Apple - Mac OS X - Family
My new machine came with Tiger. So far it's mostly a posterior pain. Old software has to be upgraded, the install is bigger, Spotlight insists on indexing peripheral drives it should ignore, I can't see how to constrain search to a path, and Quartz Extreme is still disabled and Retrospect has no Tiger support in their (orphaned post acquistion?) Windows based Mac backup (you can use the Retrospect/Mac client -- but that's not a licensed use and it's not supported).
There are a lot of nice touches, but I don't see any big advantage in Tiger for me over 10.3.9. Given a choice, I'd still choose LaunchBar over Spotlight, and I had to pay $10 for the new version of Launchbar after I upgraded!
With one exception. In 10.4.2 the 'Simple Finder' (managed user option -- Children) is very nice. It was broken badly in 10.0-10.3, so it's great to see it back. The Simple Finder now supports multiple 'windows' based on the number of icons in a folder, and there's an option (choose from menu) to break out to the full finder. So an administrator can now log in as a child, then configure the system as needed, then return to child!
The kid support is almost worth the upgrade.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Saturday, July 30, 2005
The Missing Sync for Palm OS -- and the sadness of iCal
The Missing Sync for Palm OS - Synchronize Mac OS X and Palm OS
The web site doesn't emphasize this, but you can use Missing Sync for free for a two week evaluation period. I started today -- it looks very good. A breath of fresh air. I was able to remove the festering, parasitic, incompetent mess that's Palm Desktop from my Tiger machine.
On the other hand, there's iCal. Wow. So much hype for something so feeble. No 'categories' for tasks? You must be joking! I thought the Palm data model was feeble, but iCal makes it look pretty darned complex. There's no way this would handle any kind of demanding workplace.
Looks like Entourage and Missing Sync with a PocketPC device are the best PDA solution for the Mac. This may work ok for my wife however.
Missing sync has a good list of supported conduits.
The web site doesn't emphasize this, but you can use Missing Sync for free for a two week evaluation period. I started today -- it looks very good. A breath of fresh air. I was able to remove the festering, parasitic, incompetent mess that's Palm Desktop from my Tiger machine.
On the other hand, there's iCal. Wow. So much hype for something so feeble. No 'categories' for tasks? You must be joking! I thought the Palm data model was feeble, but iCal makes it look pretty darned complex. There's no way this would handle any kind of demanding workplace.
Looks like Entourage and Missing Sync with a PocketPC device are the best PDA solution for the Mac. This may work ok for my wife however.
Missing sync has a good list of supported conduits.
The mythical Palm OS X uninstaller
Palm's web site has a description of the Palm Desktop OS X 'uninstall' procedure:
I did use the Installer's show files option -- the Palm installer puts a horribly long list of gunk in the System Library and elsewhere. No wonder this is such a festering sore.
Removing (uninstalling) Palm Desktop for Macintosh: "# Continue through the Software License Agreement windows by clicking on AGREE, the Palm Desktop Installer window appears.Having tried this about six times, I'm reasonably sure there's no such dropdown menu in the current release.
# In the top left corner of the window, click on the dropdown menu and select UNINSTALL. Directly beneath this menu, place a check to select Palm Desktop software.
I did use the Installer's show files option -- the Palm installer puts a horribly long list of gunk in the System Library and elsewhere. No wonder this is such a festering sore.
Restoring Retrospect data to an OS X disk image
When my iBook crashed my last complete system backup was only 8 hours old (for once, somehow, Retrospect worked). It was easy to restore all my data to the G5 iMac. I wanted, however, a disk image of the iBook that I could use to either clone a new version of the old drive or as reference. I find disk images very handy for that purpose.
How could I do this?
Actually, it was pretty easy. Here's what I did:
I have a hunch this method may also be the only effective way to create a true restore from Retrospect! (Create image as above from Retrospect backup, mount iBook using target disk mode, clone using Disk Utility.)
Update 8/4: Well, it kind of worked as a boot image -- but only with some massaging and not all that well. OS X Disk Utility rejected using it to create a boot sector; some kind of error condition. Carbon Copy Cloner did use it, but the permissions were completely wrong (an issue with Retrospect, you have to disable permissions when doing a Retrospect restore, didn't do that on the image, I don't know if it's possible). I had to use Disk Utility to restore permissions and I safe booted. At that point the image did work, but some extensions didn't work. I gave up and used another image -- this was just an experiment to see if the image I create above could be used to clone a bootable disk.
