Desktop Manager
June 5th, 2006Ah-ha! multiple desktops for osX. I’ve been looking for this for a while now!
http://desktopmanager.berlios.de/
Desktop Manager 0.5.3 β Mac OS X β VersionTracker
Filed under: WorkstationWrong RAM, must be more mini
April 13th, 2006Oops …
When I got my Mac mini, I determined I could save a few bucks by not getting a RAM upgrade from Apple and, by carefully following the instructions on websites (like these from Macworld) I could upgrade the memory myself. I’m not afraid of the inside of a computer, no.
But I am afraid of the procedure to open up one of these boxes. The case is held together with fifteen plastic clips that DO NOT want to be un-clipped from the inside of the warm, aluminum body. While I understand that, I’m unaccustomed to applying to sensitive and fragile electronic devices such pressure as is necessary to disassemble this computer. So, not wanting to break anything and not wanting to get any extra cat hair inside the little silver box, I left it shut and ordered two 1GB sticks of fast RAM (DDR2-667 MHz PC2-5300) and waited patiently.
Then today it arrived and, as you can probably guess by the title of this post it wasn’t the right stuff. See, I didn’t realize that part of changes necessary to shift to the Intel processor (and add the IR port for the Apple Remote), they changed to notebook-style 200-pin SODIMM memory modules which are significantly smaller than the standard kind I ordered. Yeah, that means what I’ve got won’t fit. Now I guess we see if the place that pricewatch showed as the lowest-cost retailer will play nice or screw me out of 15% restocking fee (read: idiot tax).
And it turns out that the instructions I need to be following are this Intel Mac mini: Take Apart Guide (RAM & HD).
Keep watching this space, I may soon be telling you that the nerd in your life really wants some upgraded RAM, even if he doesn’t know it yet.
Filed under: Computers, WorkstationWhy, again, must you run Windows?
April 7th, 2006I bought a Mac. Droplet. It’s cute.
Two days later, Apple released Boot Camp, software which allows you to use your Mac hardware to boot “other operating systems”.
But of course, the primary example alternative operating is Windows. The reviewer of Personal Technology from The Wall Street Journal. said:
Next, I installed 11 Windows programs that aren’t available for the Mac. These included Microsoft Access, Outlook and Publisher; ACT!; Adobe Photoshop Album; Microsoft Money; Family Tree Maker; Microsoft Flight Simulator; Microsoft Age of Empires; AVG anti-virus; and Spyware Doctor.
Now let’s think about this:
- Microsoft Access
- Microsoft Outlook
- Microsoft Publisher
- Microsoft Money
- Microsoft Flight Simulator
- Microsoft Age of Empires
- ACT!
- Adobe Photoshop album (what is that?)
- Family Tree Maker
- AVG anti-virus
- Spyware Doctor
Of the eleven programs “that aren’t available for the Mac” no less than six are Microsoft’s own products. Fair enough, I wouldn’t try to put Ford parts in a BMW either. There’s Adobe Photoshop Album which, frankly, I’ve never heard of. Then again, I don’t see the need to pay for Photoshop on any platform as The GIMP is free and I am not a professional graphic designer. ACT! is a contact information and schedule manager, and I’m looking into* if that info can be exported to the Address Book and iCal programs that come with the Mac as part of osX. So that brings us to Family Tree Maker. This would be one of those programs that would be a show-stopper for people who have invested a lot of time and effort in something that doesn’t yet run on their preferred platform. Finally there are two “security” programs that don’t run on the Mac because, well, they don’t have to.
So if you haven’t yet found a Mac program to import your Family Tree Maker files, and you haven’t imported your Photoshop files into iPhoto, then you’ll probably find Boot Camp to be really useful. As for me, I’m going to see if I can get my mini to dual-boot into FreeBSD!
* Update: There are versions of ACT! for Mac, and exporting the data so that it can integrate with the osX operating system appears easy
mini mac $499
February 12th, 2006Is this a good deal? Froogle seems to think it is…
Micro Center Online - the center of .computer shopping
Filed under: Computers, WorkstationCUPS = Can’t Usually Print Stuff
December 12th, 2005These are notes on getting CUPS running on my FreeBSD workstation such that I can print to printers on my LAN and create PDF documents.
