iWatermark

If your looking for a way to convert a bunch of images to use numeric format, such as 1.jpg, 2.jpg, 3.jpg etc.. You should look at iWaterMark by Script Software.

iWatermark has lots of cool functionality, but I just discovered the renaming functionality. This is great for testing images in applications where you don't want to type in long names. Also useful for renaming lots of files downloaded from the internet.

Apple Releases 10.5.2

On February 11, 2008, Apple released a patch to Mac OS X 10.5, the latest patch brings the OS X to 10.5.2. According to the release notes, this fixes many problems/functionality issues reported by users. Including issues that I have encountered with 10.5:

• Airport not connecting to WEP access points
• Dock Folders not using the listing method
• Menubar not being transparent

I am still having issues with accessing WEP access points. This first happened when I went to visit PayPal in November and wasn't able to connect to their network. It made training a little difficult, but I was able to get things done by using a cable. I don't have any problems connecting to an existing network prior to the upgrade, or to a network that doesn't require WEP authentication.

I am now having problems getting my Powerbook to sleep. The problem has to do with "The IOUSBFamily was not able to enumerate a device." I had a USB flash drive, but ejected it prior to putting it to sleep. The computer doesn't goto sleep when I close the computer lid.

Given the problem that other users are reporting, I assume that Apple will probably be releasing another patch soon. It would be great to get the Airport problem fixed.

InDesign Character Styles

The following are the default Character styles that I have in my Indesign install on my laptop. This is a useful list if you are looking for various BODY and HEADLINE styles for your projects.

Less is more

I just notice that I have 92 items in my Application folder on my Powerbook. Wow!! That's a lot of applications to manage. Which got me thinking, is that really worth my time to navigate between all these items?

Yes, having less is more. That is: Less applications means an increase in productivity. For example, learning more about Photoshop will allow me to simplify having multiple graphic applications. Sure iWaterMark, Thumbscrew, Picturesque all do some cool things, but wouldn't it be easier to learn just one application and not have to think about which application to use.

If you are looking for a good source for Macintosh Applications, I suggest looking at iusethis.com. Signup and list your favorite applications and see what others are using. Just for fun, check out what the most popular FTP application is on the Macintosh, the answer may surprise you!

Here's a list of items in my Applications folder:

Acquisition, Address Book, Adium, Adobe Acrobat 7.0 Standard, Adobe Bridge, Adobe Help Center, Adobe InDesign CS2, Adobe Photoshop CS2, Adobe Stock Photos, AOL Instant Messenger (SM) xFFFD, AppleScript, Aqua Data Studio, Art Directors Toolkit 4, Automator, Backup, BBEdit, Calculator, Can Combine Icons, Chicken of the VNC, Citrix ICA Client, CleanArchiver, ColdFusion8, CSSEdit, Dashboard, Delicious Library, DEVONthink Pro, Dictionary, DiscLabel, Disco, DVD Player, eclipse, epson, EPSON Printer Utility, EPSON Scan, Evaluating, Expos, FileInfo, Firefox, Flip4Mac, Font Book, Front Row, Game Room, GraphicConverter, iCal, iChat, Image Capture, iMovie HD, Interarchy, Internet Graphics, iPhoto, iSync, iTunes, iWeb, iWork '06, Journler, KeyCue, Mail, Microsoft AutoUpdate, Microsoft Office 2004, Not Using, OmniGraffle, OmniGraffle Professional, OmniOutliner, OpenTerminalHere, Paparazzi!, Pixadex, Preview, QuickTime Player, RDC Menu, RealPlayer, Remote Desktop Connection, Safari, Scrivener, sidenote, SmartSVN, Snapz Pro X, Spaces, SQLGrinder, Stickies, StuffIt 11, System Preferences, Test Apps, TextEdit, TextMate, Time Machine, Toast 7 Titanium, Transmit, Utilities, Virtual PC, VisualHub

Interarchy 9

Yesterday Nolobe release Interarchy 9, the first major release of Interarchy since 2006.

I have been using Interarchy since 2001, version 4, and my inital reaction is that this looks to be an awesome upgrade.

I really like the new look and feel, it looks like a regular Finder winder. The Path Bar is great way to navigate back, and the side bar is very similar to what Transmit is using.

I am still playing around with it, but it looks like an awesome upgrade! I would highly recomend you download a trial version.

Textmate Guide

This is a handy guide that I use as my sidenote reference to help me remember some common comands that I use in TextMate.

Some people might find it useful. Others might want to create their own reference guide. I would encourage you to design your own quick reference guide to help you learn all the techniques of Textmate.

