A couple weeks ago, I showed you a sneak preview of one of the most surprising iPhone games ever, Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Gunner, which combines seemingly traditional space combat with augmented reality (AR) for a decidedly unique "Star Wars" experience.

As I said then, "It's like the PC classic 'TIE Fighter' mixed with the ingenious UFO on Tape mixed with the Layar Reality Browser."

But would the AR gimmick work? Or would the entire game feel like some weird novelty? Well, Falcon Gunner just hit the App Store, so I'm ready to give you an answer.

Falcon Gunner is priced at $4.99 and compatible with only the iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, and iPod Touch 4G. It casts you as none other than Luke Skywalker and plops you in the Millennium Falcon's gunner turret.

To control the turret, you rotate and tilt your iPhone while aiming your quad laser with an onscreen joystick. It's not easy, and in fact I had better luck leaving the joystick alone and just maneuvering enemies into the target reticle.

Without the AR component, Falcon Gunner looks and plays like a traditional arcade-style shooter, the action unfolding near the Death Star, asteroid fields, Star Destroyers, and so on. John Williams' classic soundtrack underscores the battles, along with some hokey voice-overs that, quite frankly, sound nothing like Harrison Ford or Carrie Fisher. Quite frankly, it's all a little bland. Been there, blasted that.

Enable AR, however, and the outer-space backdrops disappear, replaced by real-time images from your camera lens. At the same time, the compass or gyroscope kicks in, meaning you now steer your turret by steering yourself. It sounds weird and looks even weirder, but trust me: it's really, really cool.

So what you do is plop yourself in an office chair, making sure you've got room for full 360-degree spins, then start blasting. (You could always stand in place, too, but you literally might make yourself so dizzy as to fall down.) I'm as surprised as anyone, but TIE-fighter combat with your own real-world backdrop is just crazy fun.

Will the novelty wear off after a few weeks? Probably, but at least the game keeps you coming back by awarding credits you can use to mod the Falcon with extra weapons and shields. (Alternately, you can buy upgrades if you don't have the patience to earn them.) If only THQ would build multiplayer into this thing, then you'd have a game for the ages.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Back in April, Yahoo Mobile announced a unique approach to searching for nearby restaurants with the Sketch-A-Search app for iOS. The concept of the app couldn't be more simple: pull up a map of the area that you're currently in, and then sketch a circle (or any approximation of a shape) around the neighborhoods or blocks of streets where you'd like to eat. Sketch-A-Search then drops in pins to indicate the restaurants that fall within the designated space. Clicking the pins pulls up information on each establishment, including the phone number, operation hours, and Yahoo user reviews.

Today, Yahoo announced a welcome update to Sketch-A-Search. Version 1.5 brings in partnerships with both Zagat and OpenTable, so you not only get more in-depth reviews, but also the ability to reserve tables directly within the app. According to Yahoo, the team has also worked to improve the quality of the data to ensure that the user receives the freshest local information possible--good news for those who complained that the previous version contained out-of-date info and out-of-business restaurants.

Sketch-A-Search 1.5 is free and is now available in iTunes. There are separate apps for the iPad and the iPhone/iPod Touch.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Editors' note: This article originally stated in error that ClearContext Professional was released this week. The content below has been updated to correct this mistake.

As evidenced by this article on NudgeMail, e-mail organization is of personal interest to me--and I know I'm not the only inbox control freak structured individual in existence. Certainly, ClearContext was counting on that when it developed ClearContext Professional, a plug-in for Microsoft Outlook.

The goal of ClearContext Professional is to help you stay in control of your inbox by providing organizational tools and rules for e-mails, tasks, appointments, and projects. Adding it to Outlook tweaks the interface to accommodate the variety of features designed to streamline your processes and save time. Noticeable changes include the addition of a taskbar at the top of the screen as well as an optional dashboard module on the right side. The app also automatically analyzes your e-mail to determine VIP contacts and then highlights those in red; messages from other known contacts are denoted with a green box.

The taskbar is where you can find all of the features that ClearContext Professional offers. Choose to automatically file unimportant messages (from unknown contacts); instantly file messages or strings of messages with one click; quickly turn e-mails into tasks or appointments; unsubscribe from unwanted conversations (such as those you've been CC'ed on); defer e-mails with one click; and view all past conversations with a contact within a single message window. The dashboard provides a terminal for viewing the scope of your workday, and serves to organize projects.

Certainly, several of these additions are useful. I'm quite fond of the ability to view a truncated list of all past e-mails between a contact and myself in the bottom of any open message window with that contact (quicker and easier than Outlook's own "see related" feature). However, most finicky Outlook users who already have a pretty decent filtering system in place will be more thrown off by the add on than assisted. There's so much new going on that rather than making things feel streamlined, the app just seems like more clutter.

