Into Streams Of Song

Sydney Morning Herald

Monday May 21, 2007

David Flynn

Catch a fresh bunch of tunes with QuickTime, expand your online searches with Firefox and get Apple's iCal and Google on speaking terms, writes David Flynn.

MUSIC

Want to try something a little different? American folk-rock band Wilco recently released their sixth album, Sky Blue Sky, and all 12 tracks have been put online at the band's website (www.wilcoworld.net) as streaming music that plays through QuickTime. It's an ideal way to sample new music in the background while you work.

Note that the music is packaged using Adobe Flash in what Apple calls an "interactive booklet" and this requires enabling a special feature in QuickTime. Start QuickTime and click the Edit menu, then choose Preferences and click the Advanced tab. If you're using Windows, be sure to select the box labelled "Enable playback of Flash tracks" (or, on the Mac, "Enable Adobe Flash"), then close and restart QuickTime.

INTERNET

Sometimes the best features in your software are right in front of you - but are hiding. That's the case with the Firefox web browser and its customisable search box, to the right of the address pane (the bit where you enter the website you want to visit).

Yet I'm knocked out by the number of Firefox users who don't realise they can add multiple search engines to this box. Click the drop-down arrow next to the G symbol of the default Google search pane, then click the menu option to Manage Search Engines. This lets you change the order in which the current search engines are listed, as well as remove ones you don't need. Click the "Get more search engines" link at the bottom of that box and you'll be whisked to a website that provides plug-ins to add two dozen search engines to the box, including Wikipedia and IMDB movie database. You can find even more at mycroft.mozdev.org.

MOBILE

If you've recently acquired a BlackBerry 8800 - that's the one with the in-built GPS navigation system - then point your BlackBerry browser to www.google.com/gmm. There you'll find the latest and now BlackBerry-compatible update to Google Maps Mobile. This loads the Google Maps service (example pictured) onto your smartphone so you can find not only where you are but where you want to go and how to get there. You can also use Google Maps Mobile on your Palm Treo or Windows Mobile device.

MAC

Speaking of Google, the search supremo's online calendar has become a hit with those trying to move more of their life online. As with other web-based programs, you can get access to Google Calendar on any PC (or even a smartphone) with internet access. But what about synchronising your conventional computer-based calendar with Google's? Spanning Sync (from www.spanningsync.com, 15-day trial free) gets the Apple Macintosh iCal and Google Calendar talking. By using Apple's iSync and iTunes, you can even copy your current Google Calendar to your iPod.

© 2007 Sydney Morning Herald

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