Following WWDC 09 Keynote...

I've had a few tweets asking where I'll be following the keynote. So here are a few links that I'll be using. I much prefer the auto renewing pages, much less hassle to follow along. All these sites are auto-refreshing:

MacRumoursLive

ars technica

A new one this year is the gdgt live page which I'll be taking a look at.

However, the non autorefreshing page over at Engadget usually has some great photos.

My usual approach is to follow them all in separate browser windows for the first ten minutes or so, it's pretty easy to see who is on top in speed and detail after that. I then close down all except for the best two.

There's plenty more out there, feel free to leave your favourite in the comments!

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WWDC 2009 Predictions....

Well, I did say my blogging would be "light & sporadic"

It's 12:26am here in the UK, the day of the WWDC 2009 keynote and I suppose I should really make some predictions on what will be announced later today (actually, I started writing this at 11:26pm the day before!) I've already gone on record over on the Mac OS Ken Day 6 podcast, after being asked by Ken for some predictions last week, but as that is a subscription based podcast, you may not have heard it.

In fact, I could make a completely new set of predictions and you may never be the wiser ;-)

Seems that this year, all the predictions I've heard of, seem to have an unprecedented level of assurance that they will in fact, turn up. This is always a bad sign. It usually leads to severe disappointment and an anti climax immediately following the the keynote (and a hit on the stock price), even if Apple deliver something great but fall short of the, sometimes, incredible rumours.

The thing to bare in mind for the WWDC 2009 conference and keynote is that it's a developer conference.

It's all about the software.

Yes, I know the iPhone 3G was launched there last year and other hardware before that, but it's really aimed at the software developers.

Consequently, I think there are two givens today:

iPhone 3.0 software: With the push of iTunes 8.2 last week and the fact that it supports iPhone OS 3.0, I think iPhone OS 3.0 will be launched today and made available for immediate download.

OS X 10.6 - Snow Leopard: Not a launch but the announcement of the release date and the pricing.

Both these announcements could easily take up half the keynote each.

With the iPhone 3.0 software, they will already have a ton of apps that will support some of the new cool features. They'll probably already have some hardware vendors on board with some new hardware add-ons. Then there is the feature set of 3.0 itself. This could easily take 30 minutes to go through.

Snow Leopard is interesting in that they really haven't pushed this hard for a long, long time. If I remember, it was not featured in:

Macworld 2008 Keynote (MacBook Air, AppleTV Take 2, Time Capsule, updated iPhone features)

WWDC 2008 Keynote (iPhone 3G, App Store, MobileMe and Notification services)

Macworld 2009 (Update iLife and iWork apps, iWork.com, 17" MacBook Pro, DRM Free iTunes)

So for the past two years, Snow Leopard has not even been mentioned in a single major event by Apple.... and Windows 7 is in public beta and starting to get some major props when compared to Vista.

I think the event today will be the ideal venue to showcase the new OS and I fully expect a major demo of the new features in Snow Leopard, the benefits it brings to the developer and consumer and the release strategy. Although Apple have positioned it as not having any specific "new features", and it's really just an exercise in "tightening" up the performance of Leopard, I've no doubt some of the "non-features" will suddenly be re-branded as features, along with some new features, as yet to be revealed. Again, I could envisage this taking up another lengthy part of the keynote.

So what about the new iPhone hardware?

This seems to be the announcement that everyone and his mother thinks is a dead cert for today.

I'm not too sure....

Would they really want to overshadow Snow Leopard with the new iPhone at such a critical time?

Would they want to turn WWDC in virtually an iPhone exclusive event, yet again?

Would Steve Jobs really want one of the other executives to launch the new iPhone?

If you remember back to the original launch of the first iPhone, Steve mentioned he'd waited three years to announce the iPhone. He had his family and friends in the audience at Macworld 2007 (I was in the Starbucks next to Moscone, but that's another story). It seems to me that the iPhone is a big deal for Steve. Who just so happens, is back from sick leave at the end of June.

