Recently we posted the release of Parallels Desktop for Mac build 3036 Beta. The amazing software allows Apple users to run Windows side by side with Mac OS X in a secure, isolated, virtual machine. Since its release, word-of-mouth buzz says the app is quite a killer. Video blogger Michael Verdi took Parallel Desktop for a test drive and it's safe to say he is now a fan calling it "super cool."

Using a MacBook Pro 2GHz core duo, system 10.4.8 with 2GB RAM, Verdi launched Parallels with several other programs including one that recorded the screencast. In the screencast Verdi demos Firefox and IE, Notepad, and copying from Windows to Mac and vice versa. Watch the screencast and see for yourself.

By the way if you haven't downloaded Parallels, you can do so right here. But remember this is just a beta version. Do not install it into the production environment and it is highly recommended to make a backup of your virtual machines before trying it out.

Download: [Parallels Desktop Screencast]

Inquisitor series of search helpers for Safari">David Watanabe, you rule. Seriously. You've been developing the Inquisitor to the point that many tech savvy Safari users probably think it's already part of their system. Lucky for Safari folk, there's a new version out now.

The new version, Inquisitor 3.0, is currently on beta 1 stage. Now, if you don't know what it is, Inquisitor helps you search for whatever it is you're looking for on Safari. It'll predict what you're typing and suggest particular sites depending on what you're looking for. It has an auto-complete function for the words you might be searching, so you can skip some thought processes if you feel like it. Best of all is the ability to customize it by adding search engines to Safari.

Now, if you're wondering what's so great about it besides that, you also have to realize it's stylish, and looks good on a Mac interface. Of course, it probably won't work on a Firefox browser with a Mac interface, but that's beside the point. It's got the same functionality as previous versions of Inquisitor, but this time, it's free.

You can't go wrong with free, can you? If you're interested, don't hesitate to say hi to the developer. Let us know if you like the add-on as well, alright?

You can never be too rich or too thin, but one sure can overload on passwords! So how do you make it hard for hackers and ID thieves to crack into your accounts without overwhelming your brain cells? You can use the same password for all your web-based accounts, which is the Dodo bird's way of doing things, since you can just imagine the damage if someone got hold of that single password.

1Passwd for the Mac OS X frees your mind from memorizing hundreds of user IDs and passwords. The app manages all your passwords for you with just a single password to unlock all your accounts. But isn't that the same thing as the Dodo way?

Not at all. 1Passwd stores all information into its built-in Keychain. This allows you to switch between browsers without divulging your information. You can also synchronize 1Passwd keychain to your Mac to manage your passwords across machines.

The app is the first password manager and form filler for the Mac OS X platform and it is designed to work with

• Safari
• Firefox
• Camino
• Flock

If you want to test drive 1Passwd, download the free version. Drag the 1Passwd.app file into the Applications folder and run it from there. If you like it, you can purchase the license code. Single user retails for US$ 29.95. The Family License costs US$ 39.95 and can be used by up to three users in the same household.

Download: [1Passwd Free Version]

Mac users have been longing for a new browser, something a bit out of the ordinary. The current high flyers in the Mac browser business are of course the likes of Safari, Mozilla Firefox and Flock. Now it's time for something new, and that's where the Shiira 2.0 Browser comes in. Shiira 2.0 is currently a Beta release and so is not technically a full release yet, but of course we are here to give you a run-down on the new kid on the Mac browser market. We featured Shiira 2.0 alpha way back in July and you may want to compare that to what we have now - there have been huge improvements!

Here's a list of what Shiira 2.0 Beta features:

• A Nice design - Shiira has been designed with practicality in mind, and has everything in the right places.

• Full screen browsing - This allows you to see everything a website has to offer at the perfect resolution for your monitor. No more annoying toolbars or scroll bars to get in your way, just you, the website and your Shiira.

The rest of the article awaits after the jump!

Download: [Shiira 2.0 Beta]

According to Market Share, Apple Computer's Safari browser is continuing to fight it's way through the Internet browser arena, taking on the likes of Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft's Internet Explorer to rise by 46% year-over-year. Safari remains the third most popular browser with Internet Explorer topping the charts and Firefox taking second place but the statistics are much in Safari's favor.

In August 2005, Safari's market share was 2.20 percent.  In August 2006, its market share comes in at 3.21 percent.  The rise from 2.20 to 3.21 represents a year-over-year growth of 46 percent for the month of August.  In July 2006, Safari had a 3.18 percent market share and experienced a 0.94 percent increase in just one month. Of course, as you will know the Safari browser is only available on Mac OS X, leading some critics to believe that Safari's market share is directly related to an increase in Mac sales.

Of course, Mac sales have increased, particularly after the integration of Intel-chips into Macs but what critics don't take into account are those who have switched from Firefox and Internet Explorer (especially after Microsoft stopped updating IE for Macs) to Safari as the browser has improved. Whatever the reason, Safari's market share is likely to increase again as browser developers feel the full-force of the Intel Mac.

Apple Company is making things a bit easier for users of video iPod, MAC and PlayStation Portable (PSP) who want to amp their playlists. It does so by acknowledging a new shareware application from Stinkbot.com.

