Random Thoughts on Leopard
I’ve had an opportunity to really spend some time with Leopard and I think it’s the best Mac OS X upgrade ever. As a certified Apple Consultant, I’m spending time at one of the local Apple Stores tonight giving demos. Here are some thoughts I have on some of the features:
Stacks - nothing spectacular, but a nice addition to the Finder that makes it easier to keep files off of your desktop. This will definitely help out in my case, since the desktop tends to be where everything ends up until I decide to either dump it or organize it.
Finder - Some of the new features are not only eye candy (i.e., Cover Flow in the Finder) but very useful as well. As you get older (I recently turned the big Five-Oh) you appreciate being able to see files and folder icons and their contents “writ large” on your screen. The
sidebar has been improved as well and should be much more useful than its Panther and Tiger counterpart.
Back to my Mac - Apple’s built-in answer to “Go to my PC”. Nice!
QuickLook - Brings the quick scan capability that came out in iLife ‘08 (hover mouse over icon and move from side to side to see contents of a collection of files) to the Finder.
Spaces - About time. This should help me arrange my clutter. Up to 16 spaces can be used at once.
Time Machine - I can’t wait to get a lot of my clients using this, as they hate “traditional” backups. It can not only use an external drive to store backup images, but also a Mac OS X Server share, XSAN volume, or any other shared drive (but not a drive shared from an Airport Extreme Base Station). The interface is very well thought out, and it’s one of the best backup implementations I’ve seen. Apple’s going to sell a ton of 3rd-party external drives in the next month or two.
Mail - Stationery should have been part of Mail for years, but it finally makes it. What’s different is that it uses the same drag ‘n drop of photos that you see with iLife, so you can bring up stationery and easily customize it by just bringing up the media browser with one click, then dragging pictures onto the stationery. Notes are nice as part of Mail, but it surprises me that they didn’t integrate them with Notes on iPhone. Data Detectors in Mail are nice, where any info text (like a phone number, address, appointment, etc.. becomes “hot” and can be directly moved to a supporting application). This is the first time since the Newton that we’ll be able to have someone send a message that says “let’s have a
meeting at 10:30 next Thursday” and add that meeting to our calendar with one click. Cool.
iChat - iChat Theatre is great! Sharing photos, Keynote presentations and full screens through an iChat session is very handy and fun. The Video Backdrops are fun - I did a demo where I had a video of a space shuttle launch that I had captured running in the background while I was talking to someone. VERY cool (although not very useful in a business environment).
Boot Camp - finally out of Beta. I still prefer VMWare Fusion.
I can’t wait to start upgrading some of my client computers in a few weeks (I’ll wait to see if there are any hidden “gotchas” first!).
Technorati Tags: Apple, Macintosh
Travel Update
Long-time readers of Movable Beast know that I travel a LOT, part of the reason that I named the site Movable Beast! I’m currently on a trip on the American Queen steamboat, heading up the Mississippi River from St. Louis to St. Paul. One of my big concerns is always whether or not I am going to have Internet service, and I have been using my Sprint Mobile Broadband card to make connections all over the country. However, a quick look at the service area map for Sprint showed me that it wasn’t going to be likely that I’d be able to use the card. We’re still near the St. Louis area (we’re up near Alton, IL right now), but I’m sure that as we get into the hinterlands of America the EVDO Rev. A signal will degrade to Rev. 0, then 1xRTT, then ???
So what’s an web addict to do? Fortunately, I did find that the cruise line (Majestic American Cruises) had installed some sort of connection and they have Wi-Fi infesting the boat, so that’s a huge help. That will help a lot. But how about sending pictures to my .Mac Web Gallery from my iPhone? Most data work requires an EDGE connection, and I’m pretty sure that AT&T’s data network doesn’t extend to most of the heartland (except near big cities and highways).
As we zip around the next week, I’ll give some updated about how the connection is working. In the meantime, I’m enjoying the connection and the fun of cruising on the mighty Mississippi!
Short Review: Dymo LabelWriter Duo
Sheesh. It’s been a while since I posted anything. i won’t give you any excuses, I’ve just been busier than heck.
I thought I’d do a short review of a device that I’ve had for a while. It’s not portable, it’s not a smartphone, but it is one of the most useful pieces of equipment on my desk. It’s the Dymo LabelWriter Duo. I initially wondered what I’d use this device for, but now I find myself crunching out labels and postage on a regular basis.
More (and photos & screenshots) after the break…
Technorati Tags: Macintosh, Printers, Vista
Second Experience With A New iPhone
What with the price of the iPhone coming down $200 and my $100 Apple Store credit from the first iPhone, I decided that it was time to get my wife a new phone. She had been using an old Motorola flip phone that basically sucked, and she had been eyeing my iPhone lustfully since Day One. With her birthday coming up in about a week, I thought it was a perfect time to buy one.
The second experience was just as good as the first, although it didn’t go as quickly. The purchase process in the phone was definitely faster (I was in and out of the Apple Store in about five minutes). When I bought my iPhone, I set up a new number on AT&T so everything was up and running immediately. For Barb’s iPhone, I entered the “transfer” information during the activation and within a few minutes I received notification that the phone was activated. Yeah, it could SEND phone calls, but it couldn’t receive. It ended up taking about 12 hours for the change to make it through the combined systems of T-Mobile and AT&T, which isn’t that bad when you think about it.
As a surprise, I’ve also set up her phone with her home email account, added some favorite bookmarks, and set her weather widget to show the weather at home. It must be nice to be married to an ACN and have someone set up all these great things for you! 
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Joy of Tech!
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MacLevelTen
