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FINALLY, I can talk about the coolest input device I’ve seen in quite a while – Apple’s Mighty Mouse.

This is a multi-button mouse done right, folks – from the no-button buttons (it senses pressure on the smooth shell, eliminating the need for separate buttons), to the scroll ball (how obvious an enhancement is that?), to the programmable functions which are possible for each button press (including a simple mode, where each button simple provides a single click).

Oh, and just to show the attention to detail: It does NOT make physical sounds when you click or scroll – it actually has a speaker embedded in the mouse, to provide audible feedback for these actions. Wow.

Check it out. IMHO, this is the mouse by which all others will soon be judged. It doesn’t matter that Apple held off on embracing more than one mouse button – because when they finally did, they did it right.

The TactaPad is billed as “a tactile, immersive, two-handed input device”. But that doesn’t come close to indicating just how creative – and yet incredible obvious and logical – this thing is. It contains a camera for tracking the motion of both of your hands over essentially a force-feedback touchpad.

I can’t really describe just how intriguing this approach is – you need to watch the movie for yourself.

Since we’ve encountered several movies lately featuring The Incredibles, Spider-Man, Batman, the Fantastic Four, and even an upcoming new take on Superman, I thought this tongue-in-cheek “Where are they now?” interview was rather funny.

Note especially all those who were interviewed – including the leader of The World’s Most Dangerous Band The CBS Orchestra ;-)

You know that Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper ad with the incredibly-catchy, goofy music?

Well, as I was discussing with friends recently, it’s based on what some consider to be the best Muppet Show skit ever – that of “Mahna-Mahna and the two Snowths” (their name is a combination of “Snout” and “Mouth” – so they should really be “Snouths”). See that page for more details, and the full lyrics.

And, I’ve found links to a video of the original skit, as well as a slightly-different audio file – which is even funnier, IMHO, due to the extended Waldorf & Statler commentary. (And, as an aside, here’s the rough opposite of that commentary, as well ;-)

WARNING: Watch/listen to this song, and it will be stuck in your head for quite some time…

And note: Each attempt I’ve made to verify my belief that “If you merely say ‘mahna-mahna’ to anyone who grew up in the ’70s, they will immediately respond with ‘do-doo-de-do-do’” has worked out perfectly. Thanks for validating this, folks!

(As far as my term “earbug” – see this story)

Yep, the rumors are true: Steve Jobs announced at today’s WorldWide Developer Conference (WWDC) keynote that Apple will be transitioning the entire family of Macintosh computers to the Intel platform within the next 2 years. See the press release: Apple to Use Intel Microprocessors Beginning in 2006.

I can’t speak to any facet of this transition except that it certainly takes guts to announce it – and that it is certainly logical to do so at a Developer gathering. After all, it will be those Mac OS X developers who will either make or break this transition. Mac developers are the most creative, loyal, and demanding software engineers out there – and I hope that they see this move as one which will allow even more exposure to their products, and an even larger potential customer base.

We’ve known that Darwin has been running on the x86 platform all along – but although I “knew” some inside information, it was certainly surprising to see a full-fledged implementation of Mac OS X – including calculation-intensive programs, the full GUI, etc. – operating on a Pentium 4-based system. A nicely-done demo – and it was certainly a coup to get Intel’s new CEO up on stage to discuss details, as well.

Note a reference from 3 years ago, which appears to be quite appropos, right about now: Apple Keeps x86 Torch Lit with ‘Marklar’

Also: Note that Microsoft will be rolling out LongwaitLonghorn around the same time as these IntelliMacs begin to hit the scene. This could prove to be a great bit of serendipity – or a horrible roaring beast, which may drown out any other announcements or attention which Apple might be hoping for.

Mark my words: We’ve seen the start of a HUGE change in our beloved platform today. I’m hoping for the best, but preparing for some rocky roads ahead. Will users continue to buy Mac hardware (Apple’s bread-and-butter, high-margin products) now, or hold off to see how the move plays out. We’ll see…

(Aside: The worst part, as a ex-Apple,now-Intel friend just reminded me, we may have to hear that damn “Intel Inside” chime in Apple hardware ads soon. I hate that sound byte… )

UPDATE: I found at least one very optimistic take on the matter. Sounds good to me, if it comes to pass…

OK, Star Wars: Episode III has been out for a while, so I don’t think I’ll be giving too much away to say that the movie sucked.

No – I’m not going to go into details; waste your own money and find out for yourself. I will mention a great little tongue-in-cheek article regarding continuity, though, which I thought was entertaining: Metaphilm -Star Wars

Alas, many of the concerns which the author had were not resolved – and those that were, were done so in such an amateurish way. I really think George Lucas has gone off the deep end – he had so many opportunities for doing something great with the prequels, and appears to have sold out any creative vision he had, merely to make a fast buck in “kid-friendly” (pronounced: “Dumbed down to the average comprehension level of a 5-year-old”) storylines, as well as Attention-Deficit-Disorder-friendly visuals.

