Those with new years resolutions and an iPhone will be happy to know you can get the normally $9.99 RunKeeper Pro for iPhone free. I have the pro version and have to say it's pretty good. GPS used for tracking your runs, and while the pro version doesn't offer a huge amount over the free version, now you don't have to make that decision.
Sorry for the slow week(s) guys, Christmas, plus new years, plus vacation = a lazy Arcterex. However I'll post now and then until things resume as normal after New Years. Have a look at this mesmerising video of Quake Finished in 52 Minutes with 100% Completion.
Good news for those with brand new iPhones for Christmas, an Untethered iOS 4.2.1 Jailbreak has been released by the iPhone Dev Team. It's still beta, but if you want to be able to reboot your jailbroken iPhone without a computer nearby, it's close!
Aryk sent over a link to some details of Notion Ink's Adam tablet's hardware.
PeeJay pointed me over to this teaser trailer for Kevin Smith's Red State. I honestly have no idea what's in the trailer, but I love KS and have followed him on his podcast SmodCast for ages, and can't wait to see this movie!
Cool article on how to Install Mac OS X on any Intel-based PC using iBoot and Multi-Beast. Very cool if it works, though I just finished recovering my own computer from trying to upgrade the OS on it, so I don't think I really want to go mucking with it now that it's working :)
A bunch of months after Tap Tap Tap studio's little tiff with apple over their app Camera+ there was news that they had kissed and made up and the Camera+ news was that it was in the "review" section of the process. Today I did a 'check for updates' and lo and behold there it was along with a ton of new features, both in shooting modes and effects.
Interesting article on why Computertworld things thatApple will steal the shows at CES 2011.... even though they aren't going to be there.
All those Mac-using Windows journalists will be running for a CES hotspot to get their 'first looks' and passive aggressive criticisms filed. Meanwhile the Apple-holics will be gushing, hopefully over apps with a little more about them than this one, but you'd have to be blind, dumb or stupid not to be able to see the reality-creating Apple hype machine rolling into action.
With the rumors of Del.icio.us's imminent demise running rampant, Evernote blog has an entry on Making the transition from Delicious to Evernote. I really hope that Yahoo keeps Delicious, or someone buys it, as it's a great site / system (though I admit I haven't used it for ages).
Yahoo to Close Del.icio.us. Ouch :( Looks like things like "yahoo notepad" are however being made feature. Twitter source though, so take it with a grain of salt. Sucks to be yahoo though. Wonder where Flickr fits in there, as there's no mention of it on that screenshot. Thomas Hawk just wrote an open letter to Yahoo! basically asking them not to screw up potentially the best thing they have going for them.
Nice look at google maps 5.0 for android over at the official google blog. Gotta say I really hope this stuff comes to iPhone, cause the 3D stuff is sexy!
The most awesome and potentially expensive car configurator you'll see today is the Veyron 16.4 Configurator. If you're at all into cars (or even have a passing acquaintance with them via something like Top Gear) you'll know of the Bugatti Veyron. In the configurator you can set up the options, colors, etc. Pretty awesome. Note that there aren't prices associated with these, cause I think if you're looking at the Veyron you're the kind of person who doesn't pay attention to prices (or sites like this one either).
Here's my configuration (pdf) if anyone is feeling generous this Christmas.
If you've wondered if the new Chrome OS is enough to do "real work", you'll be happy to know that Lifehacker spent Six Days Working Entirely from Chrome OS to answer that exact question.
Cool video/slideshow of Bruce Dale's National Geographic pictures called 30 Years of BAD Pictures. Awesome stuff.
Definitely some cool new looks you can give your facebook profile page with this Facebook Profile Picture Hack Tutorial. From The Best Article Every day.
Very cool blog article on learning vi and vim - This is Your Brain on Vim.
If you use Safari or Chrome and use the web version of Twitter, you might be interested in Feather, an extension to clean up the UI a bit.
Good news for people on windows looking for a nice FTP/SFTP/WebDav/Everything client.... there is a public beta of Cyberduck, a well known free file transfer program for mac (homepage).
My buddy Deesa pointed me to this list of the Top 50 Programming Quotes of All Time (via reddit). Reminds me a bit of the Stack overflow programming quote list.
My favorite:
24. "PHP is a minor evil perpetrated and created by incompetent amateurs, whereas Perl is a great and insidious evil, perpetrated by skilled but perverted professionals."
- Jon Ribbens
Awesome find from Geeks of Doom - a Doctor Who T-Shirt 'Count the Shadows'. In case you were wondering, yes, this would make an excellent Christmas gift for your friendly neighborhood Arcterex! :)
Great mashup of two of the best sci-fi movies ever :)
QWOP is an interesting game of athletics where you control individual legs and calves.... Lets just say my record is a 3 meter run :)
Saw that Cut the Rope holiday version is now available, and free. Hey, free is free, and CtR is a fun game.
Cracked.com has a nice list of The 10 Most Irreplaceable Performances in Comedy Films. I was going to pass it by and not post, until I cam across #6, Alan RIckman in SpaceQuest:
Alan Rickman can pack so much tragedy, rage, injustice and disgust into a single line that you'd swear it was a McRib.
