AirPlay mirroring is a very cool iOS feature, although its major downside is its limitation to iDevices such as the iPad and Apple TV. Even though the app is merely a prototype for now, it will be a huge step forward for AirPlay mirroring once it’s released, either on the Mac App Store as Stanfill is hoping for or even elsewhere unofficially should Apple turn it down once it’s ready. As of now, only the iPhone 4S and iPad support its AirPlay mirroring technology. However, more iDevices are expected to be supported soon, and best of all, jailbreaking is not a requirement for use.

Look out for further details on Hacksugar from Napkin Studio as development progresses and a public release gets closer. Let’s hope Apple takes the high road and allows this into the Mac App Store once it’s ready, as Stanfill surely deserves it for his hard work in bringing us this amazing new AirPlay implementation.

Via [TUAW]

That sort of use is not supposed to be ideal or even congenial to battery longevity, but over the past 16 years of using a series of Apple laptops—from a PowerBook 5300 to the Core 2 Duo aluminum unibody MacBook in this mode—I’ve had very good luck with batteries, with only my Pismos (one of which has been in regular service for nearly 12 years) ever requiring a battery replacement. Consequently, I can only deduce empirically the battery in the plugged in machine seems to work for me. Your mileage may vary.

However, with my current MacBook closing in on its third birthday, it occurred to me the other day that it might be prudent to check out the condition of the battery. Happily, there are several utilities for doing that, and I downloaded a couple of freeware examples to check out their comparative usefulness, as well as that of the MacBook battery.

coconutBattery 2.7.2

coconutBattery has been around since the PowerBook days, and is a quick and slick tool to provide a snapshot  of your battery’s current health. The utility shows you live information about your battery such as how often it was charged and how the current maximum capacity is dong in relation to the original capacity your battery had when it left the factory.

You are also able to save the current maximum capacity of your battery so you can track changes in your battery’s condition over time.

Data is provided on the following points:

• Current charge: The current battery charge (in mAh – miliampere-hour)
• Maximum charge:The maximum capacity your battery can be charged with (in mAh – miliampere-hour)
• Current capacity: see ->”Maximum charge”
• Design capacity: The capacity your battery could be charged with when it left the factory (in mAh – miliampere-hour)
• Mac model: The Apple model identification string for your Mac
• Age of your Mac: Calculates the age of your Mac using the coded production date in the serial number of your Mac
• Battery load cycles: How often was your battery loaded from 0% to 100%? (for more on this, see the Apple battery information page)
• Battery temperature: Well, this is the current temperature inside your battery
• Battery power usage: Using the MacOS internal power information, coconutBattery calculates the current power consumption of your MacBook

coconutBattery requires a MacBook/Pro/Air and Mac OS X v10.5 or higher (version 2.6.6 is still available for MacOS X 10.4 and iBook/PowerBook support). It’s available as freeware, but a donation is always welcome.

Product [coconutBattery]

Battery Health Monitor 1.5

Battery Health Monitor is another free battery utility for MacBook, PowerBook and iBook owners that monitors  battery health parameters and displays them in an easy-to-read format.

Original capacity is an indication of the battery’s storage when it was new. Current capacity indicates how much that original capacity has changed with use. Current charge shows the battery’s current charge state while Charge Cycles indicates how many complete charge/discharge cycles the battery has experienced. The percentage value indicates approximately what portion of the number of total recharge cycles the battery supports have been used.

The annunciators at the top of the window indicate the state of the computer’s power manager circuit and the battery or batteries installed.

The developer says that Although version 1.5 should work properly on all PowerBook, iBook, MacBook, and MacBook Pro computers, there have been problems in the past with some iBook and Aluminum PowerBook G3 and G4 computers not displaying the “Original Capacity” value or reporting that the battery data could not be read. If this occurs on your computer, you may want to try the older version Battery Health Monitor version 1.2, which is also available for download.

Battery Health Monitor requires a PowerBook G3 (or later) or iBook and Mac OS X (10.2 or later). It’s a universal binary for both PowerPC and Intel Macs.

Product [Battery Health Monitor]

Taking my MacBook battery’s pulse with both utilities, I was happy to discover that both essentially revealed the same diagnosis, and that my three-year-old battery still retains 94 percent of its original capacity, which I consider more than decent after having never done anything to coddle it; I just left the ‘Book plugged in 98% of the time.

