andPOP » mac

Account Edge, CANADA, for Mac: Welcomed by CBC’s

Rick Levine — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 02:08:54 +0000

Until now, current Mac Users who wanted to run a pro level accounting software package on the Mac platform in Canada, CBC’s (Canadian Bean Counters), had precious little to choose from. CBC’s could install the US version of AE, however, the effort was, by and large, futile. Not being able to obtain current tax table updates or easily account for and track dual Canadian taxes such as the GST/PST really left MacCanadians, right out in the cold. As of September 2009, Acclivity Software has picked up the ledger, where MYOB/ Account Edge left off in 2001, with the release of a Canadian Edition of Account Edge for Mac. AE for MacCanada, is a number crunching powerhouse with a pretty face, and straightforward enough to grasp. AE verson 13.4.1 is Snow Leopard compatible.

Financial Information at Your Fingertips

If you are installing AE for Mac Canada for the first time, you will find AE to offer a friendly, easy-to-navigate interface. The AE software is ‘Mac like’ and intuitive, affording anyone, with even a little Book Keeping experience and a bit of purserverence, to be ‘in business’ almost immediately. The individual with absolutely no Book Keeping experience will probably have to count on AE’s excellent, knowledgeable support team and the Acclivity’s 30 Days Free Technical Support Service to get up and running. Although it is no simple ‘walk in the park’ for the non Book Keeping types to configure the entire accounting package, once Account Edge for Mac Canada and its selected modules are set up/configured, entering the day to day data is pretty simple and the incredible variety of Reporting features will make the practice worthwhile. Complete up-to-date accounting information, including receivables, quarterly tax remittance amounts (just a fraction of AE’s abilities) will literally be at your fingertips. The practical minded will appreciate AE’s modular approach.

To get started with AE, you would use the AE ‘New Company File Assistant’ to help create an AE data file. To generate this new company data file, you would enter some basic information about your company, such as your Fiscal Year End, Tax Numbers (PST & GST numbers) and Account Lists. Once this Company Data File is created, you can modify the ‘Chart of ACCOUNTS’ that will allow you to keep track of your Assets and Liabilities. For those who aced their way through high school book keeping, it will be a breeze and you will be crunching your company’s financial records in no time at all. If the words ‘Debit and Credit’ used in the same sentence cause you to glaze over, zone out or hyper ventilate, then you will most certainly need to hire the services of a Book Keeper or Accountant (with some computer skills) to get you past any initial barricades. AE provides a link to the a PDF called: Accounting 101 Guide

Massive Power in a Minature Package

The AE online ‘context sensitive’ help system is the next best thing to having a book keeper with Mac computer skills right at your side. Although the Canadian version of AE Mac is packaged in a slender box with a slim ‘Getting Started’ Guide, the Context Sensitive Help system is super impressive. While performing a task, the user can click on the circular, purple ‘Question Mark ICON’ located on the lower left hand corner of the AE home screen to generate Context Sensitive Links leading to answers that were surprisingly well written and more helpful than expected. Flanked by the excellent AE context sensitive help system, the online AE help menu and Acclivity’s telephone/email support, most issues can be resolved effectively. The AE Partner’s Program pledges to provide a list of Certified Book Keeping consultants around the country whose professional level services may be contracted should one be in search this type of assistance. AE provides a number of on-line resources including and ‘Easy Setup Guide’ for users.

There is no Accounting for the Unpredictable – It’s been EIGHT years!

Catching that first glimpse of all of my MYOB/AE data in this newest release of AE was a truly impressive moment – honest! With a little help, I had all my custom designed INVOICE forms printing out as slick as ever from AE v13.4.1. If you are migrating from an earlier version of Account Edge (which is compatible), with the push of a couple of buttons, the upgrade prosess can work seamlessly, but each person’s upgrade experience may vary.

