A developer tipped off Ars Technica on the evidence in the latest beta of iPhone OS 3.1 of a property list file for USB configuration that contains an “iProd1,1″ entry.

Source: Ars Technica

This isn’t the first time cryptic references have turned up, either.

In March, an identifier for “iProd0,1″ was found in the iPhone OS SDK beta, along with “iPhone3,1,” “iFPGA,” and “iPod2,2″ identifiers, the iPhone reference turning out to be the iPhone 3GS. In July, analytics firm Pinch Media found the “iPod3,1″ string, which is likely a next generation iPod touch. That reference appears in this latest configuration file, too.

However, the “iProd1,1″ references a new productID and descriptor, “standardMuxPTPEthernet.” Ars Technica speculates this may refer to “high-speed networking capabilities.” With the iPhone, it refers to sharing a 3G connection through tethering, while access to a 3G network and data plan fits rumors of an Applet tablet and Verizion.

Since Apple has introduced new iPods every September for the last four years, we probably don’t have to wait long for the mystery to be revealed, and with Steve Jobs back at work, it’s hard to imagine better timing for an Apple Tablet.

Yesterday evening was a red-letter night for Apple developers, especially if you happened to have both Mac and iPhone developer accounts. That’s because Apple dropped new builds of both iPhone OS 3.1 and Snow Leopard, bringing it to version 10A411. Users with an iPhone developer account can head to Apple’s Developer Connection web site and get iPhone 3.1 Beta 2 and its attendant SDK in the usual way, while Snow Leopard users should find the new build available when they open up Software Update.

iPhone OS 3.1 Beta 2

I wasn’t expecting any massive changes in an incremental decimal point update, and a Beta 2 at that, but apparently this latest build packs at least one big punch. Said punch is the ability for developers to communicate with their device wirelessly while debugging new apps and versions, over Wi-Fi. It’s not something end users will ever see or necessarily appreciate, but it’s hard to understate how much it helps on the development side not to have to depend on a hardware tether anymore.

Theoretically, at least, this clears up the dock connector for use with third-party peripherals that tap into OS 3.0’s new software access features. Hopefully that gets more developers working faster on integrated hardware devices, since it’s the one remaining OS 3.0 feature that has yet to see its potential realized.

One “feature” not everyone will be pleased with is the new beta’s built-in tethering trick block, which cuts off the workaround iPhone owners have been using to get around AT&T’s official reluctance. If it makes it through to the official release, I’m not sure U.S. iPhone users will be in a huge rush to upgrade, especially if the rumors of a $55 official tethering plan prove true. AT&T’s official stance at this point is that those particular rumors are not true.

Some additional improvements about which few details are available are battery life improvements, and more access to video functions for developers, which hopefully brings us one step closer to “true” augmented reality capabilities.

Still included in Beta 2 are the Voice Control via Bluetooth and non-destructive video editing features first introduced in Beta 1, which came out June 30.

Mac OS X “Snow Leopard” Build 10A411

This appears to be yet another minor update on the road to the Snow Leopard GM candidate, with all the usual bug fixes, security enhancements and stability improvements associated with that kind of build. The last update did see some UI tweaks, but at this point no new feature additions should be forthcoming.

Via the Quicken Blog, Intuit has announced a February release for the oft-delayed Mac financial software.

Intuit spokesperson Scott Gulbransen sought to “clear the air” regarding the rumored demise of Quicken for Mac. In recent days, Intuit had removed information about the formerly named Quicken Financial Life for Mac from its web site. This action, shortly after Microsoft’s cancellation of Money, may have led some to believe Intuit was giving up on a client-based application for the Mac in lieu of its online service. According to Gulbransen, the truth is much simpler: Intuit screwed up.

Feedback from Mac customers led us to rethink our approach to developing Quicken for Mac. We went back to the drawing board and are making changes to everything from what the program does to how it looks.

After being shown at Macworld Expos two years running, QFLM was finally released as a beta earlier this year. Reception was cold. As Gulbransen notes, “We learned the product was not doing what we – nor customers – wanted it to do.” Accordingly, development was reset, with changes including a new register, better reconciliation model, and a “robust” migration function for current Quicken users, including Quicken for Windows. They also dumped that idiotic name.

Intuit will be taking pre-orders for Quicken for Mac starting in October. Considering the troubled development history of the product, waiting until release would seem like a good idea. After all, what’s another seven months after three years?

Following closely on the official release of iPhone OS 3.0, Apple has seeded a developer build of version 3.1, build 7C97D, along with the SDK.

