News & Rumours

The 3D design exploration tool gains model geolocation with Google Maps, improvements to Match Photo, improved support for Building Maker models, Solid Tools (Pro only) for additive and subtractive modeling, calculation of volumes, and more.

Maxon's modeling, rendering, and animation package gets a rigid body dynamics system based on the Bullet engine, new dynamic properties in the Inverse Kinetics system, full integration of Python scripting, double precision math, and much more.

Xeric Design's Cinematica is a video library manager that can track of dozens of properties for every video, with background importing and cataloging of video files, sorting and searching by multiple criteria, and other features.

FileMaker's free Bento 3 Project Manager is a template for managing projects, with forms for tracking contacts, milestones, tasks, files, and more.

Adobe's video production software adds XD-CAM-HD export, Broadcast WAV support, improved RED workflows, and other improvements.

Apple announces all-new iPods, including an iPod Touch with front and back cameras (lower in resolution than the iPhone 4 camera) and the "retina" display; plus new iOS versions with bug fixes and a "Ping" social network for "music discovery"; and a tiny new Apple TV that acts as a streaming client for Apple's new movie and TV rentals, as well as streaming content from your computer and from iDevices.

SeedCode's Zulu is a plug-in for FileMaker Server that makes it possible for iCal to see FileMaker data as iCal calendars.

Adobe's photo manager adds raw support for more cameras, publishing to Facebook and SmugMug, new lens profiles, and bug fixes.

Marketcircle released Billings Pro, a multi-user time tracking and invoicing application based on the Billings 3 desktop edition with sync technology from the company's Daylite application.

Dave Taubler's wireframing application gains new components (including a tabbed pane component and a dialog component), a Clipart Library, styling of individual cells in a spreadsheet component, auto-cropping of canvas sizes, an editor sidebar for notes, editing of grouped components, padding control for text components, and more.

An upcoming version of the REAL Studio development system promises to make Web application development as easy as Basic development for the Mac.

This custom-built monster of a computer is far faster than any Mac Pro sold by Apple, but is also runs Mac OS X (albeit with a few issues). Our review includes performance benchmarks, hands-on experiences, a breakdown of the unique hardware features, software issues and links to related information.

MOApp's image editor gains a simplified interface, unlimited undo, unlimited history, new image enhancement tools, improvements for other tools and filters, presets for adjustment tools, improved performance, and other changes.

Second Gear's iCal-based task manager adds basic support for recurring events, the ability to select a default calendar for new event/task creation, and several bug fixes.

"...addresses issues in Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, and adds export compatibility to Pages with the standard ePub file format (for use with iBooks)."

For 15-inch and 17-inch MacBook Pro mid-2010 models, this update "resolves a rare issue that may cause the system to freeze during startup or intermittently stall during operation, and it improves compatibility with external displays."

Red Rock Software's 2D and 3D charting application gains interface updates to complement the latest Mac OS X and Windows versions, fully cross-platform document files, support for Pantone and other third-party spot colors in PDF and EPS export, and international text support.

Both Apple's Magic Trackpad and Wacom's Bamboo Touch offer multitouch control capabilities to desktop Macs, but they differ sharply in capabilities and compatibility. Our review digs into the details.

Thorough review of iPhone 4, covering features, display, reception issues, camera quality (with still and movie samples), hardware design/internals, upgrade choices and much more.

This "tip sheet" offers helpful information about all sorts of issues and optimizations for the iPhone 4 and iOS 4.