AIKOUSHA  Looks impressive. Unfortuately doesn't fit my needs. I need software that will properly fill Catalog Numbers (since ALL my music is from CDs I own, and need to reference if the track is used), as well as allowing at least two custom fields which are not represented in the massive collection of tags in the prefs.

And, why, on a Dual 2.5Ghz, does it take nearly a minute to start the program?  
(Version 3.2.1)

AIKOUSHA  Can't review it. On launch it says it goes looking for updates (where there's no internet connection?!?), it beachballs for about a minute and then crashes. Repeatedly. Unable to truly startup. It doesn't even draw it's menubar.

Guess I'm still stuck with a horribly buggy VLC (which now crashes if you click in the playlist ^_^).  
(Version 0.6.4)

AIKOUSHA  Wondering why the fonts in mkv files don't manage to make it through Exporting. They look fine while playing, but on export they turn into plain, large, Helvetica...

Also, be sure to turn off autoload external subtitles when working with the Studio Pro apps, as they hook into Quicktime to do a lot of work, and external subtitles WILL get picked up whether you want them or not.

Now just hoping to see the last of the Indeo codecs, Xiph Audio, and better font control in matroska, and possibly quantized MPEG4 (AVC and Xvid) on Export?

Keep up the great work!  
(Version 1.1.3)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, now it won't play in Tiger anymore. By September is it going to be Intel and Snow Leopard ONLY?  
(Version 1.0rc4)

AIKOUSHA  Lord, did you miss the point...

And the reason why Leopard breaks so many apps, is because Apple pulled the software out of Leopard that was required (or superseded it)... This is not a fault of the programmers! The same thing they did in Tiger... Anybody else miss the old search, and hate the very broken Spotlight? It sort-of works, but you wouldn't accept that in airline travel...

And as far as snow leopard is concerned... It "breaks" everything that isn't Intel. According to Apple, they have abandoned PPC completely.

If I want to go Intel, I'll buy an Intel Machine, Install WinXP, Linux and Hackintosh. Best of all worlds.  
(Version 1.3.6)

AIKOUSHA  Yes, like others commenters, I suggest you find another... Jubler, Subs Factory, or Miyu. The interface for this is archaic, non-intuitive, and for what little it does, extremely expensive.

It may have been good when dealing with analog and non-sophisticated work, but it has long since been surpassed.

And, if you plan on eventually getting your subbed video onto DVD, I would suggest thinking about investing in DVD Studio Pro, and possibly Sublime or Annotation subtitle software (these two are expensive and pretty much for those with professional work or constant job flows).   
(Version 1.7.8)

AIKOUSHA  Interesting alternative to ffmpegx's interface (which severely needs filtering and updating). I'll be keeping an eye on this.  
(Version 1.0.3)

AIKOUSHA  I can't really say anything good about this because I couldn't get it to rip a single DVD, other than the one that was burned by my DVD-Recorder (that was to see if there was a drive incompatibility with the program, which there isn't).

I tried 5 discs that were tough for other rippers. Yet, it couldn't get a singe one, usually failing within 20 seconds of starting. All the DVDs play flawlessly in an ancient region-free DVD player.

It doesn't have features... it's supposed to just rip DVDs, but I have 3 free apps that do this, and at least one of them will read images, so it plays well with fair mount. This doesn't. I gave it a 2 because if it really worked, one feature would be more than enough... and, unlike previous versions, it no longer seems to freak out over non-matching region discs. However, it shouldn't even have to deal with that, and I'm not really certain that that might still be the issue, as there is nothing that tells you why it stops or has trouble with discs.

Ease of use... same as above, you stick in a DVD disc. Hmmm, but that didn't always work, it often didn't realize the disc was in there, even though the system did. Often requiring an eject and then re-insertion. However, due to the lack of recognizing a disc as an image, I had to knock it down to a one. Every disc I gave it might have succeeded if it did. At least one disc does this with one of the free apps.

Value: if I have to pay $20 for something that won't read the discs everything else I have won't, then it's fairly useless. Start working like some of the Windows-side apps (or the old "Locksmith" program from Apple II days) then you will quickly get a "5."

It didn't crash, but it halts rather quickly on everything I threw at it, and it does have that odd quirk of sometimes not recognizing the disc is there.

On top of that, it only works under Leopard. What feature of Leopard is an absolute requirement in a DVD ripper? It certainly isn't helping this program read commercial discs.

Looking forward to a major upgrade. Hopefully by then it can rip the older discs (5+ years old) that I gave it, as well as the newer ones with sophisticated protections.  
(Version 1.2.11)

AIKOUSHA  It doesn't have a logo. I'm not sure the developer wants one.

The app window also hides itself if it isn't the fromtmost active app. Almost seems like stealth is the aim. If so, I don't mind. My primary use is to rip TV from my DVD-Recorder, and this is blazingly fast and easy.  
(Version 0.0110a1)

AIKOUSHA  OS9 isn't the only reason to refuse 10.5. Many "drivers" and applications are broken under Leopard. Not a single one of my CAD programs work, neither do any of my SCSI devices... which cannot be replaced because they simply do not exist outside of this form. It would be easier to buy a windows machine than "move-up" to 10.5.

If you want, you can buy me a Mac-tel mini and I'll gladly use Leopard on that! ^_^  
(Version 1.2.7)

AIKOUSHA  You have to have newer, just to justify yourself?

Newer isn't always better, and with OSX 10.5 it unfortunately breaks hundreds of reliable and useful apps. (don't see this happen much in Winodws, sad to say).

So, for me as well, I can't give this a recommendation unless there is a 10.4 version.  
(Version 1.3.4)

AIKOUSHA  Exactly. Couldn't agree with you more. Add to your reasons, there is also the simple fact that there are HUNDREDS of very powerful apps out there that do not work on the new architectures and Leopard. I simply cannot move up, because Apple has tossed out the ability to run these apps, or the support they require (just one example: my drum scanner is SCSI only which is spotty at best since OSX, and just won't work at all under Leopard and Intel). Since there are at least ten working older macs where I work, for the same reason, I'm guessing this isn't unusual for a large number of businesses that don't use just the apps that come with their Mac model.  
(Version 0.9.9a)

AIKOUSHA  Here's another user, wishing for a 10.4 working version!  
(Version 1.4.2)

AIKOUSHA  We need a developer to upgrade this to work better.

Needed is quantizer controls and the ability to play friendly with both AAC and MP3 audio encoding in QT.

Video through QT without quantizer is usually horrifically large to look even halfway decent.  
(Version 1.0a)

AIKOUSHA  Agreed. and to Misha... as someone whose primary work is with cross-platform/system work, matroska is the very worst container format with so many problems it's a nightmare, even on it's own specific platform/system combo.

If you own a modern windows machine and that's all you care about, fine. But you are on a Mac site, and matroska on Macs and Linux/Unix (and others) is awful beyond belief.

If they start really developing native on other platforms, I'll applaud them. Until then, I give matroska the same finger their website gives to everybody else. I'm tired of other developers being forced to make .mkv software because there are so many selfish idiots out there.  
(Version 7.0)

AIKOUSHA  Another update, another test, more bugs (or should I say still the same bugs).

Presets are still a major nightmare...

You can only assign them AFTER you have renamed something, or they don't fix to the right search/replace strings.

If the preset loses the name you give it (which it does frequently), it says "new preset", until you TRY to rename it.

Attempting to rename a preset has severe issues, as simply clicking on a line forces whatever name was previously selected, and does not allow you to type in the proper name.

Even if the name shows properly in the list (as if you had successfully renamed it), it does not show properly on the pulldown button... I kept getting "New Preset" until after several rename attempts, and then it started inheriting the names of other presets, and never the right one.

If it has issues with non-alphanumeric characters that might be the problem, as the names I tried to assign were: "_[Suffix]", "[Prefix]_", " - to spc", "_-_ to spc", "_ to spc", and spc_spc to spc" (when the previous refused to name properly.

In the end the presets had "[Prefix}_" and seven instances of "spc-spc to spc", yet they all had different functions. but since I can't memorize what they do, if not labeled right, it's basically now a useless function. Thankfully I was only doing a test-drive.

IMO, common sense dictates that you should save presets BEFORE clicking the Rename button, and the list for renaming needs to work like other lists where double clicking while "editing" the list will allow renaming, and dragging (which doesn't seem to exist) will re-order the presets.

I may be picky, but the presets have never worked right (or at least within common sense) since it has appeared. I just keep with the old version, with the previous interface (no presets) since the next feature I would want to work with, would be the presets.

It's beautiful, otherwise.  
(Version 3.12.1)

AIKOUSHA  Tried to use to burn .cue flac image, and though it clearly shows it recognizing the files, it absolutely refuses to burn the disc, citing that the I should look and make certain the files hadn't moved.

In fact it seems it's problem is, that it refuses to allow the image access to the external drive, only allowing the data to show when querying the internal drive... which can't burn CDs.

Not much of a program if it won't work on the reliable external devices.  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  This new version crashes whenever there is a name with kanji in it...

and what was the problem with "™" instances?

Oh, well.  
(Version 3.10.1)

AIKOUSHA  I can't take any application seriously that is EXPIREWARE!

The program dies and does nothing but says it's expired after a certain date (without contacting home to determine if there is really a new version). This means that if the program actually works and is useful, one day, if the programmer passes or can no longer work on it, it will just no longer be there.

I experienced this with lots of software from 1995 to about 2002. Companies thought they were all smart trying to protect their media, but when the websites and companies died, the software did too.

Not Smart, not nice.  
(Version 1.7.11)

AIKOUSHA  I've tried at least 4 versions of this under two versions of Tiger. For about an hour or so it worked perfectly each time, and then even though loaded and active, it just stopped working... even across reboots.

It's behavior is consistent on my computer regardless of the system and many other situations. Don't know why, but sadly I cannot recommend or use a program which stops working very quickly, and then never operates again. And cleaning up after it to remove it is a pain.

Such a great idea and implementation... too bad it doesn't work on my computer.  
(Version 4.2)

AIKOUSHA  The links are dead, and the author's site has no navigation links, just photos... Jan-2009  
(Version 4.1)

AIKOUSHA  Actually, they are no longer working on it. It was bought by Apple and now is the Primary visualizer for iTunes. So, if your iTunes is fully updated, just turn on the default visualizer.  
(Version 0.2b)

AIKOUSHA  Definitely doesn't work for me. Won't save rules, locks up with scripting errors after 4th block attempt, after crash (about 5 minutes after lockup), will not restart (icon appears in dock but nothing else happens, and this then creates a situation where a power-button restart is required).

This is off a clean install of 10.4.11, so I can't understand what is going wrong.  
(Version 2.1)

AIKOUSHA  Where is Progress.app?

Good questiion, since it's in the package itself, yet, the dialogs do not let you navigate to inside a package... So everytime I try to use it, it just takes a couple of minutes to locate every app on every connected drive... gives the selection dialog, and any exit attempt (by selection or cancellation) ends up with the GUI's "Encode" button waiting to be pressed again.

How can an app not locate a tool that's part of itself?

Anybody have a simple fix for this?  
(Version 0.0.9y)

AIKOUSHA  Why is this constantly phoning home to intuit? It does it numerous times per session and it isn't doing it to check for updates, it does that on startup. No, it keeps doing this when I import a data file, in fact it does it a minimum of two times, and it's notifications of what it is actually doing are blatantly false... "Contacting financial institution" while reading a local xml file on an unconnected computer? WTF?!?

I feel real unsafe just trying this program, I'd be just plain scared to allow this thing access to my accounts on a daily basis... brrrrrrr.

It's easier to just use Excel, more straightforward, and I'm betting, a whole lot safer.  
(Version R2)

AIKOUSHA  If you are having perfect playback, you must be living either in a fantasy world, or are only dealing with the most accurate, simple, and CPU-friendly encodes. Wait, PACOBELL must have a 3Ghz Quadcore Intel machine... that must be it.

Most of the mkv files I deal with choke both Mplayer and VLC... in fact due to the bad encodes, most actually crash VLC. Small Xvid files tend to do okay, but that's not what is typically given over. The moment anything complex happens, it doesn't work (I like the files which play audio perfectly, but the video either only shows 1 out of about 80 frames, or does fun things like only displaying keyframes, or running at approximately 1/10th speed). I can't explain the joy of a submitted job where somebody thought they were smart by using chaptered files...

