MacMinute notes a Register report that Apple has confirmed Mac OS X 10.3 Panther will be a 32-bit OS, but with 64-bit libraries to support the new Power Mac G5 and beyond. Is this really a big surprise? Maybe I just hang out online with, and read, more technically-minded folks, but I thought this was a foregone conclusion. From my daily use of Panther (no, I didn't dump the WWDC beta for Jaguar this past weekend like I said; rather, I have begun a much more rigid backup procedure), it is already an evolutionary step forward from Jaguar. Faster on the same hardware; the Aqua GUI is a bit more subdued, though I have mixed feelings over the new Finder. Quite simply, I like it, even in beta form, the same way I liked Jaguar over 10.1, and 10.1 over the original release. The OS simply keeps getting better, and at a much faster pace than what the competition offers. Expect a 64-bit OS somewhere around 10.4, maybe even 10.5. There's a lot of work that has to be done for that to happen, and developers have to be brought on board as well. A 64-bit OS will be something more revolutionary, and revolutions--at least ones that will matter in the long term--do not happen overnight.

Wired has a new article on the staying power of the Power Mac G4 Cube, and the lengths some Cube owners will go to keep their beloved system up to date. As for me, I've upgraded everything in my Cube except the processor. I decided after WWDC that it would be more beneficial to me to turn those funds in to a new G5 (this daddy-in-waiting plans on utilizing Final Cut Pro quite a bit for all those DV movies I'll be capturing via our new Canon ZR70). The Cube could then be turned in to the house's file server. I certainly do not wish to get rid of it; it is a work of engineering art...

MacMinute reports on a CNET story that Bill Gates told analysts Microsoft is considering a music download service. Gee, wherever would he have gotten that idea from?

MacResQ is now offering a SuperDrive upgrade for any PowerBook G4. Too bad I know my employer would not pay for this for my TiBook/500. Eh, I'm looking toward a future PowerBook G4 12" with SuperDrive purchase, and I have two G4 desktops with SuperDrives at the office...

Having experienced my second kernel panic with the WWDC beta release of Mac OS X Panther 10.3, and the corruption of some of my emailboxes, I'll be doing some volume cloning and Jaguar reinstalling this weekend...

Yes, Virginia, you too can build a web browser without a single line of code. Thanks to Apple's WebKit SDK, available here (free registration), the Mac OS X Developer Tools (latest version available via previous link), and these instructions by Brian Kendig. Presenting version 0.1 of WebPhisch(tm). It's no Safari, but it's a start. No, I'm not going to become a browser developer. Why would I, when there's Safari? This is just to show the awesome power of Mac OS X and the tools available to developers. Think you can build a web browser in five minutes with .NET? Think again... (Yes, Michael, I used the metal appearance just like Safari. No, I don't know why. Just because I could, I suppose. Yes, I used DropDMG for the disk image. [New version's out!] Yes, this is just one of about a million Safari-wannabes now popping up on the Mac web...)

Just had my first kernel panic under the WWDC Panther beta on my PowerBook G4/500. This is the first kernel panic I've had with OS X on any Mac since before 10.1 was released. To be honest, I cannot recall any kernel panics prior to the OS X beta program. So we're talking about two-and-half, three years? Contrast this with my XP-equipped Compaq Evo, which goes down about once every two weeks...

This month has seen a couple of milestones reached by yours truly, regarding my work with About This Particular Macintosh. First, the current issue, 9.07, marks the end of my 5th year involved with the publication. This is a longer period of time than I have been with any paying employer. I have worn many hats for ATPM. I started as a Copy Editor; at the time, the Copy Editor. I've been the Publicity Manager (we could use one! Let us know if you're interested!). I've been the Help guy. I've been a Contributing Editor (we need some of those, too!), though I'm not sure if I really contributed more than headaches for Michael. Now I'm the Managing Editor, Numero Two-o, Almost-The-Big-Cheese, the Publisher's Right-Hand Man. I strike fear in the hearts of our writers with cries of "Deadline! Deadline! Deadline!" and "What is this *&#@!% drivel?!?!?" and...oh, sorry, got a little carried away there. :) The second milestone, well, technically, I reached it before today, but due to the way I've got email organized....well, you'll see. I have now archived over 10,000 messages to my ATPM account. This doesn't include whatever is sitting in Claris Emailer on my Cube that didn't get exported to Mailsmith eons ago. Nor does it include items sent to the ATPM help, editor, submissions, and other internal addresses that all end up in my box, since I keep those items sorted to separate mailboxes. If I were to include all of those, I'm probably looking at well over 13,000 messages, by far the most I've accumulated with any one email address since I've gone online. Outside of a friend who's local, but I met online, and a certain font guy, I would have to say my closest online friendships have come out of ATPM. It's been a blast working on something that interests me personally, even if it doesn't pay a dime. We don't produce ATPM to make a buck; we do it because we care about the Mac platform and we have something to share with the Mac-using community. Here's to the next five years, and 20,000 messages!

I have been running the WWDC preview release of Mac OS X 10.3 Panther on my TiBook for over a week now, and I've noticed an odd problem with NetNewsWire 1.0.3 under this OS. Specifically, it's crashing/quitting when updating from my friend Michael's blog. What's even more odd is that version 1.0.2 of NNW works just fine! I know Michael's not doing anything wocky with his RSS feed, as he's very much a web standards kind of guy. So it makes me think there's something off in this rev of Panther which will hopefully get fixed as it heads to golden master. All the same, I let Ranchero's Brent Simmons know. Any other Panther/NetNewsWire users see similar behavior?