So this could go two ways, Apple could release the new iPhone today and overshadow everything else in the keynote or...

They could wait for Steve to get back in a few weeks and hold a special event to release the iPhone, and have all the benefit of an extra few weeks build up plus the return of Steve Jobs. The stock may take a hit if the new iPhone doesn't appear today, but if the iPhone 3.0 and Snow Leopard demos are good, it may only be minor and heck, it would only be for a few weeks. It might even give the stock price a double bump.

I'm really torn to say with any certainty which way they'll go, I just have a gut feeling that they'll delay the release of the new iPhone for a few weeks, and then hit us with a double whammy of a new iPhone with Video plus the fabled iPhone Nano. The iPhone Nano must come soon so they can start the strategy they adopted with the iPhone in creating models to meet a range of price points.

So I'll stick my neck out and say no new iPhone today (but would not be completely shocked if it did appear- you know how these things go!).

A couple of long shots for you to mull over....

A new AppleTV? The original AppleTV is looking really old now and could really do with a refresh. Why not a new hardware platform and an AppleTV SDK for the developers to start developing some AppleTV apps or even games? Have Apple decided that the "hobby" might be worth investing in?

The fabled Apple Tablet? No. Not yet!

New Unibody MacBooks? Following the bump in the plastic MacBooks, this could be a possibility but on past form, I doubt they'd use WWDC to announce a speed bump.

No matter what happens, it should be an exciting event and I hope we all get what we want out of it, just be prepared for a little bit of disappointment, if only for a couple of weeks!

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Hardware day.....

Today is a hardware day, and in that I mean, it's time for a re-organise!

I've already split my 2 x RAID 0 Arrays into 3 1TB RAID 1 Arrays - One for Media, one for Data and one for current Video projects and the empty Drobo and DroboShare is arriving tomorrow.

So today I need to:

PowerPC G5 Tower
Remove the existing PowerPC G5 Tower and make ready for sale.

MacPro-01 (My original MacPro)
Add some additional eSata ports using an eSATA extender cable so I can hook up the Voyager external drive using eSATA

Move MacPro-01 over to the other desk and migrate the accounts on the G5 Tower over to it.

Reconfigure the printers connected to the G5 Tower to hang off MacPro-01

MacPro-02 (My new MacPro)
Split the existing RAID 0 partition and remove the 3 x 1TB drives and replace with 3 x 750GB drives from the split raids. I intend to use the 3 x 1TB drives (plus and additional 1TB drive in the Drobo)

Add some additional eSata ports using an eSATA extender cable so I can hook up the Voyager external drive using eSATA

Reconnect all three monitors

Start adding in any applications I haven't yet installed

MacBook Pro
Connect to the 30" monitor using the KVM switch

Finish the build process as best I can

Drobo
Clear a space for the Drobo and DroboShare

Cabling
Remove any redundant cabling and basically tidy up.

Superduper Backups
Make SD backups of all machines

So that should keep me busy for a few hours!

Update: I decided against installing the sSATA extender cables. They use two unused ports on the MacPro logic board but to get to them you have to remove the drives and fan enclosure. Not a big job, and for someone delving into the innards all the time, probably trivial. But, I decided against risking it, just in case!

I'll hold onto them until I either pluck up the courage or if there is a real need for them.

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Yet another build...

.... but I'm not complaining!

On arrival back from NSConference yesterday, was a rather plain looking brown packing box containing the new MacBook Pro.

Yowsa!

It took slightly longer than anticipated to arrive, but in reality, the timing was perfect. Had it arrived before the conference it would have been an unneeded diversion, as I had to prepare this weeks show in advance. I have to say though, I showed remarkable restraint and actually left the machine in the box unopened for a good six hours or so. Well, after being a way from home for a couple of days, it wouldn't have gone down too well to ignore the family and spend all night fiddling with the new machine.

So after an appropriate length of time (once they'd all gone to bed!) I duly did the ceremonially unboxing (no photos) and took stock of the new machine.

