Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Free & Quick Image Resize in Windows XP
Image Resizer from Windows XP Power Toys collection is quick and dirty tool to resize many common image files. It's also Free :), and we like Free.Labels: Image Resize, Power Toys, Windows XP
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posted by Edward at 4:04 PM
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Google Maps - My Location without GPS
via Gizmodo, Google Maps Mobile just added a new beta feature to display your current location on phones without GPS capabilities. It uses that fancy cell-tower-triangulation-thingofmajiggie you see on cop shows all the time. I wonder why this wasn't available before?
Labels: Gadgets, Google Maps
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posted by Edward at 12:40 PM
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Lightspeed 2.5 Released for Leopard
Lightspeed 2.5, the excellent Mac POS System from XSilva, was just released todat. The latest version brings full Leopard compatibility as well as some new features such as, Cover Flow and iPhone support to view vital store information.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Mac Apps, Point of Sale, POS
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posted by Edward at 11:59 AM
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Tuesday, November 27, 2007
BuinessWeek: Sorry, Steve: Here's Why Apple Stores Won't Work
via DaringFireball / John Siracusa, Doh!Labels: Apple, BusinessWeek
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posted by Edward at 4:30 PM
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Leopard complaints
It seems that a lot of people are complaining about Leopard. Personally I've had pretty good luck with it. I wonder if some of these issues are actually hardware related or a configuration problem rather than a Leopard issue.My advice as always, backup backup backup. And double check that your backup works.
Update: I take it back, I do have complaints about Leopard. The Leopard Firewall is a pain. It's nice to hide advanced details from the average user, but advanced users should be allowed to see exactly what's going on. TidBits got it right, Leopard's Firewall Blackbox is a PITA.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Bugs, Complaints, Firewall
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posted by Edward at 3:46 PM
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Leopard Perfect 10?
Here's a long detailed review of Mac OS X Leopard from Info World.Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Review
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posted by Edward at 2:17 PM
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Double Boil Hard Drive Fix
Sounds somewhat remotely plausible... temporarily repairing a clicking hard drive just long enough to recover the data by double boiling it... It's really crazy, but might just work. I do have a dead clicking drive...Labels: clicking hard drive, dead drive, hard drive
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posted by Edward at 12:23 AM
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Monday, November 26, 2007
Security Issue with Leopard Mail
via Daring Fireball, A security issue with opening malicious attachments in Leopard Mail has been reported by Heise Security.The usual precautions remain, be careful opening attachments from unknown sources...
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Mail, Security
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posted by Edward at 6:43 PM
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Monday, November 19, 2007
Disable Transparent Menu Bar in Leopard
via Daring Fireball, MacOSXHints.com has a post about how to disable / adjust transparency for OS X Leopards menu bar:Run: sudo defaults write /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.WindowServer 'EnvironmentVariables' -dict 'CI_NO_BACKGROUND_IMAGE' 1
Then restart.
You can also enter values between 0 and 1.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, defaults, Menu Bar, Transparent
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posted by Edward at 11:45 AM
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Thursday, November 15, 2007
NTFS for OS X
via Uneasy Silence, Paragon Software Group has great solution if you need Read / Write access to a NTFS drive from your Mac:Paragon NTFS for Mac
Labels: Apple Mac OS X, NTFS on Mac
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posted by Edward at 3:06 PM
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New set of Leopard Stacks Icons from Optica Optima
More Stack Icons from Optica Optima can be found here. Temporary download site here.Also a blank PNG version is available for you to create your own icons.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Stack Icons, Stacks
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posted by Edward at 2:43 PM
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Leopard 10.5.1 Update Released
The 10.5.1 Update is recommended for all users running Mac OS X Leopard and includes general operating system fixes that enhance the stability, compatibility and security of your Mac.
I'd suggest waiting for some more reports about the new update before installing 10.5.1.