It's not ignorance on my part, or anyone else's, just obliviousness on yours. After all, as I'll point out again, my friend does have a Quad, and it's running XP now, and he can easily play .mkv files, just many of those he gets tend to run buggy.

I can't wait until the next generation comes around, or until they actually get it to be fit enough to BE mainstream.  
(Version 2.3)

AIKOUSHA  Get this to work like (or add features that will allow it to) the file search under 10.3 and it will be perfect.

Spotlight is practically useless as a "file"-search utility, Apple knows this, have since the first days of 10.4, and they just ignore the thousands of complaints. Blows my mind why they don't just port the routines to an app, and provide it to users.  
(Version 0.3)

AIKOUSHA  I'm guessing this utility is dead. It was never upgraded to work with Tiger safely, so, I guess if you can still get it and you plan to stay with OSX 10.3, this'll work. A few of the utilities were very useful for me, but I've had to delete it since there have been no updates.

BEWARE: many disk recovery programs can actually destroy your data when attempting to recover it, if they are not fully updated to the current system specs... specifically TechToolPro!  
(Version 1.1.5)

AIKOUSHA  Any chance of making this usable with 10.4?  
(Version 2.60)

AIKOUSHA  I'll have to second the previous poster's comment.

Looks a little like an idea I was toying with... a cross between TextEdit and HexEdit... since it's Intel only (and therefore useless to me), guess I might eventually take a stab at it...  
(Version 1.2)

AIKOUSHA  Ooops, came back to check on the update, and wow! Now it's completely useless to me. 10.5 dropped support for several critical things, so I am stuck with 10.4, and since this no longer works with 10.4 or lower... C'est la vie... Still printing with cmd-shft-4.  
(Version 1.5)

AIKOUSHA  Any chance of a recompile for older architeecture (PowerPC)?  
(Version 1.5)

AIKOUSHA  And to add to the previous... if it could work under 10.4 (Tiger), that'd be a plus, too.  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  For those of us that cannot move to 10.5, maybe the next version might allow 10.4 as well?  
(Version 1.1.1)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, my review vanished... C'est la vie...

However, I just noticed something else that needs addressing.

You need to place a version number or date on the info side of the widget! I know I have version 2.something, but that's it. ^_^  
(Version 2.3.4)

AIKOUSHA  Back again, since I'm still in search of the elusive working OCR package for the Mac. Don't know if this works well on Windows, but I'll probably learn that soon, as given a choice for a wireless laptop, I'm probably going with windows so I can use both a Mac and Windows (for those few things that still can't be done on a Mac).

Too bad the guy I met last time I tested this software no longer works at the store.

I actually tested version 11.6.3 , funny that it's not available on MacUpdate, yet...

Don't be dismayed, this program has ALL the problems it had the last time I reviewed it. The only thing it seems to have different is a bunch of links to SANE to attempt to get older scanners to work with the OCR.

It's too bad that when I finally jumped through the hoops to get SANE installed (took over two hours of installs, component searches, code compiles, and restarts, before that was going), SANE worked, but no matter what I did, Readiris recognized SANE, but still couldn't access my scanner. So, using this required that I scan through Photoshop or VueScan, and then read the files in Readiris. Painful and time-consuming, but at least I don't lose the "scans" when Readiris INEVITABLY crashes.

No matter what, I cannot recognize more than 3 pages at a time... Guaranteed crash.

It still doesn't recognize common type, consistently misinterpreting scratches, unable to understand baselines, periods, colons, semicolons, hyphens, em-dashes, etc., identical to the last time.

So, again, I can't recommend this, and unless you absolutely have to have it for work, I'd stay away from it, and the company.

For those looking for a kanji based OCR (Japanese, Chinese, Korean, etc.), DON'T EVEN BOTHER. According to their website, it doesn't exist for the Mac, hasn't for quite a while, and I'm guessing won't be available for years. (So, what were they selling before? Vaporware?).

A SUGGESTION FOR READIRIS: Save all the recognized material to a file that acts like a log, instead of waiting for the entire process to complete before writing to an output file, that way, when the program crashes, you only have to start where the log file ends!

Also, USE the splines from an actual typeface in order to learn the shapes that are scanned. Most people have the most commonly used typefaces, and businesses often purchase the typefaces they need for the documents they scan (in order to reproduce them exactly), so this should be an easy thing to implement and use... assuming you code in-house, and aren't just absconding with the work of others.  
(Version 11.6.2)

AIKOUSHA  Not updated since 2005, and the plug-in is version dependent. i.e., the last supported version of Acrobat was version 7. I tried to run the demo version in Acrobat Pro 8 (OSX 10.4.11), and it causes a Mac Error without terminating Acrobat.

Not even certain if the company still exists, since there is no sign on their site that anything has been changed since 2005.  
(Version 2.0.1)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, it's gotten extra-buggy since 0.8.x and now unless you buy a new video card, you won't get any bugs fixed at all? BTW the recommended non-quartz 0.9.2 is so buggy it's unusable, so that's not an option.

How about correcting all the major issues first before jumping to a form that will kill a large number of user's? What's next, mandatory OSX 10.6? Which will require the newest Core Trio Macs only?

STILL using 0.8.6!  
(Version 0.9.4)

AIKOUSHA  I don't know what form of mkv files those who gave this a 5 were converting, but it wasn't x264 based...

I've been trying this on and off since it was version 1 of mokgvm2DVD. I had EXACTLY one conversion come through correct and easily on the video portion, but the subtitles were screwed up (tiny with no way to change the size or position, yup I know about the options button).

However, probably not due to the GUI or tools in this package, it can't cleanly convert any of the stupid matroska files I need to convert. I actually have to give these to people outside the company to deal with. The video that results from this and it's previous versions have stalls, drop outs, jumping blocks and in ALL cases now, have a really bizarre form of horizontal digital streaking. My guess this is due to a popular windows x264 (not a compliant H264) codec that has no Mac/Unix/Linux equivalent, and it screws up like this due to improper header information and something critical in the actual image processing that is not completely compliant with H264.

On top of that, nothing I have given this new version (MKV Tools), can even get the subitles to burn into the video. Since everything I deal with has subtitles of one form or another, this is a deal breaker.

I do like the fact that matroska files converted with this maintain audio sync correctly, even though there isn't a single player out there that can maintain sync while playing the mkv files I deal with, live.

I'm sorry I can't give this a recommendation, even if the main problem is most likely with the idiots on the Windows encoding side, but a Matroska converter that can't convert matroska files to make them watchable (regardless of whose fault it is), is fairly useless.  
(Version 2.1)

AIKOUSHA  Connectivity is a major feature of this program!

The previous commenter really needs to play with the app a little and visit the website that discusses the functions of the program. If you actually end up using only 10% of this program consistently, $15 is more than reasonable. Although some nomenclature could be in need of overhaul, this is incredibly powerful... And with a multi-web cam setup, allows tabletop RPGers in different locations to play almost as if they were sitting at the same table. This is part of it's power.

This also allows RPGers with MacBooks sitting at the same table to automate all sorts of number&die-crunching, including allowing the DM to auto-poll rolls from the other players' computers, with or without the players' knowledge. Incredibly complex die rolls and situations can be set up on a couple dozen, to hundreds of buttons. "If-Then" statements are part of the die formulae! As well as mathematical and some other statistical functions. For a complicated button set-up, you can individually color buttons, change their basic look, and many other things.

If I actually needed such a complex app, I would gladly pay the fee. However, I don't, and would probably never play in a game where such was necessary. But a group of young professionals, who play on a weekly basis, where members often have to take business trips, this would keep a game from dying or stalling. Of course, there would be a bit of a learning curve, and everybody would need a Mac with CrystalBall... but it definitely has a place in RPG gaming. An iPhone or Touch version of this app would be very useful for gaming in situations like those mentioned above.

Now, some issues with this... primarily cosmetic. It is one of the ugliest things I've seen in a while! (^_^). It covers a huge amount of desktop in a locked-to-the-menubar palette style (which I don't really like). There is no log, or paper-tape (though I suspect this will be part of the Full crystalball), The secondary window for the Ball itself is unnecessary (and too large), a few of the output formatting functions need to be quickly avaiable for changing (in the menu or on the palette), and some menu entries need to be cleaned up (see the Help menu).

Keep working on this, it's impressive, even now, and can easily be better.  
(Version 2.2.2)

AIKOUSHA  If you need a dice simulator/random number generator that has complex boundaries, and don't need to change those boundaries often, or if you need a log of the resulting values for large quantities of those numbers, this is the simulator for you.

Unfortunately, this is not a very good simulator if you need to switch sets or make a number of different simple rolls, or even quick rolls.

To use this, you need to switch several panes, and fill several fields. Changing sets is not quick or easy. In other words, it's not for someone who is using this for normal rolling in D&D, Gurps, ICE, CoC, Paranoia, or any other normal tabletop RPG or miniatures environment. For that, you might as well just get a proper bag of polyhedral dice.

However, if all you need is a single repetitive and complex set, this is excellent. And for other than Bones, is, at the moment one of the most flexible dice simulators for the Mac.

For the Developer, if you intend to continue with this format, you may wish to add a "set bar" and set-pane to allow multiple pre-created boundary-sets to be quickly selected from a pull-down menu. You may also wish to either change the format of, or allow exporting of, the roll-log, so people that could use this for probability work could get the numbers from the app. The current log form is not usable by anything I have access to, at home, or at Drexel University (and actually is a little non-intuitive to non-programmers).  
(Version 1.4)

AIKOUSHA  Seriously, I have to keep deleting all the updates and just keep going back to 0.8.6.

Maybe it's time to split the app until things can be properly ironed out... Make a build that's Matroska only, avi only, and possibly an info drop box., as it certainly hasn't improved on simple file playing at all.

Nice for free open-source, but bug updates really need to reduce the number of bugs, not increase them. :-(  
(Version 0.9.3)

AIKOUSHA  I had major issues with this software... I had 2.0.2 and even though it previewed in and out points just fine, in almost all cases (iDVD and DVD recorder discs) packaged in image files, it failed to actually pull the proper start and end points..; most of the time it grabbed less than 50% of the stream, not including either the start or end, but the file sizes were correct. This is odd as it didn't seem to have this problem with physical discs... which is silly, since you can use MacTheRipper for free to take anything off of physical DVDs (which I do for all the stuff that comes off my Sony DVD-Recorder).

I also find the interface for segment selection horribly busy, it seriously needs to make things simpler... it works, but is overly complex.

However, after demanding a refund on this, the regular version, since it wouldn't work right, they seemed to have corrected the non-physical disc issues quite nicely in the Pro version... it may be corrected in this version... 2.0.7, but since I moved up to the pro version (thanks dev!), I don't know.  
(Version 2.0.7)

AIKOUSHA  Though a fascinating thing to do, this sounds massively dangerous, considering that FMP still has some major problems... often not connecting to it's keyboard shortcuts on launch, and not loading the search function when the machine is busy doing something intensive.

Plug-ins like these are nice, though, and hopefully someday they will be written into the program... Things like barcode interfacing and container content by path calculation... ^_^

Keep it up!  
(Version 2.0.2.4)

AIKOUSHA  Yup. URL is dead due to non-existent address/server. Sounded cool though.  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  Server not found error...  
(Version 1.2)

AIKOUSHA  Stragglers? New functionality? Yup, I just love buying new hardware and software every six months and trashing thousand of dollars of hardware every year. Yup, I guess that's the whole reason for owning a computer...

I want the developer to know there is interest, but that it has to stay as only an "interest," unless it can work with "antiquated" 12 month old systems.

Sorry, but Leopard has removed nearly 5 times the functionality that it supposedly added, and Tiger did the same, but not as bad, even though it's upgrade prevents nearly $50,000 worth of professional equipment from working with the computer, that will never be upgraded itself... I'd call that waste, not progress. However, ALL the windoze software we have works from 95 all the way to XP without issue in any direction, and I find that sad.

I understand that upgrading is the neatest thing for some people and applications. But it isn't necessary for most of the things we end up testing, reviewing and using,, both here and for other places.

I use my Mac primarily for work, and all the Macs at work are used ONLY for work, however, 2 cannot be upgraded to Tiger because of loss of functionality, and the whole company cannot upgrade to Leopard for the same reason.

If admin feels this is a "troll," please feel free to remove it and the other comments, but the original intent was serious.  
(Version 1.0.6)

AIKOUSHA  You get a "400" error attempting to download this.

Going to the very odd programmers page (which resembles an ad-page more than anything else), you can eventually find that this software is "retired."

