How long should a Mac last? Mac360′s Alexis Kayhill posed the question recently, and it got me thinking on the topic, especially since Alexis framed her column around the experience of a co-worker who had purchased a new unibody MacBook (on her recommendation) only to have Apple upgrade the 13″ unibody to Pro status with feature enhancement and a lower price a few months later.

I’m in the same boat, having also bought a unibody MacBook last February. Alexis says her friend “got burned,” though I think that’s a bit harsh. I don’t feel “burned” at all — more like a bit disappointed that I didn’t wait four more months, but you can drive yourself nuts second-guessing such things. I love the MacBook, and am already becoming convinced that it’s going to be one of my all-time favorite Macs. I just wish it had a FireWire port, which the new 13″ MacBook Pro does have.

My target for intervals between upgrading my main workhorse systems has been three years ever since I bought my first Mac back in 1992, and I’ve done pretty well at adhering to it. That would put replacement time for my MacBook in early 2012, which seems a long way off.

The way it usually plays out for me is that the first year I revel in the greater power and storage capacity of my new machine compared with whatever it replaced. At 18 months, twinges of slight frustration and dissatisfaction start to set in, especially after upgraded models have been introduced, but I really have nothing to complain about. However, by the beginning of year three, the aging Mac is usually beginning to feel compromised in some respects, and the hunt begins, although for the last three machines I’ve managed to reach or beat the three-year replacement benchmark.

Of course it helps that I like the challenge of getting useful service out of antiquated hardware. We still have two nine year old Pismo PowerBooks in very active service, and they’re great for what we do with them — text-crunching, email, Web-surfing, and so forth — “netbooks” of a sort, I suppose.

Actually, I still have most of the Macs I’ve ever owned, and only a very few are not in working order. Our six year old iBook G3 died suddenly last winter, but had been a virtually flawless performer up to the day it completely refused to respond to the power button — presumably a terminal motherboard issue. One of my daughters is still using my old 1999 WallStreet PowerBook, and the 17″ PowerBook that served as my primary workhorse between the iBook and MacBook is still in fine fettle.

As Alexis Kayhill observes, there’s a line somewhere between the disappointment that occurs when a newer, power and feature-enhanced, and possibly cheaper revision is unveiled, especially if it’s only shortly after you buy a new Mac. But there’s also the pride you feel when your Mac still looks good and works well five years (or nine years!) after you bought it.

Macs being generally more expensive than typical Windows PCs, at least up front, it logically stands to reason that they should have longer useful lives.

How about you? How often do you usually upgrade your system, and what do you consider a reasonable service life for Macs?

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In this week’s enlightening installment of the App Developer Diary, I pitch my game concept to the coders, preach the gospel of the Game Bible and muse upon the possibility of the project imploding.

Straight after submitting last week’s App Developer Diary, I packed up my MacBook Pro and headed down to Nolla, a local bar and Scandinavian restaurant. I was to meet with Markus, one of the project’s coders, and pitch my game concept to him.

Hailing from Finland, Markus Piipari is one of the three coders who invited me on board to make the game. Together, with his brother Matias and Benjamin Schuster-Böckler, the trio formed Pear Computers, a dev studio specializing in mobile development.

When I arrived at Nolla, Markus was hunched over his MacBook (one of the old white models, which was sealed, I noted, in a scruffy faux-leather hard cover). He glanced up, headphones in ear, and although he acknowledged me with a quick nod, had that glazed look of somebody whose mind is elsewhere.

The pitch process is a fundamental component of having your idea become a reality. It’s the first hurdle, as not only should it be a clear and concise outline of your concept, it should also enthuse the rest of the team. As they say in the industry, you need your team’s buy-in — if the team hasn’t bought in to the concept from the very start, then the project is almost certainly doomed to failure.

I was already nervous enough, pitching a concept that I believed in so firmly, and yet Markus seemed to want to make me sweat more than a chubby man in a Finnish sauna. Perhaps this was a Scandinavian tactic to pile on the pressure and make pitching an even more tense affair? Or maybe Markus was living up to the stereotype of a hardcore programmer: King of the Code, cold and focused.

Setting Up My Pitch

Markus uttered a few words in Finnish, clicked around on his MacBook, and the glazed look dissolved into a warm smile. He wasn’t cold or emotionless, he was just chatting to his brother, Matias, on Skype. And now he was back in the room, ushering me to sit down, already offering me a steaming glass of black coffee — a staple beverage for Finns throughout the year.

Awkwardness over, I booted up my MacBook Pro and opened Apple’s Keynote. Rather than bewilder Markus with the entire game design in one go, I’d prepared a short Steve Jobs-style presentation, explaining the multiplayer component of my game concept. The game was to be a multiplayer bat-and-ball game, featuring novel physics-based power-ups for an added twist.

The images that I’d prepared were mockups of the game screen, featuring arrows and captions pointing to the most important elements — describing the game-flow, control mechanic and graphical style. Markus loved the concept and insisted on immediately contacting Matias and Benjamin to enthusiastically pitch the idea to his team. The coders were on board; I had buy-in. Boom!