Internet utility TubeSock grabs online YouTube Videos and damps them into your system. The software is no-hassle as it converts the videos on its own, choosing the best codecs and bitrates for each device. Those who don't have video iPod can also use TubeSock as it allows grab audio only option as well. And since it already uses MP3 format, loss in audio fidelity should not be a problem.

Other features include Preview Playback, Safari and Firefox integration, and Front Row compatible. Below, a trial version is available for download that converts the first 30 seconds only. Registration and payment for the product is $15.

Download: [TubeSock]

Sometimes, you never really know what you'll find in a thrift store.

Adam Guha recently picked up a 25$ iMac from a thrift shop, amid bulky CPU towers and 10-year old PCs. Not knowing even the kind of Mac he picked up, he booted it up and found a six-year old iMac DV Special Edition in pretty sweet shape. After a bit of tinkering with the OS and adding a mouse and keyboard, he realized it would be the perfect upgrade to his grandparents' Performa 630, a Apple creation from the early 1990s.

The iMac itself was a big step up from the Performa. Unlike the Performa, the Mac had USB ports to use with digital cameras and printers. It was also DVD-capable, which is definitely a bonus. Since it also only needed two cords, a power cord and a cable cord, this replacement was also going to be a lot friendlier to grandma and grandpa than their previous comp. Of course, it needed a bit more functionality, so he added the latest versions of Safari and Firefox as well.

With far more features than their old computer, all Adam needed to sell the idea of the new Mac to his grandparents was to add their favorite game or two. Of course, if they weren't going to get on the internet to email their grandkids, it was still going to be a great computer for a solid game of solitaire.

With the coming of newer and more complex gadgets these days, we tend to forget how overwhelming it can be for people who are new to it. Buying some old, but not obsolete, computers and sprucing them up can sometimes help to close that gap between newcomers and average users.

Who knows? You may just end up getting the family together to mod a computer for grandma.

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.

The team behind Macintalk conducted their 4th test of the four major browsers for the Mac OS X namely Safari, Firefox, Camino, and OmniWeb, and they have noticed several improvements on almost all the browsers. The browsers were judged based on RAM usage, loading speed, RSS support, and PDF viewing.

The editor's choice: Safari. Firefox is a great browser for Windows or Linux. On a Mac, you're better off with Safari, WebKit, and OmniWeb, which are not only more Mac-like, but also faster and more efficient. FireFox fans love it for the extensive support for extensions but the review team say it's a subjective decision. To help you decide, here are the test results summary:

Firefox

Pros:

• Cool feature: extensive support for plugins, themes, and add-ons
  
• Acceptable support for CSS and Web Standards compared to IE

Cons:

• ItÂ?s ported to OS X and not a native browser
  
• It uses Gecko, which performs horribly on Mac OS X
  
• Windows-style buttons and UI elements
  
• Can be slow at times

OmniWeb Beta

Pros:

• Uses latest WebKit framework
  
• Cool feature: Interesting sidebar tabs function
  
• You can set preferences for each web page
  
• Saves browsing sessions
  
• Shared bookmarks

Cons:

• Costs money Â? who wants to pay for a browser?

Safari/Safari WebKit

Pros:

• Cool feature: Built-in DOM inspector
  
• Nightly build available with latest WebCore

Cons:

• Nightly Build is sometimes unstable
  
• Plug-in architecture is crappy

Camino

Pros:

• Based on Cocoa Â? more Mac-like than FireFox
  
• Integration with Mac OS X Standards

Cons:

• It uses Gecko, which performs horribly on Mac OS X

YahooÂ?s own Graded Browser Support may have rated Apple's Safari "an A-graded browser" for achieving the highest level of support with the Yahoo interface library. But  the company released a preview of its Ajax-enabled home page only for Internet Explorer 6.0 and Firefox 1.5. Not surprisingly, Yahoo's act was met with bristling hostility from Apple fans. One developer  in particular described it as "highly disappointing and disillusioning" and "just plain wrong."

"The only logic one can use to justify such a move is based on a totally PC-centric viewpoint, which argues that only Windows users are worth troubling with, since they comprise the vast majority of potential viewers," said Leland Scot in an article on the topic posted on Musings from Mars. "But this is precisely the viewpoint that must cease if Web 2.0 is to become the fertile melting ground for truly cross-platform interdependence that it wants to be. ItÂ?s simply not the viewpoint of any company that really cares about Berners-LeeÂ?s vision or about the millions of users on platforms other than the virus- and malware-riddled mess that is Microsoft Windows today."

By the way Sir Timothy "Tim" John Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web and director of the World Wide Web Consortium once said "Anyone who slaps a Â?this page is best viewed with Browser XÂ? label on a Web page appears to be yearning for the bad old days, before the Web, when you had very little chance of reading a document written on another computer, another word processor, or another network.Â?

Furthermore, Scot said Web 2.0 sites "should be built to open standards, and any catering to specific browser extensions should be avoided. If proprietary extensions are utilized, they should have no effect on the siteÂ?s core functionality, and should not be even noticed by users of other browsers. For example, IÂ?ve employed a harmless extension to the HTML text input field that Apple developed in order to beautify search forms in Safari. ItÂ?s nice for Safari users, but has no impact on IE users or on Firefox users on any platform."

Looks like Yahoo stirred a hornets nest and the pissed hornets are not holding back on the sting!