Earlier this week, we mentioned that the first known worm attack on iPhones has been released, but it does no harm. Today though, security firm Intego reports that a new iPhone malware has been spotted, and unlike Monday’s worm attack, this can actually access personal information on your iPhone.
The newly spotted malware can, like the worm from Monday, only access jailbroken iPhones and iPod Touches with default SSH passwords, but Intego states that the risk of the malware is “low”, and it doesn’t install anything on the iPhone.
Hackers using this tool will install it on a computer – Mac, PC, Unix or Linux – then let it work. It scans the network accessible to it, and when it finds a jailbroken iPhone, breaks into it, then steals data and records it.
This hacker tool could easily be installed, for example, on a computer on display in a retail store, which could then scan all iPhones that pass within the reach of its network. Or, a hacker could sit in an Internet café and let his computer scan all iPhones that come within the range of the wifi network in search of data. Hackers could even install this tool on their own iPhones, and use it to scan for jailbroken phones as they go about their daily business.
If you haven’t jailbroken your iPhone, you can relax because you’re out of the danger zone.
Today it’s Thursday and it’s time for our weekly free app reviews. Each Thursday, AppleLunch will provide you with reviews of free apps from the App Store to separate the wheat from the chaff. Today, one of our editors gets embarrassed, and a tip for the lazy music lover.
Paper Toss
If you work in an office, you are probably familiar with the feeling of not doing anything. This feeling is called boredom and some brainiacs claim that boredom makes one smarter, and it has definitely made at least one guy smarter, when he suddenly got the idea of making a game for the iPhone where you shall throw a crumbled piece of paper into a small trash can and see how many times in a row you can hit it without missing. This itself seems quite easy, but when you add some different wind power from different angels, it becomes a bit more difficult. Since the game takes place in an office, the wind comes from a fan of course.
The game has 4 different levels and the harder you decide to play it, the distance to the trashcan will increase, and the paper ball will be even more influenced by the wind. Here at AppleLunch we take things seriously, and wanted to see whether Paper Toss is realistic or not. Watch the video below.
As you could see, paper toss in real life isn’t easy. The distance to the trash can though was corresponding to medium level in paper toss, so maybe our tester forgot to practice before shooting the video.
In the App, Paper Toss, you throw the crumbled piece of paper by sliding a finger in the direction you want to throw the ball. It’s easy and fun to compete against you friends in ‘how can get the best streak’ but it doesn’t come with a multiplayer version. The graphic is above what you can expect from a free application and the sounds are realistic too. On the negative side is the games’ gameplay, which is a bit uniform.
This application is officially made by Apple is available for free in iTunes App Store. This Application is exceptional and truly amazing and should be on every iPhones and iPod Touches. If you are a Mac owner you probably have an Apple Remote which has the most important features; play/pause, volume up/down, forward, backward and menu. iTunes Remote from App Store has more than just that. In fact it has everything you need.
Remote shows you album cover and looks like the iPod function
Since you have an iPhone or iPod Touch (maybe both), you’re probably familiar with the iPod function in those, and iTunes Remote works exactly like the iPod function, but with more features. To describe it, you can, from your iPhone or iPod Touch play, pause, skip, shuffle, see your songs, playlists, and album art on your device as if you sat in front of your computer and it also supports Apple TV.
If you are one of those persons who has a really big mansion and have connected speakers all over the place to your Mac, and you are in the opposite site of the house, you have no need to be worried. You don’t need to go all the way upstairs to the third floor, walk all across the hall to the room which the computer running iTunes is, and skip to the next song.
iTunes remote supports the new Genius Mix feature
All you have to do is pick up your iPhone or iPod Touch from your pocket, connect it to the same Wi-Fi is the computer and then skip song (Note: You’ll need to verify your iTunes Remote in iTunes before you can use it). This also includes regular people with regular income in regular houses or apartments.
When Apple created iTunes Remote, they were in a happy mood because it supports iTunes for Microsoft Windows too, and this is just another reason that there is no reason not to download this application.
It works fantastically and you can even play the new Genius mix on iTunes through your iTunes Remote. You can also create new playlists or if iTunes or running the “iTunes DJ” playlist, you can request songs and you can also connect your friends’ iPod Touchs and iPhones to your iTunes and let them request songs too and iTunes will automatically make a queue of requested songs.