However, it's no longer free, it's grouped together with several other things which you have to pay for via paypal. Assuming this isn't just a scam-site.  
(Version 1.3)

AIKOUSHA  Quark "acquired" the software company that created this, and I do not know if they corrected any issues with it, but it can be retrieved from here:

http://files.quark.com/download/xpress/xtensions/alap/qxp/mac/alap_acrobat_imposerpro_mac.zip

If you enter via the "front door" you have to fill out craploads of information which they have no business knowing, even if you buy the software. Only if you want to FULLY register it (do they really need to know your address, phone, and IP, if you are just going to test the software?).  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  This program might have been useful back in the day, but it has proven useless several times when I needed it recently. Apparently they removed a lot of interim and early file-type support, so a VERY LARGE number of early files cannot be recognized, let alone translated, or even just stripped of their text. And the only help I was able to get from their customer support was eventually pointing me to a fact-sheet buried in their knowledgebase, that mentioned a few filetypes that were dropped... years ago.

I work cross-platform as a specialty, and I can't even get a tool that's supposed to handle this stuff specifically to work on the SAME platform? Microsoft has a better support record than this!

Stay away from this developer now, they've apparently long since lost their edge, and worse, their usefulness.  
(Version 16.0010)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, this works better as an emulator than "classic" does. It also managed to save my butt in retrieving old legal documents that had to be re-edited for changes in some business laws. Nothing could read the old files from WN2 and the original Nisus, and MacLink which was supposed to be able to do this apparently dropped all interim support for ALL very old filetypes, so there was no way to bring the files into the OSX age (tossing that program for good). But I threw together a few disc images and fed them to Mini vMac, and I not only had the files in their original form, but editable, and relatively easy to get straight into OSX with just some format tweaking once in Tiger.

Only complaints (all very minor)... clumsy, non-mac interface (for settings), DSK extension can't be recognized by anything other than vMac (would be nice if it could recognize the .dmg extension for easier file movement or possibly dragging files into and out of the actual window for copying), and some way to retain the control panel settings... they're always resetting, as if the "MacPlus" had a dead battery.

I can't wait for the IIfx version... now if I could find a way to connect an actual floppy drive to the program ^_^

Thanks so much!  
(Version 3.0.4)

AIKOUSHA  Sounded interesting, until I got to the requirement of 10.5.

Sadly, it's this kind of restrictiveness in a lot of programming that really makes my work on other platforms seem so much friendlier, even in windoze (shudder).  
(Version 1.0.5)

AIKOUSHA  I've got an old APEX DVD player that will do this, and it's all hardware. And it cost $60 (over 4 years ago). For $50 I would certainly hope the software would do a lot more things than just speed up or slow down video while compensating audio... and things every other free player already does...

So does it?

Like ignoring prohibited functions (UOPs), ignoring region codes, doing this with Blu-Ray discs, single frame forward and reverse, easy still capture, streaming capture, segment capture, post processing of video and audio, full compatibility with multi-channel audio cards, etc....  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  Tried this out for a bit while attempting to revive some old forms for new "legalese."

However, it was much harder to use than going to an emulator, using MacDraw, dumping to .ps, and then printing using Preview.

Though I am impressed with the flood of preferences, major portions of the programs' interface seriously need to be brought under mac-like standards, and severely tightened-up. I taught myself MacDraw in minutes, without a manual... I still, after nearly ten years can operate it without thinking... (and without having used it for nearly a decade). EazyDraw does not have that, and many interface layouts specifically make things harder.

As an example, the foating toolbar is huge and ugly, it should resemble the old MacDraw palette, or the current adobe palettes... Rulers and Gridlines should be unobtrusive but are far from it, even when trying to use the prefs to make them that way (complete failure).

Though I suspect there might be some "Claris" copyrights to be wary of, a program that is supposed to be the modern successor of ClarisDraw should really have all the best interface elements already built-in, and moreover, tweaked for the OSX generation. Sadly I didn't see ANY of that.

I definitely want to keep this in mind for printing old documents without any roundabout tricks, but since it failed to recognize a typeface in an old document that's actually present (and replaced it with another), I really don't want to chance editing things that work fine in an emulator, in exchange for a document that is solely reliant on this software.

Keep working on this, it definitely could be a worthy successor, but has far to go, IMHO.  
(Version 2.6)

AIKOUSHA  I'm not going to rate this, as rating an alpha release will pointlessly lower the rating.

In short, it does work, and compared to anything else mac out there, that makes it the best.

However, it's a bit shaky. The worst bit, at the moment is that it crawls. It typically takes more than 5 minutes (on an unencumbered 1.2Ghz G4 running 10.4.11) to open novellas. I want to test it with "War and Peace" just to see how long that takes... but to just open a short file, you might as well go out for coffee.

However, I do expect this to evolve, and part of that is obviously going to be speed.

Hoping to see it beta and then officially released, soon!  
(Version 0.15a-static)

AIKOUSHA  Crashes instantly at the point of conversion. I gave it more than 20 .pdb files, all of which should have only plain ASCII (although if there is any formatting, I can't tell, because I can't open these files with anything other than plain text readers, which supply the title at the file start, but everything else is random text (assuming a compression scheme here).

This makes it pretty useless. It does the same thing on "View." It does the same exact thing whether dragged to the icon, to the dock, or using the open menu command or cmd-O. Once you click "select" it instantly and quietly dies. Even tried file and extension variations based on other comments... this is apparently not the cause. However, capitalizing PDB somehow makes it think the file is a text file, so it attempts to convert it INTO a pdb file, which does successfully create a file, but that's kind of useless, as the content looks even more trashed than the original, and since it warned me that there were illegal characters that would be skipped, I'm guessing a very large amount of "dead" was put into the newly created file, which cannot be read by anything available to me anyway for investigating...

Also note! It has a major HIG error... once launched, if you accidentally gave it a wrong file, hitting "cancel" does not get you out of the program... or the routine. You must either give it a destination, or cmd-opt-esc FORCE QUIT. Hitting cancel just re-opens the file save dialog box instantly... ad infinitum. At one point it even had two "Select Destination..." dialog boxes open at the same time... Wow!

Sad to give it a 1 in "value" but it doesn't work, so it has no value. I was so hoping to get something to open or translate these latest middle-finger salutes to the Mac community.

Using OSX 10.4.11 G4 1.2Ghz, 1.5GB, and more than 250GB of hard disc space... It's definitely not wanting for speed or space.

Please fix this, I would love to see it work, especially if it is unicode compliant, as well.  
(Version 3.4)

AIKOUSHA  To the one question... this is somewhat like tofu. They both use the same methodology to display text. However, this is an e-book reader, tofu is not. Tofu handles only basic text documents and some pdfs.

This is a unique little application, but it is far from being complete:

1. It doesn't handle .chm or .pdb e-book formats (and might not handle others I couldn't get my hands on), it opens them without complaint, but all you get is ascii hash.

2. So far it only recognizes the very simplest of chapter headers and ends up crashing some other text together in odd ways, making it difficult to read and sometimes hard to differentiate parts and story flow. Either better auto-recognition should be used, or a set of options to recognize certain features.

3. It sometimes blows the formatting rather badly... though I don't know if this is due to misinterpretation of the text or the multi-column display process.

4. It's far from complete when formatting .pdf files. One file I opened it was missing large chunks of text and all but one image, and it couldn't handle almost all the formatting. This made it very difficult to read since numbers were appearing in the text that didn't belong, and pieces of text were out of the correct positions and not displayed correctly.

5. As far as X/HTML is concerned, it can't even handle the most basic formatting (italic, bold, links, etc.) and that's just the start.

6. The "Themes" function has major bugs, at the moment I cannot get it out of a black or dark background, and the set background color doesn't work at all.

One main test I do with all software is Unicode compatability... unfortunately I could not locate a Unicode formatted e-book to download, so I was unable to test this... so can it display kanji or arabic, or sideways text? I have no idea.

Though I would never use it, since there are too many hijacked crappy e-books out there already, this apparently also has an export feature, which might prove useful in book reviews where capturing quotes is necessary. However, since many of the listed formats cannot be read by the program at the moment, I question it's ability to actually export any of these accurately or at all.

Though this is a very good start for something that everybody has been screwing Mac owners over for the last several years, it has a long way to go. In it's current form, I wouldn't pay even $2 for it, let alone $15. I certainly wouldn't use it to read e-books until it handles almost all of the formatting problems (I can use 4 different programs that do this right, and are free, at least for most e-book formats). And most intelligent publishers use .pdf for manuals and textbooks, so the system handles that just fine with "Preview."

As far as stability, I didn't spend too much time testing it on that, but nothing I threw at it destabilized it in any way, and I did have quite a number of windows open at one point. Though I suspect, it's easy to make things crash-proof, if you make sure everything being input is converted to plain ASCII or preformatted .jpgs.  
(Version 1.0b11)

AIKOUSHA  A version that would work with 10.4 would be very handy, as I cannot move to 10.5 because of several feature removals and inconsistencies with older software (being a cross platform/system expert is getting harder everyday... ^_^ ).

---Thanks  
(Version 1.5)

AIKOUSHA  First, AlbumWrap sucks, and anybody that used it was a freaking idiot, nothing like screwing large numbers of people with bad experimental programs, that aren't even supported on most platforms. HEAR THAT MATROSKA!!

Sadly, this was poorly implemented for the Mac.

It doesn't handle long filenames, truncating them horribly, at a time when most people named their personal audio files with nearly double the length this could handle (how's that for obvious oversight).

You pretty much have to extract a single file, and rename it quickly before continuing... ARGGGGH!

This won't launch in Classic at all, and does some pretty weird stuff if you try to work around it. So, if you have OSX forget this (and don't even bother with the "OSX Version")

Being free it has some value, but come on, this shouldn't even have passed as an alpha version.

Definitely not stable, had several crashes, which aren't nice under OS9... if only it would work under classic.

Of course, it has only one feature, to extract files from ALBW files, but it does that so poorly...

There's another program that claims to be able to extract files like these from ALBW and other combined file types, however it doesn't work at all, and worse, it takes over 5 times the (time) length of the files to not do it.  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  An intriguing idea. How about an app that will do something similar to the data, via the speech synthesizer. That could be hilarious, and if you could limit the conversion to a layer, or an attribute, you could even hide messages in images... a more modern version of the secret-code-watches of the 50's and 60's. Steganography, it's fun. ^_^  
(Version 22)

AIKOUSHA  Anyone know if this works on the BBC website, or can download streaming Real or Microsoft media files?

I can manually download everything else, from everywhere else, I've ever needed to go, with a simple double-click.

If it can, then it's definitely worth a look (all other D/Lrs like this have always failed in one form or other, even on simple sites like DISCOVERY).  
(Version 4.0)

AIKOUSHA  It saves a little time, as you can send it quite a number of files and walk away, instead of waiting and submitting them every 10-20 seconds by hand.

So, I definitely reccomend it, if that will lighten your work load.

However, I can manually send dozens of files to ffmpegx and never have an issue with the queue, but if I attempt to send 10-12 files at a time, there is a good chance that the queue will actually stop accepting the entries. When this happens, ffmpegx gets the file info, then it changes any relevant info (frame size/frame rate, etc.) and then sends the commands to Progress, however, it doesn't actually put a job in the queue. This has happened three times in the last week. And once the queue enters this state, you have to quit and restart the jobs (or wait 'til it's done and quit), and restart the Progress queue, before it'll take any more jobs.

For me, this negates it's use, when it does this, as half the point was to start a large number of jobs that'll take 20-45 minutes each, and I would like to get sleep while it continues to work. If it only accepts 10 jobs, it'll finish LONG before I wake up.

I don't know if this is an issue with the scripting, the script interpreter, or the Progress queue... but it never happens when I send things manually, no matter how many things I've stuck in the queue.

If anyone else has experienced this, and knows a workaround, or trick to fix it when it happens... please let me know!  
(Version 0.5b)

AIKOUSHA  I'm not certain, but I believe this crashes Safari on any web page with flash (and possibly moving gifs), as it crashes all the time, except on a blank page, or on animesuki.

As it does this just as it starts drawing the page and then locks everything up for about a minute while it actually finishes crashing-out, I didn't feel like spending all night troubleshooting it (needless to say I got it to crash about 10 times, before I gave up).

This makes it worthless, completely. You can't even really use the cookie part, since cookies are useless if you can't even get to the site to get one.

