Stan's List

Computerworld reports on a survey by ChangeWave Research which determined, from those planning to buy a computer in the next 90 days, nearly a third will buy a Mac.
Stemming from consumer satisfaction reports, it is predicted this trend will continue. Apple has an ever increasing army of unpaid marketing reps.

The Apple ProRes QuickTime Decoder software allows both Mac and Windows users to play Apple ProRes files through QuickTime. Apple ProRes is a visually lossless format that provides uncompressed HD quality at SD data rates.

It is an excellent choice for mastering and can easily be transcoded to distribution formats like H.264. With new support for playback on both Mac and Windows computers, Apple ProRes can also be used for review and approval of Final Cut Studio sequences.

Huge iPhone Security Flaw Puts All Private Information at Risk

Major Security Flaw in 2.0.2

Thanks to ars technica, I download 3 Smithsonian Channel programs. They are not only coming At a $1.99 each for the 3 hour long nature shows, glad to see these available. This makes over 20,000 TV shows available. This particular one is most invited. Now to get PBS’ Nova and Nature.

RoughlyDrafted does a critic of several articles, with links back, on the level of MobileMe security, if any. The security is varied and depending on what area, whether desktop or web. What does this mean with email, calendar, data and web access? A good read.

MobileMe is not recommended.

There is talk of JavaScript equalling the performance of C code, thus becoming a candidate for a true development language. Mozilla has included a majority improved JavaScript interpreter in Firefox. ars technica measures the improvement to be in the order of a factor of 20 to 40

Opera Software has released Opera 9.5.2, a security and stability update.

While there has not any changes, other than what has been mentioned, Opera 9.5.1 has an extensive list of changes. Thereby knowing you are getting the latest version.

The MobileMe State page has been replaced with the MobileMe Support page. This last post reports:

This is the place to go if you’re experiencing a problem and want to know if it’s related to an issue with our servers. It’s also the page to visit if you’re looking for general information about setting up MobileMe on different computers and devices, for answers to frequently asked questions, and more.

They have a new place for the daily status updates, with a colored button that indicates current status, as well as when it was last updated, together with “history” link. Considerable improvement over the previous status page not knowing when it would be updated, the last being July 29. Apple is looked at not being information friendly. They have a stellar service reputation, but failing to part with the most basic of information. The constant example is the software updates with those dismally cryptic descriptions

In further apology Apple is extending membership by 60 days, with the addition period being applied in the next few days.

There’s a Knowledge Base article that, in answering plausible questions, setting out the terms and conditions,

Apple released version 2.0.2 firmware for iPhone and iPod touch and is only available via iTunes.

Apple’s short description is:

This version of the software includes the following improvements and supersedes all previous versions.

* Bug fixes

Expect more details as they become available. Most anticipated is a fix for the connection dropout.