appleJAC Macintosh Users

President's Corner

by Tom Piper, aJMUG President

June is half over, school kids have gone home, we’re just a week from our next office move, and my new 3G S iPhone will arrive shortly . . . upgrades on computers were announced at the World Wide Developers Conference, but the long-awaited Apple netbook is still a dream. Meanwhile, the humidity has spiked, and we can tell that summer is fast approaching.

Building on the success of the MacBasics classes, George Kopp will be holding a special July 9 2-hour iPhoto MacClass at the Landwehr home (see registration info below):



The minimum of eight registrants has already been met, so be sure to get your registration in as soon as possible while there is still room. My iWork ’09 MacClasses will be at Lewis and Clark Middle School on September 10, 17 and 24 featuring Pages, Numbers and Keynote.

The “Made on a Mac” image enhancement competition has begun, with your entry (one per member up to 2 megabytes in size) due no later than August 4 to applejac@mac.com (see explanation below).



DVD copies of the videotaped (Steve Archer and Sharon Hanson) January, February, March, April, May and June meetings are available from our Library (see Bruce Heerboth to check any out, or get a copy). We are really busy with lots of membership benefits.

Next meeting we will enjoy the Annual appleJAC MacFixIt meeting. As in past years, if you have a need to upgrade to your machines RAM memory or possibly install a larger hard disk, appleJAC veteran members will be on hand to assist you. Please let us know in advance if this is the case so we can help you to get the parts and have tools available. We will again show you important maintenance steps to protect your Mac, and do a special presentation about setting up and using Time Machine, Apple’s own Leopard backup.

Last month, 45 appleJAC members, families and friends enjoyed the hospitality of Joe and Kathy Mertzlufft at their lakeside home. Due to the rain, the festivities were moved into their three-stall garage where everyone enjoyed terrific food (George and Mark again did a great job with burgers and dogs), warm commoradorie, and exciting weather. We even got one more member due to our great social and educational services.

Don’t forget to mark your calendar for the next appleJAC Macintosh Users Group meeting on Tuesday, July 7, 2009, at 7:00 pm. Bring family, friends and new members to get the most out of your Mac and other Apple products.

July 2009 Meeting Agenda

 

June 2009 User Group Offers

 Elgato Products: 40% Off

Elgato recently announced Video Capture, their new product that lets you transfer video from a VCR, DVR, set-top box, camcorder or any other analog video source to your Mac as an iTunes-ready file. One simple click allows you to sync with an iPod, iPhone and Apple TV, play it in QuickTime, or upload it directly to YouTube.

Elgato is offering very special pricing of $60 (US) to Apple user group members (the same as Apple resellers), a 40% discount. The products are not-for-resale (NFR) and are marked as such on the product/packaging.

Capture up your video life: http://www.elgato.com/appleteam
This US/Canada-only offer is valid until September 30, 2009.


Buy The Missing Sync, Get Fliq for Mac Free

The Missing Sync for iPhone lets you sync notes, tasks, documents and files between your iPhone and Mac, and archive notes, text messages and call logs to your Mac. Fliq for Mac is a powerful way for Mac users to send and receive photos, contacts, notes, tasks and documents with others over a network, and exchange notes and memos.

Regularly priced at $59.95 (US), user group members qualify for a reduced price of $39.95 (US) during this offer.

Order: http://tinyurl.com/UGPromo   

http://www.markspace.com/iphone

This worldwide offer is valid until September 30, 2009.


Voila Software: 38% Discount

Voila is a professional creativity tool for Mac OS X Leopard that lets you capture your screen, annotate, organize and share. Voila lets you capture any shape, multiple regions at the same time, menu, webpage or DOM elements, and even from iSight. Pick and add annotations, add effects and share instantly via Mail, Flickr, FTP or iPhoto.

Regularly priced at $39.95 (US), Voila is offered to Apple user group members for only $24.95 (US), which is 38% off! A full-featured trial version can be downloaded for a 30-day evaluation.

For more details, downloading and purchasing: http://www.globaldelight.com/store

This worldwide offer is valid through December 31, 2009.

iLightFarts iPhone/iPodTouch App: Unusual Game Combo

by Tom Piper

With over 35,000 Apps now available via iTunes for the iPhone and iPod Touch, the variety of selections is immense and widely varied. Recently I acquired a game that appeared to be a combination of iLighter (one of my favorites) and iFart (one of my wife’s favorites).

iLightFarts may be the most unusual, pseudo-smelliest, colorfully explodingest app on the App Store. With the screen showing 20 round-faced people around the screen releasing gaseous emissions, it is your job to save the environment. You must kill the smells by lighting all of these farts without running out of lighter fluid. The game has 10 levels, each with a different skill level, farts, lighters and speed. 

The trick is to try to light a “cluster” of farts to conserve the lighter . . . the lighter can be easily moved with touch-and-drag, then a tap to light it (care must be taken to not touch prematurely). I never got to level 10, and I wish that the lighter would last longer, but it was a lot of noisy funny (yes, the iPhone vibrate-only mode will turn the sound off).

