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Alfred 0.8 Adds Clipboard Snippets, Inline Definitions

Here at MacStories, we’re big fans of Mac application launcher Alfred. I stopped using Apple’s Spotlight thanks to Alfred, and the app got a lot of better in the past months with clipboard history, improved keyboard navigation and several new features introduced in the paid version of the app, the Powerpack. For instance, I’m a huge fan of the iTunes Mini Player and the file system browser, which allow me to quickly start playing music from iTunes and browse in a Finder alternative view, respectively. Most of all, I like Alfred because it’s lightweight, blazing fast and entirely keyboard-based. Not to mention that the developers are coming out with updated every few weeks or so. I love it.

The latest Alfred update, version 0.8, brings lots of general improvements and bug fixes (check them out below) and a couple of new features that are very welcome in my workflow. Alfred can now save test snippets in its clipboard interface: say you have these recurring lines of text you find yourself typing on a daily bases (email addresses, templates, links), you can save them as snippets in Alfred’s preferences and paste them anywhere with a keyboard command. I type “snip” to open the snippet interface, then “keys” and there my snippet with unicode characters goes into the text field my cursor is on. Takes seconds and it just works.

Other new features include inline dictionary definitions, possibility to open recent documents and eject drives with just a few keystrokes. Great stuff for the keyboard geek. In case you still haven’t tried it, Alfred is available for free here.

Full changelog below. Read more

iPhone 3G Still The Top Camera On Flickr→

iPhone 3G Still The Top Camera On Flickr

Slightly updated charts from Flickr, which show Apple’s iPhone 3G (released in 2008) is still the most popular camera amongst Flickr users. The iPhone 4 had a rapid increase in the Popular Cameraphones category, with the 3GS stable right below it.

Also, notice the perfect symmetry in the iPhone 4 and 3GS charts.

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iPad Landscape Connector [Concept]

That keyboard dock Apple sells for the iPad? It’s meant for portrait mode. There’s no way to put the tablet in there and expect the dock to hold it in landscape (which offers a broader and better view in most apps), which is kind of a bummer considering that the iPad is not the iPhone and it’s not specifically meant for portrait. Still, this is what Apple is selling.

Italian designer Federico Ciccarese came up with a neat concept of an accessory that, placed between the dock and the iPad, would allows users to use the keyboard and dock functionalities while holding the iPad in landscape mode. It looks fairly simple and clever enough to provide an alternative solution for all those who wished Apple thought of a way to hold the iPad in both orientations in the first place.

But as usual, this is just a concept and Ciccarese is looking for a producer. [via iPadevice]

MacBook Air Runs On Four Screens, Including Apple IIc

Is the MacBook Air just another netbook that can barely run Photoshop? We all know it’s not. Benchmark numbers and stats aside, that thing is fast. I’ve been trying a 11-inch model (a friend of mine bought one) this week, and it literally screams. Instant-on thanks to SSD, strong battery life, responsive…just do yourself a favor and go try one at an Apple Store near you.

Or, if you want a quick example, take a look at the picture above. It doesn’t provide any numbers, but it gives you an idea of what this machine can do. It’s a MacBook Air running on four different screens: a 20-inch Apple Cinema Display, a 7-inch Mimo 720-S USB display and an old Apple IIc which is displaying a Terminal session through serial cable.

Geek stuff.

[Gizmodo via Flickr]

The Daily Coming In January with iTunes App Subscriptions?

Peter Kafka at All Things Digital reports that Rupert Murdoch’s The Daily, the highly anticipated newspaper exclusively built for the iPad, is coming in January. The app will be based on the rumored new iTunes subscription system that will push content to users on a daily basis, with iTunes billing users automatically monthly or weekly.

Kafka also confirms that The Daily’s launch plans “have moved around a couple times in the past few months”, with many people expecting the digital publication to be unveiled by Jobs and Murdoch in December. In November, we reported that The Daily and a new build of iOS containing the new app subscription features were set to be announced in mid-December. That didn’t happen, and we speculate that Apple might have re-scheduled the launch to focus on the Mac App Store – opening on January 6.

The Daily will feature fresh new content every day, and “it will use lots of video, it will have cool multimedia bells and whistles, including some of kind 3-D effect”. Kafka also confirms that the new subscription method won’t allow publishers to access users’ data, but it will surely change the way content is pushed and billed using iTunes.

Previous rumors indicated The Daily as a collaboration between Apple’s Steve Jobs and News Corp’s Murdoch that’s been in development for several months.

Skyfire Coming To The iPad, Integrates Facebook & Twitter In The Browser

Remember Skyfire? The Flash browser for iPhone? Yes, the one that lets you watch Flash videos on the iPhone by quickly converting them to HTML5. In our review, we wrote that the app, besides Flash converting capabilities, also had a lot of neat features to bring an innovative browsing experience to the iPhone. Even if I’m sure many users bought it and quickly came back to Safari, Skyfire managed to gain quite a few followers. Skyfire is now coming to the iPad.

The iPad app, which according to Wired should be released “before Christmas” at $4.99, will come with even more functionalities than its mobile counterpart. Skyfire for iPad, thanks to the tablet’s larger screen, will integrate lots of social features such as the possibility to access your Facebook wall at any time, Twitter, Google Reader and a bunch of other websites all within popovers on screen. Skyfire for iPad will allow yo to quickly access your social profiles and check on links shared by your friends and people you follow, tap on them and open everything inside the browser, in additional tabs. The tab interface looks cool and well-animated, but I wonder why the developers went for an iPhone-like approach instead of mimicking the tabs seen in Mobile Safari for iPad.

Also, I don’t know why would I want to see my Facebook wall at any time in the browser. I can understand the Google Reader integration, but all these other social features sound like a useless overlay to me. Oh, and Skyfire for iPad will also have a universal Facebook Like button that will let you like any page without opening Facebook. This, admittedly, sounds pretty cool.

I’m not sure about all this social stuff in browsers (remember RockMelt?), but I’ll be keeping an eye on this new version of Skyfire. With Apple’s devices dominating encoded web video, clearly there’s not this huge need of a browser capable of converting Flash anymore. Perhaps all we need is a social browser for the tablet. [via MobileCrunch] Read more

First Free Download Shows Up in “iTunes 12 Days of Christmas” App

This morning my iPhone sent me a push notification to let me know that a new download was available in the “iTunes 12 Days of Christmas” app. I immediately realized that was strange, as we previously reported Apple’s annual promotion (for European users) should be running from December 26 until January 6. Why sending out a push notification on December 17?

The download is an EP by Kylie Minogue called “A Christmas Gift”, but as you can guess it seems to be an error on Apple’s end. As you tap on the download button, you’re brought to the iTunes app which returns an error and says the item is not available.

Perhaps “A Christmas Gift” will be the first free album to download on the 26. If not, well – at least the music introduction Apple put into the app this morning is pretty sweet. Read more