Labels: 10.5.1, Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Software Update
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posted by Edward at 2:24 PM
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Apple still shows Tiger users some love
So Leopard roared since the past few weeks, but that doesn't mean Apple's forgotten Tiger. If you haven't upgraded to Leopard and still run on Tiger, fire up Software Update and find 10.4.11 ready to be served. Aside from several security fixes, this update also includes goodies such as Safari 3.Labels: Apple, Mac, Software Update, tiger
posted by eugene at 12:31 AM
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Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Leopard outsells Vista in Japan
via Ars Technica, Business Computer News reports that Leopard outsold Vista in October.Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Japan, Microsoft Windows Vista
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posted by Edward at 7:52 PM
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Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Tech: Remote Desktop Connection client for Mac Beta 2
A new beta for the Mac version of Remote Desktop Connection client was released Oct. 31. Windows RDC is very useful and has always performed pretty well both on a LAN and over the internet. Beta 2 adds various bug fixes as well as the ability to open multiple sessions at the same time.If you have Windows machines you need to manage remotely, check it out.
Labels: Apple Mac OS X, Microsoft RDC, Remote Desktop Connection
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posted by Edward at 3:05 PM
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Sunday, November 11, 2007
Tech: Leopard Stacks Icons
Optica Optima created some really nice icons for Leopard's Dock Stacks. The icons are named beginning with a space so that they will stay "on top" of the stack and be used as the stack icon in the Dock.
If you decide to sort your stacks by 'date/time' then you will need to adjust the time stamp on the icon file to the future:
Adjusting time stamp for the Downloads folder icon
cd ~/Downloads
touch -mt 202001010101.01 " Downloads "
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Icons, Stacks
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posted by Edward at 10:38 PM
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Saturday, November 10, 2007
Enhance Leopard's "Guest" account
One of the new features of Leopard is Guest Account. Doesn't sound too fancy, but it's actually rather useful. It allows setting up a Guest account on the system where access is restricted and all of its files deleted after logging out. To a home user, it's great to enable it for friends and relatives who want to play with your Mac. To a business, it's a wonderful way to let your customers access your Mac temporarily. Here's a tutorial-like link to show you how to customize this feature even more.
posted by eugene at 1:48 PM
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Tech: Combining Multipart DMG files
If you have a series of multipart .dmg files you want to combine, all you need is OS X's built in Disk Utility; in fact there is no need to 'combine' the image files at all. Just make sure all your .dmg and .dmgpart files are in the same folder, then you can perform your standard 'burn' or 'restore' functions on the .dmg file. The .dmgpart segments will be automatically incorporated.Alternatively you can use C-Command's DropDMG to combine or burn your images.
Labels: .dmgpart, Apple Mac OS X, Disk Utility, Segmented DMG
posted by Edward at 12:23 PM
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Friday, November 09, 2007
Article: iTunes + iPod Monopoly!?
via DarinaFireball.net: MacUser rips apart ZDNet blogger Adrian Kingsley-Hughes' ridiculous claim that "The iPod/iTunes link IS monopolistic."Labels: iPod, iTunes, Monopoly
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posted by Edward at 2:02 PM
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Tech: Time Machine vs Airport Disks
RoughlyDrafted.com discusses why the current Time Machine release doesn't support backup to Airport Disks anymore. Hopefully, this will be addressed in future updates.Labels: Airport Disk, Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Time Machine
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posted by Edward at 12:14 PM
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Tech: iChat Star Wars Hologram effect
TUAW has a post about getting the Star Wars Hologram effect back into iChat. You basically install the hologram effect from the Leopard developer previews into /Library/Compositions .Labels: Hologram Effect, iChat, Star Wars
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posted by Edward at 2:15 AM
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Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Tech: Quicksilver now Open Source!
