Simply Mac Blog
Dec 201106

New online exhibit chronicles Jobs’ career

by admin

The Computer History Museum based in Mountain View, CA launched a new online exhibit this week dedicated to Steve Jobs and his prolific career.

The exhibit is called “Steve Jobs…First, Last, One more thing…” and traces his life from the early days in the garage with Woz to his last days as the CEO of Apple. The exhibit features a myriad of interesting Steve Jobs tidbits along with rare footage of Jobs from the 80s talking about the early days of Apple. The exhibit also includes pictures of Jobs and other interesting Apple-related items.

You can view the exhibit here and brush up on your Steve Jobs history. It’s a great shorter version of his life if reading the biography isn’t your thing.

Enjoy!

 

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filed under: Apple News, Random Apple Goodness
Nov 201130

Win a MacBook Air in the Very Merry Santa Hunt!

by admin

The holidays are here, and with that comes a very special holiday contest–the Very Merry Santa Hunt!

If you’ve played our pumpkin hunt game before, then you’ll know just what to do!

The Game

1. ) From December 1-December 21, we’ll be randomly hiding one sly little Santa somewhere on our website. There will be a grand total of 15 santas we’ll be hiding.

2.) Each Santa will only stay up for 1 day.

3.) The only way you’ll know when the santas are going up is if you become a fan on Facebook. We’ll be telling you there when a Santa is on the loose, so get following!

4.) Santas will only go up Monday – Friday between 8am-5pm, so take a break on the weekends. (Friday Santas may or may not stay up all weekend, so don’t be alarmed. Also, they will never be in the estore. Just a hint for you.)

5.) You must find a minimum of 5 Santas to enter, but every Santa you find counts as one entry!

How to Win

Come back each day to find the hiding Santa and make a list of the URLs of the pages where you found the hiding Santa.

We’ll choose a random winner on Thursday, December 22, so all you have to do is get your entry form into us before the deadline. But how do you enter you ask? Keep reading!

Submitting your Entries

All month long, keep track of the URL of the page where you found each Santa.

Then, on December 21, we will provide you with an online form where you can enter all of your URLs in a simple form and click submit. That’s it! We’ll post the link to the form on Facebook and on the blog.

Rules

1.) Don’t spoil the fun for others. Anyone who publicly  posts Santa locations will be automatically disqualified.

2.) Entries received after midnight on December 21 will not be eligible.

3.) You have to be able to pick up the MacBook Air at one of our eight locations.

Whew! There you have it. You never know when the Santas are going to be hiding, so follow us on Facebook to make sure you’re ready! That MacBook Air might just have your name written all over it just in time for Christmas.

Happy hunting!

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filed under: Contests & Giveaways
Nov 201129

The Future of Siri

by admin

We’re all raving fans of Siri–at least those of us who made the upgrade to the 4S. But as great as Siri is, one third-party developer is making it even cooler. Or at least I think so.

This developer has created a little something called SiriProxy, which is  a proxy server to Apple’s Siri that allows for creating custom plugins that perform a whole bunch of futuristic functions. Think  starting your car, locking your car doors, and controlling your home’s thermostat.

SiriProxy is very much in its early stages, so setting it up isn’t exactly for the amateur. It requires a 4S and some experience with Ruby, web servers, OpenSSL, etc. So if you’re a casual Siri user like me, then this might not be for you–unless you decide to get all autodidactic on us and figure it out on your own, which you can do here.

Here are some videos demonstrating SiriProxy in action:

Will we see an Apple edition of something similar soon? That is yet to be seen, although given the amount of potential here, I think they’d be crazy not to. Has anyone out there tried SiriProxy? Or have plans to do so?

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filed under: App Spotlights, Apple News
tags: , ,
Nov 201123

Apps to make Thanksgiving awesome

by admin

Well, kids, it’s just about time for the great American tradition of Thanksgiving. It’s a holiday rife with traveling, horrible in-laws, and pants that are suddenly way too tight. BUT–never fear. The stresses of Thanksgiving are a thing of Thanksgivings past with these Thanksgiving apps! (I know–we’re a little late to the game considering Thanksgiving is tomorrow, but they might just come in handy for your last-minute prep!)

