Weblog of a “Switcher”

Is this a sign that Leopard has become the new Linux? I say this because in the past, enterprising hackers have put Linux on just about every device that can run a program. From iPod Nano's to LinkSys routers to game consoles, and more.

With this news from TUAW.com, it's seems like we are seeing Leopard running on WinTel computers (as expected), now an OQO, what next? An iPhone? Woops, to late, Apple already did that with the iPhone software. Maybe we'll see Leopard running on Blackberry's and Windows Smart Phones soon. That would be truly amusing.

Of course, this all depends on wether or not the news that the OQO is running Leopard is really true.

(Via.: The Unofficial Apple Weblog)

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Hackers, Leopard, Linux, oqo

I just learned of a great little free program to help folks that are transitioning from Windows to the Macintosh, or just want to be able to access the Apple Menu Bar from anywhere on the screen.

The program is called DejaMenu and its really a nice compact program that doesn't take up any screen real estate. No Menu Bar icon and no Dock icon.

To use the program, install it somewhere where you normally install programs. Launch it. The first thing you will see is a dialog asking if the default keyboard shortcut (Control-Shift-M) is OK. If so, press Accept Combo and your set.

Now, if you find yourself on your second monitor or far away from the menu bar and want to access it, just press Control-Shift-M and you will see the applications menu in front of you.

If you have a multi-button mouse, you can even map one of your buttons to enter the keyboard shortcut and have access to the menu via the mouse.

One little caveat I have found so far is that this utility doesn't handle modifier keys changing the menu. So he shows all menu items no matter what modifier keys are pressed. So the menus are a little more populated than normal, but at least you have access to Option-File->Save All (as an example) with this utility.

I highly recommend this one for just about anyone who wants to make their life a little easier.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: apple menu bar, dejamenu, free, Freeware, menubar, utility

So you are ready to turn on your new Macintosh for the first time. For me, this is really a great time. It's like that new car smell. It only happens once, but it's a great experience.

When a Macintosh turns on for the very first time, the first thing you will see is a dialog asking what language you will be using your computer in. After answering the language dialog, you are taken to a short "Welcome" movie where the "Welcome" is displayed in pretty much all the languages that the Macintosh supports.

Welcome
Now you are presented with a screen to select the Country or Region you live in. This helps OS X setup the format for money, time and other region specific formats. If you wait a few seconds and you have speakers connected (built-in or external), you will hear the computer talk about voice-over options and how to turn it on or get more information on voice-over for the Mac. Select the correct region in the list and then click the Continue button to proceed.

Select Your Keyboard
The next screen asks what keyboard layout you are using. It will default to showing versions of the language and region you previously selected. With English and United States, you will be asked to select between a U.S. or Canadian keyboard. Select the correct keyboard and click Continue to proceed.

Do You Already Own A Mac?
This screen will ask if you already own a Mac. If you do, you will be walked through transferring your software and data from your older Macintosh to the new one. If this is a new computer or you are switching from Windows to the Macintosh, you can select "Do not transfer my information now" option and press Continue to proceed. If necessary, you can always run a program called "Migration Assissant" later to transfer programs and data from an older Mac.

Enter Your Apple ID
This screen asks for your Apple ID. If you don't have one yet, you can click Continue to move to the next screen, but if you have one (probably do if you ordered your new Mac in the online Apple store), you can enter that information now. If you are worried about privacy you don't have to enter any data here at all. This is just to make your life a little easier later when setting up .Mac.

Registration Information
This screen will help you register your new computer with Apple so that Apple will have information about your new computer if you need to call them later. Just fill in all the fields and press Continue to proceed. If you want, you can read about Apple Privacy Policy by clicking the "Privacy Policy" button.

A Few More Questions
This screen helps Apple better sell their computers. You don't have to select any data on this screen if you don't want to, but I don't think the info is very personal either. Click Continue when you are ready to move on.

Create Your Account
This screen is very important, you will be asked to create a user account on your computer. You can create more accounts after you finish setting up the OS for the first time. Just enter your Name in the first field. The second field is for a short version of your name. After you setup your OS you won't be able to change this name, so make sure to select a good one. If your name is Jerry Smith, a good short name is 'jerry'.

Next enter the password you will want to use with this account. You don't have to enter a password, but I really suggest entering one. This way, only you can log into your account and software won't be able to install something behind your back. Enter your password a second time to ensure you typed it correctly.

The last field asks for a Password Hint. I suggest not entering anything here. If you can remember your password with a hint, odds are, that hint might be enough for someone else to break into your account. If you are the only one that will be using your computer and this computer isn't a notebook computer, it's probably OK to put something here. Now just click Continue to proceed.