That said, for those who are just starting out with Outlook in a work setting, ClearContext could come in handy for initial setup and organization--especially for those who want to get all adjustments out of the way in the beginning. Plus, there's not much of a learning curve, so it should be easy as pie for newbies to catch on. However, the $90 purchase price is more than a bit steep. The good news is that you can check it out for 30 days before committing.

Mozilla, maker of the Firefox Web browser, saw its 2009 revenue increase 34 percent from $78 million the year before to $104 million.

The organization's source of money continues to be from search partnerships, it said in its 2009 annual report, released today. The top billing goes to Google, no doubt, though Mozilla didn't break out a specific percentage and instead lumped the search giant's revenue in with Yahoo, Yandex, Amazon, and eBay.

Mozilla's contract with Google, renewed in 2008 and running through 2011, returns a portion of Google search-ad revenue to the browser maker. Mozilla drives search traffic to Google through its built-in search box. And though Google now has its own Chrome browser to promote, Mozilla indicated it's happy with the financial idea in general.

"We believe that search providers will remain a solid generator of revenue for Mozilla for the foreseeable future," Mozilla said in a FAQ.

Expenses--employees and computer equipment, mostly--also increased, from $49 million in 2009 to $61 million in 2009. Mozilla, though isn't a business (read about its tanglings with the Internal Revenue Service in the auditor's report PDF), but rather an organization with a mission: "Mozilla exists to build individual empowerment, control, and opportunity into the fabric of the Internet," Chairman Mitchell Baker said. She added this assessment:

Mozilla is the underdog in our efforts to build participation and empowerment into the Internet. It's a big challenge to build our values into layers of the Internet where the commercial giants of our age are battling it out. Mozilla has always faced this kind of challenge. We started in an era when everyone "knew" our goals were impossible because Microsoft was invincible. Today, Mozilla is stronger than ever. Our opportunity to bring openness and choice to new aspects of the online experience is unprecedented.

More specifically, Mozilla said there are now more than 400 million Firefox users, 140 million of them daily, and that it's expanding with initiatives such as mobile Firefox.

Originally posted at Deep Tech

Apple has released a couple of updates for Safari that address a few stability and performance issues with the program, as well as increase the accuracy and relevance of the Top Sites results and Address autofill information.

The updates are between 29MB and 53MB, depending on the system you are using, and are available for Snow Leopard, Leopard, and Windows if you are using version Safari 5, and if you are using Tiger then an update is available for Safari 4.

Safari 5.0.3 (OS X 10.5.8 or later)

Safari 4.1.3 (OS X 10.4.11)

The update specifically mentions that the following items are addressed:

1. More-accurate Top Hit results in the address field
2. More-accurate results in Top Sites
3. Fixes an issue that could cause content delivered with the Flash 10.1 plug-in to overlap Web page content
4. More reliable pop-up blocking
5. Improved stability when typing into search and text input fields on Netflix and Facebook
6. Improved stability when using JavaScript-intensive extensions
7. Improved stability when using VoiceOver with Safari

Installing the new version of Safari will replace a number of items in the WebKit engine that is used not only by Safari, but also by Mail, the Help Viewer, and other applications that render HTML and JavaScript. As with all updates, this may result in issues with programs that use WebKit so be prepared to clear caches, preference files, and cookies if Web sites start behaving oddly after updating.

Be sure you fully back up your system either by cloning it or using Time Machine so it can be restored if there is an issue with the update. You will be required to restart your computer for the update to take effect.

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Questions? Comments? Have a fix? Post them below or e-mail us!
Be sure to check us out on Twitter and the CNET Mac forums.

Originally posted at MacFixIt

BlackBerry-maker RIM has just promoted its free BlackBerry Traffic app from beta status to a general software release. Now that its available in the BlackBerry App World beginning today, BlackBerry Traffic could threaten competitors like Waze.

BlackBerry Traffic is a driving tool that estimates the real-time distance between you and your destination. The app sources a combination of historical traffic patterns and real-time data taken from other BlackBerry Traffic users in the area. Like competitor Waze, which also crowd-sources its traffic details, BlackBerry Traffic displays travel times, alternate routes, and incident reports. There's a sharing feature so you can send your ETA ahead, using SMS, e-mail, or the BlackBerry PIN. BlackBerry Traffic also adds an element of location-based advertising by offering deals along your route.

Setup is straightforward. You can add your location manually from your address book, and it's easy to search for and add other places using the built-in Bing search engine. Though clear enough to read, the app is rather text-heavy.

