More than three months after releasing software for Windows-users to send documents to a Kindle, Amazon has now released the Mac version. Announced on Tuesday afternoon, the "Send to Kindle for Mac" application allows Mac users to wirelessly send personal documents to their Kindles via drag-and-drop in the Dock or within the app itself. Users can also send documents to the Kindle by printing from any Mac application.

As we wrote in January when the Windows version was released, each Kindle already comes with its own e-mail address so users can send files to themselves. (There's also an Instapaper mechanism for sending documents to Kindle.) The desktop software aims to make that process easier, however, by eliminating the need to involve an e-mail client (especially convoluted in the case of printing from an app, which would involve printing to PDF and then sending that PDF to your Kindle). Users don't have to be sending documents to a hardware Kindle either—files can be sent to a Kindle app on a mobile device, too (such as the iPad or an Android phone).

According to Amazon, users can also use the Mac software to archive documents in your Kindle library for download later if you don't want those files to show up and take up space on your device right away. "Your last page read along with bookmarks, notes, and highlights are automatically synchronized for your documents (with the exception of PDFs) across your Kindle devices and Kindle apps for iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, and Android," the company said in a statement.




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A South African man, whose name has not been published, was carjacked, robbed, and stuffed into the trunk of his car near Johannesburg on Sunday. The robbers, however, had overlooked his mobile phone, which he used to text his girlfriend, Lynn Peters. From there, Twitter took over.

Two armed men grabbed the driver and his Volkswagen Golf in the Honeydew area northwest of Johannesburg at about 9:00pm local time. Carjacking is a crime that is common in the country—over 10,000 such incidents occurred last year.






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FXI is preparing to launch the Cotton Candy, a tiny computer that looks like a USB thumb drive. The device, which can run either Ubuntu or Android 4.0, has a dual-core 1.2GHz ARM Cortex-A9 CPU, 1GB of RAM, and a Mali 400MP GPU that allows it to decode high-definition video.

It has a USB plug on one side, which is used to power the system, and an HDMI plug on the other side, which allows it to be plugged into a display. It also has built-in WiFi and Bluetooth radios for connectivity and supporting input devices. The system can boot standalone and operate as a complete computer when plugged into a display. It's also possible to plug the Cotton Candy into a conventional computer and boot from it like you would from a regular USB mass storage device.

FXI announced today that the Cotton Candy is available for preorder. The standard retail price is $199 plus tax and shipping. The product is expected to ship in March. The small form factor and relatively high specs make the product seem like a compelling choice for enthusiasts who are looking for an ultra-compact Linux system.





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"Can you pick me up at my place in 15 minutes? Text me when you get here." No, this isn't a text message to a friend or a call to a car service—it's a direct message sent through Twitter to a driver of a Chicago cab. Rashid Temuri, who goes by "Chicago Cabbie" online (@ChicagoCabbie on Twitter) has taken what would otherwise be considered a traditional taxi business and integrated it with social media in a way that is still exceedingly rare in the service industry. How much better can it be interacting your clients through Twitter, FourSquare, Facebook, or Google Latitude? Apparently a lot—Temuri is not only seeing success from his social media strategy, he's building a loyal repeat customer base because of it.







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Acer has entered its version of an ultrabook, the Aspire S3, into Intel's race to the top. While the computer doesn't have much merit in the way of design and makes some compromises, it's a solid performer with a good keyboard and trackpad, and great battery life—a combination that's been a rare find so far.

The Aspire S3 is on the heavier side among the models we've tested (the Asus Zenbook UX21 and Toshiba Portege Z835) coming in at 2.93 pounds, about the same as the 13-inch MacBook Air's 2.96 pounds, but more than the Toshiba's 2.5 pounds. The weight doesn't do much to offset the cheap feeling of the mostly plastic body, with plastic palmrests, keyboard keys, and casing covered by a metal top case. The computer's hinge is very stiff, and if you don't pin down the bottom half when trying to open it, it will follow the top half wherever it goes.







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Google's Android 4, codenamed Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS), debuts later this month on the much-anticipated Galaxy Nexus smartphone. This major new version of Android includes a redesigned user interface that promises a uniform experience across tablet and smartphone form factors, and it delivers new features and a wide range of improvements across the core application stack.

