Previously called Textpander, the TextExpander 1.4 for Mac OS X can save you a heck of a lot of time and a chock-full of keystrokes when typing. This application allows you to customize different keystrokes which you assign to your commonly-typed phrases, words, strings, and even programming code!

As illustrated in the picture above, you can set abbreviations (e.g. "wbbr") to print out whole phrases (e.g. "With Best Regards") on your email. This also makes it easier for you to key-in an e-signature, whether it may be text or a GIF of your hand-written signature, or both!

You can even configure the software to auto-correct your commonly "mispelled" words, specifically tailored by you! So, if you can't quite get the hang of "beaureau" or "Misisipee," rest assured that TextExpander has your back covered. The application also allows you to insert current time-and-date tags (in whatever format you prefer) and create keyboard shortcuts for special characters without having to open a separate Special Characters window.

TextExpander 1.4 costs USD 29.95. It might be a bit over-the-top for some of these rather basic functions that some advanced software might already have, but this application will still save you a lot of time in the long-run. See, that's the catch. You might think that the price isn't worth it in the short-term, but long-term-wise, you save a bulk load of time and effort.

Look carefully at the image above. It's actually a screenshot of Tiger Mail, with lozenge and sans lozenge... one is obviously prettier than the other, isn't it?

There has been a recent clamor to remove or at least modify the "lozenge" buttons that are shown when Mac users try to use their Mail program in the Mac Tiger operating system. Many have expressed that it's a major aesthetic flaw and is just plain ugly and should therefore be replaced. However, Apple doesn't seem to have any plans on listening just yet, as the offending lozenge-buttons are apparently also going to be used in the upcoming Mac OS, the Leopard.

Some bright people won't let that get them down, though, as Tristan OÂ?Tierney has come up with the Cage Fighter, a utility program that can remove those unappealing bubbles from your sight. Not only does it remove the bubbles in your Tiger Mail, but it will also allow you to make your Tiger Mail look just like a Panther, should the mood overcome you, just by simply installing the buttons provided into Mail.app.

The changes that are made by this utility are safe and will not change or bust your Mail at all, but will instead just change the images that are used by the mail application.

So say goodbye to them nasty lozenges, and say hello to some eye candy.

WWDC is a conference for Apple developers that gives the company a chance to show them some love while disseminating important information about the next-gen hardware on Apple's launch horizon. There is no live stream coming from the event floor, so minute to minute coverage (complete with pictures) is all there is until Apple makes the footage available after the event.

Mannymix03, a member of our forums, has been kind enough to make up to the minute posts about the event to keep us all informed about the latest happenings at WWDC 2006. So far, so much information has come out of the event that it would be impossible to detail it all here. I will do my best to give you a brief rundown of the important finds that have been discovered thus far.
 
In his usual style, Steve Jobs kicks off the conference with his enthusiastic rundown of what Apple has in store for us in the near future. He began with his usual optimism by quoting record sales figures and mentioning the unprecedented level of penetration that the company is experiencing in the OS market.

After stroking the developers egos by detailing how much of their work Apple sold the previous year, Jobs goes on to discuss the move to utilize Intel chips and the upcoming move into the next generation of Intel chips known as Core 2 Duo. While all the information about new chips and the smart architecture of the new Mac Pro kept folks interested, the news that kept many on the edge of their seats was about Apple's upcoming OS.

After giving Microsoft some of the spotlight by highlighting the ways the Redmond-based giant has appropriated technology from Apple in the past, the details about the OS (Leopard) were released. Along with 64 bit compatibility at the UNIX layer, meaning you can run both 32 and 64 bit applications smoothly and without the aid of emulation, there was mention of a built in backup feature for the OS called Time machine that backs up "everything" in real time. This new feature is not as cut and dry as it seems however. Apparently, with Time machine you get a robust backup system that is capable of full system restores as well as an ala carte system that allows you to bring back just the files that you need.

When integrated with the Finder disk searcher, we are one step closer to having all of our information stored in a searchable database that is backed up in real time. So now you can search for, and find, a file even if you have already erased it! Wonderful! Even I couldn't lose data if I had a set up like this! One of the things that I found a bit surprising was the fact that every copy of the new OS will ship with Time Machine, Bootcamp, Photobooth and Front Row and Spaces. Each one of these modules provides functionality, like a virtual desktop (Spaces), photo editing and sharing (Photobooth), music, video and other media (Front Row), that is not included with other operating systems like Vista.

