The show focused primarily on the iOS ecosystem, with traditional Mac OS X software pushed into the background. Special attention was paid to applications and accessories to get sound and video into and out of your iOS device, not just on the exhibit floor, but throughout Moscone West. Still, there were other hidden gems for everyday users, too.

Most of the OS X software developers weren’t showing new products or improvements, but demoing what they already have. One notable exception that drew me in was the newly launched latest version of Fantastical by Flexibits, which works in conjunction with OS X calendar software (iCal, BusyCal, Outlook) to quickly enter calendar items with natural language directly from the menu bar, kind of a Siri for the desktop.

Once you ignore the gimmicky stuff like iPhone cases with integrated bottle openers, and lots of bling (sparkle screen protectors from Crimsoncase), most user-aimed products seemed to want to make iDevices easier to use in more places. Judging by the show’s offerings, users seem to want to hold their iPad with one hand (Newertech, Hub Innovations, Grablet and others), make it waterproof (Drycase and Drybags), and have better input devices.

Steve Jobs would have shed a tear seeing so many ways to avoid using iOS device touchscreens. Some standouts are multiples styluses from Lafeada in the shape and style of lipstick and eyeliner, as well as Adonit’s Jot Stylus that had a “target” zone via a precision disk instead of the typical imprecise rubber tip found in most styluses. My favorite, though, was the NuScribe combo pen and stylus from Newer Technology. I love not having to carry both a pen and stylus.

Not only do people want to take their iOS devices everywhere, but they want to be able to take desktop functionality along for the ride. Nivio has a soon-to-be released subscription-based service called nDesktop that allows you to remotely run Windows applications as well as rent traditional software such as the Microsoft Office Suite on both your iPad as well as your OS X device, sort of like a more feature-rich version of OnLive Desktop’s free iPad Windows virtualization app. Sanho’s CloudFTP device is an iOS-friendly portable NAS server that is in the final stage of production after a successful Kickstarter launch. These products help fill the gap between the portability of iOS devices and the flexibility of the desktop, making the decision between an iPad and MacBook Air even more difficult.

Among the products geared towards consumers at the show, the lines between tablet and desktop computing are blurring, and the changed branding of Macworld| iWorld this year reflects that.

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SDKs and services

Audible Magic is showing its new TViD content recognition engine which can identify TV shows, including live events or first-time broadcasts. It creates a way for developers to build a second-screen experience tailored to what their users are watching.

Heatma.ps UI Testing SDK allows you to integrate touch tracking in your app to collect aggregate data from beta testers and/or real users of your app. Results are sent back heatma.ps’ server so you can view the data as a heat map of how users are interacting with your software, including where exactly their fingers are tapping.

MLState is demonstrating its Opa programming language targeted at web and social app development. Nuance is at the show talking about its consumer apps, but you could hit the company up for info on its mobile developer program if you’re looking to integrate voice in your iOS  software.

Payment solutions

For vendors that sell digital goods direct to consumers, eSellerate is at the show representing its e-commerce platform. You would use this instead of the Mac App Store, either to save money over the 30-percent fee Apple charges or because your app is prohibited from the App Store sandbox for whatever reason.

Fastspring is also present, talking about its all-in-one e-commerce, merchandising and fulfillment solution, which makes getting your sales tools in order an easy task, so you can focus on zapping bugs and getting a product shipped.

Prototyping and rapid development

TapDesigner is a new tool for prototyping mobile apps. It uses a drag-and-drop, WYSIWYG interface to allow you to rapidly build visual representations of what your app will look like, complete with custom navigation and menu bar elements.

WidgetPress FormEntry is in the Mac OS X Zone, talking about its tool for creating forms-based apps for Mac and iOS. This could have potential applications in any number of industries; for example, a realtor could quickly deploy surveys for customers to help them identify exactly what kind of property they’re looking for.

