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march 2000
 Adobe InDesign 1.5 -- According to Adobe, the first update to its new page layout program is now available. Because of the outcry from users like me, Adobe has lowered the upgrade price from $99 to $30 for 60 days if you paid $299 for version 1.0, and free if you paid $699. Although this is still unfair, at least $30 is affordable. (3/30)
Adobe product marketing director Peter Kellogg-Smith told MacWEEK that the company now realizes it made a mistake by charging for an update before issuing a free bug fix. Over the next several months, he said, Adobe representatives will keep a close eye on Internet message boards and other user forums. He promised that the company will move aggressively to address reported problems through workarounds, patches or free maintenance updates -- before it sells a full upgrade.
Readers are reporting
that the upgrade is backordered. And
Oupost.com told me they weren't expecting the upgrade until April 11th.
GraphicConverter 3.8.1b6 -- Changes include bug fixes from the image storage change, applescript command print accepts now a window reference, trim command to applescript added, fill requires now less memory and is faster, option to display new folder in the same browser window added, 300x300 and 400x400 as option to browser added, batch function pict improved (supports now insertion of an image with opacity), bug in sharpen edges command in applescript fixed and other changes. Please report
any bugs or suggestions to [email protected] (3/27)
Internet Explorer 5.0 -- Internet Explorer 5.0 Is now available from the Evil Empire. It features the new somewhat speedier Tasman (Tasmanian Devil?) engine, a tacky new interface, and the annoying habit of drawing black outlines around all frames. Since IE is fast becoming the internet standard browser, we designers will just have to find a way to work around its faults. (3/27) direct download
Tex-Edit Plus -- Version 3.0 of Tex-Edit Plus, one of my favorite shareware programs (I paid the fee), is now available for download. Read why I think Tex-Edit Plus beats SimpleText. (3/27)
GraphicConverter News -- GraphicConverter 3.8.1b5 fixes a bug that caused it to crash on some older systems. What I'd like to know is, who discovered this in the day or two since beta 4 came out, and how did Thorsten fix it so fast? (3/24)
A Better Finder Rename -- A Better Finder Rename 2.9 fixes some bugs, but there are no new features. I installed the upgrade anyway since it is one of my most useful pieces of shareware. (3/24) download page
GraphicConverter 3.8.1b4 -- GraphicConverter 3.8.1b4 has some bug fixes. It also seems to work fine now with the upgraded ACTION Files. (3/22)
GraphicConverter 3.8.1b3 -- GraphicConverter 3.8.1b3 allows images larger than the QuickDraw limit of 16000 bytes in width, solving a long-standing problem that prevented me from opening horizontal 64 Base (4096x6144) Kodak Pro-PhotoCD images.
To paraphrase Tony Soprano, "It's Dead to Me." After receiving some less than positive reactions to the $99 upgrade price of its page-layout program InDesign, Adobe Systems, Inc. has told MacNN it will be reevaluating its upgrade strategy and could possibly make some type of change in the near future. (3/16) more (macnn.com)
ACTION Files 1.5.2 -- PowerOn Software has released a free update to ACTION Files which adds Mac OS 9.0.2 compatibility, but no new features. (Thanks to Adobe, I know the difference between an update and an upgrade.) (3/16) download page
Rapster1.0b5 -- You can save some money by not buying music CDs and downloading bootleg MP3 copies of them instead. The hottest program around for finding these recordings is Napster, but it is only for PCs. I discovered a Mac clone named Rapster, and though I've only just begun to play with it, it has a clean interface and seems to work really well. (3/15) download page
Adobe InDesign 1.5 Upgrade Fiasco -- Adobe seems to be getting cranky in its old age. In fact, they're acting amazingly Quark-like. Who else beside Quark would announce their first "update" to a program, then have the nerve to ask $99 for it? (3/13)
Anyone who bought InDesign for $399, or $699 after January 1st, would agree that this so-called update is merely adding features and fixes that should have been in the program in the first place, like text on a path. But Adobe thinks we should pay $99 for their efforts.
This was supposed to be Adobe's "Quark Killer", and it's modern plug-in architecture was supposed to make upgrades quick and easy. It looks like it will be sitting on designers' shelves a little bit longer. more (adobe.com)
Xcelerate -- I just completed a two-day course at Chase on Using Xcelerate Internet Publishing System. This is a Java-based program (accessed through Netscape, but not IE) which Chase employees are using to automatically upload content to Chase.com. This is a new approach to content creation catching on in large corporate environments since their websites have become too large for webmasters to manage. Xcelerate is not the most exciting program in the world, and the resulting pages are pretty plain to look at. But Andy Oeftering, the instructor, did a really good job making it interesting to learn about. (3/10)
 Perhaps AppleWorks 6 will have to be renamed AppleWorks Sucks. Reports are pouring in that it's super slow even on the fastest G4s, that features have been crippled, that it takes more steps to do tasks that were simple in version 5, and that there are not enough new features to justify the $80 upgrade price. But the Aqua buttons look cool. (3/8) more (macintouch.com)
GraphicConverter 3.8.1b2 -- Thorsten Lemke has released a new beta of his shareware image editing program. Changes include improvements to AppleScript support and the addition of Electric Image export. (3/7)
 WebTV -- I found out more about WebTV, and it sucks. Picture quality is poor since you view web pages on your TV. Even though the box is only $100, the extra costs add up. First, you need a phone line to hook it up, since it uses a built-in modem. And you are stuck with WebTV as your ISP, for a whopping $25 a month, which doesn't even get you a personal web page. In fact, many web sites don't even work. So add about $540 a year just to use it. As for ease of use, the small cordless keyboard has tiny, hard-to-read labels on all the function keys that are as confusing to a novice as any alternative. All in all, I don't get it. (3/6)
GraphicConverter 3.8.1b1 -- Two weeks ago, Thorsten Lemke e-mailed me from Germany to let me know he'd released version 3.8 of his shareware image editing software, GraphicConverter. Now he's posted GraphicConverter 3.8.1b1, his first beta version of 3.8.1! It seems pretty stable, except I can't use it with ACTION Files and have been forced to use the Mac's built-in Navigation Services. (Try ACTION Files 1.5.1 by PowerOn Utilities; it's much better!) This has proved better than I thought, since I discovered that you can select multiple items to open at once in the open dialog box. Cool! (3/2)
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Power-Line Networking -- Ever wonder what obstacles stand in the way of using household power lines for computer networking? Probably not, right? But anyway, Bill Machrone's "Up Periscope" column in this week's PCWeek is pretty interesting. (2/28) 
Proximity-J Icons -- IconFactory has released icon artist Talos Tsui's latest set of folder replacement icons, Proximity-J, a freeware icon collection optimized for the smooth edges and 32-bit colors of Mac OS 8.5 (and higher). Tsui is the author of the popular Yosemite Folders series of icons. The Yosemite icons are so cool, I didn't think I'd ever find something to replace them until these came along. They're nice. (2/23)