So, just how do you override DNS for a hosts file under OS X? This was the question I was asked yesterday when trying to debug a problem for some friends, and I had to go do some research, because I wasn't sure of the answer. The root of the …

Two companies talked about icon management software for the Macintosh today. Both use an "iPhoto-type" interface, including single-windows and light-weight categorization. However, only one of them is currently available. Chicken Byte announced IconBox, which is available for download as a demo and retails for $12.85. IconFactory has announced on …

CNET reports that Norwegian software company Opera has returned to the Mac with a new version of their browser. But, will it compete with Apple's Safari?

If you have more than one Macintosh or are just getting a bit stingy on disk space (seeing as you have 20-30GB of iPod tunes), you may be wondering how you can play back songs on your iPod while it is connected to your Macintosh. Here are the helpful hints …

NASA's TetrUSS fluid dynamics simulation software is now released for the Macintosh. Even if you aren't interested in the package itself, the comments on "Why MacOS X?" are nice to see.

Even if you're not a Macintosh enthusiast, you have to admire Daniele Procida who took an old PowerBook 5300 and turned it into a working computer by enshrining it in a new case made of... Lego. The full article from the BBC News is worth a read (especially since it …

As the number of media switchers continues to appear to climb, this Matrix- styled article from CBS News is a fun, if not entirely informative read. Warning, your Windows friends probably won't like it, because he likes the Mac and loves the iPod

If you're a Mac person who wants to use AutoCAD, read this article from MacCentral. It tells you how to state your opinion to the folks looking in to the AutoCAD release.

I didn't realize it until I did a google search this morning, but apparently this is breaking news. According to a presentation given at the E3 workshops yesterday, the US Army is bringing the popular brand-building "simumercial" (America's Army) to the Macintosh and Linux. There is no announced date yet …

An article in the New York Times runs over some of the more amusing aspects of the long-standing Apple-Microsoft debate over innovation. Many who saw news stories from last week's conference noted that the "revolutionary" HP computer that was being shown off looked like a combination of the 1st and …

I've been wondering what it would take to upgrade the disk drives in an Xserve. Since Apple charges an arm and a leg for the 180GB replacement drives, that just wasn't a reasonable option. So, I set out with an 8MB cache 200GB drive and a pocket screwdriver to see …

Book (and web) publisher O'Reilly has announced the second MacOS X Innovators Contest. The contest ends June 16, 2003 and winners will be announced in July.

Want to see what Phil's team put together without taking a screwdriver to your brand new Airport Extreme Basestation? Today's your lucky day. A chap in the UK has taken his apart so you don't have to.

An article on MacFixit this morning tells of a test carried out using the OS X 10.2.6 incremental (6MB) and combo (86MB) updaters from Apple. The author claims that there 2800 files that are different after installing each on two identical copies of 10.2.5. From this …

For those of you who use NFS (the Network File System) under OS X for file sharing, here is a hint from MacOS X Hints that describes how to improve performance. The key is an old unix trick of doubling the number of NFS daemons running on the machine in …

Apple has updated the eMac computers (the only models with CRTs) today. The new machines run from $799 (800MHz G4/128MB/40GB/CD) to $1299 (1GHz G4/256MB/80GB/DVDR) for the standard configurations with up to 1GB RAM available in build to order. The new machines are also Airport …

After switching to an Apple PowerBook last year, InfoWorld reporter Tom Yager is planning on making his switch permanent and following it up with a change in servers. His plan is to move to an OS X-running XServe, followed by adding a second one in a cluster. According to Yager …

After a long wait, the folks at DiVX.com have released the Macintosh version of the DiVX software for encoding and decoding movies. For those unfamiliar with the format, it claims to provide DVD-quality for a fraction (1/10th to be precise) of the space. In the past, the Macintosh …

iMimic has announced that it is moving it's Reactor product line to the Macintosh. Their products provide edge caching as well as streaming in order to goose up the performance of web services.

Are they real? We won't ever really know, but the folks at MacBidouille have been known to be rather prescient in the past. However, they are a very Mac-happy bunch, so it might just be propaganda or wishful thinking. Their latest story contains benchmarks from a series of supposed 970-based …