We already gave you a look at the Galaxy Nexus earlier this month in a hands-on review of the hardware. Now it's time to take a close look at the operating system and the ICS user experience.






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Were I to tell my most perpetually indignant friend that his tablet’s 3G radio is prone to regular performance drops of up to 75 percent, he would likely enter apoplectic rage.

Such is the emotional fabric of the modern tech enthusiast. We’re already concerned about overloaded data networks that can’t handle too many simultaneous user requests, and Apple’s iPhone 4 "antennagate" imbroglio, rightly or wrongly, has left conspiracy-minded consumers wary of self-sabotaging hardware.






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From iOS and Android to BlackBerry and Windows Phone, the app store model has become the main way mobile device users find, download, and update their software. And with employees increasingly begging for access to corporate resources from smartphones and tablets, IT departments are starting to wonder whether they should jump into the app store business themselves.

"The public app store is kind of the wild, wild West," Forrester analyst Jeffrey Hammond tells Ars. Private app stores, hosted for the employees of a single business, are receiving “a lot of interest from the clients I talk to. Folks realize that self-provisioning is the long-term trend."







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One of the headline features of Amazon's new Kindle Fire tablet is a completely new Web browser called Silk that is designed with a "split" architecture, allowing it to offload much of the heavy lifting to Amazon's cloud computing cluster for superior browsing performance.

When the user requests a webpage in Silk, the request will be routed to Amazon's servers in the cloud. Amazon will load the webpage on the server side, downloading all of the necessary content elements in parallel. After downloading the content, Amazon will send the compiled page—including HTML, JavaSript, CSS, and images—back to the device as a single stream of data.






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Amazon has finally announced its long-anticipated Kindle lending library, allowing Kindle and Kindle app users to borrow Amazon's e-books from thousands of libraries across the US. Users will be able to find the Kindle books on their participating public library's website and check them out through Amazon, which will send the book directly to users' devices over Whispersync.

"Libraries are a critical part of our communities and we're excited to be making Kindle books available at more than 11,000 local libraries around the country," Amazon's Kindle director Jay Marine said in a statement. "We're even doing a little extra here—normally, making margin notes in library books is a big no-no. But we're fixing this by extending our Whispersync technology to library books, so your notes, highlights and bookmarks are always backed up and available the next time you check out the book or if you decide to buy the book."

The ability to make notes and highlights—and subsequently sync them back to the system for review later—is certainly a major plus. The downside, of course, is that the e-books have to be "returned" after a certain period of time, just like any other library book. Amazon doesn't specify on its site how long the books are borrow-able for, but when asked, Amazon spokesperson Kinley Campbell said that the expiration time varies by library and by the book.

"Generally [it will be] 7-14 days," Campbell told Ars. "We recommend checking with local libraries on questions related to availability and specific books."

Seven to 14 days isn't a lot of time to read an entire book for some people, but it's hard to argue with free, borrowed books. Our only complaint with this announcement is that there seems to be no comprehensive list of the 11,000 participating libraries—even Amazon's FAQ page about public library books remains vague on this question. The requirement is that the library offers e-books via third party service OverDrive, though, so it's safe to assume that most major libraries will be participating to some degree or another. (You Chicagoans out there get to be lazy, as I've already confirmed that Kindle books can be found via the CPL website).

Edit: Removed links to Amazon due to technical (CMS) problems on our end. See comments for proper links for now.




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One of the neatest features in the discontinued-but-alive Google Wave was its collection of gadgets and extensions. Many of those gadgets live on in Google's new Shared Spaces, where you can invite others to contribute, vote, and collaborate on the web. More »

Although its copyright settlement with publishers is still in legal limbo, Google has announced that it will be starting to sell e-books through an online storefront early this summer. Like Apple and Amazon, Google's store would see it offer up in-print books obtained from publishers, which will retain their ability to set the prices for these works. But there's every reason to expect that the same storefront will be awash with out-of-print books the minute that Google can get a settlement for its ongoing lawsuit approved.

Google apparently dropped the news at a publishing industry event, sponsored by the Book Industry Study Group, and held in New York City. It has since been picked up by, well, just about everyone (many reports seem to be crediting a Wall Street Journal story for the announcement).






