Author: Robyn

“This is for the crazy ones.” Even though I’ve been an Apple fan for many years, I’ve just recently become intrigued by the life and professional career of Steve Jobs, founder of Apple Computers. About two months ago, I saw the first trailer for the movie “Jobs,” a biopic about Steve Jobs starring Ashton Kutcher. I have to admit that I was concerned about Kutcher’s acting ability as he has primarily done comedy in his life, but the trailers were making me believe that he could be Jobs. The movie opens with an Apple Town Hall meeting where Jobs is…

Introducing, Ideally Notes for Mac – the idea keeper. Today, I’d like to introduce you to one of my favorite new apps for Mac – Ideally Notes. Ideally Notes is a menu bar utility app that allows users make notes and keep note-related files in one place. According to its developers, Ideally Notes isn’t just for storing notes, it’s an idea keeper! Ideally Notes version 1.0 was released on Tuesday, August 13, 2013 in the Mac App Store. Developers currently have the app priced at $4.99, which is 25% off the regular price as a release promotion. To start, I…

Rise will help you start your day in a unique way. I’m a snoozer. That is how I would describe myself. In the morning, I hit the snooze button on the alarm clock at least twice. Sometimes, if I’m particularly stubborn, it will be more. I’ve tried every method I’ve ever heard of to break myself of this habit, but there is no use. I’m a snoozer. One of the things that frustrates me with alarm clocks is the inability to set the amount of snooze you get. The Apple Alarm is an automatic 9 minutes. That’s a bit much…

Food.com offers Everyday is a Food Holiday on iOS to brighten the day. One of the things I love to do on my birthday is get a coffee from Starbucks and head to a spa with a book to get a pedicure. A couple of years ago, I noticed that our local Thornton’s had a sign up for a free cup of coffee on my birthday, September 29th. I then discovered that the free cup of coffee was a promotion based off of September 29th being National Coffee Day. This made me think, “How many different days of food are…

This week in tech news – the iPhone event date is made public, Pirate Bay give a gift to its users, T-Mobile changes its iPhone pricing, Apple’s developer site is restored and Steve Jobs is awarded a Disney Legend award. iPhone Event Scheduled The annual fall Apple event for iPhone has been scheduled for September 10th. During this event, Apple execs will most likely unveil a newer version of the iPhone (the most popular rumors call it the “iPhone 5S”), maybe the long anticipated iWatch or even an iTV. It’s expected that Apple will sell an estimated 30 million phones…

Photo Zoom is the next evolution in image editing. In 1724, Johann Heinrich Schultz, a German professor, first discovered that a silver and chalk mixture darkens under exposure to light. Nearly 100 years later, the first permanent photograph was made by Joseph Nicephore Niepce, a French inventor. Today, people cherish their photographs. Unfortunately, before the advent of digital photography, we had the problem of maintaining and rescuing our memories from time. Time tended to break down the paper that held our memories and so they became lost. In 1990, 160 years after the first permanent photographs, a software company developed…

Since the iPhone was released in 2007, it has led the way in the smartphone market. Apple has successfully held the majority of the smartphone market share for many fiscal time periods. On Wednesday, new data was released that shows Apple’s share of the global market slid to 13.2 percent in the second quarter of 2013. It was previously at 16.6 percent earlier in the year. The biggest change shown in this new data? The jump Android based phones are showing. Handsets running Android moved from 69.1 percent to 79.3 percent. Some of the biggest reasons for this growth include…

Growing up, I played a lot of word games with my mother and grandmother. One of our favorites was Boggle. It was always a good time and caused a lot of laugher to occur. This morning as I was looking through new apps, I found a fun little app called Tap Words. Tap Words is very similar to Boggle in concept. A board of letters is presented to the player and he or she must select words from those letters simply by connecting them by swiping across the screen. It’s very enjoyable and a must try for any word game…

“News” is defined as newly received or noteworthy information, esp. about recent or important events. Since the dawn of man, there has been some form of news. The first newspapers made their appearance in the 17th century and since then, written forms of news have been prevalent throughout modern society. In 2010, it was reported that more than 41% of people surveyed by Pew Project for Excellence in Journalism received their news online. I remember a time when teacher’s would tell us not to use sources online because they could be written by anyone. While that was true, now it…

This week in tech news – Apple takes another step towards the iWatch, Google looks to LG for next tablet and White House lifts import ban on Apple products. Apple Acquires Passif Semiconductor Cupertino-based Apple, Inc. has recently acquired Passif Semiconductor, also a California-based company. Founded by two graduate students from University of California-Berkeley, Passif Semiconductor focuses on the production of ultra low powered chips for bluetooth devices. It is rumored that this is one step closer for Apple to the iWatch. Google May Use LG for Nexus Not even a week after its latest release, Google is rumored to…

