Fresh rumors of a 7-inch iPad model have begun circulating, this time a new report on AppleInsider claims that a 7″ iPad model is in the works and will be released in the first quarter of 2011.

Citing component suppliers in Taiwan, the new 7-inch iPad is expected to have a retina display, camera, 128GB of storage capacity, and a micro-USB port.

The report says the upcoming 7-inch model will sit alongside the existing 9.7″ iPad that has become a runaway success for Apple.

Other reports about the supposed 7-inch iPad indicate the device will more closely resemble the iPhone 4 in appearance than the existing iPad, perhaps referring to the case design.

Updated on 11/23/2010: Civilization 5 for Mac has been released by Aspyr. You can order Sid Meier’s Civilization 5 for Mac on Amazon and it will ship for free.

You can also watch a Mac version video trailer, and we’ve been given a Civ 5 for Mac release date of November 23!

The wildly popular Civilization 5 is coming to the Mac sooner than later, according to a report on MacRumors.com.

We’ve received reliable word that Civilization V for the Mac is due very soon — likely in the coming weeks.

The coming weeks would be very wise, shipping Civilization 5 by the holiday season would surely boost Mac sales considerably.

I’m happy to see that Mac gaming is finally getting some serious attention, as MacRumors notes. In case you didn’t notice I’m a sucker for strategy games (Starcraft 2 anyone?), so bringing Civ 5 to the Mac is really exciting news to me.

Earlier this year, Civilization for iPhone was made available for free. If you’re a Civ addict it’s a worthwhile purchase too especially considering now it only costs $1.

If you’ve downloaded something from Adobe recently you may have unintentionally installed Akamai Download Manager. Akamai is a helpful content delivery network (at least for the web), but for whatever reason the Akamai Download Manager that is used and packaged with Adobe software often goes haywire on a Mac with usage spikes and random internet connection attempts that can really slow things down.

You can typically identify this by looking in the Console log for things like:
9/30/10 6:24:03 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50186 (com.akamai.client.plist) Throttling respawn: Will start in 10 seconds
9/30/10 6:24:13 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50186 (com.akamai.client.plist12013) Bug: launchd_core_logic.c:4103 (23932):13
9/30/10 6:24:13 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50186 (com.akamai.client.plist12013) posix_spawn("/Applications/Akamai/loader.pl", ...): No such file or directory
9/30/10 6:24:13 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50186 (com.akamai.client.plist12013) Exited with exit code: 1

The simplest way to stop Akamai Download Manager and anything labeled as ‘com.akamai.client.plist’ in your Console logs is to remove the plist file and application. The application can be installed in different places, so try running this command in the Terminal first: Read more »

You can easily prepend text to a file from the command line by using the following command syntax:

cat file.txt | pbcopy && echo "Text to prepend" > file.txt && pbpaste >> file.txt

In this case, the file to have text prepended to is ‘file.txt’, replace that with your own document. You may wish to use a backup of the file as you test this out until you understand how it works.

The above command uses cat to dump the file, pbcopy to copy that, then an echo’ed block of text to paste into the file, making hefty use of the pbcopy and pbpaste commands – you may recognize them as the command line front to the Mac OS X clipboard.

Read more »

Want access to 3,900 classic audiobooks on your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad for free? Then you’ll want to get this cool free app called, appropriately, Audiobooks. The app allows you to download audiobooks for offline playback and listen to them whenever you want.

Read more »

Remember the patent news of an iMac Touch and Macbook Touch? How about the Apple job posting that referred to a revolutionary feature in Mac OS X 10.7? Is it possible all of these things are tied to each other?

The same site that dug up the first two patents has uncovered another interesting Apple patent, this one referring to a “Virtual Input Device Application” that, well, basically creates a virtual input device on a touch screen.

The technology will somehow allow you to project an input device into the display of the unit that could then be used instead of the physical input device. For instance, a physical touchpad could be created virtually on your display and then used as you would your physical trackpad.

