Month: September 2008

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Dropbox drops out of private beta: Linux client, iPhone web interface, pricing plans

I wrote an overview of Dropbox back in April when I first managed to get an invite to the private beta. Ever since then it’s been a permanent install on my laptop and my desktop machines due to it’s simple yet powerful functionality.

Dropbox launches to the public!

The good news is that it’s finally out of private beta and anyone can sign up to try it out, you can download it and / or watch the demo video at www.getdropbox.com. It’s still in beta but at least now you can register to try it without needing to be invited first.

Linux geeks get some love

As promised Linux users now have a version of the dropbox client too. This makes Dropbox a truly cross-platform backup system, so regardless of whether you are Mac, PC or Linux then you can make use of Dropbox. As ever with Linux you’ll need to check out whether it will work with your preferred Linux distro but Ubuntu and Fedora 9 are supported with users of Gentoo, OpenSUSE and Debian managing to get it running. Full info is available from the Linux Dropbox download page.

iPhone optimised web interface

There’s also an iPhone optimised web interface available if you access it via your iPhone or iPod Touch. It’s a nice little addition that makes taking a look at your file storage whilst out and about even easier.

Dropbox pricing announced

The Dropbox blog gives some indication of how much they will charge once they finally go live with a paid-for service. As you’d expect from the people who’ve made backup via Amazon’s S3 storage infrastructure incredibly easy to use there’s going to be very simple but attractive pricing. A 50GB Dropbox will cost $9.99 per month or $99.99 per year. Sounds like a great deal to me!

Update:

Randsinrepose has a great post that sums up why Dropbox is awesome, "Dumbing down the cloud".

Show Suburbia some Dropbox love by following this link to sign up at www.getdropbox.com – I’ll get a bit of extra storage space and so will you!

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Top ten useful Quick Look plugins for Mac OSX 10.5

One of the best new features that OSX 10.5 Leopard introduced was Quick Look. As the name suggests it lets you take a ‘quick look’ at the contents of a file without having to open up the actual software application.

Quick Look supports plugins so third-party developers can create Quick Look plugins of their own to give access to many other file formats. I’ve found Quick Look to be such an intuitive tool to use as well as incredibly time saving due to not having to wait for Microsoft Word open up just to check the contents of a Word document. A great boost for productivity!

Here, in no particular order, are 10 of the most useful Quick Look plugins that I’ve found. Please note, some of these require payment for full use:

BetterZip

Allows you to preview ZIP, TAR, GZip, BZip2, ARJ, LZH, ISO, CHM, CAB, CPIO, RAR, 7-Zip, DEB, RPM, StuffIt’s SIT, DiskDoubler, BinHex, and MacBinary files.

→ http://macitbetter.com/BetterZipQL-1.0

HD Quick Look

HD Quick Look lets you view the first frame of your AVCHD files. You can also view multiple files as a slide show, as an index sheet or full screen.

This is a really handy plugin for those working with AVCHD video and a perfect companion to Shedworx excellent VoltaicHD application for converting AVCHD footage!

→ http://www.shedworx.com/

Suspicious Package

It allows you to preview the contents of a standard Apple installer package without launching the Installer. Great for checking for any unwanted additional bits of software that sometimes companies like to add!

→ http://www.mothersruin.com/software/SuspiciousPackage/download.html

AppleScript

Gives a preview of AppleScript files.

→ http://www.kainjow.com/?p=77

FLV

Allows you to view Flash video files, please note that it requires installation of the Perian Quicktime plugin to make it work.

→ http://homepage.mac.com/xdd/software/flv/

EPS

Allows you to view EPS files.

→ http://www.eternalstorms.at/utilities/epsqlplg/index.html

Folder View

Allows you to see the contents of a folder.

→ http://homepage.mac.com/xdd/software/folder/

ColorXML

Enables display of XML files with indentation and XML syntax coloring.

→ http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/26194/colorxml-quicklook

SneakPeek Pro

Allows you to preview Illustrator, InDesign and EPS documents in the Finder, dialog boxes and other applications. SneakPeek Pro also allows you to see fonts, images and colors used in many CS3 documents.

It works with Illustrator files even if not saved with PDF compatibility. $19.95 but worth every cent if you’re a frequent Illustrator or InDesign user!

→ http://www.code-line.com/software/sneakpeekpro.html

GLColorCode

Adds enhanced source code colouring for various programming languages such as PHP, Actionscript, Objective-C etc.

→ http://code.google.com/p/qlcolorcode/

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Adobe unveil Creative Suite 4 on 23/09, AIR for Linux, Flash Player 10 Release candidate

Adobe will be unveiling the next version of their Creative Suite software on the 23rd of September. This will be done via a special web broadcast, you can sign up for email notification via the following webpage – http://adobe.istreamplanet.com.

Details of any new features have not been revealed but Adobe did release public beta versions of Dreamweaver CS4, Fireworks CS4 and Soundbooth on the Adobe Labs website a few months ago.

Adobe AIR for Linux beta released on Adobe Labs

Support for the Linux operating system has been increasing from Adobe with continual improvements to the Linux version of the Flash Player plugin. Now Adobe have fulfilled their promise of full cross-platform support for their AIR runtime with the release of Adobe AIR for Linux beta.

Flash Player 10 release candidate on Adobe Labs

A new release candidate of Flash Player 10 was released on Adobe Labs. If you haven’t already checked it out then there’s quite a few new features such as 3D Effects, a new text engine, enhanced drawing API, GPU support and enhanced sound APIs to name a few.

Once you’ve downloaded it then go an check out the Feature demonstrations page to get a taste of these new features.

One thing to keep in mind though, if you a frequently upload images and video to sites such as Flickr, Vimeo and even Adobe’s own Photoshop Express web apps then you’ll want to avoid this version of the Flash Player just now as there’s still a ‘bug’ which affects the uploaders for these sites. It seems to be a hotly debated issue just now but it appears that Flash Player 10 stops these kinds of image uploaders from working due to a new security restriction. You can catch some of the discussion on this Flash Player thread.

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Singularity Conference gets ‘head’ed off at the pass

If you’re a web developer / designer or into the web in anyway then you’re going to want to check out the <head> web conference that takes place October 24-26, 2008. <head> is a bit different than your regular conference, The conference website describes it like so:

The premise for <head> is simple: instead of making you come to the web conference, let’s make the web conference come to you.

<head> is a web conference with all of the traditional elements. We have live speakers, presentations, question and answer sections, and networking opportunities. The twist is that the conference takes place everywhere – all over the world – and at real-world gatherings called local conference hubs.

And we use the Internet to tie it all together.

Now, you might be thinking “That sounds cool, but wasn’t someone already running a conference like that?”. If you were thinking that then don’t worry, you’re not going daft! <head> is actually the new name for the conference. The conference was formerly known as Singularity but due to an objection from a company that holds a trademark for the word Singularity relating to conferences the lead organiser, Aral Balkan, had no choice but to change the name!

Anyway, go over and check out the website to find out more about the conference. There’s an early bird ticket price of just $99 if you book soon!

Update 22 Aug 2017: The above is an old post and the conference is past now.

http://www.headconf.org