Joel on VBA for Macintosh and the Office alternatives

Another example of Microsoft on the skids: VBA for Macintosh goes away (Joel on Software).

Joel wrote the spec for VBA. It was a lock-in strategy from start, which is no surprise of course. The loss of VBA on the Mac won't have much impact on most users of Office/Mac, but Joel's story is interesting for several reasons:

1. It's a story about Microsoft's only great product - Excel.
2. Joel's a longtime supporter of Microsoft as a company (he grew up there) and even he's advising friends to avoid Vista at this time.
3. He gets fed up with Office 2007.

Most Mac users who really need Office are going to run Office Pro/Windows in emulation under Windows 2000 or XP. I don't care so much about VBA, but I need Microsoft Access.

Mac users who want a quality word processor should probably use Nisus Writer Express (Pro is in beta). Every other product that works well on the Mac uses a lock-in proprietary file format or an (unfortunately) little supported open alternative. NWE uses RTF.

For presentations, if you can escape PowerPoint (few can) I hear Keynote is good. For an end-user non-pro database you're limited to Filemaker (kind of hurting really). For a spreadsheet you can, err, uhhh, hmmm. That' s a problem, isn't it? When I started writing this post I didn't know of any. I decided to research the question first ...

I was able to find 6 alternatives, not counting OpenOffice since it still requires an X Window front-end:

1. AppleWorks if you can find a copy (runs in cpu emulation on intel macs)
2. MarinerCalc 5.5.1
3. Google Apps with Firefox/Camino (not Safari)
4. Tables
5. Mesa (NextStep originally) is still around and is a universal binary
6. NeoOffice: (update 5/29/07: I tried the spreadsheet with a modestly large data series. It died trying to create a chart. It's not a real contender.)
   

Spanning Sync on multiple macs

This description of Spanning Sync makes me wonder again if we can use it for a family calendar. I still need a good solution for synchronizing Google Calendar with Outlook ...

Spanning Sync Blog: Using Spanning Sync with Multiple Macs:

...To set up Spanning Sync on multiple Macs, first download and install it on one machine, login using your Google account, pair your iCal and Google calendars, and perform a sync. At this point, Google Calendar will have a copy of all of your events.

Then on each of your other Macs, create an empty iCal calendar for each calendar you're syncing. Install Spanning Sync and login with the same Google account, then pair the appropriate Google calendars with the empty iCal calendars and sync. From this point on, changes you make in iCal on any of your computers will be synchronized with Google Calendar and with your other Macs.

Remember that since Spanning Sync is licensed per-person and not per-Mac, you can install it on as many Macs as you like—just login using the same Google account on each one...

I will test this at home first ...

Update: I created a family domain for Google Apps and added both my wife and I to the domain. I've tested spanning sync and am now trying SyncMyCal and gSyncit. Gsyncit is bidirectional, which I don't want for work, so I'll try SyncMyCal first.

Coda and Fission: Nice action on the OS X app front

OS X 10.5 is MIA [1] and so is iWorks 3 (OS X spreadsheet), Aperture 2 (working date metadata and faster than a dead slug), iLife 2007 (2008?), Safari 3 (a modern browser?), a blog editor, .Mac that's worth something ... argh. There's no putting a pretty face on it, Apple seems to have taken 2007 off to work on my iPhone.

So it's especially good news to hear of two very interesting OS X product releases: Coda (DF review) and Fisson. Nisus Professional for OS X is also in beta and OpenOffice is supposed to come out for OS X (no X Windows) this summer.

[1] I worry about the Fall delivery considering the challenge of iPhone -- when big projects slip once they almost always slip three times. By that rule 10.5 will come in 2008.

A cause for the pesky -36 error with SMB connections

I get these on occasion, though I do much less with XP these days ...

Mac OS X 10.4: Error -36 alert displays when connecting to a Windows server

Mac OS X 10.4: Error -36 alert displays when connecting to a Samba or Windows server

After upgrading from Mac OS X 10.3.x to Mac OS X 10.4, you may get an error message when you try to connect to a Samba or Windows (SMB/CIFS) server. A Samba or Windows (SMB/CIFS) server includes servers operating on Microsoft Windows and other operating systems that use Samba for SMB/CIFS services.

If the connection is unsuccessful, the following error message may appear:

The Finder cannot complete the operation because some of the data in smb://........ could not be read or written. (Error code -36).

If you check the Console (/Applications/Utilities/), you will also see this error message:

mount_smbfs: session setup phase failed

This error can occur if your Mac OS X 10.4 client is trying to connect to a Samba or Windows (SMB/CIFS) server that only supports plain text passwords. If you do not see the above message in the Console, you are not experiencing this issue and should try normal troubleshooting to isolate the source of the issue.

Unlike Mac OS X 10.3, the Mac OS X 10.4 SMB/CIFS client by default only supports encrypted passwords. Most modern Samba or Windows (SMB/CIFS) servers use encrypted passwords by default, while some Samba servers might have to be reconfigured.

You should consider contacting the owner or system administrator of the Samba or Windows (SMB/CIFS) server to which you are trying to connect and encourage them to disable plain text passwords and start using encrypted ones. If the server cannot be reconfigured to support encrypted passwords, you can configure Mac OS X 10.4 SMB/CIFS client to send plain text passwords.

I think XP only uses encrypted passwords, but I'll check.

Rescue Kodak Photo CDs from oblivion with iPhoto

iPhoto can import obsolete Kodak Photo CD file formats. Neat trick! Another lesson in the risks of proprietary file formats. In ten years there may be nothing that can read these old formats.