AE is certainly robust enough to be a reliable, full-fledged computer accounting package for small to medium businesses. The program has Eight integrated modules covering Accounts, Banking, Sales, Time Billing, Purchases, Payroll, Inventory and Cards. The BANKING module is where you keep track of your Bank Deposits and Withdrawls. In this MODULE you can accomplish all your banking needs and set the program up, to Print Cheques as well as Reconcile Bank Accounts. The TIME BILLING, PAYROLL, INVENTORY and PURCHASES modules are all pretty much self explanatory and certainly versatile enough to fulfill the requirements of most businesses. You will need to dedicate yourself learning the technical ins and outs of AE and to subscribe to AE’s company updates should you wish to utilize these modules. If you choose to utilize just the SALES module of AE for the purposes of generating INVOICES and keeping track of GST and PST remittances, you will find the REPORTING capabilities of AE to be very helpful. Once properly set up, these handy reporting features are simple to use and quite convenient. Of course you could just stick to using good old EXCEL in order to generate simple numbered invoices, tally the sale totals and tax figures, but AE has style, elegance and provides room to grow in the event you want to take the time to learn integrate and utilize the next module.

The CARD FILE module is certainly the easiest module to understand and to maintain. Most of the other modules rely on the CARD FILE module to function, therefore you would need to make use of and maintain the CARD FILE module even if you only using the SALES MODULE for example. The CARD MODULE is ultimately a real time saver because once you enter the contact information of your Customers and Vendors, repetitious tasks such as creating Invoices and printing cheques can be much less tedious. AE Card File always worked well in the old version and this newest release of AE has been modernized to include email and website information fields so that emailing an invoice is now only a click away. In addition to being able to import customer records from other database programs, the CARD FILE module can also integrate with Apple’s Address Book.

This new release of AE has what is labeled the TASK DRAWER whose usefulness can only be truly appreciated by those who had used a previous version of AE that did not have the TASK DRAWER feature. The TASK DRAWER is a handy sliding module that glides out of the right side of the AE window and is a place to store previous tasks such as a GST Tax report. This is the type of report that has to be generated several times a year and the TASK DRAWER is the place to be able to re generate the report with out having to reconstruct all the technical details. After adding a task to the TASK DRAWER and eventually creating a list of common TASKS, just click on the TASK that you want to generate in the TASK DRAWER, put in the current date parameters and voilà, the report appears. The TASK DRAWER is brilliant and a real time saver.

Crossed Platforms – Will Gates do the Job?

In a perfect world, everyone would be using the same OS (operating system) – preferably Macintosh of course, but it is understandable and certainly of no surprise that WINDOWS is the platform of choice for the Book Keeping/Accounting profession. This compatibility issue is probably not a huge deal in the long run, but the Mac/Windows situation could raise a number of immediate questions: For one, to what extent should this compatibility issue be of concern? Presently, your up-to-day Macintosh AE data file will not be accessible by WUBA’s (Windows Using Book Keepers/Accountants) until a PC version for Canada is released and adopted by the Bean Counting Community.

In the meantime, to bridge the gap, AE has excellent Importing/Exporting features which include the ability to Export/Import directly to EXCEL Spread Sheets. The work around would thus be, to Export any necessary Modular Data Files to EXCEL which is reliably cross platform. You could eMail your exported EXCEL worksheets to your WUBA for inspection and professional analysis, providing your accounting professional with all the numerical information needed to complete your business’ financial records and formal tax submissions.

Attention all CBC’s (Canadian Bean Counters)

For the Canadian Macintosh Business Person in need of a solid, feature rich, modern account program on the Mac, AE and AE Network Edition is a must see program. Time is money, so sharpen your pencil and visit the link below to find out for yourself just how much fun it can be to do your own book keeping, by obtaining the 30 day free trial version of the Account Edge Canada.

Canadian Pride – Aclivity held to account

Why in the world the CANADIAN version of Account Edge Canada is listed on the Account Edge WEBSITE in US funds ($399.00 USD) is something I cannot account for, but it is worth reporting that AE is willing to offer $100 rebate, also in US Funds, to Canadian Mac Users upgrading from any previous version of MYOB or AE.
For further information contact: customer.service@acclivitysoftware.com

An Extra 18 Hours For Mac

Carys Mills — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 14:05:57 +0000

QuickerTek has announced an external battery/charger that will give MacBook Pros an additional 18 hours of battery life.

