TidBITS#789/25-Jul-05
=====================
Our look into GPS continues with a review of the Garmin Forerunner
201 from the aptly named runner Paul Lightfoot. Dawn D'Angelillo
then joins us to talk about the serious problems surrounding
obsolete electronics and the need for better recycling facilities
and programs. Glenn Fleishman covers the release of the Mac
Desktop Controller for the Sonos wireless speaker system, and
we look at Yahoo's purchase of Konfabulator and the releases
of OmniWeb 5.1.1 and DoorStop X 1.0, along with the official
story of .Mac bandwidth limits.
Topics:
MailBITS/25-Jul-05
Sonos Adds Mac Desktop Controller
Old Macs Don't Just Fade Away
Running with a Garmin Forerunner GPS
Take Control News/25-Jul-05
Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/25-Jul-05
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MailBITS/25-Jul-05
------------------
**OmniWeb 5.1.1 Released** -- The Omni Group has released OmniWeb
5.1.1 to fix a variety of minor bugs and improve compatibility
with Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. You can read the full change list on
the OmniWeb Release Notes page linked below; suffice to say that
if you use OmniWeb, particularly with Tiger, you'll want to
download the 6 MB update to eliminate some annoying page drawing
problems on certain sites and crashes in specific situations.
Despite Safari's new features in Tiger, I still find myself
relying on OmniWeb for most of my Web browsing thanks to features
like reopening pages on relaunch, workspaces, separate window
editing of textarea fields, find/replace in textarea fields,
and more. [ACE]
<http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omniweb/releasenotes/>
**Apple Discloses, Limits .Mac Bandwidth Transfers** -- Apple's
.Mac service has played it coy for years about how much bandwidth
transfer (bytes to and from your Web pages and other parts of your
account) are included with your annual $100 fee. I've asked Apple
directly about it before and some folks have tested it, and it
appears to be... well, it varies based on velocity of downloads,
kind of material, etc.
No more. Now the bandwidth limits are officially 3 GB per month
with a regular subscription and 9 GB a month if you pay the extra
$50 per year for a full 1 GB of online storage. [GF]
<http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/mc/20050720/tc_mc/
macaddshigherbandwidthoption>
<http://mac.com/>
**DoorStop X 1.0 Enhances Mac OS X's Firewall** -- Back in 1998,
Open Door Networks shipped DoorStop, the first firewall for the
Mac. The program was subsequently licensed to Symantec for Norton
Personal Firewall, and now Open Door has released DoorStop X,
a new version for Mac OS X 10.3 Panther and 10.4 Tiger. Although
Mac OS X has had a built-in firewall since Mac OS X 10.2 Jaguar,
and the version in Tiger finally offers rudimentary logging of
denied access attempts, DoorStop X provides far better logging
(particularly in concert with Open Door's Who's There? Firewall
Advisor utility) of both allowed and denied access attempts.
DoorStop also features a more graphical interface that makes
it easier to understand your configuration at a glance, and
most important, the program enables you to open up a particular
port to a specific IP address or range of IP addresses, thus
eliminating the all-or-nothing approach of Mac OS X's built-in
firewall. Through 15-Aug-05, DoorStop X costs $40, or $60 when
bundled with Who's There. Educational discounts are available
for multiple license packs. A fully functional trial version
(2.2. MB download) works for 30 days; Who's There has a fully
functional, 10-day trial version (also 2.2. MB). [ACE]
<http://www.opendoor.com/doorstop/>
<http://www.opendoor.com/whosthere/>
**Yahoo Gets With a New Konfab** -- Yahoo announced today
that it has purchased Konfabulator, an application (for both
Mac OS X and Windows) which enables users to run small custom
applications - called Widgets - right on their desktop.
(In case you're wondering, Konfabulator came substantially
earlier than Apple's Dashboard and its widgets: see Adam's
review back in TidBITS-717_.) Konfabulator has inspired an
enthusiastic developer community that created widgets to
report on everything from traffic and mosquito conditions
to metronomes and add-ons for Apple's iChat and iTunes.