This virtual input would apparently work in either 2d or 3d representations, and could shift from a two-dimensional to a three-dimensional object based on user input. A more simple version of a ‘virtual input device’ could be something like the iPhone and iPad keyboard, which appears as a virtual keyboard and is activated through touch response.

So what does this have to do with Mac OS X 10.7 and cloud computing?
Read more »

If you’ve ever dropped your iPhone or spilled a drink on an iPad you probably realized a little too late that getting these expensive devices insured is a good idea. There’s a lot of confusion as to what’s the best way to go about insuring expensive gadgets though, and there’s a million third party warranties and insurance plans out there that range from $100-$200/year that will cover the iPhone, iPad, your MacBook, etc.

Before you jump into any particular service though, check out something called a “personal articles floater” policy:

you can insure these types of items [iPhone, iPad] on a mini insurance policy known as an inland marine policy, or more commonly, a “personal articles floater”, and the cost is pennies on the dollar

I’d never heard of this until one of our readers sent us this link from an insurance industry blog that recommends the policy.

Apparently a personal articles policy can cover nearly anything, and often cost as little as $15-$20 per year. The other great part? There is usually no deductible, and they cover against any kind of loss: theft, damage, loss, you name it.

I imagine you just contact your general home owners or renters insurance agent to discuss adding this type of policy, and I must say this seems like good advice for not just your iPad and iPhone, but maybe your iMac, MacBook, and other expensive gadgets as well.

You can watch what a process is doing with your filesystem by using the opensnoop command. To try this out, launch the Terminal and then follow along to learn how to watch by applications, file usage, process ID, and more.

Read more »

Mistakes happen, and there are few mistakes more devastating to a geek than one that damages or destroys your favorite gadgets and computer hardware. So, how would you feel if you set your iPad on top of your car, and drove off on the freeway forgetting it’s up there? Pretty awful right?

This is the case of Chris Ainsworth, he set his iPad on the roof of his car and proceeded to drive 70 MPH down a freeway before hearing a thump and realizing that he forgot his iPad on the roof of his car… he turned around to recover the device, expecting the worst, and what happened next is remarkable:

I opened the case up. The screen was completely intact: no cracks, no shatter. It didn’t pop out of the aluminum housing. I took the iPad out of the DODOcase for inspection: not one scratch. Nothing. No dings. No scrapes. No bumps. No bends.

The iPad completely survives. Damage free. Now, it’s very important to note that the iPad was inside the third party DODOcase, which has an internal bamboo wood frame and it surely helped the iPad live through the incident trouble free. Here’s a picture of the DODOcase, which came out of the crash remarkably intact itself with just a few scuffs and a couple cracks in the wood:
Read more »

Have you ever wanted to work at an Apple Store? Do you wonder how much you’ll get paid? Here are the average salaries and hourly wages for Apple Genius, Apple Specialist, and Apple Concierge positions inside the Apple Store. These are self reported numbers so they should be considered pretty accurate.

Apple Specialist Pay

The Apple Specialist position pays on average $11.64/hour, with the pay rate ranging from $9 to $16, likely depending on location and overall experience. This data is from 334 salaries reported to GlassDoor.com:

From my research, it does not look like Apple Specialist positions pay a flat salary, although it does appear that they are eligible for standard benefits through Apple if they work over a certain number of hours a week (likely 40, but this is unknown).

Apple Genius Salary & Pay

Other than Apple Store Managers, the Apple Genius is probably the highest paying position at an Apple Store. Here’s the scale of how the Genius position pays: Read more »

Here’s your daily bad idea: shooting an iPad with a shotgun. Leave it to the internet for someone to shoot an iPad and record a video of the carnage. Interesting video in that ‘Myth Busters’ kind of way, but man, what a waste.

You can play any song or audio file directly from within the Quick Look windows of Mac OS X, and that means music can be played from Finder as well as Open and Save dialogs, or anywhere else you can use the Quick Look function.

