“Inside sources” claim Apple has set December 13th as the official launch date for the upcoming Mac App Store. Mac App Store submissions started rolling into Apple around the 3rd of November. So the store it self should be fairly well stocked at the time of launch.

I love the idea of the Mac App Store simply for the fact that it will be so convenient to discover new apps. There is no doubt that all apps available for OS X will not be in the app store, but I believe it will still benefit the majority of OS X users.

The Mac App Store has another benefit as well, updates! All apps installed via the app store will also be able to receive updates directly through the app store. This centralized update hub should definitely help to keep everyone up to date with the freshest software release.

Apple to sell iLife, iWork apps individually

VLC is a free and open source cross-platform multimedia player and framework, that plays most multimedias files and various streaming protocols. VLC has all codecs built-in. It comes with support for nearly every codec there is.

Requires: iPhone OS 3.2+

8.9 MB

Download and learn more about VLC Media Player for iPad here.

Interested in buying Apple products on your Apple product? If so, please read on.

Apple recently released a new app into the wild called “Apple Store“. The “Apple Store” app allows you to purchase products, read reviews, set up Apple appointments, and find nearby Apple Retail Stores.

“The Apple Store app is also the easiest way to buy or reserve your new iPhone — right from your current iPhone. You can do it in just a few taps, without entering your AT&T account information. Order your new iPhone from the Apple Online Store and it’s shipped to you free and ready to use. Or reserve your new iPhone, pick it up at an Apple Retail Store, and we’ll set it up for you in minutes.”

You can download and learn more about the Apple Store app Here.

Wait no more. A truly bold move in the cell phone industry will have you happier then ever with your iPhone!

Via CNET:
“Months after teasing us at CES with an announcement of Skype’s native VoIP client for the iPhone, the free Skype for iPhone will finally be available to download from the iTunes App Store sometime on Tuesday. We got a chance to sit down with the application’s principal engineer before the announcement was made at CTIA 2009, to see Skype for iPhone do its thing. While most of the features aren’t too surprising–Skype does want to maintain some consistency across its mobile applications, after all–there are a few capabilities that are notably missing, and a few iPhone-only perks that are refreshing to see.”

You can find the full storu here. Skype for iPhone: It’s Official.

Pricing sounds like $0.00 Which, is always a good price.

In what appears to be a step closer to a beta release, Ars has revealed that Google’s praised browser is now even closer to becoming a realization for OS X users.

Now, as much as an avid Firefox supporter as I am, the amount of time and effort Google is pushing into this release makes me feel like Chrome is going to be able to hit the ground running. The day this browser is released will be the day it will go head to head with Firefox for the default browser spot on my Mac.

You can find the full story here at ArsTechnica.

iBench is a synthetic benchmark program for the Mac OS X operating system. It is constituted by 21 tests (12 of integer workload and 9 of floating point) of real usage that allow to check and compare the CPU and memory performance of your Mac.

iBench is a Universal Binary and works seamlessly on 32- and 64-bit Macs and on both Intel and PowerPC Macs.

The only requirements are 512 MB of RAM or more and Mac OS X 10.5 “Leopard”.

Best of all it’s freeware. So, if you are looking to compare the performance of your Mac against other Macs, I suggest you give this nice little app a try.

Download and more info Here.

While still not overly stable, the new beta of Camino can give you a good idea of what to expect in the finished product. The Mozilla based web browser for OS X has improved tabbed browsing and also implemented Growl support for download notification. Other new features includes:

• Optional flash animation blocking on a per site basis
• Tab rearrangement through drag and drop
• Gecko 1.9 rendering engine for faster graphic rendering and compatibility

Camino has aspects of both Safari and Firefox which make for excellent usability and even better design.

If you are interested in learning even more of what Camino has to offer check it out here. Camino 2 Preview

I have been using Safari Beta 4 for close to 48 forty-eight hours now. While not blowing my mind wide open, it does offer a few useful features.

• Cover Flow, while useful in iTunes, finds a way to be even more useful as a web browser feature. Cover Flow in Safari allows you to visually search your bookmarks and history, a welcomed feature for someone like me who tends to forget names much easier then faces.
• Top Sites. While not being incredibly useful, is in my opinion, much better then a static home page. The ability for it to inform you of which pages have changed since you lasted visited them is a nice RSS-esque feature.
• Nitro Engine. While totally having a lame name, it’s always nice to be able to load the many pages of the www just that much faster.

So, as LeVar Burton would say:  You don’t have to take my word for it. Check it out for yourself. Apple.com/Safari

Back in July of ’08 I wrote about a neat little app called Snapplr. Snapplr is a replacement for OS X’s built in screen shot tool. Snapplr brings  many additional features as well as ease of use to screen shots. The highlight of Snapplr is the ability to instantly share whatever you may be capturing. With Snapplr you can:

• Publish you screen shot instantly on the web thanks to Snapplr’s instant image hosting. After the selecting the live option for your shot, Snapplr instantly adds the corresponding URL to your clipboard so you can instantly share it friends.
• Import your clips instantly into your email! Snapplr supports the ability to share screen shots through integration with OS X’s Mail app.
• Save directly to your clipboard. Snapplr also makes it easy to import screen shots into design and graphic apps via copy and paste.
• Last but not least is the ability to share your clips live. Snapplr offers a unique service that streams your selected area live on the web!

Snapplr resides in the menu bar when not in use, configurable hot keys bring up the snapplr window that allows you to set options before snapping your picture. The lightweight, unobtrusive style of snapplr makes it fun and simple to use.

Head on over to Snapplr.com to learn more and download the free trial!

Apple’s own Front Row is a pretty solid media center, as long as you are just looking to watch/listen to your media. It is simple and it does its job well. However, some people like a few more feature when it comes to a media center, especially those who are using there computer solely as a media center. Enter Plex.

On the outside, Plex may look just like any other media center, but inside you will find it is packed with useful and ingenious features.

For starters Plex has the ability to automatically fetch and apply Metadata from IMDB and TVDB to your media. This feature paired with Plex’s file manager makes organizing your media powerful and convenient. Support for RSS feeds and Shoutcast streams also make Plex stand out from other media center options.
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