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The Low End Mac Link Archive, February 2004
Low End Mac Reader Specials
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External news links are listed below by the date of publication
with the most recent articles listed at the top, older ones below
them. Other monthly archive indexes are linked on the right. Links
were correct when originally posted. However, we cannot guarantee
that these links are still active.
OS X: File sharing
vulnerability discovered in Mac OS X, Daniel Drew Turner,
eWeek, 02.27. "This problem allows you to trick it into sending the
unencrypted password to you instead of the intended server."
Opinion:
My last two hours enduring Mac OS 9, Apple-X, 02.27. "...Mac OS
9 was full of more usability problems than the current version of
Mac OS X."
Rights:
US porn
typosquatter banged up, John Leyden, The Register, 02.27. "A
Florida man who directed children to pornographic websites by
registering misspellings of domains likely to be popular with kids
was imprisoned for two-and-a-half years yesterday."
Opinion:
Black History Month &endash; Rodney O. Lain, Steve Harris,
The Mac Mind, 02.27. "In a bunch of Lain's articles he ties the Mac
community together with the black community, being it that they
both are minorities in their respective areas."
Review:
Hoo neads a speeling chicker?, Bob Levitus, Dr. Mac: Rants
& Raves, Mac Observer, 02.27. "I'm addicted to Spell Catcher X
from Rainmaker Research."
Opinion: Mac
Word 6.0, Rick Schaut, Buggin' My Life Away, 02.26. Why
Microsoft Word 6.0 for the Mac was a "crappy product" - and what
Microsoft learned from the experience.
News: IBM debuts
pocket-sized PC, Tony Smith, The Register, 02.25. Clever
portable, dockable drive is about the size of a Newton when coupled
with an LCD touch screen.
Opinion: The 20 Mac
games that mattered most, Inside Mac Games, 02.24. "We at IMG
would like to thank the game-makers who have provided 20 years of
expanding imaginations and just plain fun."
Hardware: The iBook
logic board fiasco; still not over, Charles Moore, Applelinks,
02.24. "I've heard from readers with iBooks both earlier and later
than the privileged serial number range specified in the repair
program who have suffered the all-too-familiar issues...."
Hardware:
Key components ready for PowerBook G5, MacMinute, 02.24. "All
of the key components for Apple to produce a PowerBook G5 appear to
be ready, and Mac users should expect to see the new laptop no
later than this summer...."
Opinion:
What's on your PowerBook? - and another 550 MHz G4 Pismo
upgrade, Charles Moore, Road Warrior, Mac Opinion, 02.24. "The
WOYP? ads were very effective in an era when there were still lots
of people who wondered whether there was a compelling reason to buy
a computer at all, let alone . . . [a] PowerBook."
Web: Pop-up "suicide"
can kill your brand, Tim Richardson, The Register, 02.24.
"Bunnyfoot's research found that pop-ups were the 'single biggest
turn-off among users' with users deleting the ads on average just
2.5 seconds after they appear."
News: Motorola chip
launch paves way for 1.5GHz PowerBook G4, Tony Smith, The
Register, 02.23. "Motorola's chip division . . . today updated its
G4-class PowerPC processor, the MPC7447, taking the part to 1.5GHz
and paving the way for one more PowerBook G4 update...."
Opinion:
When Windows won't work, it's time for a Mac, David Coursey,
AnchorDesk, ZDNet, 02.23. "In my computing life, there's one
constant: The Macs don't crash and the Windows machines do."
Spam: Microsoft
and Sendmail launch "email caller ID", Internet Magazine,
02.23. "Email technology provider Sendmail is launching a sender
authentication plug-in which is hoped will combat email fraud and
spam."
News: Apple
releases Security Update 2004-02-23, MacCentral, 02.23. "Apple
on Monday offered Security Update 2004-02-23, the latest update to
Mac OS X v10.3 'Panther.'" Also for 10.2.8.
Review: DiscBlaze
v3.02, Mike Swope, Applelinks, 02.22. Disk burning utility
offers most of what Toast does, a little extra, at a US$19.95 price
tag.
Opinion: Beyond Luxo Jr : The next
flat panel iMac, Daniel Eran, Roughly Drafted, 02.20. "Just
slap an Xserve or PowerBook logic board on the back, with a full
size hard drive and an optical drive that ejects the CD out the
side of the display."
Rights:
FBI shutters Web host, Rich Miller, CarrierHotels, 02.19.
"...the FBI determined that it was more efficient (from their point
of view) to remove all of our servers and transport them to the FBI
local laboratories for inspection."
Analysis:
Smiles fade at Napster, Dawn C. Chmielewski, SiliconValley.com,
02.19. HP/Apple deal and competitors keep Napster a fraction the
size of Apple's iTunes Music Store.
Opinion:
It's the standard, stupid, Christopher Breen, Mac 911,
Macworld, 02.19. Why Apple needs to evangelize the AAC format to
companies that make portable music players.
Rights:
RIAA sued
under gang laws, John Borland, c|net, 02.18. "A New Jersey
woman . . . as countersued the big record labels, charging them
with extortion and violations of the federal antiracketeering
act."
