Apple released Safari 5.0.1 with the support of Safari Extensions. Extensions is available in Safari 5.0 but you have to set it up in order to use it. Safari 5.0.1 also has direct access to the newly launched Safari Extensions Gallery website. Safari Extensions Gallery serves as the central hosting site for third party Safari extensions. With this new release of Safari, installing extensions from the site is just a simple click on the “Install” icon.

Beside the support of extensions, Safari 5.0.1 also plug the Autofill vulnerability which exposes your address book data.

Apple releases bumper crop of products this Tuesday, among them are the iMac and Mac Pro refreshes. Apple Cinema Display has a new 27-inches 16:9 ration model to accompany the new Mac Pro. But attention sure would go to the brand new Apple Magic Trackpad. Apple Magic Trackpad is essentially the multitouch trackpad as found in Apple’s notebook line, made standalone and larger for the desktop. Powered by AA batteries and communicate with the desktop using Bluetooth, Apple Magic Trackpad at $69 replaces the mouse for people who are accustomed to using trackpad. And interestingly, you can now purchase Apple branded AA NiMH battery charger. At $29, Apple Battery Charger comes with six AA NiMH batteries that can last for up to 10 years. Why not make some money and at the same time improve the overall company green effort indicator for industry watchers?

• Apple Magic Trackpad

• Apple Battery Charger

• iMac

• Mac Pro

• Apple Cinema Display

Desktop Safari 4 & 5 has an AutoFill feature which has a default setting turned on for “Using info from my Address Book card”. You can access this setting from Safari>Preferences and click on the AutoFill tab. This AutoFill setting will autofill websites with data from your record in your Mac’s address book, which you might have entered your name, company, address and email address. The problem is this AutoFill feature will auto-complete a website even if you’ve never entered any data on the website before. This opens to exploits by malicious websites, as it is possible for website to obtain your address book data behind the scene without you knowing.

To illustrate the point, Jeremiah Grossman has even developed a proof of concept website where you can see it in action.

We recommend you to uncheck this setting from your Safari preferences for your own protection.

Via Jeremiah Grossman’s Blog

People’s favorite open source media player VLC has a new version 1.1.0 release. Among the notable new features are enhanced HD support, 64-bit for Mac OS X, Google WebM codec and extensions framework allowing scripting via Lua language.

With this release, VLC removes its SHOUTcast functionality due to “license incompatibility”. The release notes has a lengthy explanation on the reasons of the removal. With the built-in extension framework, we supposed it will be just a matter of time before you see a SHOUTcast extension to bring the feature back.

VLC 1.1.0

Apple has released iTunes 9.2 which is a required update for iOS 4. This version will work with the new Homescreen Folder feature in iOS 4 and will allow you to sync PDF documents into iBooks 1.1. (Apple has not released iBooks 1.1 yet, existing iBooks on the App Store is version 1.0.1 for iPad)

Please update your iTunes to 9.2 in order to upgrade your iPhone and iPod touch to iOS 4 which Apple will release on June 21. You need to have iTunes 9.2 ready if you intend to get the new iPhone 4 which runs iOS 4.

Note iTunes 9.2 will update your iTunes Library when you first launched it. It might take iTunes 9.2 a while to process your library, depending on the library size.

Mac OS X 10.6.4 update is now out via the usual Software Update. The update is about 315MB and is recommended for all users running Mac OS X Snow Leopard.

General fixes and improvements

• improves compatibility with some Braille displays
• resolves an issue that causes the keyboard or trackpad to become unresponsive
• resolves an issue that may prevent some Adobe Creative Suite 3 applications from opening
• addresses issues copying, renaming, or deleting files on SMB file servers
• improves reliability of VPN connections
• resolves a playback issue in DVD Player when using Good Quality deinterlacing
• resolves an issue editing photos with iPhoto or Aperture in full screen view
• resolves an issue with Parental Controls Time Limits for Open Directory or Active Directory users
• resolves a display sleep issue with MacBook Pro (Early 2010) computers
• resolves an issue with MacBook Pro (Early 2010) computers in which the right speaker may sound louder than the left speaker
• includes Safari 5.0
• security improvements

Fixes and improvements for Aperture 3

• adds tethered shooting support for additional digital camera models
• addresses IPTC metadata compatibility issues

Fixes and improvements for external devices

• RAW image compatibility for additional digital cameras
• resolves an issue with using third-party USB web cameras
• resolves an issue with noise when using some third-party FireWire audio devices
• resolves pairing issues with Apple remotes

Via Apple Support Document

While everyone is waiting for the hotly anticipated iPhone 4 Pre-Order page on the Apple Store, Apple surprised us all with the launch of refreshed Mac mini.

New in this revision: aluminum unibody design, HDMI-out, SD card reader and a doubling of graphics performance due to NVIDIA GeForce 320M.

Apple Mac mini

Safari 5 comes with extensions support but it appears to be a developer feature at the moment. It is not at all apparent how to enable extensions or install extensions.

Enable Extensions

Before you can manage Safari 5 Extensions, you need to enable it. But first you need to enable the developer menu. Open Safari 5 Preferences and select the “Advanced Tab”. Tick the checkbox “Show Developer menu in menu bar” at the bottom.

Close Safari 5 Preferences and you get a new Developer menu. Select “Enable Extensions” from the Developer menu.

When you open Safari 5 Preferences you should see a new Extensions tab that allows you to manage installed Extensions. The following picture shows two installed extensions. See section follows on how to install extensions.

Installing Extensions

Safari Extension Gallery will only open this summer but there are several extensions already available. You can search the web for Safari extensions or visit this Safari Extensions Tumblog that will tide you over until Apple opens the official gallery.

To install an extension, simply download the extension and open the extension file ends with safariextz. A prompt will appear asking you to confirm the installation.

1. Safari Reader makes it easy to view web article in single, clutter-free page. When Safari detects something it can display with Reader, the right end of address bar will show a “reader” icon. Click on the icon or Shift-Command-R to pop up the Reader.

2. New extension support allows developer to enhance Safari with codes written using HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript. Every extension needs to be signed with an Apple-provided digital certificate which developer can obtain free by joining Safari Developer Program. Apple will open later this summer a gallery for all extensions, making easy for you to look for and download extensions.

3. Safari 5 supports a dozen new HTML5 features including full screen playback and closed captions for HTML5 video, HTML5 Geolocation, HTML5 sectioning elements, HTML5 draggable attribute, HTML5 forms validation, HTML5 Ruby, HTML5 AJAX History, EventSource and WebSocket.

4. Safari 5 on the Mac runs JavaScript 30 percent faster than Safari 4, three percent faster than Chrome 5.0, and over twice as fast as Firefox 3.6.

5. In addition to Google and Yahoo!, Bing is now an option on the search bar.

Press release below.

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VMWare has released Fusion 3.1 which is a minor release that is long sought after. VMWare Fusion 3.0 touted its support for OpenGL graphics when it was launched last year but the performance is underwhelmed. Fusion 3.1 promised to redeem itself with up to 35% improvement in application performance compare with 3.0 release, and up to 5X better 3D graphics performance.

Check out complete list of VMWare Fusion 3.1 new features

VMWare Fusion 3.1 is free for existing Fusion 3 customers, $40 for upgrade from Fusion 1.x and 2.0, and $80 for new purchase.