United We Stand

As commentator Paul Harvey is fond of saying, “It’s not one world.” The events of September 11, 2001 brought that home to Americans, who usually felt safe and secure at home. And now we worry about terrorism.

Linux and BSD Unix for Older Macs

Not long ago, I threatened you all with the end of the PPC Linux column. In response, many of you wrote in to ask for it to stay. (One person suggested that I let it die a graceful death for reasons which I happen to agree with, but he was outvoted.)

xD-Picture Cards

2002: All memory cards are not created equal. CompactFlash and SmartMedia have been duking it out over price, speed, size, and capacity for several years. Sony threw a wrench in the works with its Memory Stick technology (which hardly anyone except Sony uses), and just recently the tiny Secure Digital card has come into play […]

iApps? My Eye!

As the dust settles on Apple’s decision to charge us for the intangible iTools services (see Kiss iTools Good-Bye, Free mac.com Email Becomes Fee Mail, and The iTools Bait and Switch), people begin to ask how this will affect Job’s plans for the digital hub.

A Runtime Revolution for Linux and the Mac OS

The votes are in. PPC Linux is here to stay, but please don’t expect a weekly column (unless you all want to micropay me individually). Today I want to look at a specific application program named Runtime Revolution – it runs not only on Linux, but also in Mac OS, Mac OS X, Windows, IRIX, Solaris, […]

PPC Linux: The End?

Okay folks, it’s time for some democracy in action. As you probably know by now, I’m writing a new column on Low End Mac (LEM) called Mac Life. Now, between this and everything else I write, as well as the odd bit of graphic design, my fine art practice and my academic research, time is becoming […]

G4/500 WallStreet and Lombard Upgrades, iCurve Notebook Stand, TiBook RAM Install, and More

The biggest news of Macworld week for Apple portable fans didn’t come from the keynote, in which there were no laptop hardware announcements at all, but rather from Sonnet and Newer Technology, both of which released 500 MHz G4 processor upgrades for WallStreet G3 Series PowerBooks from the former and a WallStreet/Lombard G4 upgrade from the latter, joining […]

Yellow Dog Linux on a Power Mac

Despite the use of the PowerPC in other computers, such as the IBM RS/6000 and even TiVo digital video recorders, the Apple Macintosh dominates the world of PowerPC computing, and as such, it’s Macs that Yellow Dog Linux (YDL) 7.2 is squarely aimed at.

Rodney Lain and Mark Flynn

This article was published on The Painful Truth website, “a collection of Facts, Opinions and Comments from survivors of Armstrongism and The Worldwide Church of God.” This was written after Rodney moved from Georgia to Minnesota.

Good-Bye, Rodney

Rodney O. Lain was one of the most erudite, informed, opinionated, and iconoclastic writers on the Mac Web. In other words, he thought for himself, spoke his mind, and did it well.

OS X from a Linux Perspective

Apple’s Mac OS X has been gaining a lot of column inches in the computer press, and for good reason. As you are no doubt sick of hearing, the new Mac operating system is not just another revision of a bloated and moribund, though elegant, desktop OS. It is Unix – BSD Unix to be […]

Open Source Reality Check

You would be forgiven for thinking that the open source in business debate had been finally put to bed with the likes of IBM backing Linux and even the notoriously secretive Apple opening parts of Mac OS X to the public. However, you’d be wrong.

Beyond Linux Apps: Mac on Linux

We’ve all heard it: Linux has no applications. Despite the availability of many professional desktop applications for Linux, such as Star Office and Corel WordPerfect Office, the rumour of the dearth of applications for Linux persists. In fact, it does have some truth in it, at least for users of nonstandard versions of Linux such […]