At least the “Star Wars” franchise is finally OVER (I hope, I hope, I hope…), and we should be able to get those overly-adamant Star Wars geeks (and Lucas apologists) to shut up, already.

One of the coolest features of Mac OS X is the built-in support for robust graphic image manipulation – the 2-dimensional display routines are referred to as the “Quartz” graphic subsystem.

And, with Tiger, this type of manipulation is being shown off quite well with the new “Quartz Composer” application – which allows you to do all sorts of cool things. To get an idea of just what types of things you can do with this type of power, check out the samples of these manipulations on the Futurismo Zugakousaku page (no, I have no idea what that is supposed to mean).

None of these are pre-rendered; everything shown can be done on-the-fly. Those sample movies there are abso-tively, posi-lutely incredible, IMHO. Mac OS X rocks, and these are just a few of the many reasons why.

For those of you who may not have seen it yet, a collection of folks in Alaska created a 152 foot high “ice tower” via the use of a well, a water pump, and an interesting collection of spray nozzles. It finally fell this week, after a 5-month creation period. Think of it as slowly building a HUGE inverted icicle, via some very creative engineering.

See one particularly great picture of the aptly-named “Ghost Raven” structure – as well as a view from underneath, with over 2000 icicles pointing down.

But, be sure to read the full story of its creation – including a multi-page journal of pictures at each stage of development – at the following location:

  http://www.alaskaalpineclub.org/IceWall/04-05IceWall1.html

The creation/destruction story is a very entertaining read (note the author’s first attempts to shoot an improvised crossbow bolt over the top, to provide a climbing rope ;-), and goes to show that some folks have waaaay too much time on their hands. Some of the shots of the hundreds of icicles which developed on the overhanging areas (see page 4) were gorgeous.

Apparently, it gets freakin’ COLD in Anchorage…

UPDATE: A friend let me know about a very cool (pun intended ;-) related story, that of the (apparently annual) “Harbin Ice and Snow World” festival, in the northernmost province in China. Find some great pictures here:

  http://www.rtoddking.com/chinawin2003_hb_if.htm

Apparently, the snow festival is mostly a display of art; the ice festival is mostly a display of architecture.  Note that the above link is for 2003; the creator also has some updated pictures from 2005. Absolutely incredible…

Here’s a follow-up link regarding the Duke iPod initiative (see my earlier blog post regarding it), and how it’s being perceived, as well as what the expectations are going forward:

  http://www.chronicle.duke.edu/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/02/28/42230159a01ba

In all, there are still several questions regarding the project’s impact, and whether it really was a good use of the $500,000 set aside for the plan. But, from what I’ve read here and elsewhere, it boils down to how openly the faculty embraces the use of new technologies such as this in their curriculum: Not only do the students in those classes which take advantage of the iPod in their classwork appreciate having the tools available, but the teachers are actually able to “Teach Different™“, and go far beyond what a traditional paper-and-pencil curriculum would have allowed.

Yes, these were handed out to 18-year-olds, who were probably primarily interested in the “cool factor” of the product. But, the more focus that is placed on the learning technology aspects of that gift, the better chance that these students will learn to embrace it as much more than the latest must-have gadget, and see that it can provide them with many capabilities which they can capitalize on to advance their studies beyond their upper-class peers.

Here’s to hoping there is enough positive impact shown by the program to continue it next year. And, as an aside to the folks at Duke OIT: I’m available to help this August, as well ;-)

Alright, so I loved the announcement of the new PowerBooks. But, since I’m already using an older-model 17″ Aluminum PowerBook, this update – bringing with it faster processors, better graphics, a faster SuperDrive, etc. – wasn’t really that significant to me.

The only thing I was interested in, however, was the new “scrolling trackpad“, which sounded like it would be quite useful. After all, when I’m away from my scrollwheel mouse, I certainly miss the capability of being able to scroll a window without moving the cursor around and clicking on the scroll arrows.

But then I saw the following article regarding how to enable this feature on existing PowerBooks (and iBooks):

  http://www-users.kawo2.rwth-aachen.de/~razzfazz/

Sure enough: I downloaded the .kext, unloaded my existing “AppleADBMouse.kext” (why in the world is Apple re-using Apple Desktop Bus drivers for new products?), then loaded the new one, and I can now take advantage of two-finger scrolling using just the trackpad! Woo-hoo! It works for scrolling left-to-right and top-to-bottom, as well as simply scrolling a page around within a window – a feature of Internet Explorer (via the Cmd key), which is sorely lacking in Safari, by the way.

Be sure to backup your old .kext first, Your Mileage May Vary™, Void Where Prohibited™, and all that jazz – but hey, It Worked for Me™! ;-)

I love the internet.

UPDATE: A bit more information from the author of SideTrack (another alternative trackpad driver) regarding the details – including how the new PowerBooks apparently do not use “ADB” trackpads – here:

  http://www.ragingmenace.com/index.html