I used OmniGraffle Professional to add the background image and header. Click on the above image to see the "Full Size" version.

JDBC and Markdown

One of the disadvantages of upgrading any Operating System is that some applications may have to be updated. Most of these updates are likely paid updates. This isn’t good considering that I am short on cash right now.

As far as I know there’s three applications that I have, that should be releasing a paid update fairly soon:

1. Textmate
2. Interarchy
3. SQLGrinder

I am considering changing the SQLGrinder Application. As much as I like using it, it does seem to be missing lots of tools and doesn’t quiet feel like its an enterprise application. For example, its not easy to manage multiple databases like you can with Aqua Studio.

On a Macintosh, if your using JDBC connections for development, you are probably be using:

1. Aqua Data Studio
2. SQLGrinder
3. SQL4X Manager J

I am just learning Markdown with TextMate, and its a great way to do write blogs without having to use some complex tool. If your doing custom blogging tool and looking for an application to do clean HTML markups, I would suggest looking into implementing Markdown.

AirPort problems in Leopard

I was at a customer site earlier this week and was having problems connecting to their wireless network using a Powerbook G4 and Macintosh OS X 10.5 ( Leopard)

When I was trying to connect I was getting time out error almost instantly. As soon as I type in the WEP Password, which was a 128-bit encrypted password, I would get the timeout error.

The following message appeared in the console log:

November 6, 2007 11:18:38 AM SystemUIServer[204] Error joining SITE: Connection timeout (-6 timeout connecting)

I tried this several times and gave up. I check several Apple sites and it appears this is still a problem. I did an update to the Apple Keychain before I went to the customer site, which I think was supposed it fix the problem.

Guess what, it didn't. If your experiencing the same problem, don't bother to keep trying. There's several several postings on Apple Discussion Boards about this. I think the problem is how Apple handles 128-bit encrypt passwords.

I ended up having to connect via an Ethernet cable.

Macintosh Leopard

Last Saturday I updated my laptop to the latest version of Macintosh OS X (Leopard). The update took a long time to process, about 2 hours for my Powerbook G4 and it used up a lot of disk space.

My inital reaction of some of the new features have been mixed. Some of the new features are cool, while others I won't touch. The "Time Machine" feature is ok, but a laptop doesn't have that much disk space, so I don't think I'll be using it. (I think it would have been cool to name it "Back to the Future", after all the Movie did show a Macintosh in it.) The only cool feature that I was looking forward to seeing was Fan/Grid display of folders in the Dock. I am not very impress by it. It would be nice if that the Grid icons could be resize.

Also I am now experimenting putting the dock on the left instead of the bottom. I don't like the 3D look and I think the dock is taking up more space than it was before. Having it on the left is a little visual challenge since I am use to it being on the bottom for 4 years.

I do like the new Photo screen saver, it looks pretty cool. I was looking to see what new screen saver was in this build since Apple has done that in the previous OSX builds.

Is this a must have upgrade? I don't think so. I think most users can wait and upgrade when they can afford to or have it pre-installed on their next computer. Goto an Apple Store and play around with it, ask one of the sales people to show you some of the new features.

MonoDevelop

If you are a Macintosh developer and working in a development environment where some developers use dotNet, you should look at using the MonoDevelop. MonoDevelop is a free GNOME IDE primarily designed for C# and other .NET languages.

Keep in mind this is a complex toolset and will take some learning curve to get up and running. But I think if you are a serious developer, you can easily master the toolset over a weekend.

Using MonoDevelop will be significantly faster than Remote Desktop and in some cases using Parallel or Boot Camp. This is because you don't have to open up a separate OS enviroment to create C# or .NET code.

WebLog

Experiencing some problems with the Blogging tool. Will conduct some cleaning this weekend to get things back up and running.

I don't think its anything too serious!

Apple Keyboard

I got the new Apple Keyboard yesterday at the Apple store at the Natick Collections. Its great because the store is within walking distance from where I work. In some cases, its easier to park where I work and walk over to the store than to park at the Mall.

The keyboard is great, very quiet to type on and has a nice look and feel to it. I am using it as my primary keyboard with my Powerbook G4. I have my Powerbook on a Targus Podium Coolpad and attach the keyboard to one of the USB ports on my laptop.

I was using the MacAlley IceKey Keyboard for many months, it works pretty well, but the Apple Keyboard is cooler looking and has a modern design to it. Nothing wrong with the MacAlley keyboard, I'll probably take it home and use it on my home computer.