Consulting services

Carr/Ferrell Attorneys are there to guide you with IP, licensing, contracts, and other legal needs, which are still a big concern with ongoing problems like the Lodsys saga. This is one of the thorniest aspects of software development, and ongoing legal disputes between the biggest companies involved could always potentially result in fallout for smaller players, too.

That’s my bite-sized overview of what iOS and Mac developers might find most interest at this year’s Macworld | iWorld conference. Chime in down in the comments if you saw some other interesting displays or vendors aimed at developer’s at the show.

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Ecoute

Ecoute (French for “listen”) is aimed at being a minimalistic standalone player that syncs with iTunes. It’s been around the longest of the players listed here, having recently reached version 3.

The best way to describe how Ecoute looks is to imagine what the iPhone’s music app would like if it were ported to OS X. Navigation is done through lists, with album art on the left side to make it easier to distinguish between entries. There’s a breadcrumb navigation bar at the top, so it’s easy to get around.

Ecoute has a lot of nice touches. The Dock icon displays the currently playing album artwork, global keyboard shortcuts allow you to control playback in the background, and the controller (which can be customized with available themes) can display the current album artwork on the desktop. You can also share the current track on Facebook, Twitter, and Last.fm.

Ecoute is available in the Mac App Store for $8.

Enqueue

Enqueue’s name comes from one of its main features: a queue in the sidebar that acts as a temporary playlist. You can drag songs and albums into the queue and listen to them in order, making it easier to plan and enjoy long listening sessions. Enqueue also has a mini player view available that just shows the queue alongside controls. Being able to see the queue makes it a lot more useful than iTunes’ mini player.

The rest of Enqueue’s interface is more traditional than the others in this list, but that doesn’t make it less useful. There are four tabs at the top for your library, playlists, history, and preferences. The library tab adopts a staid browser layout, with filter columns at the top and results below. I don’t much care for this configuration, so I was happy to see I could change it in the view menu to display just a list of artists on the left and results on the right.

The history tab displays your most played artists or songs and how they relate to each other using a bar graph, which is unique among the apps in this list. Further features include iTunes sync, Last.fm scrobbing, and configurable global shortcut keys.

Enqueue is available in the Mac App Store for $10.

Sonora

Sonora (Spanish for “sound”) has a straightforward interface with a lot of power buried beneath. The toolbar houses the controls for play, pause, shuffle and the like. The middle of the toolbar is occupied by the queue, an area where you can drag albums or songs from different artists to make a temporary playlist, similar to Enqueue’s. By default, the queue will be populated by songs from the currently playing album, which makes it easy to skip to a different song while browsing music as well. A sidebar along the left lists all artists, and the main browser shows album artwork arranged alphabetically by artist, like iTunes.

The most interesting feature of Sonora is the ability to type anywhere in the app to bring up a search box, which works a little like Alfred. Type the name of an album, hit enter, and it starts playing. It’s slick, but hard to discover initially.

Unlike the other apps listed, Sonora is still in beta, so be warned you might run into a bug or two. It’s available from the developer’s website for free for the time being.

Rdio

Rdio is unique among this group in that it streams music rather than playing downloaded files. This allows for a much broader selection of music, as anything in Rdio’s vast catalogue is available to stream. Instant access to new releases and recommendations is also a plus for Rdio. The downsides, of course, are the requirement of a network connection and the lack of more obscure artists.

The Rdio app itself is basically a wrapper around a web app, though most people wouldn’t notice. The load times are fast; I’ve never had to wait long for a song to buffer, and the UI loads quickly as well.

Rdio also has social features built-in. Other users can follow you and see what you’re listening to, and you can share your activity to Facebook, Last.fm, and Twitter.

Rdio is available for free, with a variable song cap (basically, the more you use the service, the lower the cap becomes). Unlimited desktop and web access is $5 a month, and unlimited web and mobile access costs $10/month.

Note: A competitor to Rdio, Spotify, is also quite popular. The reason I’m not covering it fully is because I think the Rdio app is better, though it still deserves a mention.