The product expands the included battery’s capacity for 11.5 to 18 hours. While in use it also charges the internal battery. Users can benefit from the extended battery life during airline flights.

“This new battery and charger not only gives you all-day performance, but it also enables a longer wireless experience, by providing all the extended power needed when mobile. It looks good and it’s easy to carry with you when you travel,” said Rick Estes, QuickerTek president.

“This battery technology is now 25% more dense – so we can pack more into a smaller size.”

The product is three pounds and is available for $499.95 USD.

Review: Suitcase Fusion 2

Rick Levine — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 02:49:53 +0000

The newest release of Suitcase is really exciting and practical, taking advantage of the latest Apple OS technology. Typography is a beautiful thing. With Suitcase Fusion 2, typography becomes a pleasure to work with and responsible font management can resolve many of the common ailments facing Mac users such as poor system performance. A splendid upgrade, the newest version of Suitcase takes advantage of Apple’s newest animation technology as well as Leopard’s modern interface to provide the user with new visual functionality. What iTunes does for cataloging your music selection, SF2 does for activating, previewing and cataloguing your font collection.

SF2 Sports a modern and entirely new user interface. A Font Libraries and Sets Pane is located on the upper left hand side. This is the character based area where you organize your fonts to suit your needs. Located on the lower left is the Attributes Pane where fonts are classified. The Preview Pane is where you will spend most of your time and takes up the central part of the interface. There are numerous ways to preview fonts in SF2 which utilizes some of Apple’s newest and most impressive animation technology. With the Waterfall View all Fonts can be sized with a slider allowing you to zoom in and out of fonts sizes seamlessly. Of course you can type your own text for previews with the Quicktype selection as well in any of the preset views from the drop down menu at the bottom of the Preview Pane.

In terms of new functionality, SF2 has a feature called Floating Previews that is way cool. Floating Previews is a convenience feature that allows you to manipulate your fonts directly from SF2 while working with outside documents. Type any text in the preview pane, grab that preview as a floating panel or ‘tear off’ palette and put it in any outside document you are working on in order to see exactly how it looks on that particular document. The ‘Drag-and-drop your previews into a live document’ feature is just too wild to explain, so take the time to view this on the On Line Demo (third video demo) called ‘Comparing and selecting fonts’.

If you need to use Wingdings, Symbols, Dingbats or fonts that are not of the usual roman characters, you will find The Glyph viewer very useful. The Glyph view allows us to view all if the different characters in a particular font. By hovering over that particular character, additional useful information will become available including how to create that particular character. The ‘Codepoint’ indicates the Key Commands used to create that symbol or dingbat. Adobe Pro Fonts are accommodated in the Glyph view as well by allowing you to view particular portions of the font family, which can be a real time saver in these pro fonts families that have so many variations available. Here is a link to the Apple Key Command Symbols that provide a visual table of the keyboard commands. This ‘key command’ table should be listed in every user manual but never is.

A plug-in based auto activation feature automatically activates fonts needed for a particular document. Font Sense creates a ‘finger print’ of your fonts by applying a unique I.D. to each font in order to activate the exact font you want for a document. For example, there are many versions of Helvetica, and it may be the Adobe version of Helvetica that you actually want to activate instead of the version from Linotype. In addition to Font Sense, the Auto Activation preference panel allows the user to have control over Font substitution, embedded fonts, and entire font families. Duplicate fonts can cause a lot of headaches on the Mac OS. ‘Name duplicates’ are allowed but SF2 will not allow the loading of exact duplicates.

Fonts from Suitcase Fusion can be imported to SF2 so you will not have to re- construct all your existing font sets if you are upgrading. This did not work too well when I was upgrading. During the process an alert box appeared telling me that a particular font on a particular external drive could not be located. In the end I had to re-construct my sets for the upgrade, but ultimately it was time to do some housekeeping anyway.