The point release appears to be more than bug fixes, too. A number of sites, including Gizmodo, are reporting features like:

• Faster boot time
• Bluetooth voice control
• Access to video editing through APIs for third-party developers
• Non-destructive editing of video by allowing saving of copies
• Fraud Protection, or phishing warnings, as an option in preferences for Safari

This discussion at MacRumors also has an interesting list of new features:

• A carrier selection preference, though apparently not for AT&T customers
• An MMS option, though again this does not apply to AT&T customers yet
• Saving video sent in e-mail to the camera roll
• Direct copying and pasting in the address book, no need to select edit first
• Copy and paste phone numbers to and from the phone keypad
• Canceling text messages as they are sent
• Choose picture size/quality for MMS video, where MMS is an option

As for fixes, the biggest problem, so far, relates to hardware of the iPhone 3GS, not the OS. Whether the new firmware helps with overheating issues has not been reported yet.

The speed at which Apple is updating the iPhone firmware is intriguing. From the final of version of 1.0 to 1.1, over two months passed, and nearly that much time from 2.0 to 2.1 and 2.1 to 2.2. Of course, this latest version of the iPhone OS is a beta, but it’s hard to imagine two more months will pass before iPhone OS 3.1 is officially released. One possible explanation might be that with the apparent early success of the Palm Pre, Apple feels the need to compete a little more aggressively. If so, bring on Windows Mobile 7.

The big day is only a week away, and it looks like no one is more keenly aware of that fact than Apple. Those enrolled in the iPhone Development Program received an email late today telling them to go download a developer preview version of AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) in order to further test Apple’s push notification servers. Included in the email was a special code redeemable via iTunes.

Unlike the AP News app, no specific expiration date is specified for the AIM preview, though the email does state that the app can only be installed on iPhones using the 3.0 GM Seed. Most likely, next week when everyone upgrades to the full, final version of 3.0, this version of AIM will no longer be operational.

The beta app doesn’t boast any new feature additions or functionality beyond the push notifications, but they are definitely impressive. Unlike with AP News, when we were basically at the mercy of its schedule in terms of receiving pushed content, it’s fairly easy to engineer a received message in AIM. I tested it out with a number of people, including myself, just to make sure things were running smoothly, and they definitely were.

New messages bring up a notification window, with the message and the user name of the sender, and play the AOL chime that has become permanently associated with the AIM brand identity. The app icon is also badged with the number of unread messages, and it does increase if more than one message is received. New messages replace old ones, in terms of the content of the notification window. I can see rapid-fire AIM conversations becoming very aggravating unless they introduce some way to customize how you receive consecutive messages from the same user.

Potentially annoying or not, this true test of push notification in a more user-controlled setting is very promising. If possible, I’m now more impatient for next Wednesday to arrive, after which point I’ll be relieved for exactly two minutes before I begin anticipating next Friday and the official release of the 3G S. Heady times for Apple fans.

If you were getting antsy about Apple’s upcoming Snow Leopard OS X update, you’re not alone. One user was so eager to share that he uploaded video of the latest developer preview beta of the software to YouTube. It was promptly removed after Apple bared its legal teeth, but screenshots remain, and they provide a peak behind the curtain at some features we’ve been hearing lots about but have yet to see in action.

The screens show a number of usability enhancements, such as the “Put Back” feature that’s been added to the trash bin (similar to “Restore” for Windows users), improvements to Quick Look, and the new, much-talked about QuickTime X interface, mock-ups of which have been posted before by sites like AppleInsider. The concept graphics proved to be fairly accurate representations of what it really looks like, with more of a chrome-less black viewer interface, so that even in windowed mode, videos now look more like they do during full-screen playback in version 7.6.

As mentioned, Quick Look improvements are also upcoming. It looks like previews will appear directly in the Finder window, and will have advanced options for some more interactive file formats like PDF documents and videos. The Finder will also get an icon size slider in the bottom right-hand of all windows, which is a lot more convenient than going through an options menu like you have to do right now, speaking as someone who takes a lot of screenshots of app icons.

Finally, a number of new “Services” menu options are available, which, judging by their names, will have me actually using it for the first time ever. “Look Up in Dictionary” and “Search in Google” are two in particular which I predict will be very handy. “Reveal” to locate a file in Finder is another nice trick that should’ve been there to begin with. They may not reveal much, but these screens are definitely whetting my appetite for the real 10.6.

Yesterday, people registered as paid iPhone developers received an email alerting them to the availability of a new version of the Associated Press News app via a temporary, exclusive code. The purpose of the app is to test high-volume live push notification and its effect on Apple’s servers before the function goes out live to all iPhone users in June at WWDC.

The app, which expires in seven days, appears to only be available through the U.S. iTunes store, which doesn’t seem to have stopped Apple from sending out emails to all developers, regardless of their country of residence. The email specifies that devs should choose U.S. English as the app’s default language at first run, which suggests that they are fully aware that people already have or are able to create U.S. store accounts without actually being residents.

A forum thread on MacRumors details some developers’ progress so far with the test app, which is varied. Some, like Ben Dodson, have successfully received push notifications from the app (check out a lengthy post on his blog for details and screenshots). Others have yet to receive any notifications at all, myself included. A cursory survey of those who’ve also been unable to receive any push updates from AP finds that most, if not all, are located outside of the U.S., but I don’t have nearly enough information to cite that as the definite cause.