But not only is Yahoo buying Konfabulator, it's giving the
program away for free! Anyone who purchased Konfabulator
in the last two months will receive a refund.
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=07545>
Yahoo sees Konfabulator as a core technology behind the Yahoo
Developer Network: Konfabulator - likely to be renamed Yahoo
Widgets - will be a means by which Yahoo promotes its new
XML-based content distribution schemes. By making Konfabulator
free, Yahoo hopes developers will create Widgets for Mac and
Windows that do all sorts of cool and useful things, many of
which will be tied directly to Yahoo's online content offerings.
Developers will appreciate not having to "scrape" Web sites to
extract data for their Widgets; users will appreciate cool,
new cross-platform tools; and Yahoo will see their content
(and associated advertising efforts) reach new people in new
ways. Konfabulator is now available as a free 5.2 MB download,
and requires Mac OS X 10.2 or later. [GD]
<http://www.konfabulator.com/>
<http://widget.yahoo.com/>
<http://developer.yahoo.net/>
**Adam Talks about Macworld Expo on Tech Night Owl** -- Time for
another radio interview, this time with Gene Steinberg of the Tech
Night Owl Live. Gene and I talked for a while about Macworld Expo
Boston, what it was like, and why it has shrunk so much over the
last few years. On the page below, you can either listen to the
MP3 directly, or find the link to access the podcast of the show.
<http://www.macradio.com/Thursday/nightowl/>
**iMix Playlist Representing Apple History** -- Want to have some
fun? The final "stunt" in the MacBrainiac Challenge at last week's
Macworld Expo in Boston was to create a playlist from tracks
in the iTunes Music Store with about 10 songs whose titles best
represented Apple's corporate history. It was tough, both because
of slow Internet connectivity to the iTunes Music Store and
because of the limited time we had on stage. Honestly, I can't
remember the specific songs my team picked, but I do remember
that the opposing Smart Folders team did a better job and was
justly rewarded with more audience applause.
But hey, you can participate in this too. Go to the iTunes Music
Store and make up an iMix playlist with tracks whose titles
(not artist or album names) elicit parts of Apple's history,
in chronological order, of course. You can use as many songs as
you like, and it would be especially cool if other aspects of
the song contributed additional levels of meaning to what you're
trying to represent - having a blues song whose title represents
Apple's 1998 death spiral, for instance, would be great. Then
write up a description of your iMix, explaining what each song is
supposed to elicit, and send it, along with a link to the iMix,
to TidBITS Talk at <[email protected]> so the rest of us
can see what you've done. [ACE]
<http://www.apple.com/itunes/store/share.html>
Sonos Adds Mac Desktop Controller
---------------------------------
by Glenn Fleishman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Testing a Sonos Digital Music System was like staying at a four-
star hotel on somebody else's dime. The system lets you stream
music around a house using Ethernet or mesh wireless as the
connection medium. I had a loaner system a few months ago for
a review in Personal Tech Pipeline, and have been waiting for
additional Macintosh support, which Sonos just provided.
<http://www.sonos.com/us/
<http://www.personaltechpipeline.com/60401913>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=07956>
The heart of the Sonos system is the ZonePlayer, a hub that powers
a set of high-wattage speakers or pumps input and output through
stereo and RCA component jacks. You can have up to 32 ZonePlayers
scattered throughout your house (or castle, if you own that many)
linked via Ethernet or wireless networking. For example, you can
bring input from one Sonos ZonePlayer - say, an iPod playing
through its stereo output into a Sonos input - to that ZonePlayer
or one or more others.
A handheld controller or similar desktop software lets you create
ZonePlayer groups, create queues for each group, and control other
settings. The software is now available for the Mac; it was
Windows only when Sonos first shipped the system.
<http://www.sonos.com/news_and_reviews/press_releases/2005/pr_072005_v12.htm>
<https://www.sonos.com/us/my_account/my_downloads/>
The software controller is really a critical part of the system.
