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INTEREST: monthly iPhone costs; Rogers not carrying iPhone
by billing 19 Jun '07

19 Jun '07

Apple has already announced the US pricing for the iPhone (US$499 for the 4MB model, and US$599 for the 8MB) but what would the monthly operating costs be. A journalist has put together his approximation: If purchased from ATT/Cingular, the monthly iPhone costs have been estimated to be: - AT&T 450 minute individual plan - US$39.99/month (There may be a minimum required voice plan to get the iPhone.) - Unlimited data plan - US$39.99 (final data price still unknown for iPhone) - Estimated monthly taxes and fees - US$15 - Total cost of montly services - US$94.98 Just for comparison, similar service from Rogers Communications in Winnipeg would be: - Rogers Business Plan 500 (500 minutes) - C$50 - Unlimited data plan - doesn't seem to exist. They do have 5MB/month for $5.00 and 10MB/month for $10.00 (each additional MB costs 3 ¢ with, it seems, no cap on the charges. There is also a BlackBerry plan for $95 with 350 Weekday + Unlimited Evenings & Weekends and 50 MB/month. Each MB over the initial 50 is $7 with, apparently, no cap on the charges. Sources for the above information: ATT pricing: http://blogs.zdnet.com/mobile-gadgeteer/?p=400 Rogers pricing: - cell phone plan: http://www.shoprogers.com/business/wireless/ plans_services/business_plans.asp? shopperID=RGS2RJ6DGNUV9PKNXF1ER64K99GC4PNF&plan=business&cat=1&typ=1? shopperID=Q0VQA923PLXQ8KCF85F84UA1LX88DHK0& - OR the tinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/yoe4fg - mobile internet plan: http://www.shoprogers.com/store/wireless/ services/voice/navigate-mobile-internet.asp? shopperID=3GGLJL1KL8VJ9ME6N2GJ7RQELEKU8UCD - OR the tinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/ysr3pm BlackBerry plan pricing: http://www.shoprogers.com/business/wireless/ plans_services/business_plans.asp? shopperID=W6053CQGDAC99N2WPV9HXM3UBU2SAD30&plan=blackberryvoicenemail&ca t=3&typ=2 - OR the tinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/ywj4xz = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = ...from: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM. 20070617.wiphone0617/BNStory/Technology/home Why you can't buy Apple's new phone (in Canada) CATHERINE MCLEAN Globe and Mail Update June 17, 2007 at 9:06 PM EDT The most hyped consumer electronics device in years will make its debut on June 29, but Apple Inc. [AAPL-Q]'s iPhone will be conspicuously absent from Canadian store shelves. Sold out? No — just not for sale. [...] Rogers Communications Inc. [RCI.B-T], recently admitted little was happening on that front. "The truth is we aren't very far with Apple," Bill Linton, Rogers' chief financial officer, told a conference last month. "They're concentrating on this launch and the U.S., and when they decide to turn their mind to other markets, we'll be in line." [...]

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FYI: FBI "Operation Bot Roast" (no joke) identifies botnets > 1 million machines
by billing 18 Jun '07

