Appletell

Starting today at around 9:45 a.m. PST (12:45 p.m. EST), Appletell will be running a live blog with commentary on the announcements coming out of the Moscone Center. We’ve covered the Mac OS X rumors, we’ve analyzed the iPhone leaks, and now our team’s ready to go with the real thing. Be sure to check back with us later today to read about the big announcements as they happen, and to get the analysis and product details that won’t be part of the keynote itself.

And stick around afterwards, too, as we follow up on the announcements with images and specs and everything else needed to help you decide if a trip to the Apple Store should happen this evening.

Update: Appletell’s WWDC 2008 live-blog is now active!

Well, folks, its this time of year again. Tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. EST/9:00 a.m. PST, Steve will be donning the blue jeans and black turtle neck and heading for the stage of the Moscone Center. As this year’s World Wide Developer Conference gets ever closer, it’s time for a rumor and speculation round-up.

For the most part, the speculation this year has hovered around four items:

1. 3G iPhone
2. .mac
3. iTablet
4. Mac OS X v10.6

Read on for all the recent news regarding these and other possible happenings at WWDC ‘08.

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Adobe Systems Incorporated announced yesterday that Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 6 for Macintosh® is available immediately. “Since its January launch at the 2008 Macworld Expo, Photoshop Elements 6 for Mac was named “Best of Show,” and given the 2008 Editors’ Choice Awards by The Mac Observer and the 2008 Macworld Award by Macsimum News,” the Adobe Press Release reads.

The biggest new features to Photoshop Elements 6.0 are the fact that it is now a Universal Binary, the new Photomerge technology, and a new interface and different levels of the program depending on the user’s expertise.

According to Adobe, “Adobe Photoshop Elements 6 for Macintosh runs on Leopard, (Mac OS X v 10.5.2), as well as previous versions of Mac OS X starting with 10.4.8. [...] Photoshop Elements 6 is immediately available in the United States and Canada for an estimated street price of US$89.99. Owners of previous versions of Photoshop Elements can upgrade to Photoshop Elements 6 for US$69.99 with an in-box, mail-in rebate or through http://www.adobe.com.”

Photoshop Elements 6.0 can be purchased at Apple Stores, Apple.com, Amazon.com, Best Buy Stores, BestBuy.com, Costco.com, J&R, Microcenter, NewEgg.com, Staples Stores and Staples.com.

You can read my first look reviews, on speed and features and the interface, and also keep an eye out for a final review of the final copy, coming in a few days.

When Apple announced the iPhone Software Development Kit on March 6th, the iPhone version of Spore, introduced by Electronic Arts, stood out as one of the many amazing things coming with the iPhone SDK when it is released in June. More details on the iPhone version of Spore were announced today by Travis Boatman, VP of Worldwide Studios for EA Mobile.

The first thing that was reported is that the iPhone version of Spore has been reconfirmed to be the mobile version of the game, though the specifics of what that means for the game are still being withheld. The iPhone version of Spore may see a large visual difference from the other mobile version(s), as he stated that EA “[builds] our titles specific to the platform and the device and maximize features.” Also stated was that the unique use of the iPhone’s accelerometer and Multi-Touch functionality will be implemented for the user interface and “evolution modification” of the game.

The cost and distribution methods of the game are currently uncertain, probably pending communication with Apple about the new initiative. The iPhone version of Spore is aiming to launch alongside the September launches of the various other versions of the game. Boatman also hints that there “will be other” titles in development for the iPhone platform, meaning that the iPhone is likely to become a unique gaming platform in the near future.

This is by no means a guaranteed outcome, but an Apple representative I spoke with seemed very confident that we will see an update from Apple very soon.

I had called Apple about my MacBook Pro. About every 4 times I put it to sleep, it would wake up, but the screen would not come on, and then it would require a force shutdown. Upon reboot, It would tell me that Mac OS X has shutdown unexpectedly. I assume it had a kernel panic, though I couldn’t verify because the screen wasn’t on.  I was also having a problem with using my MacBook Pro in closed lid mode with my external display. As I thought, the Apple rep confirmed that these problems were related. There was apparently a specific run of MacBook Pros with this issue.

Where it got interesting is when he told me that I had two options: either I could do an Archive and Install, or I could wait for the next update. “Oh, great,” I thought, “Either move back to a buggier OS version, or just wait for who-knows-how-long.” Then the Apple rep said, “the update should be coming out very soon.” I asked what that meant, a few months? A few weeks? A few days? His response: “I’m surprised it’s not out yet.”

His advice was to check software update every couple of days.