This game from ModStylez does have funny sound bytes, fart sounds, realistic explosions and lighters. It is very inexpensive at only 99¢, and more entertaining than I had imagined.

iPhoto 09 for Mac OS X: Visual QuickStart Guide: Effective Learning About Optimizing Your Pictures

by Tom Piper

Author: Adam C. Engst
Publisher: Peachpit Press (part of the Visual QuickStart Guide series)

First Edition: May 6, 2009 
Pages: 229
Series: Paperback
ISBN: 978-0-321-60131-5

Publisher’s brief description: Readers can start from the beginning to get a tour of the applications, or look up specific tasks to learn just what they need to know. This task-based, visual guide uses step-by-step instructions and hundreds of full-color screenshots to teach beginning and intermediate users how to make the most out of their digital photos with iPhoto '09. Perfect for anyone who needs to learn the program inside out, this guide covers everything from importing, tagging, editing, and perfecting images to creating slideshows and photo albums to easy online Web publishing. Readers will learn about everything new in iPhoto '09, including: Faces, which allows you to organize your photos based on who’s in them; Places, which uses data from GPS-enabled cameras or your iPhone's camera to categorize photos by location with easily recognizable names; themed slideshows; online sharing via Facebook and Flickr with one click; enhanced photo editing tools; and more.

My first impressions of this ebook (PDF version) were very good with a great Bookmarks side panel, it enlarges well (for the "hard of seeing"), and is appealing to the eye with a two-column format and serif font (sans-serif headers). The titling is bold, the tips are frequent and helpful, the pictures and illustrations are colorful and illustrative, the instructions easy to follow, excellent use of white space and balance, great “boxed” special notes, innovative applications, and empathetic perspective. Adam (and his co-editor Tonya) guides you through the experience as a companion, not as a pupil, understanding that the concepts are important before detail, with a supportive style (see example below).

The volume is well-organized:

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Getting Started

Chapter 2: Importing and Managing Photos

Chapter 3: Organizing Photos

Chapter 4: Working with Faces

Chapter 5: Working with Places

Chapter 6: Editing Photos

Chapter 7: Making Slideshows 

Chapter 8: Publishing Photos on the Web

Chapter 9: Sharing Photos

Chapter 10: Printing Photos

Chapter 11: Troubleshooting

Appendix A: Deep Background

Appendix B: Taking Better Photos

Index

As Adam says at the beginning of the book, “Even though iPhoto ’09 is the best version of the program that Apple has released so far, it still doesn’t entirely demystify the process of importing a digital photograph, editing it, and presenting it on paper or on the computer screen. And iPhoto comes with no documentation beyond minimal and often incomplete online help.” So, this book should be read “. . . not just for the manual iPhoto lacks, but also for the help you need to take digital photos and make the most of them.” 

My reading of this PDF is done on both a MacBook Pro 17” (unibody), and a second generation iPhone (16GB). On my laptop using either Preview or Adobe Acrobat Reader, the “pinch” command allows me to quickly zoom in or out of text and illustrations, and to jump to anywhere in the book from the Table of Contents (TOB) or the Index (or the Sidebar) for quick reference. On the iPhone using DataCase, the dual columns are a blessing because the reading is very comfortable when zoomed in on one or the other, while a “pinch” or a “swipe” moves me effortlessly around the pages. I’m still looking for an iPhone PDF reader that will read active embedded “links” so it can jump from the TOB or Index, just like in Preview on the Mac.

This wonderful book retails for $24.95 ($17.99 for ebook alone), but can be found for $16.49 ($15.00 for ebook) or less at various internet locations. A complete Peachpit description with purchasing details are available at  http://www.peachpit.com/store/product.aspx?isbn=0321601319. The author-generated ebook version can best be purchased through the Take Control cart at: http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/iphoto09-vqs.

Elgato Video Capture: Transfer VCR to Mac with Ease

by Tom Piper

I have many old VCR full-size video tapes from my son’s youth that I wanted to put on DVDs for posterity (and my grandson’s viewing). This used to be a very complicated process, but its been made much easier by an experienced and respected company in the video device field.

According to Elgato’s website, there is no easier or more convenient way to transfer home video to your Mac. Elgato Video Capture records from analog video sources in the H.264 or MPEG-4 formats that are native to iTunes. Your video is captured in real-time and no lengthy re-encoding is necessary; the video is immediately ready to sync with an iPod, iPhone, or Apple TV, to play in QuickTime, to edit in iMovie, or to upload directly to YouTube.

The era of VHS tapes is winding down, and after three decades there is a lot of video content to transfer for modern playback devices. What’s more, any video stored on magnetic tape (such as VHS, Video8 and Hi8) has a limited life span and deteriorates over time. Elgato Video Capture provides an easy way to bring those precious memories into iTunes, to edit them in iMovie, and to share on the Web.

Elgato Video Capture is very easy to use. The software Assistant guides you through every step, from connecting an analog video source to capturing video that is optimized for the way you want to use it. The software offers a simple tool to trim the beginning and end of the captured video. And, it takes just one click to add your video to iTunes to sync with an iPod®, iPhone™ or Apple TV®; to play in QuickTime®; to upload directly to YouTube™; or to open in iMovie ready for editing.