Select a Picture For This Account
This is pretty cool. Every computer except the Mac Mini and the Mac Pro (interesting that the cheapest and most expensive computers don't come with iSight cameras) comes with a built-in iSight web camera. Since this is the case, you will probably see a screen with a window that has the output of the built-in iSight camera displayed. This allows you to use the built-in iSight camera to take a picture to use with your account.

If you don't want to use a picture of yourself for the picture used in your account, you can select "Choose from the picture library" to pick a picture that comes with the computer. You can change this picture at any time when you have something you really want. Click Continue to proceed again.

Complete Your Mac Experience
This screen is basically an ad for .Mac (dot Mac). .Mac is a service that Apple provides that gives you some nice features, but it's a bit pricy. $99 a year. There are plenty of arguments on both sides of the fence for .Mac. I actually have a .Mac account. I use it mainly for the "Back To My Mac" feature that allows me to use my MacBook "anywhere" in the world to connect to my Mac Pro which allows me to get files, send files, control it as if I were sitting at my Mac Pro and more.

The screen tells you all that .Mac can do for you. Personally I like the "Back To My Mac" and Syncing feature. You can sync data on one Mac computer to another Mac computer and back. If you travel and have a desktop and notebook Mac computer, this will be very helpful.

You can signup for a trial account that I think lasts for 60 days so you can see if it's worth using. You can't sign up for the trial account in this screen, but later when you go to the .Mac website. As always, when ready, click the Continue button to proceed.

Thank You
After a short amount of time configuring your computer to the settings you selected during the process, you are presented the "Thank You" screen. Your finished.

Press the Go button and OS X will startup for the very first time.

Create A Second User
At this point, it's a very good idea to create a second "Administrator" user. This way, if something happens to your account, you will have the Administrator account to use to setup a new "Standard" user account later.

Also, make sure the account you setup when setting up OS X for the first time is a "Standard" account. Unlike Windows, you don't need to be an Administrator to run software. OS X is perfectly capable of running and installing programs as a Standard account. This is the safest way to run your computer. Especially if you are unfamiliar with computers and security.

There are a few programs that require Administration level access to install. Printer drivers or software that will run for all accounts instead of just your account. You can use the Administrator account and password to install those, even when you are logged into your Standard account.

To make sure your account is a Standard account, launch the System Preferences program. You can easily do this by pulling down the "Apple" menu (Menu item with the  symbol at the far left side of the menu bar. The 4th or so item down is "System Preferences...", select that menu item and System Preferences will start.

Select the Accounts item in the line of "System" icons and you will see something like this:

As you can see, my personal account is set as an "Admin" account. To change this to Standard, you will need to click on the little lock on the lower left portion of the screen. That little lock ensures that no important options are changed without proper approval. You will be asked for your account password to proceed.

To change the account to a Standard account, uncheck the "Allow user to administer this computer" checkbox. The account will be a Standard account after you log out and back in again.

While you are in the Accounts Preferences, you should add an Administrator account. Click on the little "+" button under the list of accounts and "Login Options" item on the left side of the window.

You will see a sheet (a "sheet" is the small window that slides down from the upper part of the window like the one above when you click the "+" button) appear with fields that are the same as the ones you used to create your initial account when setting up OS X for the first time. I suggest entering 'Admin' for the name and 'admin' for the short name, use a good secure password and no hint here. This is the account that if someone logs into your computer with, can do just about anything to your system. You want to make sure that only you can log in with this account or someone you allow to administer your computer. Don't turn FileVault protection on unless you know what that is.

Click the Create Account button when you are finished.

Now click the little open lock icon to lock the screen up again.

You can change your account picture here by clicking on the current picture. You can select from the list of icons that Apple provides, or you can select "Edit picture..." where you will then be able to adjust the picture, select a picture from your iPhoto library, or from a picture on your Hard Drive, or even take a picture with your built-in iSight camera.

At this point, go ahead and quit System Preferences and log out of your account. This way you will be accessing your computer as a Standard user from that point on and you will be much safer doing so.

System Preferences
At this point, I suggest starting System Preferences again, and going into each of the "preference panes" to see what they can do for you. Go ahead and change some of them if you feel comfortable doing so.

Basically, if you don't feel comfortable making a change, don't. However, there are certain preference panes like Appearance that you will want to look at to make changes to the way the Scroll Bar Arrows appear. If you are coming from Windows, you might want to have them set to be at the top and bottom of the scroll bar instead of both the up and down arrows being at the bottom.

