Archive for category Software
My Commonly Used Mac OS X Applications
A colleague of mine recently got a MacBook Pro and asked me what some of my favorite Mac applications are. Having made the transition from a Windows PC to a Mac a few years back, I distinctly remember all the trial and error I went through in learning about the Mac and finding apps on a new platform. This question also brought a perfect opportunity for a new blog post!
So without further ado, these are some of my most used applications for Mac OS X 10.6, ignoring built in Apple apps:
- 1Password – password manager
- Adium – universal im client
- AppCleaner – mac app uninstaller
- BetterTouchTool – better customization for multitouch input devices
- BetterZip – zip utility
- Chrome – net browser
- FaceTime – webcam chat
- gfxCardStatus – graphics status
- Growl – notifications, must have!
- iStatMenus – system stats
- LittleSnapper – screenshots
- Notational Velocity – note taker
- OmniDiskSweeper – check disk space usage
- PathFinder – file browser replacement
- Perian – video codecs
- PhoneView – download/archive iphone files
- Pixelmator – photoshop replacement
- Pomodoro – productivity timer
- Secrets – configure secret options
- Skype – voip/chat
- Steam – pc/mac gaming
- svnX – mac client for subversion
- Tagr – id3 editor for media files
- TextWrangler – text editor
- Things – task management
- Transmission – torrent
- TrueCrypt – encrypt files
- VirtualBox – virtual machine
- VLC – media player
- Xcode – mac development
Apple apps that I use most often are:
- iCal
- iPhoto
- iTunes
- Remote Desktop
- Terminal
- Time Machine
And applications that I use every once in a while depending on the task at hand.
- Boxee – media front end
- Carbon Copy Cloner – disk imaging backup
- Cyberduck – ftp client
- ExifTool – photo metadata editor
- Firefox – browser for net development
- GeekTool – display stats on the desktop
- Hugin – panorama maker
- iStumbler – wifi browser
- kdiff3 – diff
- Office for Mac – word proecessing
- Remote Desktop – microsoft rdp viewer
TextWrangler with Subversion on Mac
Amazing what you’d find if you read the manual!
Even though TextWrangler is a window-based editor for the Mac, it comes with this useful terminal command: edit. Executing this command loads TextWrangler from the command line.
How is this useful for a window-based environment like the Mac? Well just recently I was configuring my Subversion environment on my Mac and wanted to use TextWrangler for my comment editing needs. Using the edit command, making this configuration is as simple as loading up the config file (by default in ~/.subversion/config) and changing the editor-cmd entry to:
editor-cmd = edit -w –resume
-w blocks the edit command from returning until the file is closed in TextWrangler.
–resume will restore the last top-most app before TextWrangler launched. In this case, the Terminal window.
Now every time I checkin, the svn command will automatically launch TextWrangler with the comment file for me to fill out!
Vista SP2: Now with more free space!
Just did the Vista SP2 upgrade on one of my PC’s and, just like the rumors, got some extra hard drive space back. Neat!
Before
After
Here’s to hoping Windows 7 will at least keep the same size!
Skype on iPhone
My initial reactions to using Skype on the iPhone:
- The sound quality is about the same as using the AT&T 3G network. Not as clear as Skype is on the desktop. Better than using Skype through Fring. I was hoping for desktop sound quality, but oh well.
- Not being able to run programs in the background, Skype will only work when the program is activated. Therefore it can’t work as an alternate phone line.
- Chat is saved on the Skype server. If you lookup your chat history on your desktop Skype, the chat through the iPhone will be there as well.
- There’s no shortcuts for smileys on iPhone Skype. You’ll just have to remember the shortcuts to use your favorite emoticons.
- There’s no sound effect to notify you of new chat messages. You’ll just have to look at the screen to see the chat count. This isn’t so bad since you have to keep Skype open anyways to chat, but kind of annoying this behavior forces you to check your screen every few seconds if you’re engaged in a chat with a buddy.
Oh well, not bad for version 1. Hopefully with iPhone 3.0 and updates, Skype on iPhone will become even better soon!
Deleting a Stubborn File
During the past week, I was consolidating a bunch of files from my smaller external drives onto a new, larger drive (more on this in a future post!). The new drive is formatted as HFS+ (Mac) while the smaller drives are formatted as NTFS (Windows). I didn’t pay attention to the copying, just dragged and dropped from the source (NTFS) to the destination (HFS+).