Oh dear god, this review has lasted 6 days now and we are still going strong. This just indicates how excited we are about the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard. When we first started this review, we were sure that it will only take about two days to get it all on paper and published, but we were very wrong and if you have followed us since the beginning of the review you would probably have noticed that we haven’t mentioned a single negative word about Snow Leopard. This doesn’t mean that it’s absolutely perfect nor that we are very poor reviewers (well, it’s up to you to decide). Today, though, we will mention some negative things about the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard, so read on.
Boot Camp
Today I gave myself a difficult challenge which required a lot of patience. The challenge was to install Windows on my MacBook Pro and I started with a blunder and deleted my current Boot Camp disk instead of just reinstalling Windows on the Boot Camp partition. After I deleted the Boot Camp partition I couldn’t get access to partition the hard disk again so I had to erase my entire hard disk, reinstall Snow Leopard and restore from my Time Machine back up, before I could get access to partition my hard disk using the Boot Camp Assistant and after all, it succeeded. Then to the psychological hardest part: to install Windows, but it went surprisingly without any errors nor alerts, though it believed it to be was the first time I used the computer.
When Windows were finally installed correctly, it was ugly as… something, but it was because I hadn’t installed any drivers yet. I inserted my Snow Leopard install DVD and followed the instructions and 5 minutes later, Windows were ready to use with all drivers installed. For those who didn’t knew, Snow Leopard has new Boot Camp drivers and software so now you can access all your files on your Mac OS X partition without any third party applications. This is just a one-way access, because Apple doesn’t trust Microsoft’s security and fears that some files might get infected by viruses through Boot Camp. Sensible thought in my opinion . If you want to transfer a file from your Windows partition to your Mac OS X partition, all you have to do, is to open the drive called ‘Bootcamp’ and now you can look for the file you want to your Mac OS X partition.
Screensaver & incompatibility
That’s enough Windows for this review, let’s take a look at something less full of failures. Are you tired of looking at the same screen saver repeatedly? Apple came up with the solution in Snow Leopard because now you can active ‘screen saver shuffle’ which, by name, shuffles through your screen savers, just like you shuffle your songs in iTunes. If you are a user of iPhoto you also have the opportunity to use selected photos that you desire for your screen saver by flagging them now.
In the beginning I promised you some negative words, and I fulfilled my promise in the Boot Camp section by blaming Microsoft to produce silly software and operating systems. Unfortunately, I have to say something about Apple too, because not all applications are compatible with the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard. You’ve probably heard of the Adobe Creative Suite 3 (or earlier) is incompatible software to Mac OS X Snow Leopard. That’s not the only applications which might suffer from incompatibility with Snow Leopard. Apple has made a list of applications that are unsupported in Snow Leopard. Users of Snow Leopard have also been active and made a publicly editable list of applications that are compatible with Mac OS X Snow Leopard.
Now, we are really close to have covered all new features in Mac OS 10.6 and this review is near an end. You’ll probable notice that we still haven’t told anything about iChat, which of course also has been enhanced by the forces of Apple engineering. Due to some reasons, we will wait some time before we will write a review on this application. Until, come back now and then to read some more news and rumors while you’re eating your lunch, if your wife allows it. If not, buy her an iPhone or if you (or she) already has an iPhone, come back later today because we have a surprise for you. Enjoy your lunch.
Today you can read the fourth part of our Mac OS X Snow Leopard review. Yesterday we made a review of the new fabulous QuickTime Player X, but during my lunch today it appeared to me that something in the review was missing and a short while later I found out what was missing. I was so excited when I wrote the review on what was new so I totally forgot what was missing in the new QuickTime Player and that is to say, the opportunity to upgrade to an enlarged pro-version of the application. In Leopard you had to upgrade to QuickTime Player Pro to download QuickTime videos on the internet, specially the Get a Mac ads on Apple’s website? Now you don’t need an upgrade, because you don’t need a pro-version at all. Just right-click the video you want at press ‘Save as QuickTime movie…’ It doesn’t get any easier than that.
Around in the corners
Today’s review will cover many small new features in Mac OS X Snow Leopard. All of them are there to make your life easier and more perfect. Let’s start with the upper right corner of your screen. Here you can see the Spotlight-icon. Spotlight is a part of Finder, which has been completely rewritten and now supports 64-bit computing and Grand Central Dispatch. It’s faster than the Finder in Leopard and to be more accurate, it is 1.8 times faster to refresh PDF icons and 1.4 times faster in refreshing JPG icons than in Mac OS 10.5 Leopard. Spotlight is now, because of the new Finder, faster than ever and it only takes a few seconds to find what you are looking for.
