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Jeff Gamet

Jeff Gamet is the Mac Observer’s Managing Editor, and co-host of the Apple Context Machine podcast. He is the author of “The Designer’s Guide to Mac OS X” from Peachpit Press, and writes for several design-related publications. Jeff has presented at events such as Macworld Expo, the RSA Conference, and the Mac Computer Expo. In all his spare time, he also hosts TMO’s Daily Observations podcast, co-hosts The iOS Show podcast, and makes guest appearances on several other shows, too. Jeff dreams in HD.

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TMO Quick Tip - Leopard: The Return of the Usable Dock

Apple giveth, and Apple taketh away… and sometimes Apple giveth back again. In this case, Apple took away some Dock functionality when it replaced pop-up menus with Stacks. Mac OS X 10.5.2 brings Tiger-style functionality back to the Dock, and it’s super easy to enable. Take your Dock folder view from this… Here’s how: Click…

MCE Unveils QuickStream Portable DV Hard Drive

The QuickStream is available in 6 hour/80GB and 9 hour/120GB configurations, can play back footage to through the camerais built-in display, includes a hot shoe mount, 4-pin to 6-pin and 6-pin to 6-pin FireWire cables, and an AC power adapter. The QuickStream DV/HDV is priced at US$799 for the 6 hour model, and $999 for…

Apple Unveils Aperture 2, Lowers Price

Apple announced the immediate availability of Aperture 2 on Tuesday. The new version of the digital photo editing and management application sports a redesigned interface, a new image processing engine, and a price drop down to US$199. Aperture 2 gained new imaging tools for highlight recovery, color vibrancy, local contrast definition, soft-edged retouching, vignetting and…

iPhoto 7.1.2 Fixes iWeb, Security Issues

The update fixed a flaw where subscribing to a maliciously crafted photocast could allow a remote attacker to run arbitrary code on your computer. It also improved overall stability, and fixed several other minor issues. iPhoto is part of the iLife suite which is priced at US$79. The iPhoto 7.1.2 update is free for all…

Dictionary's Power Reference Tools

Front/Back Matter is loaded with useful reference materials including a lists of the countries of the world, all of the U.S. presidents, all of the states in the U.S., clich?s (including which ones to avoid), and punctuation guides. It also includes the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, weights and measurements conversions, and more. Finding…

iPO Quick Tip - Breaking the iPhone Sync Blues

Occasionally your iPhone or iPod touch starts syncing when you connected it to your Mac only to drop out of the sync process. Even worse, once the cycle stops, it continues every time you plug your handheld in. This fix is fairly easy, but you won’t find it in iTunes. You’ll know if you are…

Microsoft Makes $44.6B Bid for Yahoo

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer stated “We have great respect for Yahoo, and together we can offer an increasingly exciting set of solutions for consumers, publishers and advertisers while becoming better positioned to compete in the online services market.” Googleis strong position in the online search and advertising market has left Microsoft and Yahoo in the…

Microsoft Offers Workaround for Office 2008 Security Flaw

Microsoftis Erik Schwiebert stated on the mactopia blog that the “issue is that our installer is incorrectly granting ownership of the files to a particular local user as it installs them, so that if your Mac actually has a second local user and that user is not an administrator on your Mac, they could modify…

Digital Pics: Importing Specific Images

iPhoto makes it easy to import just the images you want from your digital camera. After you connect your camera to your Mac, select the pictures you want to add to iPhoto, and then click the Import Selected button instead of the Import All button. Importing selected images into iPhoto.

Analyst: Mac, iPod Likely Driving Strong Quarter

Apple is due to report its December quarter earnings later on Tuesday, and American Technology Research analyst Shaw Wu expects the company to once again beat its own guidance. “Based on our supply chain analysis, we continue to expect Apple to beat its guidance substantially (US$9.2 billion in revenue and $1.42 in EPS). We are…

MacBook Pro, Leopard Score InfoWorld Technology Awards

Apple’s MacBook Pro and Mac OS X 10.5 operating system both landed on top of InfoWorld’s 2008 Technology of the Year Awards list. The annual awards highlight the best and most ground breaking products from the prior year. Apple’s MacBook Pro ranked as the top notebook computer thanks to its Intel Santa Rosa chip set…

Ready-made Macworld Expo iCal Schedules

Rock took the time to create a series of iCal calendars you can subscribe to that are all broken down into categories. For example, if you attending the MacIT sessions or the Market Symposiums, there are specific calendars for each. To subscribe to any of the Macworld Expo 2008 calendars, just point your Web browser…

Meander 1.2 Adds Custom Measurements

Meander is a Universal Binary application that lets users plot points, create routes, and measure distances on maps. It supports Google Maps, scanned maps, and more. The application is available for download at the Fastforward Software Web site and is priced at US$19.95. The update is free for registered users.

Creaceed Intros Hydra HDR Image Editor

Creaceed announced its new high dynamic range image editing application Hydra on Thursday. Hydra composites multiple digital images and automatically matches the exposure for all of the pictures. Hydra 1.0 Users can adjust settings, including matching and blending, in real time, and render higher resolution images for final output. Hydra requires Mac OS X 10.5…

Mac, PC Named Best Commercial Characters

Apple’s Mac and PC transcended the ranks of commercial spokesmen in 2007 to become USATODAY’s best ad-based characters of the year. The characters were portrayed by Justin Long and John Hodgman and appeared in 17 advertisements throughout the year. John Hodgman and Justin Long in Apple’s Get a Mac campaign. The advertisements were conceived by…

Analyst: Macworld to Bring Subnotebook, Blu-ray, Movie Rentals

Appleis last offering in the subnotebook market was the PowerBook 2400 in 1997. This time, however, the Cupertino company will likely forego tradition design elements by using NAND Flash RAM for primary data storage to reduce power consumption, improve reliability, and reduce weight. Likely names for the laptop, according to Mr. Wu, include “”MacBook mini”…

DockStar 2.1 Adds RSS, To-Do Support

Ecamm Network announced the immediate availability of DockStar 2.1 on Friday. The update added the ability to monitor Mail’s RSS feeds and To-Do items, added clickable indicators to the menu bar, and improved Smart Mailbox support for Mac OS X 10.5. DockStar2.1 DockStar is a utility that adds badges that track email messages to Mail’s…

Leopard: Regaining the Dock's Hierarchical Menus

One application that returns hierarchical menus to Leopardis Dock is the free HierarchicalDock from Eternal Storms Software. This app creates special folder icons for your Dock that act like the hierarchical menus from pre-Leopard days. Just drag a folder into the HierarchicalDock window, and then drag it to your Dock. Leopardis Stacks…

AAPL Clears $198

Apple left a nice stocking stuffer for investors on Monday when the company’s stock closed at a new high of US$198.80. The Mac, iPod and iPhone maker’s stock climbed $3.80 during the day from its opening $195 price, and $4.89 from its $193.91 closing price on Friday. As of closing on Monday, Apple’s market cap…

Leopard: Auto Quit Print Spools

If you donit want the printer spool icon to stay in the Dock after you are done printing, you can force the icon to behave just as it did in pre-Leopard days. Hereis how: Click and hold on the printer icon in the Dock. Choose Auto Quit from the pop-up contextual menu. Auto quitting a…