If you want to play with some of the slightly scarier settings, log in with the "Guest" account, you can make all kinds of changes to see what they will do. If you are not asked for an administrator password, you are changing an option that is specific to the Guest account. When you are finished playing, log out of the Guest account. The way the guest account works is that when someone logs out of the Guest account, all data and options created during that the session the user was logged in for will be removed so that the next "Guest" that logs in sees a clean account just like the previous "Guest". This is a great way to experiment with preferences.

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In the next installment I will go over what you see on the screen when you first log into OS X. The Desktop, Dock, Menu bar, etc...

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Mac, Macintosh, switch, Switcher

Need I say more? Original picture here.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Apple, ballmer, notebook, presentation

So, you have gone to your local Apple store or the Apple website store and bought your new Macintosh. The box is in your home and you are ready to begin. So let's go over what to do next...

Unboxing
One thing you will find with Apple is that they know how to package a product so that it is not damaged in shipping. It probably causes the cost of the product to got up by a fair amount, but I have to say that I feel it's worth it so that when you are finished unpacking your new expensive toy, it's in pristine condition.

I get the feeling that Apple takes great pride in making sure that their products are well packaged. It shows in everything they sell. From their Mac Pro all the way down to a lowly cable converter.

To show what I am talking about, here is a link to an Engadget article unboxing an new iMac: Apple 4G iMac: first unboxing, impressions. Here is a link to Ars Technica article doing an unboxing, also of a new iMac: Unboxing the new, anodized aluminum iMac.

Here is a short video of the same thing: (Sorry, there is a few ads in there)

Apple Macintosh owners are usually very proud of their new purchases and like showing them off when ever possible.

Connecting
So now everything is out of the boxes, time to connect up all the cables and power cords.

Depending on the model of computer you purchased, there may be as few as 3 cables to plug in or there maybe more. With the iMac, you will have a power cord, the keyboard and the mouse. You will then be ready to turn it on.

The notebook computers will only need to have the power brick plugged in and connected to the computer. Notebooks usually are shipped with about an 80% charge on the battery to start with, but it's pretty much a good idea to plug in the notebook to make sure you have power for getting the system setup.

The Mac Mini will have what ever you already had as far as cables to plug in, or if you purchased a monitor, keyboard and mouse because it was your first computer. Then you will have a few more. The little booklet that came in the box with the computer will have a good description of what needs to be connected in order to get started. If you are unfamiliar with your new computer, it's probably a good idea to read that little manual just to make sure you don't mess anything up.

Mighty Mouse
I would like to take this moment to mention that if you are switching from a Windows system to a Macintosh. You will probably want to use your old mouse with your new Macintosh. You can download the latest drivers for the Mac here: Download Mouse and Keyboard Software. You don't need to install mouse drives for a USB mouse that you were using on your old computer. However, it the mouse has more buttons than 3, to take advantage of the extra buttons, you will need to install the drivers.

Also, if your mouse is not a USB mouse, you can use it too. You will need a PS-2 to USB converter, but the Macintosh will recognize the mouse and use it just fine. (My parents use an older PS-2 mouse)

I personally am not a fan of the Mighty Mouse Apple sells. For someone who has never dealt with left and right clicks, the Mighty Mouse is a fine transition to a multi-button mouse. However, for someone used to Windows and more importantly gaming, the Apple Mighty Mouse is not a good choice. The biggest problem I have found with it is it's lack of support for detecting when both the right and left buttons are pressed at the same time. Apple feels that if both fingers are on the surface of the mouse (the Mighty Mouse determines which button is being pressed by touch), that the user is treating the mouse like the older Apple mice. Gamers use both buttons on mouse as another action pattern. For example, World of Warcraft takes both buttons being held down to tell the game that the player wants to look around when they move the mouse around.

Your Old Keyboard
If you are using a special keyboard, be it a gaming keyboard or an ergonomic keyboard. You are probably used to that keyboard and probably won't like or want to switch to a new keyboard.

You can use your old keyboard, even if it isn't a USB keyboard. You will need to use a PS-2 to USB converter to interface the keyboard to the computer.

There is a small caveat with using non-USB keyboards with Macs. After a reboot, you will have to disconnect the keyboard then reconnect it in order for the keyboard to be responsive. At least this has been my experience with my parents Mac Mini. After that disconnect/reconnect, the keyboard works perfectly.