TUAW.com reports that Quicksilver is now open source. If you haven't tried Quicksilver before, I highly recommend trying it out. Quicksilver is basically does what Spotlight does, but better.I primarily use Quicksilver to launch programs, but the extremely flexible plugin system and huge list of plugins provide tons of extra feature to Quicksilver. You assign a hotkey to Quicksilver, and after that it allows you to launch a multitude of tasks from just a few key strokes.
MacRumors has a nice guide to the intricacies of using Quicksilver.
Labels: Apple Mac OS X, Free software, Mac Apps, Open Source, Quicksilver
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posted by Edward at 5:38 PM
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Tech: Leopard Trojan / Phishing fix
Last week the net was swamped with reports of a new Mac malware, the OSX.RSPlug.A Trojan Horse. Macworld has a detailed report on what it does and how to remove it.From MacWorld:
- In the Finder, navigate to /Library -> Internet Plug-Ins, and delete the file named plugins.settings. Empty the trash. This deletes the tool that sets the rogue DNS Server information.
- In Terminal, type sudo crontab -r and provide your admin password when asked. This deletes the root cron job that checks the DNS Server settings. You can prove it worked by typing sudo crontab -l; you should see the message “crontab: no crontab for root.”
- Open your Network System Preferences panel, go to the DNS Server box, and copy the entries you can see to a Stickies note, TextEdit document, or memorize them. Now retype those same values in the box, then click Apply.
- Reboot your Mac.
Bottom line is to follow typical 'safe computing' guidelines...
As always, the best way to avoid these things is to not install software from untrusted sources—especially if it comes as an installer package and requests your administrator’s password! But if you do get infected, at least you’ll know how to confirm you have an issue, and remove the troublesome software.
Labels: Apple Mac OS X, Malware, Security, Trojan Horse
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posted by Edward at 11:01 AM
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Tech: OS X move bug
Be careful when you are 'moving' files to external or network drives. The following article demonstrates a particularly nasty bug if you lose connection to the destination drive during a move operation. File that were in the process of being moved will be lost.Until Apple fixes this, you should copy your files and then manually delete the source instead of using the 'move' command in the Finder.
Labels: Apple Mac OS X, Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Bug, Finder
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posted by Edward at 10:17 AM
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Leopard tamed!
My previous experiences with upgrading Mac OS X have always been positive: insert CD (or DVD), restart, click upgrade, watch TV, done. This time of upgrading to Leopard, however, proved to a challenge.The Leopard DVD comes as a dual-layer format, and that seems to cause confusion to my MacBook. The first time I inserted it, the MacBook spitted it back out. A fluke, I'd thought. Tried again, heard some unusual disc spinning noises, but eventually it read the DVD. Clicked install and restart, went through the early installation steps (picked a language, install destination, etc.), then as the process went half-way, the dreaded "Installation Failed" warning popped up. I tried a couple more times, even choosing the risky "Erase and Install" option, but that didn't help. Instead I ended up with an erased drive and no operating system. Not good.
Thankfully we have another Mac at home, and I was finally able to install Leopard on my MacBook by starting it in Target Disk mode connected to the other Mac. Now I've spent hours trying to set it up with various missing applications and such. I'm finally at a point where I can productively use the laptop again.
I was glad that I'd done a backup just last week and was able to retrieve some needed documents. Also found my Parallels virtual machine image of Windows XP and restored it. Hint: Backup just stores the data as a DMG file which you can mount and browse.
Also FYI, my DVD drive specs are:
MATSHITA CD-RW CW-8221:
Firmware Revision: GA0H
Interconnect: ATAPI
Burn Support: Yes (Apple Shipping Drive)
Cache: 2048 KB
Reads DVD: Yes
CD-Write: -R, -RW
Write Strategies: CD-TAO, CD-SAO, CD-Raw
Media: Insert media and refresh to show available burn speeds
Labels: Apple, DVD, install, leopard, Target Mode
posted by eugene at 3:37 AM
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Friday, November 02, 2007
Tech: Change Leopard Login Background
I found that the new Leopard login background to be a little annoying. Replace this file with an image that you want, and you'll get a new login background:/System/Library/CoreServices/DefualtDesktop.jpg
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Login Background, Login Image, Login window
posted by Edward at 2:01 AM
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Tech: Apple Mail 3.0
Apple Mail has a neat new feature that hides all the nitty gritty stuff about setting up an e-mail account. Now all you need to do is enter your e-mail address and password, after that Mail takes care of everything.
