Category: Mactopia

AFP548 – Changing the world one server at a time.

I’m seriously considering experimenting with Mac OS X Server, and I was just pointed in the direction of this resource (I knew it already, wasn’t it run by Michael Bartosh (RIP) who tragically passed away earlier this year.

The guy who threw me the link, asked me if I could guess what AFP548 is hinting. Well the AFP is simple, Apple Filetransfer Protocol, but 548…The portnumber of the service maybe?

Unfortunately Mac OS X Server is rather pricey, and the upgrade price is too high. I might hold my horses and wait for Leopard Server, that will introduce many new technologies, including an open sourced Calendar Server and a Wiki Server.

CodeWeavers – CrossOver Mac

CodeWeavers has released CrossOver, the Windows compatibility layer based on the WINE Project for the Mac, and I finally got to test it today.

My expectations were low, since I struggled with the pure open source DARWINE Mac OS X port of WINE.

But…So far I’m impressed!

The first application I tried to install, Vig Foreningsprogram, installed without a hitch – I jumped a little in my seat when I saw the Windows Installer pop up, and that I could use Windows style directories.

So far it runs like a charm. This is exactly the class of applications, business apps, that should run without problems under CrossOver, and so far it looks very promising.

I know it’s a bad choice for first application to test, since I don’t really know it, but I have a motive.

Vig Foreningsprogram is a free, Danish developed software solution for administration of associations (foreninger) an important part of the Danish culture and democracy.

Vig Foreningsprogram has been developed for Windows only, but now it runs on Mac as well, and since it’s now “available” on other platforms, associations could have a choice besides Windows for their IT needs.

Here’s a list of applications I’d like see working.

• Internet Explorer 6 or 7 with Danske Bank
• Visual Studio .NET

If I could get these two applications running under Mac OS X, I could loose the Windows box entirely.

I’m putting in a pre-order for CrossOver Mac, forget about Parallels and Boot Camp, “it’s the end of the Redmond Tax as we know it” (humming a REM song).

Wired News: Has Steve Jobs Lost His Magic?

Wired News attended the WWDC 2006 Keynote…And they made an observation that I also made…

I wondered if Jobs, who was treated for cancer last year, was sick. Was he sharing presentation duties to save energy? When I saw Jobs introducing the iPod Hi-Fi at Apple’s headquarters in late February, about five months ago, it looked to me like he was tiring quickly and was glad to get it over.

Well, enough with the “central commite in the early 80ies speculations”.

Actually I suspect that Jobs is much more exited by the retail stores and consumer products than Macs, these days.

I think he glows when he’s talking about the 5th Avenue “Temple”, and I think he was quite inspired at the special music events in fall 2005 where the iPod nano and the iPod video were introduced.

Apple Opens Up: Kernel, Mac OS Forge, iCal Server, Bonjour, Launchd

Apple seems to be doing the right thing, and is renewing it’s commitment to the power of open source, following the disappointing decision to shut down OpenDarwin.org.

First of all the Intel Kernel sources will be made available. Quote from the mailing list:

As of today, we are posting buildable kernel sources for Intel-based Macs alongside the usual PowerPC (and other Intel) sources, starting with Mac OS X 10.4.7. We regret the delay in readying the new kernel for release, and thank you for your patience.

More importantly a new community project web-site called Mac OS Forge has been launched, and a number of projects are already hosted on Mac OS Forge.

Most notable on the list of featured projects is the calendar server from Mac OS 10.5 Leopard, that was unveiled yesterday.

I was a bit worried that the Mac OS X Leopard Calendar server would be a closed project, so this is great news.

But Mac OS Forge is definitely no OpenDarwin, yet!

Thanks to macnyt.dk for drawing my attention to this important news.

Apple – QuickTime – WWDC 2006

Finally the 7th of august arrived, and the WWDC 2006 Keynote has been delivered. It’s available as a stream from the link above, but expect sluggish performance for some time, everybody seems to be tuning in.

And boy was this one hyped event, as the “Joy of Tech” pointed out, it seems like all tech web-sites, even non rumour sites, were turning into rumour sites.

Come on, this is WWDC, it’s about developers, and I didn’t expect anything besides the unveiling of Leopard.

And the anticipation was building with banners bashing Microsoft and calling Leopard Vista 2.0.

With the Keynote kicking off with the “PC” from the “I’m a PC and I’m a Mac” commercials asking the Mac developers to take a long break, or come help him out with Vista – we need it!, the tone was set.

InTheMac.com…Apple Mac Software +

Just discovered this Mac OS X software site, it looks very nice, and above all, it seems to be updated quite frequently.

Being a recent Tiger user, I’m shopping for Dashboard Widgets, and this was how I found this site, Googling for a flickr Widget.

I guess I’ll stop looking for Widgets after a while, but Widgets is a simple and quite useful technology, that can be quite addictive.

And the site really is putting RSS feeds to good use, with an extensive list of feeds sorted by category.

Highly recommended.