You can install the software on every machine on the network
and use any machine to then control any ZonePlayer or set of
ZonePlayers. With the software controller, you could also choose
not to purchase the separately sold $400 hardware controller
(which is effectively $200 when purchased as part of an
introductory bundle).
Music that can be played through the Sonos system may be stored
on any number of computers; collections can be broken up and still
be made available across the entire system through aggregation
that Sonos performs. Sonos uses Samba file sharing to gain access
to stored music; using Mac OS X's Samba support worked fine in
my testing.
Sonos also now supports Windows Media Audio (WMA) Internet radio
stations, which is a nice addition, and lets iTunes users access
their iTunes library within Sonos's system. It still can't play
Apple's AAC-FairPlay digital rights managed songs from the iTunes
Music Store, however, since Apple has refused to license FairPlay
to anyone.
The system is pricey, but wonderful. It works precisely as
advertised. ZonePlayers are $500 each; controllers cost $400
each. A bundle of two ZonePlayers and one hardware controller
is $1,200, or $200 off separate purchase.
Old Macs Don't Just Fade Away
-----------------------------
by Dawn D'Angelillo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
As electronics enthusiasts, it's easy for us to get excited
about new iPods, faster processors, sleek iBooks, and flat-screen
monitors. But most of us have given little thought to what becomes
of the equipment we replace.
An estimated 130 million computers will be manufactured and sold
this year, as well as untold numbers of cell phones, televisions,
and other electronic devices. The outdated electronics we replace,
such as computers, televisions, printers and related peripherals,
become electronic waste (e-waste). It's estimated that in 2005,
one computer will become obsolete for every new computer put on
the market. Cell phones have the shortest lifespan among consumer
electronics: 1.5 years.
**What's Inside** -- E-waste is both an environmental problem
and a health hazard. Many people don't realize that electronics
contain hazardous toxins such as lead, cadmium, hexavalent
chromium, mercury, and brominated flame retardants, all shown to
have adverse health effects in humans and wildlife. Particularly
hazardous is older equipment which had large amounts of banned
substances used in their production, such as polybrominated
biphenyl (PBBs) and diphenyl ethers (PBDEs). These chemicals
degrade slowly into the environment and build up in living
organisms, much as the more well-known PCBs do. Accumulations
of PBBs and PBDEs are known to affect behavior as well as thyroid
hormone production as levels increase. While the adverse health
effects of exposure to lead and mercury are well documented,
most people are less aware that hexavalent chromium (Cr VI) is
more soluble in water than its natural cousin, chromium (Cr III).
Cr VI targets the respiratory system and in 1975 was declared an
occupational carcinogen by the National Institute for Occupational
Safety and Health.
Want specifics? Different devices and components include a wide
variety of toxic substances.
* Monitors and televisions contain cathode ray tubes (CRTs), which
use lead to shield users from radiation. CRTs also contain barium.
* Printed circuit boards can contain chromium, lead, beryllium,
mercury, cadmium, nickel, and zinc. Lead solder is used to hold
components to circuit boards, and brominated flame retardants
are used in circuit boards, cables, and plastic casing.
* Batteries contained in printed circuit boards have numerous
hazardous metals including mercury, nickel, cadmium and lead.
* Laptop computers have a small fluorescent lamp containing
mercury in the screen, in addition to the materials in monitors
and CPUs.
* Peripherals such as printers utilize circuit boards, batteries,
and toner cartridges. Copiers have selenium or chromium drums.
**Collateral Damage** -- When electronics are not properly
disposed of or recycled, they end up in our landfills, where
the toxins they contain can make their way into the ground water
and into the air we breathe. Some discarded electronics are
shipped to developing countries to be harvested for any usable
components by children and other workers paid pennies a day.
This work is often done without gloves, masks, or goggles,
resulting in exposure to the harmful chemicals, glass, and
other sharp objects.
<http://www.svtc.org/cleancc/pubs/technotrash.htm>
<http://www.ewaste.ch/case_study_china/>
All this happens in part because no national regulations
govern the handling or disposal of e-waste in the United States.