[1] I'm using the Retrospect 6.0/Mac client on my Tiger machine -- a temporary option while I figure out how to replace Retrospect entirely -- but that's another story.
How could I do this?
Actually, it was pretty easy. Here's what I did:
- Create a sparse disk image on iMac of 15 GB (Tiger Disk Utility has a GB and TB option now.) Give it the same name as the old, extinct, drive (eg. iBookDrive.sparseimage) - I think that may be pretty important.
- Mount image.
- In Retrospect Professional for Windows 6.5 open client view and go to tools. The mounted image appears as a volume. Select it so it's "known" to Retrospect.
- Do a complete volume restore to the mounted image.
Update 8/4: Well, it kind of worked as a boot image -- but only with some massaging and not all that well. OS X Disk Utility rejected using it to create a boot sector; some kind of error condition. Carbon Copy Cloner did use it, but the permissions were completely wrong (an issue with Retrospect, you have to disable permissions when doing a Retrospect restore, didn't do that on the image, I don't know if it's possible). I had to use Disk Utility to restore permissions and I safe booted. At that point the image did work, but some extensions didn't work. I gave up and used another image -- this was just an experiment to see if the image I create above could be used to clone a bootable disk.
[1] I'm using the Retrospect 6.0/Mac client on my Tiger machine -- a temporary option while I figure out how to replace Retrospect entirely -- but that's another story.
Friday, July 29, 2005
OS X file sharing: truly weird
Mac OS: How to Connect to File Sharing or Apple File Services (AFP)
I've used OS X for about 3 years now. File sharing has always been odd. SMB sharing finally works well, but today I enabled sharing from an Apple server.
I had a hard time figuring it out. I started with the IP address -- that worked using afp://10.0.0.1. Then I researched and learned this would work too: afp://MyMachineName.local -- but the .local was required. Lastly I learned that if you browse for the server it's in Network:Local, not in Servers where one, instead, can find the name of the client machine.
Don't tell me that's not weird. It also takes a few seconds on my iBook for the remote share to appear, I had to wait a bit.
I think I'll use the 'scrap' technique I use with my SMB shares to create a simpler reference.
Lastly, somewaht contradictory to the documentation, if you login with a username and password that matches an admin account on the host machine, you can browse everything the local admin can (I only tested a write to my own server directory).
None of this is anywhere near as transparent as the OS Classic approach -- and that wasn't too simple either.
Weird.
One does get a nice choice of file sharing protocols however: smb, afp, ftp, etc.
I've used OS X for about 3 years now. File sharing has always been odd. SMB sharing finally works well, but today I enabled sharing from an Apple server.
I had a hard time figuring it out. I started with the IP address -- that worked using afp://10.0.0.1. Then I researched and learned this would work too: afp://MyMachineName.local -- but the .local was required. Lastly I learned that if you browse for the server it's in Network:Local, not in Servers where one, instead, can find the name of the client machine.
Don't tell me that's not weird. It also takes a few seconds on my iBook for the remote share to appear, I had to wait a bit.
I think I'll use the 'scrap' technique I use with my SMB shares to create a simpler reference.
Lastly, somewaht contradictory to the documentation, if you login with a username and password that matches an admin account on the host machine, you can browse everything the local admin can (I only tested a write to my own server directory).
None of this is anywhere near as transparent as the OS Classic approach -- and that wasn't too simple either.
Weird.
One does get a nice choice of file sharing protocols however: smb, afp, ftp, etc.
AbiWord: Read and Write DOC files (free)
AbiWord Downloads
I'll try the new version on my Mac. We need something lightweight to both read and write doc files.
I'll try the new version on my Mac. We need something lightweight to both read and write doc files.
Windows smart phone sync to a Mac -- yes!
Mark/Space brings Windows smart phone sync to Mac | The Register
The Mac PDA/phone universe has just grown significantly.
The Mac PDA/phone universe has just grown significantly.
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