Shopper

If you turn into the Hulk after Thanksgiving grocery shopping like I do, then you’ll like this little app that will help you keep it all together. Shopper takes grocery shopping lists to a whole new level with simple and quick lists that include savings offers, bardcode scanning, budgeting, custom aisle layouts, and more. The coolest part is the app will show you coupons and local flyers from top brands and retailers so you can save a little on your turkey dinner.

Chow Thanksgiving Dinner Coach

This little wonder is free, and it will help all of you Thanksgiving newbies out there be a little less clueless when it comes to prepping your turkey dinner. It gives you a bunch of the most traditional Thanksgiving dishes and gives you a step-by-step timeline that will guide you through it. It also gives you a shopping list so you can get your shopping done quickly.

KitchenPad Timer

Sometimes during Thanksgiving you have about a bajillion things in a couple different ovens all with different cooking times. This app gives you a visual kitchen timer that will help you manage your multiple cook times for stove top AND oven. Now there’s no excuse for ruining the stuffing.

Thanksgiving

Here’s an app just in case you encounter an awkward silence at your Thanksgiving dinner. When grandma asks you that completely inappropriate question, why not wow her with some Thanksgiving trivia?! You’ve got an easy out with this app–you can get all of the deets about Thanksgiving’s history right on your phone. Did you know B. Franklin proposed the turkey as America’s national bird? You’d know if you had this app.

Thanksgiving Coloring Book

And lastly, if you’ll be sharing the Thanksgiving table with a bunch of little ones that are not impressed with the food, you can help them out with this Thanksgiving coloring app. It’s got lots of different Thanksgiving-themed pictures for them to color and 60 colors to choose from.

We hope you all have an incredible Thanksgiving! And if you’re a crazy Black Friday shopper, don’t forget to check out our Black Friday deals.

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filed under: App Spotlights
Nov 201117

Welcome to the Holidays!

by admin

As you might have surmised by now, Thanksgiving is nigh upon us. What’s more Christmas is a mere 37 days away. The best news, though, is that the holidays at Simply Mac start tomorrow with our Pre-Black Friday deals!

But wait–there’s more! Our second-annual Meals for Macs food drive starts tomorrow as well. Last year’s food drive was pretty phenomenal–we donated $25,000 worth of food to the Utah Food Bank, and we’d love to match that if not beat it this year! Click here for all the details on how you can help!

We were so excited about the upcoming holiday season that we threw a big holiday launch party last night complete with ugly sweaters, nog, and cookies.

Mat won the award for ugliest sweater…

I got most cat-lady-like sweater (this was an obvious choice considering I had a cat dress, TWO cat sweaters, a cat brooch, cat scarf, cat earrings, AND a cat ring. But I don’t have two cats at home and numerous cat figurines or anything…)

and David Lawrence walked away with the best holiday-themed sweater.

We take holiday cheer pretty seriously around here. Are you ready for the holidays?

 

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filed under: Simply Mac
Nov 201116

Mix it up with Siri’s different dialects

by admin

This one’s for all of you 4S users out there. If the novelty of Siri is wearing off for you, why not try switching up her voice and/or language?

Siri can speak to you in a british accent, an Australian accent, or in French or German. And if you’d rather hear your saucy Siri banter from a male voice, you can do that, too.

Go to Settings > General > Siri. From here you can do all the switching you want. As for the male/female part, the US and Australia use a female voice, but the UK offers a very dignified male voice.

A word of caution, though: Siri is built to identify your own accent, so switching the language might hamper Siri’s capabilities. We hear using a fake accent might work, but you’ll probably find yourself switching to your own dialect after a few Siri mishaps.

Are you still loving Siri? And have you uncovered any witty new replies?

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filed under: Tips & Tricks
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