Blessed are the Geeks, for they shall internet the earth

Mac Unloads Arsenal of New Hot Apps and Hardware
By Erik Hansen

Just when the novelty of the innovative products apple released wears off, they drop another bomb on the computer world, raising the bar yet again for hardware and software manufacturers.

Every year Apple holds "Macworld", a conference and expo showcasing the new and exciting things in the world of the Mac. This year has proved to be as exciting as the rest. The most exciting and life changing app introduced was Safari, a turbo charged web browser for Mac OS 10.2.3. Safari gives end users what they have been asking for for a long time, three times the speed of Internet Explorer, built in Google search in the toolbar, Snapback button to original page, powerful bookmarking, seamless downloads, precision layout of HTML, XHTML, DOM, CSS, JAVA, JavaScript, QuickTime, Flash, and Shockwave, and last but not least no more pop-ups!

Right after the introduction of Safari, Steve Jobs introduced "Keynote", Apple's new stab at Microsoft's business, kicking the crap out of PowerPoint. Keynote has been in testing for one full year with Jobs, leaving no details overlooked. They integrated a navigator, alignment guides, enhanced canvas with anti-aliasing, and slide inspector for added options into the user interface. Next they made it extremely compatible with everything you can think of, including old PowerPoint presentations, PDF's, QuickTime movies, Photoshop images, and Illustrator documents.
Then they added more ways to express your ideas with new and exciting themes, transitions, and graphics that make PowerPoint look like Atari to Apple's Playstation 2. Finally they give you the ability to create and customize charts and tables like something straight out of a data analysis program.

Next in the Apple bag-o-tricks was the introduction of iLife, the improvement and connection of their digital lifestyle programs, iTunes 3, iPhoto 2, iMovie 3, and iDVD 3. All of these programs now are fully compatible with each other and gui's are customized to pull from one app directly into another.

Other new products consisted of, Airport Extreme, 5-times faster wireless networking station for up to 50 Mac's and PC's simultaneously; The Burton Amp Jacket, a Gor-tex skiing jacket with a special pocket for iPod with built in soft controls into the sleeve and headphones in the hood; Final Cut Express, a slightly lighter version of Final Cut Pro, with a extremely lighter price then the hefty original; and the most innovative in hardware design, the 17 inch Powerbook, and the 12 inch Powerbook, the largest Portable computer screen in the world, and a little brother 12 inch version
for the compact people.

The statement Apple made at the show is apparent, bye-bye-Microsoft. Apple is staying true to their creed of not becoming one of the pack shackled to the constraints of Microsoft technology. I understand that Apple wanted to provide better products to their customers then what was available, but they sidestepped the company that helped them stay alive over the last couple of years. When Apple was out blowing in the wind without decent word-processing and data analysis programs, Microsoft stepped in and converted their popular programs to the Mac platform. Without that help they would be nowhere near where they are today. It looks like Steve Jobs is finally getting revenge on Bill Gates.

Send your comments to ErikHansen@Thenetworkadministrator.com

Disclaimer: The Opinions shared on TheNetworkAdministrator.com are contributed by its readers and does not necessarily express the opinion of the creators of this publication.