Snaptee makes it possible for users to create custom t-shirts. I remember growing up with the ‘No Fear’ t-shirts covering my classmates. It was a status symbol for some, but for others it was a way of expressing their beliefs and attitudes. For me, my No Fear shirt was a statement when I rode a roller coaster for the first time that I wasn’t going to let a fear stand in my way. Our clothes can say a lot about our personalities and they can be as unique as we are. Now, thanks to Snaptee Limited, we can create custom…

Weber’s On The Grill is the ideal grilling companion app. Summer is grilling season. At 6PM in our town, you can’t walk a block without smelling the sweet aroma of food cooking outdoors. Growing up, my father prided himself on his grilled specialities. Steak, hamburgers, shish kabobs and even hot dogs were delicacies when he prepared them over a charcoal grill. I am proud to say that I feel as though I might be following in his footsteps when it comes to mastering the art of grilling. Two summers ago, we purchased an infrared grill by Chargrill for our household.…

Tuba for Mac brings YouTube to your desktop. Social Media has redefined how the people of the world communicate with one another. For some, blogging is a form of therapy and for others it is simply a way to share his or her opinion with other like-minded individuals. Instead of picking up a phone to get in touch with friends, family or even neighbors, many times we take to the social networking sites, like Facebook, to reach out to others. Sharing is a basic principle that is taught to us when we enter kindergarten. Our first lessons in school are…

Apple Making Changes to Executive Team Apple Inc. is moving Senior Vice-president of Technologies, Bob Mansfield, out of its executive team to work on special projects. Mansfield is the latest addition to CEO Tim Cook’s “Special Projects” team. Mansfield led the development of a number of devices including the MacBook Air. Apple iPhone 5C A photograph revealing the icon “iPhone 5C” has been leaked to the internet. Sources report that these packaging photos are for a thicker iPhone that may be more affordable for consumers. The photograph could be a fake or it could be a sign of things to…

Once upon a time, a young professional woman went to work. She was there for approximately 9 hours and then she drove 12.5 miles to get home. She was at home for approximately 15 hours, then, she drove the 12.5 miles back to work and spent another 8 hours at work. If someone were following your movements and creating a story from them, would it sound something like that? Imagine that an app on your phone was doing that for you. What I just described is what Lifelog with Saga does. Saga keeps track of all the places you go without you having to check-in to individual…

Have you ever had trouble determining where to eat a meal? Or, have you ever wanted to try a new place to eat, but weren’t sure if you would like it? If you answered yes, then Great Food Nearby is an app that should be in your iOS collection. Great Food Nearby is to the food industry as Pandora is to the music industry. The app makes suggestions of restaurants based off of how you rate other restaurants. When you first start up the app, you are asked to choose types of cuisine that you enjoy. Then, you are asked…

A few months ago, we discussed the importance of keeping the brain active with games and exercises designed to enhance the brain’s performance. Along with this observation, we reviewed an app called Fit Brains Trainer. The app worked to train a brain through a series of tests. I mentioned that there are many apps available in the Apple iTunes store that work to keep brains fit and active. Today, we bring you another one of these apps – Lumosity. The concept of Lumosity is very similar to Fit Brains Trainer. Lumosity seeks to improve the brain’s potential for memory retention,…

Blotter version 2.2 brings Retina display support and many backend updates. A couple of months ago, we published a review on Blotter for Mac OS. This app delivers a transparent calendar widget for your desktop that works with the Mac’s native calendar application. We were highly impressed with this app for many reasons, but the most popular reason was the ease of viewing our schedules without having to open the calendar app. Developer, Wireload LLC, released a highly anticipated update on July 18th. Version 2.2 includes the following: Support for Retina displays Better support for Google Calendars Improved support for…

This week in tech news – Apple looking at bigger screens for iPhone and iPad, Ubuntu hoping to release Edge in 2014 and Apple’s developer site was hacked. Apple Testing Bigger iPhone Screens? Some potential prototype pictures that suggest a larger screen may be in store for the next iPhone have hit the Internet. According to a report from The Wall Street Journal the Cupertino-based company has recently been testing an iPhone screen larger than 4 inches with its Asia suppliers. This report also suggests that the iPad screen may be increasing in size as well. Screens slightly smaller than…

As more and more digital photographers are using their iPhone as their primary method of capture people, places and things, more and more apps are hitting the marketplace to enhance the photographer’s toolkit. There are the ‘essentials’ like iPhoto and Instagram that allow users to edit photos with ease. Photo editing apps are getting close to being a ‘dime a dozen’ and it can be a struggle for developers to come up with something unique. Earlier this month, developers Artware, Inc. released Layrs, an iOS photo editing app. So, what make Layrs so special? It allows users to mark the…

