Just yesterday Pieter Omvlee asked on twitter if anyone used iWork.com, implying that Apple had forgotten about it. Almost everyone agreed that iWork.com has been less than a hobby for Apple and they hadn’t done anything with it since its release at Macworld ’09. A little over 9 months later, Apple has pushed some important updates to their ‘so far feature deficit’ web service.

The biggest change, is the ability to view all your documents in a grid view with sorting options, giving you a much better view of your files. Second, is comment notification, which will notify you at your preferred interval if any new comments come through on your documents. Again, nifty feature, but not a lot to talk about. And third, is 128-bit AES security, which can be used to add a password to a shared document.

I think the question still remains. Has Apple abandoned iWork.com? Google and Microsoft are pushing hard for the online office, but Apple’s offering seems nowhere near usable on a day to day basis. Sure it serves its intended purpose of ‘merely sharing documents’, but we need more than that. I think the grid view is one step in the right direction, but there needs to be better integration with the desktop versions of iWork with the online service.

What I’d like to see is some kind of Webkit view within the three iWork apps that lists out online documents. There should also be a seamless way of dropping documents in your online ‘bucket’. That would really remove the bounds of ‘which desktop’ while still keeping the richness of a desktop client. Second, some integration with MobileMe would be great. There’s no point in keeping iWork as something separate of MobileMe. Rather bring the suite together so they work with each other. Third, more updates, more frequently.

I have used iWork.com on several occasions to share documents (mostly to ‘wow’ PC users) and it has worked out well. Have you been using iWork.com for any document sharing (besides just trying it out)?

You must have seen the banner ad in our sidebar for a while now, and been wondering what exactly was going on. Truth be told I myself didn’t know much about the deal except it was going to cost $50 a piece, and set to go live on the 3rd of August. In case you didn’t realise, it’s the 3rd already, and The Mac Sale has gone live.

What’s the deal this time? 10 apps, worth $450, for $50. Most of the apps look familiar, so I’ll try and drill through each one. Take note that my little comments are not reviews.

Flux ($65): I’ve only heard about this web development tool and am yet to give it a try. It’s supposed to take on the mighty Dreamweaver as one of the most powerful web development platforms on the Mac. This is just what I’ve heard, so take it with a pinch of salt.

Scribbles ($20): Bringing an innovating way to draw on the Mac, Scribbles does away with confusing palettes and tools, bringing back the fun in digital art. A fun app to have, and although otherwise not worth the $20, it’s a good addition to your app-sernal.

Interarchy ($60): One of the more advanced FTP clients I’ve tested, Interarchy features everything from Amazon S3 locations, to even connecting directly to HTTP locations. A really good tool for network admins. At $60 it’s a little pricey, but a fantastic addition to the bundle.

Iris ($80): Cool user interface, but a little limited in functionality, Iris is good enough for the home user. Featuring a one window user interface, there’s not much confusion as to what you’re supposed to do.

Writeroom ($25): If writing is your thing, Writeroom will go a long way in keeping you free from on screen distractions. Featuring a full screen barebones mode, which is completely customisable to your liking, I couldn’t be happier to give Writeroom the go ahead. Excellent addition. Our review.

REALbasic ($99): By the looks of it it appears to be a software development platform for coding BASIC applications for Mac, Windows, and Linux. I shall refrain from commenting further. Costs $99 though.

HoudahSpot ($25): If you find Spotlight frustrating, HoudahSpot will let you do custom searches fast, narrowing your results down to a manageable few. Check out our review.

Stuf ($21): Not one of the best clipboard managers I’ve tested, but still, it does the job it’s supposed to do. In my experience, clipboard managers are really useful, so this is another useful addition.

TaskPaper ($30): If GTD apps have you scared, TaskPaper will bring the simplicity of paper to your digital desktop. Here’s our review.

MarinerCalc ($50): A kind of legacy spreadsheet app for the Mac. I have no experience or interest in spreadsheet apps, so I’ll refrain from commenting.

In a bundle

Overall the bundle has got a range of apps serving different purposes. They’re mostly solid apps, some of which might not be best in their league, but they’ll work nonetheless. My major complaints with some of the apps in my previous writeups was that they were a little too expensive. However, bundled in at $50, I’d definitely recommend you check out this bundle. TheMacSale.com.

Disclaimer: No, this writeup was not sponsored.

Analysts predicted that Apple would post a brilliant June quarter, and Apple didn’t prove them wrong. Posting $8.34 billion in revenue share diluted to $1.37 per share, this blows past the estimates of $1.17 a share as predicted by analysts. For perspective, last year Apple posted $1.19 a share with a revenue of $1.17 billion.

From the press release:

Apple® today announced financial results for its fiscal 2009 third quarter ended June 27, 2009. The Company posted revenue of $8.34 billion and a net quarterly profit of $1.23 billion, or $1.35 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $7.46 billion and net quarterly profit of $1.07 billion, or $1.19 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 36.3 percent, up from 34.8 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 44 percent of the quarter’s revenue.