Vox

Vox is different from the other apps mentioned. Instead of choosing music from within the app, you choose it from the Finder. This behavior goes back to the early days of music players, when you chose music from the file manager instead of within the app itself.

The UI consists of several palettes rather than one unified window. The palettes can be hidden or shown with simple Cmd-number shortcuts, i.e. Cmd-1 to bring up the player, Cmd-2 to bring up the equalizer. The advantage of this kind of design is that it’s easy to show and hide what’s necessary. Of course, the downside is that it’s a little harder to use.

Vox has a large list of supported file types, including FLAC, OGG Vorbis, and Apple Lossless. There’s also an export feature, which can convert every file type it supports into a good selection of formats, including AAC and WAV. It can even apply effects to the exported version.

There’s also a menu bar entry for Vox, which lets you easily pause, skip, and choose a new song. Vox is available at the developer’s website for free.

Are you sticking to iTunes for listening to music, or have you switched to a different app to fulfill that need? Let us know about your favorite in the comments.

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Pair your remote with your Mac

If there are multiple Macs around when you’re using your remote, you’ll find that pressing a button once will perform the same action on every nearby Mac. To solve this problem, you can pair the remote specifically with a single target Mac. Open System Preferences, and then open the Security & Privacy pane.

At the bottom is a button labelled Pair…. Click this button, then follow the instructions that appear by holding the remote near your Mac and holding down the Menu and Next buttons on the remote. (Next is the button on the right-hand side of the ring at the top of the remote.)

Once you’ve done this, your remote and your Mac will be paired, meaning that using that remote will only control that one Mac.

Send your Mac to sleep with the remote

When using your Mac as a media center, you may wish to put the computer to sleep once you’re done. To do this quickly, you can use your remote. All you need to do is hold down the Play/Pause button on the remote. After a few seconds, a graphic will appear on the screen and your Mac will go to sleep.

Set up custom actions for your remote

By downloading the free utility BetterTouchTool, you can set up custom actions, which will be performed when you press specific buttons on your remote. This is great if you don’t use your remote for controlling iTunes or FrontRow, since you can override the default actions (play, next, pause, etc).

Once you’ve downloaded BetterTouchTool, you can add custom actions (called Gestures in BTT) by clicking its icon in the menu bar and choosing Preferences. Click Gestures at the top, then Apple Remote and other.

Next, click Add new gesture at the bottom of the screen. You can then select a ‘gesture’, i.e. a button on the remote, from the drop down in the lower left. After that, choose an action from the other drop down in the bottom right corner, or type a keyboard shortcut in the box.

For instance, you could set up an action which locks your computer when you hold down the Menu button on the remote by setting the gesture to Menu, Holding and the action to Show Loginscreen. (Note that since OS X doesn’t have an explicit ‘lock’ feature, this is the next best thing since it requires you to enter your password to get back into your Mac afterwards.)

Change the startup disk and eject CDs

As your Mac starts up, if you hold the Menu button on the remote, you’ll see the same menu as if you hold the Option key on the keyboard – a list of available startup disks. You can then use the remote to select a disk, and boot from it using the Play/Pause button.

In the same menu, you can also use the Volume Up button to eject a CD or DVD after selecting it.

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What learning curve?

As opposed to Photoshop, and even simpler solutions like Photoshop Express or Pixelmator, Snapseed has little to no learning curve. It keeps editing options grouped intelligently and doesn’t overwhelm a user with toolbars and menus. Instead, you have three types of Basic Adjustments, and seven varieties of Creative Adjustments to work with. Within each of these, you get more fine-grained control, but even then, Snapseed makes sure to walk you through the basics, and all changes you make are instantly previewed on your full, working image in real-time.

For family albums and the average user, I’d be willing to bet that quick use of the Basic Adjustments alone would be enough to satisfy most needs. You can likely accomplish the same changes in Photoshop Express and Pixelmator, too, but Snapseed will save you a step or two and that can add up if you’re churning through a backlog of accumulated photos.