Here’s what I think is safe to assume, assuming he has the correct information: An update is coming out within the next week or two for Leopard. It is most likely Mac OS X 10.5.3, given that the other solution was to move back to 10.5.0, implying that the problem stems from 10.5.2. Thus, 10.5.3 would logically be the problem solver. And lastly, it fixes this (rather large) MacBook Pro problem, as well as logically bundling other bug fixes.

Start checking Software Update!

Today’s iPhone roadmap event was chock full of news. Here is the quick and dirty breakdown of what all was announced as part of the iPhone/iPod Touch 2.0 software.

iPhone Developer SDK
The SDK provides developers with the same APIs as Apple, so they can develop full fledged applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch.

MacRumors compiled this list of the contents of the SDK:

Cocoa Touch - Multi-touch events, Multi-touch controls, Acceleromter, View Hierarchy, Localization, Alerts, Web View, People Picker, Image Picker, Camera
Media - Core Audio, OpenAL, Audio Mixing, Audio Recording, Video Playback, JPG, PNG, TIFF, PDS Quartz, Core Animation, Embedded OpenGL
Core Services -
Collections, Address Book, Networking, File access, SQLite, Core Location, Net Services Threading, Preferences, URL utilities
Core OS - OS X Kernel, BSD TCP/IP, Sockets, Power Management, Keychain, Certificates, File System, Lib System, Security, Bonjour

Application Store
The user will purchase third party applications via the Application Store, a new app with the 2.0 software update. The developer sets the price, $0 included, and gets 70% of the revenue. Apps can be downloaded direct to iPhone, iPod Touch, as songs can be on the iTunes WiFi Store. Apps can also be purchased on iTunes and moved to your iPhone, and developers can push updates direct to the application.

Built in Exchange Support
Apple also announced that it has licensed Exchange ActiveSync from Microsoft, and will build it into iPhone 2.0, so that it can connect to Exchange Servers 2003 and 2007. This provides secure push email, calendars, contacts, and more. This is big for companies holding out because of lack of Exchange support.

The iPhone SDK is available as a beta right now. IT departments can sign up for beta versions of iPhone Software 2.0 with Exchange Support at apple.com. iPhone Software 2.0 will be released as a free update in June of this year.

Apple’s computer market share has been steadily increasing over the past years as more and more frustrated Windows users make the switch, but as Seth Weintraub writes for Computerworld.com, this week “the Mac platform finally has a big win in its hands.” Apple has finally beat out Dell as the number one computer in higher education.

At last week’s Goldman Sachs Technology Investment Symposium, Apple’s Tim Cook revealed “we just received word on Monday that Apple surpassed Dell as the number one supplier of portables to US higher education for 2007,” adding, “the ceiling for the Macs is nowhere in sight. Even if the market itself isn’t growing, for us, switching Windows users is an enormous opportunity.”

Apple was the main educational computer until the 1990s, when Dell’s acceptable and cheap computers became a better economical choice for schools.

Read [ComputerWorld]

Apple has sent out an invitation to press contacts inviting them to an iPhone/ iPod Touch SDK “Roadmap” meeting.

In an invitation sent to reporters, Apple wrote, “Please join us to learn about the iPhone software roadmap, including the iPhone SDK and some exciting new enterprise features.”

9to5Mac reports that “the event will largely cover enterprise topics like Exchange and Lotus Notes syncing.”

Apple on Tuesday released iPhone and iPod Touch Firmware 1.1.4, which was listed as 165 MB of bug fixes, but also likely laid groundwork for the SDK, which will allow for third party iPhone/iPod native applications. Currently the onyl way to get applications on the iPhone is through web-apps, which run through Safari and are not native, or Jailbreaking your iPhone/iPod Touch, which voids your warranty.

If you already read Appletell everyday, why not just subscribe to our RSS feed? 

According to Wikipedia, “RSS is a simple XML-based system that allows users to subscribe to their favorite websites.” But really, that’s even making it sound a whole lot more techie than it actually is.  RSS is a way to allow you to receive content (news, blogs, audio, video) without actually having to visit each site itself.

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To keep up with the demand for content thanks to uncle Steve J., we are looking for additional writers who are interested in keeping our readers plugged in to the Apple world. If you have a passion for everything Apple consider joining the team.

To make the cut you must:

• Have knowledge of the industry
• Possess a unique/creative writing style
• Be proficient in the English language (spelling, grammar, sentence structure)
• Be able to contribute a minimum of 20 articles (200-400 words per article) per month
• Stay up to date on current news stories

If interested send an email to jobs(at)dabbledoo(dot)com with your contact information, resume, and an appropriate writing sample (or links to past work). For more information visit our Appletell jobs page or our corporate Dabbledoo jobs page.

Ps. - We are also searching for additional contributors for Gadgetell and Gamertell.