After installing the software provided on CD, the process really is as easy as Get Started > Connect Video > Connect Audio > Record > Trim > Finish Up. The final product can be recorded to DVD (like my VHS tapes), put on your iPod, played on your Mac, sent to friends or posted on your video account for public viewing.

To learn more, and even view the Mac screens that walk you through the process, go to: http://www.elgato.com/elgato/int/mainmenu/products/Accessories/Video-Capture/. For $99.95, this is a very good product that can help you preserve your precious video memories. I believe this is a quality product, made even better by the offer below.

Elgato Products: 40% Off

Elgato recently announced their Video Capture product. You can transfer video from a VCR, DVR, set-top box, camcorder or any other analog video source to your Mac as an iTunes®-ready file. One simple click allows you to sync with an iPod®, iPhone™ and Apple TV®, plays it in QuickTime®, or uploads it directly to YouTube™.

Elgato is offering very special pricing of $60 (US) to Apple user group members (the same as Apple resellers), a 40% discount. The products are not-for-resale (NFR) and are marked as such on the product/packaging.

Capture up your video life: http://www.elgato.com/appleteam

This U.S./Canada-only offer is valid until September 30, 2009.

MacSpeech Dictate: Better, Stronger, Faster

a review by Tom Piper

In February 2009 I published a review of MacSpeech Dictate 1.0 with a speech recognition history and some glowing comments about Dictate like “persistance and patience have paid off in a great product.” To their credit, this program has gotten even better.

MacSpeech Dictate 1.5 is the first upgrade to their premier speech recognition solution for the Macintosh, introducing a new Vocabulary Editor, new English profile options, enhanced accuracy and much more. Users can add, delete, manage and train words in their profile's vocabulary using a new Vocabulary Editor which also lets people customize behaviors related to the included words, such as capitalization, pronunciation or the use of spacing surrounding the word.

The new MacSpeech Dictate v1.5.1 (a free maintenance upgrade) provides greater accuracy than ever before with up to 20% more accurate recognition than previous versions. From the initial profile accuracy rate, customers can continue to increase the accuracy rate of their MacSpeech Dictate profile up to 99%. 

There are also new compatibility enhancements for working with Microsoft Word which include an automatic execution of the "Cache Document" command any time a Word document is opened while MacSpeech Dictate is launched. Also available on demand, the "Cache Document" command allows MacSpeech Dictate to read a document's contents, in order to navigate the document, and to enter and edit text.

Other enhancements include the addition of the top 100 web sites to the "Jump To" command options, a new Save Profile menu item for capturing Phrase Training information prior to Quitting, a new User Manual, and other enhancements and refinements to the user interface for a more efficient, intuitive experience.

MacSpeech Dictate is now the only desktop speech recognition solution for the Macintosh which provides unprecedented speech recognition accuracy with minimal training and works with existing Mac applications. It delivers a true Mac user experience, and conforms to behaviors already familiar to Macintosh fans worldwide. Beyond dictation, MacSpeech Dictate lets people perform basic navigation of their Mac and control it with their voice to launch applications, open new windows, execute menu commands, and other controls.

For more information, visit www.macspeech.com, where Macspeech Dictate can be purchased for $199 (or upgrade for $54.95 from version 1.3 or earlier). The program requires an Intel-based Mac, Mac OS X 10.5.6 or greater ("Leopard"). An Internet connection is also required for product registration, plus a MacSpeech-certified noise-cancelling microphone (included in box). If you are looking for a quick and reliable way to convert speech-to-text, and/or verbally control many commands on your Mac, this is the product to buy.

Think it . . . speak it . . . create it . . . speech recognition at its best!

Third party tools for eBay

These sites and services are not affiliated with eBay. We can't provide technical support or assistance for these tools. If you have questions about these systems, visit their websites and contact their customer support directly. The prices noted may be outdated.

iSale
This is a bulk listing, listing designer, and tracking tool.
iSale can't revise active listings.
It's currently $39.99 for a single license or $59.99 for a double.
You might be able to try a demo version of the latest release.
Visit http://www.equinux.com/us/products/isale/download.html

eLister
This is an offline bulk listing creator.
eLister is the Mac version of  Turbo Lister.
It's $19.95 per month or $34.95 for 6 months.
It's only compatible with eBay (not any of our sister sites).
Visit http://www.blackmagik.com/elister.html

GarageSale
GarageSale is an all-in-one tool.
It's a lot like BlackThorne.
It's fully integrated with iPhoto and comes with over 70 built in listing templates.
It has a built-in image editor and built-in scheduler.
It's $24.99 for a single user license or $44.99 for a family license
(allows up to 5 computers in one household).
Visit http://www.iwascoding.com/GarageSale/

AuctionGenie
This is an all inclusive tool that helps with listing and bidding.
It has reporting, feedback, payment, and delivery features, a built-in
proxy bidder, and an item watcher.
It's $40 a year.
Visit http://www.luxcentral.com/auctiongenie/

appleJAC Offers iPhoto Class

 

End of July appleJAC Digest/Blog