Easy effects without the cookie-cutter look

For people who want to share their photos on social networks or use them on personal and professional websites, the Creative Adjustments can really help simplify getting unique and interesting effects. Because each is infinitely tweakable, and because effects can be stacked, you also should be able to create images that don’t look like they came off a filter effect assembly line — something I find can happen far too often with apps like Instagram.

Just be careful when you’re stacking filters; I had one isolated incident where a photo developed some kind of digital noise as a result of combining effects. Luckily, Snapseed uses non-destructive editing techniques, so my original was preserved, but picky users might want to wait for a bug-busting update that addresses this small issue.

Lots of control, but not as fine-grained as the big boys

The lack of dedicated toolbars and brushes in Snapseed means it can’t achieve the level of specific manipulation possible with Photoshop and Pixelmator. You won’t find a blemish brush here, for instance, and while you can add control points that provide impressive control over specific parts of images, there’s no lasso to let you painstakingly stake out an exact, finite area to apply your effects.

This is, I think, both a blessing and a curse. For the average hobbyist user, the lack of fine controls merely means Snapseed’s interface is less cluttered and confusing. It also makes working with Snapseed feel less like work and more like fun, in my opinion. If there’s a blemish or a speck of dust you’d just love to zap away, however, it’ll be frustrating to have to do without.

A tool for photographers, not a profession all its own

The bottom line is that Snapseed, like its iOS predecessor, is a fun, useful tool that should help those who take photos for fun get even more enjoyment out of them. Unlike more full-featured editing suites, it won’t require you to dedicate time and effort to becoming not only a good photographer, but an expert on editing software as well.

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1. Rule your Inbox with automate routing

Rules don’t have to be complex, but they can be incredibly good at keeping less important emails out of your sacred inbox. Any aspect of a message can be set for routing. A common rule I recommend setting up is to take those notifications from Facebook, Twitter and other services and put them in a social media folder.

Other easy targets for rule making are any email lists you are on (create a rule to immediately put any message from that list into it’s own folder) or any places you regularly purchase from (create a folder for e-commerce that contains all the emails from your regular purchase places). Apple has a great tutorial here.

2. Unsubscribe

We’re all on many email lists, whether by accident or on purpose. All those daily deal sites, combined with the “subscribe to our newsletter” checkmarks you forget to uncheck fills your inbox with unnecessary items. Ideally, you can mark these items as junk within Mail, but the app isn’t always that smart, and providers will change the message slightly over time to trick junk mail filters.

You might be afraid to click unsubscribe for fear that you’ll somehow confirm to a spammer that your email is valid. While that may be correct for true spammers, clicking unsubscribe on messages from reputable vendors won’t put you in danger. Go ahead and click that unsubscribe button, and regain your inbox.

3. Use folders and smart folders to keep things close at hand

The inbox should be used for incoming items only. Once you’ve read it, it’s time for it to go somewhere. If it requires action, create a folder called “take action” and move it in there. If it doesn’t require anything on your part, move it to an “archive folder.”

The only problem I see with a folder is that an email can only be in one folder at a time, but that’s where smart folders come in. For example, if you put all your online purchases in an e-commerce folder that includes your Apple purchases, your Amazon purchases and all that other online stuff. Just create smart folders that filters both Amazon and Apple separately, and that way you can have them in both places and quickly find that receipt.

Moving items into folders is incredibly easy with a little noticed function. When you move an item to a folder, notice on the message menu the “Move to … Again” and the command-option T shortcut. Just press that button to make your message quickly move to the same mailbox you just moved your last message to. Very empowering seeing those emails quickly disappear from your inbox. If you want a few more quick keys to instantly route your messages, create your own keyboard shortcuts using the keyboard System Preferences pane.

Inbox zero is an attainable goal in Apple’s Mail app thanks to the tips above. It’ll still take some time, but the feeling of seeing nothing in the inbox and no number badge in the dock can be quite exhilarating.