California and Maine have passed their own e-waste laws, which
place responsibility on the consumer. Other states have passed
legislation classifying electronics as hazardous waste. This
patchwork of different laws from coast to coast makes it difficult
and expensive for consumers to understand what to do, and for
retailers and manufacturers to adhere to the laws.
<http://www.computertakeback.com/legislation_and_policy/
e_waste_legislation_in_the_us/>
**Make a Difference** -- So what can we do about it? As consumers,
we need take personal responsibility for recycling our electronics
properly. Every electronics reseller should offer options to
customers and provide information about hazards of improper
recycling. Manufacturers are also responsible: Apple, Dell,
Sony, and the rest of the gang need to step up and offer
incentives to make sure their temporarily cool items are recycled
when they are no longer wanted. Apple has done some work here
with the iPod recycling program and other environmental programs,
although the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition has called on the
company to go further.
<http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/jun/03recycle.html>
<http://www.apple.com/environment/>
<http://www.svtc.org/>
Most solid waste districts can provide you with more information
on resources in your area. You may want to ask a few questions
when you go to drop off your electronics to be sure they're being
disposed of properly. Some questions to ask include:
* Do you provide a data scrubbing service to remove information
from the machines?
* What company handles the electronics after they leave here?
* Are the electronics repaired and resold or dismantled for
working parts? If so, what protections do the workers have
against the toxic materials?
* Where are the electronics sent? What is the final destination
of the electronics?
* Are non-working electronics sent to developing countries?
If you're not sure where to go to recycle your dead electronics,
the Electronics Recycling Initiative and the Electronics
Initiative Alliance have a list of links to pertinent recycling
information for electronics. You can also find additional
background information about the electronics waste problem
on the Small Dog Electronics Web site.
<http://www.nrc-recycle.org/resources/electronics/policy.htm>
<http://www.eiae.org/>
<http://www.smalldog.com/ewaste/>
Small Dog Electronics supports shared responsibility and shared
cost among consumers, manufacturers, and retailers. In other
words, we're not just leaving it to our customers to pay for
recycling. Currently, we offer free recycling when you purchase
a replacement hard drive or iPod battery. We are also a local
drop-off point for all electronics recycling. Recycling is
available for 25 cents per pound, which covers the costs that
we are charged by the recyclers.
We're also working with government leaders and industry
organizations to develop a model for handling end-of-life
electronics where financial and physical responsibilities are
shared. This is proving to be a slow process, especially since
our senator will be retiring this year. So far, no laws have
been passed that have come directly from our efforts, but we will
continue to keep this issue forefront in Vermont politics. We can
all put pressure on our state and local governments to cooperate
by writing to our elected representatives. Our biggest gains to
date have been working with our local recyclers and solid waste
managers to get them to assist in telling the story of e-waste.
Businesses, the technology and recycling industry, and our
federal, state, and local governments should work together to make
sure that our e-waste does not go to landfills or incinerators or
to developing countries, but that our country has a system for
responsibly handling and disposing of e-waste.
Even if Small Dog Electronics can't be the biggest contributor
to this movement, maybe we can help by being the smallest and
the noisiest, doing the share of the work that is ours to do,
and spreading the word to other people. This isn't hard. It's like
taking a pooper scooper with you when you go for a walk with your
dog. If each person cleans up his or her own mess, the whole mess
starts to get cleaned up.
[Dawn D'Angelillo wears many hats at Small Dog Electronics,
including Customer Service, Marketing Director, newsletter
publisher, and listmaster. Small Dog Electronics is an authorized
Apple reseller of computers and peripherals based in Waitsfield,
Vermont. The social mission of the company has remained focused
on multiple bottom lines. Small Dog Electronics believes that
its effect on the community, environment, customers, and employees
is just as important as maintaining its profitability.]
Running with a Garmin Forerunner GPS
------------------------------------
by Paul Lightfoot <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
I have been running regularly for many years. Although I gave
up competing 20 years ago, I still like to jog around the
lanes and footpaths in Cornwall, England for an hour or so
each morning. Until recently the limit of my record keeping
and analysis was to file the number of minutes for each run,
to make sure I maintained a reasonable average month-by-month.