Also, you might want to change some key mappings so that the Control, Alt/Option, and Command/Windows keys are in the correct place for true Macintosh users. In the System Preferences, in the Keyboard & Mouse system preference:

If you click on the "Modifier Keys..." button at the bottom left:

You will get a "sheet" to appear that allows you to remap four modifier keys to do something other than what they usually do:

Now, a veteran Mac user might want to change the Caps Lock key to "No Action" so that they won't accidentally change the state of the Caps Lock. (This is what I do) However, you can change the modifier keys around in so that a Windows keyboard is laid out similar to a Mac keyboard. To do that, you will want to swap the Option and Command keys. The "sheet" will look like this when you have finished swapping those keys:

This will also benefit yourself when you go to someone else's Macintosh that happens to have an Apple keyboard. You won't be confused over where the Command and Option keys are.

External USB/FireWire Hard Drives
I also want to bring up external hard drives too. Now that you have a new computer, it's probably a good thing to start backing it up. Especially since you have Leopard with Time Machine that automatically backs up your computer without you having to do anything at all.

What you will want to do is buy an External USB or FireWire Hard Drive that is 2 times the size of your internal Hard Drive storage or more. So if you have 250GB's of Hard Drive storage in your new iMac, then you would want to get a 500GB External Hard Drive. The reason for this is so that you have enough space on the External backup drive for your entire internal hard drive and future incremental backups that will go on day by day for months in the future.

Trust me when I say that backing up your computer is probably the most important task you will ever perform on your computer. You will most certainly regret not doing it the day you lose a hard drive to wear & tear or some other reason.

Speakers
Every Macintosh comes with some form of built-in speaker system. Some are pretty darn good like the iMac, and some are a complete joke like the Mac Pro and MacBook Air. If you plan on listening to music or watching a movie on your new Macintosh, you will probably want to look into getting some decent computer speakers.

There are a lot to choose from and fall into anyones budget. Make sure you can actually listen to the sound quality before you purchase any speaker system. You don't want to spend your hard earned money only to find that the speakers you just purchased are even worse than what came built-in to your computer.

The next installment will cover turning on your computer for the first time, setting up OS X and adjusting the computers preferences to your personal tastes.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Mac, Macintosh, switch, Switcher

Well, actually for users of all web browsers that 1Password supports, which is pretty much all the mainstream and even some of the not so mainstream browsers.

The great program 1Password has updated their software to version 2.6 and added a great new feature to it's program that allows it's browser extension to test visited web sites against an online database of known Phishing sites called PhishTank.

It's great to see 3rd party software stepping up to the plate to help make our World Wide Web experience and enjoyable and safe as possible.

I have been a very happy user of 1Password for quite some time now and use it to hold Credit Card info as well as my wife's Social Security Number (I get asked for that number quite a bit since I have been seeing quite a few doctors lately).

With 1Password, you can take all your secure information and store it on your mobile device or iPhone in such a way that only you can access it. This feature has saved my behind several times now!

The program is only $34.95 and well worth every penny.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: 1password, anti-phishing, iPhone, Safari, Security

Last time, I talked about the desktop computers that Apple sells. This time, I'm going to go over the notebook line. So lets begin...

MacBook: This is Apple's entry level notebook computer. It's base price is a very reasonable $1099. There are choices that can be made to increase CPU speed and the color. However, even the top of the line 2.4GHz MacBook with a 250GB HDD is only $1499.

To be fair, you can get some down right cheap Windows notebooks that cost only $500. However, the processor that they have in that notebook is no speed demon. Mind you, for $50 more, you can get a 1.73GHz Dual core chip. It's not the Core Duo line, but it's probably pretty reasonable.

However, the problem here is that you want to get away from Windows, right? There has always been a problem with Apple and the price they sell their computers for. However, anyone who owns a BMW or Volvo knows that they could buy a much cheaper car to get them from point A to point B, but they are going to have a lot more fun with the BMW/Volvo than they would with a Yugo.

The same goes for the Mac. Yes, you can buy cheaper computers, but if you want quality workmanship and a really stable OS then Apple is really the way to go. Anyway, I digress...

The MacBook is suited for students going off to college and basically someone who wants to have the freedom of a notebook computer. Even the 2.1GHz MacBook is going to run quite quickly. It comes standard with 2GB's of RAM and 120GB's of HDD space. This is a great configuration. You won't need to upgrade anything to get full use of this system. However, if you do want to upgrade it, it's very easy to add 2GB's more RAM and even upgrade the Hard Drive. I have done both and it really is a piece of cake.

With other notebook computers, you have to unscrew the keyboard from the computer to get at the Hard Drive if you want to upgrade it. With the MacBook, it's just a matter of removing the battery and unscrewing 3 screws that hold a small piece of metal to the side wall of the battery compartment. You then have access to the RAM slots and the Hard Drive.