Controlling drive mounting dependencies: iTunes example

Make sure iTunes mounts a networked music library is a hint with a clever technique embedded. If you want to require a drive be mounted before an application (such as iTunes) is used, then put an alias on the application on the mounted drive, then put the alias on your Doc. Clicking on the alias will only work if the drive can first mount.

PodCorps, Eventful.com and Meetup.com

Two interesting connections from one Udell post:

1. PodCorps and bring lectures on special needs children to those who cannot attend. (My post based on Udell's PodCorps notice.)
2. Eventful.com: A user generated events calendar, also used to summon the PodCorps. (Pod people?) There have been zillions of these, most famously Meetup.com. I don't know why this one is fashionable, but there you go. I'll try promoting some of the Minnesota Inline Skating Club outings through these two and see what happens.

Google owns my web history

Another thread is tying me to my Google (Gmail) identity and to Firefox. I've given Google the right to track and record every web page I visit using Firefox with the Google toolbar installed and PageRank enabled:

Official Google Blog: Your slice of the web

...Today, we're pleased to announce the launch of Web History, a new feature for Google Account users that makes it easy to view and search across the pages you've visited. If you remember seeing something online, you'll be able to find it faster and from any computer with Web History. Web History lets you look back in time, revisit the sites you've browsed, and search over the full text of pages you've seen. It's your slice of the web, at your fingertips.

To get full value I have to use Firefox and the Google toolbar on every machine, and I have to be logged into Gmail. Quite a powerful connection ...

OS X modifier keys: organized by key type

Another list of Apple's modifier key combinations, this one organized by key: A long list of modifier key tricks

It's not that long really, and must be quite incomplete. On the other hand, cmd-click-dock item to show in Finder was new to me. I'll keep it around.

How does one really hack a system?

CH reviews a book that categorizes software errors: Coding Horror: Sins of Software Security. He then provides a count of how often each has been exploited (over 3,000 times for buffer overflows). If you know a bit of C programming, then it's all very readable and it makes clear why so much software is so vulnerable. Ahh, if only we'd never left Pascal ...

iStock Photo: $2 to $4 per image

I read about iStockphoto.com in an article about globalization and crowdsourcing. These inexpensive photos look like they'd be great for desktop backgrounds (I use black and white images with limited white areas for my wallpaper so I can see icons) or presentations. Sure, you can find photos for free using Google, Flickr, etc -- but these are pretty nice quality. Might be worth a few dollars to save search time.

Ports: a handy reference for firewall work

"Well Known" TCP and UDP Ports Used By Apple Software Products lists the port, protocol and service. A handy reference, even if it's dated in places (Retrospect is no longer Dantz).

WordPress: the blogging platform of the moment

I've suffered with Blogger for years, while competitors waxed and waned. Blogger is getting more tolerable, but WordPress is the fashionable place these days. I opened an account and played with it a bit. It doesn't have much more Safari support than Blogger, but it's a strong competitor for Firefox clients and I think it has a more stable API than Blogger. I was very impressed by the import/export facilities, WordPress is not afraid to let their customers free.

I'll keep playing with it, though if Blogger improves their BlogThis! client I'll probably stay with Blogger.

Blogger BlogThis!: Drag and drop URLs

This works in the Firefox rich text field that one sees when using BlogThis! in rich-text mode:

1. View a page in Firefox
2. Click on icon displayed next to URL in the url field.
3. Drag and drop into the editing area. A link appears.

It would, of course, be better if the URL was assigned given the page title [1], but I can live with this. I've not seen it mentioned anywhere, though it's a hard topic to search on. I'm sure it's a general property of the Firefox rich text editor. It's a significant time saver.

Incidentally, Blogger 2.0 with Firefox's [2] impressive integrated spell-checking is a qualitative improvement on Blogger 1.0. I've been reluctant to declare that since I've been burned so often by Blogger! Alas, BlogThis! is still stuck in the dark ages; it doesn't support tags. I've got my fingers crossed for BlogThis! 2.0 sometime soon.

[1] Internet Explorer may use the page title, Microsoft Live Writer uses the page title as does old FrontPage 98 (which I still use - it was a good application then).
[2] Don't even think of using Safari.

iWorks MIA: OpenOffice and NeoOffice

It's been years since AppleWorks was retired, but there's still no full replacement. Apple's 10.5 delay bodes poorly for anything soon.

Time to look again at NeoOffice and OpenOffice.

NeoOffice is now on version 2.1. It's still Java based, but it has an Aqua UI and doesn't require X11. NeoOffice has been ailing ever since Apple deprecated Java as a development environment, but the small team of international volunteers is still working on it. I'll test it out, being sure to install the most recent patches. It now comes with an app that installs support for Spotlight search of OpenOffice document formats.

OpenOffice 2.2 is still dependent on X11, so it's not a consideration for our home. However, there's a tentative date for a true OS X version: Digg - Timetable Announced For Native Aqua OpenOffice - Public Release in May

OpenOffice has a very well done Wiki on the Aqua (not Cocoa!) project, including minutes from the March 30th meeting. It's encouraging news, suggesting there might be something we'd use ready for late summer. I wouldn't consider replacing Nisus Writer Express, which has been excellent (Nisus Writer Pro is in beta now), but a decent Excel clone and PowerPoint reader would be very helpful. Note that "Aqua" doesn't mean OpenOffice will become a full fledged Cocoa application with services integration, system spell checking, etc. It won't show off the (aging) advantages of OS X as well as NWE or even iWorks.