MacsimmumNews provides an interesting analysis of Apple’s recently filed “Accelerometer” and “Universal Container for audio data”.

The author believes the “Accelerometer” patent filing reveals a kind of Tablet Mac as well as a gaming tablet application.

The second patent filing that is analyzed is a patent relating an “universal container for audio data“. A container that may include different versions of an audio file, each one encoded with a different codec, making the audio file “universal”.

As notes MacRumors, Apple is hiring a Finder engineer for development related to Finder:

The Finder team is seeking an energetic, motivated software engineer to help develop next generation versions of the Finder, the notorious file browser for Mac OS X.
You will be responsible for developing new features of an application that is often perceived by our users as the “face of the system”. You will be working on user interfaces spanning various browser views, new advanced search features, navigation and data presentation as well as many other parts of the application.

In this position you will be expected to:
- Participate in all of the various stages of feature development from design brainstorms, through feature development, all the way to fixing that last critical elusive bug under a tight release deadline.
- You will be required to produce clear designs, excellent implementation and tight code.
- Deliver tight, well implemented features, fix bugs and develop Finder into the best file browser on the planet.
- Work on performance and responsiveness of the Finder, making it feel lightweight, fast, snappy and pleasant to use.

This could be a confirmation to a report we posted in October 2005 revealing some information about Leopard’s next generation Finder. The job posting mentions “advanced search features” and “speed improvements”, reflecting the extensive use of Spotlight and the performance improvements we had mentioned in our report.

According to AppleInsider, Apple is going to add the Front Row feature to its next generation, Intel-based iBook line.

Front Row, which was first introduced late last year with the last PowerPC G5 powered iMac brought a kind of “Media Center” experience to the Mac by gathering all the content of the iLife suite along with a movie trailers navigator in a single piece of software.

According to AppleInsider, Apple has seeded the first builds of Mac OS X 10.4.5 (Tiger) Update. The builds, numbered 8H3 and 8H5 focus on the following areas :

- Safari,
- CoreGraphics
- Mac OS X Dock
- Mac OS X crash report
- Software Update
- MSDOS file system compatibility

No timeframe is provided for the release date of this update.

Apple has filed a trademark for “iWeb” at the U.S. Patents & Trademarks Office. The trademark was filed on January the 17th with the following description (Goods & Services):

IC 009. US 021 023 026 036 038. G & S: computer software for use in developing web sites; computer software to help users create, edit, organize, search, transfer, publish and subscribe to weblogs, blogs, podcasts, web broadcasts and news and information feeds on global and/or local computer and telecommunications networks; computer software for use in authoring, downloading, transmitting, receiving, editing, extracting, encoding, decoding, playing, storing and organizing audio, video and still images; computer software for authoring digital content; computer programs for personal information management;. FIRST USE: 20060110. FIRST USE IN COMMERCE: 20060110

“iWeb” is the name of the latest iApp Apple has released for its cunsomer oriented iLife ‘06 software suite.

Microsoft announced that it is stopping the development of Windows Media Player for the Mac platform.

The company has however signed a distribution deal with Telestream so as to promote Flip4Mac which is a QuickTime component that can play wmv files directly from QuickTime Player and the QuickTime plug-in for web browsers.

Apple has released iPod Updater 2006-01-10 through the software update utility. Here is the description provided by Apple for this update: (more…)

Google has officially released Google Earth for Mac which has been made available on their web site.

Requirements to run Google Earth for Mac are the following:

Mac OS X (10.4)
500Mhz
256M RAM
400MB disk space
Network speed: 128Kbits/sec
3D-capable video card with 16Mbytes of VRAM
1024x768, “16-bit High Color” screen

Mac users have been waiting several months after the Windows release but now, the piece of Software is available as a final 3.1 version for Mac OS X. About a month ago, a beta version was leaked on the Internet and was made available on several peer to peer networks.