Apple has managed to nab exclusive rights to the soundtrack for The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, and will release it as a $9.99 download on the iTunes Music Store. No physical CDs will be pressed! (via MacMinute)

The July issue of About This Particular Macintosh has been released. I enjoyed Matt Coates' column on the Apple iTunes Music Store, new staff member Andrew Kator's graphics article, and the reviews by Paul and Eric. Great stuff throughout. Stop by and read online or download the PDF of your choice.

The big news in the Mac market today is that longtime software publisher Casady & Greene is closing its doors, with all software reverting back to the individual developers. Casady & Greene's tour de force in software publishing was Conflict Catcher, which eased the process of troubleshooting control panel and extension conflicts in OS 9 and below. It was a primary weapon in any Mac troubleshooter's arsenal, but alas, it has no place in an OS X world. The only other C & G product I've used, and continue to use, is Spell Catcher, which will continue in development through its developer, Rainmaker Research. After Apple bought SoundJam and turned it in to iTunes, and OS X began to dominate the landscape, it was only a matter of time. So we bid Casady & Greene a fond farewell, and thank them for taking the risk on publishing some great software.

So yesterday I installed the WWDC release of 10.3 on a spare G4/933 at the office. It simply flew. It is fast. Wicked fast. Below are some of my observations of it on the 933, as well as my PowerBook G4/500. (ATPM staffers, you've seen most of this already.) Mac OS X 10.3 appears as fast--if not faster--than OS 9 on the same machine... The system in question is the aforementioned G4/933 single-proc with SuperDrive. Our OS 9-based graphics configuration was loaded on it, but this system hasn't seen any testing in a while, so it was a perfect candidate for co-opting to test Panther. I loaded the Panther Disc 1 into the SuperDrive, and started the installation. Typical OS X install, began after a restart, pretty boring. I figured that the install would kill the existing OS 9 config, but that's easily replaced, so it was no big deal. Filled out the contact info, selected my time zone, and voila!, it brought me to the log-in prompt. First surprise: don't all previous versions of OS X want to restart at this point? So I logged in, and brought up a Finder window. Second surprise: all of my OS 9 stuff was still there, the Panther install didn't touch any of it! (The reason for this is that on the Panther developer beta, the default install is to upgrade the existing OS X system, if present. If not, it simply installs it. If you want to wipe the drive for a clean install, you have to tell the installer.) Eye candy-wise, they haven't put in any new user pics, desktops, or screen savers just yet. Regarding the new Finder window: I like it. Yes, it is a little Windowsy, but damn if Apple hasn't outdone Windows on a Windows feature/interface. I have nearly always used the OS X Finder in column mode anyway, so there was little for me to get used to with the new one. I made that change in my Finder prefs right away, so that all my Finder windows open in column view. And yes, boys and girls, Finder prefs are sticking! System Preferences have been streamlined. Desktop and Screen Effects are now one and the same, with buttons denoting each to click between. They are not tabs in the sense that they do not look like tabs, but that is how they function. While I'm not wild about the metal appearance everywhere (it has grown on me through repeated iChat, iTunes, Safari, and Mellel use), I do like the removal of the Aqua stripes from all windows. Most pleasant. It's fast. Fast. Wicked fast. Did I mention it was fast? As usual, there are many subtle interface surprises that you wouldn't think to look for, but when they happen, they pleasantly surprise you, then you promptly forget about them. Which is why I'm not listing any here right now. :) Exposé is a very cool feature. Very cool. Wicked cool. (Yes, I like that word.) It's going to change the way people work in OS X with windows and applications, and I believe it will be a change for the better. One thing that's missing thus far: an Internet pref pane. They pulled the .Mac stuff out and gave it its own pref pane, but Internet is AWOL. So no way that I've found thus far to determine default browser, default mail, etc. Hey, it's a developer beta, there's more to come. Safari 1.0 is included. IE 5.2.2 is the other web browser of note. I don't have a FireWire cam to use with iChat AV, but I like the app itself, especially how the typing area at the bottom of a chat window automatically expands as you type. This way, you don't have to scroll up one line at a time to see exactly what you've typed. Cool switching, Cmd-Tab, brings up an enormous bar with your active apps in the center of the screen, with a semi-transparent background, like with the brightness and sound pop-ups. It also puts the current app at the front of the list, with the app you last used right behind it. For instance, right now I'm switching back and forth between Safari and iChat AV, and I don't have to go to the Dock and cool-switch through a bunch of other stuff between the two, or use my mouse to click. One Cmd-Tab smoothly switches me back and forth. I think this is going to kill a good portion of the market for Liteswitch. That's about as far as I've gotten right now. I have yet to encounter one of my apps or little extras that's breaking under the beta, but then again I haven't given my systems a total workout with the new OS just yet. I expect that now that this release is in developers' hands, we'll begin seeing updates to applications left and right in the coming month or so. More to come.

I've got to start reading more from James Lileks. Like with the previously-noted pen comment, he cracks me up: bq. Today they announce the new machines. From all I hear the new computers go up to 11, so to speak. Dual 2 ghz processors. Of course, this means the company, which is DOOMED, will now go out of business twice as fast as before.

Bare Bones has released v2.0 of my favorite email client. Major kudos to Michael for getting SpamSieve bundled with all Mailsmith 2.0 purchases (before 31 July 2003). Speaking of which, SpamSieve 1.3.1 has been released. Seems to be a bit faster to me, and I like the new script addition that sends a piece of mail directly to the Trash when I mark it as spam. (I have the Mailsmith filter that SpamSieve's script uses set to send spam to the Trash; others have a spam folder, so your mileage may vary.) If you're already using both of these products, here's the kicker regarding Mailsmith 2.0: it features direct integration with SpamSieve! No more scripts or filters! Rock on, Michael! Way to go!