.Mac Revamp May be In the Works
.Mac Revamp May be In the Works
by , 10:45 AM EDT, May 30th, 2008
Apple's .Mac service may be in store for some kind of reworking or update, even if it is in name only. Code snippets ferreted away inside post-Mac OS X 10.5.3 versions of iCal, Mail and Safari all point to a name change for Apple's online service, according to Blogging Robots.
![]() Apple's .Mac service |
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iCal, Apple's calendar and scheduling application, includes this line in its Localizable.strings file:
/* Label of .Mac button in iCal's General preferences. %@ is the new name of Apple's online service (was .Mac) (remove -XX02)
Safari's Localizable.strings file includes this line:
/* Title of .Mac alert sheet, with .Mac brand name subsituted */ "You need a %@ account that has syncing enabled" = "You need a %@ account that has syncing enabled";
Mail includes a similar string in its Prefs.strings file:
/* Title of button used to open the .Mac system preference pane. */ "AOS_SYNC_BUTTON_FORMAT" = "%@..."; /* Descriptive text for .Mac Sync. */ "AOS_SYNC_FORMAT" = "Use %@ to synchronize Accounts, Rules, Notes, Signatures, and Smart Mailboxes.";
Based on what's been found so far, it looks like the .Mac name will be changing, and Apple coders are using %@ as a place holder for the as yet unannounced new name. Daring Fireball, however, reported that the .Mac name could be replaced with "Mobile Me" as part of a move to include iPhone and iPod over-the-air syncing to the service.
If so, that could mean that iPhone and iPod touch users would have a way to keep their schedule and contacts remotely synchronized with their computer without having to rely on Microsoft Exchange, which would be good news for personal users and companies that aren't using Microsoft's tools.
Observer Comments
Two things
1; They bloody well better not take away my @mac.com e-mail address. It's the significant reason I've stayed with the service.
2; Mobile Me is possibly the worst name they could come up with. Someone on another thread said it sounded too much like Mini Me. Personally I just think it sounds bad, and worse yet doesn't convey what it is clearly.
Fri May 30, 2008 1:11 pm Subject: @mobileme.com
Quotegeoduck wrote:
Two things
1; They bloody well better not take away my @mac.com e-mail address. It's the significant reason I've stayed with the service.
2; Mobile Me is possibly the worst name they could come up with. Someone on another thread said it sounded too much like Mini Me. Personally I just think it sounds bad, and worse yet doesn't convey what it is clearly.
I too "flashed" on Mini Me when I read the story. Even worse it also sounds windowish, like something MicroSoft would name to compete with Apple.
Maybe call it "mobilemac.com" or something along that line, us @mac.com legacy users could still keep and use our addresses. Hmmm, wouldn't it be great if Apple could get a TLD of "mac" or "apple"
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