If you can believe Microsoft, they frequently put groups of users in little test rooms — or some sort of testing environment — and expose them to the new features in a product. By gauging their reactions, they decide whether those capabilities deserve to go into production. Now if you look at Microsoft’s shipping products, […]

In 1984, I was working in a prepress plant, laboring over traditional cold (or photo-based) typesetting equipment. Instead of looking at a true representation of the printed page, the video display presented text and formatting commands. Yes, with a little practice, you could visualize the end result, more or less. However, these particular devices simply […]

It’s got to be a strange world out there, with some folks reporting that Leopard has driven them crazy, while most of you appear to have had great experiences with Apple’s latest operating system. Include me in the latter camp. In recent articles, I’ve tried to put this confusing picture into perspective. I know there […]

When Apple released its 10.4.10 update a while back, most of the initial comments were quite positive. But there were the usual spate of problem reports, such as inconsistent wireless networking, mysterious crashes; the usual stuff that accompanies such releases. But perhaps the most unusual symptom of all was a popping sound reportedly heard on […]