If it eventually ends up working properly it'd be indispensable, and you can't beat free.

What I don't understand is that Flash blocking or disabling should have been built into Safari years ago, as should minor cookie management similar to this program. Was Macromedia paying off Apple, or are the Safari developers all a bunch of ƒµ¢kíñq idiots that don't have real-world experience browsing the web?

If it weren't for a few sites that require it for what I need (and that's countable on one hand, mind you), I'd remove flash completely from my Mac, treating it just like the old AOL virii that came pre-installed.  
(Version 1.5.1)

AIKOUSHA  Can't review it, because it's not working right.

Attempted to archive two prototype applications, that I had already archived via the macs native contextual-menu zip, but deleted all the source files and information, leaving only the apps.

Gave a message similar to "Error. Cannot open password protected files" twice, and what I got was an empty zip file of 36K. In essence, I lost everything and had to go back to the University to retrieve the files again. (Yes, I keep backups, but I certainly didn't expect this sort of major failing, or I would have duplicated first... The zip and rar programs under Windows don't do this, and most will insert, delete or move material instanly on drag-and-drop).

There was no password protection anywhere, but it seemed to think so, so it overwrote the file with nothing.

Definitely not a good first test. I was actually going to use this to sort .cbr files which got scrambled on the mac, but there's no chance of that now.  
(Version 1.7.1)

AIKOUSHA  First suggestion: Either buy a cheap bare-bones PC (it'll be cheaper and less of a headache) or get one of those Mac dual-cores with the ability to run Windows.

Don't bother with this version (7.x, the Microsoft one).

I've been on an upgrade path with VPC since version 1 or 2 and every upgrade was a step up, However, as soon as Microsoft got it, it got slower, bloated, severely unstable, and installed things that made data safety and security impossible.

The program no longer can be isolated in it's own partition. It MUST install itself on the current boot drive... Do you realize how screwed up and unstable this program gets when you have more than one boot drive? Don't test it, it ain't worth it.

When you go from 6 to 7, not only do you take a speed and efficiency hit, but many things are capped at low settings. VPC7 alters PC disc images so that previous versions of VPC can no longer recognize them. The tools, like drag and dropping between host and VM tend to stop working at random times. Even the saved-state process slowed down.

Then, why they didn't implement the ability to use a real PC format HD or partition is beyond me, the coding for the drive image access is sloppy and fails all the time, and when it does it badly, you LOSE the entire drive image and everything in it (most of the data is still there, but no version of VPC will access it any more), and attempting to reaquire the drive, or even the program itself is not possible, because after such a crash, VPC7 forces you to reinstall itself. This means you have to get out your original discs (7.0 base and upgrade, and the Windows OS disc, you then have to reinstall it all over agin, in exactly the right order (if not, you have to start from scratch), and then you have to track down the 2 or 3 serial numbers you have to have, and if you are testing with XP, you have to freaking call the damn company to Authenticate Windows, all over again.

This crash issue happens very frequently (at least on my Mac). Last year, I had to go through this process SIX times. Currently I have no viable VPC HD image... I'm using DOS-Box for a few things currently, and a local library to test what few things I can use their computers for (if you have to restart, their computers reset to a base image, so nothing that requires a 2-stage install ^_^).

I should also point out that due to Microsoft's method of sticking things all over, pref file (or one of the other files) corruption can also cause the forced re-install... and VPC7 rarely comes out working after a restored backup on my system (everything else does, though).

Virtual drive backups are essential but a pain in the ass when you are testing things that play with video (I tend to have to max the size of my virtual PC drives).

I'd go back to 6, but because everything I have is an upgrade from back before OSX existed, the disc with my 98 image refuses to install, bizarrely it launches the script editor instead of installing.

I have to figure out which version and which Mac OS system to start with, and run at least 3 upgrade discs to get to 6.0. If I have to run something that desperately in Windows before I get a new computer, I'll take the time to figure it out, but it's not worth it, otherwise.

IF YOU HAVE VPC6, STICK WITH IT! Don't upgrade. If you have access to a full version of VPC5 or 6 install those. Otherwise, your best bet is to invest in new hardware.

VERSION 7 SUCKS! I can't stress it enough. And I should also point out, like one other reviewer did... It's dangerous, apparently not only to your PC "drive" but to your Mac's drives.

I wonder if the Windows version of VPC is as moronicly designed and implemented.  
(Version 7.0.3)

AIKOUSHA  Tried to try this on an old Mac with an actual floppy drive, and it won't work. Apparently this requires CarbonLib to be installed on the system, and Apple doesn't have a CarbonLib that works for anything below system 8. Yet, this is listed as running under system 7 (7.5 rec). Under 7.6 all it does is complain that there's no CarbonLib, and then quits.

Anyone know where to find a 1.0 or 1.0.1 version of CarbonLib, or a workaround? Installing system 8 is not an option, as it will eat practically all available disk and RAM memory.

Thanks,

--Aiko  
(Version 1.0a36)

AIKOUSHA  Not to say the name of the application is bad, but it tends to appear under certain searches for printer utilities ^_^ y'know "Toner."  
(Version 1.0.7)

AIKOUSHA  If this does what I think it does, it's a godsend for all those ancient files and disk images before Apple basically killed all old technology support (SCSI, serial, adb, HFS standard, ProDOS, Pascal, etc.).

Sad to say that even though I maintained perfect backups at both home and work (3 jobs back), most of these backups, even though on CD are unreadable and inaccessable, since they were either in older disk formats, or using a disk image system which comes up with an error similar to "no mountable systems found" in OSX.

Thanks so much for this attempt at brilliance, and I'll be testing it out when I track down my archaic CDRs.

All we need now are OSX mountable 5.25 and 3.5 (400/800k) floppy drives. Might even be able to play some of those old Apple ][ copy protected masterpieces of old.  
(Version 1.0a36)

AIKOUSHA  SMART isn't prescient. It cannot predict all problems that will cause a hard disc to become unreadable. It's main purpose is to detect hardware faults and issues which can cause and are signs of hardware failure and hardware issues that can cause write and read errors.

For instance (and I have had this happen several times with OSX directly related to Spotlight issues), if your system writes garbage to the boot blocks or partition maps, your hard drive will no longer boot or be recognized by the system, as this isn't a fault of the Hard Drive, there is no way SMART can predict it. However, if sector seeks start taking longer, or blocks start taking repetitive reads to load successfully, SMART will register these.

BTW, if your drive fails due to things like boot block or partition map corruptions, you may want to try the program "Data Rescue" or "Stellar Phoenix," the only two programs that will find and recover the files on drives so afflicted. I reccommend Data Rescue as it is infinitely faster, and tons more reliable.  
(Version 2.3.7)

AIKOUSHA  There's a lot missing from the description (and the developer's page, since that is all the info on the developers page).

1. How does this work? Does it require an internet connection (like all the other translators out there). If not, how are updates acquired, and how big of a footprint does this have.

2. WHAT LANGUAGES? and what translation vectors?

It would be really nice to know these things, as it would be great having a reasonably accurate translation program for a laptop.

On top of that the "fix for uni-" scares me, as all language translators except those that only use roman based systems, should have full unicode support from the very first coding.

Then you have to be forced to 10.5 to use it, and unless I get a dedicated 10.5 laptop, that just isn't going to happen. Apple killed too much compatability with the new system.  
(Version 1.09)

AIKOUSHA  I can't use this, as it does the oddest thing...

Anytime I enter a text box, and click a key, the application loses the ability to track keyboard or mouse events, and will no longer respond to any type of system calls (sorry no quitting, even from the dock). The only exit is by pulling up the Force Quit dialog. Thankfully opt-tabbing still worked, as does clicking on the background. Or I would have had to force a reset.

Very, very odd.  
(Version 0.5.6b)

AIKOUSHA  For something that is supposed to run under OSX 10.4, this behaves like a 10.5 or Intel only program. (Launching has it bounce the icon in the dock once, and then terminates).

Using OSX 10.4.10

Can't rate it, 'cause I can't run it.  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  So where can I find out what the max. version is, that will work with 10.4.10?  
(Version 1.20)

AIKOUSHA  Some issues here:

It doesn't allow disk editing or viewing, it only allows this with files... Still useful though. A block editor would be real nice for those of us that get into that low-level stuff.

The program attempts to check for updates, but doesn't check for an actual internet connection, so when I launched this, it froze up for about 4 minutes trying to work with something that wasn't there.

It also displays a Network volume (inconsistently, I might add) even when there is no Network connection. For yucks I attempted to read one of the files it showed, and it permanent locked-up the program (cmd-opt-esc required). If there is no network, this should avoid accessing system files that will cause issues if it isn't really present.

The program does two things annoying on install... it forces you to install in Applications only, and it doesn't set the proper permissions. Typically one would put this in "Applications/Utilities" and unless it hooks into the system in some bizarre way, should be an app that can be placed anywhere. And having to manually change the permissions so you can delete read-me files that are in a non-native language, is silly.

This looks nice (better than several other hex editors), though could have a slightly better assembled look.

Hope to see it updated to address these issues. It beats the "bang-it-with-sledge" hex editor I'm using now.  
(Version 1.3.4)

AIKOUSHA  It's too bad this doesn't work below 10.5, as there is no way I'm upgrading until there is a stable alternative to classic and a few other things in 10.5.

Hopefully the developer can re-code slightly for earlier systems.  
(Version 1.30)

AIKOUSHA  Very simple and useful!

One problem, however. For some reason the program assumes half the menu items are Japanese and nothing I can do can alter that (though I can figure out what is what, it is pretty annoying). It also manages to convince some other apps' menus to be in Kanji... (but this goes away when J> quits). Pretty odd behavior.

As far as specific ratings for Features/Graphics & Sound, as there's only one real feature and no real rateable G&S, I didn't give it 5 simply because there's no real things to rate.

It seems pretty stable except for the language issue.

And you can't beat the price. Though probably worth a couple of bucks, put this together with an interface/PPane that will allow you to assign Keypresses, menu selections, and mouse movements to the gamepads/devices, and this could easily be worth $20-25. (mainly because I have tested many such interfaces and most are far from stable, or are horribly unusable (keypress assignments only).  
(Version 3.0)

AIKOUSHA  At $150 you can buy a better programming environment, or get lessons on how to code with Xcode and Interface Builder. After all, this is just a tiny library. It might be perfect, but the price isn't.  
(Version 1.0.4)

AIKOUSHA  Actually, I would prefer a utility that would find album artwork (without an iTunes store account) and store it so that iTunes (and an iPod) could find it, without embedding it in the music files. Well, unless they put out an iPod Touch with a massive hard drive, that is.

I gave up a year ago on these utilities since they did one of two things (in ALL cases), could not find the artwork because it wasn't "good ol' American popular music" or it automatically and without permission stuck the album images into the songs. 4 out of 10 songs even got pulled down wrong on one app.

If this could do everything at once from my CD Info.cidb file, and get it all correct, I'd go for it... But no track namer has been more than 25% correct, so I have my doubts with other search-find apps.  
(Version 3.0)

AIKOUSHA  Actually Ritsuka was half right. I wrote that at the end of a large work session and screwed up. I misused the word codec instead of container, and if Ritsuka had actually read the whole thing, he or she would have realized that. I made a mistake that had the same meaning and importance as a typo. I stand by my views on Matroska, THE CONTAINER. And re-assert the fact that using this only partially alleviates all the "F-U"s that Window-centric selfish users dump onto the non-windows (and old windows) community.

I applaud those that are willing to code this for non-windows machines, and hope the quirks involved with this lousy experimental container can at least be ironed out well enough, so we can at least trans-code out of it.  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  If it includes Star Wars, Call of Cthulhu, Modern, WW, and many of the tournament functions (RPGA, etc), this would be an excellent tool.

I'll try this out and give it a review, but I have yet to find a program (including those for windows) that come close to the Filemaker 5.5 set I created for tournament generation years ago. I could never share that because it's so full of non-standard methods, it would be a nightmare for anybody else to use. However, it does one thing I've never seen anywhere else, full and complete user created forms... just add a new layout and spend some time moving fields around and adding art.  
(Version 5.14rc1)

AIKOUSHA  Where tf are the asian voices or better yet, an asian version of macintalk? Been waiting for that since before OSX even existed!

(for laughs), somebody needs to make a George Clooney, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, or even a Marilyn Monroe voice... I'd lmao, and then permanently make them my default voices.  
(Version 1.2)

AIKOUSHA  Wow! What a unique vision for a simple concept. Does wonders for RPG'rs who have to use handfuls of dice for specific reasons.