18 Jun '07

...from: http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel07/botnet061307.htm Over 1 Million Potential Victims of Botnet Cyber Crime Today the Department of Justice and FBI announced the results of an ongoing cyber crime initiative to disrupt and dismantle “bot- herders” and elevate the public’s cyber security awareness of botnets. OPERATION BOT ROAST is a national initiative and ongoing investigations have identified over 1 million victim computer IP addresses. The FBI is working with our industry partners, including the CERT Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University, to notify the victim owners of the computers. Through this process the FBI may uncover additional incidents in which botnets have been used to facilitate other criminal activity. A botnet is a collection of compromised computers under the remote command and control of a criminal “botherder.” Most owners of the compromised computers are unknowing and unwitting victims. They have unintentionally allowed unauthorized access and use of their computers as a vehicle to facilitate other crimes, such as identity theft, denial of service attacks, phishing, click fraud, and the mass distribution of spam and spyware. Because of their widely distributed capabilities, botnets are a growing threat to national security, the national information infrastructure, and the economy. “The majority of victims are not even aware that their computer has been compromised or their personal information exploited,” said FBI Assistant Director for the Cyber Division James Finch. “An attacker gains control by infecting the computer with a virus or other malicious code and the computer continues to operate normally. Citizens can protect themselves from botnets and the associated schemes by practicing strong computer security habits to reduce the risk that your computer will be compromised.” The FBI also wants to thank our industry partners, such as the Microsoft Corporation and the Botnet Task Force, in referring criminal botnet activity to law enforcement. Cyber security tips include updating anti‑virus software, installing a firewall, using strong passwords, practicing good email and web security practices. Although this will not necessarily identify or remove a botnet currently on the system, this can help to prevent future botnet attacks. More information on botnets and tips for cyber crime prevention can be found online at www.fbi.gov. The FBI will not contact you online and request your personal information so be wary of fraud schemes that request this type of information, especially via unsolicited emails. To report fraudulent activity or financial scams, contact the nearest FBI office or police department, and file a complaint online with the Internet Crime Complaint Center, www.ic3.gov. To date, the following subjects have been charged or arrested in this operation with computer fraud and abuse in violation of Title 18 USC 1030, including: James C. Brewer of Arlington, Texas, is alleged to have operated a botnet that infected Chicago area hospitals. This botnet infected tens of thousands of computers worldwide. (FBI Chicago); Jason Michael Downey of Covington, Kentucky, is charged with an Information with using botnets to send a high volume of traffic to intended recipients to cause damage by impairing the availability of such systems. (FBI Detroit); and Robert Alan Soloway of Seattle, Washington, is alleged to have used a large botnet network and spammed tens of millions of unsolicited email messages to advertise his website from which he offered services and products. (FBI Seattle) The FBI will continue to aggressively investigate individuals that conduct cyber criminal acts. | Press Releases | FBI Home Page |

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FYI: more "What's coming from Apple?"
by billing 09 Jun '07

09 Jun '07

...from: http://zdnet.com.com/1606-2_2-6189050.html?tag=nl.e622 During a presentation Wednesday in Washington, D.C., Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz said his company's open-source file system, ZFS (Zettabyte File System), will be introduced into Mac OS X [with the release of OS X 10.5]. ...from: http://www.sun.com/software/media/real/zfs_learningcenter/ 06D00555_09_100.rm In this video, Bill Moore (Lead ZFS Engineer at Sun) introduces ZFS and describes how ZFS provides provable data integrity for disk storage and shows how ZFS allows immense storage capacity to any OS which implements ZFS. ...from: http://www.sun.com/2004-0914/feature/ Creating Immense Capacity Sun engineers wondered if the 64-bit capabilities of current file systems will continue to suffice over the next 10 to 20 years. Their answer was no. If Moore's Law holds, in 10 to 15 years people will need a 65th bit. As a 128-bit system, ZFS is designed to support more storage, more file systems, more snapshots, more directory entries, and more files than can possibly be created in the foreseeable future. This scalability also means that storage can be dynamically added to or removed from storage pools without interrupting services, providing new levels of flexibility and availability for globally accessed application services. To efficiently use all of this capacity, file systems grow and shrink automatically as users add or remove data. Administrators can set quotas to limit space consumption and reservations to guarantee future availability of space. ZFS also provides compression to reduce disk space and I/O bandwidth requirements. Logically, the next question is if ZFS' 128 bits is enough. According to Bonwick, it has to be. "Populating 128-bit file systems would exceed the quantum limits of earth-based storage. You couldn't fill a 128-bit storage pool without boiling the oceans." [NOTE: for more info on the "boiling the oceans" comment, see http:// www.hodulik.com/2006/12/18/boiling-the-oceans/] ------------------------------- What is ZFS and how will this affect my disk storage? ...from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zfs In computing, ZFS is a file system (a method of arranging data on computer storage) originally created by Sun Microsystems for the Solaris Operating System. It features high capacity, the integration of the concepts of filesystem and volume management, a novel on-disk structure, lightweight instances, and easy storage pool management. ZFS is implemented as open source software, licensed under the Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL). ...from: http://www.sun.com/2004-0914/feature/ The ZFS will provide for disk storage which is/will provide: - Always-valid on-disk state - Consistent, reliable backups - Data rollback to known point in time - Dynamic striping across all devices to maximize throughput - Copy-on-write design makes most disk writes sequential - Multiple block sizes, automatically chosen to match workload - Explicit I/O priority with deadline scheduling - Globally optimal I/O sorting and aggregation - Multiple independent prefetch streams with automatic length and stride detection - Unlimited, instantaneous read/write snapshots - Parallel, constant-time directory operations Or, more simple ZFS delivers virtually unlimited disk storage capacity, provable data integrity, and near-zero administration. ...More details about ZFS: ZFS Storage Integrity, Security, and Scalability - http:// www.sun.com/bigadmin/features/articles/zfs_part1.scalable.html ZFS Learning Center: http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/ zfs_learning_center.jsp Videos describing ZFS: http://www.sun.com/software/media/real/ zfs_learningcenter/high_bandwidth.html