Here are some significant pointers you can gather from this press release.

• This is the highest non-holiday quarter earnings reported in Apple history.
• Apple sold 2.6 million Macs, which is highest sold for the June quarter.
• iPod sales growth was low at 7% with 10.2 million iPods
• 5.2 million iPhones were sold recording a 626% growth in sales over last year, although this is not exactly an accurate figure since the iPhone 3G went on sale only on June 11th, which means the iPhone 3GS had a 2 week headstart.
• Apple’s gross margins also increased to 36.3%, up from 34.8%.

As usual there’s a Steve note in between the press release:

“We’re making our most innovative products ever and our customers are responding,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We’re thrilled to have sold over 5.2 million iPhones during the quarter and users have downloaded more than 1.5 billion applications from our App Store in its first year.”

This followed by a live quarterly earnings call (which can be listened via live stream).

Totally unreal video demo of acrossair’s latest app “New York Nearest Subway” currently pending approval at the App Store.

When you load the app, holding it flat, all 33 lines of the New York Subway are displayed in coloured arrows. By tilting the phone upwards, you will see the nearest stations: what direction they are in relation to your location, how many miles away they are and what lines they are on. If you continue to tilt the phone upwards, you will see stations further away, as stacked icons. Only available to Apple iPhone 3GS users.

This is the kind of app that makes you realise that we’re already in the future

[via ★DF]

Oh look! Sprint has decided to take it upon themselves to educate the masses about the current phone landscape. I guess Palm is busy dealing with their losses over the last quarter. Sprint keenly observing that the first generation iPhone contracts are coming to an end, Palm think it’s time to switch to their latest and greatest ‘iPhone killer’, the Pre.

Here’s an ad Sprint has put up on their facebook page.

Palm and Sprint are obviously smoking something we haven’t even heard of. Multiple applications you say. Try running a google search for “Pre battery life” and you’ll be a little closer to the truth. Hardware keyboard? Get a BlackBerry. Synergy? Would have been good, if it worked. Applications? I hear over 1 application was added to the store over the last week. And let’s not forget, Apple is all set on pulling the iTunes-Pre sync. Consider those Pre-happy-hours.

Ah Palm. I guess PC guys are just going to figure this out. They are just going to walk in.

*The author of this post has not used the Pre or the iPhone 3GS, and is not happy about either fact.

[via EdibleApple]

Just as the iPhone OS 3.0 was unleashed onto the world, the reviews of the 3G S started emerging on sites like Engadget, Gizmodo and the like. We at Smoking Apples can only stare at the pictures, since the iPhone will hit India somewhere in August. Till then, here’s the story the rest of them are telling.

Engadget was the first one out with a review, and while their review is an overall positive, it’s not praising ‘the S’ to the skies. Impressed with the speed and quality of recorded video. They’ve even got a raw video file of the 3G S which demonstrates what the final video looks like. And it’s stunning!

“Okay—you got us. Video recording on the iPhone 3G S is really quite impressive, and there are two reasons why. For starters, the phone handles pretty fantastic looking VGA video at 30 FPS, which makes for not just passable mobile video, but usable mobile video.” – Joshua Topolsky, Engadget.

Gizmodo’s review is a much better read actually, since they bring a little more fun and flair into their writing. They’re totally stoked about the speed, mentioning it more than too many times. The rest of the features like Compass, Video Recording, and the rest of the party.

“But as a whole, the iPhone 3GS is the best all-around smartphone available. If you’re looking for a refined, augmented version of what you already know, a phone that, not for nothing, runs all the tens of thousands of apps on the App Store, choose the iPhone 3GS.” – Jason Chen, Gizmodo.

David Pogue at the New York Times gives his usual wordy review of the iPhone 3G S. Again, damn impressed with speed, and advices any and all to avoid buying the $100 cheaper iPhone 3G. “If you’re used to the old iPhone, the speed boost hits you between the eyes, especially when you’re opening programs, playing games and loading Web pages.”

“The new iPhone doesn’t just catch up to its rivals — it vaults a year ahead of them.” says Pogue

No Apple product doesn’t go under the Uncle Walt scanner, and the iPhone 3G S is no different. Mossberg however isn’t that impressed with the new iPhone, considering it evolutionary, and that the juice is mainly in the software 3.0. He goes on to review the iPhone 3.0 OS as well, one that he’s very impressed with.

While we’re on 3.0, Dan Moren at Macworld has done a fairly comprehensive review of the 3.0 software, should you want to know more about it. As for the nitty gritty, you can check out this article titled “How to use the best 40 features of the iPhone 3.0 OS“.

As a final word, even though I haven’t even taken a whiff of the new space saving box of the iPhone 3G S, I’d say if you’re going for it, take the S plunge. The extra $100 will go a long way in terms of speed, features, as well as another 8GB of storage space. It’s a no brainer.