MacCraic

This week Justin “The Head Craicer” Byrne takes exception to Andy Ihnatko’s Jersey Shore/Apple remark as the main Cupertino crew seem share some common traits (though I don’t believe that they are sleeping with one another (Dave “Snookie” Shortle) ).

News

• Apple iPod Operations Manager Paul Shin Devine held in supplier kickback scheme – Christ where do you start with this, suffice to say though we might not be getting as many scoops from Asian supplier leaks going forward.
• Camera+ nabs $500K in 2 months with easter egg, gets pulled from App Store –  ’Tis dangerous to mess with “the situation” Jobs or the App Store approval team when planting easter eggs.

Sponsor – GoDaddy

iPod Touch, iOS4 & the magical disappearing battery life – The boys discuss the curious case of the magical disappearing battery life on Justin’s 3G iPod Touch which we could summarise as blame fast app switching or the Mail.app

Apple TV becoming iTV, getting application support, yet losing full HD? I give my thoughts on whether this “iTV” can handle 1080P, but with an A4 chip

it should be more than capable just like this.

App Review: Shark or Die from HandyGames (Free) For those of us out there who always wanted to be Jaws

 

 MacCraic 87- Dodging Grenades on the Jersey Shore: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

In the Beginning

When a number of our listeners suggested that Dave and I be certified I don’t quite think that the following was quite what they had in mind.

Since becoming a Mac owner (and subsequent fanboy) I have toyed with the idea of doing the exams to become Apple Certified, not just for the prestige of the Cert itself, but also to learn more about the best computing platform I have ever used.   It is one of those ideas that resided on my “someday/maybe” list.  When I was informed in June that I was being made redundant due to the current economic crisis I moved this idea to my current projects list replacing the work related projects that I would now no longer be responsible for finishing.

After careful consideration I decided what better way to assist my studies and keep me focused on my learning than to use the MacCraic website to blog about it.   I hope the blog will serve as my revision aid and also be of assistance to others who decide to follow along the same path.

So here begins the diary of my road to certification.

Finding Out What the Requirements Are

My first port of call was Apples website where I searched for what was required to become certified.   There are a number of various routes that you can take form Pro Apps to IT Support.  I decided to start with the Apple Certified Support Professional course (Nicknamed Snow Leopard 101).  A full list of available Apple training and certification can be found at http://training.apple.com/#certification.

Method of study

You can choose to attend an Apple Authorized Training Centre or study at your own pace using one of the Apple Authorized Training Books published by Peachpit (http://www.peachpit.com).

As there are no AATC’s convenient to me, coupled with time and family constraints, I opted to go the route of getting the book and learning at my own pace.   A quick search of Amazon and I had found and ordered the book.  Thanks to Pat Dengler (http://www.yourmacdoctor.com) for telling me about the book.   If you are in the LA area and need help with your Mac be sure to check out Pat.

Exams

Once I feel I have acquired enough knowledge I will apply for and sit the Snow Leopard 101 exam.   When I previously looked it appeared that there was not a place to sit the exam in Ireland however that seems to have changed and I will be looking into this at a later stage and will advise in a later post.

Keep your eyes and ears open for more of this as I hope this series of articles will be of assistance to others who choose to go the same route as me or just of general interest to Mac and MacCraic fans.

I look forward to having you as companions on my journey.

Thanks for reading.

That’s all the Craic till next time.

Justin

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

The boys as usual discuss the latest news that has com from the wonderful world of the bog.. sorry blogosphere with Justin getting a little more obsessed than usual about blue boxes- I’ll swear I’ll never look at the TARDIS in the same way again, thanks for nothing dude

News:

• In-flight iPads for under $10 on Australian low-cost airline (Ryanair & Aer Lingus get in contact with Bluebox Avionics)
• Apple hires Palm webOS talent
• iPhone 4′s retina display claim put under the math microscope
• Apple releases Safari 5 with Safari Reader, Extensions and Bing  search ( and my own take on Safari 5 vs Chrome) & list of Safari Extensions blog
• Vodafone, 3 and O2 confirm they’ll sell iPhone 4 in Ireland ( also fact that Apple will be selling the phone SIM free on it’s Store site)

Dave’s Pog Mo Thoin: The “new” Mac Mini (a bit of a bummer really)

Go Daddy Promotion

Justin’s App Picks:

• Magnetic Sports Soccer (Wi-Fi version was fun & less drain on battery than using Bluetooth).
• Also Air Video (Free)  (stream video from your Mac to iPhone or even iPad)

Emailbag: Message from Brad on Virtualbox with update provided by Dave. Link to Virtualbox changelog

Contact details

• twitter.com/justingbyrne
• twitter.com/davidshortle
• themaccraic@gmail.com
• Mevio

Outro

That’s all the craic from this week’s Mac

 

 MacCraic 82 - Granny Fanny [53:35m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Our heroes in a half-shell (Turtle Power ?) are joined by one not so grumpy Bart Busschots for his first ever appearance on MacCraic. Also, speaking from his secure underground bunker in Switzerland, one Mr Paul “Nuts” Shadwell joins us to give his side of the story when he emailed a Mr S Jobs & got the kind of reply that proves Stevie is reading some of the mails that are being sent to sjobs@apple.com . So sit back & enjoy the craic.

News

• Jobs Shagwells Shadwell ( If this mail had been sent after the iPhone 4 leak…Apocalypse Now baby )
• Compu-B comes to Dublin
• Rhapsody on an iPad

GoDaddy Promotion

Special Guest - Bart Busschots

Daves Slot - Chad Barraford’s JARVIS life assistant is the envy of Pepper Potts  (video) (if you’ve got $700 bucks & some HW & SW knowledge, you too could be Tony Stark (dreaming) )

Contact details

• maccraic.com
• twitter.com/justingbyrne
• twitter.com/davidshortle
• twitter.com/bbusschots
• themaccraic@gmail.com
• Mevio

Outro

Subscribe in iTunes (link)

 

 MacCraic 76 - Chocolate Nuts & Duffel Coats [68:48m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Our dynamic duo are left to play with themselves this week and actually had quite a pleasant experience doing so.

Intro- Which involves a case of the willies from Justin & a reminder from Dave to “backup, backup, backup !”.

News

• iPad News (could we avoid it) Time covers Steve Jobs and the iPad & iPad review round-up
• Square payment system launches on iPad

Dave’s PMT (Haven’t had one of these for a while)- iPad Pricing/Gouging Seven HD Gameloft iPad Games Revealed for $6.99 but one company did a cool thing IUGO’s iPad Titles to be Free Updates to Existing Games

MacCraic’s Make & Do Section- Flickr Find: Papercraft Steve Jobs

Feature – Dave’s Slot  Don’t trust the critics: Four Apple products they thought would fail with general reaction including random song outbursts from the boyo.

Quick reaction & predictions for iPhone 4.0 event for Thursday April 9.

Apple builds “iPad ready” site to showcase non-Flash video sites

Outro

Tag – That’s all the craic from this weeks Mac.

Contact details

maccraic.com

twitter.com/justingbyrne

twitter.com/davidshortle

twitter.com/theiblog

themaccraic@gmail.com

Mevio

iTunes comments

Subscribe in iTunes (link)

 

 MacCraic 74 - We are the World [52:20m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Bookmark It

Hide Sites