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Firework (Katy Perry)

I don't know why, but the fireworks that come out of people's chests are both frightening and fascinating. I swear I've seen them somewhere before - I want to say on my Mac or something, almost like the old iMovie effects - but I can't quite place them… ((Most likely because they're original to this video.))

And if you want to look at something else in this video, the lip synching is terrible.

Single Biggest Issue with Logitech Performance MX over MX Revolution

The lack of the side scrolling button. I used it for page up/page down universally and the two arrow keys above and below it were used for various things: back/forward in Safari, delete and go to next/previous unread in Entourage and Cyndicate, etc.

The number of buttons I've got has been reduced by two, and I don't like it. There's no easy way to replace page up/down and scrolling may take a lot of getting used to.

BTW, Not All is Bad with Mail

Please don't assume from my previous post that everything with Mail was poor.

In fact, I like a few things about Mail. I like that keyboard shortcuts like option-delete will delete whole words. I like that emacs key bindings work. I like the extensibility (specifically Herald), and I like that the dock icon works, SpamSieve is integrated nicely, and so on.

Plus, Cyndicate is based on Mail, so reminding myself of some of the keyboard shortcuts is not as hard as I would have thought.

Update (2010-11-16): I like that I can paste screenshots from the clipboard (or any image for that matter). I like the way files are handled - I can drag from an email to an FTP client directly.

USB Overdrive and Problems with Spaces

A little over a year ago I briefly wrote about a bug with Spaces. Essentially, if I switch spaces (either directly to a space with the number keys or by using the arrow keys to slide to the next or previous space), the keyboard shows a high likelihood of dying.

When my mouse finally died yesterday, I disabled USB Overdrive and found that the Spaces bug no longer exhibited itself. Unfortunately, USB Overdrive has not been updated since September 29 of 2009.

Given that, I'm torn. USB Overdrive has worked REALLY well, but it's been so nice not to have to avoid switching Spaces the most convenient way that I'm tempted to give Logitech Control Center a shot. I've avoided it in the past because I seem to recall good things (and USB Overdrive worked really well), but now…

P.S. Uhhhh… maybe I'll avoid LCC after all. I wonder if the USB Overdrive guy is still around. I'll have to email him.

P.P.S. I think I may have missed the "any keyboard" option in USB Overdrive. I disabled it while keeping USB Overdrive enabled and I believe Spaces continues to work. Pfffft. So dumb of me. That doesn't fix it either.

Mail Frustration

Holy bejeezus this conversion to Mail is painful. In no particular order, some thoughts.

  • I miss categories and their coloring already. I have to constantly confirm what mailbox I'm in by looking to the left.
  • It's weird that Mail has to "load" messages when I click to another mailbox. I can see the list being built.
  • Mail lacks keyboard shortcuts for things like "next unread message" (and the one I used a lot: "delete and open next unread message"). I'll have to investigate making AppleScripts for these types of things.
  • Speaking of AppleScripts, I spent nearly three hours trying to re-create a set of AppleScripts I used all the time in Entourage. They simply changed the account from which I was sending an email. Yeah, I could have just chosen it from the pop up menu, but I prefer binding specific accounts to specific keyboard shortcuts.

More tk…

Switching to Mail

For a long, long time I've used Microsoft's email client. Why? I was content with it, as it most functioned like Claris Emailer. It had great keyboard shortcuts (or where not great, familiar), it had wonderful AppleScript support (as I've come to find out, better than Mail), and it had categories which I used primarily to help set label colors for email, folders, contacts, etc.

It was at least Mail's equal in terms of rules, had the List manager, and with SpamSieve was as good or better at handling junk mail.

Now Microsoft has seen fit to kill Entourage and replace it with Outlook… but only to bundle Outlook with the full versions (i.e. not the student/teacher edition). As I almost never need Word, Excel, or PowerPoint (that's why we have Pages, Numbers, and Keynote, right?) I find myself with a choice to make.

So I've gone bold and have set up Mail. It'll take me a few hours just to get my mail imported, and tomorrow I'll begin the tedious re-training process necessary to teach myself how to use an app that's unlike the email app I've used for better part of the last two decades.