Chime in and let us know your experience if you’re also helping Apple test the app.

Snow Leopard is starting to settle down into a relatively stable piece of software that will likely resemble the final release version, according to Engadget. Some speculate that it could receive retail release alongside iPhone OS 3.0 as soon as WWDC, which takes place in early June.

Like iPhone OS 3.0, Apple is now giving developers the go-ahead to develop Snow Leopard-specific apps without fear of major feature changes or revisions, since they just announced that the operating system’s APIs are now frozen. That should also mean that the feature list we’re seeing reported now from devs with access to the Snow Leopard beta is an accurate representation of what the new OS will ship with.

Some of the highly popularized features of Snow Leopard are the inclusion of QuickTime X, the long awaited update to the resident OS X media player software that will finally take it beyond version 7.xx. Another recent addition is Chinese character handwriting input recognition, a feature it borrows from its portable cousin, and a finished version of the Grand Central architecture, which lets devs use multiple processor cores without necessarily having the advanced programming knowledge usually required.

MacRumors points out yet another new feature they’ve spotted, which is the ability to access HFS+ formatted drives in Windows using drivers built into the new version of Boot Camp that will ship with Snow Leopard. The only people not pleased about that are probably the developers of MacDrive, a third-party Windows program which currently allows you to do the very same thing, but for a price. So long as Apple includes drivers for accessing NTFS drives in OS X, the circle will finally be complete.

It’s getting down to the wire, and Apple clearly means business. Yesterday they sent out an email to those enrolled in the iPhone development program notifying members that all apps submitted will now be reviewed for approval using iPhone OS 3.0. That means that even if you were designing your app using the iPhone 2.0 SDK, as Apple has insisted that all apps submitted until now must be, it’s finally time to break out the 3.0 SDK and see if your work is compatible with the new software. If not, better get it into shape quick, because now Apple has yet another reason to reject you.

In the notification email from Apple, they also cover existing apps already available in the App Store. According to them, all apps should (theoretically) already be compatible with the new software. In my experience, this isn’t exactly true, with some very odd behavior coming from some apps, like eBay mobile not letting me successfully sign in. There are other quirks as well, but hopefully devs take this last month to test and correct both of those so that when iPhone 3.0 officially launches people don’t encounter the same annoying ticks that beta testers have experienced.

Bad user experience isn’t the only thing devs have to fear if they don’t make sure their existing apps play nice with the new software, though. Apple notes in the email that should any app prove incompatible with iPhone 3.0 once it goes live, they reserve the right to remove it from the App Store. Hopefully this isn’t just an empty threat, because it could help trim at least some of the vaporware fat from the store.

This week, Apple deviated from their usual biweekly update schedule and released yet another installment of the iPhone OS 3.0 beta. As of last week, the beta has been accompanied by an iTunes 8.2 pre-release build, and an updated version of that accompanies the beta firmware and the SDK. Aside from the single-week interval, the beta is also unusual in that it was released on a Wednesday night, instead of a Tuesday, when Apple has usually released new iterations in the past.

There are a few different reasons Apple might be stepping up the release schedule. First, WWDC is coming up very soon, and they might be speeding up the development schedule in order to get a stable product out the door come early June. They might also have picked up on a nasty security vulnerability before anyone else did for once, and therefore a quick patch along with any bug fixes completed to date was required.

There’s a final reason for the early release, which seems to be best supported by the information available to date. It looks like Apple has tried to block MMS access entirely for Beta users by preventing people from being able to switch carrier .IPCC files via iTunes. With all earlier builds, it was possible to do a force restore to an edited version of the file, which users had managed to hack in order to enable tethering and MMS on their devices, which were not meant to be available to users until the full version of the OS is released. The update also hides MMS features in the iPhone’s GUI for U.S. users. The MMS functions have never been visible on my iPhone, which is Canadian.

Apple looks to have pushed out an early release specifically to stop users from fooling around with hacked .IPCC files, and given the odd timing of the release, probably at the insistence of AT&T and/or others of their carrier partners. It’s possible that the early iTunes build was introduced specifically to stop this, and that the first build either didn’t succeed or was introduced early just to allay suspicion as to its ultimate purpose. This also seems to indicated that the beta pool is large enough that unauthorized MMS and tethering usage was actually having a significant effect on carriers.

Either way, we’ll have to wait and see if developers come up with another workaround. If not, there’s only a month left before WWDC ‘09, so users anxious to get MMS and tethering up and running won’t have long to wait.

Last week, Mozilla released Firefox 3.5 Beta 4 as a public preview, and I duly downloaded it for a look-see. I had tried earlier beta builds of Firefox 3.1 and 3.5, but hadn’t been favorably impressed, and soon reverted to using either the latest final update of Firefox 3, or lately Camino 1.6, with its Mac-dedicated Cocoa-based GUI on top of the Firefox Gecko browser engine, and which seems to be better-optimized for the Mac than cross-platform Firefox.