Spotlight, Core Animation and Universal Access are additional applications in the works at Apple. Spotlight allows you to search the drives of all of the Macs in your home from any one of them. Core Animation is a powerful program that allows you to deconstruct media into its various parts (video, music,ect) and manipulate it into a new creation. Universal Access is designed to allow all people, whether blind, or otherwise disabled, to use their new Mac with ease. With all the new software being developed and hardware changes galore happening at Apple, you'd think that they would be the ones with all the delays and shoddy releases instead of Microsoft!

Mail, Dashboard and iCal have also been updated and changed! Stationary, Notes and To Do's to mail have been integrated into the new email system that will come with the new OS. Dashboard has over 2500 widgets and with Dashcode users can easily create their own customized widgets. With Web Clip and Dashcode you can turn any part of a website into a widget that will update every day keeping you in the know with your favorites on the web. Then there's iChat and iPhoto, which are integrated and will offer multiple logins, invisibility, animated buddy icons, video recording and tabbed chats.

This is near information overload here so I suggest that you digest this as quickly as you can then can come back and get some more! The conference is more than three days long so you can be certain that Jobs and Co. will continue to hit us with surprises well into this week!

Finally, for those with short attention spans, here is a brief list of the key innovations that were revealed this morning:

• 64-bit
• Core animation
• Universal access
• Enhanced parental controls (who cares about that?)
• iCal
• The complete package
• mail
• Spotlight
• Dashboard
• Web Clip and Dashcode
• Announcing Xcode 3 at the afternoon session
• Spaces
• Time Machine
  

Keep an eye out for updates to follow. For those who got their appetites whet and are looking for ways to satisfy their "Apple" craving, check out the video of the conference's Keynote Address delivered by Apple top honcho, Steve Jobs.

Shiira is a web browser based on Web Kit and written in Cocoa. The goal of the Shiira Project is to create a browser that is better and more useful than Safari. In case you missed it Safari "won" the 4th Mac OS X browsers test conducted by Macintalk beating Firefox, OmniWeb, and Camino. The project is about to release Shiira v2.0 and here is the Â?technology previewÂ? of the upcoming browser: 
 
So far, the reviewer doesn't think Shiira v2.0 is not ready for daily use since some key features are still not available in the prototype. Among them are the Growl and RSS support, the management and creation of custom search engines, the ability to display Safari / Firefox bookmarks using ShiiraÂ?s built-in bookmark parser and the export bookmarks as html function. But then again the browser update isn't ready for general release at this point. The finished product, however, is expected to sport the following features:

• Tab Exposé
  
• Tabbed Browsing
• PageDock - Tab Thumbnails
• FullScreen Mode
• Preference Pane
• The Shelf

Although the project's mission of creating a better browser than Safari, Shiira is evolving into a simple yet powerful alternative to all major browsers. With a little more polish Shiira v2.0 will be ready to takes its place on Mac's desktop although that will probably take months.

Widgets are fun but were designed to be functional. Now, if you're like most Apple People (the one's who are not widget pack rats, anyway), you probably install the widget first before running it to see if it is something that serves your need. If the answer is no, you go through the uninstall process, unless you don't mind sifting through a sea of widgets on your Dashboard to find the one that you need.

Did you know you can test a widget without installing and uninstalling it? Yes, you can! And here's how. When the widget installer window loads, press and hold Command and Option. This changes the Install button to a Run button:

Hit the Run button and you can use the widget the same way as the "installed" widgets. You can modify settings, move it, view its output plus it appears on the Dashboard and its directory. However, when you close it, the widget wonÂ?t add to clutter your Dashboard bar because it's not there! Just one of those little-known tricks that can make a big difference!

If you're living on planet Earth, regardless of whether you are a Mac fanatic or not, you most probably have heard of Boot Camp. If you haven't, well, welcome to planet Earth and let me brief you on what you've been missing.

Boot Camp lets you install and run the Windows XP operating system on Mac. This ingenious application will burn a CD with all the Mac-specific drivers for Windows - graphics, networking, audio, AirPort wireless, Bluetooth, the Eject key (on Apple keyboards), and brightness control for built-in displays. This CD will also install a Startup Disk control panel for Windows.

Now that you have knowledge on what the community has been buzzing about for a while, here's another news for you and the whole Boot Camp lookers-on as well: Apple has just released a new Boot Camp public beta installer.

