Thanks everyone who entered the MicroCRM giveaway. Also, we’d like to thank the developers for the codes they gave to MacStories.
Here are the winners:
Mozilla Introduces Their Next Gen JS engine, Partially Based on WebKit JS: JägerMonkey.
“So what we’re doing in our 2nd generation engine is to combine the best elements of both approaches:
We’re using some chunks of the WebKit JS engine and building a full-method JIT to execute JavaScript code. This should get us fast baseline JS performance like the other engines. And most important, it will be consistent – no more jumping on and off trace and spending a huge amount of time in interpreted code.
We’ll be bolting our tracing engine into the back of that machine code to generate super-fast code for inner loops. This means that we’ll be able to still have the advantages of a tracing engine with the consistency of the method-based JIT.
This work is still in the super-early stages, to the point where it’s not even worth demoing, but we thought it would be worth posting about so people understand the basics of what’s going on.”
Rediscover Your Music with Attic. Review and Giveaway.
My music setup is pretty heterogeneous. I have a decent vinyl and cd collection, a 160GB iPod Classic that syncs with my digital iTunes collection, a Spotify Pro membership. This setup allows me to listen to my favorite artists wherever I am, whenever I want - especially since I bought the iPod Classic I can enjoy my collection while driving with my car through the beautiful landscapes of Italy. Ok, maybe we haven’t got that landscapes here.
But anyway, I missed something: I wanted to have another device that allowed me to play some stuff while working, without having to open iTunes or put a disk into my superdrive. I thought syncing only some music to my iPhone was a good idea after all. I mean, the iPhone is always next to the MacBook during the day, I could just copy some of the albums I’m currently into and periodically update the playlist. And it worked, as you may have seen from the screenshots I posted on Twitter last week.
But being that music nerd that I man, the “iPhone Weekly” playlist ended up in being a 2GB monster sitting in iPod app and, even if the selection of artists was limited, I wasn’t really listening to some of them. But fortunately, I got accepted into the beta testing group of this new application called Attic which, in the words of the developer, was aimed at changing the way you listen to the music you have on your iPhone. Rather than offering a new UI for browsing music (I don’t know if that’s even possible) Attic helps you in re-discovering the songs you have but haven’t played recently.
After some weeks of testing and daily usage, here’s our review of Attic. And also, we’ve got 5 promo codes to give away.
Site News - Twitter Username Change, @storiesofmac Is Now @viticci, Official Account @MacStoriesNet Goes Live
If you’re following me on Twitter you should have read that I was thinking about changing my Twitter username.
Now, @storiesofmac has changed to @viticci. So, if you want to mention me be sure to use the @viticci username. You don’t have to re-follow me again. As for the much requested official MacStories account, we’ve finally activated the @macstoriesnet account we created a while ago.
If you want to follow MacStories’ posts, the stuff I daily discover and my random thoughts about things - you can follow @viticci. If you just want to stay updated with the posts, @macstoriesnet is the way to go.
Enjoy.
Secrets of the Apple A4 Chip: The iPad as Wii
“In the end, I keep coming back to the idea that Apple has stayed quiet about the A4 because any real magic or “wow factor” that the iPad delivers will come from the software—the efficiency of the OS, the user interface design of the OS and apps, and the snappiness of the overall experience all come from the software team.
Perhaps an even better analogue for the iPad is Nintendo’s Wii, which is another product that relies for its success not on its processor, but on its novel interface and broadly accessible software.”
Couldn’t agree more. But there’s one thing in the iPad / Wii analogy that Stokes doesn’t consider - 3rd party developers relations. Just think of a “Nintendo App Store-only” Wii. Now you get the idea.
Creature24: An iPhone Game in 24 Hours, Plus Software Giveaway
From the website:
“An iPhone/iPod touch game made by 3 guys in just 24 hours.
Yes, you read that right! 3 guys… 24 hours.
Starting with just a skeleton idea; the three of us will implement a complete game from nothing, to full submission to the AppStore within 24 hours.
The fun begins on Saturday, March 6th at 9:00am EST.
Watch it all unfold LIVE right before your eyes by following our Blog during the event. Each of us will be posting updates on our progress throughout the day. You’ll be able to view sketches, graphics and screenshots as and when they’re made, listen to sound effects and music as they’re created, and comment on any post that we make on the site.”
Seems like after the OneWeekApp event the goal is to create apps in the shortest timeframe. They’re also giving away some apps, starting with Pixelmator. I’ll check it out anyway.
Newsprint Winners Announced
Thanks everyone who entered the Newsprint giveaway. Also, we’d like to thank the Hashbang Industries developers for the codes they gave to MacStories.
Here are the winners:
vrdabomb5717
dew
Patrick Mandia
Hawken
Davide85
Jon Macchio
Koki
Nicola Zaghen
You’ll receive the code in your inbox in a matter of a few hours. For those who didn’t win, I highly suggest you to consider purchasing Newsprint. It’s a really good feed reader, which will receive even more features and fixes with the next 1.1 update.
Cheers!
Shawn Blanc on the iPhone’s Missing Feed Reader
“I don’t want another iPhone feed reader, I want a better one. Because apps like Tweetie, Twitteriffic, Birdhouse, and Birdfeed are all outstanding Twitter clients — each one is clever, polished, and fun. And who says feed reading can’t be as enjoyable as tweeting?”
Fast Link Sharing Between Mac and iPhone with AirLink
I often find myself wanting to open a page I’m reading on my Mac on the iPhone, sitting just next to my MacBook. Normally, that would mean I have to manually type the URL on MobileSafari, or using a clipboard sharing app like Pastebot.
AirLink makes things way too simple. Sharing links between your desktop browser and the iPhone is now just a click away, seriously. All you have to do is head over AirLink install page and drag a bookmarklet onto your browser’s bookmarks bar and create a new bookmark on your iPhone with the unique link you’ll be provided. Done.
Now, everytime you’d like to send a page to the iPhone from your computer just click the bookmarklet, open the bookmark on MobileSafari and boom, you’ll be redirected to that page. It takes 2 seconds.
Just great.