Incidentally, one of the things I really love about this MacBook is that when the battery’s capacity eventually does begin to flag significantly, it’s a simple matter to replace it, unlike with the later MacBook Pro models that share the aluminum unibody form factor. Being one who tends to keep my Macs a long time (I still have two 12 year old Pismos in daily service), ease of battery replacement is an important advantage.

As for coconutBattery and Battery Health Monitor, they’re both great at what they do, dirt-simple to use, and the price can’t be argued with. For basic battery information, it boils down to which user interface you like best, although coconutBattery does provide more general information such as the model and age of your machine.

There is also another freeware OS X battery utility you might want to check out called SlimBatteryMonitor. It’s different from coconutBattery and Battery Health Monitor in that its interface is in the menu bar, intended to replace OS X’s default battery condition readout. If that has appeal, you can check it out at www.orange-carb.org.

One of the most popular features in OS X Lion is Resume, which works along with Auto-Save to ensure a user’s documents and other files are always saved in the background and restored to their former state once a Mac is rebooted or an application is exited. While this feature can be extremely useful for users who want to ensure their files are always saved and that they can continue where they left off within any application, it can also prove to be a nuisance for those who want the opposite. Sometimes, it is not in a user’s interest to automatically save their files and documents or preserve an application’s state, and that’s where RestoreMeNot comes in.

Although there are other solutions to this, such as the ability to quit and discard windows by pressing Option along with CMD+Q every time one wishes to do so, RestoreMeNot does it one better by allowing users to automatically disable window restoration in user-specified apps. Although a number of Terminal hacks allowed this to be done in the past, this method is a lot more user-friendly, and rather than being a standalone app, it instead adds a panel in System Preferences that allows a user to choose in which apps to not restore windows. This basically overrides the quit command with quit and discard every time an app is exited, although it does not disable Auto-Save, so modified documents will always be saved even with window restoration disabled.

RestoreMeNot is a free download for all Mac users running OS X Lion, and will save you a lot of headaches in the apps which you don’t want restored the next time they’re launched.

Via [MacStories] ]]> http://www.technologytell.com/apple/78141/disable-lions-resume-feature-in-specific-apps-with-restoremenot/feed/ 0 http://www.technologytell.com/apple/78039/lion-changes-scrolling-paradigm-dating-from-ancient-parchments/ http://www.technologytell.com/apple/78039/lion-changes-scrolling-paradigm-dating-from-ancient-parchments/#comments Sat, 24 Sep 2011 13:02:06 +0000 Charles Moore http://www.technologytell.com/apple/78039/lion-changes-scrolling-paradigm-dating-from-ancient-parchments/ Naples Daily News Mac411 columnist and Naples MacFriends User Group (NMUG) president Jerry King draws our attention to the controversy over traditional vs. so-called “natural” scrolling. King notes that, historically, paper or parchment documents of more than single page viewing length were wrapped across two rolls—unrolled from one and rolled up on the other with a small viewing area showing part of the document at any time. Some were held and scrolled in a vertical position; others were scrolled horizontally. I hadn’t thought abut it in that context. Really traditional.

I use both an iPad and several Macs, and really don’t find switching back and forth between the iOS and Mac OS any more troublesome than I do adapting to driving with an automatic or a stickshift, of which I also own examples of both. I prefer the stickshift and traditional mouse-based scrolling respectively, but can work comfortably with either. I would, however, strongly prefer that Apple continue offering the option of traditional scrolling in the Mac OS for those of us (many) who like it better.

As Wells observes, for more than 30 years, information presented on computer screens has been based the historic scrolling metaphor that dates back to antiquity. Mice and trackballs trained users to drag the scroll squib down to move the viewer down; up to move it up. Then came the iPod, iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, disrupting things by changing the metaphor from moving the viewer to moving the document—what Apple somewhat hubristically calls “Natural Scrolling”.

Wells notes that this change is causing great turmoil amongst longtime Mac users who are finding themselves obliged to unlearn and relearn deeply ingrained muscle memory. Or conversely, they just use Lion’s System Preferences to change scrolling behavior back to the way their muscles are trained. However, that doesn’t restore our full-sized scrollbars, and may in any case prove but a temporary respite, since, as Wells suggests, we can reasonably anticipate that OS X v10.8 won’t support the option to traditional scrolling, noting Apple’s penchant for discarding prior capabilities (eg: floppy disk drives, Windowshading in OS X).

