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Macintosh miscellany

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15:30 / 14.11.06

I would refer m'learned colleague to Merlin Mann on Quicksilver.

15:53 / 14.11.06

What do you like so much about it, cube? Is it a lot more useful than Spotlight?

15:57 / 14.11.06

Heheheheh -- I went to college with Merlin. I was in a band with him.

I married him, actually, in 1997. (To his first wife.)

He's tried with me, he's tried.

I know things about him that could bring this whole productivity empire tumbling down if ever revealed... things about dishes and workspaces. But no, no, no.

He's got dirt on me, too.

I feel like worlds have just collided... how beautiful.

18:01 / 14.11.06

grant, does your machine still shut off or go to sleep while the battery pack and a/c adapter are both connected to your pbook? If so, I would also consider the fact that the power supply and/or power inverter might be also be an issue.

Also, if you don't have a battery pack in your computer, the clock shouldn't reset since the battery on the motherboard should be throwing the minimal amount of power to keep it going.

My 4 year old tibook has had two sets of issues that work against me from time to time but I can usually work around it. I got a newer, higher-capacity battery pack from newer technology, but I can still have problems.

If I have the battery pack in (always) and the a/c adapter hooked up, my backlight will sometimes go out if the battery is fully charged and pulling in outside power. I usually avoid this by keeping the a/c adapter unplugged at full charge and have it plugged in when the battery is low.

The other issue that occurred from time to time was that the battery pack would slowly diminish even if I had the a/c power connected. It would only recharge the battery pack if the machine was shutdown or asleep.

It sucks to have to work on the machine this way and I do believe that it is an issue with the power supply and/or inverter. Since the machine is an old portable, I'm looking to get a new machine instead as the cost to get it back in working order is less cost effective then investing in a better machine.

18:16 / 14.11.06

I *think* the power-off problem was just happening when it was on battery only.

The power adapter is now totally messed up (duct tape and wiggling), and I'm gonna try buying one of the after-market replacements once I can scrape the $40 together to do so (rather than shelling out another $80 for an Apple one).

I may try letting the battery run down and plugging in only for recharge -- I've been working on doing the opposite, lately.

19:46 / 14.11.06

That's what I love about Mr Mann, he's very upfront about the fact that he's constantly struggling to get organised and that's FINE. I mean, look at the hair... but it works. For some reason I had a sneaking suspicion you might know him.
Anyway, what I like about QS is that I do not understand how the MacOS works. I have been a PC geek for 20+ years and although I have a rough understanding of Linux filesystems on PCs, I'm scared to break my Mac by exploring.
So, QS has been a good way for me to sidestep the arcane "Finder" and "Spotlight" and all the rest. All I have to do is hit CTRL&SPACE and the first three letters of pretty much anything I want to find, work with or do and it's right there. F'rinstance, to get here tonight, I hit "Con" and it worked out that from experience I wanted to go to Convo, so it fired up Firefox and opened it. No fiddling with the trackpad, just six keystrokes. Love it.

20:59 / 14.11.06

Once again, someone tempts me to fiddle with it!

21:13 / 14.11.06

Good luck, grant.

Spotlight does the same thing, cube (I assume you have the Convo page bookmarked), but I assume it must do things the built-in software doesn't.
I think I downloaded it when I first went Mac, but stopped using it in favour of Spotlight for some reason. I'll give it another spin.

I've got a slightly odd problem. I've just got an iMac and have it on the same wifi network as my iBook. Mail on both machines is pointed at my Gmail account. The thing is, if both machines are on, they divvy up emails between them. The first one to check grabs it, and the other doesn't take a copy of it's own (which is what I want). Neither are set to delete the mail off the server after retrieval, but only one takes a copy.
I don't understand it. Can anyone explain? And can anyone suggest a way of making both Mailboxes mirror one another without signing up to .Mac and iSynch?

21:28 / 14.11.06

Can we go back a few steps there - can anyone show me how to configure a mail program for the mac that will point to a yahoo webmail account

21:36 / 14.11.06

I can't find specific instructions for Yahoo, but it allows POP access, doesn't it?
If so, I guess you can follow this walkthrough but replace 'gmail' with 'yahoo'.

21:38 / 14.11.06

Ah, shit you need Yahoo! Mail Plus for POP, don't you.

21:45 / 14.11.06

Balls, another problem with my new iMac that's annoying me. Quicktime doesn't want to play any video files; files I can play on the same version of Quicktime on my iBook. (Although, weirdly, in some cases I do get a half second blip of the audio right at the beginning.)
It passes both tests in the troubleshooting page, here, but still no joy.

I'm getting those vague, 'Some necessary Quicktime software is missing' pop-ups, but I haven't got a clue where to start. Is there a standard codec pack I should install?

21:51 / 14.11.06

You could download VLC, a compact and versatile media player that can cope with pretty much anything... (this is not a link to the software, just a wikipedia page about it)

22:01 / 14.11.06

Yeh, I've got that, sleaze. It's not a major problem, I just wondered if its failue indicated that there was some software I'm missing. It's not a biggie though.

05:59 / 15.11.06

Perian is a nice codec pack for Quicktime that you might find useful.

11:54 / 15.11.06

Thanks, Callahad, you're my knight in shining armour.

