Apple

Apple’s Hardware Improvements in the Life Sciences Industry

The research firm IDC Health Insights surveyed 100 of the most popular life science companies to contrive its Q1 Leading Indicators in Life Science IT Spending Survey and reached to the following conclusion: Apple’s hardware is placed second on the top of the life science companies preferences for 2012.

Apple moves into the second place for the first time and scores the greatest improvement in the hardware category. More than 30 percent of the participant companies are planning to purchase their hardware from Apple.

Meanwhile, Dell is proudly holding the lead as the most preferred hardware vendor; 45 percent of life science companies chose Dell as their hardware provider. This way, the company comes into the first place for the 6th year in a row.

In this top of preferences, Apple is followed by Cisco, HP, Intel, EMC and IBM.

Apple experienced considerable improvements also in the software area, along with SAP and SAS. It did not reach the first place, as Oracle is the leader on the software market, with more than 25 percent of the life science companies planning to spend money on Oracle in 2012.

Source: TNW via IDC

Mac, News/Rumors

Xcode 4.3.1 Released

Xcode is a complete IDE for buiding Mac and iOS applications. Starting with Xcode 4, the tools have been redesigned to be faster, more accessible and useful to developers, helping them to write better code.

Along with the new iPad, Apple also announced iOS 5.1 which means developers need updates on development tool features for iOS 5.1 and for the new hardware. The latest version of Xcode, 4.3.1, is now available for free in the Mac App Store. It needs 900MB hard disk space, patience and a good internet connection.

What’s new in Xcode 4.3.1:

  • Includes SDKs (Software Development Kits) for Mac OS X 10.7 Lion and iOS 5.1
  • New code signing workflow supports signing OS X apps with Developer ID
  • Adds installation of command-line tools to the downloads preference pane
  • Open Developer Tool menu launches Instruments, File Merge, and other tools
  • ARC migration tool converts both retain/release and garbage collected code
  • Additional bug fixes and security improvements

Have fun coding!

Apple, Mac, News/Rumors

Firefox 10 update for Mac and Windows is now available

Firefox, one of the leading Internet browsers, released today an update to version 10 which is available and ready to download for Mac and Windows. Lately, Mozilla rapidly launched new versions arriving in nine months from version 4, to version 10.

Some of the new features it brings, are the forward button that automatically hides when forward action is not valid, and the possibility to visualize full-screen web applications, which means we can enjoy games, movies and landscapes much more.

Firefox 10 also fixed a bookmarks crashing bug, enhanced the HTML5 element tag support, integrated CSS3 3D transformation which wasn’t available before, and added Anti-Aliasing for OpenGL. The rest of improvements are addressed to developers.

For the moment, Firefox 10 does not support full screen feature for Mac OS X Lion which is believed to be integrated in Firefox 12 beta version.

To get this update, go directly to your Firefox browser, select “About Firefox” and the update will automatically download. After installing, your browser needs to be restarted.

 Source: modmyi

Apple, iCloud, Mac, News/Rumors

Apple Updates AirPort Utility, AirPort Base Station and Time Capsule Firmware

Apple has just released yesterday updates for Airport Utility network software with a very simple user interface but impressive graphical map of the wireless base stations and how they interact to each other enhancing the listing option. This new version, 6.0, works with latest AirPort Express Extreme and Time Capsules supporting 802.11n. It seems that, this new simplified interface is missing the capacity to detail clients’ wireless signal strength, MAC addresses and some network statistics. Also, internet connection settings and other technical specifications are organized in a more convenient way, to increase its usability and make it easier for end users.

Beside the Utility update, Apple also released the AirPort firmware update 7.6.1 for security improvements and wireless performance, where the most interesting of the improvements is the possibility to remotely access a Time Capsule’s hard drive or a hard drive connected to an AirPort device through USB. This feature previously existed on Apple’s MobileMe online service, but became unusable once users moved their accounts to iCloud. Before applying the firmware update, it is recommended to install at least AirPort Utility 5.5.3.

We notice, Apple continues to progressively improve its wireless technology and, as I said in a previous article, it’s expected to add the new 802.11c standard support for Gigabit Wireless.

Source: macworld