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My initial thoughts on Intel and Apple…

Macworld logoI wrote a weblog entry for Macworld covering my initial reactions to the announcement, as well as some thoughts as to what it might mean for the future. I've heard it called Macintel, but that seems to easy to me. Since it will have "Intel inside," I prefer Mintelac [min•tel•ak], since that's literally Intel inside Mac.

In short, I'm definitely excited about the potential, but quite scared about the transition ... you can read why in the full entry over at macworld.com.

[Note: I've disabled the comments for this article, as editorials such as this one are now actually part of my job for Macworld -- hence, I'd like any follow-up conversation to appear on Macworld, not here. Don't worry, my blog's not going away, and I'll still try to post here regularly. But there will be posts such as this, where the topic I wish to discuss is very closely aligned with my job, that will appear on my Macworld weblog instead -- I will always include a pointer to such articles here, though.]



Ten things I know about golf

When I have some free time (ha!), I enjoy playing golf. Despite the fact that I'm really not that good at it, I find it both relaxing and challenging. After a recent round, I was thinking about the sport, and came up with the following list of observations (and don't worry, this isn't turning into a sports blog; I've got a long writeup on Butler in the works! This was just top-of-mind last night...).

  1. If there's one spot on the fairway you don't want to be, that's where you'll find your drive.
  2. Golf balls have a strange magnetic attraction for water.
  3. Though it may appear the putt breaks left (right), it actually breaks right (left).
  4. If your irons (woods) are working really well today, your woods (irons) are not.
  5. If your score on the front nine is five shots better (worse) than your typical round, your score on the back nine will be at least five shots worse (better) than your typical round.
  6. If you consistently hit your 9-iron 150 yards, and you need to hit it at least 140 to carry the lake, you will hit it 139 yards.
  7. Trees may be 90% air, but your ball will hit that single, tiny, skinny branch sticking out roughly 99.5% of the time.
  8. When the Golf Gods force you to use five shots on a short 175 yard par three hole, then immediately let you use only three shots on the very next 440 yard par four, thou shalt not question the Golf Gods decision making process.
  9. The hardest shot in golf is your opening tee shot on a busy Sunday morning at the local course, where the crowded outdoor patio at the restaurant overlooks the first tee.
  10. If you ever stop to really consider what it takes to even make contact with a golf ball, you'll probably never hit one straight again.

Despite all this, I still find the game fun to play ... though I'm not sure why!



Free iTunes songs from Audi!

A3 PictureThe car in the picture is Audi's new A3, which just launched here in the USA. I was browsing Audi's site last night, looking for some info, when I stumbled onto a pretty cool promo ... Audi USA is offering this deal, but not for much longer:

Test drive an A3, and get 33 free iTunes songs!

This promo ends today, so if you've got any free time and a local Audi dealer (I have both today, luckily), it might be worth a lunchtime test drive. Just fill out the form, print the email you'll receive, then visit the dealer. I'm don't think I'm all that interested in the car, but heck, test driving new cars is always fun. Throw in $32.67 worth of free music, and I think it'll be worth the 45 minutes of sales pitch from the rep. Who knows, maybe I'll like the car, too! :)

Sorry for the short notice, but I just found out about this promo last night.



Multi-button mice are great timesavers

mouse picOne of the first things I tell new Mac users is to ditch the one-button mouse that Apple provides. Sure, it's simple and easy to use, but it also has limited power and you end up using way too many keyboard modifiers to get things done. There are lots and lots of multi-button mice out there, and all of them work (to at least some degree) with OS X: the second mouse button is functional by default, and will bring up the contextual menu -- that's the menu you normally reach with a control-click.

But for the most productive computing experience, find yourself a mouse that comes with OS X drivers, so that you can program all of the buttons. Logitech makes a full line of OS X-compatible mice, as do Kensington (wired, mobile) and Microsoft (check compatibility for each device; some are PC only). But this isn't a post about which mouse to use (I've chosen the Wireless Intellimouse Explorer, used for the icon in this story), but more a discussion on how to best put all those buttons to use once you have a multi-button mouse. So I thought I'd share my configuration, and ask what others might be using...

The Intellimouse Explorer has five buttons (two main buttons, a scroll wheel button, and two buttons under the thumb) plus a scroll wheel with "tilt" side-to-side scrolling. Here's how I have the five buttons set up:

  • Left button: Click
  • Right button: Control-click
  • Scroll wheel button: Dashboard (F12)
  • Top thumb button: Exposé all-windows mode (F9)
  • Bottom thumb button: Activate DejaMenu. If you haven't seen this handy little program, it's a huge timesaver. It puts any program's menubar one keyboard combo away -- no mousing required. I just assigned its keyboard combo to the thumb button, and presto, menus wherever I want them.

