Type of Article: MacNews News Article

Maintain has announced Cocktail 10.3.4 (Sierra Edition), the latest maintenance update for users running macOS Sierra.

Cocktail is a general purpose utility for macOS that lets users clean, repair and optimize their Macs. This version adds ability to show heat map in Year view in Calendar and ability to disable checking for updates for connected devices in iTunes. It also fixes some compatibility issues with System Integrity Protection and adds macOS Sierra 10.12.5 compatibility.

FreeFileSync (https://www.freefilesync.org) has rolled out version 9.1 of its free open source file synchronization utility for macOS, Windows and Linux, and macOS. The new version supports synchronization via FTP (File Transfer Protocol) and the encrypted variant FTPS (SSL/TLS).

This enhances FreeFileSync’s capabilities to not only work with local drives and network shares but also synchronize mobile and cloud storage. On the Mac platform, it works with macOS 10.7 or higher.

ABBYY (www.abbyy.com) has launched a cloud-based web client for ABBYY Business Card Reader. The web version gives mobile users access to their digitized contacts on a computer, in addition to a smartphone, tablet and Apple Watch.

BCR Web makes working with long contact lists comfortable and efficient, while the mobile app digitalizes business cards in 25 languages, enables users to search, sort and group their contacts, exchange digital cards and export them to Excel and Salesforce, according to Ivan Bodyagin, vice president, Head of Text Recognition Products at ABBYY.

HDRsoft (www.HDRsoft.com) has revved Photomatix Pro to version 6. It’s the latest version of their Mac compatible software app that helps photography pros and enthusiasts create HDR (High Dynamic Range) photos in a large range of styles, from realistic to artistic.

Version 6 provides: more style choice for realistic results; more control over color; the ability to blend an original photo with the rendered image, either globally or by using a brush to select specific areas; a new distortion correction tool; and a more intuitive workflow.

Sonnet Technologies has announced the eGFX Breakaway Box (http://tinyurl.com/y73krnlq), a Thunderbolt 3-to-PCI Express (PCIe) expansion chassis with a single slot for connecting any size Thunderbolt-compatible PCIe card, including high-performance graphics (GPU) cards to a Thunderbolt 3-equipped computer.