New Firefox; New Chrome Icon

This morning I decided to wake up early. I was greeted by two separate browser updates. Most significantly, the Mozilla Foundation released a new version of Firefox. Version 4.0 to be specific. It has been a while since I last used Firefox on my own machine. I’m not as big into the add-ons as I once was, so Chrome or Safari have been my go-to browsers. It would seem that I’m not the only one, and Mozilla knows it. They’re stepping up their game in order to lure people like me back.

Firefox seems to perform relatively well. I’m not sure it has quite the same snappiness of Chrome or Safari, but the difference (if any) is negligible. The interface has been pared down to resemble the minimalism previously available in Safari and Chrome. That, in my opinion is a good thing. As usual, Firefox appears to render pages correctly. The average user is unlikely to ever notice any issues, although Firefox 4.0 technically falls just shy of full web standards compliance (Acid3). In contrast, Chrome and Safari both score 100/100.

For more details on Mozilla Firefox, check out the official Firefox website or download it for yourself. It’s free!

In other browser news, it appears that Google Chrome released an update. Along with the standard fare of security and performance tweaks, Google has released a new icon for its browser. I’m not sure whether I like it. When viewed at 500 x 500 pixels, it appears quite sharp. However, the scaled version currently sitting in my dock looks far less appealing. The same is likely true on all platforms, but the icon looks out of place on the Mac dock.

Christmas Season Shipping

Back in March, I posted an infographic on the State of the Internet. Among other things, it pictorialized the growing number of emails that are sent these days. In case you thought that the internet was going to kill all physical postal services, I present to you an infographic about holiday season shipping. The numbers are still quite impressive. After all, it may still be a few years before we can have eBay purchases ”beamed” to our living rooms. Bear in mind that this infographic only covers USPS (United States Postal Services) and UPS.

Migrating an iTunes Library

I’m currently in the middle of transferring my files from my trusty iMac to my new Hackintosh. On my iMac, there was only 1 drive (640 GB). Almost everything was stored on that single drive. My Hackintosh sports a different setup. I have a 120 GB SSD that I use for my OS, applications, and my Aperture library. The rest of my files, including my iTunes library, have been relegated to a 1 TB HDD.

I found myself in a situation where I needed to move my iTunes to an entirely different drive on a new machine. However, I didn’t want to lose all my albums, rating, etc. What to do? As it turns out, the solution is quite simple.

For those of you new to or unfamiliar with Mac lingo, the “~” symbol is a shortcut for your home folder. In the Finder sidebar, it’s the location with the “house” icon. So, ~/Movies is the path for the Movies folder inside your home folder.

Step 1

On the “source” machine, locate the “iTunes” folder (~/Music)

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Migrating Apple Mail Across Computers

With my recent move to a Hackintosh, I’ve been busy moving all my personal files and settings from my old computer to my new one. I use Apple Mail to access my plethora of email accounts, so I needed a way to migrate all my email “stuff” to my new computer. The process is relatively simple. The result: when I turned on Apple mail for the first time on my new computer, everything looked exactly as before!

Step 1

On the source computer, locate the mail folder (~/Library/Mail/). The tilde is the shorthand symbol used to indicate your home folder.

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Test Your Password’s Strength

The more we live online, the more important online security becomes. Ultimately, most online security comes down to good passwords. Your bank’s servers may be rock solid, but if your password is “1234,” your security is doomed. Heck, I could probably get in!

Now you’re probably wondering to yourself how secure your password is. Microsoft has set up a helpful website to let you know. Hope it helps!

Hackintosh: First Stress Test

About two months ago, I watched a video on YouTube that made my jaw drop. An individual running an overclocked Hackintsoh opened 56 applications in mere seconds. Immediately I began to imagine the things I could do with such a machine. With only a small amount of begging and bartering, my wife granted her blessing, and I got busy ordering computer parts.

I’ve assembled my Hackintosh, and I’ve posted my own stress test. My computer isn’t over-clocked yet, but it still managed a humble 66 applications in 20 second.

www.tonymacx86.blogspot.com

Convert WMA to MP3 for iTunes

On the Windows platform, iTunes has the ability to convert .wma files to .mp3. Inevitably, one encounters Windows Media Audio (wma) files from time to time. It nice to be able to simply drag and drop the files into iTunes and not bother with converting. However, for whatever reason (probably licensing), Apple does not include the ability to convert wma’s to mp3 in the OS X version of iTunes. That leaves us poor sods to fend for ourselves.

One of the simpler (Free) solutions I’ve found is All2MP3. It’s a simple drag-n-drop interface that supports a number of file types and provides easy conversion to the iTunes-friendly .mp3 format.

Hope it helps!

Manly Men Only: Kijiji Truck Ad

This is the text from a real ad that was posted on Kijiji in August 2010. I copied the text here so that the comedic genius wouldn’t be lost when the truck sold. Enjoy.

OK, ill start off by saying that this Truck is only available for purchase by only the real manliest of men (or women). My friends,…if it was possible for a vehicle to sprout chest hair and five o’clock shadow, this truck would look like Clint eastwood or Tom Selleck. Its just that manly of a truck!

This truck was never intended to drive to the mall so you can pick up that “adorable shirt and matching shoes” that you have had your eyes on. It wasnt meant to transport you to yoga class or go drive you around to go on “wine sampling tours” and things. NO thats what your Avalon, Prius, or Neon, or Sunfire are for. If thats the kind of car your looking for, then just do us all a favor and stop reading this right now. I mean it, just stop.

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Be Careful What You Wish For

For all the expectant mothers out there, especially the ones that I know! This could happen to you!

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

The New iTunes Icon: Wha?!? (updated)

Earlier today, Apple hosted a special press event. Among other things, Apple released version 10 of iTunes. I’ve had about 10 minutes to play with it, and so far, I like what I’m seeing. In my opinion, this is the snappiest version of iTunes to date. Even on newer machines, I’ve found iTunes to be a bit sluggish with larger libraries…until now. Apple has refined the interface, and the changes are largely good.

However, the one thing that struck me as odd was Apple’s redesign of the iTunes icon. To be blunt, it’s simplistic, unlike Apple’s typically beautiful iconography, and it sticks out like a sore thumb in my dock.

Apple’s reasoning for changing their icon is valid. The previous icon with the blue eighth notes and CD is a little outmoded as CD’s are on the way out (as per S. Jobs). However, is this the best replacement Cupertino’s world-renown design team was able to conjure? In stark contrast to other Mac icons (Apple’s own and 3rd party), the new iTunes stamp looks simplistic and plastic-y. Most of Apple’s icons have a semi-photorealistic look to them.

One of these things is not like the other...

It makes a person wonder whether there’s something bigger behind the redesign. Is this the first breeze in the wind of change? Will Apple be changing the look of more application icons? After all, this icon almost has a MobileMe-esque feel to it (some may remember that the MobileMe icon was scrutinized for its cartoonish looks).

In the past, Apple has used iTunes to test out new interface ideas. iTunes was one of the first apps to drop the brushed metal and aqua blue, so Apple may be testing the waters here, both in terms of icon design and interface design.

Time will tell, I suppose.

Update:

Apparently I’m not the only one who isn’t fond of the new iTunes 10 logo. In fact, someone went so far as to email Steve Jobs to let him know. Click for whole story.