One of the things I really appreciate Apple is that they help people find what they are looking for and suggest apps for different lifestyles. At this point in time, the iTunes App store has a featured category of “Back to School.” The apps featured within Back to School are meant to maximize productivity for students when they return to school after the summer break. Some of the apps included are Pages, Numbers and Keynote, which are comparable to Microsoft Office. There are several free apps listed, but there are also some ‘pay-for’ apps. If you are returning to school…

Sums Gesture Calculator for iOS gives a new reason for gestures. Even though the iPhone comes equipped with a native calculator, there are dozens of calculator apps available in the iTunes App Store. Some of them have sound effects like an adding machine and others make clicking noises. But, I’ve only found one that uses iOS gestures to activate the calculator’s functions. Sums Gesture Controlled Calculator uses multiple gestures to complete the math functions of the calculator. For example, if you want to add 2 and 2. You would enter 2 on the keypad on the screen, then swipe to…

Auto Memory Cleaner frees up your memory on autopilot. Here on MacSources.com, we have discussed the importance of cleaning your computer’s memory from time to time. When your computer starts to lag or act a little slower than usual, cleaning up your memory is usually the first thing you want to check. There are many ways to do this, but quite possibly the easiest method is to simply open Terminal and use the ‘purge’ command. This allows you to free up computer memory that isn’t being used without tying up additional memory with an application that does the same action.…

This week in tech news – prices are cut due to low sales, trade-ins are offered for upgrades and Apple is on a hiring spree. Microsoft Cuts Surface Prices Microsoft Corp. has decided to cut the price of its first tablet computer, the Surface RT, but as much as 30 percent as it struggles to capture customers in the tablet market. Since its debut in October, only 900,000 units of the Microsoft tablet have been sold. By comparison, the Apple iPad had over 14 million units sold in Q4 of 2012 alone. Best Buy Held an iPad Trade-in Event For…

Sky Guide is your iOS window to the universe. For quite some time, Starbucks has been giving free music away to loyal customers on Tuesdays. This music giveaway promotion started in store and Stabucks gradually moved the promotion over to their mobile app. Since its partnership has tightened with Apple and iTunes, now the app offers free app downloads on Tuesdays, too. I’ve used this nifty reward program for a while and have downloaded a few songs, but mostly ignored the option until apps were included. Now, I download an app nearly every week. This week’s app was Star Guide.…

Any Screen Record Pro allows users to selectively capture video. As someone with a video production/post-production background, I can say that I’ve used most methods to grab videos from all kinds of sources. I’ve converted video from DVD, VHS, DVC Pro, Mini-DV, Hi-8 and even Betacam. One thing that always seems to elude me is video screen capture. Mac actually includes a screen capture option within Quicktime now, but it captures video from the entire screen. It does not allow for selective video capture. Any Screen Record Pro for Mac does. Any Screen Record Pro is the a great resource…

This week in tech news – Apple celebrates App Store birthday, iOS 7 Beta update released, WebTV to shutdown and inventor of the computer mouse dies at age 88. WebTV to Shutdown September 30 Microsoft owned MSN TV, formerly known as WebTV, is to be shutdown on September 30th. The service was one of the first to connect TVs with the Internet. Microsoft acquired WebTV in 1997 for $425 million. This news comes as Apple increases its efforts with set-top boxes. Apple to Celebrate iTunes App Store Anniversary on July 10 The iTunes App Store is turning 5 on July…

Argus is the all-in-one health and fitness app for every one. I have many apps on my iPhone that track different aspects of health and fitness. I’ve been hoping that at some point I would find one app that tracks the same types of information so that I would not have to have multiple apps for health and fitness. It looks as though Argus may be that app. Argus is a one-stop health and fitness app that tracks every piece of a user’s activity. Some of the features include: Daily step counter and activity tracking Helps users create a food…

This Week in Tech News – Yahoo shuts down AltaVista, Google closes Reader, Apple files for iWatch Trademark and next iPhone may have LTE-advanced. Yahoo to shut down AltaVista Search engines have changed the way we find information. One of the first indexing search engines, AltaVista, is scheduled to be shutdown on July 8th. Yahoo acquired AltaVista in 2003 and anyone looking for AltaVista after the shutdown will be redirected to Yahoo’s main site. Google Closes Book on RSS Even though diehard fans were outraged, Google still discontinued Google RSS Feeds, its free Reader service. The reasoning behind the decision…

Shape Magic gives users three utilities in one. In this ‘everything is better as long as it’s faster’ world, menu bar utilities are among some of the most popular apps downloaded. They make us more productive and help us complete our normal daily computer tasks much quicker and easier. Most of my current menu bar utilities only feature one task. But, I recently acquired Shape Magic, which incorporates three utility functions – Internet searching, taking screenshots and hiding apps – into one app. Shape Magic is a menu bar utility that features three shapes – diamond, square and circle – that…