Sadly, Apple did not divulge what was new in this release. If you do get to try this out, please be kind enough to share the updates with us all via the comments below.

Needed to run Boot Camp are the following:

• Mac OS X 10.4.6 or later
• Intel-based Mac
• The latest firmware update for your Intel Mac
• A genuine installation disc for Microsoft Windows XP, Service Pack 2, Home or Professional (no multi-disc, upgrade or Media Center versions)
• A blank recordable CD

Download: [Boot Camp public beta installer]

We earlier featured the first episode of the oh-so-many ways to Pimp your App. The first installment focused on HandBrake and HandBrake Lite, but the second episode focuses on another Mac app which is said to be one of the best freebies around-- the multi protocol chat application, Adium. Phill Ryu and his friends are at it again, this time he aims to add some color to your Adium. If you plan on using these designs, make sure that you are using the Adium 1.0 beta for optimal results.

First off in the list of things to amp is the application icon. Yes, we all love that innocent-looking green duck, but with these designs by Adam, you can change the color of your duck-- you can make it blue, black, red, yellow, and violet. Pretty cute right? To use the colored ducks, double click on the .Adiumicon files in the Â?Dock iconsÂ? folder of the download, and you can install them from within the app. The Â?awayÂ? and Â?idleÂ? sign posts acn be dropped into the Â?Shared Dock Icon ImagesÂ? folder within AdiumÂ?s resources. (Control click Adium, select Â?show package contentsÂ?, navigate to the Â?resourcesÂ? folder).

Next in the list is the preferences. Again, with the help of his friend Adam, they offered new set of icons which brings out the uniqueness of the app. To use it, Drop all included files into AdiumÂ?s resources folder (control click Adium, select Â?show package contentsÂ?, navigate to the Â?resourcesÂ? folder). If youÂ?re just giving this a spin, I would recommend keeping a backup of the app handy to revert.

Then, the quacking menu. Adium includes a pretty solid menubar item used for status switching, selecting ongoing conversations, and viewing unread message status in a glance. But Adam again thought that it didnÂ?t quite match the colors of the rest of the systemwide menu items. In addition, he felt that the icon took a bit too much space, so he fixed it. Also, you can also get the Adiumy Smiley, made by Adam of course.

Download: [Pimp Your Adium]

Looks like this Apple Person who is also a Wii Fanboy isn't waiting for the official launch of Nintendo's next-gen console. Nope, he just went ahead and made the Wiimote Widget for the Mac OS 10.4 Tiger.

The ode to Wii widget is still limited in function but clicking on the A button takes you to Nintendo's web site. "What more could anyone want?" says its maker. Can we click on another button and tell us when the Wii will finally hit the stores and how much it will set us back?

Download: [Wiimote Widget for Mac OS 10.4 Tiger]

If you have a strange gut feeling that your boyfriend or girlfriend is cheating on you, but you can't just find any proof, then maybe this little trick using Quartz Composer will be of some assistance. It only works if you have Tiger and an iSight or another webcam.

Quartz Composer is a development tool provided with Mac OS X v10.4 for processing and rendering graphical data. There are only two components to this trick - the video input and the billboard to render it. Now what you do is drag a line from the video's input "Image" on to the Billboard's "Image" input. After that, use the inspector to set the width to two.Export this to a QuickTime movie, 320x240. Since only one application can use your camera at a time, you'll have to close Quartz Composer for QuickTime to play the video. When you like what you have done, just embed it in HTML. I'm sure he/she will make a confession in no time.

This splendid, award-winning application from Washington based Flying Meat Inc., is a personal wiki that allows people to richly link information on their desktop the same way a community wiki links information across the internet. Drag and drop folders, images, applications, or URLs into VoodooPad and they're linked up just like on the web.

Features:

• Open multiple tabs in the same window.
• It can support big documents. Define big? Gigabytes.
• It sheds the drawer and moves content out into easy to use palettes.
• A variety of text styles.
• List and auto-bullets.
• Use Spotlight to do fast searches.
• Save workspaces.
• Click for complete list of features.
  

The features above are only a few of the luscious features of VoodooPad, but if you want to take it to a whole new level, you can easily purchase it for $29.95 or upgrade your existing VoodooPad for only $9.95. But if you've just bought VoodooPad 2.5 on or before May 5th, you get to upgrade the version 3.0 for free.

Download: [VoodooPad v3.0]