Conversely, if you’re holding off upgrading to Lion but want to get acclimatized in Snow Leopard, you can download a freeware utility from PilotMoon called Scroll Reverser that will switch your Mac’s scrolling to emulate most of Lion’s scrolling features.

You can also use Scroll Reverser with OS X Lion to customize scrolling behaviour beyond what is possible in its System Preferences, for example to reverse the trackpad but not the mouse.

While you’re at it, if you’re a fan of the new order, you might want to grab PilotMoon’s $3.99 PopClip from the App Store, which brings iOS-style cut/copy/paste to the Mac. PopClip appears when you select text with your mouse, and puts Cut, Copy and Paste at your fingertips.

PopClip offers fast copy and paste, as there’s no need to bring up menus or use keyboard shortcuts. It works in most apps as a natural (that word again) part of your workflow.

PopClip requires Mac OS X 10.6.6 or later.

A little bit more than a year ago I got the chance to test-drive MacKeeper for the first time. I really liked the application, but even more, I liked the potential of it. I’ve been using it ever since, catching up to every update, and looking for improvements.

I come to the writing room now from an end-user’s point of view. Far from going through all the features, I’ll comment on things I believe are worth mentioning in the current version. I’ll try to simply sum up my successes and failures over the past year using this wide-range application.

The installer

If you’re new to MacKeeper, maybe you won’t notice the changes made on the installer. If you go to the download section of the site, you’ll get a .pkg installer just over 200KB in size. During the installation process you’ll actually download the application, and then copy the files on the system in a pretty standard fashion. You’ll need an Internet connection for this, of course.

MacKeeper Report

One of the first things you’ll notice after installation on the latest version of MacKeeper is the new screen for the MacKeeper Report. This report focuses on three key areas: Junk (files), Security, and Performance. You’ll get the race car-like interface for these metrics, and you can go from critical, through serious, up to excellent, according to your system state.

The analysis process is pretty straight forward, and after the scan is done, you’ll get the diagnostic along with suggestions to fix the issues the app found. You’ll also get to make choices to act or ignore the issues and then improve the health of your system.

Personally, I deactivated right away the antivirus warnings from the security analysis. I don’t care for having AV software running in my Mac. I believe we’re still in those days where you can avoid threats on Mac OS just with common sense.

It is important to mention, though, that the number of threats for the Mac is growing, and there are certain types of users (e.g. moms and dads) who may not be aware of the latest developments on the Mac-related security arena. Having a good AV installed for them could be the way to go.

Two of the main features I heavily use are the Disk Usage and the Update Tracker.

Update Tracker

Having a way to keep track of application versions in a centralized manner is an amazing and ambitious concept. The fact that MacKeeper developers are going after something like that makes you realize they’re not here just to tackle the easy stuff.

But the Update Tracker has issues. If you have a little knowledge of how complex and diverge are the installation methods on the Mac, you can imagine the effort behind an initiative like this. The updater works well most of the times, but it still misses a few of my installed apps, it doesn’t have a method to force the monitoring of the apps it doesn’t automatically recognize, and sometimes it just refuses to properly update the acknowledge apps.

I’m constantly testing this feature with every new update of MacKeeper. I’m confident they’ll get it mature enough soon, and it’d be even better.

Disk Usage

With the Disk Usage utility there is a mixed feeling as well. It does its job, giving you the info you need about the space every folder takes on you system hard drive. You can use that information to detect opportunities of freeing some disk space. The thing is, it does look like something you’d expect from a Windows system, not a Mac.

I’m still crossing my fingers for a Daisy Disk like interface in the future; something that is even included today on Linux systems as the standard disk space analyzer. This utility does the job, and at the end of the day, it helps me better understand how my files affect the system, but it surely can do it better.

The ZeoDisk promise

The ZeoDisk feature is still on the “Coming Soon” stage. This has been promised for quite a while now and you can’t avoid thinking on the implications of openly offering features that can or cannot be delivered fast enough. Personally, I don’t mind having to wait for it, but it feels least weird to see a year go by with the promise of a “soon to be released” feature.

Finally, one of the strengths of MacKeeper has always been its support. You can get a pretty accurate picture of how serious a company is about a product just by getting a taste of the support they offer. One thing is selling an application; another story is supporting it via live chat, forums, phone calls, email, and ticketing system 24/7.