Firefox 3.5 Beta 4 is the sixth development milestone and fourth beta release of what will become Firefox 3.5, the next version of the Firefox Web browser. While this release is considered to be stable, Mozilla says that it is intended for developers and members of the testing community to use for early evaluation and feedback — for example, don’t expect all your plugins and add-ons to work properly with this beta. That’s not a problem for me since I don’t use many plugins, and one that I do, WeatherBug, works fine with 3.5.

Firefox 3.5 Beta 4 is based on the Gecko 1.9.1 rendering platform, which has been under development for the past 10 months, and incorporates many “under-the-hood” changes over the previous version, supporting new web technologies, improving performance and ease of use, and adding new features, some of which are:

• Improved tools for controlling your private data, including a Private Browsing Mode and the updated Clear Recent History function (in the Tools menu) to keep your browsing habits a secret.
• Better performance and stability with the new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine.
• The ability to provide Location Aware Browsing using web standards for geolocation.
• Support for native JSON, and web worker threads.
• Improvements to the Gecko layout engine, including speculative parsing for faster content rendering.
• Support for new web technologies such as: HTML5 and elements, downloadable fonts and other new CSS properties, JavaScript query selectors, HTML5 offline data storage for applications, and SVG transforms.

New stuff you can do with Firefox 3.5:

• Tear tabs off the tab bar to create new windows, and drag and drop them from one Firefox window to another.
• Watch a video in your browser without needing any plugins or external media players.
• Control the Smart Location Bar results with special characters.

All to the good, although nothing to get up in the night and write home about, and there are no interface changes I could discern. What I really wanted to check out is whether basic performance had improved. Living and working in an area where broadband is not yet available, browser speed is critical for me. Previous builds of Firefox 3.1/3.5 had proved sluggish on my setup compared with other browsers.

Unfortunately, that pattern remains consistent with Firefox 3.5 Beta 4, which I persevered with for several days, but finally got fed up with and switched back to Camino 1.6.7, which is gratifyingly lively (so to speak in the dialup context) and stable.

The final version of Firefox 3.5 is anticipated for release later this year, perhaps before the end of Q2. Hopefully, they’ll be able to inject some Élixir de Lapin between now and then.

In keeping with the release schedule they’ve established, Apple yesterday let loose new versions of its iPhone 3.0 OS and accompanying SDK. This time around, developers got another goody, in the form of an early pre-release of iTunes 8.2. The new version of iTunes is apparently required for activating the new iPhone OS beta, build 7A300g. As always, users must also install the latest iPhone SDK (build 9M2732) in order for the update to work properly.

The new iTunes pre-release is stealing the spotlight this time around, thanks to a mention in the “About iTunes” legalese of Blu-ray (screenshot above) among other formats mentioned in conjunction with Gracenote, the software used to gather track information when CDs or other media are played back in Apple’s media jukebox app. Many are speculating that this could foretell the coming of the sometimes maligned video disc format to the Mac platform.

Before you get too excited, though, realize (as Gizmodo points out) that the same legal content in iTunes 8.1.1 (the current version) didn’t list DVD, so the inclusion of Blu-ray doesn’t necessarily indicate anything. Unless, of course, it indicates an upcoming ability to play back (folding DVD Player into iTunes and getting rid of the separate app) and/or import from both sources, in addition to CDs. Now that’s tantalizing.

On the iPhone side, there are some nice new features that I actually am really happy to finally see included. The “Store” menu that showed up in previous builds, but that didn’t actually have any content, now lets you sign in and out of your iTunes account, and view and change your account payment details and credit card information. The less dependent on iTunes the iPhone becomes, the better, in my opinion, and this virtually cuts the cord. Now we just need wireless syncing.

Running a new beta on the iPhone is a little like being a kid with very loving but forgetful parents during Easter. You can bet that there are lots of eggs hidden around, but you’ll probably still be finding some long after the actual hunt is over. Since Apple doesn’t come right out and tell you what it is specifically that’s new about a new beta, features and improvements leak out slowly as developers actually use and poke around in the software.

The latest beta, dubbed 7a280f, is no exception. Lately, all kinds of neat new tricks have come to light, some of which are just nice conveniences, while others indicate a maturation of the platform ahead of the upcoming full release in June. I’ve been playing with it myself for a while, and a lot of these features escaped my notice.

One that I did run into is audio scrubbing in iTunes, which we noticed when it was introduced for podcasts. Now any iPod track can be scrubbed in the same way, by moving the track duration slider back and forth. Just like with podcast scrubbing, moving your finger up or down on the screen will adjust the scrub rate, making it faster or slower accordingly.

This is the extent of what I noticed myself, but AppleInsider has unearthed a few more new additions. First is the ability to close out all open windows in mobile Safari, something which I’ve always wanted to be able to do. Previously, you could close out all but one, but the last would remain open until you opened a new window. Now, closing the last window will automatically create a new blank one for you to start out in.