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MacBook Air: OK, I'm probably going to get some flack for this, but unless you just want to be the one on your block that owns a MacBook Air, I would suggest holding off on this notebook for a little while.

Don't get me wrong, it's an absolutely gorgeous notebook computer that is truly as light as a feather and incredibly thin. It's just that it's lacking some basics that I personally can't do without. A consumer replaceable battery is the big one. As a notebook computer owner myself, I know that notebook batteries start to lose their uptime range fairly quickly. My 2 year old MacBook is down to about 2.5 hours of usage on a single charge. The battery is able to charge up to about 80% of it's original capacity.

Now with Windows notebook computers, the ones that are cheap, I don't see this as a big problem since you would probably be replacing the computer after only a few years due to it being fairly underpowered.

With the MacBook Air, I can see keeping it (assuming you don't accidentally throw it away with the sunday paper) for quite a few years. It runs at 1.6GHz (not super fast, but still pretty good considering it's running OS X) with 2GB's of RAM and 80GB's of HDD space. Really not a bad configuration. However, there are some other limitations too. No CD-ROM drive of any kind, only 1 USB port, no Firewire. So, if you need a CD-ROM/DVD-ROM drive and can't use the software based sharing method (you want to watch a movie on a plane with it), you are stuck buying a DVD drive made specifically for the MacBook Air and you loose the USB port in doing so.

So who is this machine suited for? I would have to say the traveling business person who needs a notebook computer with them all the time. It's light, only 3lbs. and yet still has a full sized keyboard and a 13" widescreen display. However, for just a few hundred dollars less and 2lbs. more you can get a top of the line MacBook that otherwise is pretty much the same keyboard/screen size, just all the rest of the computer that the MacBook Air doesn't come with.

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MacBook Pro: This machine is the Mac Pro of the notebook line of Apple computers. It's fast, has a great graphics card, 200-250GB Hard Drive and 15" or 17" widescreen display.

This machine is for anyone who wants a notebook computer to replace a desktop computer. It is used by all kinds of professionals including video production. It's not cheap by any means, but were talking a powerful desktop computer that fits in the size of a notebook computer. The 15" is just a fraction of the weight of a MacBook at 5.4lbs. and the 17" is 6.8lbs. so they are not light, but they are not overly heavy either. (I'm thinking Dell XPS M2010 which weighs a whopping 18.3lbs.)

If you have the money and want a notebook computer that can do just about anything, the MacBook Pro is definitely one to consider.

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There is something that all the Apple notebook computers have in common. Something that protects them from being destroyed by a clumsy co-worker or relative. What I am referring to is the MagSafe power connecter that comes standard with all the MacBook notebook computers.

As you can see, the connector is pretty much flat, it's held in place by a strong rare-earth magnet. If for some reason, someone kicks the cord when walking by, all that happens is the connector pops out of the computer harmlessly. You just pick it back up, place it next to the receptacle on the computer and it will attach itself back to the computer and you have external power once again.

With any other brand of computer, if that scenario happened, either the computer would be pulled to the ground, or the connecter would damage the receptacle in the computer to a point that you quite possibly would never be able to charge up the notebook again.

That connecter has saved my MacBook twice already. Both times I had brought it to work to use in a training meeting. Someone walking by in front of me caught their foot in the cable and the power popped right out. It's so easy to do that I don't think the person even knew they did it. I just reached over and plugged it back in and continued working.

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So that covers all the computers that Apple sells today (4/26/08). Trust me, when WWDC comes this June, there will probably be some differences. Maybe just some upgrades in processors or CPU speed, or they may even refresh a line of computers completely. The current rumors are that there will just be an upgrade of hardware, nothing more. With Apple, you can never be sure until after Steve Jobs' keynote speech.

The next installment: You have bought your new Mac, now it's time to set it up and get familiar with how it works and what the differences are between OS X and Windows.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Mac, Macintosh, switch, Switcher

I usually don't discuss Windows security issues here at Weblog of a "Switcher", but this issue is pretty serious:

Hundreds of Thousands of Microsoft
Web Servers Hacked:

Hundreds of thousands of Web sites - including several at the United Nations and in the U.K. government -- have been hacked recently and seeded with code that tries to exploit security flaws in Microsoft Windows to install malicious software on visitors' machines.

...

According to Finnish anti-virus maker F-Secure, the number of hacked Web pages serving up malicious software from this attack may be closer to half a million.

...