With the trial version of MacKeeper you’ll get the full support. I’d recommend you try the “Geek on Demand” feature to get the best out of their team of Mac experts available to help you out.

To me MacKeeper is a winner, and you can try it for free by downloading the trial from the MacKeeper site. Have fun with it. It’s worth it.

Appletell Rating:

Buy MacKeeper

OS X Lion brought many changes for Mac users that took some getting used, and may have just been unbearable. For those who are unhappy with some or all of Apple’s new changes and features in Lion, an extremely easy-to-use tool by the name of Lion Tweaks comes in handy.

All a user needs to do is install Fredrik W.’s Lion Tweaks app and click a couple of Yes or No buttons to enable or disable things like Safari’s Reading List icon, the resume feature, permanent scrollbars, and many others. Although many of these features can be enabled and disabled via Terminal, this app makes it much easier for the everyday user to customize his/her Lion installation.

Lion Tweaks is available free of charge from developer Fredrik W.’s web site, along with eight more of his free OS X utilities.

Via [ModMyi]

Apple’s newest software release is a useful tool that allows users of OS X Lion with a recovery HD to prepare an external hard drive or flash drive with at least 1GB of free space for recovery. The app, called Lion Recovery Disk Assistant, installs a Lion Recovery partition to the external media in order to allow a user to create another boot disk. In order to use the app, you’ll need to plug in the external media, ensuring that no data is on it as it will be erased during the process, and then allow it to create a recovery drive.

Apple notes that if a user’s Mac shipped with Lion preinstalled, the external drive with the Lion Recovery partition can only be used with the Mac that created it, and that if the system was previously running Snow Leopard before upgrading to Lion, the external media can also be used with other Macs that upgraded from Snow Leopard to Lion.

Lion Recovery Disk Assistant is available for download through from Apple’s support site.

Via [MacStories]

Normally, this wouldn’t be such a simple task, but developer Guillaume Gete has taken the time to make it so by creating Lion DiskMaker to practically do all the work for you. All you’ll need is your download of Lion in your Mac’s Applications folder (therefore the app is best used right after downloading Lion from the Mac App Store, although this is not required). Lion DiskMaker will also erase any data you may have on that external media, so it would be best to either back it all up or use something you can spare.

You can get more familiar with how Lion DiskMaker works on its info page, although the process of using the app is as simple as opening it, selecting the media you wish to make bootable, and letting Lion DiskMaker take care of the rest.

Product [Lion DiskMaker] Via [MacStories]

Working with NTFS-formatted disks on non-Windows environments has been an unpleasant activity so far for me. It is always related to extra work in the form of additional configurations and many frustrating results.

Before I was a Mac user, I got the “privilege” (as it is seen on the techie community) to struggle my way around the possibility of configuring a few Linux systems to write on some NTFS volumes formatted by Windows.

As it is usual in many Linux-related configurations and tweaks, the process was full of unsupported and experimental installations, system errors, and hours of forum reading activities. Probably, as a Mac user and, knowing that Windows is the main force behind the operative system’s universe, you would think that accomplishing the task of working with NTFS volumes on the Mac OS X would be easy. Why not? Most things on the Mac are.

If you’ve had the need of dealing with NTFS partitions on your Mac before, I can assume it is highly possible you already know fit is not easy, it is not standard, and it is not remotely enjoyable to work (and with work I mean R/W) with NTFS disks at all on a the Apple operative system today.

If you don’t know the right tool, the experience could be as frustrating as it is on any other system besides Windows, even in those we like to see as inferior systems. The main purpose behind this article is to share with you a bit of my experience trying to find that proper application and hopefully save you from making the same mistakes.

As with 99% of the times I need to find a way to solve something, I started at Google when I noticed I could not use my NTFS disk on the Mac. I instantly remembered the additional rpm installer of Red Hat and assumed that something similar could be happening on my beloved unix-based operative system.

Since this is not a new issue on the system, the web already has thousands of articles and blog posts on the subject. Many solutions are available; some of them are free, and some of them are paid. I’ve tested a few, and today I’d recommend the one I believe to be the best among them all: Tuxera NTFS for Mac.

My first approach, as usual, was to go with the free option. As most people, I don’t like to spend money just because. If there is a free application that can properly accomplish the task; that is the way to go for me.

