Upgrade to iLife '08



All this site (other than this page which currently uses iBlog 1.0) is created using iWeb part of the apple iLife suite. After 18 months, the update to iLife was announced by the real Steve Jobs on Tuesday. Fortunately this occurred after meeting Lutz in DC so we picked up a copy on the way back to the boat (not bad value - $100 for a family pack we can install on 3 computers) and installed it. The only applications I have used, iPhoto and iWeb have had some pretty neat upgrades.

iPhoto has greatly improved the ease of picture management, replacing film rolls with events and has much better image correction tools. It has also introduced a way of directly hosting images on the web with an interesting user interface (mimicking the events display) that also allows image uploading via email and the iPhone. Click here to see a couple of my albums displayed this way. Unfortunately it doesn't allow the addition of any comment text for albums or copyright info so, for now, I am still publishing pictures via iWeb.

iWeb on the surface didn't appear to have many new features, however they have greatly improved the handling of large sites such as this. Startup time is now under 5 seconds (a great improvement) and it no longer starts from scratch when uploads fail (which was a very frustrating problem on many Central American internet links). The page layouts are now more flexible which has allowed me to improve the layout of all the photo albums I have published (increasing the size and page area used for the photos) and there are now options for commenting on any photos and downloading decent resolution versions of the pictures. Try any of the photo albums (click on a photo and the "Play Slideshow" link to see the new options). The other enhancements are pretty minor and include the ability to add google maps to pages or blog entries like this (though you have to be online to do this - tricky on a boat). Of course the URLs of just about every page changed so lots of manual relinking to do from this page (I think I will migrate from iBlog to iWeb for this page in the next month or so to get round that problem).

I also bought a copy of iWork '08 (the first time I have tried it). This is their office suite and again only cost $100 for 3 computers (my macbook, Ruth's macbook and the imac back in the condo) - a lot cheaper than office. So far I have only tried the spreadsheet 'numbers' and it is pretty impressive for a version 1.0. It is missing some functions I like in Excel (external cell referencing formulae for conditional formating and some table functions etc), however it's structure using a number of distinct tables on a worksheet instead of a giant grid is a much better way to go..... (not that I need much in the way of complex spreadsheets these days - the provisioning list is pretty simple!).

Back to the boat..... I have just removed and re-bedded 3 stanchions in an attempt to stop a water leak and have started the process of recaulking much of the teak deck (it is getting soft in patches) - this will be a horrible job. It is Ruth's 25th high school reunion this afternoon which is an excuse to down tools.



Posted: Sat - August 11, 2007 at 09:06 AM          

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