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Soon after the first iPads started showing up on Princeton University's network earlier this month, the university's network admins noticed strange behavior from Apple's tablet computer: some iPads kept using an IP address after its DHCP lease ran out. That's part of the reason the university "banned" the iPad from its network. 
What's really going on here, and how can it be fixed?





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The question of how to print from wireless devices has been thrust once again into the limelight recently thanks to the printing-anemic iPad. Longtime notebook and mobile device users are quite familiar with the printing conundrum—cables, drivers and all.

Google has announced that it's looking to address this problem in the form of Cloud Print. Part of the Chromium and Chromium OS projects, Cloud Print aims to allow any type of application to print to any printer. This includes Web, desktop, and mobile apps from any kind of device—potentially, this could be used on a BlackBerry, Windows machines, Macs, or even the iPad. (That is in addition to Google's own offerings: "Google Chrome OS will use Google Cloud Print for all printing. There is no print stack and there are no printer drivers on Google Chrome OS!" says the company.)





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Apple touts the automatic graphics switching in its new 15" and 17" MacBook Pros as a "breakthrough technology from Apple." Some readers scoffed at the description earlier today, assuming (as we originally did) that Apple was using NVIDIA's Optimus technology. We discussed the graphics switching technology at length with Apple this afternoon, and though Apple's implementation is similar in concept, it differs in a few key areas from Optimus.

The main goal of Apple's automatic graphics switching is to balance graphics performance with long battery life. Intel's latest stable of mobile processors—Core i3, i5, and i7—all include integrated graphics in the same package as the CPU. Dubbed Intel HD, this integrated graphics processor is designed primarily for efficiency. While its performance is far better than the previous GMA950, for instance, it still wouldn't be classified as good for "performance" graphics in any sense of the term in common usage.





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During a media event in San Francisco today, Microsoft revealed the spiritual successor to the Danger Sidekick messaging phone. Called "KIN," the new platform is designed with a heavy focus on social networking and is targeted mainly towards younger users that Microsoft has dubbed the "social generation."

KIN is launching with two different hardware versions. KIN ONE is a small touchscreen QWERTY slider that looks not unlike the Palm Pre. It has 4GB of flash memory for storage and a 5 megapixel camera optimized for low-light use.

KIN TWO is a larger, more traditional-looking QWERTY slider, with a larger, wider touchscreen. It has 8GB of storage and an 8 megapixel camera that can shoot 720p HD video.





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When Jon Rubenstein agreed to join a fading Palm with the goal of outdoing his previous work on the iPhone at Apple, I'm sure he knew that he had a shot at the CEO role if his project succeeded. But I seriously doubt that he ever expected to give an interview like the one he just gave to CNN Money:

The conventional wisdom is that Palm has blown it and either is going to run out of money or get sold or both.

Clearly we've hit a speed bump. No question about it. It’s really disappointing, and it's frustrating. But, the company has tremendous assets.

The rest of the interview is pretty much on this pattern, where the interviewer asks a question that amounts to, "Aren't you guys kind of screwed?" Rubenstein responds with something to the effect that "things have been tough, mistakes have been made, but look at what we've still got going for us... and if that's not enough, then hey, look at what Palm had going for it before webOS."

Throughout the course of the interview, Rubenstein acknowledges the Pre's initial hardware problems, but he claims that's in the past now and that quality is up. He also acknowledges that the recent Verizon launch was a flop, but he blames it on the Verizon in-store sales staff's lack of experience with Palm. And when he has to make the case, yet again and at this late date, for webOS's existence in a market that's already dominated by a few established players, he turns to multitasking. 
Yes, people want easy multitasking, but maybe they don't actually need as much of it as Palm gives them; maybe they just need the little bit that Android gives them, and that Apple will soon give them.

At one point in the interview, the subject of Palm's anemic software library comes up, and Rubenstein both acknowledges the "long tail" effect and then completely misses its significance.

"I mean, if you look at the long tail of the 150,000 or 180,000, or whatever number Apple has got these days, it's an amazing number," Rubenstein says. "The reality is that it's the first thousand or so that matter and the rest of it is long tail."

Yes, the rest of it is indeed long tail, and that long tail of apps is precisely what gives the iPhone such a massive advantage over its rivals. The whole point of the long tail is that's where the bulk of your business comes from... but if Rubenstein doesn't understand this, then what hope does Palm have? The answer increasingly appears to be: not much.