To make it short and simple, if you want to try the free solution, you would need to read a bit about MacFUSE, and NTFS-3G for Mac OS X. I did install the software, test a couple of versions (including beta), and the results were mixed.

The first time I used this alternative, it worked. The keys to this success were the requirements I had at the moment. Just writing a few files into a disk from time to time was enough for me. It wasn’t a bug-free process, but it was pretty decent if you realize you can overcome a few glitches (in the form of errors when trying to copy files back and forth), and eventually accomplish the task for free.

Serious problems began when working with NTFS external volumes became a part of my job. As it turns out, working on a daily basis with external units on a fully-equipped Windows environment, moving around big files, and executing virtual machines on the fly from those units can be highly stressful for your disk, and more important, for your system and its third-party libraries.

There’s only so much the software can do for you, and every piece of software has its limitations. In my experience, working with the 32-bits MacFUSE package bring excessive load to my system, leading to frequent hangs and damaged file systems on the NTFS disks. Trying to work with this model became a nightmare.

Frustrated by the constant error messages, execution of disk-repairing tools, and temporary freezes of my system; I started looking again for a different option. That’s when I found Tuxera NTFS, downloaded the trial version, and starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Tuxera NTFS for Mac supports every version of Mac OS X, including Lion. The support for extended NTFS features and the 64-bits kernel makes it a robust solution for everyone, especially for the demanding users.

My first set of “informal” tests was related to the massive amounts of data passing from one disk to another. With one Firewire 800 and one USB 2.0 disk, moving files from one to the other was not only faster that in any previous test, but as reliable as only the “no-errors” factor can be.

Several attempts to collapse the system with heavy and multiple transfers resulted in a clean copy/move of files every time. It didn’t matter if I was working with many small files or a few big ones; the result was always flawless. At the same time, the system was pretty much unaware of what it was going on. I never got the CPU usage above 2.5%, which is a pretty small footprint for any given process.

Another important feature you gain when using Tuxera is the possibility to verify and repair NTFS disks using your Disk Utility. When I was using the MacFUSE drivers and my disks were giving me a hard time, it was not possible for me to check them using the utility I’ve always used on the Mac. It was simply not supported. Now, with Tuxera installed, it is all “Fine and dandy” as Mr. Carlin would say.

A few more interesting settings can be configured to better suite the needs of your environment or simply your personal preferences. Some of them are related to specific volumes (e.g. disable file system caching) and some other to the general behavior of the software (e.g. always mount unclean volumes).

I’ve been using the trial version of this software and I couldn’t be happier with it. I’d recommend all of you who are having similar issues to try it as well. After you’ve tested its simple installation and flawless performance, I’m sure you will feel that $36 ($30+tax) is more than fair price for such a good product.

There are many options and different approaches to solve this common problem within the Mac community. Some of them work better than others but without a doubt I can assure you that with Tuxera for Mac you can kiss your NTFS problems goodbye.

Product [Tuxera NTFS for Mac]

Earlier this week, Apple released OS X Lion. We’ve told you how to check if your Mac apps are ready for Lion, but if you’re still having problems with some apps, here’s a collection of software developer/publisher statements regarding Lion compatibility right here. Announcements are still being added each day, so check back often to make sure you’ve got the latest versions of your important apps.

