Sean Hull, "Cloud Computing Use Cases":

What types of applications do fit well in the cloud?

1. Applications with Seasonal Traffic Patterns
2. Proof-of-concept Applications
3. Quick Temporary Dev & Test Environments
4. CPU Intensive Applications
5. On-Demand or Unknown Future Demand

Skitch, a wonderful screen capture and annotation utility that I've been using for as long as it's been out, has just gone free on the Mac App Store after its acquisition by Evernote.

It's known as simply Skitch on the App Store, but you'll see Skitch Plus displayed in the application window when you launch it. Prior to the acquisition, Skitch Plus was the version with features available only to paying customers.

When I switched to the Mac, I'd noticed that there weren't many easy-to-use and reliable solutions for making screen captures of web pages that won't all fit into the browser window. On Windows, you had paid programs like Snagit that did a great job.

There is a version of Snagit for the Mac, but I could never get used to how annotation is done there, preferring the approach used in Skitch instead.

Anyway, I was happy to accidentally discover that this new, free version of Skitch does a perfect job of letting you make image captures of most scrolling web pages. I'll note the exceptions toward the end of this article.

There are two web page capture options in the app's menu, Capture > Snap Safari and Capture > Snap from Link….

Snap Safari captures the front-most web page currently open in your Safari browser. In the screen capture example below, I had navigated to Skitch.com first, before clicking on Capture > Snap Safari.

(Click the image to view the original 1436×2466 PNG in a new tab)

The second option, Capture > Snap from Link… is there for you to conveniently paste in a URL link without having to first open the related web page in your browser, or if you don't use Safari in the first place.

Web captures may take a bit of time depending on your internet connection speed. The following Web Capture progress dialog appears during the process.

The width of the image capture seems to correspond with the native resolution width of the primary display of your Mac.

You are now free to annotate, crop and resize the capture using Skitch's tools, and save the image to Skitch's server or Flickr, or simply drag out the image using the Drag Me tab (at the bottom of the app) to your desktop, folders or another app.

Skitch supports the following file formats: .jpg, .png, .pdf, .svg, .skitch, .tif, .gif, .bmp. Choose one of these from the drop down menu near the bottom of the app.

The .jpg format can be fine-tuned further with one of five quality settings: Maximum quality – 100%, Very high quality – 80%, High quality – 60%, Medium quality – 30%, Low quality – 10%.

Images can also be dragged into the Skitch app window if you wish to use the image editing tools there.

I'm aware of two problems with using Skitch to capture web pages.

First, Skitch seems to launch a separate process to perform the capture, instead of what your Safari browser currently displays. You will not be able to capture the exact web page that you might be seeing when logged in, for instance, to a web site administration panel (say, one of the WordPress setup admin pages). Unfortunately, Skitch does not allow for any credentials to be entered for this purpose.

Secondly, we don't know which internal web browser is used by Skitch. I get the following image of “Your Browser is no longer supported” error page when trying to capture Google+.

Despite these two drawbacks, I still use Skitch heavily on a daily basis for my screen shot tasks as I don't frequently do captures of long web pages.

While the keyboard navigation and other Google Instant enhancements have not made the mouse or trackpad totally obsolete for doing Google searches, they have made searching and displaying search results much less tedious affairs.

Here's how I use Google Instant with keyboard shortcuts in the Safari web browser on my Mac.

While typing what you want to search for in the search box, Google will suggest terms that are related to the keywords you're currently searching for.

In the following example, I'm searching "movies for kids". After I'd typed "movies for", Google suggests "kids" (displayed in light gray), which is exactly the next word I'm looking for.

To go ahead with the suggested "kids" and autocomplete the search query phrase, I can press Tab or Right Arrow on the keyboard. I prefer Right Arrow.

There's also other suggestions that come up in a list directly under the search box. I can select any of those by hitting Up Arrow or Down Arrow on my keyboard.

Google Instant will immediately display search results for the terms you've actually typed in, or for the search phrase that is a combination of whatever you've entered so far and any suggested term in light gray. Also, the search results will dynamically change every time you select a different query from the search suggestions list. Do note that there's no need to press Enter for this to happen

When you're comfortable with the search results you're seeing, press Enter. You will see a tiny arrow pointer next to the first search result.

You can navigate the search results by moving the pointer with Up Arrow and Down Arrow on your keyboard.

A pointer at a search result means that particular result is currently selected. To get an idea of what the web page looks like for that result, press Right Arrow. This brings up Instant Preview to the right of the search result.

Instant Preview continues to remain open while you press Up Arrow or Down Arrow. This lets you see what the web page for the previous or next search result looks like.

To hide Instant Preview, press Escape or Left Arrow. I prefer Left Arrow.

To open a web page for the currently-selected result, with or without Instant Preview visible, press Enter to open the web page in the current browser window. Press command+Enter (Ctrl+Enter in Windows) to open the web page in a new browser tab. I always open a result in a new browser tab whenever there are multiple web pages I want to take a closer look at.

When you're at the last search result (there can only be ten results per page), hitting the Down Arrow one more time places the pointer at Next. To go to the next page of results, press Enter (command+Enter, or Ctrl+Enter in Windows, to open the next page of results in a new browser tab).

To change your search query or enter a new one, just press any other key on your keyboard (there are a few you can't use such as the Spacebar, comma (') and quote (") keys). Doing this immediately puts your cursor in the search box, adds a space and the character you just typed after that. Alternatively, you can hit delete (Backspace in Windows) to immediately delete the last character from the query.

I've not had a single regret since subscribing to The New Yorker Magazine for the iPad.

The outstanding writing, plus the beautiful illustrations and graphics in there, makes me glad I ditched my Newsweek and Forbes subscriptions.

Dan Bricklin, creator of Note Taker HD, gives an excellent demo of the app on YouTube.

Starting at 7:46, Dan shows how an IRS Form W-4 PDF can be viewed in Mobile Safari, opened in Note Taker HD and filled out using a pen tool of the type and format of your choice.

AppleInsider:

Now, users who own an iOS device or a computer from any manufacturer can obtain a credit for the fair market value of that device, calculated by PowerOn, a third party company Apple contract with to run the reuse program.

While recycling old products dismantles them and harvests valuable components such as metal, plastic and glass for recycled use in new products, reuse is an even greener option, as it extends the useful life of products that have value in the second hand market.

Apple's recycling program is especially useful to owners who are unable to sell their damaged Apple devices, PC desktop, laptop and notebook computers.

The USB port on Android devices is a huge benefit that allows apps such DSLR Controller to directly control a Canon digital SLR camera via a special USB host cable (also known as USB On-The-Go / OTG cable).

A similar solution, DSLR Camera Remote by onOne Software, exists for the iOS platform but requires that the camera be tethered to a computer.