One of the disappointing features of the Apple Keyboard is that doesn't hold enough power to charge an iPod. This is supposed to be a USB2 keyboard, but when I connect the iPod it says that there's not enough power to charge the iPod. I know I have a USB2 port on my laptop because I can connect the iPod directly to the laptop.

The software update did fix the ability to power an iPod that is connected to the keyboard. The Apple Keyboard software update is 19.4 MB! Wow! What's in the software update? Also this is the first piece of Apple hardware that I purchased that didn't come with the software. Which is a good idea since most people would just download the latest software online anyways.

Apple System Profile Confirms this isn't a USB2 Keyboard:

Apple Keyboard:Version: 0.67
Bus Power (mA): 100
Speed: Up to 1.5 Mb/sec
Manufacturer: Apple, Inc
Product ID: 0x0220
Vendor ID: 0x05ac (Apple Computer, Inc.)

The keyboard has a 1 meter cable attached which is a perfect length for me. In the box there's a cable extender which doubles the cord length. So if you need a longer cable you could attach the extender. The MacAlley IceKey has a long cable which is pretty annoying.

March 14, 2014 Update: If your looking at any Targus products you should first visit the official Targus Coupon page for outstanding deals.

MacOSX Database Clients

If you are evaluating on what Database client application to use on Mac OS X. Here's some things to consider between SQL Grinder and Aqua Data Studio.

One nice advantage that SQLGrinder has over Aqua Data Studio is that it can keep the SQL color syntax between applications.

So if I have a SQL Query and copy it to Word/TextEdit/Pages the color syntax stays the same. Aqua Studio just copies the text unformated.

SQLGrinder handles Oracle connections better than Aqua Studio. Not sure the reason, but I am unable to make connections to Oracle using Aqua Studio. I believe that JDBC connections are managed better in SQLGrinder

I did have SQL4X Manager, but the version I have is old. (Purchased July 18, 2004) At some point I plan to test the latest version.

Update BBEdit?

I am thinking this week of updating my BBEdit to the latest version 8.7 from 8.2. The upgrade only cost $30.

Since migrating to Textmate last year, I have been using Textmate for all my initial web development. Textmate is an awesome application and I would highly recommend it! However there some features in BBEdit that are pretty cool and worth keeping , here are some examples:

• If I open up multiple documents from an FTP application, such as Interarchy, BBEdit opens one window and puts all the selected files in a Drawer, which makes it easy to move around files. Thus making it easy when editing multiple files.
• The color syntax seems to be better in BBEdit than Textmate, the color tones are easier to read.
• After many years of using BBEdit I am very familiar with all the keyboard shortcuts.

The question is are the new features in BBEdit worth the upgrade? My initial reaction is that there isn't any must-have feature that I should upgrade for. So, for now I'll just use BBEdit 8.2 and Textmate 1.5.6.

To simplify matters, I have two FTP clients in my dock. When I want to use BBEdit, I use Panic's Transmit, when I want to use Textmate I use Interarchy. I think Interarchy and Textmate combination works really well.

I will be checking into Coda, the new application from Panic, which is supposed to be the latest and greatest FTP/Editor tool all in one.

Mouse-in-a-Box

I use the Kensington #72123 Mouse-in-a-Box as my computer mouse on my Powerbook computer every day. At home I use Logitech MX518 Gaming Optical Mouse. The Logitech is a great mouse, just seems a little "over powering" at times.

What amazes me is how simplifies the Kensington mouse is compared to the Logitech mouse. I really don't need a fancy mouse to perform simple tasks, clicking, right-clicking and scrolling. The Kensington mouse performs the task very well and a good mouse to have.

I purchase Apple's Wireless Mighty Mouse when it first came out, thinking it would be cool to have a wireless mouse. Today, the mouse is sitting on a shelf on my desk at home. Why? Well I had some problems with the mouse loosing the Bluetooth signal even thou it was inches away from the computer. I do bring it with me on business trips but very rarely do I use it.

This got me thinking about Apple's new iPhone that is going to be release this week. Sure its cool, got the latest technology, awesome graphics, and probably the best sound in wireless phones. But, is that something I really need? Am I better of just using a simplified solution? Earlier this year I got the LG VX8300 phone, and signed up with Verizon for 2 years. So I won't be jumping ship just yet to get the iPhone. However, I'll be checking out the phone the next time I goto the Apple Store.

In the meantime, if your looking for a good mouse, goto eBay and pickup a Kensington #72123 Mouse-in-a-Box. Currently you can get one for around $25.