• Popular OS X app 1Password has received an update to version 3.6, mostly adding support for OS X Lion and dropping support for OS X Leopard and PowerPC Macs. The main reason for the drop in support for the older OS and PowerPC Macs is that the number of their users running 1Password has dropped dramatically (less than 6% of 1Password users are using Leopard), making it quite pointless for the developers to keep them supported. Also, some new features that developer AgileBits wished to include such as Grand Central Dispatch, which was introduced with Snow Leopard, weren’t possible if they chose to keep supporting Leopard.
• publicspace.net has released A Better Finder Rename 8.85, an update to its popular file, photo and music renaming utility. A Better Finder Rename is a sophisticated tool that caters for the full range of file renaming tasks encountered by the modern creative professional. The new version 8.85 introduces a new default renaming mode for faster file renaming performance on Mac OS X Lion.
• Reggie Ashworth has announced AppDelete 3.2, a major update to his popular application deletion utility for Mac OS X. With a simple Drag & Drop, AppDelete will uninstall anything along with all of the associated items. Mac users will no longer have to hunt through their system to find and delete these items manually. AppDelete is a must-have utility for beta testers and the perfect companion to any Mac fanatic’s toolbox.
• St. Clair Software has announced App Tamer 1.0.8, an update to their Macintosh utility that automatically pauses applications to improve battery life and reduce CPU usage. App Tamer’s unique AutoStop capability automatically pauses applications when you switch away from them, and then restarts them when you click back to them. The new version of App Tamer delivers compatibility with Mac OS 10.7 Lion and improves App Tamer’s gaming mode.
• IdeaSwarm has released AppViz 2.0, a new version of their popular desktop analytics tool for Mac & iOS developers. AppViz helps developers download and visualize their application sales. It features a dashboard that displays an overview of product sales and trends, as well as a graph view for more in-depth analysis. Version 2.0 builds on the feature set of 1.0 and adds many new features including iAds, automated downloading, improved rankings, & support for the forthcoming Mac OS X 10.7 Lion.
• Centrify Corporation has announced that its DirectControl for Mac offering supports the just-released Mac OS X Lion operating system with Active Directory-based authentication, access control and Group Policy for users of Apple’s latest OS X Lion release. IT administrators can easily manage authentication, authorization and configuration of Mac OS X systems, as well as lock down the user’s desktop environment, enabling the Mac to be easily integrated to the most complex Windows environments.
• Econ Technologies has updated ChronoSync to version 4.2.2 and ChronoAgent for Mac to version 1.2.2. ChronoSync is the automated synchronization and backup application for Mac OS X and ChronoAgent for Mac is a utility that runs on the destination Mac and communicates directly with ChronoSync, giving you full root access to the destination Mac. The update includes changes to functionality and aesthetics to ensure compatibility with Lion. Additionally, this update includes several bug fixes.
• St. Clair Software has announced Default Folder X 4.4.3, an update to their award-winning utility for Mac OS X. Honored with Macworld Magazine’s Editors’ Choice Award for Best System Enhancement Utility, Default Folder X enhances the file dialogs in all Mac OS X applications. It provides fast navigation to your files, convenient previews, integrated Spotlight tagging, and more. Version 4.4.3 addresses several late-breaking compatibility issues with Mac OS 10.7 “Lion”.
• DEVONtechnologies, LLC has released updates for all editions of DEVONthink, the #1 information and document manager for the Mac, and for its smaller brother DEVONnote for full compatibility to OS X 10.7 “Lion”. Further improvements include user interface improvements, better AppleScript and Automator support in DEVONthink Pro and up, better full-screen app handling, as well as smart groups with user-defined dates.
• LikeMac Group has announced Disk Order 3.2, a Lion compatible update to its double-pane file manager for OS X. Disk Order is designed to be substitution of the Finder. Just like other famous file commanders it makes file management fast and easy. It can copy/view/edit files, browse archives, connect to FTP servers, download your music from iPod and more. This release makes it Mac OS X 10.7 Lion compatible and adds some usable features.
• Apparent Corporation has announced Doxie, an important update to their award-winning portable scanner for Mac and PC. Doxie makes scanning, sharing, and organizing paper and photos easy, with a lightweight, portable design built for scanning anywhere. Ready for OS X Lion, Doxie adds cloud-based scan to e-mail, and Yojimbo integration. Easily compose new e-mail messages with popular e-mail clients with a link to scanned documents and photos. Doxie works with Mail.app, Outlook, Gmail, and more.