The Gospel of Games

With the team bought into the concept, the next step for me would be to produce what’s known as a GDD, a Game Design Document. This document is sometimes referred to as a Game Bible as, once written, it’s the point of reference for every single detail within the game.

Produced during the pre-production phase of a project, the GDD is a key asset during the game’s actual production. It provides guidelines for gameplay, user interface and menu flow, scoring and game rules. It will even include the game’s story, characters and location. Essentially, every detail of the game, no matter how seemingly inconsequential, is mapped out in this document before starting production.

The GDD defines the features and scope of the project; ideally, once production has begun, the GDD won’t change and will serve as a blueprint for the game’s development. Games being what they are — entire populated virtual worlds with their own distinct rules — they are particularly susceptible to feature creep. This project management issue occurs when new features creep in to the product design during the production phase — it drags out development, costing both time and money.

Feeling Doubtful

Over the past few days, since my meeting with Markus, my thoughts have been a flurry of game-related ideas, ready to throw in to the GDD before we begin production. It’s really happening and it’s so exciting to be part of the process. The team — Markus, Matias and Benjamin — are passionate about coding, so accomplished in their abilities, I feel lucky to be working with them.

However, my mind keeps returning to one question: Will this app really make it the App Store? It’s an exciting project indeed, but it’s such a massive undertaking and all the more intense because I’m documenting it in public, right here. It seems like an irrational doubt, but, we could be setting ourselves up for a big fall.

Gomi is a forthcoming iPhone game that blends Katamari Damacy with Mario Galaxy, rolling a recycling blob creature around tiny planets to clean up the trash. Based on the preview videos, the game looks fantastic, yet its release has been delayed for several months now.

My worry is that if one element goes awry (we lose a coder, the game mechanic isn’t fun, the scope is unrealistic, our project planning is off) we could end up delaying, or worse, shutting down the project. Everything seems to have run smoothly so far, but once we get into the nitty gritty of pre-production, I wonder if that will still be the case.

Next time: Marvel at the visual delights as I unveil my conceptual character artwork, delve in to the details of gameplay mechanics and discover what happens when a hardcore coder disagrees with a journalist-cum-designer. It’s all in the next thrilling installment of TheAppleBlog’s App Developer Diary.

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Their environment page states, albeit in a typically corporate way, a commitment to creating ‘green’ gadgets:

Apple recognizes its responsibility as a global citizen and is continually striving to reduce the environmental impact of the work we do and the products we create.

The new U.S. ad campaign was launched on Monday night, and is coupled with a new page on the Apple site providing more environmental information. Not only is it the first TV spot Apple has released heralding environmental progress with their products, but it marks the start of any major campaign for the new MacBook lineup.

The Achievements

Some of the features of the new MacBooks which Apple is pushing include:

• Arsenic-free glass
• Brominated flame retardant-free
• Mercury-free
• PVC-free
• 41% smaller packaging
• Highly recyclable aluminum and glass enclosures

While Apple has been praised by many for the progress with their notebook line, work has still to be done on their lineup of desktop machines. Any mention of the environment is suspiciously absent from their iMac and Mac Pro pages. I’m confident that the next incarnations of these products will be promoted in the same way, marking the transition of Apple’s whole line to environmentally friendly materials (no doubt coupled with a glossy press photo showing each machine with a nature-themed wallpaper).

Advertising Focus

This new advert raises the topic of what product features Apple has a history of pushing in advertising. Recent campaigns have focused around the Mac’s superiority to Vista (and, judging by the number of “I’m a Mac” ads created, this is faring well for them). iPhone ads have similarly focused on the sheer range of features available in the software.

It’s difficult to judge exactly what consumers demand in a notebook, but I would think that the ground-breaking features in OS X have a great deal more advertising sway than pushing the environmental aspect of new MacBooks. I’m sure the new ads will compel some people to make the switch to Mac, but I don’t think they’ll be running on a long term basis.

The Latest TV Ad

This is a video of the latest TV advert, promoting a selection of environmental features in the new MacBook:

Do you think this is a wise route for Apple to take with their ad campaigning?

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I thought Daylite 3.7 by Marketcircle was just another PIM, kind of like Microsoft’s Outlook or Entourage. Daylite is not just another PIM; it is a business tool that organizes your data better than any other application I have ever used.

Currently, I am part of FiniteComedy.com, a small video production company that makes video for the web. Creating and producing video content creates tons of projects that require plenty of attention.

My Old System

I had been using a kludge of applications to keep myself organized. I regularly used a combination of Google Calendar + iCal integration and GMail and its Contacts feature. I’ve experimented with 37signals and its Highrise web application — Highrise is an online address book, contact manager, task list web application; I don’t believe it has a calendar. It is a fine web application, but for some reason it never stuck with me.

I have also had a lot of past experience using Microsoft Outlook, but hardly used Entourage.

