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Upcoming Appearances
June 21. Apple Store, San Francisco, 6 pm
June 25. Northeast Ohio Apple Corps, 9 am
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Thursday, January 22, 2004
Posted 9:19 AM  

Not-So-Smart Albums in iPhoto 4
I've been loving the speed and new features of iPhoto 4, but I've run into a couple of limitations of the smart albums feature, which lets you tell iPhoto to build an album according to search criteria that you specify.

My complaints deal with the way iPhoto 4 handles dates.

You can't omit the year. I may be missing it, but I can't figure out how to easily create a smart album containing photos from a given date, but from any year. In other words, say I want to create a Smart Album of every photo I've taken on Christmas day, regardless of the year. The smart album dialog box doesn't let you say "Date starts with..." -- you must specify an entire year. So creating a "Christmas Day" smart album means adding multiple criteria -- one for each year whose photos you want to include in your album. That means a lot of extra work.

Two-digit years don't cut it. iPhoto appears to store date information using a two-digit number for the year -- for example, 1/22/04 instead of 1/22/2004.

Didn't we have a big brouhaha about this a few years ago? I thought so.

The problem with iPhoto's two-digit scheme arises when you add an old scanned image to iPhoto and change its date to reflect the year in which it was taken -- for example, "45" for a photo taken in 1945. Or "05" for a photo taken in 1905. I discussed this very use of iPhoto in one of my Digital Hub columns in Macworld.

Worse, iPhoto 4's smart albums feature doesn't appear to be able to find photos that have, for lack of a better term, "unusual" dates. I changed a photo's year to "45," but the smart album feature can't find it.

iPhoto 4 is a terrific upgrade, but it would be just that much more terrific if it handled dates just a bit better.



Wednesday, January 21, 2004
Posted 12:02 PM  

GarageBand On the Radio Tonight
I don't mention it here often enough, but I co-host a computer radio show called Point & Click Radio on our local public radio station here in the spectacular boonies of California's Mendocino County.

On any Wednesday when my schedule permits, I drive 25 minutes through gorgeous redwood groves and past world-class wineries to downtown Philo, California (population: about 400). There, I join my good friend Bob Laughton, who has been heroically hosting Point & Click Radio for over seven years.

Mendocino County has been thinking different for a lot longer than Apple has been selling computers, and it's decidedly Mac country. I don't have statistics, but I'd bet a PowerBook that there are more Macs here than there are Windows computers. Given that and the fact that Bob and I are both Mac lovers, Point & Click often has a strong Mac focus.

Tonight will be no exception. Tonight we'll be demonstrating Apple's hot new GarageBand software. We'll walk listeners through the process of creating a GarageBand song from scratch.

It should be a fun show, and if you aren't fortunate enough to live within KZYX listening range, you can listen live on the Internet using the RealOne player. Our show airs at 7:00 pm Pacific time. You'll find a link to the live stream on the Point & Click Radio home page.

See you on the radio!

Archives

  04/20/2003 - 04/26/2003
  04/27/2003 - 05/03/2003
  05/04/2003 - 05/10/2003
  05/11/2003 - 05/17/2003
  05/18/2003 - 05/24/2003
  05/25/2003 - 05/31/2003
  06/01/2003 - 06/07/2003
  06/08/2003 - 06/14/2003
  06/15/2003 - 06/21/2003
  06/22/2003 - 06/28/2003
  07/06/2003 - 07/12/2003
  07/13/2003 - 07/19/2003
  07/20/2003 - 07/26/2003
  08/03/2003 - 08/09/2003
  10/05/2003 - 10/11/2003
  10/12/2003 - 10/18/2003
  10/19/2003 - 10/25/2003
  11/02/2003 - 11/08/2003
  11/30/2003 - 12/06/2003
  12/07/2003 - 12/13/2003
  12/21/2003 - 12/27/2003
  12/28/2003 - 01/03/2004
  01/04/2004 - 01/10/2004
  01/18/2004 - 01/24/2004
  01/25/2004 - 01/31/2004
  02/01/2004 - 02/07/2004
  03/07/2004 - 03/13/2004
  03/21/2004 - 03/27/2004
  04/11/2004 - 04/17/2004
  04/18/2004 - 04/24/2004
  04/25/2004 - 05/01/2004
  05/02/2004 - 05/08/2004
  05/09/2004 - 05/15/2004
  05/16/2004 - 05/22/2004
  05/23/2004 - 05/29/2004
  05/30/2004 - 06/05/2004
  06/06/2004 - 06/12/2004
  06/13/2004 - 06/19/2004
  06/20/2004 - 06/26/2004
  06/27/2004 - 07/03/2004
  07/11/2004 - 07/17/2004
  07/18/2004 - 07/24/2004
  07/25/2004 - 07/31/2004
  08/01/2004 - 08/07/2004
  08/08/2004 - 08/14/2004
  08/22/2004 - 08/28/2004
  08/29/2004 - 09/04/2004
  09/05/2004 - 09/11/2004
  09/12/2004 - 09/18/2004
  09/19/2004 - 09/25/2004
  09/26/2004 - 10/02/2004
  10/03/2004 - 10/09/2004
  10/24/2004 - 10/30/2004
  10/31/2004 - 11/06/2004
  11/07/2004 - 11/13/2004
  11/14/2004 - 11/20/2004
  11/28/2004 - 12/04/2004
  12/05/2004 - 12/11/2004
  12/12/2004 - 12/18/2004
  12/19/2004 - 12/25/2004
  01/09/2005 - 01/15/2005
  01/16/2005 - 01/22/2005
  01/23/2005 - 01/29/2005
  01/30/2005 - 02/05/2005
  02/06/2005 - 02/12/2005
  02/13/2005 - 02/19/2005
  02/27/2005 - 03/05/2005
  03/06/2005 - 03/12/2005
  03/27/2005 - 04/02/2005
  04/03/2005 - 04/09/2005
  04/10/2005 - 04/16/2005
  04/17/2005 - 04/23/2005
  04/24/2005 - 04/30/2005
  05/01/2005 - 05/07/2005
  05/08/2005 - 05/14/2005
  05/15/2005 - 05/21/2005
  05/22/2005 - 05/28/2005
  05/29/2005 - 06/04/2005
  06/05/2005 - 06/11/2005
  06/12/2005 - 06/18/2005

Really old stuff (before February 2003)

©2002-2005 by Jim Heid.



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