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An interesting article on Macdevcenter
by Mark Rogers 07 Jun '07

07 Jun '07

This looks very interesting. http://www.macdevcenter.com/pub/a/mac/2007/06/01/discover-the-power- of-open-directory.html Mark Mark Rogers www: http://web.mac.com/mark_rogers msn: mark underscore rogers at mac dot com

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INTEREST: new announcements on Apple web site
by billing 04 Jun '07

04 Jun '07

- iPhone is coming June 29 (at least in the USA), say the new Apple ads: http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad1/ http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad2/ http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad3/ - YouTube on your AppleTV: http://www.apple.com/appletv/ "Direct-to-Internet With Apple TV, you can watch theatrical trailers from Apple.com on your TV. And soon, you’ll be able to browse and watch YouTube videos on the big screen, too. Coming in June, you can browse and watch thousands of free YouTube videos streaming directly from the Internet. Just sit back and enjoy the show." Wayne

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Word 2007 converter
by Doug Hamilton 15 May '07

15 May '07

Hello, Have you had colleagues or students send you a Word file which you can't open? Did you notice that this file ended with .docx as opposed to the usual .doc ? Well if you do have such a file, what you've got yourself there one of them newfangled Open XML files. Office 2007 (Windows) and the yet unreleased Office 2008 (Macintosh) use a new file format called Open XML. However, Office 2008 isn't slated to ship until sometime in the second half of this year, and Open XML isn't readable by any earlier versions of Word (Windows or Macintosh). Even when Office 2008 does ship, there will be those who may not wish to upgrade. This is where the new Word 2007 Open XML file converter for Macintosh comes in handy. http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx?pid=download&location=/ mac/download/Office2004/ConverterBeta.xml Of course, you could always request of the individual who sent you the .docx file, to please resend the file as .doc (ie. they need to use the "Save as" command). Regards, Doug ------------- Doug Hamilton, BA, MA, APP Senior Computer Consultant Computers-on-Campus; Univ. of Manitoba 204-474-6196 (Ph.) 204-474-7556 (Fax) http://www.umanitoba.ca/bookstore/

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INTEREST: Microsoft dumping US$3 XP Starter Edition to government student programs; One Laptop Per Child program
by billing 23 Apr '07