For complex RPG dice sets this is the only program to look for, currently on the Mac (still looking for a super simple small-footprint program that handles the opposite end of the spectrum).

A few simple changes will make this a 5! A few simple feature additions will make it a SOLID 5. And being free, you can't really beat this anyway.

Here are a few suggestions for a minor upgrade:

1. If possible, find an easier way to set-up the hands/sets. Though impressive and functional, I was jumping around and clicking everywhere to set up sets. Dragging and dropping the dice images onto the "set" might be a more intuitive option (but maybe about as busy, though).

2. Color code the dice/die representations (at the top and in the set representation.

3. Add a D30, and possibly a custom "value" so a die (or dice) in a hand can be odd numbers, like 7, 21, 365, 400, or 1000, etc. Along with this, adding a sum to a die (+/- a certain value) can also be helpful... Die results that start at zero, negative to positive ranges, a true percentile representative (0-100), etc. Though not of much use in D20 systems, this was a constant need in a lot of older SF and miniature games.

4. For design and readability only... the totals (sums) should be just to the left of the "die" markers. It's tough to instanly see what is connected to what, if you have to scan across a possibly near-empty set.

5. This might be difficult, but many games have methods of skewing dice rolls by elininating one or more of the high or low rolls. If a hand can be "auto-sorted" (without moving the "dropped" switch) this can be done automatically using the "dropped die" feature. As it stands right now, the dropped function on a die follows it in the sort.

6. And, this is purely my own taste, but I hate the metal interface and actually find it difficult to "stare" at. If this is true of other users, you might want to allow changing the interface, or even desining one uniquely your own.

Once again, excellent job!  
(Version 1.0.1)

AIKOUSHA  Dead server... no active links.  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  Came upon this looking for a Web Crawler for making downloads easier from scanlation sites. However, this is apparently only a pr0n downloader. So of all the categories you can subscribe to, only 2 are relevant to my interests, and apparently nothing actually downloads in those categories.

Though I have nothing against pr0n, this does seem to be rather lacking to do anything much other than downloading a few images/movies.

What is really missing more than anything, is an explanation of what types of things it "subscribes" to, and where it is getting it from. Specifically, what services and sites, and whether it can be expanded to embrace other media.

Because it crashed twice on looking up "categories" for subscription, it actually took me 20 minutes to find out what this program really did.

An update and stable sources would make this very "useful" to many people out there, especially if the subscriptions flag "new" images for review on updates. If it worked for manga, I'd slap down $20 in a second.

BTW, from the categories, my guess is if you're straight and female, there's not much to interest you.  
(Version 2003.01.10)

AIKOUSHA  It looks pretty, but that is apparently just a mask over some pretty bad implementation and rather suprisingly stupid decisions.

1. I don't know about most collectors, but all the ones I know aren't American Snobbish. You like movies, you get them from all over the world, same with music... you don't just stay with American punk, you mix it with the good stuff from the UK, Australia, Germany... wherever. If you need to search more than one source, you do that... you don't limit it to only one, when you can query a couple sites in a row.

2. Put a FREAKING VOLUME CONTROL ON THE VOICE!!!!!!! My volume is high for about 20 apps for voice notification of dozens of processes, but this one when it shouts "LOOKUP FAILED" nearly blows me right out of my panties. And it worked better than coffee at waking up co-workers when I tested it at work.

3. 20 items: 5 from Japan, 15 from the US, all current, all popular, and all listed on their respective amazon site, and looked up concurrently with the "Delicious" system. I found them all, Delicious did not find a single one.

4. The shelves are cute, but annoying and pointless when each Collection will have over 1000 items in each (which I'm not going to do, since this clearly isn't working quite right). "Neato" features that lose their appeal in less than an hour, should probably be removed. Creating a virtual version of the operators' shelves would be more helpful, allowing one to locate exactly where the item should be (so spine out displays may also be more appropriate).

5. The iSight barcode reader is also a neat idea, but it typically took me 15 or more seconds to get each one to read in properly, and all the while the video display window is jumping, flashing and stalling. Is this tied to the agonizing slowness of the interface?

6. It might just be me, but I find the entry method panel to be horribly clunky and extremely un-mac-like.

Somehow, everytime I tried to add another title, or do something else with this, I kept getting further disappointed.

I've been using Basic, Appleworks (Apple ][ version),and then Filemaker to keep all my book, music and video databases since the mid 80's, entering everything by hand. Having total control and not relying on other peoples erroneous, lazy, and narcissistic entries in other databases (hear that CDDB?) has made me tired of, but happy with my functional and efficient, but ugly databases. And my databases evolve instantly. Guess I'll keep with it until somebody actually makes something that combines functions of this, and iTunes, with a bit more style and efficiency.

Oh, and this got a high stability rating, only because I couldn't do anything to make it destabilize. Since it actually won't retrieve any info, I'm not going to play with it long enough to find things like memory leaks.

I'd also like to know what all the other websites this is contacting, besides the amazon ones, because on a few attempts, it contacted more than six different servers... and only one was Amazon.  
(Version 1.6.6)

AIKOUSHA  stumbled across this again while searching for browser extensions (wtf?). Just wondering why this is still here. It worked horribly two years ago, and the developers site is long since dead (no server at url).  
(Version 2.2)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, try to see if you can find a drawing program and a couple of others so that you can leave Classic behind when moving up to Tiger. JUST NOT POSSIBLE.

I've tried several of the drawing programs I found here, and though this looks beautiful, it has much to be desired...

1. It crashes constantly when editing text objects. You have only 2 saves before the program self-destructs. (so don't save for long periods of time... ack!). And the text selection and key-combo manipulations are atrocious. And manipulating tabs is a total nightmare.

2. No help, local or on-line. It ONLY goes to a web-based manual, and that's broken, it just doesn't work.

3. Tried multilayer selection... unless there's a secret key comination, it's not possible, had to shift objects on multiple layers, one. layer. at. a. time.

4. Needs several obvious functions, though it has an abundance of features, a few basic things need to be addressed. (like showing the currently used color in an object, in the palette, so you don't have to remember the color codes, and then take stabs at which color it is).

5. Not internally consistent with a lot of the properties buttons in the toolbar, sometimes changing the x-width would change the object boundaries, other times it would scale the x-width, and it's completely random when it does this.

6. It doesn't keep oringal object dimensions accessible after scaling things, so if you mess up, you can never return the object (like text objects and bitmaps) to their original size or ppi/type-size, unless it's still in the undo queue.

7. and speaking of which, the undo function is inconsistent as well. Odd things end up being undoable, that don't need to, like changing layers, but other things that should be are not. Single pixel key-nudging is kept on a pixel by pixel basis, which means you kill your undo queue in no time, if you are trying to move an object into perfect posistion.

8. Many features are implemented cryptically. Common sense (and HiG) doesn't always dictate what you need to do when working with this program.

After all this, I bailed, and since it hasn't been updated or corrected since 2005, I'm guessing the company has completely given up on it (as mentioned in an earlier review).

I just find it so difficult to believe that nobody has a drawing program that works better than ClarisDraw under Classic. So I guess, unless work requires me to move up to Tiger, I'm staying comfortably at 10.4.10.  
(Version X.0.2)

AIKOUSHA  I don't understand paying for a service like this, when it is not only available free from tvguide.com, but public TV stations all across the country provide a free version that is actually broadcast over the air, as well. I can't see network and local TV stations *not* wanting their information in the viewers' hands.

If someone could create a widget or unobtrusive program that would cull one of these *free* sources to populate a database and provide useful searching, it would be wonderful... and I'm assuming the public service will never suddenly become a fee based system.  
(Version 0.57)

AIKOUSHA  Downloaded and tested this a couple of weeks ago. Seemed to work perfectly. However, I found something today that I really wanted to get and view (without loss of video and stuttering) and it just wouldn't work.

It recognized the video, but when I clicked the button to save it, nothing happened (the dialogue box disappeared, but no file was saved or even opened). Further attempts to save it came up with a dialogue stating that it had already been saved, and did I want to resave, cancel, or reload the page. Save didn't do anything, and reloading did reload the page, but did not allow me to save the video once it finally was quied up again.

This literally turned into a "one-trick pony" and is now completely useless.

this should be a built in feature of Safari...  
(Version 2.1)

AIKOUSHA  I hate to rag on somebody who obviously speaks another language and is poor in english...

But the description is so vague and uninformative, I have no idea what this program does and what it's goal is... couldn't even figure it out from the website...

but it's cute.  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  I have a number of players (other than QTP which was f'd up on two recent system upgrades) that do better and faster with no plug-ins required.

However if you can implement WORKABLE matroska, you'd have me in an instant. But, I am assuming since that would require rewriting the codec package in base code, and it isn't QT compatible, this would never happen?  
(Version 2.0.2)

AIKOUSHA  If this actually worked (a large amount of it does not operate as stated), this would be a perfect alternative to launching the appropriate player and opening the "info' window.

However...

You need DRAG :& DROP!!! It took over 50 seconds to track down and determine which file to open using a browse window (I have more than 100,000 video files used for video processing and they are in hundreds of folders and the files are very similarly named). With drag and drop, this would have taken LESS than a second.

There is no need for an "Get Info" button. Once the target is located, there is only one thing to do, supply the info, or state that there was an error.

The first couple files I tested were matroska, the first two wouldn't even access, even though VLC plays and gives info on them. Going on to more matroska files, I got many to display but with erroneous info... An audio freq of "jpn"; I never got a single audio bitrate, a framesize of "jpn 40x38"?!?. on a HD file?.

It seems to work better with standard .avi files, but with some non-standard A/V pairings, I started getting odd results again.

It's free and I couldn't get it to crash, but a large number of things just didn't work or work right.

A few more major bug fixes and info implementation, and I think this would be a permanent fixture on my dock (of which a drag and drop implementation would surely be needed).

Keep working on it!  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  Excellent if you are forced to deal with matroska files.

However, I have to point out that due to idiots creating matroska files willy-nilly and not really knowing what they are doing, that this set of tools, as-is, does not work at all on a very large quantity of these home-brew files. Output from files tend to have erroneous values (like fps, size, codectype, sampling rate, etc.) which makes further processing impossible for most, and extremely difficult for those that know what they are doing.

Since matroska (.mkv) typically only works correctly on fast, newer Windows (XP, Vista), why anybody would deliberately alienate all Mac, Linux, Unix, and non-modern Windows (and others), just blows my mind. And I have to say, even on my friends' blazing fast Windows Vista machine (which is now an XP machine ^_^) matroska was still horrendously buggy.

Seriously, if you are a Mac user or developer, stay away from this codec and all files associated with it. Because, until it is rewritten in base machine code for each specific platform, it's nothing but a piece of garbage. Personally, I wish someone would finish work on the next-gen of HD codecs that are fast, so that a standard could be developed to work on every platform, including hardware based disc players. (And matroska would immediately die a well deserved and overly-late death.)  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  What the hell is the point of this? There are at least 6 programs that do this directly, already.... for FREE! And there are about a thousand ways to do it using two free tools (which gets you past almost all tough issues with syncing and skipping frames, etc.

This is a worse idea than Popcorn...

Now, if this thing could FLAWLESSLY transcode any matroska file, into mpeg4 or avi, and burn subtitle streams, that would be worth slappin' down some hard earned cash (sorry, there is NO program or toolset that will do this for the Mac... especially if the x264 codec is involved. I've converted a few recently but they all took several days total and unless more than 4 steps (on video) were involved, it never worked... anybody seen horizontal video smearing? Dragging audio, super-fast video, tiny subtitles?)  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  First, I'm sorry to bash what could eventually be a very wonderful program, especially for people whose recorders have died, only own a computer for TV viewing, want foreign programming, or require a big monitor due to bad eyesight.

However it needs severe improvement.

1. It is constantly going to "ruby" to talk to places on the internet... over and over and over again, even when you kill the program (if you state once a day for checking, it really should check only once a day). Constantly giving access to something most users know nothing about is going to really bother those who get paranoid (and even those that don't).

2. Speaking of which... the uninstall for this is atrocious. It works, but would be extremely confusing, especially to people who haven't ever seen the terminal before... and by Apple's own marketing, that should be nearly all users. And it's a royal pain if you have to track down where you stuck the zip file... This should be executed from within the app itself.