Now when we’re already up there, we can go a little to the left… to the time to be precis. If you click the time and go to the ‘Date and time preferences…’, you can now choose to display the date right next to the clock. This feature only works if you show the time digitally.
Snow Leopard allows you to 'recycle' items from Trash
If you have ever experienced that you’ve accidentally deleted something and you’ve closed the window that the deleted item was stored in, you can now click the Trash icon in your dock, then right click on the file that you have accidentally moved into the Trash and you will discover a new option called ‘Put back’. The ‘Put Back’ option allows you to restore the file to it’s previous position on the hard disk.
The icon view has also been improved and allows you to look through a multipage document or watch the start of a QuickTime movie, right from Finder if you list the files in columns or cover flow. Speaking of icons: the resolutions on icons can now be up to 512 by 512 pixels and that is four times more than Leopard.
Startup and shutdown times
One of the most popular and known improvements in Mac OS X Snow Leopard is the faster shutdown and wake-up speed – and they are serious about this! When I put my MacBook Pro into sleep, it takes about 2 or 3 seconds, depending on how fast I write my password, to come back and use my MacBook Pro. It is incredibly fast. The shutdown and startup speeds are also improved and they are much faster too.
Chinese handwriting for multi-touch trackpads
Another feature, which I’m not sure to use that much actually, is the improved Chinese handwriting input, which allows Chinese people, and everyone else who wants to write Chinese, to use the multitouch trackpad to draw Chinese characters. I’ve tried it and it works like a charm, but since I don’t know any Chinese words or signs, I really can’t tell how if it works, sorry.
Like James May from Top Gear would have said: “You have to start with hello”.
That was all for today. Come back tomorrow and read more about the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard.
As promised, we will today show you how the new QuickTime Player works in Mac OS X Snow Leopard. As you might have found out, QuickTime Player has been developed and improved and now it comes with a whole bunch of new features. Apple describes the new QuickTime Player as “a major leap forward that advances modern media and Internet standards” and it’s hard to disagree when you’ve first experienced it. To be honest, I think it’s the most used application I’ve been using since I got the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard. It really make things easier and after you have read this article, you know how I think.
So, what’s new in QuickTime Player X, as it is called? Well, QuickTime has always been a step forward any other video software programs and applications, and a leader as well. This time is no difference. Apple has been able to create a video player better than all of their competitors and now I really consider Windows Media Player a joke. I have never tried any video players as smooth and sweet as QuickTime Player X. Even though it still doesn’t support all video formats, I still prefer using it to play those formats it’s compatible with.
Seriously, what is new? All right, here goes: Its interface has got a renewal and it’s prettier and more user-friendly than ever. Furthermore, you can use QuickTime Player to record a film now, or if you only want to record a voice memo, you can also record an audio recording, but that’s not all.
QuickTime Player X has an in-build screen record function, allowing you to record your screen. This is what we have all been waiting for because, if you have a friend who needs help all the time and you hate to guide him or her through a messaging client or the phone, you can now show it to him or her on video. All you have to do is to open QuickTime Player and press ctrl+cmd+n and push the red record-button and then you’re recording your own screen. When you want to stop recording, press ‘stop recording’ or ctrl+cmd+escape on your keyboard. Now a window opens with your screen recording and if you chosen the ‘stop recording’ button method, you don’t want to show to your friends that you pushed the button, right? Now, push cmd+t to enter the trim section, and mark the part of the video you want to show to your friends and press ‘Trim’.
That is just pretty, but now to the most beautiful part: you want to share it to your friend in need, and you have three different options. The first is to share it to iTunes so you can sync it to your iPhone or iPod, then go to your friend in need, and show it to him or her. If you choose to do like this, you only do it because you can, because you can make it so much easier by using the two other opportunities which is to upload the video to either MobileMe Gallery or, what seems to be more popular, YouTube. Uploading a video to YouTube have never been easier and because of this brilliant opportunity, and it is so much easier for us at AppleLunch to serve you video tutorials, and actually we have already done this with Quicktime X when we showed you how to use Spaces in Snow Leopard.