Enter Daylite: Installation

Installation is done via an installer (no a drag and drop install here). It takes up 141MB of space. While installing, Daylite asks if you want to create your own database or take a look at other databases to get a feel for Daylite in action. I created my own database. At that point, I did not know exactly what I was doing, but I figured I could learn as I go. A “database” in this context is just a term for your Daylite set up. Daylite also asks for personal information and you can import your address book and iCal information. You can also import all or some of your iCal calendars. Those of you who have jumped on board with Google CalDAV integration will be annoyed to know you cannot import these calendars.

The last step is choosing from a template. There are a number of specialized templates to choose from including Film & Video, Law, Print & Design and more. There are also blank and General templates. Each template contains some presets for categories, keywords and settings. I tried General to get a better overall feel for the program.

Life with Daylite: First Thoughts

I started using Daylite like I would any program. I just jumped right in. First I wanted to create a new contact. The default toolbar has often used (or the most useful) functions. When I hit the “New Contact” button, a window pops up with plenty of options for any contact.

After a couple minutes of use, I saw that Daylite provides you with a wealth of options in presenting you your data. To some this may be daunting. In my opinon, this is the kind control that is needed to keep track of multiple projects and data. Connecting projects to contacts is a snap. Just add some one to the “Linked” section. That way, when you look at a project, you can find whoever is connected to that project. Projects can also be linked to to-do lists.

Daylite also puts in an icon in the menu bar with quick access to create new contacts, appointments, notes and more while you are not in the actual program. Daylite is very stable and crashed only once during the testing period.

Daylite has an odd way of searching. The search field looks like a spotlight search, but you must hit enter to get results. Not a big gripe, but I thought it was odd (or at least inconsistent with the Mac interface nowadays) that the results did not populate as you type.

It seems that every bit of information in Daylite can be displayed in at least three different ways depending on how much information you want up on the screen at one time. Personally, I like seeing as much information as I can on someone or some event to get a bigger picture on what I’m doing.

Life with Daylite: Project Management

I have never been completely satisfied with the project management solutions I have tried. The best thing I had found to manage projects and link them to contacts is just using a dry erase marker and my whiteboards. It is an inelegant solution that does not provide any of the comforts of a computer-based solution, but it kind of works except for space issues.

Daylite has excellent project management capabilities. I am currently trying to set up a live taping of “ChannelFlip Tech” and some other shows at the Digital Life Show held at the Jacob Javits Center in New York City this September. There are several elements to this project. There is my contact at Digital Life, my co-host and his schedule, potential sponsors, and material for the show.

Setting up the project is simple. Create a new project and input some data like a name for the project and due date. It is the “Linked” field that I found the most helpful. You can link a project to a contact, an organization or a group. The Digital Life project can be linked to my contact at Digital Life, my co-host, sponsors and any one else who has a contact file.

Daylite’s project window shows you your different projects and you can choose to see the data in different ways. You can get a feel for your projects at a glance. I am not completely familiar with every feature yet, but I know there are many other customizations that could make Daylite more useful for my particular needs.

Daylite: The Rest of the Features

There are some very good components to Daylite. There is a calendar that works as you would expect any calendar program to work. It does allow smart calendars which is nice. Events can be categorized, although they can be assigned to only one category at a time.

There is an Appointments feature that takes your calendar data and lays it out like the Contacts section. It is pretty much an alternative view to just looking at the standard calendar.

Contacts are presented in a similar way to projects. You can see your contact list, selecting a contact will show you what is linked to that contact. I am using the “General” template so there is plenty of data fields already. Contacts also support smart contact lists. I am a big fan of smart lists that actively change as information changes. It saves a lot of time over the long run. The “Organizations” feature is similar to the contacts, just organized by organization instead of individuals.

“Opportunities.” You can add a New Opportunity to the Opportunities section of the application. I have never seen this kind of function before. This feature is obviously geared towards a business. Since I am pursuing advertisers and sponsors, this is a great section. Once an opportunity is acted upon, you can create a project. “Opportunities” is like a pre-Project zone.

There is also a “Notes” feature. I have never been a big fan of notes outside of putting notes in appointment data or in a contact file. You can link notes to contacts or projects. This seems to be the best way in Daylite to add notes to Projects. This allows for greater organization of notes as the note appears linked to the project, and the project appears linked to the note.

Conclusion

Daylite is one of the best solutions I have used to manage information. However, it is not something everyone needs. If you want to use Daylite as an iCal replacement, then it is overkill. This is software built for a small business that wants to manage its contacts, calendars and projects well. Daylite is priced at $149 US for 1 user, $745 US for 5 users and $1490 for 10 users.

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Apple is on a software-release roll. Yesterday they released Leopard 10.5.2 and today they have released Aperture 2.

Aperture is Apple’s pro-level photograph editing and management software that has been picking up a lot of steam in the past couple of years.

There are over 100 new features in Aperture 2, some of which are:

• Updated user interface
• Quick preview mode
• Larger project management
• .Mac Web Gallery integration
• Tethered shooting support
• Duplicate detection

You can see the full list of updates here.

Also worth noting is the price as now dropped from $299 to just $199 for a full version and $99 to upgrade.

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