Suitcase Fusion 2 is a well constructed, solid must have program for every Leopard user. It is hands down, the best version of suitcase ever, with incredibly useful new font management features. Used properly, SF2 will help you manage your fonts effectively and greatly improve the performance of your Macintosh. Download the 30 day free demo online and see for yourself and wonder how you ever lived without SF2.

Minimum requirements: Leopard 10.5 (will not work in 10.4)
www.extensis.com
$99.95 for Suitcase Fusion 2
$49.95 to Upgrade from Suitcase Fusion
Available on line or as a retail package.

Duet Breakout Box for Apogee Duet – Un-Tangle the Dongle

Rick Levine — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 20:10:02 +0000

If you are looking to buy one of the great audio interface boxes for the Macintosh, you may want to look at the Apogee Duet. The Duet is a quality sounding audio interface with a sleek modern design and comes with software specifically designed for the MacIntosh. With all its genius of design, the Achilles heel of the Duet appears to be the ‘The Dongle’ or in other words the way Apogee decided to provide connectivity to peripherals. Many people who love the quality of the Duet Apogee have been concerned about the cheesy looking Dongle and would like to replace that ‘dongle of strings’ with some other more substantial looking device. The Breakout Box for the Duet is now available to “take the tangle out of your Duet”.

The Duet Breakout Box is a welcome companion to the Apogee Duet and is built to the relative high standards. The device is basically in the form of a metal box which comes in either Black or Silver and the kit includes a 16 inch computer cable that connects the computer’s Audio to the outside world. The unit is simple to set up and works pretty much immediately with no flaws, as long as you take the time to hook it up properly in the first place. Notice the word ‘OUT’ on the top of the Box has been placed right where the INPUTS are located. As simple as it is to set up, better IN and OUT markings could clear up any potential confusion during the initial setup or when trouble-shooting.

Just one important note, before connecting or disconnecting the hardware to the MacIntosh, make sure to power down first. Make all the connections while the computer is OFF and then Boot Up your computer. Make sure the Apple Preferences are set up correctly for the Apogee Duet to be operating and you will be making beautiful music in no time at all. The Duet Breakout box for the Apogee Duet is available ‘on line’ directly from the manufacturer at a cost of: $95.00 plus shipping. So put your Apogee Duet ‘Dongle’ away for safe keeping and connect up audio peripherals with the Duet Breakout Box.

Visit: http://www.duetbreakout.com/
For photos, additional specs and further information.

LaCie Adds USB Speakers to Product Line

andPOP Staff — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 15:50:58 +0000

LaCie announced earlier this week the addition of USB Speakers by Neil Poulton to their product line. The speakers provide universal usability in both PC and Mac environments through bus-powered connectivity, and feature internal cable storage.

The LaCie USB speakers can plug into a PC or Mac without installing any additional drivers. The speakers can also be connected directly to a MP3 player with the purchase of an extra power adapter.

The speakers were also awarded the Janus 2007 Seal of Quality by the French Institute of Design, and were listed in Time Magazine’s Design 100 issue. LaCie was also awarded a 2008 Design Observer Star from the French Agency for the Promotion of Industrial Creation.

The LaCie USB Speakers are available worldwide for the suggested retail price of $59.99. For more information on this product, visit www.lacie.com.

Pinnacle Video Capture Device Lets You Hold Onto Old Videos

Daniel Levine — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 12:06:45 +0000

Technology, it seems, is in a constant state of transition and it’s often hard to stay current. Last year’s hi-definition disc battle illustrated just how quickly a format can descend into obsolescence.

One format that has long since gone the way of the dinosaur is VHS. The tape which claimed victory over Sony’s Betamax in the format war of the 1980’s was a staple of almost every household. After being effectively killed off by DVD’s, VHS found itself in an awkward afterlife. Electronics retailers continued to sell VCR’s, but with no new content released on tape, the concept was dead in the water.

The only reason to keep a VCR in the house was to watch old videos and home recordings. In this world of digital transference, that logic equates to a bunch of wasted space.   Enter the Pinnacle Video Capture Suite for Mac, a brilliantly simplistic way of turning analog content into digital video files.