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1. Set up Time Machine

If you aren’t using Time Machine, it’s time to start. This is your first, best line of defense on a desktop or laptop. Backups made using the built-in OS X feature are non-intrusive, and recovery of files is nearly instant. Although external hard drive prices are high right now, most everyone will benefit with Time Machine. Hook up an external hard drive and OS X will ask you to use it for Time Machine. I generally recommend getting a hard drive 1.5 times the size of your internal drive.

2. Set up online backup the proper way

I suggest online backup services as your second line of defense. It’s important to keep backups offsite in case of a disaster or theft at your location. If you do your initial backup all at once it can take months and you’ll find you are missing a key file just when you need it — I wrote about how to optimize your strategy here – and be sure to leave your computer on and awake if you want your backup strategy to work. Also, please remember that sync software like Dropbox isn’t a true online backup system, since it has the ability to remove files.

3. Back up your online email system

If you use online email systems such as Gmail, you need to back that up as well. Don’t rely 100% on your provider. Your account could get hacked, or you could accidentally delete your email. Follow this guide on backing up your Gmail using POP access. A similar strategy would be applicable to Hotmail, AOL and Yahoo (though Yahoo may require a paid upgrade to do it).

4. Test your backups

I’ve written about this before, but if you aren’t testing your backups, how do you know if they’re working? Do you know how to restore in case of disaster? Trust but verify as they say. Simply try restoring files from your backups to make sure they work as expected.

5. Back up your iOS devices

With iCloud, backing up to your computer isn’t technically necessary because you can restore from the cloud. On a practical level though, that takes time, and there’s also no guarantee your backup will always be there when you need it. At least every month, it’s important to hook up your iOS device to your computer for a quick and immediate backup of your data. To do a manual backup via iTunes, follow these instructions.

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Yes, 5.2 percent is significant for Apple, the computer side of which brings in huge profits for the company, but maintains a relatively low sales share compared to the HPs, Dells, Acers and Lenovos of the world. But the momentum is Apple’s right now. It’s growing both in the consumer space, where it was up 24.6 percent compared to overall PC growth of 5.3 percent, and perhaps more surprisingly, in the workplace.

Needham says Macs’ share of enterprise computer sales grew 43.8 percent during the third quarter of this year, compared to overall enterprise PC growth of 4.8 percent. And it’s been happening for a few quarters in a row. In a note to investors, Wolf wrote:

“What we initially viewed as a one-quarter blip in the business market has emerged as a durable pattern.”

Credit: Needham & Co.

The growth, as the chart shows, isn’t coming in just one area, but is spread throughout the wider enterprise market for computers. Apple saw decent gains in every sector, with the exception of government purchases, but saw significant growth particularly in “very large” and “large” businesses.

Macs are no longer much of a rarity in the workplace. For many years, there were valid reasons Macs were used mainly in the publishing and creative spaces, since software compatibility made it hard to use them elsewhere. But as consumer adoption of Macs has increased steadily in the past few years, many employees are either asking their employers in all industries to buy them the same Macs they’re using at home, or they’re just bringing in their MacBook from home to the office. And increasingly, IT departments are letting them.

Last month, analyst firm Forrester made waves by changing course and strongly recommending businesses let their employees use computers running Mac OS X, because they have “gained a reputation for reliability and low maintenance,” according to Forrester. The report found 22 percent of enterprise businesses foresee the use of Macs owned by employees “increasing significantly.”

Be sure to grab a ticket to our Net:Work conference on December 8 in San Francisco to learn more about the changing face of IT and the ongoing consumerization of workplace tech.

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Your library, but not necessarily your files

Unlike Spotify or Rdio, iTunes Match only provides you with access to tracks already in your library; iTunes music you’ve purchases, or albums you’ve added from other sources like your own CD collection are what you’ll have access to. Upon first set up (managed through a menu in the left-hand column of iTunes under “Store”), iTunes scans your library, and then looks for matches on the iTunes store servers. Where it finds a match, nothing more needs to be done; you’ll be able to download tracks from Apple in high-quality 256kbps AAC to up to 10 computers or iOS devices.

