Fig Leaf is hosting a new Dreamweaver MX mailing list. The other lists that they host are really high quality in my experience with the right people from both the community and Macromedia being active.
What do you get when you combine an Atari 2600, Nintendo Entertainment System (8-bit), Microsoft Xbox, Nintendo GameCube, Sony PlayStation 2, and a Windows PC? You get Yoshi’s Boxx.
I couldn’t agree with what Joel said about RealNames more. I can remember the first time I met someone from the company, at an Internet Advertising conference in New York, I couldn’t believe that this was actually something that a company was doing. The fact that they spent $100 million trying to replace the existing Domain name system with a proprietary pay as you go one of their own serves them right. I can only imagine how many interesting businesses with real useful products could have been created with that money.
Apple: Xserve Wow. They really are going after the business market. Might as well, it would be a lot easier to run one of these as a Web server co-located than just about anything else.
I watched The Phantom Menace tonight with some friends before we go to see Attack of the Clones this week. I can’t believe how much more I dislike that movie with repeated viewings. Every time that Jar Jar talks, I cringe. Throughout this viewing, all I could think about was Jar Jar’s complete lack of relevance to the plot of the movie. In a way, it’s a good thing. By watching this annoying movie, I managed to lower my expectations for Wednesday night.
“Well Known” TCP and UDP Ports Used By Apple Software Products Quite a useful document to have around. (via Mac OS X Hints)
Location X Is a version of the very important and useful Location Manager for Mac OS X. For years, the location manager was, in my opinion, what made the classic Mac OS a better laptop OS than the various MSFT OSes. I’ve missed it. I couldn’t understand why Apple would leave something that was this valuable out of their new operating system when they rely so much on laptop sales now. I hope they do step up in a future version of the OS, but this will do for now.
infoSync : PocketPCs get even friendlier with Macs Sounds as if PocketMac is really getting there in terms of feature set.
Oh, and for the record, I know that the layout over at Radio Bump is broken. Having problems getting the calendar in the third column without it collapsing into the second column. Who said CSS positioning is easy? Feel free to comment over there if you think you know how to fix it:-)
Sites of note in the referrer logs this week include chrisruzin.net, the Atlanta Design List, and widepipe.org.
On the subject of add ons for iTunes, iTunes Remote is a fantastic shareware add on that gives you a control window in any application and also lets you control a copy of iTunes across the network. I heartily recommend downloading the miniblue skin for it which makes the control window tiny and means it won’t encroach on other application windows.
iTunesTrackInfo is an Applescript application that grabs the information from the currently playing track and uploads it to a Web server for inclusion in a page via includes.
Weblog BookWatch is yet another mini app from the brilliant mind of pb.
For those of you who found this page searching for a Mac OS X version of Cold Fusion and ended up here, I’m sad to report that such a beast does not currently exist. There is a petition here. As far as I can find, there isn’t anything on Macromedia’s site that addresses this question directly. One would think that it is only a matter of time before the most widely distributed version of Unix gets support, then again this is a server product not a desktop one.
There has been a rash of chipmunk suicides in my back yard over the last couple of weeks. It’s terrible. I check on the pool, and the pool filter system at least once a day, and recently I have found at least one chipmunk in the pool every day. The strange thing is that we have had plenty of rain over the last few weeks, so thirst shouldn’t be a motivation for them to jump in the pool. I just don’t understand what could possibly be so depressing about being a chipmunk that would make them want to end their little chipmunk lives. I mean they seem so happy in the cartoons I have seen. I just seems so unfair.
Microsoft convicted of software piracy I don’t know how this escaped the major news media in this country, but this is a very serious thing. It’s terrible that a company that has the opportunity to be the statesman of the industry is continually doing things that are awful for the industry. In this case, it’s ironic that they were found guilty of this particular offense in light of their heavy handed software licensing policy and their stand on piracy itself.
Dave talks about iChat and Apple. I think people look at these things the wrong way. Yes, Apple is releasing a chat client with the next version of Mac OS X. The complaint seems to be that with their iSoftware applications, Apple is entering the space that independent developers are already in, and stomping all over their efforts. On the other hand, most chat software is free. Having said that, Apple doesn’t have the history of taking advantage of undocumented system features with their apps like Microsoft has with Office. They tend to expose the same interfaces for third parties that they use themselves. So, my conclusion is that a third party chat application with better features does have the opportunity to play in the market. These built in applications, iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, and the online application suite iTools, tend to be best of breed applications. They make the platform more attractive to consumers, without a doubt. I think that the long term gain of market share by delivering applications like these to Apple customers outwieghs the negatives. I do wonder, however, where the line should be drawn. By continuing development of all of these applications, is Apple losing it’s focus? How many of these applications does it makes sense for them to invest in? Finally, god forbid they decide to discontinue development on one of these applications if developers have decided to vacate that space.
Flash: Blogging Goes Corporate Wired documents what is going on with the Flash community and Macromedia’s weblogs.
“Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.” - Pablo Picasso
Jaguar looks as if it deals with virtually all of my complaints with the current version on Mac OS X.
I read The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream this afternoon based on Joshua Davis’s recommendation in his surfstation interview. I liked it, it’s one of those simple philosophy to life metaphysical books that I seem to be a sucker for.
Just in time for the NBA playoffs, it’s Bill and Shaq.
Digital Web Magazine: SVG: The New Flash
SF Gate: Macromedia survives a decade by reinventing itself Reading this story makes me think that, to some extent, Macromedia still is not coherent as a company. The article mentions Dreamweaver and Flash as Macromedia’s most important products, but fails to mention their server line of products, which I think will end up being equally as important to the company moving forward. This, from a marketing perspective, is a really important aspect to their story.
Cam’s Happy Pencil Holy amazing artwork. (Flash)