These days I am more interested in the views than in how fast
I might be going.
All that changed three months ago, when on an uncharacteristic
impulse I bought a Garmin Forerunner. It is a little device that
you wear on your wrist like a bloated watch. It uses the Global
Positioning System (GPS) to measure how far you travel as well
as the time you take, and thus allows you to record far more
information about each run than you could manage with a normal
stopwatch.
<http://www.garmin.com/outdoor/products.html#fitness>
**What Is the GPS?** Although previous TidBITS articles have
explained GPS in more detail (see the series "Find Yourself with
GPS"), a brief refresher might be welcome. (For a full explanation
of the system, see Karen Nakamura's "Feeling Lost? An Overview of
Global Positioning Systems" in TidBITS-388_; it was written before
the accuracy of the GPS system was "improved" for civilian use,
but is otherwise helpful.) The GPS relies on signals from a
network of 24 satellites that orbit the earth at altitudes of
between 6,000 and 12,000 miles (roughly 10,000 to 19,000 km).
A GPS device like my Forerunner needs signals from at least three
satellites to fix its position in two dimensions, and from four
to estimate its elevation above sea level. It updates its position
more or less constantly and can therefore track the distance,
direction, and speed of movement.
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbser=1264>
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tbart=02222>
In the early years of the GPS, the U.S. Department of Defense
imposed "Selective Availability" (SA) to degrade the accuracy
of the system for non-U.S. military purposes, so civilian devices
were accurate to about 100 meters. However in May 2000 SA was
turned off, and since then the system is typically accurate
to within 15 meters, according to Garmin.
Real world accuracy varies around this figure. The more satellites
the device can detect, and the more widely spaced they are,
the more accurate is the reading. In the U.S. the Wide Area
Augmentation System (WAAS) can improve accuracy to less than
three meters for WAAS-enabled devices like Garmin's StreetPilots
(but not the Forerunner series). However, tall buildings, dense
foliage, changes of direction, and other nuisances can interrupt
signals or restrict the number of satellites the device can
detect, as we will see, so 15 meters is only a guide to the
accuracy you can expect.
<http://www.garmin.com/aboutGPS/waas.html>
**What the Forerunner Can Do** -- The Forerunner enables you to
divide your run into as many "laps" as you want, and record the
time, distance, average pace and numbers of calories burnt for
each lap. You can define the laps either automatically according
to a set distance, say one mile or one kilometer. Or you can press
the Lap button as you pass turnings or other landmarks along the
way. Regardless of the numbers of laps, the Forerunner keeps track
of the total distance covered, total elapsed time, overall average
pace and the best pace you achieved during the run. You can also
have it record the amount of "rest" you take, which is defined as
moving slower than a certain pace that you specify.
You can set up targets for your run by setting a pace for your
"virtual training partner" and having the Forerunner keep track
of how far ahead or behind you are. Or you can define a set of
intervals where you alternately run fast, jog for a while to
recover and then speed up again, one of the most effective
(and exhausting) ways for competitive athletes to improve
their performance.
The Forerunner has three main 64 by 100 pixel data screens,
and each screen can show three pieces of information. The first,
Timer, screen shows the elapsed time, current pace (minutes per
mile or kilometer) and total distance for the run. The second
screen shows the same information for the current lap, and the
third you can customize, so you might choose, say, time of day,
best pace achieved so far, and elevation.
The history mode records all the above information for your last
run and summarized by day and by week. Garmin says the Forerunner
can store information from 5,000 laps.
The Forerunner can map your track and show it as a dotted line on
its screen, either for the whole run or for each lap, punctuated
with any location points that you choose to define. It is not
capable of receiving and displaying uploaded map information,
so you cannot follow your progress along roads in the way you can
with a car navigation system like a StreetPilot. But it does have
a TracBack mode to help you find your way back to the start or
some other known point in case you get lost.