Virus: Macs and
viruses - are we as safe as we think?, Peter Cohen, MacCentral,
02.18. Although the experts . . . admit that to date, they're
unaware of any Mac OS X-specific virus or worm, one thing they all
agree on is Mac OS X not immune to a potential hacker attack."
Web: The pop-up ad is
dead (nearly), Jan Libbenga, The Register, 02.18. "...a NFO
Trendbox survey which shows that 91 per cent of (Dutch) Net users
dislike these intrusive ads." And a lot of us simply block
them.
Advice:
Why, and how, not to use HTML in e-mail, Dan Gillmor,
SiliconValley.com, 02.17. "You'll be safer from viruses and worms,
and you'll have more privacy in your online world."
Analysis:
Why Windows breaks, David Frith, The Barrow, Australian IT,
02.17. "...one really hates to crow over others' misfortunes, but
there are times when we're doubly pleased our office (and home)
runs on Apple Macs, not Windows computers."
Hardware:
The Road Warrior Review - Contour NoteRiser, Charles Moore,
Road Warrior, Mac Opinion, 02.17. "...the engineering ingenuity of
the NoteRisers' designers will impress you."
Opinion: My
first 48 hours enduring Mac OS X, Matthew Thomas, 02.16. A
longtime Mac user moves to Panther and finds it inconsistent and
confusing.
Rights:
AT&T trips up SCO, Frank Hayes, Computerworld, 02.16. SCO's
claims against Linux (and potentially the BSD at the core of OS X)
may be undone thanks to a 1985 article from AT&T, the
originator of Unix.
OS X: State of the
Odyssey, Charles Moore, OS X Odyssey, Applelinks, 02.16. "Two
months with Panther: way cool but with some aggravations."
Review: iBreeze PowerBook
stand, Macs Only!, 02.16. "In summary, the iBreeze is a great
little PowerBook cooling stand."
Opinion: Experience
with Apple refurbs, MacSlash, 02.14. Overall, users seem very
happy with the quality of refurbished Apple hardware.
OS X: Panther: Room for
improvement, Justin Williams, MacZealots, 02.13. "Even in all
of its glory, however, there is always room for improvement."
Review: AlchemyTV,
Kirk Hiner, Applelinks, 02.13. "The picture quality is
exceptionally sharp at low- to mid-sized monitor resolutions, and
passable at high resolutions."
News: IBM fabs 90nm G5
using strained silicon, Tony Smith, The Register, 02.13. "IBM's
first 90nm chip, the G5-class PowerPC 970FX, incorporates a key
technique used by Intel to improve processor performance...."
Analysis: Mac OS security:
The obscurity myth has legs, Gene Steinberg, Mac Night Owl,
02.13. "A lot of so-called experts don't really want to admit that
perhaps Mac OS X is simply a more secure operating system because
it was designed to be that way."
Opinion:
The iMac needs to lose its head, Alex Salkever, Byte of the
Apple, BusinessWeek, 02.13. "...the major weakness in the iMac
line: It's an all-in-one machine, which the market has moved away
from."
Web: Make websites
linkable in stories, Hypergene, 02.12. "Despite having at least
12 sites mentioned, not one is an actual URL you can click."
News: Big
Blue gives 90-nano boost to PowerPCs, Michael Kanellos, c|net,
02.12. "Big Blue is expected to describe a 2.5GHz version of the
chip made on the 90-nanometer process at the International Solid
State Circuits Conference in San Francisco next week."
Review:
Daystar MACHSpeed G4 Pismo upgrade review, Charles W. Moore,
Road Warrior, Mac Opinion, 02.10. "While the economics of processor
upgrading can be dubious in some cases, with the G3 Series
PowerBooks it substantially less so."
Advice: When should
you upgrade your operating system?, Charles Moore, Mac Basics,
Applelinks, 02.04. "In my estimation, one would have to be a bit of
a masochist to be running any OS X version prior to 10.2 Jaguar
these days...."
Advice:
First you need to add memory, Gene Steinberg, Mac Hardware
Report, Mac Night Owl, 02.04. "If the Mac comes with 128 MB of RAM,
get another 512 MB."
Opinion: Create
a hoax, earn damnation, Leander Kahney, Wired, 02.04. "The
Overclockers.com website published a barely believable hoax last
week detailing the gutting of a brand new and very expensive Power
Mac G5."
Opinion:
Safe to buy an iBook again!, Charles Moore, Road Warrior, Mac
Opinion, 02.03. "...based on Apple's quarterly sales reports, the
number of computers eligible for this program could be in excess of
800,000."
Opinion: FBI agent:
"If you want to frustrate law enforcement, use a Mac", Bryan
Chaffin, Mac Observer, 02.02. "That's a ringing endorsement, if we
ever heard one. If only the buyers in the rest of the government
would buy a ticket on the same clue train."
History:
It sure is great to get out of that bag!, Folklore, 02.02. Did
you know that Apple "cheated" when they introduced the Macintosh?
They had to use a prototype 512K to run all the software.
Rights: