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Droplr, Mac App Store, and Sandboxing→

Droplr, Mac App Store, and Sandboxing

The developers of Droplr, a sharing utility for OS X, have announced that in order to release version 3.0 of their app on the Mac App Store, they will have to tweak the app’s “upload from Finder” functionality to comply with Apple’s rules.

The primary difference will be in the use of the global hotkey (opt+d by default) to share the currently selected item(s) in the Finder. The standalone version will continue to work as it always has, simply select something in the Finder, use the key combination, and that item will be uploaded to Droplr. For the Mac App Store version, when the key combination is triggered with the Finder active, instead of uploading the currently selected items, it will present you with an “open file” dialog where you’ll need to navigate to the item(s) you’d like to share and select them. We don’t believe this provides the best experience, but we do believe it’s an acceptable tradeoff to be able to remain in the Mac App Store, especially given many of our users don’t use the key combination as a primary method of sharing with Droplr.

This update from the Droplr team is particularly interesting as, back in May, speculation arose as to whether Apple would start rejecting any app with “global hotkey functionality” on June 1, when the company began enforcing its new Sandboxing policies for Mac App Store apps. As it turned out, the rumor didn’t specify which kind of apps would fall under Apple’s ban, but several third-party developers confirmed their applications carrying similar functionality went through Apple’s approval process.

However, it appears the “issue” with Droplr 3.0 and the Mac App Store is simply related to standard Sandboxing practices, not strictly hotkeys. It is safe to assume that, per Apple’s Sandboxing implementation, an app like Droplr can’t benefit from unrestricted access to the Finder to automatically upload a file in the background. Several developers I have contacted about this issue confirmed that it’s not a surprise Apple is requiring an Open dialog to access a file outside of the Sandbox, and that this would have been true even if Droplr wasn’t combining the feature with a global hotkey. So while a calendar app can show itself with a hotkey, or a todo app can display a systemwide quick-entry panel, Sandboxing requires an app that accesses files directly (like Droplr does) to go through an Open dialog.

Read Droplr’s blog post here, and our report from May on Mac App Store apps and global hotkey functionality here.

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Save Safari Tabs As A List in OmniFocus→

Save Safari Tabs As A List in OmniFocus

This is a nice tip to save the tabs of the frontmost Safari window as a list in OmniFocus (via Shawn Blanc). Through AppleScript, tabs are saved as webpage titles and URLs in a note in the OmniFocus inbox; the note is named with the “URL List from Safari Tabs” + timestamp format.

Using OmniFocus’ AppleScript Dictionary, you could modify the script to assign a specific context to the task for easy retrieval of your tab lists with Perspectives or OmniFocus’ own URLs. For the latter option, you can use Launch Center on iOS to quickly jump to OmniFocus projects and contexts; also keep in mind that any OmniFocus item (a task, a project, a context) has a unique ID that you can get using the “Copy as Link” option from the app’s contextual menu.

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Craig Federighi and Dan Riccio Promoted to Senior Vice Presidents→

Craig Federighi and Dan Riccio Promoted to Senior Vice Presidents

With a press release, Apple today announced that Craig Federighi, Vice President of Mac Software Engineering, and Dan Riccio, Vice President of Hardware Engineering, have joined the executive team of the company as Senior Vice Presidents. Both will report directly to CEO Tim Cook.

As senior vice president of Mac Software Engineering, Federighi will continue to be responsible for the development of Mac OS X and Apple’s common operating system engineering teams. Federighi worked at NeXT, followed by Apple, and then spent a decade at Ariba where he held several roles including vice president of Internet Services and chief technology officer. He returned to Apple in 2009 to lead Mac OS X engineering. Federighi holds a Master of Science degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.

Riccio, as senior vice president of Hardware Engineering, will lead the Mac, iPhone, iPad and iPod engineering teams. He has been instrumental in all of Apple’s iPad products since the first generation iPad. Riccio joined Apple in 1998 as vice president of Product Design and has been a key contributor to most of Apple’s hardware over his career. Dan earned a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 1986.

In the same press release, Apple has also announced that Bob Mansfield, who announced his retirement in June, will remain at Apple to “work on future products”, also reporting to Tim Cook.

In the past two years, Craig Federighi joined other members of Apple’s executive team on stage for product announcements and demoes. In June, Federighi appeared at Apple’s WWDC keynote in San Francisco to demonstrate the latest features of OS X Mountain Lion, released a month later.

Apple’s Leadership webpage has already been updated with the new profiles of SVPs Federighi and Riccio.

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Mat Honan: How Apple and Amazon Security Flaws Led to My Epic Hacking→

Mat Honan: How Apple and Amazon Security Flaws Led to My Epic Hacking

You may have heard about Mat Honan (Wired writer) being hacked last week, with his Twitter account being compromised and the hackers using iCloud to remote wipe his iPhone, iPad and Mac. Today he’s written up a detailed article on Wired that goes through how exactly the hackers got access to it all. The scary thing is that it wasn’t done by brute force, but rather by using social engineering to trick Apple and Amazon support staff.

But what happened to me exposes vital security flaws in several customer service systems, most notably Apple’s and Amazon’s. Apple tech support gave the hackers access to my iCloud account. Amazon tech support gave them the ability to see a piece of information — a partial credit card number — that Apple used to release information. In short, the very four digits that Amazon considers unimportant enough to display in the clear on the web are precisely the same ones that Apple considers secure enough to perform identity verification. The disconnect exposes flaws in data management policies endemic to the entire technology industry, and points to a looming nightmare as we enter the era of cloud computing and connected devices.

It’s undoubtedly a scary story about the perils of putting our entire lives in the hands of a cloud service - because more so than ever, physical access isn’t needed to wreak havoc. It’s also a friendly reminder to ensure you’re using strong passwords, isolating critical accounts and creating local backups wherever feasible as a last resort if indeed this or something similar does happen to you.

My experience leads me to believe that cloud-based systems need fundamentally different security measures. Password-based security mechanisms — which can be cracked, reset, and socially engineered — no longer suffice in the era of cloud computing.

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Apple Removes Native YouTube App From iOS Beta→

Apple Removes Native YouTube App From iOS Beta

The Next Web has an excellent round up of today’s news that the native iOS YouTube app will likely be removed from the upcoming iOS 6 operating system which was reported by both Macrumors and 9to5Mac. The article includes the expected generic PR response from Google and a few more details from Apple they obtained in a statement issued to The Verge.

Panzarino makes some excellent conclusions on why this change was not only inevitable, but beneficial for both companies. I won’t spoil the entire article because it is definitely worth the read however he makes one point specifically that matched my first thought when I heard the news:

Remember, though, that Google’s YouTube app will likely be at a disadvantage to Apple’s native one. The hooks that normally direct a user out to the app will now simply play in Mobile Safari, rather than bumping people out to the app.

There will be tradeoffs to an App Store specific version of YouTube made by Google and many of those tradeoffs will effect us as users. The app will likely see more frequent updates that reflect the growing features of the website, however now they are at the mercy of Apple’s rigorous approval process. Other changes, as Panzarino mentioned, include the fact that users will be redirected to Mobile Safari instead of the official app, much like the experience of clicking links for Twitter. This will likely be a negative for most users however I don’t think I will personally mind the change in which app opens to play the video. I enjoy the Mobile Safari experience and with HTML5 progressing so far, there are fewer downsides to the YouTube web app experience. I am far from a YouTube power user and find myself enjoying other services more, e.g. Vimeo.

This could change again before the final release of iOS 6, however for the reasons Panzarino mentioned, I feel this change is permanent. Nevertheless, the native YouTube app is in good hands being developed by Google. I feel Google proved they can ship a polished, native iOS app in their recent release of Chrome for iOS and I look forward to the direction they take their mobile video offerings. Perhaps they can even woo me away from my aforementioned preferred service Vimeo if they don’t flood mobile users with too many advertisements.

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CandyBar Goes Free, Heads To The Iconfactory→

CandyBar Goes Free, Heads To The Iconfactory

Panic has announced popular Mac customization utility CandyBar has gone free and unsupported due to system changes in Mountain Lion (namely, code signing). The app will also head to The Iconfactory, where it “may turn into something new”.

Since we’re unsure about the long-term future of changing system icons, we’re not comfortable charging money for CandyBar, and we’re also not comfortable simply making it disappear, instead we’re going to make the current CandyBar free — but unsupported.

And here’s from The Iconfactory blog:

We and our good friends over at Panic have taken a hard look at the future of desktop icons on the Mac and unfortunately, the writing is on the wall. There may come a time, very soon in fact, when it won’t be possible to customize any system level icon on the desktop except perhaps folders. Apple’s push to sandbox applications, the addition of signed apps and the increasing unification of OS X and iOS mean CandyBar’s days (in its current form) are numbered.

First launched back in 2007, the ease of use of CandyBar spurred the proliferation of websites and communities aimed at showcasing icon and UI replacements for OS X, such as MacThemes and IconPaper. In an interview with MacThemes from 2008 (via Shawn Blanc), Panic’s Cabel Sasser said:

The innovation, the elegance, the lack of focus testing, the general feeling that people care about the end product, it makes us want to keep doing what we do. It’s a feedback loop of inspiration.

Goodbye, CandyBar. You’ve been a trusted companion and served us well in moments of deep crisis.

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Firemonkeys Announce Real Racing 3, Coming Later This Year→

Firemonkeys Announce Real Racing 3, Coming Later This Year

Jordan Golson of MacRumors writes,

Firemonkeys, the new combined studio from EA combining the IronMonkey and Firemint gaming studios, has announced the development of Real Racing 3 for iPhone and iPad.

[…]

Real Racing 3 will be the first game in the franchise to have real racecourses and will allow 22 cars to race simultaneously. No system requirements have been released yet.

Announced on Twitter and shown off on the Real Racing Facebook page, Real Racing 3 almost looks like it could be a current gen console game. And that says a lot, especially when there’s a disclaimer noting that it’s pre-alpha footage. Real Racing has always excited fans by pushing the limits on iOS and by making good use of AirPlay on the Apple TV by allowing players to use their iOS devices as controllers while the race takes place on the big screen. Not to disappoint, catch the trailer on Facebook and look forward to Real Racing’s 3rd installment later this year.

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Evernote Adds Account Switching→

Evernote Adds Account Switching

Evernote account switcher

Evernote account switcher

From the Evernote blog:

As a Premium user, you’ll be able to switch between one Free account and as many Premium accounts as you like. Whenever you switch from one account to another, the Evernote app screen reloads and displays the other account with all the notes that had synched the last time you viewed it. There’s even a keyboard shortcut CMD+CTRL+A to quickly switch accounts.

After the first time you sign in, Evernote won’t ask you to enter the password again. I’ve just tested it with my two Evernote accounts, and it works as advertised.

Not only is this useful for classrooms and families (where it’s more likely multiple accounts are being used), I also think this is a convenient option for people that use Evernote with IFTTT. Until today, I have used IFTTT to build an archive of all my tweets in Evernote. Links to over 6500 tweets weigh only 1.6 MB in Evernote. With this new option, I can log Twitter (and other social) updates to a separate account, easily switching back and forth my personal and “archiving-only” accounts with two clicks.

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