MacBook Air: not impressed

Well, now everyone already knows about the Mac Book Air. I've seen the pictures, and to tell you to truth - I'm not impressed.

Yes, its thin. Probably light. But it looks breakable. It's expensive. It has slow hard drive.
And design? I'm not sure yet I like it either.

So, we'll have to wait and see. I thought I could get a new laptop and waited until January. Now I think I lost some time.

Installing Mac OS X on HP pavillion laptop

Hi folks

Being affected by all “Hackintosh” series posts in Lifehacker and other places (such as installing it on eeePC 701), I’ve decided to get and install it on my aging laptop, HP Pavillion, model ze4508ea.

Here’s the laptop’s specs:

CPU: AMD Mobile XP 1.8G
Memory: 750MB (can be expanded to 1G)
HD: 20G
Graphics: ATI Mobile 320M integrated up to 64MB
CDRW/DVD
Screen: 14”
Wireless: PCMCIA RTLink 2500 series card

Please let me know what my expectations can be regarding the functionality of the Mac OS X 10.4.8 on such a laptop.

Thanks a bunch!

Terminal Codes for Leopard Tweaking

Beautify your Leopard with single liner terminal codes.

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Technorati : apple. leopard

Gorgeous Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Dock Replacement! [w/pics!]

If you have Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard and dislike the look of the dock, but not enough to go all the way back to the old 2D configuration, you may want to check out this quick, clever tweak to the dock. This novice-grade hack makes the dock jet-black, highly reflective, and in most cases, much less obtrusive than Apple's variant.

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PC Magazine 'Leopard is “by far the best operating system ever written'

In his 4.5-star (out of 5) review of Leopard, Edward Mendelson (pcmag.com) maintains that Leopard is “by far the best operating system ever written for the vast majority of consumers, with dozens of new features that have real practical value.” Mendelson “found Leopard to be startlingly fast, brilliantly streamlined ....."

It's finally out!! I'll just wait for a release of a new mac laptops to decide whether I want to go the mac way....

-A

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Apple developing OS X minitablet

AppleInsider is reporting that Apple has a project underway to develop a minitablet computer based on the OS X operating system it has developed for the iPhone and the iPod Touch. The site is calling it "the return of the Newton," referring to the much-maligned but cult-favorite PDA that Apple sold in the mid-1990s.

The I 'New' Tone would be interesting name, wouldn't it?

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Why widgets suck

I've just read a blog post by Leah Calver titled "Widgets suck".

She says:

...It's not only widgets, the entire mashup phenomenon that isn't really working. I'm not usually such a naysayer, but for the sake of fellow developers I think perhaps I could call this one out.

From a business perspective, widgets are leeches..."

So I've decided to share my thoughts here.

My personal take on widgets is this:
It is a nice and cool technology which allows to create a single peace of software which does one specific thing. What cool about it, is that you choose to decide the graphics, the appearance, the functionality - its like writing a short story. If you do it well enough, many others will use it gladly and happily.
But my problem with Widgets is that they force you to put an effort to use them.

I'll explain: these things are supposed to make my life more fun, and easier and more interesting. But they are different application than what I already have on my computer. I have to "manually" see them: on Mac it's pressing the key, on Windows its minimizing all windows. That's a usability problem.

Not to mention, that widgets are huge time burner, of course.

I think though, there's a solution possible to this. As our screens are getting bigger in size, time will come when 30 incher will sit on my desk. After working awhile with such a monster, I know that my field of view doesn't catch full 30" without turning my head over. So, dissecting screen area estate to a "constant" part where widgets would sit and give me useful information, and "dynamic" part which will serve as today's monitors (for applications that is), I'd have a benefit of both Widgets (as available to me at all times) and normal work (not interrupted by operation needed to check a weather on a widget).

A temporal solution may be in form of small (say, 15") additional screen nearside your main one, or Lebedev's Mini Three.

Just my thoughts though.
Feedback is welcome.

-A.

Technorati : techonology, widgets

Gallery: Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard build 9A466 (WWDC 2007) - Think Secret

Those in attendance at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference last week went home with the first new build of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard released to third-party developers in almost two months. Think Secret has compiled a number of screenshots from the newest build.

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