Read more »

The battle for the mobile landscape is about to heat up: Microsoft is expected to barge right into direct competition with Apple and Google with the release of Windows Phone 7. Invitations sent out indicate that Microsoft will hold a launch event on October 11. The event will give attendees an insider look at Windows Phone 7 and provide a hands-on demonstration of the new devices that will go head to head with Apple’s iPhone.

Early videos of Microsoft’s new mobile OS seem intriguing and reveal a gesture and touch based interface with a rather unique look. With that aside, could they have picked a better name? iOS and Android at least sound modern and hip, but Windows Phone 7? Doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue with much enthusiasm.

Earlier in the year it was revealed that Microsoft was paying mobile app developers to create for Windows Phone 7, which is just part of what is expected to be a massive push to grow Windows Phone 7 into a viable alternative to iOS and Android OS.

AppleInsider comically notes that the stakes are high for the Windows Phone 7 because loss of the companies mobile market share “had affected Steve Ballmer’s end of year performance bonus.” All jokes aside, it is indeed a high stakes game; more and more personal computing is being moved away from the desktop and into mobile devices, if Microsoft fails here it could spell bigger trouble for the companies long term prospects in an increasingly mobile world.

Buying an iPad just got easier, and in many cases cheaper. Amazon is now offering the iPad for sale directly through their website, and includes free shipping in the purchase. It’s also worth noting that if you purchase through Amazon, they do not add many local and sales taxes.*

Amazon currently offers the 32GB and 64GB Wi-Fi models, priced at $599 and $699 with free shipping. It is expected for the other iPad versions to be available soon.

The iPad was previously only available through resellers on the Amazon website, which often marked up the price beyond the MSRP. The expansion of the iPad onto the Amazon storefront is part of Apple’s continued retail expansion of the device, which also includes Best Buy and Target. Fresh rumors suggest that the iPad may even be available at Walmart stores soon, possibly in time for the upcoming holiday sales season.

*Note: in some states you are required to manually report online purchases for taxation. Be sure to know your local tax laws regarding online purchases.

Mac users can quickly get the bitrate of any MP3, m4a, or other audio file from the command line of Mac OS X.

Read more »

This is a really great terminal command that compresses every file within a directory, turning them into a zip archive. We’ll offer two variants of it; one that removes the original source file and leaves only the compressed files, and another command that leaves the uncompressed source files intact. This has been tested and works in Mac OS X and Linux.

Read more »

If you want to mass upload a ton of pictures to Facebook from your Mac, using the Facebook built-in photo uploader tool can be annoying. Another solution is to use Mac OS X’s highly customizable Services feature and download the Facebook Services automation scripts, which then allow you to select any number of pictures from your Mac desktop and upload them directly to Facebook via the Finder’s Services menu.

Read more »

The big mystery of when iLife ’11 will be released just may have been solved. An iLife ’11 book has been discovered on the UK Amazon store that lists its ship date as November of this year, which would be a fitting time to release the iLife ’11 software package as well since selling a book about software that doesn’t exist makes little sense.

The book is actually written in German, but the translation from 9to5mac reads as follows: “iPhoto, iMovie and more with apps for Mac, iPhone 4, iPod and iPad.”

An additional item on the Amazon UK store shows an iMovie ’11 guide that lists iDVD as part of the new iMovie app, this is interesting because iDVD has been assumed to have been abandoned by Apple.

The release date of iLife ’11 has been speculated at several times this year, with most of the claims surrounding earlier this summer. It even briefly appeared on the Amazon bestselling Mac software list before disappearing from the Amazon US site. A November release date makes sense if the new software is to be included in the holiday shopping season.

The desktop software package currently rests at iLife ’09, which was released in January of 2009, and has not been updated since. Rather amusingly, if you do an Amazon search for iLife ’11 your top result will currently be iLife 1.1, which was released in 2003.