NSLog();

I'm going to be collaborating with someone on a book-writing project soon. Final copies of the book are to be submitted in Microsoft Word (an app that I despise for the most part). The book will have code, images, captions, prose, and chapters, footers, etc. A normal computer-related book. The content of the book is unimportant as far as the question: What's the best way to collaborate on such a project?

We could write everything in Nisus Writer Express, but their "tools in a drawer" trick makes me gag. We could write everything as HTML and convert to Word later, but any sort of markup would impair readability (and editability). No WYSIWYG editors I'm aware of produce very good code. LaTeX is out, so don't suggest it. It's a major PITA.

So, what to do?

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MailDrop 2.0b7 is now available. The full release of MailDrop 2.0 will occur on January 20, 2005. Introductory pricing ($20 off) between now and then.

MailDrop 2.0, which currently uses Scott Stevenson's DataCrux adds a bunch of highly requested features, including:

• Multipart/MIME
• Conditionals support via PHP
• Inline attachments
• Smart (and Custom) Lists
• Unlimited custom variables
• Import and export ODBC, Address Book, more
• Sending rate limiting

I'm also happy to announce that the engine upon which MailDrop is built is available for licensure and inclusion within third-party applications. If your application could benefit from sending mail, you'll want to have a glance at the FSSMailEngine page or send me an instant message sometime.

I'll write more about this whole process in the upcoming days. For now, I'll just say "Happy New Year" to everyone.

Question: What are your new year's resolutions?

My Answer: I don't believe that a new year is the time to try to improve yourself - it's an ongoing thing. However, January 1 I will be kicking off my winter fitness "thing." Got all the equipment and, after today, will actually have the 30 minutes/day it requires. Coincidence that it's January 1, but that's the closest I come to a new year's resolution. 🙂

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Judi is still jumping up and down over John Dvorak. I haven't cared about what Dvorak's said in awhile. Call it a growing maturity, lack of time, or the wisdom that comes with having fought the battle before.

As others are comfortable with their sexuality, masculinity, femininity - whatever - I am comfortable with my choice of computing platform. I brush aside Dvorak columns as those of a nitwit looking to gain attention. I don't give in to that.

It's not hard to create a stir in the Mac community. Dvorak's mastered the art. I applaud Judi's efforts and thought processes - it's great to think about the world at large sometimes - but am happy to sit this one out, as I have been for the past, oh, year or two.

P.S. I missed this blog's second birthday twenty days ago. Tiger Woods turns 29 today. I remembered his birthday! 🙂

Question: If you could add one feature to the iPod, what would you add?

My Answer: I'd add the iTunes visualizer to it. Why not? I don't need anything else from my iPods (including the photo stuff), so I'd jazz it up a little so it looks nice in my car.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

The home page of a company I'd only ever heard of a few times before today has taken a potshot at Apple for stupid things, and I'm bored enough to take a few pot shots back. My text appears in light grey.

The release of Black & Bleu™ v10 marks the end of our participation in the Macintosh software marketplace. So make sure you buy our products now!!!

The shrinking number of Mac users who can tolerate to look at our website enough to download software they won't need by a company that's given the Mac community a finger, the increasing reluctance of those users left to actually pay for software products that they do not need and probably never heard of and the apparently significant number of thieves willing to steal rather than pay at all (we found a serial number for our last useful version four years ago, we caught you!) coupled with Apple's seeming lack of concern about compatibility across its product versions desire to push the API forward and our reluctance to update our own applications to take advantage and the alarming problem with its software quality (over 100,000 new bugs reported during the months of October & November, 2004 alone, according to numbers we made up) has combined to render Mac OS software development unprofitable for us. It's either that, or our product is completely irrelevant now that Mac OS X is the best OS in the world, and one that rarely crashes.

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Yahoo! News - Tsunami Kills Few Animals in Sri Lanka:

"This is very interesting. I am finding bodies of humans, but I have yet to see a dead animal," said Wijeyeratne, whose hotel in the park was destroyed. "Maybe what we think is true, that animals have a sixth sense."

With all of the sophisticated technology we've got, it's amazing to me that so many people died because they were not warned. I haven't read the particulars - how far off the coast the earthquake was, how fast the wave moved, etc. - but given that the difference between life and death was oftentimes a few hundred yards, surely the death toll could have been lowered with a warning.

