Times Reader headed to the Mac

The New York Times is bringing its e-reader desktop application to the Mac this month. The newspaper publisher unveiled its latest efforts last night, with a slew of screenshots. The Times' First Look post notes that the application will be running on Microsoft's Silverlight technology, enabling rich-media effects and rendering. Users will be able to read, browse, and search the entire publication while offline.

The big difference between the PC application and the Mac version will be the ability to view pages in three different sizes, all of which have been crunched on the company's servers instead of on people's machines. Mac users will also be able to do a text search with an index of the last seven days' worth of news, while PC users are currently limited to just one day's worth.

PC users will still have the leg up on Mac users for a few features, including Pictures of the Day, which Rob Larson, vice president of digital production for the Times' Web site, says has been quite popular on the PC side.

The company will be offering the new Reader to Mac users free of charge over the "beta" test period. After that, it will assume a similar role to the PC version, which gives access only to people who are current physical subscribers, or who have subscribed to the paper's digital editions. The software is expected to ship in the next two weeks.

Mac users will soon be able to enjoy reading The New York Times while offline with the company's upcoming Reader product.

(Credit: The New York Times)