QuickTime Player X now supports HTML live streaming. What that means is, that it doesn’t require any special streaming servers, and you can stream from the internet without thinking of any port forwarding on your router.
QuickTime Player X is build into the heart of Mac OS X Snow Leopard and uses technologies such as Core Audio, Core Video and Core Animations to improve the pleasure in using it. It also uses Grand Central Dispatch and 64-bit computing to improve the quality and that makes it up to 2.4 times faster to lunch.
To sum up, we are very satisfied with the new QuickTime Player X. Together with iMovie 09 it can’t be easier to make video tutorials for our readers, so if this is the first time your read about us, then put us in your favorite bookmarks, because it seems to be pure quality when we first get started to make video tutorials here at AppleLunch. Come back tomorrow and read about more brilliant features in Mac OS X Snow Leopard.
Yesterday, we provided you with our very first impressions of the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard. Today we will go a little further and write about what is new in the Mac OS X Snow Leopard. We have already showed you how the new stacks feature works, but there are many other features in Mac OS 10.6.
Spaces, system preferences and dock
If you are one of those who upgraded from Tiger to Snow Leopard, which you actually can, you are probably a rookie when it comes to the feature called ‘Spaces’. Spaces allows you to have up to 16 different work spaces, which the video beneath will show you:
If you didn’t notice in the video above, there is something new about the ‘System Preferences’ window. It isn’t that important, but it’s new and deserves some space in this article: the ‘keyboard and mouse’ preferences has been split into two single buttons as you can see on the picture below.
If you click the keyboard button, you can see a list of keyboard shortcuts that you can use in different applications and you can add new shortcuts to applications too.
Another new feature in the new Mac OS X is, that you can minimize windows into the application window. That is very useful if you don’t like your dock to be kilometers long or if you just love to be organized. The ‘minimize into dock’ function can be activated through the dock preferences in ‘System Preferences’.
If you can’t find a specific window, you can use Exposé. This function has been improved in Snow Leopard. When you activate Exposé, the windows are now arranged in a grid. A new feature in Exposé is that if you left click and hold an open application icon in the dock, Exposé shows you all windows from the specific application that are currently open or minimized, even if it is placed in another space.
Today, we have covered some of the new features in Mac OS X Snow Leopard and tomorrow we will take a look at QuickTime Player, which has also been improved a lot.
According to some assumably reliable sources, a new report indicates even further expansion of the current Apple Tablet rumor. The new report suggests that Apple’s upcoming tablet will be made, not only in the anticipated 6 to 10 inches wide models, but also in models as large as 15 inches, which is pretty large for a tablet computer. It has always been of common understanding that the new tablet models will run an improved version of the iPhone OS (or smaller Mac OS X)… however, this new report believes one of the models (assumably the largest) will actually run a full Mac OS 10.6.
If it is indeed true, such a model will be normally competing with all current tablets on the market, which grows every day, and for Apple to successfully penetrate the market with a tablet computer, the model will require some high level of innovation. Tablets running Mac OS X have already been seen in industry, which means that Apple will need some additional creativity in the device, to gain respect and positive publicity. The rumor, since it is still unconfirmed, indirectly says that we are actually going to see two very different Apple Tablets, since the smaller ones may be great for playing games and writing quick notes on the fly, while the larger models will be pretty much a replacement for office Macs whose owners doesn’t need anything more than a pen or fingers to navigate and use the computer. But as said before, it is highly improbable that Apple will “just release a tablet”. If they make the larger models, they will undoubtedly guaranteed come with something which doesn’t replace their other Macs.
The new tablets have been rumored to arrive in early 2010. There is a possible announcement of them in the upcoming media even, but it remains unlikely.
It took some time, patience and actually not a huge amount of money. The hunt was unusually easy and I expected degrees blow zero. Of course I did remember by Jägermeister to protect myself against the murderous cold, but it turned out to be extremely unnecessary. The hunt began last Tuesday 25th August at 5:00 p.m. and ended today at 13:30 p.m. I had finally caught my prey.
The snow leopard (also known as ounce) is smaller than other big cats. It’s body length ranges from 75 to 130 cm. It has long thick fur which color is something between grey and yellow with dark spots. It didn’t scare the s… out of my pants because who can be afraid of something smaller than a lion that cannot roar?