23 Apr '07

...from: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/apr07/04-19UPLaunchPR.mspx Microsoft Announces Commitment to Promote Sustained Social and Economic Opportunity for the Next 5 Billion People Company unveils affordable education suite for young people in developing nations and announces plans for 90 new Innovation Centers to promote local software ecosystems. BEIJING — April 19, 2007 — Microsoft Corp. today unveiled a new commitment to help close the digital divide by creating new products and programs that will help bring social and economic opportunity to the estimated 5 billion people who are not yet realizing the benefits of technology. Through the expansion of Microsoft® Unlimited Potential, the company is renewing and accelerating its long-term commitment to use technology, training and partnerships to transform education, foster local innovation, and enable jobs and opportunities to sustain a continuous cycle of social and economic growth for everyone. “All human beings deserve a chance to achieve their full potential,” said Bill Gates, chairman of Microsoft. “Bringing the benefits of technology to the next 5 billion people will require new products that meet the needs of underserved communities; creative, new business approaches that make technology more relevant, accessible and affordable; and close collaboration between local governments, educational institutions and community organizations.” [...] “Computers and connectivity are still too expensive for private ownership by the poor, and applications as well as information resources that are appropriate to this group have been slow to emerge, in part because the poor themselves have not been involved in creating them,” said C.K. Prahalad, author and professor at the University of Michigan’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business. “In order to help create the applications and start the business dynamo that unleashes their potential, the people at the bottom of the pyramid need to have reliable, affordable access to technology and to learn computing skills.” Transforming Education To help expand education opportunities worldwide, Microsoft is partnering with government, intergovernmental organizations, academic and industry leaders to facilitate access to high-quality education through dynamic, learner-focused technologies and resources. [...] Through the Partners in Learning program, Microsoft today announced the Microsoft Student Innovation Suite, an affordable and reliable software package for governments purchasing and giving Windows®-based PCs to primary and secondary students for their personal use at home and for schoolwork. The education suite includes Windows XP Starter Edition, Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007, Microsoft Math 3.0, Learning Essentials 2.0 for Microsoft Office, and Windows Live™ Mail desktop. Microsoft will offer this suite in the second half of 2007 for $3 (U.S.) to qualifying governments that purchase and supply PCs directly to students. More information about the offer is available at http://www.microsoft.com/unlimitedpotential/MSIS. [...] ======================================== ...from: http://www.laptop.org/ - the home of the One-Laptop-Per-Child program developed by by Nicholas Negroponte (http://web.media.mit.edu/~nicholas/) with a core of MIT Media Lab veterans. mission Most of the nearly two–billion children in the developing world are inadequately educated, or receive no education at all. One in three does not complete the fifth grade. The individual and societal consequences of this chronic global crisis are profound. Children are consigned to poverty and isolation— just like their parents—never knowing what the light of learning could mean in their lives. At the same time, their governments struggle to compete in a rapidly evolving, global information economy, hobbled by a vast and increasingly urban underclass that cannot support itself, much less contribute to the commonweal, because it lacks the tools to do so. It is time to rethink this equation. Given the resources that poor countries can reasonably allocate to education—sometimes less than $20 per year per pupil, compared to the approximately $7500 per pupil spent annually in the U.S.—even a doubled or redoubled national commitment to traditional education, augmented by external and private funding, would not get the job done. Moreover, experience strongly suggests that an incremental increase of “more of the same”—building schools, hiring teachers, buying books and equipment—is a laudable but insufficient response to the problem of bringing true learning possibilities to the vast numbers of children in the developing world The first countries to sign up for buying the machine (officially dubbed XO") include Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Rwanda, Nigeria and Libya. ...from their FAQ: What is the $100 Laptop, really? The XO is Linux-based, with a dual-mode display—both a full-color, transmissive DVD mode, and a second display option that is black and white, reflective, and sunlight-readable at three times the resolution. The laptop has a 500MHz processor and 128MB of DRAM, with 500MB of Flash memory; it has three USB ports and an SD-card slot for expansion. The laptops have wireless broadband that, among other things, allows them to work as a mesh network; each laptop will be able to talk to its nearest neighbors, creating an ad hoc, local area network. The laptops are designed to be extremely power efficient, enabling the use of innovative power systems (including wind-up). Why not a desktop computer, or—even better—a recycled desktop machine? Desktops are cheaper, but mobility is important, especially with regard to taking the computer home at night. Kids in the developing world need the newest technology, especially really rugged hardware and innovative software. Recent work with schools in Maine has shown the huge value of using a laptop across all of one's studies, as well as for play. Bringing the laptop home engages the family. In one Cambodian village where we have been working, there is no electricity, thus the laptop is, among other things, the brightest light source in the home. Finally, regarding recycled machines: if we estimate 100 million available used desktops, and each one requires only one hour of human attention to refurbish, reload, and handle, that is tens of thousands of work years. Thus, while we definitely encourage the recycling of used computers, it is not the solution for One Laptop per Child. ...from: http://www.laptop.org/vision/progress/ 2007 April First school server deployed. March First mesh network deployed. February B2-Test (Beta 2)machines deployed to children in launch countries. January Rwanda starts out the New Year with a bang by announcing that it, too, will participate in OLPC. 2006 December Uruguay commits to OLPC. November 875 B1-Test (Beta 1)machines roll off the Quanta assembly-line in Shanghai. XO is for real. October Libya announces it has signed up for 1.2 million laptops, one for every school-age child in the nation.

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INTEREST: AppleTV overview, Google Desktop for Macintosh, Apple ships 1 millionth iPod, iPhone speculation, 8 Core MacPro,
by billing 16 Apr '07

16 Apr '07

....and OS X 10.5 delayed....... ========================================== ...from: http://www.macworld.com/weblogs/mwvodcast/2007/04/mwvodcast10/ index.php?lsrc=mwweek Macworld Video: Apple TV interface By Christopher Breen This latest Macworld Video is all about giving you a first-hand look at Apple TV in action. Senior news editor Jonathan Seff puts Apple TV through its paces so you can see how it operates and what its interface looks like. Starting with the main screen of the interface, work our way into the movie screen, and show how a movie plays. There is also a tour the screens for TV shows, music, podcasts, and photos. After a peak at the Settings and Sources screen, things are wrapped up with a look at the trailers and previews feature. --------------------------- ...from: http://www.macworld.com/2007/04/firstlooks/googledesktop/index.php? lsrc=mwweek First Look: Google Desktop (Beta) for the Mac Google’s search application comes to Mac desktops, and we try it out By Dan Moren Love it or hate it, Spotlight is pretty much the de facto choice when it comes to searching your Mac’s files. Until today, that is. Google has released a Mac version of Google Desktop, its desktop search app previously available only to Windows users. Google says its search application and OS X 10.4’s Tiger are complements, not competitors. Still, many Mac users dissatisfied with Spotlight might approach this new product with the following question in mind: By bringing Google’s considerable expertise in all things search-related to bear on your Mac, could Google Desktop outshine Apple’s Spotlight? Let’s take a preliminary look at this application, which you can download for yourself, provided you’re running Mac OS X 10.4. Search party You can summon Google Desktop’s search window by hitting the command key twice in quick succession. (That keyboard shortcut can be changed in the preferences.) Typing a query in the text box will display a live list of results, much as Spotlight does. In my informal tests, Google Desktop seemed zippier than Spotlight, showing results with little or no delay. Google Desktop easily lets you use powerful search operators to narrow down your query. Google Desktop will match searches against files, e-mail messages, addresses, and chat transcripts—by default, the application will display the first ten results but you can shorten that to the first five or expand it the first 15 via Preferences. An icon to the side of each result lets you know the type of file you’ve found and its associated application; selecting any result from the list will open that document in the associated application, just like in Spotlight. For example, if I do a search for “Apple” and click on an e-mail result labeled “Apple eNews,” that e-mail will open in my default e- mail client. At the bottom of the list there’s an option to display all results from your desktop or search the Web with the same string; selecting either of these options will open your default browser and call up the appropriate results. One feature that ought to have Spotlight users (particularly Spotlight detractors) jumping for joy is the ability to use the same query operators that Google.com uses. For example, enclosing a string in quotes will only search for instances of that complete phrase; you can also require or exclude terms with + and -, respectively. (It’s worth noting that Apple plans to add support for boolean logic—using AND, OR, and NOT—in search requests in revamped version of Spotlight to be included in the forthcoming OS X 10.5 update.) Among the most powerful options Google Desktop brings is the caching of deleted files. If you accidentally trashed that report you need for tomorrow’s meeting, you may still be able to recover the content via Google Desktop. What’s your preference? Like Spotlight, Google Desktop builds an index of your files to enable quick searching. Google Desktop’s preferences, which are installed as a preference pane, allows you to choose which volumes are indexed and whether or not you want your Gmail account and web history indexed as well. Indexing begins as soon as you install the application, and while I didn’t notice a substantial slowdown in using Google Desktop, I did notice that the fans on my MacBook kicked into action. A quick check of Activity Monitor showed the indexing processing taking anywhere from 15 to 85 percent of CPU cycles during the initial procedure. By integrating with Google.com, Google Desktop can return results from your Mac whenever you use search on Google. There’s also an option to integrate Google Desktop with Google.com. Once enabled, whenever you search for anything on Google.com, you’ll also be alerted to how many results appear on your own machine. Google says that these results are kept private (even from the company), but you can disable this functionality in Google Desktop’s preferences if you choose. Concerns Since Google Desktop is not drag-and-drop and it doesn’t use Apple’s standard installer, there’s no information about what files are being installed and where. Google Desktop does offer an option for uninstalling via the preference pane. Also, though Google Desktop offers an option of whether or not to display results from deleted files, disabling this option does not prevent those files from being cached—it merely hides the results. Those users who work with sensitive files should be aware of this fact. Naturally, this