They also show a new settings screen for push notifications, which Apple is now actively encouraging developers to test out. This might just be my issue, but I have no such screen, and no such option in the settings page. The settings, if you do have them, allow you to turn on or off Badge, Sound, and Notification alerts, or turn them off altogether.

Data detectors have also been extended to other apps, like Notes. You can now enter info like emails and phone numbers, and your phone will recognize it as active data and automatically create an active link so you can use it to send a message, call someone, etc.

Finally, if you wish your battery indicator was more like the one on your MacBook, you might be in luck, because AppleInsider also seems to have uncovered graphic elements that suggest an option to view percentage or time remaining in addition to the existing battery indicator. The feature isn’t yet live, though, so we’ll see if it goes anywhere.

Can’t wait for the next build to see what else Apple has in store. If they stay true to form, I won’t have to wait long, either, since tomorrow will be two weeks since the last release, which has been the schedule to date for new updates.

Apple released the second version of the iPhone 3.0 OS and SDK Beta today, bringing developers a number of feature improvements and stability fixes.

It’s good news for people like me who are using the beta on their primary phones — against their own good judgment and the advice of Apple and everyone else. The official build number is 7a259g, and this release marks only two weeks since the announcement and initial release of the iPhone 3.0 software.

I had a suspicion that this build’s release timing might have something to do with the recent discovery that if you’re using the brand-new Skype app with the 3.0 firmware installed, you can apparently make calls over your 3G connection instead of just on Wi-Fi. But, lo and behold, 3G voice calls still work with Skype using the new beta. In fact, a lot of the buggy issues I complained about earlier seem to have been resolved with the latest update, including the mic failure when used by third-party apps.

So far, most of the changes I’ve noticed have been improvements to overall performance, less freezing, and generally fewer bugs. Spotlight loads up a lot quicker, and returns results faster, too. Battery life seems to be better, or at least it hasn’t drained completely while streaming Internet radio over 3G. Using the first beta, I could literally watch it die none too slowly when doing this. The real test will be seeing how long the phone can go without a power cycle, since gradual OS slowdown and eventual failure was my biggest problem before. There’s also a weird “Store” menu in the iPhone’s Settings whose purpose isn’t yet clear.

If you were hesitant about using a pre-release build on your primary device, 7a259g may be reason enough to take the plunge. I’ll let you know if any major issues crop up with extended use.

Being enrolled in the iPhone Developer Program, I was lucky enough to have access to the iPhone 3.0 pre-release beta, which I installed on my iPod touch as soon as Apple’s servers recovered from the initial shock. I was a little hesitant to put it on my iPhone 3G right away, since it is my primary phone and we are still talking about early beta software. After less than a day of working with the OS on my touch, however, I couldn’t resist any longer and took the plunge.

It’s not really the case that there are so many big changes that I just can’t live without, but the little ones make a big difference in the device’s usability and day-to-day operation. So if you do plan on installing this beta build, don’t expect to be blown away, but do expect a growing sense of contentment with your phone. As long as you don’t mind a few bugs, that is.

Cut, Copy, and Paste

While maybe not something I’ll find myself using every day, I do appreciate copy and paste being available now, and the implementation is fairly elegant, especially in Safari. Currently, it seems like you have to wait for a page to load fully before you can select any text, which may have something to do with the selection prediction algorithm that predetermines likely blocks of text for copying.

Once loaded, though, the interface couldn’t be easier. Just tapping and holding on a paragraph like the one you see in the screenshot selects it automatically, and you get control discs at the top and sides for resizing your selection. Changing the horizontal size brings you in to a more traditional selection mode, where you can alter the area by words and letters.

Pasting across applications works fine, which I found when I pasted the text from TAB into Notes. Copying and pasting within Notes, and Notes performance in general, is buggy in 3.0, but not so much so that it becomes unusable. I’ve tested out copy/paste with third-party apps like Tweetie, too, and had no problems so far. It just works.

Spotlight

This might very well be the best new user-side feature in iPhone 3.0. You access it either by clicking home or swiping left from your default home screen (the springboard with Apple’s default apps), and it searches your contacts, apps, music, podcasts, video, audiobooks, notes, mail, and calendar. And should you not require such an extensive search, you can turn off any of the above-mentioned categories in your iPhone’s Settings under General > Home > Search Results.

Just as advertised, clicking any result will open the appropriate application or play the media instantly, so it does work great as a launch pad, or even as a quick way to start up your iPod functions. I would love to see Google and YouTube results somehow integrated, but it might be hard to do so unobtrusively. A little laggy in beta, but considering what it’s accomplishing, that’s to be expected.

Voice Memo

A nice little app, although lacking some of the features of third-party offerings at this stage. It’s possible that they may be added later, but it may also be that Apple wanted to make a simple app for general use, and if people need something more involved they can go to other developers. The UI is nice, and the volume indicator lets you know if what you’re saying is actually getting picked up.

I can’t tell if there’s a time limit, but there is desktop sync, via an iTunes playlist. It seems pretty rudimentary at the moment, but likely they’re still working out how best to implement the desktop side of things. Ringer volume appears all the time, maybe to let you know that it’ll be recorded too? I found it annoying and unnecessary, though.