While going through the files on the new drive, I noticed some duplicate files. Even though the new drive is much larger, of course I still want to save space! Weird thing is trying to delete these files: Finder would ask for my password (sudo?), and afterwards do something, but the file remains… it refused to be deleted!
Perplexed, I thought it might have been a permissions problem:
But as you can see, I am the owner and I have the permissions.
Wondering if it has something to do with Finder, I dropped into Terminal and tried to delete the file manually:
OK, Operation not permitted… perhaps I need to be a super user?
Gah.. still no luck. 
So getting frustrated now, I started browsing around to find some answers. Not finding anything and finally about to give up thinking there’s some NTFS -> HFS+ or file system error, I just happened to look up and noticed the icon for the parent folder has a small… padlock?
Going up a level, and looking at the info for the parent folder revealed that the folder was Locked.
So I unchecked this and BAM, I was able to delete the file now. So turns out the “Locked” folder causes anything inside to become read-only. Besides being a nub and not knowing about the locked feature, I was assuming the behavior would be similar to Windows. In Windows, a “Read-only” file/folder can still be modified by just accepting an extra message box. In OS X with Finder, anything locked is seriously “locked” making everything read-only until it is “unlocked”.
Some more noob info about the Locked feature in Finder:
- Contents of a locked folder cannot be modified. This means nothing can be added, modified, or deleted. Right clicking the contents of the folder shows a different set of options.
- Corollary to the previous rule, contents of a locked folder cannot be moved to another folder. Contents can only be copied. Using the CMD key while dragging will not force a move.
- Locked Folder A with Folder B inside. Any files/folders inside Folder B are excluded from the locked rules. That is they can be modified without any restrictions.
So if you are having trouble deleting a file in Mac OS X, try checking if the folder is Locked! Don’t make the same nub mistake as I did. 
SQL Server 2008 with Visual Studio 2008
The current release of SQL Server 2008 will not work/install if you have Visual Studio 2008 installed. For those who are planning to try this, do not install SQL 2008 with Visual Studio 2008 on the same machine until a patch is released!
I tried installing the MSDN version of SQL Server 2008 today and went as far as the Installation Rules screen. Here, setup refused to continue because I had an “old” version of Visual Studio 2008 installed.
I say “old” because at this time, there’s only Visual Studio 2008 RTM which is what I have installed. SP1 is in beta at the time of this post.
As you can see above, setup will not let me continue (Next button is disabled) until I fix this problem. So I went ahead and downloaded and installed SP1 Beta for Visual Studio 2008. The deceptively small download (450KB) took an hour to download and install.
Oh well, it took an hour, but finally I’ll be able to continue with my setup, right? After installing SP1 Beta, I clicked the “Re-run” button in SQL setup. Nope, no good. The same error kept showing up. I clicked Back and Next to try to refresh the scan. Still no good. Finally I just cancelled the setup and restarted it. Doing that will cause you to have to redo everything in SQL setup. Even though that’s a pain, what’s worst is when I came to this screen, it still failed!
Great. Well that was a complete waste of 4 hours of my time! So, for those thinking of doing this setup, you have been warned!
EDIT: Looks like someone @ MS has noticed this problem and has posted some notes about it. Also a KB article. Now for the waiting game on when things go RTM. Sigh… yet another MS “release” when it’s not really complete.
EDIT: By uninstalling Visual Studio 2008, I was able to install SQL 2008. However, the reason why I wanted to install SQL 2008 in the first place was to try out the new developer features. Kind of beats the point. Oh well.
Using MSN for Adium Offline
If all your MSN friends keep telling you that you appear offline even though Adium shows you online, it might be because your MSN account is by default logging in “Appear Offline”.
I encountered this problem and no matter what I tried my friends still said I appeared offline.
To fix this problem, find a Windows machine and change how you login to be “Online”. Now when you log into Adium, you won’t login offline anymore.
How to setup up an IT infrastructure from scratch
Working at a startup, you literally start with nothing. NOTHING! The full effect of “nothing-ness” doesn’t hit you until you sit down and start to plan out what you’ll need. Since I’m the tech guy, this post will focus on the technical side of starting up a company. If you’re here looking for information on operations, well… better find another blog.
Once you realize you have nothing, that’s when when you realize how much work the IT department of a company does to setup an IT infrastructure. Luckily if this is something you’re interested in, as I am, then it’s also quite fun to pick and choose your new toys.
