Intego has issued a warning of a new spyware for Mac OS X called ““OSX/OpinionSpy” which can record user’s activity, runs at a root level and can send information to 3rd party servers.
Intego: There’s A New Spyware for Mac OS X Around, And It Comes with Free Apps
iPhone OS 4 Beta, iTunes Syncing and the Cloud
Elastic Threads has written an interesting post about the way Apple is slowly changing the way iTunes handles music synchronization between desktop computers and iPhone OS:
“What I’ve noticed with the OS 4 betas is that when I delete a track from my iPod Touch, it merely gets hidden from the Music app. I’m sure that if I changed enough data on my iPod that the actual blocks of memory in my iPod got written over, then the mp3 would be lost and to get the song back on my iPod, then iTunes would have to re-copy the mp3.
Instead, what happens is that if you delete a song, and then later have iTunes add that song back to your iDevice, it checks first to see if that song is actually still on your device’s SSD (just invisible to the Music app), and, if its still there it just un-deletes the track. Much faster. When I upgraded my iPod to OS 4 beta 4 and it deleted the 4,000 tracks that were currently on my iPod, it only took between an hour to two hours to sync all 30 GB of data back to my iPod; in OS 3 it took a whole night.”
We don’t know whether this is just a small change to optimize the sync process or a first step towards a real cloud sync, but sure Apple is thinking about it, now that Google has announced OTA music sync for Android and Lala has been shut down this morning. We just have to wait.
The Mac Sale Bundle Live, $49.99 for Ten Applications
Summer’s here, and what better way to tithe you over with new software than a Mac bundle? Launching earlier this morning with approximately $500 worth of included applications, The Mac Sale is yet another event we can add to the record books. Purchasers may be interested in gems like Dropzone, Flux 2, and Web Remote.
Steve Jobs Email Conversation About Foxconn Suicides
The problems over at Foxconn have been a highly discussed subject in every technology weblog, and if you consider that Apple is somehow involved in this discussion (Foxconn is the manufacturer of many components used by Apple) you realize that the problem is quite big. Apple itself has released a statement last week, in which they say that they’re “saddened and upset” at Foxconn suicides and that they’re “in direct contact with Foxconn senior management”.
But, someone decided to send an email to Steve Jobs about the matter, and he replied. An interesting discussion arose between the two, and we’ve got the exclusive conversation with screenshots after the break.
Adobe Announces Digital Viewer Technology for Magazines
Even if Steve Jobs doesn’t want Flash on his App Store, he can’t do anything about digital versions of magazines built using InDesign, it seems. Because in case you don’t know, that’s how Adobe together with Condè Naste created the first Wired app for iPad. And today Adobe has made things clear, and introduced their own Digital Technology Viewer software, which enables developers to create digital version of magazines using, indeed, InDesign.
Steve Jobs: “We are not allowing apps that create their own desktops”
The iPad App Store is going pretty well, with 8000 apps already accepted and developers quite happy with the sales results. But what about an application that’s been approved and then pulled from the App Store for some strange reason? That’s what happened to My Frame, and that’s why the developers decided to email Steve Jobs and ask.
Google Dumping Windows Systems, Integrating Own Technologies
Google has had their fair share of press between Apple bashing, Android yapping, and TV flapping antics. While they’ve made great strides in web and mobile technologies, that doesn’t mean they’re still reeling from other, recent events. Remember when Google’s Chinese operations were hacked? Google blames the insecurities of Microsoft’s Windows as part of the problem.
As Google builds their own operating systems, they’ll slowly be phasing out Windows as they implement their own technologies. In the meantime, some employees are reportedly touting MacBooks due to the safety of the OS X platform.
The iPad Really is Magical
What does a magician do with something as magical as the Apple iPad? Why, he performs some wicked optical illusions of course.
Design your Next iPhone Application with Dapp
A lot of people have great ideas in mind, but visualizing such opportune designs involves a lot of guess work, sketching, wire framing, and a bit of code. Imagine if you had an application that could not only help you mockup your next application, but provide you with the ability to export your product into native SDK Objective-C source code? Dapp for the iPhone allows developers to do just that.