Landscape Keyboard

It’s there in Messages, and in Mail and Notes, and it works like a dream. There was a bit of an adjustment period because I’d become so used to the portrait keyboard, but pretty soon my words-per-minute were up to near-secretarial levels. I’m already getting stares of jealousy from non 3.0 iPhone friends when I turn the phone sideways to reply to a text.

Messaging

So far I’ve not been able to get MMS up and running yet, though some have by modifying their carrier’s IPCC file, which can also enable tethering. A share via MMS link is available when viewing contacts, but it doesn’t do anything. There are changes in the app itself, though, like the ability to add subjects to messages, and to delete individual messages from conversations. You can also select and copy individual messages, although thanks to a bug, they stay blue (selected) even when you select something else.

iPod

Aside from the publicized shake to shuffle feature, which is present, and makes a funny noise when used, there’s also new podcast features in iPhone 3.0. You can rewind 30 seconds with a conveniently placed button, shuffle and repeat no longer apply to podcasts even when turned on for your iPod in general, and you can send an iTunes link to the podcast via a mail icon. You can also navigate through the podcast with the playback slider, moving faster or slower by sliding above or below it, as if you were using a dictaphone or analog playback device. Really handy if you’re trying to track down a particular sound bite or song name. And you can change the playback speed by clicking the “1x” icon in the upper right-hand corner.

So, even though MMS and Tethering aren’t officially up and running, and I’m not sure about A2DP Bluetooth support, since I don’t have a Bluetooth stereo headset on hand, iPhone 3.0 already has a lot to recommend it. That’s before developers have even had a chance to show what they can do with the new API access, and before Apple has had a chance to iron out the details. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see what the final product has in store come summer.

One of the reasons I can’t completely cross over to using Safari 4 as my full-time browser, aside from its dangerous (considering my line of work) incompatibility with some WordPress features, is its lack of add-on support. Firefox’s rich user community and extensibility makes sure that if there’s an add-on I need or find useful, it’s probably out there and available for download. Because the vast majority of my time on the computer is spent in a browser, the more that browser can do, the better.

There are ways to get around the lack of extensive add-on support in Safari, and one is Input Managers. A new one designed for those who like to tweet is making the rounds, and as long as you’re more into the saying than the listening side of Twitter, it could suit your needs. Personally, it’s exactly the sort of thing I need, since it removes the distraction of the tweet stream while still allowing me to post links of interest or comments while working.

The extension, called Safari140, features automatic URL shortening support and character limiting, to make sure you stay under the Twitter limit (hence the “140″ in the name). While browsing, you can access Safari140’s post window at any time either by going to File > Post to Twitter (which is added when you install the extension) or by pressing “Ctrl+T”. The post dialog box will immediately appear, with the web address of the site you’re currently browsing already entered in the text box by default.

Safari140 works with both Safari 3 and Safari 4 Beta, and it’s a free download. Some people are apparently skittish when it comes to Input Managers, but I’m loving the beta, and I just want a way to tweet, so it works for me.

Get ready for yet another cloud-based backup offering for the Mac. The folks at Carbonite are now shipping a beta version for us Mac folks. Should we be excited? Well, let’s see…

After trying out their software, I can’t say that it does anything more useful than my current solution, Backblaze. In fact, I can say it is less useful. Read on for details on the positives and negatives.

Installation & Main UI

Installing Carbonite is pretty straightforward. You download the package from the Carbonite site and follow the standard install process. Once installed, Carbonite adds a menu item and System Preference Pane.

Carbonite Primary UI

Within this screen, you can define if the Backup is Enabled, Disabled, or Paused. There is also a checkbox for using low-priority mode to conserve bandwidth. Honestly, I can’t tell if this is useful or not, as it took the app over 10 minutes just to calculate 100GB of data. Let’s say that from what I can tell, Carbonite is not speedy.

If you choose to disable Carbonite, this screen changes by adding an Uninstall button for quick and easy removal of the software.

Backup UI

What’s interesting here is that Carbonite works similarly to Mozy in terms of backing up specific data rather than just backing up all of your data like Backblaze or Time Machine. On the flip side, you can completely customize what you want to backup. However, you cannot specify applications or system folders.

Carbonite Backup UI

Restore UI

Carbonite can restore your files via this simple UI. Just select the files you want to restore and then specify the drive for restoration.

Carbonite Restore UI

It also has a restore wizard. So, if your drive fails and you need to restore to another Mac, you can simply walk through this wizard and wait patiently for your files to download.

Carbonite Restore Wizard

Summary

Carbonite has done a reasonable job providing a simple Mac client for users who want offsite backup. The product is easy to set up and is competitively priced. However…

If given the choice between Backblaze, Carbonite, or Mozy, the answer appears to be simple: Backblaze. For the money (each service is approximately $50/year), you get more coverage with Backblaze and more recovery options as well. Mozy is a great alternative if you want some free storage (2GB) and then decide to add more.