So what kind of IT resources does a start up need? Let’s see…
- Web Server
- Email Server
- File Server
- Backup Resources
- Test Servers
- Production Servers
- Network Services
- Hosting Services
- Networking Equipment.
- Source Control System
- Issue Tracking System
- Workstations
- Laptops
- Wireless Communication
Of course whether you need all these resources depends on your company. For my start up, we definitely needed all of these. Technology is so essential in any modern-day business, you’ll most likely need at least one or two of these items no matter what kind of company you’re starting.
Now that you have a list of technologies you’ll need, it’s time to take the next step: cut as much as you can! Yep, you read that right. Since a start up starts with very limited funds, you’ll need to do your best to save on everything. Thus it’s crucial that you save, scrimp, clip, do whatever it takes to get by with the bare minimum, even with technology. Ideally, you want to save as much as you can now, while also picking the right technology that will allow you to easily scale down the road. Stay tuned as that will be the topic of the next post. 
Firefox 3
Just installed Firefox 3 and so far I’m impressed. I opened up a bunch of tabs (28 to be exact) right away just to test out the speed and memory usage. I’m glad to say all the tabs loaded really quick and used about ~100mb of RAM. Not too shabby!
Only one addon that I regularly use didn’t make it past the upgrade: CTC. That’s not too bad and hopefully an update will be on the way.
One thing I noticed with FF3 for Windows is that it will hijack your default browser. Um.. where’s my dialog box that disables this? I thought we were over this browser-war-hijack-default-browser-stuff? FF3 for Mac doesn’t have this problem. Whoever created the Windows installer needs to be fired (that is if he’s being paid)!
All in all, my first impression of FF3 is that it’s a great upgrade for everyone who uses Firefox. Too bad the Windows version is marred by the setup faux pas. Remember to download your copy today to help Mozilla’s attempt at the world record!
EDIT: Just downloaded FF3 again and noticed a default checkbox that would let me disable default functionality. Much better!
Learning on the web
Posted by eric in Commentary, Software on June 26, 2008
Being an on-off amateur photographer, one of the first things I installed on my MacBook Pro was Aperture. Since I’m new to Aperture, I decided to check out the tutorials link.
Clicking the link opened up my browser and navigated me to the Aperture Tutorial website with numerous videos about 1 to 3 minutes long. After watching a couple of videos, I realized how easy it is to learn from this website.
Now I’ve seen many webcast/video tutorials before, especially Microsoft ones. What makes the Apple one different, and better than the Microsoft ones?
The tutorial website is really well designed. True to Apple’s design, there is no clutter on the website and it is clear where you go and how to select videos to watch. Compare this with Microsoft’s Office website:
Seriously, how long will it take you to find the tutorials link on that page? There’s even advertisements on the Office homepage!
Another important factor to easy web learning is short and to the point videos. There is no marketing fluff in Apple’s tutorial videos. When you click on a video, you know exactly what you are watching. Each video shows you what the feature is and how to perform it and quickly ends.
Once again, let’s compare to Microsoft’s Office website. After 20-30 seconds of hunting, I finally find the Training link. From there I click on the “Popular” link showing a video on “SharePoint document libraries”. Now being on a Mac, I don’t have Windows Media Player to play the video, but just looking at that page with the “20-30 minutes” timer makes me want to close the browser. This is actually pretty good for a Microsoft video as normally Microsoft videos that I’ve watched in the past are over an hour long minimum!
Why are long videos useless? First of all, everyone is busy so no one has the time nor the patience to sit through an hour-long lecture. Second, long videos are long typically because it’s jam packed with lots of information. Thus it’s really easy to get overwhelmed and forget most of what was discussed in the video.
Another nice feature of Apple’s tutorial website is this:
Since there are numerous videos, Apple’s website helps you keep track of videos you have seen, have not seen. Wow, nice touch! These check marks even persist after you close the browser (through cookie’s I’m assuming). Come back to the website a few days later and you’ll see your check marks still there! Good luck trying to remember which videos you’ve seen/not seen on Microsoft’s website.
I used to dread watching video tutorials based on bad past experiences. Apple’s Aperture tutorial website has completely changed my perception. Now, I rather enjoy watching Apple’s video clip tutorials: I don’t have to waste time finding the videos and I get to control how much time I want to spend. And if i decide to take a break and come back the next day, I won’t have to waste time watching the same videos because I forgot I had already watched them!
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