There are other reasons it's not quite ready to leave Waze (in beta) or even the Google Maps traffic layer in the dust. Waze, which is completely based on user data, has many more social interaction elements and a much more appealing design. Google Maps' integrated traffic layer may not have as many standalone features, but it's got a more natural fit inside the app.

In addition to a standalone version, we'd also like to see BlackBerry Traffic as an option within BlackBerry Maps, especially when it comes to sharing favorite places between the two. We'd also prefer a failover location-fixing mechanism so you can estimate your ETA before exiting a building that may block your GPS signal.

BlackBerry Traffic is currently available in the U.S. and Canada on GPS-enabled BlackBerry smartphones running OS 4.6 and above. The software is the fruit of a Bay Area-based mapping team that RIM acquired in 2009.

Article updatedat 12:20pm PT with more details.

Originally posted at Dialed In

Microsoft has released a seventh test version of Internet Explorer 9 the company says is better at "real-world" Web-based JavaScript programs. But with it has come a rival's accusation that Microsoft essentially engaged in the storied computer industry practice of benchmark engineering--designing technology to be fast on an artificial speed test.

The seventh IE9 platform preview comes with new improvements to its Chakra JavaScript engine. And Microsoft asserted Chakra is engineered to do better on actual Web site tasks rather than narrow benchmarks.

"Over the last few weeks, we've been tuning the JavaScript engine for more of the patterns we've found in real-world sites. Based on the progress since the last platform preview, we're releasing an updated platform preview build," said Dean Hachamovitch, Microsoft's IE general manager, in a blog post yesterday.

The company has been creating a range of Web applications to let people test all the browsers that figure in today's fierce competition. And with the new version, Microsoft signaled its growing impatience with one test of JavaScript, the SunSpider benchmark--both with how basic its tests are and how limited it is compared to the full range of browser performance challenges.

"Microbenchmarks and real-world Web patterns have little in common," Hachamovitch said. "We think people should evaluate browser performance with real-world scenarios. Real-world scenarios involve using all the subsystems in the browser together rather than looking at single subsystems in isolation...real-world Web sites use JavaScript to respond to user input, manipulate strings, and move objects around the screen, and much more."

Microsoft has griped about oversimplified browser benchmarks before, but that didn't stopped it from prominently publishing results that now show it faster than Google's Chrome, Opera Software's Opera, Mozilla's Firefox, and Apple's Safari.

But also this week, Mozilla took issue with one aspect of IE and JavaScript: "dead code elimination."

This idea involves scrutinizing software before it runs and eliminating parts that are mere busywork--flawed code programmers don't always realize they use. One aspect of SunSpider, a test called math-cordic, "is written exactly in a way that triggers this general optimization," Hachamovitch said.

One objection came from Mozilla JavaScript engineer Rob Sayre, who filed an IE9 bug that led to Hachamovitch's explanation. Sayre, though, wasn't satisfied by that explanation, he indicated in a blog post.

His analysis showed that IE9 is using dead-code elimination for some tasks involving a number of mathematical operators. "Curiously, the IE9 team has chosen not to eliminate more expensive operations such as multiplication or division. The set of analyzed operators do happen to be the ones that appear in the math-cordic benchmark," Sayre said.

Then came his damning conclusion, essentially that Microsoft had tuned Chakra just for a good SunSpider result.

"I don't think it's possible to consider IE9's implementation of dead code elimination to be a serious general-purpose optimization. It seems clear that it hasn't been tested on anything other than SunSpider," Sayre said.

Added Mike Shaver, Mozilla's vice president of engineering, in a tweet, "Disappointed in it's based on real-world' DCE [dead code elimination] nonsense from MSFT; wish they'd just admitted starting with SS [SunSpider] benchmark and making mistakes." And he offered a challenge: "Treasure hunt: find a pattern in any site on the internet that is eliminated by the #IE9 DCE, other than math-cordic!"

Benchmark engineering is an ages-old practice in the computer industry. For example, with prominent server database test, TPC-C, server makers would attach absurdly large numbers of hard drives in an effort to achieve high scores. The design represent real-world constraints customers faced.

Alternatives to SunSpider exist--for example, Google's V8 benchmark and Mozilla's new Kraken. But even those are narrow tests that don't exercise many aspects of browser performance such as page-loading speed, graphics, and user interface responsiveness.

The situation frustrates Chris Wilson, who for years worked on IE but recently joined Google to become Web platform advocate and developer at Google.

Wilson "would rather see collaboration across vendors and developers on suite of tests that span DOM [the document object model interface browsers use to interact with Web pages] as well as pure JS [JavaScript]," he said in a tweet. He added that he prefer people "back away" from a single numeric JavaScript benchmark score as a performance claim, "frankly, because it has little to do with real-world user performance."

Originally posted at Deep Tech