• Xeric Design has updated EarthDesk, its award-winning, real-time dynamic desktop map, to support the forthcoming Lion OS. EarthDesk replaces your static desktop with an image of the Earth showing current sun, moon and city illumination, as well as real-time global cloud coverage. The software operates silently in the background, keeping your desktop updated while you work. EarthDesk’s dynamic desktop is continuously displayed as your desktop background and optionally as a screen saver.
• On the heels of Apple’s release of Mac OS X Lion, GroupLogic has unveiled ExtremeZ-IP v.7.2, the latest version of the only actively maintained and supported Mac-compliant enterprise file server for Mac Windows compatibility. Today’s release comes complete with support for Mac OS X Lion and will allow organizations to seamlessly use and support multiple versions of Mac OS X. In addition, GroupLogic will now bundle its ShadowConnect at no additional cost, allowing Macs to instantly self-restore previous versions of files and folders from the Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy service (VSS).
• Insider Software has released FontAgent Pro 4.2 for Macintosh, an update to the industry’s best font manager with Mac OS X 10.7 Lion compatibility. FontAgent Pro provides full control over the auto-activation process. It detects subtle differences among fonts to deliver the most accurate font activation possible. Built on Insider’s unique FontSavant technology, the 4.2 release includes auto-activation plug-ins for Adobe CS5.5, CS 5.5.1 and QuarkXPress 9.
• Houdah Software has announced HoudahGeo 2.9, the one-stop photo geocoding solution for the Mac. HoudahGeo 2.9 adds support for iPhoto libraries which reference images located on external drives. HoudahGeo 2.9 also improves compatibility with Mac OS X 10.7 Lion. With HoudahGeo you may pin photos to locations where they were taken. Just like an expensive GPS camera, HoudahGeo may store latitude, longitude and altitude information right within the image file – invisibly with no loss of quality.
• IGG Software has announced it has completed testing of iBank 4 for compatibility with Lion, the forthcoming version of Mac OS X. With the release of iBank 4.2.4, now available for download from IGG’s website and the Mac App Store, iBank has been declared Lion-ready. The new improvements in version 4.2.4 build upon longstanding iBank features such as direct downloads from online accounts, custom check printing, robust data export and iPhone sync.
• Apple security specialist Intego has announced its entire software line-up is now fully compatible with OS X 10.7 Lion. To celebrate this, Intego is offering all new and existing customers a 10% discount on all its products. Intego NetUpdate will allow eligible users to update their software for free. All users need to do is run NetUpdate and download and install the latest versions of their Intego software, and they’ll be ready to use Lion.
• Mireth Technology Corp. has released a new version of iVCD, its Mac OS X video burning software. Version 3.3 of iVCD, adds support for Mac OS X Lion (10.7). iVCD is an easy to use, full featured DVD, VCD and SVCD authoring software for Mac that can burn DVD, VCD, SVCD and more from most video formats such as iMovie and Quicktime movie files, as well as from AVI, Divx, WMV and Xvid. iVCD was designed specifically to be both full featured and easy to use, so that users can enjoy a full range of digital video authoring features all in one software product. Originally designed to burn VCDs, iVCD has evolved to include burning SVCDs and DVDs.
• Celmaro has announced Minco 1.3, an update to the company’s innovative, minimalist lightweight time tracking solution for Mac OS X with iCal integration. With Minco, effortlessly visualize the daily spend time in iCal and export work-times with a customizable output adapter for CSV files and web-services. Version 1.3 is Lion ready, adds the ability of work-time editing, and extends the output adapter with formatting options and new token.
• Nisus Writer Express 3.3.2 and Nisus Writer Pro 2.0 are compatible with Lion, apart from a few issues identified so far. To address these issues, Nisus has released beta versions of Nisus Writer Pro 2.0.1 and Nisus Writer Express 3.4. Nisus Writer Pro 2.0.1 also has received a handful of fixes for issues that appeared after its release (including fixes for the page number display bug and the Bookends issue). The beta release of Nisus Writer Pro 2.0.1 is available now (this is a direct download link). Nisus Writer Express 3.4 also addresses Lion incompatibilities and receives a number of bug fixes. Express 3.4 (direct download link) is also available now.
• New builds of Parallels Desktop 6 for Mac, Parallels Server for Mac 4.0 and Parallels Server for Mac, Mac mini Edition will run on Lion. The current version of Parallels Transporter app already in the Mac App Store will also run on Lion. Parallels is encouraging users of Parallels Desktop 4 and Parallels Desktop 5 to upgrade to Parallels Desktop 6 if they want to run Lion. For a limited time, Parallels is offering users of Parallels Desktop 4 and Parallels Desktop 5 upgrades to Parallels Desktop 6 for only $39.99 (25% discount).
• Yazsoft has released Playback 1.7.8, a major update to their popular zero configuration media server for Mac OS X. Playback allows anyone to share their media with any Playstation 3, Xbox 360, or other supported UPnP compatible device. Playback can also share media stored in folders or even make entire disks available to a Playstation 3 or Xbox 360. By default, Playback will share almost any content on the users system. Version 1.7.3 includes OS X Lion compatibility and tons more.