3. Where is this thing getting it's list? 8 of my 10 favorite programs aren't even on it (and I manage to never miss a torrent by manually finding it. Adding several more sites or better sites to this would be quite necessary (selecting and deselecting these sources would be good too). Also, the info is so old it's laughable. Just for an example, try "Dr. Who." The list only gives "2005" and "Confidential" as options. You won't get seasons 2-4 with this! And where the heck is "Penn & Teller: Bullsh*t!?" ^_^

4. One favorite series' is on the list, but when "subscribed to" I get a permanent "wait clock." I let it run for 20 minutes.... nothing.

5. The interface is staggeringly unfriendly for set up. You should be able to select everything as a group (click on-click off, or checkbox), or select one at a time and move (with a button or drag) to a subscribe list. It shouldn't be, "attempt to subscribe to one, and then have the horrendously long list zip back to the top, losing your place." It's nice to have the subs at the top, but that's old school or Windows thinking, it's not Mac-like at all.

6. I don't know about anybody else, but for most Mac users that don't have a superfast dual-core, playing most matroska files is impossible (and some x264 encodes don't work under mac matroska players in any form), and there is no way to select for media type (like one of the other recent commenters wanting iPod specific material). Filters for .avi, .mkv, .ogg, mp4, .flv, .wmv, .rm, etc., are more important to many people than the quality selection. Which also begs for a MB-Size filter as well.

7. I, personally, like to retrieve stuff from Asia (the location, not the band) dramas, a few game shows, and some anime, however NONE of that stuff is anywhere in this mess (for some people the reason for bittorrent is to get stuff they CAN'T see on TV in the "home country." So hooking into things like J-Addicts, Animesuki, sars, TV-Nihon and a few others might really impress a lot of people, not to mention expanding their horizons. Same goes for material from Europe.

So seriously, better interface, efficient use of the "calling" routine, and a much better choice for sources, will kick this up to something nearly everyone may use with ease, and make it indispensable for others. And used properly with Azureus, would actually allow people to go on vacation while their computer downloads, seeds to ratio, and then quits torrents, in the proper spirit of P2P sharing. If all this was implemented, I would definitely be willing to pay at least $10 for it... it would save that much in time in the first two weeks.

Good luck and I hope to see improvements. It's a nice start, even though I found it less efficient to implement than to actually get the stuff manually.  
(Version 0.3.4)

AIKOUSHA  Since there is nothing specified about this product other than, pretty much, what is here on MacUpdate, I have to ask... Why would I pay such a steep price for something which by it's own, rather meager, description uses internet based translators?

Mac users not only have a built-in widget to do this (poorly I must say), but there are at least 8 services including Babelfish, Google and others that do this for free, just by going to their well-known webpages.

Does it have a multiple-engine compilation of the software ported to G3/G4/G5 or DualCore processors, so it can be done anywhere your Mac is, connection or not? Otherwise I'd find the very steep price darn laughable.

Now, if it's a whole new translation technology that's staggeringly accurate, that would be worth paying for... and I'd buy it in an instant (but that's not in the description).  
(Version 2.7)

AIKOUSHA  Just a comment to the developer based on their reply below.

My main computer will never be connected to the internet, yet I manage to have more than 100GB worth of programs (not documents) on it. Many things were downloaded, tested and scanned at a library/university computer. Things that insist on attempting to make unpermitted external contact are deleted rather rapidly, as all calls to the internet (or any communication route, including USB and FW) are instantly notified to the user. Anybody who really wants a secure computer will operate this way, as it really is the only foolproof method.

That's why a second computer is used for internet operation, and anything created on the main computer is moved with a portable drive whose drive contents are wiped before re-attachment to the main computer.

Thinking everybody with a computer absolutely has to have an internet connectionat all times is at best selfish, and a bit presumptuous.  
(Version 1.8.8)

AIKOUSHA  This review is being written after more than a year of using this...

Of the dozens of video softwares I use on at least a weekly basis, none of them actually have a function to change the fourcc code on the fly (When I get CS3, maybe, this might change). This is actually a bad thing, since a couple of the programs I use set the fourcc incorrectly, some using improper case, one always setting the code to divx no matter what the real output is. So, I have used this on thousands of self-created and transcoding projects.

It has never crashed, and it has never malfunctioned. True, it does only one thing, and it does it fast and well. However, the application itslef could use just a few additions that would make it easier to use. These would be:

1. Drag and drop a file or group of files (or even a folder) into the window to select.

2. Drag and dropping would automatically set the fourcc to the windows' settings or possibly a preset.

3. "Open using..." would allow the selection and change of multiple files, instead of just one.

These miinor changes would perfect this simple little program.  
(Version 0.1)

AIKOUSHA  Definitely needs work.

Though not really necessary, some localization would put polish on this.

Implement Drag-and-Drop!! It's annoying as hell to search for a file via browse, when the window and file is right in front of you.

Fix up the "help" and about menus, as well as others. The author left the default "NewApplication" as the title throughout the menusystem.

It is nice not to have to go to the Terminal to do basic matroska extraction and exploring, but this was a rather lazy attempt.

Fix all the minor stuff, and even though it's a one-trick-pony, it will still be worth having, if idiots keep insisting on making stupid matroska video files.

On first use, it saved me about 5 minutes of mucking about with one matroska file in the Terminal. Repetitive use will save hours.

Maybe somebody will eventually create a one-step Matroska to MPEG4 or XVID avi file converter that actually works, and nobody will ever have to deal with this crap ever again ^_^  
(Version 1.0)

AIKOUSHA  After bringing this "home" to try on my mac, I was very disappointed. Right at the start it states that it plays matroska and has a better method of displaying subtitles. Funny, "out of the box" it couldn't play ANY matroska file. It kept trying to send me to web pages (and without an internet connection on that mac, that's not possible) for plug-ins. If it has to search for a plug-in to even play a matroska file, that it CANNOT play a matroska file and should not state that it can. It should say, "after hunting for dozens of plug-ins it might be able to play matroska files."

Even playing basic quicktime supported stuff it had problems, like continuously showing the beachball and preventing any interaction. Found out this was due to it's literally unending attempts to phone-home for something (again no internet connection, and even so, it shouldn't be trying to infinitely call home for anything -- is this installed spyware or improperly implemented logging/registration and update checks?).

Even after finding and loading a couple EXTRA codecs (including Perian a known conflict problem generator) it still couldn't play matroska. Of the five files I provided, the audio in all was choppy, the best video I got played only 1 single frame on average every 20 seconds. And the subtitles are worse than VLCs by all regards, they were soft and transparent, very difficult to read even on a still image.

VLC works better and faster, and though I couldn't actually get Chroma to crash (like VLC does), locking itself from interaction with a 1-2 minute beachball display is actually worse than a crash, which can be recovered with an instant re-launch.

The ONLY reason I would ever use this is if they can actually write an efficient matroska code set for it, so that I can actually watch matroska files (needed for many newer fansubs). Otherwise I'll stay with VLC, which, while not able to efficiently work with matroska, actually works faster than this. Heck for basic Xvid, VLC works without skipping frames while my computer is doing many other things concurrently, like video compression, downloading, burning DVDs, AND compiling code. Chroma couldn't even play the matroska files, when that was it's ONLY ltask.

(QT Player, I gave up on 2 system updates back, when opening many videos took up to 5-10 minutes, they played fine after, but taking that long to open, somebody at Apple should have been fired.)  
(Version 2007.3)

AIKOUSHA  Actually, I applaud you for doing something that kind of "sneaks in" the information in a more friendly manner. Unfortunately, such a crude scale, even on a 1-10 is useless to anything I would do. I actually created an Apple II (remember back to 64K mem, 140K disc?) disc based database of my Vinyl and used a 0-100 scale. When I transferred to macs and CDs, my database followed, but instead of a handful of fields, it has more than 400, most scripted to auto enter material, and handles full Kanji entry for asian music. Am I ever glad OSX brough Unicode to most apps.

However, I am not going to enter any ratings via iTunes until I have easy access to fields like "rating" and keeping fields, like "Catalog Number" "Record Label" "Full Release Date" "Copyright Date" "Series Title" "episode title" "True Compilation" -- not multi-artist, "Limited Edition" "First Pressing" "CD ID" "Lyrics" and a few other fields that are for true collectors and archivists, instead of just a bunch of lazy musci pirates.

I don't enter much material, other than basic titling into Itunes (which tags the lossless files I create). Mainly because, until iTunes has true multi-libraries, everytime I have to do something after importing, I have to delete the entire previous library in order to efficiently work with a new acquisition. So, though an excellent player and importer, iTunes still is primarily catering to students and music pirates.

Thanks for your impressive work though, a first step in what will hopefully be a great external update to a program.  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  That's really odd, 3 years ago, SoundJam and iTunes (old prog, new prog) did that flawlessly. Itunes was totally free.

Don't know why you purchased this piece of crap, or even find the need to defend it.

If it worked for you, that's a miracle, and good luck for you.

However, I do cross platform professional work, testing for such work, and used to do assembly level programming. In fact, and in my opinion, as well, this program is poorly implemented and programmed, and if the programmer wishes to rebuild it from the ground up, and give credit where credit is due, I will gladly re-review it, and maybe if it does those odd and hard to do conversions (WMA9, WV, APE, etc) I will give it a good review and possibly even buy it for my own use...

But at the moment, HELL NO! IT DOESN'T WARRANT IT.  
(Version 20071112)

AIKOUSHA  I guess there are a couple of WMA types that might bring up that issue. Since I avoid those and have codecs installed into QT for most of the others, and one or two (ape) with console tools, I've never had to deal.

Cool.

Thanks.  
(Version 1.13)

AIKOUSHA  My solution took me about 4 hours to track down the very last file iTunes 7.5 had left, and then, suddenly I was able to load 7.1.1. Couldn't track down a higher pre- version.

This cleared up all my problems instantly. iTunes 7.1.1 is rock steady... and apparently no other mods were needed. System and Quicktime needed no downgrades... Only iTunes.

Back to reviewing J-Rock albums. Sweet.

Thanks Guys! ^_^  
(Version 7.5)

AIKOUSHA  This used to be one of the most stable programs on my computer, never having a crash, freeze, or missed byte in an encode.

However they screwed the pooch on this one. This update has a number of pointless things (what is this something like 13 updates in the last 6 months?), and they still haven't put in options like killing the annoying MANDATORY iPod Sync and pestering message about saving notes everytime it's launched. How about a feature to grab and store album covers outside the music files in a cache? And can't we have a contextual menu for encoding, instead of having to go into preferences every freakin' time just to change one minor aspect of the "import."

And, of course, NOW, It freezes, locks-up, and goes permanent BEACH BALL everytime I try to play a CD through it, it hasn't made it past 2 tracks. Then, trying to remove it and put an older version back on is next to impossible. Killed the "helper" so I could delete the program, but something in the computer refuses to let the old install work, only giving me the option from the installer of "There is nothing to install."

This is pretty screwed up, Apple.

The rating here is for this version only... a program that constantly locks up, even if free, isn't worth the price.

When working, iTunes is pretty much the best multifeature media player/encoder out there, but Apple's track record recently with stability has been severely lacking.  
(Version 7.5)

AIKOUSHA  Total crap. I finally decide to take the plunge for the new version because the ratio of horrible things happening after upgrading to people has come down to an acceptable level, and I have time to deal with potential issues, and the thing doesn't get past the splash screen and drawing the vuze window. The mainwindow process crashes, and even though it continues to load dozens of things in the background, the program is unusable, leaving only "Azureus" and the apple menu alive, and only "quit" and "about" are available as usable menu items. The main window is black, with a blue and white block labeled VuzeBeta, and nothing else. The window is not resizable or usable (i.e., no cursor entry into the white box, which is probably a text box). Only a cryptic message pops up, but is not copyable and disappears quickly.

What a freakin' waste of time. Too bad 2503 was the last stable version, because it was taken down, and this destroyed it. Time to search through my old backups.

No matter how many times they say Vuze doesn't affect things, that the same old Azureus is buried in there, it's a total load... The part of the program that fails is smack dab in the middle of the Vuze coding, and because that fails, the BitTorrent portion of the program cannot even be initiated.

Shame.  
(Version 3.0.3.4)

AIKOUSHA  The color (or lack thereof) of this actually makes it very difficult to see things quickly (and hit control items easily).

On top of that, it doesn't change anything I would want or need to alter.

Sorry, but I'd have to say, nice try, but go on to another scheme.

