By Wardy Miller

Almost a year ago Apple released the iPhone, I was one of the guys they filmed standing in line to get one of the new shiny Apple goodies. Steve Jobs said it would be the coolest phone ever, and he didn’t lie. The iPhone 1.0 is the best phone I have ever had. Now at WWDC, Steve has demonstrated, iPhone 2.0 software which looks AWESOME. In addition to that he showed iPhone 3G. The iPhone 3G looks so cool, It should be called the iPhone speed, because that is what it is all about. The blazing fast speed of the 3G network, or GPS, the iPhone v2 is very interesting. Not to mention the super price point of $199.00 for the 8 gig and $299 for the 16 gig.

Now here is my dilemma, and I am hoping that the readers of iBam can help me out. Even though I already have an iPhone, how do I justify to my wife the need for me to get a new iPhone? What about you? Do you have an iPhone v1? Are you going to get a v2 iPhone. 

If you plan to pass on the iPhone, what is stopping you? 

Today was the day that many people have been talking about, and that was the keynote at this years WorldWide Developers Conference in San Francisco.  Speculation has been growing for months about a new version of the iPhone, and just in the last couple of weeks there has been many rumors about .Mac being updated and rebranded.  Well it seems both of those were confirmed today in the keynote by Steve Jobs.

First up is the .Mac rebranding, which is now called MobileMe.  Aside from the name change this seems to be a significant update to the service.  One of the biggest surprises for me was the fact that this service will now sync with Windows, including Outlook.  I still need to catch up with all the features, but basically it’s a huge way to sync all your mail, contacts, calendars, and more between your Mac, iPhone, and even the PC.  A guided tour is available which gives a great overview of what’s new.  It will be available in July and I for one can’t wait to get my hands on it.
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Adobe has really been pushing online services lately.  We had the release of Photoshop Express and now the beta for Buzzword is now open for business.  When you think of online documents you think of Google Documents, but Buzzword is aiming to make its own presence known in the online word processing game.  Buzzword is also part of the Acrobat.com beta, which is a web-based suite of online services aimed at users who want to create and share documents on the web.

Buzzword is free to use, but you will have to signup for an Acrobat.com account, or you can use an existing Adobe account if you already have one.   I have been using it with both Safari and Firefox, and the loading of the interface and documents just seemed slow compared to similar services.  It has all the standard features you would expect to find in a word processor, and the interface is clean, although I personally didn’t find the dark background easy to work with.  Creating and editing documents was a snap, and it seemed to handle images and text placement well.  
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By: Wardy Miller
A couple of weeks ago I wrote an article, extolling the virtues of Bento, the personal database. Since that time I was asked by the Filemaker folks to take a look at Filemaker Pro. I must say I am quite impressed. FileMaker Pro Version 9 will run on Mac, (ahem Windows) and across the web. 

Running your own business can be overwhelming. People to meet, things to do, inventory, projects, and so forth. Many of the tools used to manage these tasks are templates that you are presented with upon starting Filemaker the first time. 

I am one of those people who could find a ton of uses for databases, but I am too lazy to create one, FileMaker Pro is a godsend. I am able to create a project management database with the click of a button, and can begin inputing data immediately, without having to manually create the database and the form before I can do any work.

FileMaker Pro is loaded with plenty of templates, to get you started quickly. This version can handle anything from inventory management to email campaigns. This product is a very robust and capable database. Manipulation of the pre defined templates is effortless, and there is not much database knowledge needed. 

As I stated previously, I am from a windows environment, and have had cause to use MS Access as well as MS-SQL. Neither come close to the simplicity of Filemaker. If I was starting a business or coming into a business to consult, Filemaker would be on the top of my list of recommendations. However I must add, if you are STRICTLY a home user Bento is a better way to go. 

The Bottom line:
If you are a business owner, and want to use a Mac for your business machine, FileMaker Pro is a can’t miss. 

One of my “hobbies” is customizing my computers and electronics to my own style. It can be as simple as a wallpaper change all the way to a complete change of the user interface. My iPhone is another piece of electronics that gets my attention when it comes to personalization, but unfortunately there aren’t too many ways to alter the look asides from re-arranging some icons and changing the wallpaper. I also have a couple of other cell phones around the house belonging to various family members, and they always want wallpapers made for their phone too, so I went looking for a solution.
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