Two big announcements anchor this issue: Adobe’s announcement of the stunningly huge Creative Suite 4 and T-Mobile’s G1 phone, the first that runs Google’s Android smartphone platform. Also this week, we point to a particularly interesting Mac software bundle, Glenn Fleishman weighs in on the ever-increasing anger toward Apple in relation to the company’s arbitrary policies surrounding what apps are acceptable for the iPhone App Store, and Jeff Carlson passes on a link to a fun song composed entirely of Mac sounds. Turning practical, Glenn examines the recent drop in functionality for Leopard’s screen sharing capability and our new staff writer Doug McLean dips his feet into the TidBITS water with an article about how to solve a particular error when updating iPhone and iPod touch apps. In the Watchlist, we sort through a ton of software releases, including Firefox 3.0.3, iPDA 4.2, Java for Mac OS X 10.5 Update 2 and Java for Mac OS X 10.4 Release 7, ShareTool 1.2.3, WireTap Anywhere 1.0.2, Notebook 3.0, Art Text 2, PageSpinner 5.1, and PDFpen 4.0.
Get into a Mac mood with Mike Soloman's Apple Soundtrack, a song composed entirely of Mac system sounds.
The extra controls you could enable by entering command-line instructions for Leopard's Screen Sharing program have been sheared off in Mac OS X 10.5.5, Macworld's Rob Griffiths notes.
Although inexpensive bundles of Mac software have become all the rage, the inexplicably named "Parallels Green Computing Bundle" brings together some well-known applications from developers who haven't participated in previous promotions, all at a huge discount. Available through 30-Sep-08.
In October 2008, Adobe will ship Adobe Creative Suite 4 (CS4), the latest in a long line of releases of its professional application suite. CS4 includes Photoshop CS4, InDesign CS4, Illustrator CS4, Dreamweaver CS4, Flash CS4 Professional, and more.
Despite Google's assurances last year that the company wasn't introducing a GPhone, the G1 handset announced by T-Mobile using the search giant-sponsored Android smartphone platform has Google emblazoned on the back. The G1 could loosen Apple's grip on smartphones, but not quite yet.
Getting error 5002 when you try to update your favorite sudoku or flashlight app? Never fear, since there's a simple fix for this App Store error.
Apple continues to make terrible decisions about which apps may be sold in the App Store. If Apple isn't careful, developers might walk away - to Google Android or other platforms.
Notable software releases so far this week include Firefox 3.0.3, iPDA 4.2, Java for Mac OS X 10.5 Update 2 and Java for Mac OS X 10.4 Release 7, ShareTool 1.2.3, WireTap Anywhere 1.0.2, Notebook 3.0, Art Text 2, PageSpinner 5.1, and PDFpen 4.0.
TidBITS Talk readers this week tackle a wide variety of issues: backing up Time Capsule backups, using StuffIt Deluxe 2009 and opening password-protected archives, using the Genius sidebar in iTunes 8, replacing a Palm handheld with an iPod touch, the history of CDDB and Gracenote, and more.