Don’t click on this link unless you’re a hardcore Apple geek and have lots of time on your hands. It includes high-resolution images of every Apple ad from 1976 to 2002. Including ads for things I didn’t know existed.
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The Hottest Case Mod Ever
Flickr user wolphcry has posted some pics of his very slick MacBook, which now looks like a little Mac Pro.
Apple’s Lessons From the Newton
I ran across an article today on Roughly Drafted titled “Newton Lessons for Apple’s New Platform.” It’s an interesting read, especially considering it’s two years old.
The article discusses the failure of Apple’s Newton project of the early 1990s. The Newton was Apple’s first foray into the PDA/handheld computer, and frankly, it was not a bad attempt at all. The early models were plagued with slow hardware and rough software ( made famous forever in a comic strip), but at the end of the series (with the MessagePad 2000 & 2100 models), Apple had the kinks worked out.
Apple Enterprise: Is the Sky Falling?
Al Shipp, Apple’s senior vice president of enterprise sales is retiring, and isn’t being replaced. Lots of people have cried out that Apple is moving away from enterprise-level hardware and software. Macworld’s John Welch:
But honestly, every time I see that meme go around, I have to wonder why people would think that. Apple has never been an enterprise company, even when it had one of its Pre-Return Of Steve “Apple in the Enterprise” spasms. The company has less clue of how to be an Enterprise company than IBM had about selling computers to home users.
Clarification on a Bad Idea
From the comments of the aforementioned Ars story:
- The Ars tip basically means blowing your redundancy, unless you have another backup drive somewhere. If the disk decides to bail out at that moment, your data is lost.
- I’ll tell you the biggest risk IMO - crashing hard drives… The second worst common problem I see is lost, deleted, or overwritten files… Compared to these, the “house burns up in a fire” risk is minuscule.
I agree. But my points were that my customer had balls and Time Machine’s biggest failure is the lack of physical security. Hard drives crash everyday. Thankfully, Time Machine has saved a lot of people who otherwise would never backup anything. But it’s not the perfect solution. This comment describes a great scenario:
iPods Get Ready for New Earbuds
A while back, Apple announced new earbuds with a mic (like the iPhone’s earbuds) for iPods. And while the earbuds haven’t shown up yet (being promised in October), Apple has dropped updated software for the new iPod Nano and Classic to turn on support for the in-line mic. Apple:
The control capsule located on the cable of the right earpiece includes a microphone and three buttons. With this convenient remote, you can adjust the volume, control music or video playback — including play/pause and next/previous — and record voice memos.
iPhone Development... On Windows?
Ars, on the development of Besiegement ( iTunes Link), a tower defense game for the iPhone, made (mostly) on a PC:
The PC development side consisted of two OpenGL windows representing landscape and portrait views. These windows translated mouse movements into “touches,” similar to fingers. The right mouse button simulated a second finger, similar to the iPhone simulator on the Mac. In addition to touches, Randall added keystroke equivalents for standard system events including the Home button press, the lock button, low memory conditions, incoming calls and so forth. He used a pop-up dialog to stand in for the iPhone’s keyboard, and added other placeholders to represent iPhone UI elements. In the end, he not only matched the Simulator’s event suite, but built upon it to add events that Mac-based developers would love to see included.
DHL Pulls Out of US Shipping
Whoops:
DHL has lost nearly $10 billion in the U.S. in the five years since it purchased Airborne Express in an attempt to challenge FedEx and United Parcel Service. Despite its dominance in the rest of the world, DHL was never able to take enough share from the two major carriers in their home market. The company’s decision to largely withdraw from the U.S. will push parent Deutsche Post to an estimated $1 billion loss for the full year as it books writedowns totaling $3.9 million to cover severance payments to workers and other restructuring.
On Tim Cook
Tim Cook is believed to be Steve Jobs’ successor as CEO at Apple. CNN examines this possibility. On Tim Cook:
One day back then, he convened a meeting with his team, and the discussion turned to a particular problem in Asia. “This is really bad,” Cook told the group. “Someone should be in China driving this.” Thirty minutes into that meeting Cook looked at Sabih Khan, a key operations executive, and abruptly asked, without a trace of emotion, “Why are you still here?”
Remember This?
I stumbled across a link to the original “My iBook G3 Keyboard Smells Like Ass” thread this morning over at discussions.apple.com:
Terrible body odor type smell coming from keyboard that seems to increase with the machine temperature. It can be smelled when walking by the iBook when it’s on.
If you haven’t smelled it, it’s awful. New keyboards was the only reliable fix, even hardcore cleaning offered temporary relief.
Why ForkBombr Doesn’t Have Comments
CNet posted a story about Wal-Mart selling a really lame laptop, but for only $298, today only. Check out some of the comments:
- Of course people who shop at Wal-Mart will buy this laptop along with their Happy Meal and churro. Ahhh…happy times…happy times.
Where else can you buy a hammer, rawhide chews, grass seed, frozen chicken thighs, tomato sauce, tomato paste, Marvel action figures, Call of Duty 4 for the PC, Resistance 2 for the PS3, socks, boxers, 5 spiral notebooks, bologna, cheddar cheese, etc. etc. at 2:30 in the morning? Aaaaaaah, truly these are happy times….
One Little Bug
Seems the build of Android (Google’s Open-Source phone OS) released on the G1 has a nasty, nasty bug. Engadget:
It turns out that G1 firmware revisions RC29 and earlier literally interpret everything you type as command-line operations, so if you happen across a legit command, it’s going to get executed – with superuser permissions, no less. No, seriously. Just go to the messaging app, the browser, or anywhere else a text box is convenient, type “reboot,” press the enter key, and watch magic happen.