12:32 / 15.11.06

You could download VLC, a compact and versatile media player that can cope with pretty much anything...

using both VLC and MPlayer for OS X you'll be able to view just about anything. (there have been occasions where I could play video files in only one of them, but it's rare). Personally I find Mplayer easier to use than VLC, but in any case I hardly ever use QuickTime.

13:42 / 15.11.06

Nice one, Brains. Looks good.

14:59 / 15.11.06

I still can't get Mail to work as I want it. Can anyone recommend an alternative client?

16:23 / 15.11.06

I think Merlin still uses Opera (when he doesn't simply get QS to do the sending and checking for him). That's a *think*, not a *know*.

Me, I do everything via webmail, so I just use Safari.

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

17:58 / 15.11.06

Gettin' right down to the real nitty gritty:

What do I need to publish an iCal calendar on a "private Web server"?

I have webspace, but all my attempts end with http://________@______.com/Audio/Entourage.ics is not a valid location for this request (blanks filled in, obviously).

I know I'm using the right domain, the right folder, and the right username and password (confirmed all w/ Cyberduck), so why can't I publish? Do I need some fancypants server software or something?

08:14 / 04.01.07

Now I just KNOW that somewhere out there is a nifty little freeware program that will allow me to convert a quicktime movie to a file format that any generic PC will be able to read (ie to MPEG4 or .wmv) but I just can't find it.

Can anybody point me in the right direction?

08:20 / 04.01.07

There are lots (but I’m probably not best placed to recommend the best amongst them).
Although, you can do it free without software at Zamzar.

08:37 / 04.01.07

thanks! and, um, i just read the quicktime help a little more carefully and realised that quicktime pro will actually let me export my movie in mpeg4 format.

oops. sorry for wasting your time!

20:58 / 15.01.07

my copy of azureus just updated itself, and now there's a weird litle azureus icon hanging out to the left of my bluetooth and wifi icons on the upper right. it doesn't get in the way of anything, but i find it to be a bit against the nice clean aesthetics of os x (it's the only program icon that's ever popped up there). anyone have any clue how to make it go away? (checked the azureus prefs, but couldn't find anything useful). thanks...

21:17 / 15.01.07

sorenson - a bit late, but ffmpegx is ultramighty for any movie needs. Can change pretty much anything to pretty much anything else. Can take the audio from a movie file, can add subs, Whatever. UltimateGood.

junior anti-league - choose the 'Interface' tab in Preferences (click on the word, rather than expanding the menu). There is a box named 'Enable Status Bar Icon [restart required]' (it's the third box down). Uncheck the box and restart Azureus. Presto!

05:11 / 16.01.07

[nerdrot]

I find it funny that sorenson is asking about quicktime codecs.

[/nerdrot]

19:44 / 27.01.07

does anyone have any suggestions for convincing my macbook to continue working with the lid closed? i found a software that apparently enables this in powerbooks, but nothing for the new lappies. any leads appreciated.

23:50 / 27.01.07

Are you trying to drive an external monitor without the lcd activating? You have to plug in a usb device... preferably a keyboard and mouse to get the mac to run with the lid closed.

MattShepherd: I WEDDED KALI!

19:36 / 22.02.07

Any reason DVD+Rs don't work on this machine?

Machine Name: Power Mac G4
Machine Model: PowerMac3,6
CPU Type: PowerPC G4 (2.1)
running 10.4.8

21:02 / 22.02.07

My only guess is that the cd reader is olden and doesn't like the crazy writable dvds that the new kids are bringing up. Written DVDs are notoriously moody on difference readers. To ask the obvious - does it have a DVD reader?

My question: Can anybody reccommend a good personal finances program for OSX? It's about time i sorted out my abysmal finance-tracking abilities. The only caveat is that it has to be free or easily stolen.

10:03 / 24.02.07

Also:

What backup software do people use for their macs? I want a program that i can just point to my external harddrive and tell "backup everything new on my computer, but don't bother with the stuff i have already backed up".

I heard rsync is good for 'nix boxes, but i seem to remember reading that it can't do macs properly...

13:50 / 24.02.07

I use Carbon Copy Cloner to keep a working backup of my system and applications on my secondary internal HD. All the other stuff I backup by hand onto a dedicated external HD. I'm old-fashioned I guess, but making regular backups of my work is very important to me — important enough that I don't want to trust a piece of software to manage it for me.

As a freelancer I'm also looking for a decent but basic accounting program. I'm currently checking out Checkbook.

ONLY NICE THINGS

08:38 / 05.03.07

So - 24-inch iMac. Any good argument against? Configuration tips? This is not for me, but a colleague is thinking of one. I love my PowerBook, and have thus brought the love, but is there a counterview?

10:22 / 05.03.07

If anything, the 24" is too fucking big. 19-20" feels like a natural monitor size for me at the moment, larger than that and you really have to start taking precautions against eye strain, and the whole screen isn't in your central field of vision. It would also require a sizeable (and robust) desk. Take a look at them in the Apple Store and you'll see what I mean.

As far as the actual machine itself goes, I'm very happy with my 20" Core Duo 2, though it does need more USB ports. Two is not enough for a desktop these days.

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