For people who are interested in skinning iTunes, check out the full size capture first, and contemplate carefully if you really want to get stuck with this variation... It seems like you might have to completely re-install iTunes if you want to revert.  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  This is one of the few programs I didn't test drive from macupdate or versiontracker. I actually convinced a mac salesperson to let me try this on one of the G5s in-store. After all, they had a full setup with scanner, digital photography, and a HDTV -- everything. Installation was initially scary, as it looked more like i had accidentally installed a bootleg with virus. But after being assured they didn't care (the unit was protected), we installed and input the password. Seemed simple enough. Had a few basic issues, like reinstalling the TWAIN driver from the scanner's site.

The the problems came. Whoever designed the menu system and the language (words) used, seriously need to go back to school and to learn about precise terminology. It was very confusing, and took us both quite a lot of time to figure out what was meant by certain terms. And on top of that the "search" function in the "help" file doesn't search, it provides an "index." Which is pretty useless if you're tyring to find an explanation for some terms, or trying to find out why something isn't working the way it should be under a Mac interface.

After all that, I scanned 5 pages from a paperback I had on me... very simple document. It managed to outline the text, but in weird shapes, when a simple rectangle would definitely do (there is no option to force this, so it goes about making weird "polygons"). Attempting to "reshape" the polygons had the whole giant shape misaligning everywhere, it crawled about like some form of amoeba. Definitely bad. We eventually let it just do it's thing, and clicked analyze. (You can "redraw" the analysis boundaries, but it requires a lot of mouse-hopping to get to make a simple rectangle, which is contrary to the simplicity the automation is supposed to provide).

A very simple font was used (Goudy Old Style), with a few exceptions (like diagonal hyphens), the text should have been simplicity itself to recognize. Nope, the self-learning process couldn't seem to recognize double and single quotes properly, and even after being forced to learn several of them, it started turning them into uppercase "H"s. Not only that, it kept changing double lowercase "o"s into double zeroes. It couldn't recognize periods, colons and semicolons, and when there was noise between lines, instead of ignoring that, it dwelled on it making weird guesses. The worst was when it started splitting double quotes into singles before we finished the five pages (and it did this with a couple of other characters, like a "u". There's no way to tell the program it's totally screwed up, so you have to either "delete" the supposed character, or stick something in under "don't learn". Either way, you have to go back later and correct it in the output.... if you can get that far.

In the middle of the fourth page, the program crashed. It lost all the settings and the "learning."

We tried it twice more, once with TWAIN, and then with pre-scanned pages. Crashed each time, before we finished, but in different places.

Finally tried just a single page. It managed to get through that, but with a large number of errors, which meant we had to go back and "proofread" it. I could have hand typed the page three times by the time we got through the proofing.

On top of that, we found that there is no way to keep paragraph formatting (as opposed to single lines with a hard-CR at the end), and maintain things like line ending hyphens... it removes them whether or not they are used normally or as a line/word split.

I was kind of hoping this might be my answer to a program that could OCR Kanji, but with this performance, there's no way I would attempt it.

Besides, the version in the store was apparently from 2005 even though it was brand new there. An 11.5 version is out but I don't see it here. However, if you go to their site, you think you'll get a test download, but it does nothing but take your e-mail addy and then send you to more advertising. There's no tech specs on the asian upgrade, and attempts to find any, just send you back to the "test" version page, which only has "video" clips.

The salesman (cute guy, BTW, not a total waste of time) let me take the software home to test with a deposit. It performed even worse on my G4.

The company claims it is the best Mac OCR program... Of course it is, it's apparently the only one with a GUI frontend that I can find.

What really blows my mind is that since Omnipage on the Mac died a while back, pattern recognition has gotten much more sophisticated, but I don't see it here, at all. One would think that the program would be able to take a font file and read it's metrics and splines in order to train itself, making it a whiz to use, if you have the typeface. No, it's still working on making rough guesses (and bad ones at that).

This program also requires you to have a TWAIN interface... It doesn't have any real scanner interface of it's own, so if you have an old scanner (read OS9 or earlier) you can't use it, TWAIN doesn't work across the "Classic" barrier.

This program performed horribly, in all taking more than 5 times on average to do the work, than it would require me, or even an average secretary to type the work by hand. Kind of pointless and a waste of time and money. I'm hoping I can find a used copy of OmniPage Pro X... it worked better when I was using it on my old Mac IIfx. Though that won't solve my issue in trying to find a kanji OCR program.

I took the software back, and I hope the sales-guy tells the store to return the stock.

I am so glad I didn't buy this stuff on-line, I'd be out $400, and may not have even gotten actual software, based on my and other's experience with the company. (This is why I love MacUpdate)

Maybe by version 20, this might be working well enough to seriously use. Errrr. Maybe not, just checked the date on this "update", Oct 31 2005... Happy Halloween... guess I found the monster.  
(Version 11.0.3)

AIKOUSHA  I don't know about other people, but Jomic, and Comical are very slow on my system... and FFView hasn't worked for years, and gets worse on my system every update (displaying black pages, scrambled or only partial pages, and doing so inconsistently, poorly functioning control interface, frequent crashes...).

This was the best of every comic viewer in their current stages, and this worked the fastest. It still has a few things to iron out, including a more flexible control interface (if it could work like FFView's control system is supposed to work...).

Personally, if I get a 300GB drive for documents to capture, store, and create to, this would be an excellent addition for that purpose when it comes-of-age.  
(Version 1.3 build 690)

AIKOUSHA  "Stealing kiddies," huh? Most of the people that "bought" this complained outright about how poor it is. If you can't steal it, then how can they complain about functions that don't work properly? If there was ever a review that looked like the developer in disguise, it's the review two below mine. Baka!

Now I'll add my comments, because though I didn't "steal" this, somebody at the University paid for it to use on their iBook, and asked what they were doing wrong. (I tried this over 2 years ago and avoided it like the plague, it was so bad).

I quickly found that the program was still "flaky" like another poster said. Heck, for a large amount of it's conversions, it doesn't even have bitrate selections for those that REQUIRE it.

One test I tried in the few things while "bug-testing" this, was to convert a 48K 160kbs MP3 (bgm music for a DVD project) to AC3. It converted it, but it was awful, sounding worse than a 16kbps mp3. Many things it couldn't even accomplish, that it should have. And for the "steal" audience, it never once came up with the "full version" comment, like I remember the trial version doing, all those years ago.

Needless to say, I told him to use the DVD Studio Pro package in the Media Lab, where one of the programs will do all the conversions he needed -- and he didn't have to "steal" that package either, since it was on a school license!

As for the other reviewer that wrote about temporary files, I believe those are there as scratchpad files, as a mid-point format from one type to another, or the data-stream before a header or set of tags is attached... and someone pointed out before, that this was an artifact of the console commands that were used in the construction of this program. Were those "STOLEN" by the developer?  
(Version 070823)

AIKOUSHA  Just wondering what good the free version is, when you can do this with iTunes and/or Quicktime for free?  
(Version 1.13)

AIKOUSHA  Quiz/Poll Response: I have not star rated a single song in iTunes. I used a decimal scale before Macs even existed, (1-5 stars is useless), and since the field is actually a decimal field, I don't intend to rate them until I have easy access to that field (simple decimal display would be easier and more efficient! Bad Apple! This should be a preference, along with keeping art outside of the song files... and contextual menus should be used to select type of Conversion/Import.

^_^  
(Version 1.0.1)

AIKOUSHA  Samples show good results, however....

I tossed 4 projects which I am currently working on at it, and the process, in all the different set-ups I gave it, failed miserably. Completely unacceptable results. On top of that, the interface is gawd-awful.

I gave it a 1x2 and 2x2 photographic and a 1x3 and 2x2 multipage scan.

The 2x2 photo of a steppe-villatge was hilarious, as it put 3 of the shots exactly on top of each other and fish-eyed them, and put the lower-right image immediately to the right of the stack. Awful.

The 2x2 multipage scan turned into something resembling a doily (or mirrored cylinder art), arranged 1x4.

And the very simple 2 image photo with 1/3 overlap, it couldn't even put together, just saying it couldn't find a panorama.

This has got a very long way to go for anything I could actually use. In the time it took to fail with the two shot photo, I could have stitched it in photoshop, with only the central distortion requiring a correction.

I could use a tool to do this with my hundreds of multi-page scans that I deal with on many projects, but it actually has to work... And my scans don't have typical lens, focus, and dof distortions... These should be easy to deal with. (And how about a switch turning OFF all features that require JFIF information, as not everybody just plugs their camera in and drops the photos immediately into a stitcher.)

Some people might get results with this, and other reviews seems to support this, but I'm certainly not getting good results, and I believe that allowing the user to pre-set-up relative positions, sizes, and co-incidence points would give the program a better chance to select proper stiitch points.  
(Version 1.3)

AIKOUSHA  Wait... before I can even start with this, it requires the latest version of the OSX system? It takes us nearly 2 weeks to recover after every Apple system update, and I have to do it just to test a program that probably hasn't upgraded anything that really needs upgrading? Is the first bug update going to require 10.5?? And then the next version require you to have a Macintosh G6??

I've heard things about interface components changing (lines, font positioning, field boundaries and thicknesses altered). It did this in a previous version, but I never upgraded to it... Still using 5.5.

The WHOLE package requires a system update, yet none of the basic controls use the OSX standard (aqua) interface (pull-downs, scroll-buttons, drop-downs, just regular buttons)? What the hell is up with these people? I can suffer with the antique interface, but an upgrade should have some features useable by at leat 90% of it's user base -- you know, features that have actually been requested and would be easy to implement... not just for the developers and web-professionals (which I am, but have never used any part of Filemaker for).

I seriously need a cross-platform database, but unfortunately, this is the only program. Thankfully version 5.5 still works for everything required, but simple things in Access still haven't been implemented in Filemaker. So, I guess my databases and information continues to stay workable, but in the "stone age." No improvements or short-cuts for my users.

Every time this program is "updated," I am seriously disappointed, and pissed off.  
(Version 9.0)

AIKOUSHA  A few things I'd like to point out.

Unlike version 1.0, which I couldn't get to work at all --- all files ended up unchanged in the "BAD" folder, this version seems to do fairly well. Definitely better than SmallImage, which actually added large amounts of space to files.

However, there are some flaws with this, definitely minor, though.

First, it counts every single file in the demo mode, so all those invisible files get counted, leaving me with a test bed of only 5 real files. Picky, but hey, it should be ignoring anything that it cannot process, including invisible and text files (which it sends to the "BAD" folder).

Second, the method of requiring an input and output directory is distinctly un-mac-like and very counterintuitive, in general, with today's computers. Drag and dropping a group of files or a folder onto the application or dock icon (or app window), should be the preferred method, with either the output going to a specific directory, or being tagged with "clean" or something similar in the same directory.

Third, the routines cannot handle long or even two-byte text in directories. I'm not certain if this problem follows to two-byte text in files, but it does make me wonder what would happen if I tossed it a directory of Japanese files.

Also, for $30, It would have to deal with ALL graphic file-types, TIFF, GIF, BMP, and anything else that can have metadata stuffed into it. And I would also like it to automatically remove all this data while I work with photoshop (which often sticks up to 40K worth of garbage into a file, even when you have the settings set to not do this). $30 otherwise is incredibly steep, even if you are removing this data from thousands of files at a time... A thing I can't test for since I can only get five files at a time.

Suggestion: for $5 more, you can buy another GREAT Lemke product, GraphicConverter, and just resave these graphic files without metadata. Actually, maybe this function can be built into graphic converter..., maybe?  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  Errr... Why are all the files I processed with this, MUCH bigger afterwards? I definitely had it set to remove all 3 types of metadata, and left the quality checkbox OFF. If this worked right, it should have removed between 16K and 24K from the files, but instead nearly 60K was added to most of them. And when reviewing both the "cleaned" and non-cleaned images, the quality was listed the same, and the cleaned files showed no meta-data.

What's up with this?!?  
(Version 1.4.1)

AIKOUSHA  I tried this out on a university computer... for about 2 minutes. The interface was horrifying and confusing. I don't know what the developer was thinking, unless this is the way they plan to distribute licensed paid materials (even if so, this is the wrong way to do that).

This was so bad I just shut off the computer (this restores the computer to pristine status).

There is no way I will put this on my home computer.

Now, what should have happened for the new version was enhancing segments of code to be faster and more compact (i.e., translating java to machine), and modifying the interface so it is more system-like for the computers it is meant to run on.

