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2008

  • in Apple
  • 3 min read

Before I start listing some of my favourite Mac OS X-software, let me just say that my Mac OS X 10.5-frenzy is over. :P Some things were just too laggy in Leopard, on my Powerbook 12?, so I decided to go back to Tiger. And with 1.25GB memory on the machine, it’s working with flying colors. Now, on to the software!

  • Quicksilver
  • Allows users to use the keyboard to rapidly perform tasks such as launching applications, manipulating files and data, running scripts or sending e-mail. It is similar to the Mac OS X applications LaunchBar and Butler, but uses a different interaction paradigm. Although it is a complex application, it is centered on a very simple three-panel interface, called the “command window”: the user performs complex tasks using simple, configurable key-combinations. Quicksilver’s icon is based on the alchemical symbol for mercury (quicksilver is another name for mercury).
  • Adium
  • A popular free software instant messaging client for Mac OS X that supports multiple protocols through the libezv (for Bonjour) and the libpurple (all other protocols) libraries. It is written using Mac OS X’s Cocoa API, and it is released under the GNU General Public License, and many other licenses for components that are distributed with Adium.
  • OnyX
  • A popular freeware for Mac OS X developed by French developer Joël Barrière. It is a multifunctional tool for maintenance and optimization, and can control many basic UNIX programs already built into OS X. It can also help set hidden preferences otherwise modifed by using plist editors and the command line.[1] It has become a highly praised utility among many in the Mac community, in part due to its extensive language support and excellent help files.
  • VLC
  • A portable multimedia player, encoder, and streamer supporting many audio and video codecs and file formats as well as DVDs, VCDs, and various streaming protocols. It is able to stream over networks and to transcode multimedia files and save them into various different formats. VLC used to stand for VideoLAN Client, but that meaning is now deprecated.
  • AppCleaner
  • A small application which allows you to completely and properly uninstall unwanted apps. It isn’t, in fact, sufficient to just delete an application. Installing an application distributes many files throughout your System using space of your Hard Drive unnecessarily.
  • SSHKeychain
  • You no longer have to cancel your ssh request because you forgot to load your keys. Because SSHKeychain acts as a gateway between you and the agent, it can automatically add keys when you need them. SSH will just pause for a few seconds, and you’ll be on your way. SSHKeychain integrates with the Apple Keychain. All key passphrases can be stored, and you can use all your keys just by unlocking the Keychain.
  • Safariblock
  • The goal of SafariBlock is to provide a seamless extension to Safari Web Browser that supports ad-blocking. It is by design an imitation of Firefox’s AdBlock extension.
  • in Apple
  • 2 min read

Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) on a PowerBook G4 12”

I briefly wrote an entry about how getting VLC to be your default DVD-playing application, and how to get it to start viewing a DVD you’ve inserted automatically. I even mentioned that I had installed Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) on my Powerbook. I’ll go into further detail about that. The installation went okay, BUT, it took ages. One and a half hour perhaps, and I was tempted to reboot to see if starting the process all over again would do it good. But one thing did occur to me during the installation – it was 9G with data that was being installed. Not your usual stripped 150MB installation of Debian, eh. So I waited, and waited. And finally it was installed. I actually think my PowerBook was handling Leopard smoother than Tiger. But it’s probably all in my head. The specifications for my Powerbook G4 12?; 1.5Ghz processor, 512MB RAM, 75G disk (just about), you know, a pretty standard Powerbook. I even ordered 1G memory for the Powerbook yesterday, and it’ll hopefully be arriving today, working miracles with my machine. Now, having said that Leopard is working fine so far, the native DVD-playing software isn’t. In fact, by running the application I’m guaranteeing myself a reboot – really. It locks up the PB so bad, waiting ages doesn’t really help. So what I did was that I just uninstalled the software, along with iTunes and some other crap I didn’t need, downloaded VLC and set that as my default DVD playing software. You gotta love VLC. I haven’t really tested heavy applications on the PowerBook, as I use it as a work/media computer. That means having Terminal, SSHKeychain, Safari, Adium and VLC up and going. Working great so far. Now to see how long it lasts. ;)

  • in Apple
  • 1 min read

Mac – Play DVD automatically on insertion in VLC Media Player

So I’ve installed Mac OS X 10.5 on my PowerBook G4 12?, and it’s working quite well so far. Until the native DVD-playing software went haywire that is. Needless to say, I turned to VLC. Now the problem is getting VLC to automatically launch and start playing the DVD when a DVD is inserted. Here’s what you do. Open up the program Script Editor, and place the following in there:

tell application "VLC"
OpenURL "dvdnav:///dev/rdisk1"
play
next
end tell

Save it, and close the application. Now go to System Preferences -> CDs & DVDs and when pressing When you insert a video DVD, select Run script… and just use the applescript you just made. Voila, it works!

Simple directory listing script

<?php

/*
 *   Dili is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
 *   it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
 *   the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
 *   (at your option) any later version.
 *
 *   Dili is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
 *   but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
 *   MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
 *   GNU General Public License for more details.
 *
 *   You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
 *   along with Dili; if not, write to the Free Software
 *   Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin St, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA  02110-1301  USA
 *
********************************************************************************
 *  
 * This is the Dili (DIrectory LIsting) script v0.0.1.
 * Place the index.php in the directory you want listed, simple as that. :)
 *  
 * Jorge Barrera Grandon 
 * Atlantiscrew 
 *
 */

$title = basename(dirname(__FILE__)).'/';

        echo '';
        echo '';
        echo '';
        echo ''.$title.'';
        echo '';
        echo '';
        echo '';
        echo 'Directory listing of '.$title.'';

        $dir = opendir(".");

        while(FALSE !== ($file = readdir($dir))) {
            if($file != "." && $file != ".." && $file != "index.php") {
                $myFiles[] = "$file";
            }
        }

        closedir($dir);
        sort($myFiles);
        reset($myFiles);

        foreach($myFiles as $value) {
            if (is_dir($value)) {
                echo '[d] - '.$value.'/';
        } else {
                echo '[f] - '.$value.'';
            }
        }

        echo '';
        echo '';
            echo '';
                echo '';
            echo '';
            echo '';
                echo '';
            echo '';
        echo '';
        echo '';
        echo '';
?>

How to display UTF-8 in your Putty bash shell

My girlfriend was having some problems displaying the correct characters while talking on IRC through irssi, and putty. Eventually I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t my server or irssi that was configured badly. Searching the internet I found this:

echo -ne 'e%Ge[?47he%Ge[?47l'

Simply put that into your .bash_profile or .bashrc and relog to your server. It’s a collection of terminal escape codes that together means ESC %G – “switch to UTF-8”.

  • in Linux
  • 2 min read

Quake Wars and switchscreen

Still being thrilled about having gotten my 22” monitor, after 2 years of nagging (I need to emphasize that I’ve spent TWO years nagging my better half about a damn monitor. Did I mention I spent 2 years?), I briefly spoke to a co-worker of mine about having nothing to play after I quit World of Warcraft. He said that he’d heard about a game called Quake Wars, and that it had a Linux-client. So I took a look at it, downloaded the demo, and now I’m hooked! Not as much as before, but it’s fun nonetheless. Anyway – playing the game with a 1680×1050 monitor resolution is INSANE! I can just about feel a grenade blowing up in my face. We’re about 3 people at work planning on making a clan, so we just need a few more to make it work. And I am definitely going to buy the full game tomorrow! For more information about Quake Wars, take a look at http://community.enemyterritory.com/.

Right, that was that about Quake Wars. Now to my next subject – a nifty little program named switchscreen. A quote from the website:

switchscreen is a command-line utility that moves the X mouse cursor to a given point on a given screen. I wrote it because I could find no other program that can define both the mouse position and screen number.

In other words – you can use your keyboard to navigate between your two monitors instead of your mouse! I find it to be a wicked program that I just had to mention. ;)

Update: I forgot to mention yesterday (as I’m typing it’s the 29th) that I nearly got bald and (even more) nuts by not being able to find the “x-devel-” package for SuSe, being that we need libx.h to make switchscreen work. Just fire up YaST and search for xorg-x11-devel, and there you go!