If Apple encounters music it can’t match, don’t worry; iTunes Match uploads copies of that content from your hard drive to its servers, including album artwork and any other track and artist information, so you shouldn’t even notice the difference between it and the music provided by Apple (except maybe in terms of audio quality, depending on the quality of the originals).

All your music anywhere. Until you sign out.

You can download and play back songs from iTunes Match on any device where you have your account signed in, but the party ends when you switch Apple IDs. Content is erased from your device when you sign in using different credentials, so if your iTunes account for music, and the one you use for apps are different, for example, switching between the two is not a simple thing.

Pricing and availability

As announced when iTunes Match was originally previewed, the service will cost $24.99 per year. For that price, you get unlimited downloads on up to 10 devices (iOS, Mac or PC) and access to Apple’s 18 million strong iTunes store database for 256 Kbps AAC tracks for matching. Again, other tracks not found will be uploaded in their original format to Apple’s servers. Any tracks from iTunes Match doesn’t count against your iCloud storage limit.

iTunes Match will be available for U.S. users late in October, but international users will have to wait. No announced timeline for release in other markets is yet available, and it will probably take some time for Apple to work out the licensing deals necessary for that to happen.

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OS X update: The bloop single

I’m becoming convinced Full Screen mode is to OS X what 3-D is to movies: it seems like a great idea until you use it a lot. I raved about it when Lion launched, but my usage has since waned. With Pages, Safari, and Mail I’ll use full screen, but that’s more for easy switching or creating a distraction-free workspace. Evernote has introduced Full Screen mode and I doubt I’ll ever use it. For me, Evenote is an app I’m likely to have running behind my active window for reference and for quickly dropping links into. Still, it might be useful for taking notes during a lecture.

The developers claim they’ve “embraced the new look and feel of Lion,” which is a fancy way of saying “We got rid of the colors.” The only color to be found in the interface is the Sync icon turning blue when it syncs data. There’s also a new Favorites bar where you can pin frequently used notes, search results or notebooks. Since I have about 15 notebooks, I really appreciate the ability to pin those I use most.

iOS updates: The rest of the story

The double: Shared notebook support

The iOS versions can now read content from shared notebooks. You can’t edit or create shared notes from your device in this version (they’re working on it), but if you’re a heavy shared notebooks user, at least now you can read them. I haven’t played with shared notebooks much, but once you can edit, and if there is push or iCloud support, this should be great for collaboration.

The triple: Searching within notes

You could search for all the notes that contained a word, but if you wanted to find out where in the note it occurs, you couldn’t. Now you can. This is handy, since a lot of my searches are for terms buried in notes.

The Grand Slam: Rich text editing

It’s been their most-asked-for feature. It’s finally here. You can now edit a rich text document inline on iOS.  It’s not perfect; you have to choose to append the document or simplify it. Simplifying makes its best guess on the styles. Make no mistake though; this is a strong hit. I’ll be using this feature a lot since I tend to make notes on clipped content, or a note I’ve previously had the audacity to apply formatting to in the desktop version.

Post-game commentary

While the OS X version rates a hearty “meh,” I’m thrilled with the iOS updates. The ability to finally edit rich text notes means Evernote will see more usage in my daily workflow. In the few days it’s been available I’ve already used it more than I have in the last year. Good job, Evernote.

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Many people have a collection of recipe clippings culled from magazines, newspapers, and the supermarket. But where do you put the clippings? Ideally, you type it out and put it in a recipe manager (my favorite is SousChef). If I only had the time. What I do instead is either scan the recipe directly into iPhoto from my Mac, or if I can’t easily clip the recipe, I’ll take a picture of it with my iPhone. When I see a recipe I like on the web, I take a screen shot to easily get it into iPhoto, too.

Once in the iPhoto, I rename the photo to match the actual recipe title, and then in the keywords I put the important ingredients that I’d need to know when shopping such as “chicken breast” or “celery.” This is also a handy way to search for recipes when something is on sale or in season. Then I just drop it in an album I call “Cookbook.”

