’re away from the computer, as well. And a Dashboard widget keeps you tied to Freshbooks as well. (Freshbooks; prices start at free and range up to $39 per month)

Side Job Track: This is a basic job tracking, invoicing, reporting, and project management system intended for independent contractors who work part-time and want to keep track of what they’re working on. It’s simple, and it’s hard to argue with the price. (Side Job Track; free)

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By Gregg Keizer
Computerworld (US)
August 6, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - Apple on Wednesday patched 18 vulnerabilities in Mac OS X, including half a dozen that could let hackers hijack machines by duping users into viewing malicious image files on the Web.

Security Update 2009-003, which was distributed along with Mac OS X 10.5.8 for Leopard users and delivered separately to Tiger users, plugged holes in components ranging from ColorSync and Dock to the kernel and MobileMe, Apple’s for-pay sync and storage service.

But it was the six vulnerabilities in various image file formats that caught the eye of Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Network Security.

“The PNG [Portable Network Graphics] bug is the most interesting,” said Storms of the half-dozen image file flaws. “It’s a pervasive format that’s frequently on Web sites,” he added, noting that attackers could trigger the bug simply by getting users to visit malicious sites, a common tactic in the Windows hacker world.

“It’s easy enough to host one of these malicious files on [a hacker's] Web site,” Storms added.

Apple patched four flaws in the ImageIO component of the Mac’s operating system related to its handling of OpenEXR images, a format developed by Lucasfilm’s Industrial Light and Magic visual effects studio in 1999 and released to open-source four years later. The sixth image vulnerability, also in ImageIO, could be exploited by malformed Canon RAW photographic files.

Today’s security release was Apple’s smallest this year by vulnerability count. In May, for example, the California-based computer company quashed 67 bugs, while February’s security update patched 55.

Storms saw other oddities this time around. “Usually, we see a lot of Safari or WebKit vulnerabilities, or bugs in a lot of third-party components,” he said. “Today, we got neither.”

Two of the bugs Apple called out in its advisory affect Safari, but the flaws are not actually found in the browser. And with the exception of one vulnerability in the “bzip2″ open-source data-compressor, all of today’s bugs were within Apple’s own code.

Storms also called attention to the MobileMe vulnerability, which, although not serious, could be used by unscrupulous friends or co-workers to access someone’s account. “A logic issue exists in the MobileMe preference pane,” Apple said in the advisory. “Signing out of the preference pane does not delete all credentials. A person with access to the local user account may continue to access any other system associated with the MobileMe account which had previously been signed in for that local account.”

“This one’s important only because MobileMe is such a big application for Apple,” argued Storms.

More than half of the vulnerabilities — 10 of the 18 — were labeled with Apple’s “arbitrary code execution” phrase, meaning the flaws are critical and could be exploited to compromise a Mac. Unlike other vendors, such as Microsoft and Oracle, Apple does not assign a threat ranking to the bugs it discloses.

Most of the bugs were specific to Leopard; the older Mac OS X 10.4, aka Tiger, only harbored seven vulnerabilities.

“Tiger users should be happy that they’re still getting bug fixes,” said Storms, referring to Apple’s general policy of discontinuing support shortly after the second successive OS upgrade makes it to market. Apple plans to release Mac OS 10.6, dubbed Snow Leopard, in September.

Based on Apple’s past performance, Storms expects to see one, at the most two, security updates for Tiger after Snow Leopard ships before Apple calls it quits.

Apple bundled the security patches with Mac OS X 10.5.8, Leopard’s latest update. Included with the update were Safari 4.0.2 — Apple unveiled that separately at June’s Worldwide Developers Conference — as well as stability improvements to AirPort and reliability tweaks to Bluetooth.

The security update can be downloaded from the Apple site or installed using Mac OS X’s integrated update service. Leopard users, however, won’t see the security update separately, but should instead look for the Mac OS X 10.5.8 update.

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By Eric Lai
Computerworld (US)
July 23, 2009

FRAMINGHAM - The much-maligned Windows Vista operating system runs on almost one out of eight corporate desktops 28 months after its release, according to a Forrester Research report released today.

Apple Inc.’s Mac OS X also made gains, partly at the still-dominant XP’s expense, but that will start to change in the fall after the release of both Windows 7 and OS X 10.6 “Snow Leopard,” according to the analyst firm.

Vista’s share grew to 11.9% at the end of March, up from 7.3% nine months earlier. Vista was made available to large organizations and businesses on November 30, 2006, and to consumers and small businesses two months later. Growth, while slow to pick up among businesses as with all new Windows releases, is now “steady,” wrote analyst Benjamin Gray.

Forrester’s figures today appear to support an earlier report showing that despite Vista’s bad reputation, North American and European IT managers were “slowly warming” to Vista.

Now, “desktop operations professionals who have already standardized - or are in the process of standardizing - on Windows Vista are comforted by the fact that these investments will ultimately pay off with greater compatibility with Windows 7,” Gray wrote.

Overall, Windows’ share of corporate desktops remained a dominating 96.2%, slightly down from its 96.8% share in July 2008.

XP’s share was 86%. It is “the OS that just won’t quit,” wrote Gray, despite “signs of extremely advanced age.”

“Although Windows XP use continues to slowly fade, we expect the majority of Forrester clients to stick with it until they’re ready to make the jump to Windows 7, despite Windows XP SP2 having already entered its extended support phase and Windows XP SP3 following suit on July 7, 2010,” Gray wrote.

Apple Inc.’s Mac OS X ran on 3.6% of corporate desktops, up from 2.7% nine months earlier.

“As impressive as this growth is, just imagine the possibilities if Apple actually formulated an enterprise strategy - something it seemingly has no intention of doing,” Gray wrote. He also said these statistics are probably an undercount because of the many Macs primarily running Windows XP under virtualization during work hours that are then counted as Windows machines, not Macs.

Gray wrote that many businesses are “in a holding pattern,” waiting for the arrival of Windows 7, which Microsoft was expected to be released to manufacturing today, as well as the release of OS X 10.6 “Snow Leopard” in September.

Gray expects large enterprises to start deploying Windows 7 in late 2010 to early 2011, or 12 to 18 months after its release. Many of those deployments will be “big bang or forklift” ones, rather than rolling refreshes, Gray said, due to the many companies that have been holding off on upgrading their desktop PCs due to the economic downturn.

Forrester’s numbers come via its quarterly survey of 85,000 desktop PCs at 2,600 companies.

Windows 2000 was on 1.2% of business desktops at the end of March, with other versions of Windows holding 1%.

Linux continued to decline, falling to just 0.1% of the corporate market. Gray said there was some hope for Linux in the form of thin clients and netbooks.

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