Apple has just released Mac OS X 10.4.4 update through the Software Update utility. The 27.6MB update brings the following improvements, according to Apple:

The 10.4.4 Update delivers overall improved reliability and compatibility for Mac OS X v10.4 and is recommended for all users.

For detailed information on Security Updates, please visit this website: http://www.info.apple.com/kbnum/n61798.

Apple has posted updates for both iTunes and QuickTime through the Software Update , bringing them respectively to versions 6.0.2 and 7.0.4.
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Apple has announced iLife ‘06 and iWork ‘06 during MacWorld SF 2006 opening keynote today.
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Apple has posted an update for the Powerbook Aluminium 15″ through the Software Update utility.

The update provides the following improvements, according to Apple:

This update aids the 15-inch Aluminum PowerBook battery in performing at full capacity.

Unconfirmed reports reveal some details about iWork ‘06, iLife ‘06 and .Mac improvements which are expected to be announced tomorrow during Macworld Expo 2006. According to the reports, Apple will mainly bring multiple-media web-publishing features to its consumer-oriented software and services this year.
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According to a vague anonymous report, the iTunes mobile platform could add support for iTunes videos in the near future while Apple could be in talks for an “iTunes deal” with a second mobile phones maker.

In a similar deal as with Motorola, the new partner will be allowed to sell iTunes enabled mobile phones but with support of iTunes videos as well. Meanwhile, Motorola and Apple should continue with their partnership.

We also learned from older unconfirmed reports that while Apple and Sony Ericsson had failed to find a deal, Apple had also been in talks with Samsung and Nokia.

We have no information about when the new version of iTunes mobile and the deal with the second mobile manufacturer will be announced but we may speculate on an announcement during MacWorld Expo.

MacRumors notices that Apple has accidentally leaked some information on iLife ‘06 on its own web site.

The page shows that GarageBand will provide podcast recording and maybe even video podcast support. It also mentions iWeb in the list of the iLife ‘06 applications. Maybe a simple to use web editor? We don’t know more about it.

Apple has since replaced this page with the former version but MacRumors has kept a screenshot.

According to ThinkSecret, Apple will unveil several video products during NAB 2006 which takes place on April the …. The new products expected to be released include Final Cut Pro 6, Final Cut Extreme, an even higher definition 30″ display and an improved XServe RAID.

No details are given about Final Cut Pro 6.0, but ThinkSecret claims that Apple is going to launch a new product called Final Cut Extreme. This new product will be very high-end and will directly compete with AVID products while it will be similarly priced at around $10 000.

As for the hardware, Apple is expected to release a larger than 30″ display with resolution upgraded to 4520x2540 pixels and improve its XServe RAID with an InfiniBand link instead of the current fibre channel link.

Apple has posted a firmware update for Airport Express (to version 6.3) and Airport Extreme (to version 5.7).

Fixes for Airport Express 6.3 and Airport Extreme 5.7 firmware:

-Resolves issue with Audio dropout when playing to AirPort Express with AirTunes
-Resolves issue with Wireless Disabled mode for AirPort Express
-Resolves issue with AirPort Extreme LAN Performance
-Resolves issue when enabling AOL Parental Controls
-Resolves issue with vulnerability to Denial of Service Attacks (bonk)
-Resolves issue with wireless internet access through AirPort via some PPPoA DSL Routers
-Improved reliability when printing through AirPort base stations
-Improved support for RADIUS servers
-Improved support for Network Time Servers (NTP) for AirPort when using an IP addresses

Both updates are available from Apple’s support web site.

Apple has posted a firmware update for Bluetooth on its web site.

Here is the description of the update provided by Apple:

The Bluetooth Firmware Update 1.2 improves Bluetooth performance and reliability issues.

The Bluetooth Firmware Updater supports D-Link USB Adapters and Apple internal Bluetooth modules on the following CPUs:
iMac G4
12″ PowerBook
15″ PowerBook
iMac G5
Mac Mini