So that's how I have my mouse set up. I find it a huge timesaver, especially the thumb button tied to DejaMenu. No more wasted time moving to the top left to grab File when it's a simple mouse click away. In general, I love the mouse and I've gotten very used to how I've got it set up.

The one thing I find lacking in the Microsoft software is that you can't assign custom commands to modified button clicks -- i.e. I'd love to be able to assign Command-Option-button 4 to something other than the button 4 default. I think this should be possible, given that OS X can read command- and control-clicks, but Microsoft's software doesn't allow it.

Anyone else have any interesting configurations, and/or mouse recommendations?



Click [and click and click …] to install

Tiger boxIn comparison to other platforms, installing software on OS X is a breeze. Usually, you just drag and drop the program from the disk image to its destination, and you're done. Even some complex programs can be a snap to install -- Office 2004, for instance, has its installer hidden in its code, and it's smart enough to run the first time you launch any Office app. So even though it installs stuff to a bunch of places, it's transparent to the user.

The third option is Apple's installer, which helps guide the user through the software installation process. The installer is the ideal solution for programs that need to install things in many spots, and require administrative access to do so. And while using the installer is still a very simple process, I still find it a frustrating process at times.

As an example, consider my recent installation of a new version of Snapz Pro X, the indispensible screen capture tool. Please note that this is not intended to be a slam on Apple's installer or Snapz Pro X (which I rely on every day!). Rather, it's just an example of how the process can be a bit frustrating and confusing, along with a couple of suggested improvements.

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My favorite browser

Tiger boxQuite a few people seem interested in knowing which browser is "my favorite." I wish I had a simple answer for that question, but as of now, there's not just one. Before I get to my favorite browser(s), the macosxhints site has done some tracking of browser usage via the occasional poll. I've run a total of five polls regarding favored browsers since I launched the site. Below are the results for each, showing the top three in each poll, along with the percentage share for the winner.

  • Feb 2001: OmniWeb (41%), Internet Explorer, iCab. Note that the site was *very* young at this point, and the results were skewed as most of the readers were early OS X adaptors -- hence we all used the only (and best!) native browser of the day.
  • Jul 2002: Internet Explorer (40%), Mozilla, OmniWeb. The site has grown some now, and more typical users are visiting. IE takes the lead.
  • Feb 2003: Safari (59%), Chimera (nee Camino), Internet Explorer. Safari shipped in January, and by early February, it already had nearly 60% of the Hints readership.
  • Feb 2004: Safari (82%), Mozilla, Camino. Total dominance now. IE has vanished, with less than 2% reporting they use it.
  • Oct 2004: Safari (65%), Firefox, Camino. Firefox has emerged and made a pretty serious dent in Safari's domination (Firefox garnered 18% of the votes, which is basically what Safari lost from the prior poll). IE has dropped to 0.9% usage.

I should probably run another shortly; it's been over six months, and it would be interesting to see if Firefox has eaten away at more of Safari's lead. So enough of the history lesson ... which browser is my favorite?

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Should Apple applications be movable?

Tiger boxA quick entry tonight, just because the subject came up recently in this hint regarding iSync. In particular, the hint (and comments) note that iSync will fail if the application is moved into a directory whose name contains spaces. I had added an editor's aside about moving apps in OS X, and my personal belief that it's a Bad Thing to do. As noted in the second comment, it's not necessarily an issue with using applications -- they'll (more than likely) run fine from most any location. Instead, it's an issue with Apple's updaters failing if the application they update isn't in the usual spot.

Although it's my philosophy not to move Apple's applications around in OS X, that doesn't mean I'm happy about it. I have multiple partitions on my drive (partition vs. don't partition; that's a subject for another day!), and have one set up particularly for all my applications and utilities (called Apps). I put everything on that partition -- it makes it easier, for instance, to erase and install OS X if I have the need. As of result, the only things you'll find in my boot drive's Applications and Utilities folders are Apple's programs, along with anything that just won't run if it's located elsewhere (Tony Hawk Pro Skater 4, for instance, fails if it's not in /Applications). Everything else lives on my Apps partition. As much as I'd love to move Apple's stuff out of there, after reading about the issues people have had with upgraded applications not working, I've decided to just let sleeping Mail applications lie.