These types of attacks that infiltrate legitimate, trusted Web sites are precisely the reason I so often recommend Firefox over Internet Explorer. There is a great add-on for Firefox called "noscript," which blocks these kinds of Javascript exploits from running automatically if a user happens to visit a hacked site. Currently, there is no such protection for IE users, and disallowing Javascript entirely isn't really an option on today's World Wide Web. True, you can fiddle with multiple settings in IE to add certain sites to your "Trusted Zone," but that option has never struck me as very practical or scalable.

This kind of thing is one of the main reasons I switched to Macintosh. Mind you, I don't run a web server on my home computers, but I do surf the web. If I were doing so on a Windows based system with Internet Explorer, I could be in severe risk due to the fact that a "Trusted" web site could have been hacked by this new vulnerability and I wouldn't know it.

Actually I'm a little baffled by the author's clam that running Firefox with the extension "noscript" will protect you:

These types of attacks that infiltrate legitimate, trusted Web sites are precisely the reason I so often recommend Firefox over Internet Explorer. There is a great add-on for Firefox called "noscript," which blocks these kinds of Javascript exploits from running automatically if a user happens to visit a hacked site.

He clearly states that this attack hits sites that "are trusted". Since it can get into a trusted site, "noscript" won't help the user at all since the user has stated that they "trust" the site in the first place. Doing so allows javascript to run for that site and allows the attack to occur.

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Update (4/26/08 - 5:05pm): Thanks to commenter Giorgio Maone, I have a much better understanding of what NoScript does and retract the above statement. (I'm leaving the text in since I don't want to make it look like I'm trying to cover up my ignorance.)

It's quite clear from NoScript's website that they will not run javascripts that are not hosted by the "trusted" domain. They also help protect against XSS and CSRF attacks. This is something that a lot of web developers are talking about on the web and are very concerned about.

I have to say that with this new info, running Firefox with NoScript is pretty much a no brainer.

I still feel that if you are running OS X or Linux, you will probably be safe from most exploits except for possibly the XSS/CSRF exploits. However, if you only have one browser open and one webpage open when doing on-line banking and other web based services that need to be secure, odds are you will be safe then too.

My understanding of XSS and CSRF exploits are that they need another webpage open with a javascript or Flash program running that will monitor your activity on a secure site like a banking site and send that data to someone other than yourself. (Giorgio Maone, is that an accurate description?) So if you just have the one web page open, you should be pretty safe.

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The only real protection from this attack is to be surfing with either OS X or a Linux distribution since the malware that it will attempt to download will not run on either of those OS's.

The first part of this attack goes after all versions of IIS web servers. I've never understood why someone would want to run a Windows web server to operate their website. IIS has a huge history of attacks where Linux running Apache has a pretty clean history. It's possible that IIS offers greater flexibility in what the web developer can do, but is that really worth the risks taken?

So if you are a Windows user, please make sure you are not running any version of Internet Explorer. If you are, quickly head over and download Firefox, Opera or even Safari to browse the web with. They may not fully protect you, but at least you have a better chance of surviving a session of web surfing than you would with Internet Explorer.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: iis, javascript, Security, Windows

During my usual news surfing today, I cam across an article that basically questioned Apple's wisdom in choosing Objective-C for the language to use for it's iPhone SDK

"Did Apple Make A Mistake Choosing Objective-C
For iPhone SDK?" at Simon’s Blog:
DID APPLE MAKE A MISTAKE CHOOSING OBJECTIVE-C
FOR IPHONE SDK?
...
Recently, Apple bowed to the inevitable, and has released an SDK for developer testing. The language they chose to base the SDK around is Objective-C. This wasn’t a complete surprise - after all, it’s the ‘native’ language of Mac OS X. However, while it’s not a surprise, I wonder if it’s not a major strategic error on Apple’s part. The point is this: the Mac is a niche platform, and is especially niche in terms of numbers of developers building applications in Objective-C.
...

Normally I don't even bother to read such articles. This one, for some reason, caught my attention and I just had to wonder why Simon even wondered this.

Apple has had some serious success with it's OS X operating system. So much so, that when it developed it's mobile phone, the iPhone, it choose to use a stripped down version of OS X to drive it. As we have seen, this was a very good decision. The iPhone's user interface is now a standard that other mobile phone manufacturers are striving to emulate. Something that seems to happen a lot in the consumer electronics sector with products that Apple also has in that sector. The iPod and Macintosh come to mind here.

So now that they have OS X as a kernel for the iPhone, what language should they use for developing software for it? What else but the language that is used for OS X on their computers? Objective-C.

Since they choose Objective-C for the SDK a lot of library code used in OS X was able to be ported to the iPhone SDK so that Apple's developers could write applications for the iPhone very quickly. In fact, they use Xcode, Apple's free development environment, to develop applications for the iPhone. No need to create a new development environment, no need to create a new set of API calls. Everything was sitting around ready to be reused for the iPhone. Object Orientated programming at it's best.