• Postbox 2.5.1 brings OS X Lion compatibility and styling to all Postbox 2 users on the Mac platform. It’s a free update for all Postbox 2 customers on Mac and Windows, and can be downloaded today from the Postbox website. For our Mac users, Postbox 2.5.1 will be available in the Mac App Store very soon!
• Rainer Brockerhoff has announced Quay 1.1.3, an update to his popular system utility for Mac OS X 10.6 and 10.7. Quay extends the Dock’s functionality, allowing the user to sort Stack menus in several useful ways, and see extra information for each item. Unlike the standard Dock, Quay always follows aliases or symbolic links, and works correctly even with folders containing tens of thousands of items. Version 1.1.3 adds support for Lion.
• Karelia Software has released Sandvox 2.1, an update to its award-winning, easy-to-use website building software for the Mac, now compatible with Mac OS X Lion. Sandvox 2.1 also introduces a new Clear Styles command which makes it easier than ever to migrate content from other systems, by clearing styles in one command. In addition, a new “Block Quote” object makes including block quotation text as easy as selecting the object and dropping in the quoted text. A limited-time crossgrade discount on Sandvox of 25% off through July 31, 2011, by using the coupon code “iWeb Graduate” on checkout.
• BenSoftware has announced SecuritySpy 2.1, an update to the premier multi-camera video surveillance software on the Macintosh platform. With features such as motion detection, real-time compression of multiple video and audio feeds, and network video and audio streaming, SecuritySpy is designed for demanding video surveillance applications. Version 2.1 includes Mac OS X 10.7 “Lion” compatibility, faster network performance, and support for new network camera models.
• Yazsoft has released ShareTool 2.2.4, an important update to their award winning utility for Mac OS X. At a click of a button, ShareTool lets you connect to most Bonjour services running on your home/office networks from anywhere in the world. This includes Screen Sharing, File Sharing, Remote Printing, Secure Browsing, and more. In response to massive demand, ShareTool also delivers iTunes 10 Home Sharing across the internet, the ability to run ShareTool as a background service, and more.
• Ambrosia Software, Inc. has announced Snapz Pro X 2.3.1, an update to their award winning screen capture utility for Mac OS X. Snapz Pro X adroitly captures full motion video of anything on your screen, complete with digital audio, and an optional microphone voiceover. Snapz Pro X makes short work of making training videos, producing product demos, creating tutorials, archiving streaming video, and anything else you can think of. Version 2.3.1 offers Lion compatibility and many improvements.
• Sparrow 1.3 lands on Lion with 4 main new features: access your labels and folders easily with the Extended sidebar, send and archive can bring you to inbox zero in a matter of minutes, drag and drop mails in third party apps, and you can now completely hide the sidebar and turn Sparrow into a dead-simple message list. Sidebar animations, scroll speed and IMAP comapatibility have been greatly improved in this release.
• Yazsoft has announced Speed Download 5.2.26, an important update to their popular download manager for Mac OS X. Speed Download 5 redefines the Mac OS X download manager by combining four amazing products: a turbo-charged download manager, a fully featured secure FTP client, a file sharing utility with full encryption, and complete .Mac/iDisk/WEBDAV connectivity, into one small and easy to use application. Version 5.2.26 is compatible with OS X Lion and more.
• Eltima Software has announced that SyncMate is now compatible with Mac OS X Lion. SyncMate is offered in Free and Expert editions. SyncMate can sync contacts, calendars, images, videos, Entourage and Mail notes, Folders and Stickies between Mac and any iPhone, iPod touch or iPad. Users can also mount iOS running devices as Mac disks and more. The Free edition allows syncing Contacts and Calendars, the most important data, between Mac and supported devices.
• Xeric Design has released Time Palette 6.0, its award-winning, global time app. Time Palette has been the standard Mac world time application since 1992. Version 6.0 is a complete rewrite and is fully compatible with Lion, Snow Leopard and Leopard. Time Palette displays the current local time for any location and calculates a wealth of global geographical, astronomical and weather data, including real-time weather conditions from NOAA, complete Daylight Saving Time rules, and sidereal time.
• Global Delight has released Voila 3.1, an update to its popular screen-capture, recording and annotation tool on the Mac App Store. Voila is a great replacement and enhancement for your Mac’s screen-capture and screen-recording features. It also has a perfect set of image annotation and adjusting tools that every user would look for. Version 3.1 is now fully compatible with Mac OS 10.7 aka Lion. Boom volume booster and system equalizer for Mac is also compatible with OS X Lion.