**How It Actually Performs** -- The Forerunner weighs just 2.75
ounces (78 grams) which is nearly unnoticeable on your wrist; it
is easy to set up and use; the data screens are easy to read while
running; it does all you would expect and that the manual claims;
and it certainly adds something to your running experience. It is
good to know how fast you are going, however unforgiving the
minutes may often be. But the Forerunner has a few quirks that
have made me curious about exactly what is going on inside and how
accurate it is.
I have compared different measures of distance between the same
physical points, taking care to follow the same track each time.
The same run, repeated exactly on two days, showed up as 6.73 and
6.90 miles, a difference of about 2.5 percent. For six measures
of a roughly 1.5 mile circuit, the range from highest to lowest
result was 0.05 miles (264 feet), or about 3 percent of the
average of the six measures. This level of accuracy seems typical
where I have a relatively open view of the sky most of the time
and no more than a fifth of the route is narrow with overhanging
branches.
I occasionally hear the plaintive beep that the Forerunner lets
out when the GPS signal is weak, and that is where the distance
readings become the least consistent. For four measures of
a section of about 0.7 miles where the lanes are lined with
high, solid hedges and often overhung by trees, the range was
a whopping 22 percent.
For what I thought would be a definitive accuracy test I took my
Forerunner to a local 400 meter track, located on a piece of land
that is flat and open by local standards, with no tall buildings
and few trees near enough to affect the readings. To my surprise,
the level of accuracy was less good than in my earlier tests,
ranging from 383 to 425 meters over four laps, which was between
4 and 6 percent off.
When I asked Garmin about this result they said a good satellite
"fix" at the start is critical for such tests, especially when
running a circuit where the device must update its position from
different satellites as you change direction, and in this case
I might not have given the Forerunner enough time to get a good
initial view of several satellites. In their own tests they used
a wheel to measure a local running track at 398 meters, and for
14 laps the Forerunner recorded from 393 to 402 meters, with an
average error of 0.56 percent.
The current pace on the main screen is one of the readings
I like to look at. It is usually plausible but occasionally
changes dramatically within a short distance for no obvious
reason, not necessarily where the sky is most obscured. And I am
curious about the distance over which the Forerunner calculates
the best pace of the run, which sometimes seems a bit too good
to be true. Garmin was coy about the frequency of calculation
and other details of these numbers.
When I stand in front of my house looking south at almost 180
degrees of open sky and sea, the elevation reading changes by a
foot or so every second, over a vertical range of anything up to
30 feet. Even though the Forerunner knows about elevation, Garmin
acknowledges that it is more difficult to pin down than location,
and the Forerunner does not include elevation in its calculations
unless the readings are stable enough to be reliable. On one run
it showed I had burned 40 calories on a lap that I marked while
struggling painfully up the steep hill from my house, but 75
calories when running the same lap more quickly but far more
easily on the way down at the end.
**Alternatives** -- Garmin makes three Forerunner models. The 101
(about $100 street price) runs off two AAA batteries and does not
allow you to transfer your data to a PC. My 201 (about $140) runs
off a rechargeable battery that holds a charge for 15 hours of use
and allows transfers, using Training Center software that Garmin
makes available on its Web site; Training Center enables a PC
(but not your Mac, sadly) to track your runs on street maps and
carry out more sophisticated analyses of your past runs. The main
feature of the newest member of the Forerunner family, the 301
($250), is that it uses a chest strap-mounted sensor to record
your pulse rate in addition to time and distance. It also comes
with a CD that contains a more sophisticated version of Training
Center that enables you to plot your pulse rate at any point along
the way, and plan future training sessions based on an assessment
of your performance so far.
**Overview** -- I am pleased with my Garmin Forerunner mainly
because it adds a new level of interest to my runs. Call it a new
level of challenge if you are that way inclined. Even at my sedate
pace it has probably made me run a little faster, and I can vary
my pace more systematically, so perhaps I am in slightly better
shape than I was three months ago. I can live with the level of
accuracy that the Forerunner can manage in my testing environment
of Cornwall. I certainly prefer it to other distance-measuring
devices that depend on maintaining a constant stride length,
which aside from being difficult goes against the principles
of fitness training that I learned in the dim and distant past.