I saw a poll on CNN a few days ago saying "could officials have warned people sooner? yes/no." A stupid question I'd expect from USA Today and not CNN. After all, nobody answering the poll has insider information to know. Really, the question asks "would it have been better if officials could have warned people sooner?" Do people answering "yes" to that question really believe that officials "could" have warned people sooner, but chose not to?

I wonder why they couldn't.

In the iTunes Originals: R.E.M. "chats," Michael Stipe of R.E.M. talks about a theory espoused by an artist, a painter, named Paul Clay Klee as a way of explaining pure artistry. The theory goes as follows:

At the beginning, everyone starts at the bottom of a circle, which represents naïvety and innocence. As you learn, as you gain education in your trade, you move up the left side of the circle until you reach the top of the circle. At this point you're proficient - a craftsman - with a complete education. You keep going down the right side of the circle as you forget things, and return to a state of naïvety and innocence. When you come full circle, you've achieved a state of artistry.

An interesting theory, and one I've documented here for my own sake. I'll think on it more. I don't consider myself an artist at anything in particular, and calling me a craftsman is stretching it. So I don't know that I can comment on the right side of the circle. I don't know if I've ever been there.

Bill Bumgarner has also seen the advantages in using Rainer Brockerhoff's RBSplitView over the standard NSSplitView. PulpFiction 1.2 will remove our hacked up NSSplitView and use RBSplitView. The title of this post may give you a clue as to what this has allowed us to do.

Total time to convert from our hacked up NSSplitView (which can be collapsed, stores sizes, has minimum sizes before collapsing, etc.) to RBSplitView and to add the feature I just mentioned: about ten hours. Coded, bug fixed, and tested.

Every time the page finishes loading, the damn window comes to the front. This includes being in another tab, in another window, and having minimized the window with amazon.com in it.

I type a search, flip to a new tab, and a few seconds later, BLAM, there's amazon.com again.

If you could flip a website the bird and yell "fuck off," amazon.com would get my bird and curse today. 😛 This is more annoying than target="_blank" links.

Carey's mom wants an MP3 player… with an AM/FM tuner. So, forget the iPod. She has a relatively new PC. What do you suggest?

Question: What do you expect to see at MWSF 2005?

My Answer: I don't even care. A new iLife? Yeah, whatever… iTunes is fine, and I use it constantly. iPhoto I use sometimes. iDVD and iMovie I almost never use. I just want a damn AppleWorks update! I doubt we'll see that. A headless iMac might be nice, but a G4? Bah.

ThinkSecret reports on iLife '05 and Keynote 2, but the thing I find most intriguing about that is that iDVD 5 is rumored to support multi-layer burning. Won't do much good for those of us with current SuperDrives, but a nice way to move the technology forward (if it turns out to be true). GarageBand update? Yawwwwwwwwwn. This same ThinkSecret report talks about Keynote-related products, "Crossbow" and "Slingshot," but I doubt either of those are also known as "AppleWorks 7.0." Same is true of "Sugar."

Of course, I know more than I let on, and I may or may not be misleading you. 🙂

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Question: Have you ever used whitening strips or the brush-on pasty whitening cream?

My Answer: Before a few days ago, no, I'd not. Some of my teeth are permanently (and slightly) stained due to an illness I had while they were growing in. Not much I can do about that, so I'm curious what will be possible. I've never been happy with my teeth - my orthodontist took my braces out far too early. Perhaps in a few years I'll give the Invisalign stuff a try.

I'm typing this with two Crest White Strips in right now, and man am I producing a lot of saliva. My tongue keeps subconsciously pushing playing with them and pushing against them. Only 24 minutes left! Ugh!

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.

Why is the shortest day of the year at the beginning of winter (and the longest day at the beginning of summer)?

It's true, too: winter in PA is from late December through late March. Spring is April through June. July and August are summer. September through November is fall.

Question: What is your favorite kind of cookie?

My Answer: My mom makes these chocolate cookies with peanut butter chips (much like the ice cream) that, when they're soft and a little warm, are wonderful. With or without milk.

You are encouraged to answer the Question of the Day for yourself in the comments or on your blog.