This Friday, Feb. 15, a 180,000-ton asteroid with the thrilling name of "2012 DA14" will fly past the Earth. Don't worry, we're not talking a "Deep Impact" scenario. Which is good, right? And you can follow the asteroid using Apple devices.

The 50-meter space rock will come within 17,200 miles of earth -- that's closer than our orbiting geosynchronous communication satellites. Although we don't have to worry about a collision, the passage of 2012 DA14 is a record close approach to the Earth for an object of this size.

Southern Stars has released update to its SkySafari Plus and Pro apps for iOS, Mac OS X, and Android to let you track 2012 DA14. If you want to track the asteroid you'll want the updated apps. Why? Because the Earth's gravity affects the asteroid's orbit so severely, most desktop planetarium programs -- and all other mobile apps -- will completely fail to predict the asteroid's position correctly, says Southern Stars founder Tim DeBenedictis.

...

Satechi (http://www.Satechi.net) has released the Divoom iBase Dock Station for the iPod, iPhone or iPad. The US$44.99 device combines a speaker system and docking station.

The Satechi Divoom iBase Dock Station features four full range neodymium dynamic drivers and a 20.6 ounce speaker. Additionally, it has a vertical support to ensure the iOS device is secured in place. The Satechi Divoom iBase Dock Station is also compatible with other MP3 players via the 3.5mm line-in jack.

InterMapper has published four white papers on network monitoring, mapping and alerting and InterMapper. You can find them all at
http://www.intermapper.com/resources/whitepapers.aspx .

The papers look at "Top 8 reasons SMBs need to monitor their networks," "top 8 considerations for selecting SMB network monitoring software," "10 steps to streamline the deployment of network monitoring software for SMBs," and "6 ways to calculate returns from your networking monitoring investment."

InterMapper is Mac OS X compatible network monitoring software. It uses SNMP to monitor the network infrastructure, and has probes for monitoring many kinds of servers, including web, mail, LDAP, FTP, etc. More information and a free 30-day demo are available at the product Web site (...

Future Media Concepts has posted a video on "Fixing Flat Color in Final Cut Pro." It teaches you how to make your colors "pop" in footage in Final Cut Pro. You can find it at
http://www.fmctraining.com/fmc.asp?w=blip_AYHdkS4C .

Future Media Concepts is a digital media training center representing the leading software manufacturers, including Adobe, Apple, Autodesk, Avid, Boris FX, Digidesign, NewTek and Softimage. Headquartered in New York City, FMC now operates 5 additional digital media training facilities located in Boston, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Orlando and Chicago.

A new online video (http://www.memoryminer.com) shows some of the best ways for using MemoryMiner, a digital storytelling application for Mac OS X. Designed an an complement the iLife suite, the software is all about capturing and exploring your life memories.

MemoryMiner allows anyone to zero in on the stories depicted in their photos by linking them to each other based on people, places and time. While photos are used as the starting point, the goal is always uncovering the backstory.

With MemoryMiner, you can directly record audio or video to capture the backstory of a photo. You can attach documents, web URL's, or other media to add depth and context. Each photo becomes a frame in a storyboard that can be browsed by periods in a person's life, where people overlap, by place, by time, or any combination.

MemoryMiner requires Mac OS X 10.5 or higher. It's Universal Binary so runs...

Seagate (http://www.seagate.com) has unveiled the newest addition to its GoFlex family of hard drives -- the GoFlex Home network storage system. When it's connected to a wireless router, an entire household can centrally store, easily access and continuously back up files wirelessly from Mac and Windows systems on the home  network.

The new centralized storage system simplifies the backup process by being compatible with the Apple Time Machine, as well as including a version of the backup application for both Mac OS X and Windows operating systems, says Darcy Clarkson, Seagate vice president of Retail Sales and Marketing. With the GoFlex Home storage system, families can also wirelessly stream photos, movies and music to most network connected DLNA devices, such as game consoles or a GoFlex TV HD media player, from any room in the house.

The GoFlex Home is available in 1TB and 2TB capacities at...

There's a new video demonstrating the features of SonicPcs for the iPhone. The app -- available in an US$2.99 and free, "lite" version -- is a tool for turning your images into custom slideshow movies that you can share with your friends online!.

SonicPics lets you add images from your iPhone's photo library or camera, arrange your photos, and then narrate the project to create an enhanced m4v video (complete with chapters). You can take photos of your kids, special events, weddings, vacations, the new pet, or first day at camp and narrate them with SonicPics.

When the recording is complete, you can publish your movie to your YouTube account or to your computer. You can view the video at http://www.sonicpics.com/public/index.php#4 .

OrigAudio has posted a video (http://www.origaudio.com/) on the Rock-It, an US$49.99 vibration speaker system.