And now, after seeing all the other problems and horror stories, my paranoia is so high, I don't think I want to ever upgrade from 2.5... ever!

I've left 2.5 running for over 2 months at a time, without any problems, and after lots of tweeking, I get better results from it than almost anybody using anything else from the same ISP. Why bother moving to this new horror show?  
(Version 3.0.1.4)

AIKOUSHA  It would have been 2 on features, but the parser option (unlike filling in 3 fields) was done well. However, none of the die buttons worked on my Mac.

Now, to get picky:

The interface is too big. Single results should be in a text box. The paper tape should probably be like the one in calculator.app, separate, resizable, and with a clear button.

Otherwise, it is what it should be: simple, clean, and efficient.

Playability and Graphics/Sound are not applicable fields. If there's a mod out there reading this, you need to have a NA response to your category ratings!  
(Version 0.2d)

AIKOUSHA  Tested this new version, but had to quickly bail on it. It still does a few things it shouldn't:

1. opens on a blank disc insert when another version is already open (not a consistent thing).

2. It changed the "launch" option on blank-disc insert, without permission.

3. No way to have it stop burning unwanted/unneeded files... Usually I don't need desktop db files, DS store files, and anything else system related on a DVD disc. The Mac doesn't even require these on DATA DISCS in UDF format, let alone on DVD-Video where these extra files cause problems on many older, and a few newer, players. If it doesn't show on the burn list, it shouldn't be on the actual disc itself.

4. Bloatware alert in a major way for the multimedia handling, it was bad enough from 6 to 7, it's even worse from 7 to 8. I'll never use any of this stuff, since there are free tools that'll do this stuff better and faster (at least in most cases).

I didn't test it long enough to determine if there is a memory leak, since between the problems above and the new GIGANTIC interface, I just kept version 7. The new interface is actually unforgiveable. What do people without large cinema displays do to run this program?!? So much for intuitiveness.. two more steps, it'll be like a bad PC interface.

Also, with version 7, I can keep 8 other programs running (and fully tasked) while operating it... Filemaker, ffmpegx, azureus, safari, excel, photoshop, golive, and word, all without experiencing any problems or errors... Definitely can't do that with version 8.

I may have to update when I get a Blu-Ray burner, but until then, I'll suffer with version 7.

BTW, Toast is still the best burning software for Mac, but between the interface and bloat, it just took a major hit... from itself.  
(Version 8.0.1)

AIKOUSHA  I'd love to review/check this out, but it's another dead .mac website. I've yet to come across ANY software linked to .mac that was actually accessable, and that covers at least 70 different programs.   
(Version 1.4.2)

AIKOUSHA  Not very useful unless you have to do this all the time, AND you have one of the services required.

It's easier to use one of the dozen or so file host services, and I guarantee that their servers are FASTER and less likely to stop working due to a dozen or so .mac "features" or "limitations."

What somebody needs to do is make something that does fast file transfers (point-to-point) from Mac/PC to Mac/PC that doesn't require an expensive service or any silly servers inbetween to store the stupid file first. Otherwise, you might as well just get an inexpensive website (unless you're transferring something like porn which is banned on almost all sites-hosts).

That said, there are free apps that do the same thing as this does, so if you do require this form of transferring...  
(Version 2.6.5)

AIKOUSHA  A great trash addition would be to "hack" the empty trash dialog box so that it will display these missing bits of info, and to have marked checkboxs for those drives you want to empty the trash from.

There are a few networked drives I have that I do not want empty the trash on, while they are connected, and this would be a very useful addition.

Just a thought...  
(Version 2.0)

AIKOUSHA  All I get are adverts and a web-host trying to sell me site space, from the download link...  
(Version 1.1)

AIKOUSHA  Sorry, Wavpack unpacking does not work. This is a repeatable bug. No matter the .wv input, no matter what output file type or settings. Result is always the same -- horribly buzzy and hashed sound. The output is barely recognizable.

Waveform output shows the main reason -- at very rapid frequency, the waveform zeros out, then returns.

Hope this gets ironed out soon... It's a nice little app.  
(Version 0.6.1)

AIKOUSHA  I just want to convert a 320MB MPG4/AAC file from a camcorder with self created subtitles, to an MPEG4 or XVID AVI file, reducing the file to half the size (about 170MB). The program allows me to do all the proper selections (except some refuse to let me set the subtitles to position 92% -- which is mandatory, subtitles aren't subtitles when they appear centered at the 2/3 mark from the top). The preview looks perfect, but in all 4 video out selections, the progress box, in about 1-2 seconds, rings, and says it is complete, with a zero size file as output. I even tried audio passthrough to hopefully reduce conflicts -- no luck.

Everytime I've ever tried this program, this is the result. If for some reason, it can't go from one type to another, it should tell you, and offer suggestions, not output "completed".

What's up with this...

I do like the tools UI revamp, but the program seriously needs more of this kind of UI redo. And I don't know if it works in the tools, since I tried to mux another video MP4 and AAC, and it keeps failing... but both files are playable through QT, VLC, MPlayer, and practically everything else I have. In the end, I had to recode with QTpro, which took a couple of hours, instead of the hopeful quick job through ffmpegx.  
(Version 0.0.9xr2)

AIKOUSHA  This is one of those "less is more" programs, where it does just one primary thing, and is useful in doing such. Like one person commented, copying and pasting from open windows doesn't provide a pasteable list (things are in odd order and multi-level lists are useless).

This keeps things sorted and allows numbering, and the ability to list just folders, just files, or both from within a single folder.

All it needs now are three final things (IMHO):

1. a very small help file in the about or help menus, just to give a brief explanation of how things work -- only about 6 sentences would cover it.

2. The ability to add recursive folder listings to the list, represented by either a tab or a specified number of spaces for each level.

3. Drag-and-drop of the specified folder into the window, for selection.

(It's hard to give a program that only does one basic thing, 5 stars for features, but add the recursive feature, drag&drop, and maybe the ability to log file sizes, and I'd have no choice but to give it fives across the board.

Thanks!  
(Version 1.2.2)

AIKOUSHA  Has Roxio corrected the problem with V7 where no matter what method you use, it sticks invisible Mac files on DVD video discs (and data discs). I use version 6 and if you burn from "DVD-Video from VIDEO_TS" all you burn is what you place there. But from my friend's iBook and Version 7, it places invisible Desktop files on the base directory (which do not show up in the main window until the burn starts). This causes some earlier DVD players to choke! And since I have to burn on an external drive using output from Sizzle and a few other minor tools, this means I cannot use version 7 (so why upgrade?).

Roxio was most unhelpful with my friend, and insisted it was not a problem with the software (even after two re-installs).

Personally, I won't put this on my Mac, because if it kills 6 in any way, I might lose my (proper) home burning ability.  
(Version 7.1.2)

AIKOUSHA  Wow, what a jackass. I give constructive criticism, and actually specify the problems, and you can only repetitively claim I'm stupid. Did you even read the specifics... BTW, I write software manuals and used to debug vertical-market software.

Fine, if you don't think it's valid commentary, because you won't add or modify the program beyond it's limited range (many programs are fine doing this), but I though for a FILE SPLITTER, this was valid. Especially for $20. I get better value from the PC file splitters, and if I have to, I can take my portable drive to work and do it there.

However: on 10.4.7 on G4-AGP 1.2Ghz

"Too much disk access:" The program takes longer to split/copy than the finder's copy (and the system's split), AND it prevents access to other programs while it is working... Do you know what disk interleaving is? How about head travel speed...? I mentioned it in the original review.

"Can't be, it's simple math. You probably just don't understand the way that file sizes are reported by the OS." No, I understnad it completely, including MBs, MiBs, and conversions between KB, MB, GB, TB, PB both base 10 and 16. The file discussed was truncated -- So either your program, the system, or the drive screwed up. I mentioned this so you could see if there was a conflict, or problem -- -but you obviously don't care. AND I'm not going to debug your program for you.

"bugs in the .bat file: Response: Don't know what to tell you." Well that's why I'm telling you. This was consistent on multiple installs, and over 20 tests. If you were polite, I'd have helped you narrow down what might be a conflict. AND IT STILL INSISTED ON ADDING .mpg as an file extension to a disk image file. That's a bug no matter what you call me.

Splitting is "UnMac like" -- It's still true, even though you refused to understand. A small change in interface will correct it, and enhance the users experience. Did you even read the MHIGs?

"And now we get to the root of the issue. The app is worth $20 and more. It is infinately easier than learning the command line and far more elegant."

Actually learning the command line is very easy... Just for this, I looked up how to do it online -- I found about 6 websites in google that explain it well enough, that anyhbody could do it. That costs you nothing, and took less than 2 minutes to locate and read.

If you want to stick with only USENET uses fine. But the two readers I used did this by themselves, without human intervention, and had more bells and whistles. These were Mac apps, and free. So, if they did this embedded in a reader, I think my opinion of $20 being too high is quite valid.

You have much to learn about customer service and what constructive criticism is.

I still stand by my review, even though you are horribly rude and insulting.  
(Version 2.5fc2)

AIKOUSHA  Though PS is pretty much a necessity in some of the newer work I'm doing (mainly because it has no real competition), I find I still have to use Graphic Converter at college. Why? Because I am doing a lot of stuff for web-work.

So, even though the program is set not to add anything to the saved images, why does a .png image (or even .gif and .bmp images) that should be represented by about 300 bytes, end up as 44K on the Mac? No one in the classroom has been able to stop this. So, if you want web ready graphics, I guess you need another program.

BTW, the same images fed through Graphic Converter, do come out the proper size, i.e., 4K.

Pretty f'd up, if you ask me.  
(Version 9.0.2)

AIKOUSHA  This is one of four tools that I find avsolutely necessary for web-design. I have only started in the last couple of months, but ever since TextEdit started interpreting code instead of allowing editing of HTML/XHTML, I've had to use another editor. And I'm glad I did.

However, I currently am using the 8.5 version at college, and we have to have the serial number taped on the monitor and stuck as a folder name on the desktop, because, everytime you open a second document (after a session the serial wasn't entered at startup), it closes everything and tells you that the program has expired. You then have to enter the serial number again, wherein the program works fine until it is later quit.

This is pretty damn annoying and hardly inspires me to purchase a working copy of my own.

Is this fixed in the October update?  
(Version 8.5.1)

AIKOUSHA  First, there aren't many features. Basically it is supposed to be the splitting and joining of files. Other than that there's not much. On the PC side, I have access to over 20 FREE utilities that do what this does better (but at home I'm stuck only on a Mac).

Second. Since this basically only does two things, it is pretty easy to use, except that splitting is very un-mac like. At first I didn't understand why I kept getting a file dialog everytime I highlited the file I wanted to split and then clicked split -- Well, you can't drag and drop for splits, and therefore cannot do more than one split job at a time ( I though the big window would allow multiple split jobs).

Third, I wished to use a file splitter to take huge DV files and put them on multiple DVD-Rs and DVD-RWs. However, this cannot make splits bigger than 2.2GB (which just coincidentally is too big to put 2 on a single DVD). To be of any real use in today's market where CDRs and DVDRs are the common media, this really needs to be corrected. I had to calculate that 2240MB is just big enough to fit two segments per DVD. A part of a selection drop down should at least have common split sizes -- this is present on every PC version I've ever used.

Four, this has several major bugs, two of which are immediately visible in the .bat file this makes to be compatible with PC/Win double-clicking. On a file that was a Toast disk image (not videos), this appended ".mpg" to the joined file name, and only had commands to join the first three parts of the file, the fourth part (.004), was not in the batch file at all. Though I am not going to test it, When this file was first split, it had 3 2.2GB segments and one 384.7MB segment. When I reduced it so two segs could fit on a single DVD-R, I got 3 2.19GB sements and one 384.7MB segment. Errrrr..... Shouldn't the smaller segment have grown significantly in size, not stayed the same?

Though it's a matter of paranoia only, the program also pretty much locks out all other actions while it is spitting, and is very tough on the hard disc, even when spitting from one HD to another (most file copies are quicker and less harsh on the HD -- could this be a timing/interleave problem?). A slightly less harsh split routine (even though it would take longer) would be preferable, especially if the drive being accessed is also doing something else...

This has a very long way to go before it becomes worth $20. It's much easier to learn the Terminal commands under OSX and use them, than to play roulette with this program. (Though I would prefer using a GUI to the terminal window -- The terminal hasn't fouled anything up, that I've given it).  
(Version 2.5fc1)