I was recently re-installing VMWare Fusion, as it’s very handy to have an installation of Windows around to test websites and what not. While setting up the Virtual Machine, I wondered, “What other OSes could I install while I’m at it?”

I poked around the internet a while and found gOS (Good OS), which apparently started as something installed on netbooks you could buy at Walmart. It doesn’t have anything to do with Google directly, but some of their higher ups are former Google higher ups. Everything in gOS is geared towards two things: the internet, and open source. It comes bundles with quick access to every Google app invented, and I’m guessing it could very easily be installed on a flash drive for a quick and easy portable desktop. It’s a very small, easily portable OS where all your files – documents, calendars, contacts, pictures, etc – are stored on your Google account, easily accessible from any computer with an internet connection.

As a graphic designer, though it wouldn’t really give me the on-the-go editing power of a MacBook Pro (though it does come bundled with an OpenSource GIMP editor!), for a business-type machine, or for someone who really only needs to keep in touch and get things done, gOS would be an awesome thing to have on any one of the little netbooks that are so popular these days.

Download and play with VMWare, Parallels, or an old computer here.

At the Worldwide Developer’s Conference in San Francisco, Apple announced that they would indeed be allowing developers to create third-party applications for the yet-to-be released iPhone. People were wondering if they’d do it at all, so it came as a big surprise to learn that the phone would be open, and an even bigger surprise that it’ll be done with AJAX!

If you’re unfamiliar with AJAX, it’s a collection of web technologies (aka Web 2.0) that aims to make the web experience more like a desktop experience. Instead of loading a new page every time you click a link, information is pulled directly into the one you’re looking at. Other things like image resizing pop-up windows and sliding tabs are some other examples of what can be done with AJAX.

So with this announcement, it shouldn’t be any shocker that Apple.com has become what must be the single largest Web 2.0 website of any major company. They’ve got it all: dynamically loaded content, unobtrusive popups, slider bars, tabs… and my favorite, a Spotlight-like search bar right on top of every page.

Go marvel at the spectacle that is the web-to-be at Apple.com.

If you’ve got a Bluetooth-enabled Mac and a Bluetooth-enabled phone or PDA, you’re one step closer to enjoying a taste of the future!

I was able to use Home Zone, now in public beta, to set it up so whenever I walked away from my computer, the screen saver kicked in, and whenever I came back, it played my very own theme song. Home Zone allows you to set different actions for when a particular device leaves and enters the “zone”, allowing you to trigger all kinds of things via proximity, the way the future is supposed to be.

Want a program to be waiting for you when you walk up to the computer? Do you feel you need your own personal theme song? Want to lock up your machine when you walk away from it so no one else can see your fascination with ABBA? Download a copy of Home Zone and let your imagination run buckwild with all the possibilities!

I had the great privilege to attend MacWorld this year compliments of my employer, and I’m happy to bring back reports from the field. Some of my photos are a little blurry, but let’s just pretend that adds to the magic and mystery of Macworld. Click below for the full story!

Obviously the big announcement was Apple’s iPhone. One of my personal favorite things about the iPhone is how Apple psyched everyone out, completely. Normally, the weekend before Macworld, everyone knows everything, but this year was different. There were rumors, sure, but no one could say with certainty what exactly was coming. If you watch the keynote stream on Apple, you’ll hear people freak out, but only if you were there could you catch the collective aroma of the Mac faithful pooping their pants in unison.
You can learn about the phone’s crazy features at the Apple website, but I’m going to point one important thing that may have been overlooked. One of the most genius pieces of info Steve gave was that the phone has no buttons. Why doesn’t it have any buttons? Well, why should it? If you want to add a new feature to a phone and you’ve locked yourself into a particular configuration, you’re going to have to spend the money to get a new design worked out for your next release. With Apple’s design, it’s infinitely scalable – you can make it whatever you want, or whatever you need to. Genius.

Another interesting bit of the convention was the Microsoft Office 2008 Sneak Peek. Ok, I lied. It wasn’t entirely interesting. Word 2008 looks like Pages in iWork ‘06. Designer templates, auto-popping-up guides for alignment, and even an ‘inspector’ icon. Did they not copy enough of OS X in Vista?

And in the same vein, I was fortunate enough to check out the presentations of Adobe’s CS3 betas, including Lightroom. Yes, it looks a lot like Aperture. It’s pretty slick though, and seemed to be working really nice, but overall the interface looked pretty much just like Aperture! Does Apple have Adobe, and Microsoft, scared to the point where they need to play catch up? Don’t make it like Apple… make it your own, and make it better!

The last really interesting thing I saw was the ModBook, a MacBook modification created by Axiotron and OWC. If you haven’t heard of it yet, the ModBook is a modification by which your awesome MacBook is turned into an awesome tablet Mac. Andreas Haas, co-founder of Axiotron, gave a great introduction and demo of the ModBook during the unveiling. Essentially, it’s a MacBook with a Wacom tablet underneath the screen… everything else is stock. The modification process is “non-destructive” in that the case mod doesn’t change anything on the computer that can’t be changed back. Everything else is the same, with the addition of a GPS receiver. They had some artists and photographers on hand to demo the tablet in context, but if you’ve used a Wacom tablet before, it’s basically that, but right on the screen.