There are dozens of video capture options on the PC, but the Mac has been left out in recent years. This is partially due to Apple’s lack of user-swappable video cards. On a PC, users can install their own video cards with video-capture ability. Apple’s closed system restricts this freedom in favour of aesthetic purity.

Pinnacle’s steak-shaped product requires two connections: one to your Mac’s USB port, and the other to your VCR via a composite or S-Video input. The video connection cables are not included with the unit, but most VCR’s do come with them.

Once these connections have been made, Pinnacle’s OSX application launches and begins the capturing process. It’s simple: press play on the VCR, hit the red button and the digitization begins. Video capturing is normally a resource hog, bogging down your system’s processing power and RAM usage. Pinnacle’s product features a built-in MPEG-4 encoder for all the grunt work, meaning your Mac won’t break a sweat during the import. The MPEG-4 codec is also compatible with iPhone, iPod, and Apple TV right out of the box. I was astonished to see how effective this process worked.

Pinnacle doesn’t include any video editing software but who needs it? Apple’s built-in iLife suite happily accepts the MPEG-4 format and allows for complete flexibility of the encoded file. I was able to import some old home movies with the Pinnacle, edit them in iMovie and later burn them in iDVD. Pinnacle’s product fits perfectly into the Apple ecosystem of simplicity and flexibility.

DVD discs remain the format of choice for newly-released video, but their extinction is already foreseeable. I predict the future of video to be 100 per cent digital, a concept exhibited by Apple TV and the XBOX 360’s Video Store. Some prefer physically owning their content, a tangible manner of ownership, but in this green-obsessed world, the elimination of all physical packaging is unavoidable and understandable. As hard drives get bigger and cheaper, they’ll become the medium of choice for media storage.

Pinnacle, it seems, agrees with this logic. By jumping straight from the archaic VHS format to the digital MPEG-4 format, the Video Capture for Mac effectively skips a stage of obsolescence.
The Pinnacle Video Capture for Mac is available for $99 USD, a small price to pay for the elimination of that clunky VHS collection.

Pros-

Brilliantly easy to use

Converts to flexible and compatible MP4 format

Doesn’t hog system resources

Cons-

Doesn’t include video/audio cables

Review: DocuPen RC800

andPOP Staff — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 20:31:03 +0000

It’s official: loving technology is cool. The image of the nerd in mama’s basement has been banished and replaced by the multitude of gadget lovers that roam the streets brandishing iPhones and Blackberrys. Companies are realizing the sales potential of cool looking devices in a world where image is everything.

Planon, a small Canadian company, employs a similar logic in their unique product line of portable scanners. It seems improbable that the words “portable” and “scanner” belong in the same sentence, but Planon pulls it off with the DocuPen RC800. The diminutive scanner makes quite an initial first impression. It’s a device that would feel right at home in 007’s back-pocket.

On paper, the DocuPen’s specifications sound pretty good. Roughly the size of a pen, the device is capable of full 24bit scanning in a matter of seconds. It’s activated through a rolling motion as you slide it over a document or image, and produces scans of up to 400 dpi. It can store about 100 scans on its 8mb internal memory, but can be upgraded with a microSD card.

In practice, it’s a slightly different story. While the pen is visually impressive, the build quality is very poor. I’ve used sturdier electric toothbrushes. It really is a shame that Planon chose to use cheap materials on what really is a cool looking and ridiculously overpriced product.

The pen operates through two side-by-side buttons: one to turn the unit on, the other to toggle between scan modes. It includes scanning modes for black and white documents, colour documents, and a dedicated photo setting. All of my test scans were done in the pen’s highest-resolution setting. I scanned a simple 8.5×11 text document and found the resultant images surprisingly legible. There were some harsh edges and blurred characters, but document scanning was impressive overall.

After switching to the photo mode, I ran the pen over a 4×6 print. Because the pen’s default size is 8.5×11, the resultant images included the surrounding scan area and needed cropping. Planon’s built in software should have included a function to do this automatically, but I was forced to do it myself in Photoshop. The quality of the photo scan was satisfactory, but mediocre when compared to a scan from a full-sized flatbed scanner.