First impressions and the upgrade
Anyhow, my first impression of the new Mac OS X Snow Leopard was great. The package was a little confusing though and unfortunately damaged during the transportation to my house, but I didn’t care – I wanted to get started! I ejected my Football Manager 09 DVD from my MacBook Pro and pushed the Mac OS X Snow Leopard disc in and a few seconds later the installation began.
Oh dear god, this takes FOREVER...
I had no idea on how long it would take to upgrade an operating system to another, but still I got a little surprised when the timer showed ‘1 hour 45 minutes remaining’. A few seconds later it was only 1 hour and 3 minutes and I decided to do something useful while Mac OS X Snow Leopard installed itself. I began the installation at around 1:40 p.m. and at 2:26 p.m. I got a message: ‘Install succeeded’. When I studied I had math on a very high level so I can hereby, without any calculator , tell you that it took 46 minutes to install Mac OS X Snow Leopard. This, of course, depends on how fast your Mac is. After the installation it did an automatic reboot, which took forever (maybe because of my excitement) and two minutes later the well-known ‘Welcome’-video appeared on my screen. Oh yeah it evokes memories from the first time I ever opened my Mac.
The new stack function is pretty sweet
When the video stopped I could finally begin to explore the new operating system, Mac OS 10.6. Except for the desktop picture, I couldn’t really see any big difference, until I clicked on ‘applications’ in my dock and discovered the new ‘stack’ and oh boy this little detail will make my life so much easier and I don’t really know why. This might sound a bit ironic, but I actually love the new ‘stack’.
Let the stack be the ‘crack of dawn’ in this article. Our review on Snow Leopard will of course continue tomorrow, so see you then.
Finally, Facebook 3.0 has been approved by Apple and you can now download it at App Store for free. The Facebook App is one of the most popular Apps that App Stores has ever seen and it has been under development for more than a year, and in this new version of the App you will experience a huge difference in speed and many new possibilities as well as further performance related improvements.
The interface has also got a make over and now it seems to be more user-friendly than ever. The developers have made it possible to access any Facebook features except the incredible number of third-party Facebook applications, so unfortunately you can’t play Word Challenge and Traveler IQ on your iPhone yet.
List of new features:
View upcoming events
See your friends’ birthdays
View Pages, updates and pictures to Pages you own
Change your profile picture
Access the same news feed as you see on your Mac… or PC
Read your friends’ notes and write your own
Upload videos from your iPhone 3GS
Upload pictures to any of your own albums
Zoom in on pictures
‘Like’ function is also available now
Visit links in the built-in web browser
See your friends’ friends (:)) and Pages
See mutual friends
Easy search on people and Pages
Ask to become friends
Become a fan of Pages
Built-in link to call or SMS a friend
Shortcuts to favorite friends and Pages
To summarize: the new Facebook App is great, it works like a dream and of course it is 3.0 compatible. It is developed so effectively that you can use every Facebook’s official features and you will never see any advertisements on the Facebook App for iPhone in this version.
On Friday, August 28th, one of us was promised Mac OS 10.6 delivered to the door. That means you can read detailed reviews about Mac OS X Snow Leopard which we will provide throughout the upcoming weekend and during the next week.
While we wait for Mac OS X Snow Leopard to arrive, why don’t take a look at what we can expect? Here is a list of some features we already know about Mac OS X Snow Leopard:
It’s faster and more reliable than any other Mac OS’ (and probably any other OS’ as well)
It has a new look and new features for Exposé and Stacks
It’s 2x faster to wake up and 1.8x faster to shut down than the older Leopard
It gives you about 7GB more disk space than Leopard
It has the new Quick Time X implemented which e.g. allows you to upload easily edited videos to YouTube and MobileMe
It has a more reliable and higher-resolution iChat
It makes sure that you always have the most up-to-date drivers for your printer
Time Machine back ups is about 80% faster, and of boy are we looking forward to that!
It is more secure than any other Operating System
It has Microsoft Exchange Server support
It can connect to PC’s over a network
It has an advanced screen reading built-in for those who are blind or too lazy to read things themselves
It takes full advantage of multi-core processors using Grand Central Dispatch
Built-in applications are now 64-bit technology which makes your Mac faster than ever
It also makes good use of the graphic processors using OpenCL technology
This list is not complete at all, but it’s a quick snap of what we can expect to see in just a few days.
. If you want to transfer a file from your Windows partition to your Mac OS X partition, all you have to do, is to open the drive called ‘Bootcamp’ and now you can look for the file you want to your Mac OS X partition.