being a Google app, Google Desktop is still in beta, but in the brief time I’ve used it, I’ve experienced no problems. While it may not offer the same level of integration into the OS that Spotlight has, it seems a more than able competitor when it comes to the nitty-gritty of searching your Mac. Macworld will have a full review of Google Desktop as we get more of a chance to put the application through its paces. ------------------------------------------------------------ ...from: Apple ships 100 millionth iPod By Marguerite Reardon Staff Writer, CNET News.com Published: April 9, 2007, 7:54 AM PDT Apple said last Monday that it has sold its 100 millionth iPod [NOTE: Greg Jowswyak, Apple's VP of iPod World Wide product marketing spoke with Macworld's Philip Michael's about this milestone. In that podcast, Greg stated that, of that 100 million units, 46 million were sold during 2006.] [...] Apple's iTunes Store has seen comparable success in selling items from its catalog of more than 5 million songs, 350 television shows and 400 movies. The company says it has sold more than 2.5 billion songs, 50 million TV shows and 1.3 million movies. [Editor's note: the TV shows and movies are not yet available in the Canadian iTunes Music Store.] [...] ================================= ...from: http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/04/03/tech- iphonejune-20070403.html Apple confirms U.S. iPhone launch set for June Last Updated: Tuesday, April 3, 2007 | 3:45 PM ET CBC News Apple Inc. has confirmed reports that its iPhone cellphone will be released in the United States in June. [...] "We haven't announced whether we will carry the iPhone," Odette Coleman, manager of corporate communications for Rogers Wireless, said in an e-mail to CBC News Online. "Everything in the media has been speculations to this point. The only fact is that we are the only GSM carrier in Canada. That's the only fact." (Editor's note: the "only fact" quoted is not quite true. www.icewireless.ca shows the ICE Wireless GSM system available in Yellowknife and Inuvik.... Well, OK. The "only fact" is that Rogers Wireless is the only GSM carrier in most of Canada within 100 miles or so of the US border - except for Alberta (where most of the province is covered - thank-you Teles) and North-Western Ontario where you won't have any coverage at all between Kenora and Sault Ste. Marie except for around Thunder Bay. ::-) ***** ***** ***** ***** [Editor's note: from an email received January 16, 2007 from Rogers Customer Service: > Dear Wayne Billing, > Thank you for taking the time to write to us, we appreciate your > use of > online customer service. > > In your recent email, you have informed us that you have concerns > about > the availability of the iPhone on Rogers. > > We would also like to assure you that we take your concerns very > seriously and we appreciate any feedback that you can provide us. We > appreciate your feedback because this is information that we can > use to > address any similar problems that may arise in the future. On the > whole > it makes us better able to address our customers concerns. > > On Tuesday, January 9, 2007, Apple announced the unveiling of their > new > iPhone, a combination mobile phone/digital music player/camera > > Availability > " The iPhone will first be introduced in North America > " Cingular is the only wireless carrier to launch the iPhone in the > United States > " Rogers is actively working with Apple to launch the iPhone in Canada > as soon as possible and will be the exclusive provider of the > iPhone in > Canada > " Apple is planning to introduce the iPhone in Europe (Q4 2007) and > Asia > (2008) > " Please be advised that Rogers will be offering the iPhone > exclusively > in Canada. Unfortunately, the launch date and pricing for Canada > are not > yet available > " Other Canadian wireless carriers will not launch the iPhone, Rogers > will be the only Canadian wireless carrier to offer the iPhone ================================= ...from: http://www.apple.com/macpro/ http://www.apple.com/macpro/specs.html Apple has announced the new MacPro line which can have two Quad Core Xeon or two Dual Core Xeon processors, 16 GB of RAM, well..... OK.... it's Big and Fast with lots of room for Expansion. ::-) Apple sees is aiming this at film/video, 3D animation, 3D modeling, 3D rendering, Scientific computing, in addition to high end graphic desing, music/audio, and photography users. ==================================== OS X 10.5 delayed ...from: http://www.apple.com/hotnews/ Apple Statement iPhone has already passed several of its required certification tests and is on schedule to ship in late June as planned. We can’t wait until customers get their hands (and fingers) on it and experience what a revolutionary and magical product it is. However, iPhone contains the most sophisticated software ever shipped on a mobile device, and finishing it on time has not come without a price — we had to borrow some key software engineering and QA resources from our Mac OS X team, and as a result we will not be able to release Leopard at our Worldwide Developers Conference in early June as planned. While Leopard's features will be complete by then, we cannot deliver the quality release that we and our customers expect from us. We now plan to show our developers a near final version of Leopard at the conference, give them a beta copy to take home so they can do their final testing, and ship Leopard in October. We think it will be well worth the wait. Life often presents tradeoffs, and in this case we're sure we've made the right ones. [Apr 12, 2007]