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How [not] to upgrade to Mail in 10.4

Update:

Thank you, Andy Warwick! I'm leaving the following article online, just so I remind myself how much time I wasted on this. However, the comment from Andy (#9 in the chain) pointed me to what I was doing wrong. So for anyone who hasn't imported their email yet, the trick to using the Mail for OS X import function is this: simply point it to your old user's Library/Mail folder, no deeper.

I still think Apple's language could have been clearer (see my #10 comment), but I retract the other nasty things I said about the import routine. When pointed at the correct folder (I just tested it), it worked like a charm. Good job, Mail team. Now how about making the import screen read simply "Please navigate to the previous Mail folder"?

This is a follow-up to my The Art and Science of OS X System Upgrades article. I'm (still) in the process of upgrading my main drive, having just finished migrating my email archives last night. Why did it take so long? User stupidity plus, in my opinion, some poor functionality in 10.4's Mail import routines.

As noted in the earlier article, I had chosen to do an upgrade install on my main drive, but to not automatically copy over my user's folder (due to all the cruft in it). It was this decision that ended up costing me many hours of email migration labor. Why, you might ask, did it take so long?

After I got 10.4 up and running, before doing much of anything else, I launched Mail and set up my two primary accounts, just so I could keep up with email while doing the rest of my work. Mail may have asked me about importing old email when I first launched it, but I don't think it did -- my ~/Library/Mail folder was empty, since I hadn't moved the old Mail folders over. Apparently if you allow the user information to migrate, Mail will automatically import your old Mail messages. Ah, I should be so lucky...

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The hidden Comcast higher-speed option

comcast logoOur home internet connection is from Comcast, and overall, I'd say I'm a reasonably satisfied customer -- I've had a few outages, and a flakey modem that had to be replaced, but they've always been prompt and courteous when dealing with these issues. But this post isn't really about their capabilities as an ISP, it's about their marketing (or lack thereof).

A couple months back, I heard that Comcast had a faster package available. Now cable modems aren't slow to begin with, but there's always a desire for more speed, so I was intrigued and went net searching. I probably should have started at Google, or just called Comcast, but I didn't. Instead, I tried our account page on Comcast.net, but came up blank. Next, I tried the Products page from the corporate homepage. No luck there either. I even tried entering our zip code, address, etc., but could find no reference to this purported faster package on the ordering screen. For what should be an easy sale to existing customers, Comcast was making this information very hard to find.

I finally found it, after much clicking, by tracing a convoluted series of links from the FAQs page. In an FAQ discussing available speeds, it states:

Comcast High-Speed Internet Service + $10 Add-on for Speed
$10 Add-on for Speed delivers you a 100% Pure Broadband experience. Super blazing fast speeds (6Mbps downstream and 768Kbps upstream) will help you fly through the Web's most graphic-heavy sites.

Finally! This was the info I was looking for -- for only $10 more a month (about 23% more money), download speed increases by 50% (4Mbps to 6Mbps). Even better for me, as I do a lot of this, upload speed increases by 100% (384Kbps to 768Kbps). Since I rely heavily on my connection, this added investment was a no-brainer for me.

This package is officially called the '$10 Add-on for Speed,' which is what you need to know to order it. So if you have Comcast, and want some additional speed for a bit more money, it might be worth a phone call -- unless you're in the Portland area, then don't upgrade, as I want all the bandwidth for myself! :)



The “joy” of travel in the digital age

Note: This post originally appeared on my friend Kirk McElhearn's blog, Kirkville, back in January, as I didn't have a blog site at that point. I wrote it shortly after returning from the Macworld show in San Francisco, as I was amazed at the amount of stuff I had to take for such a short and simple trip! I'm reproducing it here just so it becomes part of the archives...

wire jumbleLast week [January, 2005], I had the pleasure of speaking about Mac OS X (one of my favorite subjects) at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco (thanks to everyone who came to my sessions!). Since I live in Portland, Oregon, I had to pack for a plane trip to the 'big city.' That's when the fun began...

Traveling has become a much more complex endeavor than it used to be. A decade ago, packing for a three-day business trip would require nothing more than insuring that you had sufficient clothes in your bag, the required personal care items, and perhaps your address book and maybe even a calculator. But that was about it.

Packing today, especially if you're giving a presentation, is a whole different ballgame, as you can see in the image at right (larger version)

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