Simon's point was that Objective-C isn't a very popular language compared to others being used for development. Now, he got his data from Tiobe Software, a company specializing in assessing and tracking the quality of software. Apparently, they index software development languages every month to see how they fair in the world of software development.

Based on this index for April 2008, Objective-C is 38. One behind BASH, a command-line shell scripting language.

Now, one thing that I have to wonder about this index is, who are they polling to get their data? Well, from what I can get from the site, it looks like they query search engines like Google, MSN, and Yahoo! as well as others and apply the results of the searches through normalization formulas to get the results they publish.

So, they are basing their index on how much people talk about a language. I wonder if they include posts about how bad a language is and the multitude of questions people as on the web for help with those languages.

He goes on to say that he doesn't feel that Objective-C is a bad language, he just feels that it's not popular. I have to wonder if he would feel better if Apple used (heaven forbid...) Java.

I have been spending time recently attempting to learn how to program the Macintosh, and possibly even the iPhone. I feel pretty comfortable with Objective-C at this point. There are still a few parts I need to understand before I start tackling the Mac and it's API What I have learned about Objective-C makes me really appreciate the language choice over many other languages they could have chosen. Let me give an example...

With Java, how many times have you gone to a web page that hosts a Java Applet and found it doesn't run due to an exception of some kind? It's not your fault, but it just died. Now, imagine you are on your iPhone and see a dialog pop-up that tells you that the program you are running threw a NULLPOINTER exception. How annoyed would you be?

With Objective-C, null pointer exceptions can't happen. Null pointers can be passed around, but the language pretty much just ignores them and moves on. No exception dialog, it just moves on. Now, this can be a bad thing if that null pointer was needed to perform a critical task. We all know that iPhone apps "crash". I have had Safari crash several times on me. The difference here is that the user doesn't know why it crashes, it just went away, and a simple touch of the icon will bring it back quite quickly.

Another very annoying issue with Java is it's garbage collection. Objective-C 2.0 can do garbage collection, but Apple has decided to disable the ability to use it with the iPhone. A very wise decision. The absolutely most annoying thing about Java is having to wait for the JVM to get around to cleaning up memory. Now this means that the iPhone could have a program that leaks memory in such a way that it uses up all the memory available for program execution. One the other hand, programs on the iPhone run very fast, way faster than any other mobile phone I have seen.

So, did Apple make a mistake choosing Objective-C to develop iPhone applications with? I have to say no, and I think Simon will see that I'm not the only one that feels that way when June comes and the iPhone Application store opens to show hundreds if not thousands of applications ready to download to iPhones.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Apple, iPhone, objective-c, Sdk

So, you have decided on getting a Mac, but you have no idea which one of the several Macintosh computer systems is right for you.

Apple offers 6 base Macintosh computers, 3 are desktop computers and 3 are notebook computers.

Desktop computers:

• Mac Mini starts at $599
• iMac starts at $1,199
• Mac Pro starts at $2,299

Notebook computers:

• MacBook starts at $1,099
• MacBook Air starts at $1,799
• MacBook Pro starts at $1,999

Each computer can be customized to your needs, some have more options than others.

The Macintosh that best fits your needs is one that will do what you need it to do for as little as possible.

Lets look at each model and see what they are best suited for. Starting with desktop models we have...

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Mac Mini: This computer is about as bare-bones as a computer can be from Apple. It doesn't come with a mouse or keyboard or any other peripheral for that matter. What is pictured above is pretty much it along with a power cord and a few cables and cable converters.

This computer is for the computer owner who already has a system and is going to replace that system with the Mac Mini. If you already have a monitor, a USB based keyboard, computer speakers, etc... Then this computer can be a great replacement.

One of the most amazing features of this computer is it's size. It's 6.5" wide by 6.5" deep, by 2" tall. That's it. It pretty much dwarfs any other desktop computer out there. Yet it packs some pretty decent power.

This computer is best suited for the user who uses the world wide web and email and maybe writes a few letters. The base $599 unit is more than capable of performing those tasks with ease. The base Mac Mini comes with 1.83GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, 1GB of RAM, 80GB Hard drive and a 24x Combo drive DVD player/CD-RW burner.

There are some that consider using the Mac Mini as a Multimedia hub for their home entertainment system. With a wireless Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, the Mac Mini can be placed next to any home entertainment system and not really look like a computer. It can be setup to display full 1080p resolution to an HD television.