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INTEREST: Microsoft starts testing Office 2008 for Mac
by billing 02 Apr '07

02 Apr '07

Microsoft starts testing Office 2008 for Mac By Ina Fried, CNET News.com Published on ZDNet News: March 30, 2007, 10:53 AM PT ZDNet Tags: Microsoft Office, Software engineering/development, XML, Microsoft Microsoft has started private testing of the next version of Office for the Macintosh, which is due out in the second half of the year. Office 2008 for Mac, as the product is known, helps bring the desktop suite back into compatibility with two key technologies. First, the product is the first version of Office that runs natively on both Intel- and Power PC-based Macs. The new software also adds support for the XML file formats that Microsoft added to the Windows version of Office--Office 2007, which hit store shelves in January. Microsoft did not say how many people are taking part in the private beta or whether it will have a public test version, but a representative said Friday that the company is still on track to have the final product out sometime in the second half of the year. While the biggest changes in Office 2008 are the compatibility moves, Microsoft has detailed several new features. One is a program called My Day, which gives users quick access to calendar information without requiring them to first go into the Entourage e-mail program. Also on tap are improved page layout controls in Word and new Excel templates, called ledger sheets, which allow users to handle tasks like producing invoices without having to create or understand the underlying formulas.

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FYI: EMI, Apple partner on DRM-free premium music
by billing 02 Apr '07

02 Apr '07

...from: http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/04/02itunes.html Apple Unveils Higher Quality DRM-Free Music on the iTunes Store DRM-Free Songs from EMI Available on iTunes for $1.29 in May CUPERTINO, California—April 2, 2007—Apple® today announced that EMI Music’s entire digital catalog of music will be available for purchase DRM-free (without digital rights management) from the iTunes® Store (www.itunes.com) worldwide in May. DRM-free tracks from EMI will be offered at higher quality 256 kbps AAC encoding, resulting in audio quality indistinguishable from the original recording, for just $1.29 per song. In addition, iTunes customers will be able to easily upgrade their entire library of all previously purchased EMI content to the higher quality DRM-free versions for just 30 cents a song. iTunes will continue to offer its entire catalog, currently over five million songs, in the same versions as today—128 kbps AAC encoding with DRM—at the same price of 99 cents per song, alongside DRM-free higher quality versions when available. “We are going to give iTunes customers a choice—the current versions of our songs for the same 99 cent price, or new DRM-free versions of the same songs with even higher audio quality and the security of interoperability for just 30 cents more,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We think our customers are going to love this, and we expect to offer more than half of the songs on iTunes in DRM-free versions by the end of this year.” “EMI and iTunes are once again teaming up to move the digital music industry forward by giving music fans higher quality audio that is virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings, with no usage restrictions on the music they love from their favorite artists,” said Eric Nicoli, CEO of EMI Group. With DRM-free music from the EMI catalog, iTunes customers will have the ability to download tracks from their favorite EMI artists without any usage restrictions that limit the types of devices or number of computers that purchased songs can be played on. DRM-free songs purchased from the iTunes Store will be encoded in AAC at 256 kbps, twice the current bit rate of 128 kbps, and will play on all iPods, Mac® or Windows computers, Apple TVs and soon iPhones, as well as many other digital music players. iTunes will also offer customers a simple, one-click option to easily upgrade their entire library of all previously purchased EMI content to the higher quality DRM-free format for 30 cents a song. All EMI music videos will also be available in DRM-free format with no change in price. ...webcast of the press conference: http://w3.cantos.com/07/pjxrobbi-703-5zvx0/interviews.php?task=view ...EMI Worldwide web site including groups and songwriters signed with EMI: http://www.emimusicpub.com/worldwide/index.html

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