A nifty application was released that allows Mac OSX 10.3.9 (or later) users to Convert any Youtube video into iPod Video at the click of a button. It works in cooperation with the Safari browser so that you can convert YouTube videos into quality iPod video with a simple operation, even allowing you to add videos to your iTunes library.

The simple interface works great, and according to reviewers gives a great video output perfect for any iPod. The only limitations with this version of the program (v1.0) is that you cannot use this application to convert flv files (what YouTube uses) stored on your local computer, and that it doesn't have a progress meter to tell you how much of the video has been converted. Besides that, this program works really well and hopefully requested features such as a progress meter and local flv file support can be added in a later version.

Download: [PodTube v1.0]

Somebody's been poking around Steve Jobs' computer and got a hold of the features of the upcoming Mac OS 10.5 Leopard. The information is not confirmed but that won't stop us from posting it. This is after all the Leak Department. According to the leaked documents (which will put the Mac security system in bad light if proven genuine) the major MacLeopard changelog will be seen in the following:

• Spotlight 2.0
• Dashboard 2.0
• Safari 3.0
• iChat 4.0
• Automator 2.0
• QuickTime 7.2
• Mail 3.0
• iCal 3.0
• Address Book 5.0

See the details of the "supposed" Mac OS changelog after the jump!

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.

Even die-hard PC People will admit that when it comes to viruses, the Mac still rules. According to Symantec, the virus designed to infect Apple machines haven't been created yet (or at least have not been released in the wild). So what makes the Mac OS X immune system so tough?

Apple's Mac OS X operating system is configured to have the most secure default installations of any desktop operating system on the market. And this security can still be boosted by enabling additional features and options within Mac OS X. Here are the  features PC People can only dream about:

Communication Ports
The Mac OS X ships with secured (closed) communication ports providing protection from Internet invaders. When a new Mac is booted for the first time, the Mac OS X goes through Setup Assistant; one part of the Setup Assistant setups an Internet Connection. Mac OS X automatically configures a Mac to connect to the Internet but only users with administrator privileges can open additional ports on an as-needed basis. 

Download Validation
The Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger automatically inspects downloads for safety through a feature called Download Validation. It performs checks against potentially unsafe content. Files downloaded via Safari, iChat, or Mail automatically checks for any application in the download. Any unsafe content triggers the follwing  messages:

• "Are you sure you want to download the application?"
• "Are you sure you want to continue downloading?"
• "The safety of this file cannot be determined. Are you sure you want to download?"

Users have the option to cancel or continue. Without a anti-virus software, Windows is unable to perform this security check.

Attachments
Unlike Windows, attachments sent via e-mail or through programs such as iChat are not opened automatically but go through the download validation for security check. It is up to the Mac user to open unknown files manually.

While Apple provides out-of-the-box security for the Mac, it can still be tweaked to make it even tougher for the nasty bugs to penetrate. Make sure the Firewall is enabled and only enable the needed Services. Disable automatic login and enable password for access.

And finally, although it's not found on the Mac, always enable common sense. Don't download files from websites you cannot trust and do not open arbitrary and random email attachments.

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 ‘technology preview’ 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 Shiira’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.

Aren't you glad that we live in a day and age that embraces individuality. To each his own-whatever floats your boat-your cup of tea lifestyle also transcends to our web life. Please, do not accept default as the norm. That is simply unacceptable.

Let us take for example the OS X Safari. Others may dismiss it and go for a Firefox instead. After all, with its extensibility, growing user base, near flawless page rendering and open source nature, it is proving to be quite a challenge for its competitors and a win-win situation for users. However, one thing that Safari can boast of is its browser load time and page rendering that Firefox doesn't even come close to.

Just remember that sometimes the most bland outfit can be pulled off using the right accessories. Details are key. Same with these very useful applications, you can use to make your Safari the most happening browser out there.

Inquisitor 2.6

David Watanabe's Inquisitor, offers both live search and recommended search terms in this integrated search bar that provides quick access to popular search engines. You can also make a custom search string, making it convenient for you to create custom search shortcuts.

Download: [Free Demo of Inquisitor]

Saft

Saft is a Safari Safari plugin to add features like draggable tabs, full-screen browsing, searchable bookmarks and history, URL shortcuts, kiosk mode and more. It has been praised and given high scores by trusted names in the business. It has received a 4 and a half out of five rating from Macworld SF in 2005.

SafariStand for Tiger

It offers quite a hefty sum of features considering it wouldn't cost you a single cent.

• Sidebar (thumbnail tab)
• 'Stand Bar' (Bookmark, History, Side Bar compatible, Simple RSS Reader)
• 'Quick Search'
• 'Stand Serach' - supports Spotlight
• 'Action Menu'
• 'Arrange Tabs'
• 'Site Alteration'
• Intelligent Plug-in blocking
• Original bookmark property (color label, category, comment, rate)
• Syntax coloring in viewed source
• Open "_blank" Link in New Tab

Download: [SafariStand 2.0b14]

Web Inspector

The Web Inspector is the latest addition to the WebKit that lets you browse the live DOM hierarchy in a compact HUD style window, catering to the needs of web developers and WebKit hackers alike.

It has the ability to root the DOM hierarchy when you double click on a node to go deeper. This allows you to easily manage large nested pages and focus on a particular sub-tree with minimal indentation.

Download: [WebKit Latest Version (July 18, 2006)]

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:

• It’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 — 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 – more Mac-like than FireFox
  
• Integration with Mac OS X Standards

Cons:

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

This is one control freak that I'm sure you'd like to keep around. Haiyan Zhang's Master Thesis Project for Interaction Design Institute Ivrea called Control Freaks are devices that you can attach to everyday objects and turn these objects into hosts. Once attached to the host, the device can sense its host's movement, vibration or sound, which is then translated into control functionality for the game. Kind of like how the Wii is.

As part of her thesis presentation, Haiyan, developed two adorable games to demonstrate the concept of Control Freaks on. Her first game, titled Brain candy, uses a chair as a host. The player must then swing from side-to-side to control the movements of the Otzi Brain Monster.

Her second game, Super Safari, instead of using a chair as a host is attached to the actual player, who has to jump around to make Boris Monster jump over the poisonous mushrooms, dodge spiders and capture the little green monster trees.

Yahoo! - which has been accused by Mac users as being totally PC-centric with its Ajax-enabled home page, viewable only by Internet Explorer 6.0 and Firefox 1.5 but not Safari - has updated its YM for Mac OS to Yahoo! Messenger for Mac 3.0 Beta 1. The YM for Mac has a "new look and feel for OS X" and features, Avatars, sounds, and display images. Coming with stealth settings, conferencing, and "New IM" indicator in the OS X dock, 3.0 beta 1 also promises to bring IM with friends that use Windows Live (MSN) Messenger. Max OS X 10.3.9 or later is needed to run the latest YM update. We guess Yahoo! finally realized its better to build bridges than burn them!

In 1995 I purchased a first-generation Apple Power PC 8100. At the time, I worked mostly with music and graphic files, and was certain that the 750 MB hard drive would serve me well for many years...

Today, I have a G4 Graphite model with two hard drives - the original 20 GB and an additional 80 GB. And they are fillin' up fast!

Now, a full hard drive isn't necessarily a bad thing... it means you've been happy and productive. You should be proud of yourself. On the other hand, files of all kinds are not getting any smaller, and frankly, its a pain offloading everything to zip drives and other media - or having to buy a new HD at a moment's notice.

We've rounded up eleven ways for you to give your hard drive a break, check them out in the Full Article!