In the end, what Carbonite is offering for the Mac is decent. You get roughly a two-week trial, so if it fits your needs, then please give it a shot. If you’re a small office and have been running Carbonite on your Windows PCs, then to maintain consistency it makes sense to use Carbonite with your Macs.

However if you are looking at all of the options available to Mac users for online backup, I would recommend looking elsewhere.

Safari has come an awfully long way since its conception, and today marks the beta release of the fourth major incarnation of the acclaimed web browser. Version 4 introduces a range of new features and interface improvements, among them speed enhancements, visual history searching and Cover Flow integration.

Safari 4 can be downloaded directly from Apple, and is available for both Mac and Windows. This brief introduction will outline what to expect in the latest version, with a particular focus on new features.

Interface Changes

For better or worse, there are numerous changes to the interface style. Most obvious is the shift of the browser tabs to appear at the very top of the window, above the bookmarks and address bar. It doesn’t appear that there’s an option to change this setting, so it will likely require a little getting used to. The ‘New Tab’ button is located at the very top right of the window. This shift in thinking matches that of Google’s Chrome browser, and seems to continue a new standard in browser interface design.

A second notable change is the removal of the blue progress background in the address bar that used to appear when loading a new page. This has been replaced by a spinner towards the right-hand side. The spinner changes to a ‘Stop Loading’ icon when moused over, and also functions as a ‘Refresh Page’ button once loading is complete. This switch in progress indication is likely due to the speed enhancements with Version 4.

Speed Improvements – The ‘Nitro Engine’

Many browsers make dramatic claims about speed, but browsing on Safari 4 is the first time I’ve ever noticed such a massive improvement. Page loading, JavaScript rendering and general browsing feels far faster than I’ve ever experienced before. A few claims made by Apple (which should probably be taken as slightly exaggerated) are:

Safari executes JavaScript up to 30 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and more than 3 times faster than Firefox 3 based on performance in leading industry benchmark tests: iBench and SunSpider.

In addition to superior JavaScript performance, Safari offers top-flight HTML performance — the best on any platform — loading pages 3 times faster than Internet Explorer 7 and almost 3 times faster than Firefox 3.

Apple has a speed comparison with other Mac and Windows browsers over at their new features page.

Top Sites

Top Sites is a new feature that shows a dynamic grid display of up to 24 of your favorite web sites. These are generated automatically based on your browsing habits, and as such may take a little time before they offer up an accurate representation of your favorites.

Top Sites can be edited and moved around easily, with a star in the top right-hand area representing a change of content since your last visit. It’s a simple way to see a visual representation of your favorite bookmarks, without needing to visit them if no recent updates have been made.

Cover Flow

In their attempt to integrate Cover Flow into every possible niche of your Mac, bookmarks are now displayed by default in a visual Cover Flow mode. You can flip through them as you’d expect, and click to open. This is very useful if you’re a visual person as it allows you to select the required site based on its look and feel.

History and Searching

Safari takes control of your browser history and makes it more usable than ever before. You’re able to search through all the web sites you’ve previously visited, viewing them in Cover Flow mode. Not only does Safari search for the URL or title of the site, it also indexes all the page content to allow thorough searching of your previously browsed sites.

Searching for new sites is also made easier through an auto-suggestion tool within the browser search bar. Start typing, and Safari will suggest a list of possible phrases for which you may be looking. It provides a ‘recent search’ listing underneath the suggestions, and also offers to convert your web search into a local ‘Find’ command, looking for the phrase anywhere on the current web page.

Full Page Zoom

Taking a page from the iPhone book, Safari now provides better support for zooming into web sites. It scales images and graphics as you zoom in and keeps text sharp while perfectly preserving the page layout. It’s a big step forward in scaling web sites, and removes many of the previous headaches of breaking layouts as you resized text.

Summary

At first glance it would appear that Safari 4 is a great step forwards in terms of usability and function. Some of the interface changes will take a while to become natural, but seem to make more sense in the long term. For me, the most impressive improvement isn’t the flashy Cover Flow implementation or minor changes in design — it’s the speed. I may use Top Sites from time to time, but I’ll benefit from the faster rendering and page loading time on every site I visit.

Head over to the download page and give Safari 4 a try for yourself. I’d be interested to hear your thoughts!

I have no numbers to back this up, but based on personal experience, and anectdotal evidence, I would say that a lot of Mac users are probably using some kind of multi-client IM application like Adium or aMSN. That said, I believed until quite recently that everyone used Messenger identities, only to find that in the U.S., AIM is much more popular. That sort of leaves Yahoo! Messenger out of the picture, but perhaps their newly released 3.0 Beta can change that.

The new beta brings a number of improvements, including support for adding Windows Live contacts, which has been available on the PC version of the software for quite some time. Yahoo! Messenger also now boasts some of the same VOIP features that Skype offers, including receiving and calling out to landline and mobile phones, call forwarding, and voicemail services, all of which are available for an additional fee.