First impressions are that the screen seems significantly bigger than the MBA, which is one of the major reasons for upgrading. It seems huge and very bright. The other revelation is the trackpad - it's so smooth and easy to use. I'd picked up on this using my brothers MacBook, but it really does feel super smooth and is a delight to use. Not really started using the additional multitouch features yet, but the absence of a proper button (the whole trackpad is a button) is no issue and the muscle memory is easily re-trained.

Following a bit of a think (and lots of advice from the twitteratti) I decided not to go ahead with a migration from the MBA but to do a clean OS install and selectively start to add in my applications. It's not a trivial job as I use a ton of applications, but this time round I'm documenting all the steps on configuring the new Mac as a basis for a ScreenCastsOnline show for new Mac users.

I'm pretty much at the point where most of the core essential applications I use are now on the machine (Mail Act-On, 1Password, Launchbar, Evernote, TextExpander and a few more) but I daresay, it will take me a couple of days on and off to bring it fully up to spec.

As far as the MBA is concerned, it went on eBay for £760 to a chap in the Netherlands. Payment has been received so I'm just about to start the process of preparing it for sending off in the next few days. I've got a MBA superdrive so it shouldn't be to difficult to do a fresh install. I'll miss the MBA as it's been a fantastic machine but the MBP is a worthy upgrade.

As an aside, I suppose it's not that surprising but I'd say the vast majority of developers at NSConference were using new unibody MacBook Pros with a smattering of MacBooks and MacBook Airs. Quite a few new 17" machines as well. Now that is a huge screen!

Will keep you posted on any additional thoughts over the next few days.

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NSConference 2009

oops! Missed a couple of blog posts but I've been away for a couple of days.

Well the MacBook Air is now sold via eBay but I won't be able to wipe and rebuild it until the weekend. So it's made the journey with me down to Hatfield in Hertfordshire for the very first (but probably not the last) NSConference 2009 - a tech conference for Mac developers run by MacDevNet

One minor point before talking about the conference, is the fact that I'd left my USB ethernet adapter at home resulting in my not being able to access the internet from my room at the conference. Instead, I've had to rely on WiFi in the main conference room for internet access. No big deal but another barrier thrown up by the lack of standard ports on the MBA, much as it irks me to point that out!

But anyway, back to the conference.....

Whilst not a Mac developer, I decided to invest two days of my time by supporting the efforts of the MacDevNet (or actually Scotty and Tim) by attending the very first NSConference. This two day conference has been put together as an alternative to the rather expensive proposition (well at least for us Europeans) of travelling to WWDC over in San Francisco. Whilst obviously not being able to offer the scope and breadth of sessions available in WWDC, Scotty and Tim have done a fantastic job of arranging a number of highly information sessions covering a wide range of topics and subject matter.

For this first year, the sessions have been arranged as a single stream releasing all the delegates from any problematic decision making on what sessions to see. As a non-developer, I was a bit concerned that the sessions would be pitched way over my head, resulting in frustration and possibly leaving me with an inferiority complex! However, although the majority of sessions have been techy, they've all been extremely informative and stimulating both in the range of subjects covered, but also in the way the subjects have been approached.

Of course, one of the major benefits of these sorts of events has always been the networking side and this NSConference has been no exception. It's been great to meet up with UK, European and International Mac developers, many of whom I've collaborated with in the past when producing ScreenCastsOnline shows. Obviously, I can't mention everybody but it's been great to meet up with Danny Gregg and some of the RealMac software guys, Scott Morrison from Indev Software (the creator of the invaluable MailTags and Mail Act-on, all the way from Canada), Uli from Elgato, Dave Verwer from Shiny, Mike Lee from Delicious Monster and Tapulous, Fraser Speirs from Connected Flow, the list goes on and on.

I really think that this is the start of an extremely significant annual event here in the UK, one that has the potential to expand beyond its current remit.

I will definitely be making it a permanent feature on my calendar.

Congrats to both Tim and Scotty for organising such a fantastic event.

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