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Whether you've got an an iPad, a different snazzy tablet, an Android phone, or some other touchscreen device, sometimes your fingertip isn't the ideal input device. With a few common materials, you can make an effective and inexpensive stylus for your touchscreen. More »

The iPad isn't a big iPod touch—an iPod touch is a miniature iPad that restricts the full multitouch experience in exchange for offering greater portability. With the iPad, in contrast, you get multitouch the way it was meant to be done.

That's one of our many take-aways after having submerged ourselves in iPad land since launch. The larger screen doesn't just offer more space to work with—it opens up a different and more immersive user experience. Because of this different experience, though, the closed nature of the platform can get under some users' skin in ways the iPhone and iPod touch do not.

Still, the iPad is likely to just be a starting point for Apple and for multitouch computing in general. There are obvious downsides to the device—we'll tell you what those are—but it's clear that it does sit in its own category that floats somewhere between a smartphone and a laptop, and it serves different purposes than either its smaller or bigger siblings. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

A large chunk of the Ars staff contributed to this review, either in the form of writing full sections or by offering feedback and insights based on their own experiences. Because the 3G + WiFi version is not yet on the market, we all tested a WiFi-only iPad. We think it's worth noting up front that the WiFi-only version is probably best if you only plan to use it at home or at Starbucks—you'll definitely miss not having an Internet connection while out and about, and the (non-contract) 3G data plans are not bad at all, so long as you can stomach the extra $130 you'll have to fork over for the privilege.

It's also the case that there are some parts of the iPad "experience" that we didn't get to cover here, but we think the next several pages will convey more about what using the iPad is like than you ever thought you wanted to know. So let's get on with it!





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So you've shot some great footage with your camera, and you have
experience editing with one or two of the popular professional tools like Premiere,
Vegas and Final Cut. And you've probably dabbled in some audio editing tools like
Audition, Forge or Soundtrack. But you're really just experimenting, and you're not sure
what all the filters and options are for. You can spend hours fiddling and
not be any closer to making the footage look better or the audio sound better.
This article walks through the post-production process in a home studio
setting, and it shows you how to effectively use the tools you have on-hand.

Note: This should be read after Cheap shots: How to shoot pro-quality video on a budget, as it makes reference to ideas and concepts
covered in that article.






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Not too long ago, David Findlay built a device capable of communicating with just about any model of iPod via the dock connector using an Arduino Nano, PodGizmo breakout board, an old USB iPod connector, and a momentary switch. While it may not sound like a big deal, there is more to it than one might think: namely programming a device (in this case the Arduino Nano) to be able to receive, interpret, and respond to messages sent from an iPod. 
This means teaching it to speak Apple Accessory Protocol and, although proprietary in nature, it has been fairly well documented around the Internet. Finland slung some code so that his iPod touch was hooked up to one of the famous Staples Easy buttons in his car. Now he could easily play and pause his iPod touch without having to fiddle with the on-screen controls.

Fast-forward several months and  Findlay had all but forgotten about the project when he was asked by the folks that run Make magazine to talk about it. In particular, they wanted him to talk about the library he created for communicating with Apple’s portable audio players. He said yes, and decided to dive back into the project and attempt to add additional functionality to the project. 
Finland's first go around only involved tackling the the Simple Remote portion of the Apple Remote Protocol, which handles things like mute, next playlist, skip, and turning the device on and off. With newfound interest, however, he has now tackled the Advanced Remote portion, which opens up a bevy of new functionality, including getting names of songs, albums, artists, and track time; toggling shuffle and repeat mode; and all the other neat functionality that iPods have.

This newly released library of code will surely appeal to the do-it-yourself hackers who love tinkering, soldering, and programming. Someone could theoretically even build his or her own iPod speaker solution with a plethora of different options and feedback. The more daring could hard-wire a solution to a car’s in-wheel audio controls. Personally, I envision some sort of bicycle solution that docks the iPod on the handlebars but allows riders to control the device without taking their hands off the handlebars. An even more enterprising individual could rig something like this up to a sudden motion sensor so that when someone enters a room, the iPod begins to play.



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