Nice Captcha

Nice Captcha

Seriously, what the heck does that say?

Fortunately, subsequent ones were somewhat readable. I only had to enter two more after "hernusenurc" or whatever that one is to get it right.

They can't seriously expect me to spend four minutes looking at that thing in detail, can they?

P.S. Google Apps threw this at one of the accounts I was setting up for some users.

Still Like Kindle, Still No iPad

I echo a lot of the sentiments shared in this post. The Kindle is far and away a better "reading" machine than the iPad.

Still, for the things I blow through quickly - magazines - I'd love to get an iPad. I've said it since the iPad was announced. Disappointingly, there's been no movement on this front. There's no "magazine" application or an Apple-run "Magazine Stand" application that collects and gathers magazines in a format suitable for the iPad.

I don't need interactive stuff (clicking links is about all I require) like embedded movies or moving advertisements or surveys you can take "inside" the magazine. Heck, convert a magazine to a long PDF document and deliver it to my iPad and I'd be happy. The environmentalists would be happy. The circulation department (and thus the ad department) would be happy. No?

I have the feeling I won't be getting an iPad for a long, loooong time… 😛

Don’t Want Rosetta, Never Did

Does anyone know of a way to find for Rosetta software that's still on your system so that you can remove it?

I've never installed Rosetta. I delete software that asks me to install Rosetta (or, where possible, download an updated version).

Did you install it? I had no real reason not to - it felt "cleaner" not to install it and have it running - but I'm probably virtually alone in doing so.

Two Kinds of Computer Users

There are two kinds of computer users out there: those who know what "/me" means and those who do not.

I like that one more than "those who have lost data and those who will." And it's true, too.

Favorite Independent Mac Software Sites

Everyone's got some "favorite independently developed Mac software." For example, I like MarsEdit and FastScripts, and Daniel's made great strides in improving the look and feel of his site. It's functional and suits the software he's developed.

But it's probably not among anyone's lists of favorite software sites ((Frankly, I'm only listing it because I like it, and I hope Daniel knows this isn't a "bash" at all.)). Maybe a site like CSSEdit's, or Transmit's is in your list.

Why, you ask? Because I'm about to create a site for Analyzr, a product which I assure you competes with nothing on the Mac market to date - not even close. Part of that process is seeing what people like, throwing it all in a blender, and coming up with something that - hopefully - combines and tweaks the best of what's out there to suit this particular product (a $50 Home and $500 Pro app).

Replenish Cleaners

Stuff like this just makes sense.

Pricing is $7.99 for the bottle and a pack of concentrated cleaning solution. Refill packs are $3.99.

That seems to cost about the same as regular cleaning solutions.

It's a multi-surface cleaner, but I doubt it works on glass very well. Perhaps just countertops and other similar surfaces.

At any rate, it's sold out. I've signed up to be notified when they're back in stock.

Your Halloween Traditions

I never much cared for Halloween as a kid. I had a Kermit the Frog costume that won me several awards, but otherwise it was just a good excuse to eat candy.

Still, many adults (particularly if you watch network TV shows) seem to engage in partying and other sorts of traditions on Halloween.

What do you do? I'm particularly interested if you're in another country, as a Russian friend recently told me that almost nobody in his country does anything for Halloween.

P.S. I know these get old, but they've not really reached that stage for me yet. Not when they're this good:

Scorecard for iPhone Update

When Apple approves it, a new version of Scorecard for the iPhone will appear in the App Store.

The graphics have been redone for the Retina Display and we've modified the way tables are built for iOS 4. Both versions iOS 3 and 4 are supported, but we've dropped support for iOS 2.

A few little bugs are tweaked as well.

Grab the update when you can. The app is free, so naturally the updates are as well. Scorecard (desktop version) updates are coming along shortly as well.

PGA Update

I haven't begun studying anything for my level one classes. Now that winter is coming up, I'll have more time and will be home a lot more frequently to do this sort of stuff.

We're giving a Golf Evolution school near Phoenix on November 20, 2010. Interested golfers can get in touch with me.

We're also looking to become an AimPoint certified location over the winter - perhaps in conjunction with one of our schools in Florida.