I'd have to give it to him for his performance as Marvin in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy... every time Marvin said anything with Rickman's voice I burst out laughing.
Great video from google of 2010: Year in Review.
Great stuff, brings a tear to the eye...
Transformers Dark of the Moon trailer. Sweeeeeet.
Andy I has a nice Samsung Galaxy Tab review.
A few weeks later, when Apple showed off the awesome firepower of their fully armed and operational iPad, it was as if a million potential competitors cried out "Of course, the unit we demonstrated was just a concept device" and were silenced.
Aryk pointed out that the Fait Lux "Adam" Android based tablet has it's preorder information page up. I'm personally wanting to see this in person before I'd pop out $400 for the low end model, or see a few reviews, but it is intriguing for sure, and it's nice to see information coming out for those who are chomping at the bit to get it.
Ever surf around at work and see a link that's marked as "NSFW" but really want to check it out? Enter VariablySFW, which lets you put in a link and check it safely. Kudos to heyhermano on reddit.
A nice blast from the past.... anyone else remember the great song Every OS Sucks?
Just saw that Salesforce.com Bought Heroku For $212 Million In Cash. Wonder how this will affect their Ruby on Rails hosting and if Rails people will exit en-mass to The Next Great Thing(tm)?
Visualized: the real Android fragmentation via Aryk.
Homeland Security 'messages' coming to Walmart, hotels, malls. Site is dead - here's cached version.
Shoppers at Walmart will soon have something other than glossy magazines and chewing gum to look at when in the checkout line: A "video message" from the Department of Homeland Security asking them to look out for "suspicious" activity and report it immediately.It's part of a new Department of Homeland Security program that could see Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's face on video screens in malls, retail outlets and hotels across the United States
Dear America. It's like you picked out the worst parts of the dystopian future novels and 1984-like visualizations of the future and said "hey, that's a great idea!"
Seriously, homeland security videos encouraging people to report "suspicious" activity? Didn't I see that in the beginning of Half Life 2?
I know it's about an hour late, but if you're interested you can check out the Google Chrome Live feed to see what they're announcing. From what I've seen so far it's a netbook pilot program for Google Chrome OS. You can apply to be a tester for the netbook by registering here.
I'll update with a summary when things are all done.
Features and details of the new Chrome netbooks are Posted by Arcterex at 11:57 AM
This Panasonic Lumix Camera TV Commercial was thrown into Reddit under the title of A Newb Meets The /r/photography forum. Both funny and a good commentary on photography.
Not an endorsement for Lumix, though I've had a couple of their cameras and they are quite nice, though their "intelligent" system is still no substitute for knowing what your f-stop and aperture are set at.
The Google Wave blog Introduces Apache Wave, as Wave is now part of the Apache "Incubator" program. This will make some people happy, Gina Trapani especially.
Now the big question is how will Wave turn out. It "failed" as a project unto itself under google's control, so how will Apache run things to keep it going, or change it to foster a more successful project?
Google has the Android 2.3 Platform Highlights out there. Some sexy new stuff (NFC, download management) and some stuff that will nicely fill in the gaps (ie: better text selection methods mirroring those on the iPhone).
Awesome video from the AutoBlog where they show you get to see a BMW M3 taken around the Nürburg Ring in GT5 and Real Life by the same driver in the same car. Very cool to watch. I'll bet he's not using the normal controller somehow :)
So it looks like the rumored Playstation Phone is in fact, real. Doesn't mean it's not a silly idea of course, but you never know what'll happen until you throw it against the wall and see if it sticks ya know?
Stolen from iPhone in Canada: [Updated] Xmarks To Live Another Day: Acquired by LastPass. This is great news, especially as a happy LastPass user. They are moving to the same freemium model that LastPass, Evernote, and lots of other successful web companies are using, so I have high hopes that XMarks will stick around for a while now.
Hot on the heels of the Evernote 4.0 for windows release, there's a great Evernote Beta for Mac. You have to check the 'update to beta versions' in the preferences to get it, but I have to say it's a nice upgrade.
Perks include a new easy to use management of shared folders, stacking notebooks for better organization, and other UI tweaks especially in the left hand panel. Note that this is a beta so if you're really worried about your data, read the warnings and take heed, and maybe wait for the official public release. I had no issues with the upgrade for my 614 notes however.
It's been all around the net, so I figure I'll link to it as well. Ben the Bodyguard.com is the website for a new iPhone app that will protect your sensitive iPhone data. There's not much else there in terms of details, but when you hit the site just scroll down and be amazed at what you can do with HTML/Javascript (HTML5?) and other nifty (non-Flash) web technologies.
Seriously, most of the iPhone apps I'll buy on a whim are from well designed and informative websites. I think if this was a $2.99 app I'd probably buy it sight unseen just from the site. Kudos to the designer. Make sure you run through it a couple of times as well there's a lot of small subtle (and gorgeously done) detail in there that I missed the first time through.
1Password now supports Google Chrome and Windows
DPReview has posted a nice in-depth review of the Nikon D7000.
Nikon surprised many people by pushing its enthusiast DSLR distinctly up-market just as Canon was doing the opposite with its 60D. The result is such a highly specified camera that it's generated almost as much interest from existing and would-be D300S customers as from the traditional D90 audience.