As a Mac user I would like Garmin to put out versions of its
software that I could actually use, although Garmin says they
have no plans to do so, and in practice I am not sure I would
use it much because the Forerunner already displays enough
information for my needs. It does not take much effort to type
one or two key figures into a spreadsheet each morning. If you
are keen enough you can get software from other sources, such
as Hiketech (for the Mac) and Motionbased (for Windows, with
Mac support promised), which enables you to upload and map
your runs.
<http://www.hiketech.com/>
<http://www.motionbased.com/>
For me, the Forerunner's main weakness is its inability to
incorporate elevation into its calculations and analyses.
Slogging up my Cornish hills can be hard work and I feel
a bit cheated by not getting credit for all that effort.
[Paul Lightfoot is a freelance writer and consultant
on international development projects. Now based in
Cornwall, England, he has spent much of his adult life
running around Asia.]
<http://homepage.mac.com/paullightfoot/>
Take Control News/25-Jul-05
---------------------------
by Adam C. Engst <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
**More GarageBand Content and Summer Sale** -- Jeff Tolbert,
the author of our two Take Control ebooks about GarageBand,
is seemingly inexhaustible when it comes to telling people about
his favorite music-making program from Apple. After he finished
updating his ebooks to cover GarageBand 2, he went on to write
additional articles about GarageBand for various Web sites based
on his experience writing the ebooks. He does a great job with the
right-brain/left-brain work of explaining how to work creatively
in a digital environment, so those of you who want to keep your
creativity fresh while making tunes in GarageBand should be sure
to check out his other pieces. And if you haven't yet purchased
Jeff's ebooks, we're having a 30 percent-off sale through the
end of July: purchase both "Take Control of Making Music with
GarageBand" and "Take Control of Recording with GarageBand"
and save 30 percent on those and any other ebooks in the same
order! Use the Buy Both button on one of the ebook pages to
take advantage of the sale.
<http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/garageband-music.html>
<http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/garageband-recording.html>
* For Synthtopia, Jeff penned an article called "Advanced Audio
Effects in GarageBand" that covers how to pump drums, set up
a ping-pong delay, and make a comb filter.
<http://www.synthtopia.com/Articles/GaragebandTips2.html>
* MacIdol published an excerpt from "Take Control of Making Music
with GarageBand" that walks you through the song-planning process
with a look at how to sketch the overall feeling of a song, plus
thoughts on harmony, texture, dynamics, and timbre.
<http://www.macidol.com/tips/take_control_excerpt.php>
* The final article, this one for MacJams.com, rounds up a number
of Jeff's favorite GarageBand recording tips, including his Most
Important Audio Tip Ever, how to get started with a beat, locking
tracks, and more.
<http://www.macjams.com/article.php?story=20050306160702320>
Hot Topics in TidBITS Talk/25-Jul-05
------------------------------------
by TidBITS Staff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
The second URL below each thread description points to the
discussion on our Web Crossing server, which will be faster.
**Low-end monitors** -- A reader looks for feedback on refurbished
and inexpensive monitors. (1 message)
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2650>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/501/>
**Trade show attendance** -- Adam's reflections about Macworld
Expo 2005 in Boston prompt a discussion about attendance at
other Mac events. (2 messages)
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2651>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/502/>
**Regional Macworld Shows** -- Readers weigh in on the concept of
putting on several smaller, regional Macworld-type shows instead
of focusing on the San Francisco and Boston shows. (2 messages)
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2652>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/503/>
**PC Card Ethernet Support** -- A reader needs a second Ethernet
connection in his PowerBook, but Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger killed
support for his existing setup. As with many major software
updates, it's not an isolated problem. (3 messages)
<http://db.tidbits.com/getbits.acgi?tlkthrd=2654>
<http://emperor.tidbits.com/TidBITS/Talk/505/>
$$
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