There are a few drawbacks using a Mac Mini vrs. an AppleTV. The biggest being that the Mac Mini is not allowed to play HD quality movies rented from the iTunes Store.

On the other hand, you can install some video playback codec's (little programs that allow you to play video files like DivX or XviD encoded movie files), you will be able to play movies you have ripped from DVD's in your DVD collection without having to actually use the DVD's. You can store those movies as well as other media like pictures and songs on a more powerful desktop computer somewhere in the house. Using the Mac Mini's built-in WiFi capabilities, you can connect to your repository of media and play them on your home entertainment system with very little effort. (I do this myself with my MacBook notebook computer right now.)

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iMac: The next step up in the line of desktop computers is the iMac. It comes in two base varieties, the 20" and 24" models. The iMac has gone through quite a few variations of designs, some were OK designs and some were more like "What in the world were they thinking?" At least in my opinion.

The current design of the iMac has to be one of the most beautiful computers I have seen. Clean lines, brushed aluminum and black-bordered glass make this iMac stand out heads and shoulders above the rest.

The iMac line of computers have 4 base priced choices starting at $1,199. Each can be configured in several ways except for the graphics they use. The lowest end model comes with a lower end graphics card (ATI Radeon HD 2400 XT with 128MB of GDDR3 memory), where the other three base price units have a higher end graphics card (ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO with 256MB of GDDR3 memory).

This system is best suited for someone who is going to be using their computer in a home office or for playing games. iMac's can have it's memory expanded by the user, but that's about it. The Hard Drive and graphics card are built into the unit and pretty much require a experienced technician to upgrade them. In fact, both the Mac Mini and iMac's are build around notebook technology hardware with the exception of the iMac's Hard Drives. What I mean by this is that there is a lot of hardware crammed into as small a space as physically possible. This allows the units to have some pretty extensive power without taking up too much physical desktop real estate.

The downside to this kind of design is that once the user configures their system when purchasing it, they can't "upgrade" the system themselves to keep up with the ever improving technology.

For that reason, Apple created the Mac Pro...

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Mac Pro: The big daddy of Apple's line of desktop computers. This computer has it all and room for much more. It starts at $2,299 and can be configured to nearly $20,000. It has room for 2 3.2GHz Quad-core Intel XEON processors (8 cores), 4 1TB Hard Drives, 32GB's of RAM, and several choices of graphics cards.

This computer is best suited for the serious gamer and up to professional media producers like Television stations, movie production companies, etc... It's a serious computer with some serious speed.

This computer is probably not for most home users. Unless you want the ability to upgrade video cards, Hard Drives and RAM when needed. Since I bought one of the first Mac Pro's to come off the assembly line, I only have 2 2.66GHz Core 2 Duo XEON processors (4 cores), but I am able to add RAM as needed, currently at 6GB's and Hard Drive space which is currently at 1.125TB's taking up 2 of the 4 Hard Drive bays. My Mac Pro cost me right around $3,600. This is close to twice what I normally paid for upgrading Windows systems, but I don't expect to need to get a new system any time soon.

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Before ending this installment, I want to mention that when you do purchase an Apple computer, stay as far away from buying Apple RAM as you possibly can. Apple charges quite a premium for it's RAM. Something that us Mac users can't quite figure out. For any system other than the Mac Pro, buying RAM is just a simple matter of going to just about any online store and buying standard RAM DIMM's. The Mac Pro requires a special kind of RAM in order for the RAM to run as fast as possible. The RAM comes with heat sink's on them and are called "Fully Buffered". Something that the other Apple computers and other computers in general don't use. Because of this, Mac Pro RAM will cost more than just about any other computer's RAM. However, that RAM allows the Mac Pro to run faster than just about any other computer being produced.

You can also purchase Hard Drives from third parties to save some money too. I upgraded my MacBook's Hard Drive recently from 60GB's to 160GB's for about $150 and can now use the old 60GB drive in the enclosure that the 160GB drive came in.

This requires you to install the RAM or Hard Drives. The Mac Mini is very difficult to upgrade, but not impossible. There are videos on the internet that walk you through the process. If you don't feel comfortable doing it, either find someone you trust to do it or go ahead and purchase the better RAM/Hard Drives from Apple. Smaller improvement steps don't cost as much as large improvements.

The Mac Pro is a cinch to upgrade and usually only takes a couple of minutes to install both RAM and Hard Drives. Just about anyone can do it, even someone that doesn't have much technical savvy.

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The next installment will conclude the Apple product line of computers with their notebook line.

written by Dave M. \\ tags: Mac, Macintosh, switch, Switcher