So, those were the highlights of Macworld’s opening day. No doubt the announcement of the iPhone overshadowed pretty much anything else that happened that day, but if you’d like to check out pictures of the rest of the show, click here to see the gallery.

Check out Apple’s website and scroll to the bottom to witness the quiet change.

Welcome to 2007, indeed!

Check out the Japanese versions of the Apple v. Mac ads here. Note that the Mac doesn’t come across as a smug cockey hipster like in the US ads!

I love Aperture.

If you take a good amount of photos with your digital camera, and love organization, Aperture is for you. Like iPhoto, you can rate your photos, and keep Smart Albums, but you can also take your organization to a whole new level with a robust Keyword system as well as keeping “stacks”. Another great feature I love is the Master vs. Version model. Aperture uses what’s called “non-destructive” editing, meaning that your original files are never altered. When you make adjustments, the changes are saved in a little bit of text that acts as a recipe for the computer to show you what you’ve done, allowing you to make tons of versions and save crazy amounts of hard drive space!

I could go on and on about the many wonders Aperture has to offer, but what I’m really happy about is Connected Flow’s FlickrExport for Aperture. FlickrExport for iPhoto was the easiest and most straightforward way to get your pictures to flickr, and it was the added feature I missed most when I made the switch.

But now, no longer do I have to live in sorrow! Thanks Connected Flow!

Click the flier below for more information. Be there, or be quadrilateral!

Via Craftzine

A few good men posted some videos made for Microsoft starring Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant of The Office, and they are seriously every bit as painful and great as the show itself!

Rickey Gervais for Microsoft UK at Coolzor

I was looking through my stats recently, just to see if traffic had spiked following TypeCon 2006 in Boston. You see, I developed an awesome flash placeholder site as well as built the framework for the existing site, and as a thank you, the good people of The Board™ gave me a half-page ad in the back of the TypeCon program (which was printed by the Kodak Creative Network, and looked stunning for something off of a digital press)

I hadn’t checked the stats in a long time, and while I didn’t see a spike in traffic, I discovered something exciting: random strangers all over the internet are using my graphics all over the place. I AM INTERNET FAMOUS. People all over myspace are using my sketches in their profiles and comments! One myspacer even used a sketch as their page’s background, which I should say is quite an honor.

There are also links on various blogs and journals on Livejournal and Xanga, but Myspace is my biggest customer. I’m not sure how things like this spread, but it’s a very nice feeling to be internet famous… you might as well head over to the Official LRHB Industries Glitter Graphics page though and do it up proper instead of linking up on the sly!

The latest, and by no means the last, evidence of MySpace’s matriculation into “Staple of Pop Culture” status is Gym Class Heroes‘ jammy jam ‘New Friend Request’. Good production and good hip hop flava’ make the song actually enjoyable!

Check out the video here in streaming Quicktimey goodness.

Found through my favorite papercraft blog Paper Forest, this site has some great examples of Edo-era (1603-1867) papercrafts that you can download and assemble yourself.

The 8 scenes available for download represent various Japanese port cities: Kobe, Ama, Sakai, Osaka, Wakayama, Maizuru, Hidaka, and Shimozu.

I’m definitely going to make these the first chance I get, but they’re as beautiful to look at on paper as they are constructed. If your Japanese is a little rusty, the links next to the red box are Hi-res and Lo-res versions of the pieces, and the links next to the blue box are instructions.

Enjoy!

You know, I’m not a big gamer. I grew up in the arcades, and sure, I had a Nintendo, but these days, I’m not so much into video games. Wii though, wants to change my mind.

In a pretty great 5-page exclusive preview, TIME is invited to check out Nintendo’s latest before its big announcement at E3. Some highlights from the article are quotes from Satoru Iwata, president of Nintendo:

“The one topic we’ve considered and debated at Nintendo for a very long time is, Why do people who don’t play video games not play them?” Iwata has been asking himself, and his employees, that question for the past five years. And what Iwata has noticed is something that most gamers have long ago forgotten: to nongamers, video games are really hard.”

[ . . . ]

“Nintendo threw away the controller-as-we-know-it and replaced it with something that nobody in his right mind would recognize as video-game hardware at all: a short, stubby, wireless wand that resembles nothing so much as a TV remote control. Humble as it looks on the outside, it’s packed full of gadgetry: it’s part laser pointer and part motion sensor, so it knows where you’re aiming it, when and how fast you move it and how far it is from the TV screen.”

[ . . . ]

Few details were to be had about the upcoming CRAFT, from the creators of MAKE magazine, but the signs were everywhere. After talking to a few folks about it, it seems they’re going to make something in the same DIY spirit of MAKE, but focusing on the crafty elements, from knitting to screenprinting to who knows what! Keep an eye on the brand spanking new CRAFT page over at makezine.com for mo’ fo’ one one as it becomes available:

CRAFT: Make Cool Stuff

I’ll start though by saying thank you to everyone who purchased stuff from me, Polly Danger, or Style Recycled, and thanks to everyone for being so gosh darned friendly and making the weekend fun fun fun! Everything there was super inspirational, and I hope to see each and every one of you again at Bazaar Bizarre LA or some other craft fair soon!

If you need to get a hold of me with any questions or comments, feel free to email me at: me [at] lrhb [dot] org.

As always, great pictures from the community can be found at flickr here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/makerfaire/