The included software is extremely barebones, with nothing more than a thumbnail preview and download button. As simple as this sounds, Planon still managed to get this wrong. In order to transfer and save my scans, I was forced to use the save option in Mac OS X’s Preview application. As fast as the unit may be at scanning documents, the time it take transfer the files is painfully slow. The DocuPen is badly crippled by poor software implementation.

Charging the DocuPen’s built in li-ion battery requires a USB connection via Planon’s proprietary USB cable. Unfortunately, the unit features no battery status meter. I couldn’t tell whether I had a full battery charge or whether the pen was on its last leg.

As cool as this thing is, I’m struggling to see its day-to-day application. Those who frequently scan documents would appreciate the convenience of a portable scanner, but the clunkiness of the unit would certainly prove infuriating in everyday use. The MSRP of $299 USD is simply unreasonable, a ludicrous amount for a device worth half that amount.

The DocuPen is then a classic example of form over function, a cool-looking one trick pony meant to impress the guys at the office rather than become a permanent fixture in one’s technological arsenal.

Pros:
- Scans documents and photos effectively on the go
- Awesome design and diminutive design
- Mac and PC Compatible

Cons:
- Ridiculously overpriced at $299 USD
- Scan quality is mediocre at best
- Build quality and materials are sub par
- Terrible software
- Proprietary USB connection

Parallels Releases New Compatability Software

andPOP Staff — Fri, 09 May 2008 12:48:02 +0000

Parallels, a software company that specializes in compatibility software for Macs, has just released the latest version of it’s Desktop software. Parallels Desktop build 5600 provides full support for Windows Vista SP1, Windows XP SP3, and provides increased compatibility with MacBook Air. By using the Parallels software, Windows programs can be run on a Mac without rebooting the computer.

Some other major features of the Parallels Desktop build 5600 include improvements in the Shared Folder software, such as faster file transfer speed and the ability to share files and folders between removable drives. There have also been smaller improvements in the bug fixing capabilities and overall performance of the software.

The Parallels Desktop update is free to all current Parallels users. Users can get the update via Parallels Desktop auto-updater, or download it from http://www.parallels.com/products/desktop.

Macally Announces Turtle Mouse

andPOP Staff — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 04:03:42 +0000

Macally says their new Turtle Mouse, designed specifically for laptop uses would be a great accessory for new MacBook Air users. “Macally today announced just the right mouse that matches the light thin design of the new slim Apple notebook. The Macally Turtle is a USB mouse and ideal for use with a Mac notebook.”

The Macally Turtle features a retractable USB cord and 800 dpi precision laser sensor. The device, announced at Macworld San Francisco is ergonomic and compact with a MSRP of $19.99

“As consumers spend more and more time at their computers for fun activities such as video editing, music downloading, and photography sharing, they want a mouse that delivers a physical point of contact that is comfortable, intuitive and full-featured,” said Andrew Saldana, Macally?s vice president of sales and marketing. “These new mice products provide our customers with the highest quality and value and will provide an effortless and pleasant interface with their computers.”

More info and pictures available at www.macally.com.

Resolution Independant Vector Graphics App Announced For Mac

andPOP Staff — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 15:19:11 +0000

TweakerSoft has announced VectorDesigner 1.0.0, a resolution independent vector graphics application exclusively for Mac OS X.

VectorDesigner is built for vector drawings, diagrams and illustrations, raster image handling, filtering and color correction. It targets users looking to create vector artwork, such as posters, brochures, stickers, logos, web design, tshirt production and more.

The software works using Mac OS X technologies such as Quartz and CoreImage.

Tools include: smart shapes, rectangles, ovals, rounded rectangles, polygons, stars, bezier creation and editing, as well as raster to bezier conversion.

Download link: http://tweakersoft.com/vectordesigner/

Minimum Requirements:
* Mac OS X 10.4 (Tiger) 10.5 (Leopard) recommended
* Universal Binary for PowerPC & Intel
* G4, G5 or Intel Processor
* 900 Mhz or faster
* 512 MB Memory or higher
* 8.9 MB Hard Drive space
* Some features require Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard)