JARinteractive

I like to sort my CDs alphabetically by artist, then chronologically with the newest album by that artist first. Prior to iTunes 7 the closest I could come was to sort by artist, which would leave the albums to be sorted alphabetically. In iTunes 7 you can click on the album column header and switch between album, album by artist, and album by year. You can also click on the arrow to switch between ascending and descending order. Unfortunately it doesn’t remember the sort direction when going back to Artist as my primary sort. So the closest I can come is alphabetically by artist, then ascending chronological order within artist.

Also, iTunes finally has gapless playback!

Yep, it has finally come to market albeit without the SpaceBalls branding. And you can choose from a variety of flavors including “Original” which “tastes like air.” I might try “Big Ox” if it weren’t for the surplus of air all around me.

If you notice that the trackpad does not respond to you when you make short sudden movements, turn off “Accidental Input detection.” It can be frustrating when playing Starcraft or working in Photoshop if you don’t.

The MacBook (or any of the Intel Macs) in combination with Parallels Desktop is the ultimate web development machine. Now when creating a website, it is possible to preview it in every major browser (IE, Mozilla/Firefox/Camino, and Safari). In addition, if developing for a Windows server you can run it locally. With the MacBook you can take your development on the road without giving up anything except maybe some screen real-estate.

It appears that you can run IE 6 through WINE on OS X as well, although it is a bit buggy at the moment according to reports. That could be a good option for folks who don’t want to spend the money for Parallels and/or Windows.

I have my MacBook (1.83Ghz Core Duo). I am already putting it through its paces, installing Windows in Parallels Desktop, all of the OS updates, listening to shared music from my tower, and browsing the web. It acted a little choppy while the windows installer was copying files (at the same time as OS X was updating itself). It is very fast otherwise. I’ll try to post more info in the next couple days.

after surviving 5 years of constant usage, 4 years of college classes, various travels (including across the pond to England), and a few falls, my trusty PowerBook G4 (500 Mhz) has finally succumbed to all of the use and abuse. The infamous “Spinning Beach Ball” appeared and froze completely. It managed to reboot to the point of claiming a “DMA Failure” (Direct Memory Access). Replacing the hard drive cable (suggested on the MacNN forum) was not able to revive it. Tomorrow a new MacBook will head my way… More details on the MacBook in the near future.

Rep. William Jefferson has been charged with bribery after investigators found $90,000 in his freezer. Talk about freezing his assets…

Werner Vogels, Amazon’s CTO, recently had an interview with ACM. The best quote:
“Developers are like artists; they produce their best work if they have the freedom to do so, but they need good tools.”

Binary Bonsai pointed out the upcoming Star Wars Trilogy DVD release. The movies will be released individually and include both the 2004 version and the original theatrical release (remastered). Hooray!

Yesterday in overtime, the Colorado Avalanche beat the Dallas stars to win the series and advance to the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. All of the experts predicted Dallas to win the series. Maggie, the TSN monkey, was the only one to predict a win by the Avalanche. On to the second round!