Sounds cool, and it works quite well. However, it still may get things wrong. For example for GMail accounts it defaults to POP access, but GMail now support IMAP as well. The trick is to hold down the Option key when you click on the "plus" sign to add a new account. This creates a new mail account without using the Add Account helper, and let's you enter all the settings manually.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Gmail, Mail.app
posted by Edward at 1:08 AM
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Thursday, November 01, 2007
Tech: Leopard update_prebinding
If you're getting these error messages in Leopard you need to run update_prebinding:Nov 1 23:21:16 Macintosh com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.dyld): Throttling respawn: Will start in 60 seconds
Nov 1 23:22:16 Macintosh com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.dyld): Throttling respawn: Will start in 60 seconds
Nov 1 23:23:16 Macintosh com.apple.launchd[1] (com.apple.dyld): Throttling respawn: Will start in 60 seconds
Run the following in Terminal and then reboot:
update_prebinding -force -root /
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, com.apple.dyld, Error, updae prebinding
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posted by Edward at 10:25 PM
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Tech: Leopard Airport issues
A lot of people are having issues using Airport after upgrading / installing Leopard. I ran into the same issue as well. My problem was resolved by manually setting the Airport MTU to 1492.For some reason my ISP's implementation of PPPoE requires me to manually set the MTU on all the systems in my network. I had a script that did this automatically every time I switched to my "Home" location. This of course broke after the upgrade. I decided to try my luck and see if the proper MTU's would be automatically detected and set, so I didn't bother to set it manually.
It turns out that without the right MTU set, I could not join the Airport network at all. "Connection failed" would be reported in the Airport preferences, and the following appeared in the system log:
Nov 1 22:02:45 Macintosh airportd[225]: Error: Apple80211Associate() failed -3Nov 1 22:02:45 Macintosh Apple80211Agent[195]: Error: airportd MIG failed = -3 ((null)) (port
= 27139)Nov 1 22:02:45 Macintosh Apple80211Agent[195]: Error joining XXXXX: Connection failed (-3 resul
t unavailable)
Setting the MTU manually fixed this issue immediately.
sudo ifconfig en1 mtu 1492
Labels: Apple Airport Extreme., Apple Mac OSX Leopard, MTU, PPPoE
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posted by Edward at 9:29 PM
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Tech: Leopard Login & Keychain Update 1.0
If you're having issues with your keychains on your upgraded Leopard system, check Software Update for the Login & Keychain Update 1.0.Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Software Update
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posted by Edward at 9:27 PM
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Tech: Leopard Security Features
Matasano.com has a nice write up about the various security features in Leopard. Along with the various improvements are also some flaws in the implementation. I suspect some of the flaws are due to 'time constraints' of meeting the release schedule and will be addresses in future patches.When talking about the new "Address Space Randomization" feature in Leopard Ptacek mentions:
This feature removes a talking point argument about Microsoft Windows Vista’s superior security, but it doesn’t address the underlying point of that argument. Cocoa programs running in Darwin are less secure than Win32 programs running under NTOSKRNL, and aren’t even in the same ballpark as Managed C++ or C# programs.
I wonder if that's true, Vista having superior security. Perhaps there's a side-by-side comparison somewhere.
Labels: Apple Mac OSX Leopard, Security, Windows Vista
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posted by Edward at 9:45 AM
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News: iPhone going to Germany Nov. 9th
See the Google translated German Apple Store page...
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posted by Edward at 9:17 AM
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