It also introduces stealth settings, which is a selective invisibility filter, meaning you can appear offline to specific, individual users, and remain online for everyone else. I call this “Adultery Mode.” Shame on you if you use it. Shame.

You can also share huge files, up to 2GB, send SMS messages, and broadcast live video to more than one user at a time. As an IM client, Yahoo! Messenger does present some nice extras, and its basic functionality is straightforward and, unlike AIM, not overly distracting visually. Best feature of Yahoo! Messenger for the Mac? The giant, extremly happy smiley face in your dock. Still, I’m definitely not giving up Adium anytime soon.

I’ll admit it – I’m obsessed with Cloud Computing. From the earliest distributed computing projects (like Seti@home) to FolderShare (way before Microsoft bought it) all the way through to Azure and MobileMe, I’ve embraced every Cloud service I could find.

Of course, being a Big Geek I would have tried all those services anyway. But it just so happens I do have practical reasons for embracing The Cloud, and they’re mostly based around a never-ending search for the perfect Collaboration tool.

I run my own business and have an iTeam, if you will. Living in different parts of the UK (and a few key colleagues overseas), we communicate constantly by email. I must review their work daily and offer guidance and support in a timely manner as they are doing the work, not when it’s finished. Yes, it’s all very serious and grown-up. It just happens to be serious and grown-up and something that delights my Inner Geek (iGeek?).

So when Phil Schiller announced the availability of the iWork.com Beta, I was all over it, practically foaming at the mouth as I feverishly bashed the URL into Safari. 

iWork.com is a Cloud-based collaboration environment for iWork ‘09 users. Inside each of the iWork ‘09 applications is a new “iWork.com” button on the toolbar.

The new iWork.com toolbar button

Clicking the button fires-up a connection between your currently active document and your iWork.com account. (If you have a .Mac or MobileMe account, you automatically have an iWork.com account.)

iWork.com upload dialogue

As you might expect, the “To” field conveniently hooks-in to Address Book, making email entry super-simple. Some basic options allow you to choose which of your mailboxes the invitation will be sent from, there’s room for a short message to your recipients and check boxes for setting what you want viewers of the document to do.

Upload/Download Options

And here’s the really clever part that everyone who has ever collaborated in an online workspace will love: the ability to automatically make the document available for your Viewer’s to download in all the most common file formats. If you’ve ever had to re-save the same document again and again in multiple different formats, you know how delightful this option is!

Even better, if you later download a shared document from iWork.com in the Pages ‘09 format, any comments that have been added to it by other users will be perfectly preserved. Thank you, Apple.

(Sorry, I just need a moment. I’ll be alright. I’m just a little emotional…)

Once you’ve finished setting all your options, clicking Share will:

• upload the document to iWork.com
• generate copies of the file in the other formats you selected
• send an email invitation to your chosen recipients
• send a confirmation email to your own inbox letting you know everything got shared successfully

For a 1.0 release, this is all very slick and, yeah, it “just works” — pretty much what we expect from Cupertino. (No one mention MobileMe!)

Visiting your shared document online presents you with a simple web-based version of it that appears indistinguishable from the master copy on your hard drive.

A Pages document on iWork.com

Comments are much as you’d expect. Click and drag to select a block of text and then hit the “Add Comment” button at the top of the page.

Comments

Document Notes provide a handy way to record information that wouldn’t be appropriate for a Comment.

Document notes

Downloading the document is a simple matter of selecting a file format from a drop-down list.

Download options

Apple isn’t exactly first out of the gate with this kind of tool. In 2007 Corel Corp. partnered with ConceptShare to bring collaborative workspaces to CorelDRAW. And, of course, Microsoft’s Sharepoint-based “Office Live Workspace” offers its own flavor of online collaboration. 

I’ve tried all of these (and more), and I believe Apple has managed to strike the right balance between functionality and simplicity. Sure, there’s no online document editing, no way of seeing which users are currently viewing a document, no form of versioning or recording changes over time. Currently it’s not possible even to organize your online documents into folders or logical groups (say, organized by Projects or Categories).

But there’s also no need to install browser plug-ins to make it all work. You can share documents with anyone, regardless of their computer platform or OS. One of my favorite features is that I can share with colleagues and know they are not being forced to create accounts in order to use the service — unlike Microsoft’s draconian policy of requiring every Office Live Workspace user to have a Windows Live ID.

Remarkably, iWork.com is already set to become a crucial part of my workflow. It’s a functional, stylish, and accessible collaboration solution that is fast becoming a key part of my business IT strategy. For a product that’s only been out a couple of weeks, that’s pretty impressive. It’s already such a pleasure to use, I can’t wait to see how it evolves.

Currently in Beta, iWork.com is free for all iWork ‘09 users, though Schiller did confirm that this will eventually become a subscription-based service. Whether that’s something entirely new, or a part of MobileMe, I’ll be one of the first in line with my credit card at the ready! 

iWork.com icon courtesy of Cocoia.