FreeBSD lappy.corp.com 6.0-STABLE FreeBSD 6.0-STABLE #0: Mon Nov 21 13:05:09 EST 2005 earlax@lappy.corp.com:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC i386
Although I have read ESR’s rant on CUPS, I still find it easier than building my own printcap file. Unfortunately, I always forget something. So, to avoid that next time, here’s another collection of sparse notes without comment — an occasional feature of this site. Don’t do any of this if you don’t know why you’re doing it.
It should be said that some guy named Scott Robbins did us all a favor by scratching out these CUPS gotchas. They cover command-line manipulations as well as Red Hat, Gentoo, NetBSD and FreeBSD specific as well as general CUPS stuff.
I find that I need to install three ports to get CUPS working
- print/cups-base
- print/cups
- print/cups-pdf
The last is not required, but If I am going to send something to someone else, it needs to be in a format I know they can read.
So, after installing those three ports I need to add this to to /etc/rc.conf
cups_enable="YES"
and to /etc/make.conf
CUPS_OVERWRITE_BASE=yes
NO_LPR= yes
then I need to
mv /usr/bin/lp /usr/bin/lp.bak
mv /usr/bin/lpr /usr/bin/lpr.bak
ln -s /usr/local/bin/lp /usr/bin/lp
ln -s /usr/local/bin/lpr /usr/bin/lpr
and
cp /usr/local/etc/rc.d/cups.sh ./usr/local/etc/rc.d/cups.sh
so I can
box# /usr/local/etc/rc.d/cups.sh start
and connect to http://localhost:631 and provide the root username/password to be able to create printers.
To create the PDF printer I use:
- name: pdf
- location: /var/spool/cups-pdf/
- description: creates Portable Document Format files
- Device: Virtual Printer (PDF Printer)
- Make: Postscript
- Model: Generic postscript color printer (rev3) (en)
To create printers for one of the two network (HP JetDirect) printers in my office I use:
- Name: ds
- Location: past the bathroom
- Description: doublesided
- Device: AppSocket/HP JetDirect
- Device: socket://192.168.146.18:9100
- Make: HP
- Model: HP LaserJet Series CUPS v1.1 (en)
Bad Atom
November 2nd, 2005From:
http://www.brandonhutchinson.com/BadAtom_BadWindow_errors_with_ssh_X11_forwarding.html
Although I’m not sure if the “problem” resides in the version of XFree86 or the OpenSSH client or server version, I sometimes receive the following errors when using standard (ssh -X) X11 forwarding with OpenSSH:
warning, error event received:
X Error of failed request: BadAtom (invalid Atom parameter)
Major opcode of failed request: 18 (X_ChangeProperty)
Atom id in failed request: 0×1b3
Serial number of failed request: 944
Current serial number in output stream: 946warning, error event received:
X Error of failed request: BadWindow (invalid Window parameter)
Major opcode of failed request: 25 (X_SendEvent)
Resource id in failed request: 0×16000d5
Serial number of failed request: 2055
Current serial number in output stream: 2056
Using “trusted” X11 forwarding (ssh -Y) appears to fix the problem. The ForwardX11Trusted=yes directive may be specified in ~/.ssh/config as an alternative to specifying the -Y flag on the command line.
Filed under: documentation, FreeBSD, WorkstationMouse Wheel notes
October 18th, 2004install /usr/ports/x11/imwheel
edit /etc/rc.conf
moused_flags=”-z 4″ # Any additional flags to moused.
edit /etc/X11/XF86Config
Option “Buttons” “5″
edit ~/.xsession or ~/.xinitrc
29 # this is for the mouse wheel.
30 # requires tweaks in /etc/rc.conf and /etc/X11/XF86Config
31 imwheel
they said Please
July 1st, 2004So i’ll note it here:
PLEASE NOTE:
============
To enable printing under Gimp do the following:
1) Uncomment application/octet-stream line in mime.types
2) Uncomment application/octet-stream line in mime.convs
3) Restart cupsd
ISO image tricks
June 9th, 2004Making an .iso of an existing CD is easy using ‘dd’
box% dd if=/dev/acd0 of=/data/cooldisc.iso bs=2048
then you can mount that file directly if you make a
‘memory disk’ for it:
box# mdconfig -a -t vnode -f /data/cooldisc.iso -u 0
box# mount -t cd9660 /dev/md0 /mnt
and finally, burning to an ATAPI drive is:
box# burncd -s max -f /dev/acd0 data /data/cooldisc.iso fixate