I also have an album called “Current Recipes.” I, and other members of the family, will put especially interesting recipes into this album. I’ll sort them in the album to create both variety and efficiency in shopping. I have the recipes synced to a password-protected MobileMe site as well for ease of browsing. With iCloud’s Photo Stream feature, which arrives in September, this should be even easier.

You can also sync those albums to your iPhone and iPad so that you always have all your recipes close at hand, which can be useful if you stop in at the grocery store on the way home from work. Not only is this a great reference, but recipes can be easily emailed from the iPhone to whoever’s doing the shopping.

With the recipes in digital form, cooking with iOS in the kitchen is also breeze. I’ll use either my iPad or my iPhone to check out the recipe(s) I need. After cooking, I’ll return to iPhoto and modify the ratings and notes for the recipe so we know whether to make it again. If it was lousy, we delete it from the album.

Keeping my recipes in iPhoto has reduced our reliance on eating take-out, as well as being a great way for everyone to contribute to dinner. Considering every Mac comes with iPhoto, it’s also cost-effective and easy, too. Anything you think might add even more to my system?

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1. Full-screen apps. Especially on a notebook, the ability to quickly switch to full-screen mode and navigate between apps that are using it has absolutely changed how I use Macs for the better. It definitely helps you focus on one thing at a time, and it makes great use of Macs with limited screen real estate. It just feels like something we should have been doing all along.
2. Launchpad. Despite my complaints about aspects of it in my last post, Launchpad itself is a welcome addition to the Mac. I’m using it most on my iMac, where the large icons and full-screen navigation make it much easier to find that one seldom-used app I’m looking for. I also think Launchpad is the first stage of an evolutionary tale that will only see it improve dramatically with future iterations of Mac OS, with feature additions like greater control over app arrangement, and maybe even live icons that display dynamic info at-a-glance.
3. AirDrop. Before AirDrop, copying files from my Mac to a visiting friend’s machine was sometimes so much of a chore that we wouldn’t even bother. Now I never have to have that “Hey, you still haven’t given me that file” conversation again, at least so long as everyone involved is packing the right equipment.
4. Hold key for special characters. I’ve never been able to remember the character codes for Macs, and using the special character palette from the Menu bar still requires more steps than the classic Google, copy, paste method. Holding keys down to produce special characters, as you can do on iOS devices, actually makes my life a lot easier, even though I don’t use them all that often.
5. The price. I recently had to install Windows 7 on a Boot Camp partition for my sister’s Mac. Price of the OS (even after it’s been on the market for nearly two years)? $220. The price of OS X Lion (which I was able to install on all four of my Lion-compatible Macs)? $30. Pricing may be Lion’s most appealing asset.

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Apple is off to a roaring good start with sales of its newest operating system. On Thursday the company announced that it had already sold 1 million copies of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion since it went on sale Wednesday morning. Already the company is saying that “users are buying Lion faster than any other OS release in Apple’s history.”

Now, Apple didn’t offer any numbers back when Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard was released in August 2009 that can be looked to for a comparison. But the pace of Lion sales does indicate that the way it’s delivering the new OS is going over pretty well.

Apple has chosen a nontraditional way of distributing a major desktop OS release: through the Mac App Store, which officially opened for business in January. Of course, for most Apple customers, buying software that way isn’t all that new: For the past three years the iOS App Store has been hooked up to the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

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One of the benefits of Mac OS X 10.7 Lion is that you don’t have to stand in line to buy it or order the software online. Instead you just click over to the Mac App Store and hit “download.” While that’s awfully convenient for many of us, what about those who don’t have a consistently decent Internet connection? Or the ability to get online at all?

Well, Apple isn’t about to miss out on those sales. The company is going to put its brand-new operating system on a USB stick and sell it for $69. That is quite a bit more than the $29 it costs to download the application. Alternatively, Apple is also offering the option to go into an Apple Store and download Lion to your computer.