The Rock-It works with iPods, iPhones, laptops and more. It takes music from the device and generates it into vibration sequences. It sends those vibrations through the Rock-It "pod," which you can stick to any object.

The Rock-It requires two AAA batteries (not included) or an USB connection. It comes with an USB cable and four replacement sticky pads.

Open Door Networks (http://www.opendoor.com) has posted a video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sqb1T5WERos) looking at its Art Authority app for the iPad.

Art Authority is an US$9.99 app that offers a collection of works by over 1,000 of the western world's major artists, from ancient times to today. It offers detailed captions on the works, including title, date and location; multiple levels of organization including by artist name, period, movement and date; and overviews of major works by period.

The app also includes signature features of the company's Envi app line, such as full-screen slide shows, insightful thumbnail overviews, Ken Burns motion effect and access to information on artists and periods. The app focuses on western painting and sculpture from pre-history to present-day,...

It's About Time Products has posted a screencast on It's About Time for the iPad. You can find it at http://vimeo.com/10576929 .

"It's About Time" is an iPad application that allows you to access and utilize multiple "mini apps" with different, customizable types of information. It will be available soon at a special launch price of $0.99.

Mini apps 1.0 ships with a 1984-style mini Calculator, Browser, Sticky, Weather, and NASA image of the day, all of which run at the same time.

"Our Dashboard-like engine also gives users the ability to have multiple copies of one mini app on screen. "I plan on having multiple mini Browsers open so I can go to all my favorite sites whenever I want," says Saied Ghaffari, CEO of It's About Time Products. "Mini apps is compatible with the majority of available Dashboard widgets on the Mac. It's About Time hopes to find developers with whom to partner to...

A new screencast (http://supersync.com/intro.php) walks you through the use of SuperSync, Mac OS X compatible software that acts as a music collection’s central hub, retrieving, organizing, and syncing all music and movie files across machines and disk drives in order to create one consistent, complete music library.

SuperSync includes integration with iTunes so that any additions to the SuperSync music library can be automatically reflected in iTunes. SuperSync eliminates the need to manually add new music or remove broken links in iTunes. Also, the software includes a powerful library scanner that will clean up your SuperSync and iTunes music libraries, removing broken links to music and adding new tracks.

A copy of SuperSync is recommended for each Mac and PC that has music on it. SuperSync is priced at US$29 for two copies. For an individual synchronizing or remotely accessing...

Robert McHale's "A Practical Legal Guide to iPhone Application Development" white paper is now available as a downloadable PDF.

By examining the iPhone SDK Agreement, Apple’s End User License Agreement, and federal copyright and trademark registration, this article provides an introductory overview of the common legal issues surrounding iPhone Application development, and the measures developers can adopt to minimize liability and maximize protection of their intellectual property rights.

R | McHale (http://www.rmchale.com/about.htm) is a Boston-based law firm offering legal services in the following practice areas:  Corporate Law, Litigation, and Business Immigration. Founding partner Robert McHale has corporate and litigation experience representing individuals, start-ups, multinational corporations and Fortune 500 companies.


Eltima Software has posted a screencast on restoring an FLA or Flex project from SWF using Flash Decompiler Trillix. You can find it at http://mac.eltima.com/swftofla-converter.html; click the Play button on the left hand side of the page.

Flash Decompiler Trillix for Mac (formerly known as SWF to FLA Converter) converts Adobe Flash SWF files back into FLA format and SWF files created in Flex back to Flex sources, which can be edited in native Flash or Flex environment. Every group of objects such as morphs, shapes, texts, fonts, sounds, scripts, etc., are placed in separate FLA library groups with appropriate names to simplify using and working with the resulting FLA file.

Flash Decompiler can extract any object (images, sounds, videos, shapes, text, morphs, scripts, etc.) used in SWF files into various file formats just in several clicks. The latest...

Akvis has posted ascreencast (http://www.youtube.com/user/AKVISvideo#p/a/u/1/fjyc_W5CwGo) showing how to use AKVIS Smartmask to remove someone from a background.

Smartmask (http://akvis.com/en/smartmask/) is an image selection and masking plug-in for the Mac and Windows platforms. It's designed to save time on complex selections. With the app, there are two pencils, red and blue. Draw a line with the blue pencil inside the object being selected (for example, yourself in a group photo) and then outline the same object with the red pencil to define the areas that should be cut out.

The selection algorithm analyzes the image and your drawing, and creates the selection you want. Akvis SmartMask features three selection modes are tailored to...

Mac adoption is rising, even in the enterprise, and IT departments and support staff can't afford to ignore the Mac any longer. A recent survey by the Enterprise Desktop Alliance (http://www.enterprisedesktopalliance.com), an organization that helps IT departments integrate Macs into the corporate environment, shows that 66% of 322 IT administrators from large organizations with both Macs and PCs stated that their organization expects to increase the number of Macs in their sites.

Additional responses show management priorities and organizational approaches to managing Macs. The respondents cited user preference, increased productivity, and ease of technical support as leading reasons for choosing Macs.

Increased Mac usage can only mean increased Mac-related support issues. Unfortunately, most remote support products simply don’t support Macs at all, and many of...

Many CTOs and system/network administrators feel that tape is something to be avoided. But a new white paper by the Tolis Group (http://www.tolisgroup.com) -- which makes back-up solutions for Mac OS X, Windows, Linux and Unix systems -- begs to different.

The Tolis Group says that no longer is tape a performance, usability, or cost gating factor. In fact, the white paper says that LTO-4 technology is actually faster than the filesystems that feed it, the reliability is excellent, and the life expectancy of written tapes is measured in decades. The same can be said for other fine tape formats, though throughput performance varies.

What's LTO? It stands for Linear Tape-Open, a magnetic tape data storage technology . IT developed jointly by IBM, HP and Seagate as an open alternative to the proprietary Digital Linear Tape (DLT). Developed jointly by IBM, HP, and Seagate.

LTO-4 cartridges...

With screen sharing, Mac users can control the mouse and keyboard of one computer while sitting at another computer across the room or on the other side of the world. In a new ebook, "Take Control of Screen Sharing in Snow Leopard," networking expert Glenn Fleishman walks readers through the steps for identifying, configuring, and using the screen-sharing option that best meets their needs. For those who want to get the most out of Apple's MobileMe-based Back to My Mac file- and screen-sharing feature, Fleishman has also written a companion ebook, "Take Control of Back to My Mac." Each title costs $10, or they can be purchased together for $15 at http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/snow-leopard-screen-sharing

Find essential advice for running Windows on your Intel-based Mac! Using an Intel-based Mac means you can choose the best of both worlds—running Mac OS X or running Windows, but what's the optimal way way to go about it? Cross-platform expert Joe Kissell has distilled untold hours of testing into this ebook to help you understand the pros and cons of Apple's Boot Camp versus virtualization software and to give advice and step-by-step instructions for installing and using either Windows 7, Vista, or XP in Boot Camp, Parallels Desktop 5, VMware Fusion 3, and VirtualBox. http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/windows-on-mac

Configure file sharing to be fast, effective, and secure with networking guru Glenn Fleishman! This detail-packed book makes file sharing easy, whether it's between two Macs on a local network, among a mixed-platform office workgroup, or between far-flung computers on the Internet. You'll learn how to select and configure the right hardware and software for your needs and budget, consider the pros and cons of different file-sharing options, find set-up steps for each of the core Mac OS X file-sharing services—AFP, SMB, and FTP—(with tips to help you avoid problems and security risks), and learn how to connect to Mac file servers from a variety of major operating systems. The ebook discusses Snow Leopard's Wake on Demand feature and the quirky Snow Leopard firewall, as well as how to share files from iPhoto '09 and iTunes 9.

http://www....

Why REALbasic?

What development enviroment should you use? Already you are faced with a plethora of choices: cross-platform or for Mac only? Standalone programs or ones that need a runtime? Just for fun or might it develop into something more serious?

My own requirements in a development tool were: easy to learn, good graphical user interface, cross-platform, and if possible, cheap, preferably free.

So, based upon my requirements, that excluded X-Code (though I still have it on my Mac), Tcl, Python, and a few others and left me seriously looking at REALbasic, Java, SuperCard and Revolution. I tried all of them for a few weeks and REALbasic came out on top by a mile. I had used the old HyperCard extensively and I found SuperCard and Revolution to be quite limited. I hadn’t previously appreciated the difference that a fully object-oriented language would make. Java is object-oriented and cross-platform, but it is intended mainly for...

Start podcasting or take it to the next level with our step-by-step guide!

Beginning a podcast is easier than starting a radio station, but it's still hard to assemble your hardware and software, and learn the tricks of the trade. You can easily meet that challenge with start-to-finish guidance from long-time podcaster Andy Affleck.

http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/podcasting-mac

The Rapid Release Model for Software Development

Summary

Moving software development schedules to a 90-day cycle offers substantial benefits for both software consumers and software developers. For software consumers, it means gaining faster access to new features and functionality and better software quality. For developers, it means reduced risk, improved project management and market agility.

Introduction

For the past 20 years, commercial software has been packaged and sold using the same sales model as other household products such as breakfast cereal and laundry detergent; in an attractive box on the shelf of a retail store. The software industry has grown up trying to fit within this well-established system of selling consumer products.

http://www.realsoftware.com/support/rapidrelease.php