This should make the transition to Lion easier in emerging markets that have less-than-reliable web infrastructure. Those are markets in which Apple is starting to find some traction, as Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer explained on Tuesday during the company’s third-quarter 2011 earnings report. He noted that the surge in Mac and iPhone sales during the quarter were boosted by new Apple customers in China, other Asia Pacific region countries, the Middle East and Brazil.

Sales of the new Lion-on-a-stick will come some time around the end of August, though no specific release date has been announced.

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One company that’s a perfect example of how to do Apple-based brand extension right is Wacom. The iPad, arguably, represents a considerable threat to their consumer drawing tablet business. The iPad can’t replicate the pressure sensitivity of Wacom pen tablets, of course, but for users that may otherwise have opted for Wacom’s entry-level Bamboo product, that may not be that much of an issue.

Rather than try to fight encroachment by Apple’s tablet, Wacom has embraced the device, releasing a Wacom-branded Bamboo Stylus for use with the iPad’s capacitive touchscreen. There’s also now a complementary app called Bamboo Paper that furthers the brand and acts as a marketing tool for the Bamboo Stylus.

A similar app called Moleskine is an example of how brands need to be really careful about how they represent themselves in the App Store. Moleskine is the maker of pocket paper notebooks and sketchbooks that take their design from the kind of notebooks used by people like Oscar Wilde and Ernest Hemingway. The app is a digital notebook, but it dilutes the brand rather than serving it by not living up to the quality expectations customer associate with Moleskine.

The lesson is that if you aren’t willing to put any real time or effort into your brand extension, you’re better off not trying it at all. Unless, that is, you opt for something small, pretty and clever instead of something ambitious and useful. For brands that don’t need to worry about whether or not they need to rethink their business model down the road (as Wacom and Moleskine may have to do if consumer tablets catch on and continue adding features), a little goes a long way.

Such is the case for Vipp, whose iconic metal waste bin is a design classic. Vipp wisely recognized that the interests of Mac buyers are closely in line with their target customer base, and so released a tiny app that does just one thing: replaces the OS X trash can in the Dock with a Vipp pedal waste bin. It’s animated, installs and uninstalls with just a single click, and it looks great.

An Apple tie-in is a good way to build a brand, but putting an ugly product or one that doesn’t work well on hardware that excels in both categories will only hurt, not help. Instead, brands that take the time to come up with something clever or useful will be the ones that successfully reach out to the lucrative market segment made up of Apple customers.

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Huberty came away from the meeting expecting that we will see “major feature/function updates” at Apple’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) in June, according to her note to investors. WWDC is usually where Apple unveils new iPhone models each year, but rumors have been circulating that this year the conference will only focus on software updates, which will likely include iOS 5 and Mac OS X Lion.

Apple did not confirm or deny whether or not a hardware iPhone refresh was on track for summer or later this year, but Huberty reports that since Apple sees itself as focused on software, iOS 5 and Lion are expected to continue to drive strong sales. She also reports that executives conveyed the message that other factors will continue to support strong margins, like improved product cost and higher average selling prices for iPads. Huberty also left the meeting feeling that Apple’s earnings per share could climb as high as $50 in 2013, thanks to “lower-priced iPhones, iPod-like market share in tablets, and expanding distribution in China and other emerging markets.”

The Apple execs really seem to have gone out of their way to take the emphasis off the possibility of new hardware and place expectations firmly on the shoulders of software. That could be a sign the company is trying to further soften the blow of a fall or later iPhone hardware refresh, while also sticking to its policy of not revealing product release plans in advance.

A dramatically altered iOS 5 could indeed steal the show at WWDC and even stave off concerns regarding a changed hardware refresh cycle, but only if it addresses customer pain points with Apple’s mobile OS. If it’s a strong-enough release that’s available to all devices that support iOS 4, it could actually bolster customer loyalty by providing new device-style experience without the price tag. But that’s a pretty big “if,” so we’ll see if Apple can deliver.

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