PandoraMan
I just saw a PandoraMan mentioned on VersionTracker. This has the same main functionality as PandoraBoy, that I mentioned earlier. Unfortunately, it is missing some of the nice features that PandoraBoy has, like Growl notifications and global hotkeys.
fetchmail and Google Mail
In this post, I mentioned that I wished that the lack of IMAP support was preventing me from switching to Google Apps for Your Domain. Last night, I was thinking about this, and I relalized that I already have an IMAP server. I just need to get the mail to the server.
Fetchmail can be used to deliver mail from pop servers to other servers. This page has a script that can be used to start fetchmail when the computer starts. This page describes the how to setup fetchmail to check Gmail through fetchmail.
Daylight Saving Time
Last night I went around the house setting the time on the clocks, that don’t automatically adjust, back an hour. I remember that every clock had to be adjusted manually. Then in college, I bought an VCR that automatically adjusted itself. At that time, Mac OS didn’t automatically adjust for Daylight Saving Time. So, I wrote the Set Daylight appe to adjust the time. This was pretty easy to do, since the rules for the dates that the time adjustment occurred, were static. This was added to Mac OS 8, so it wasn’t necessary anymore.
But now most electronics include support to automatically adjust for Daylight Saving Time. For example, TiVos, Mac OS X, Windows and Linux PCs, and PDAs will automatically adjust. Now that the days that Daylight Saving Time is changing, all of these devices have to be update in order for the time to be correct.
Firefox 2 config tweaks
This page describes some tweaks that you can make to Firefox 2.
[via something or another...]
Firefox 2.0
I installed Firefox 2.0 today, and it works very well. Here is a list of the extensions, that I have installed, that don’t work:
The Unarchiver and Stuffit archives
I have had several Stuffit archives that The Unarchiver has unpacked to empty directories. On my last post about The Unarchiver, Nathaniel Nutter commented that there are problems with resource forks, and suggested BOMArchiver. I couldn’t find a place to download it, so I just re-downloaded Stuffit Expander 11.
There are fewer and fewer things that use Stuffit (especially since Mac OS X has built-in support for disk images and zip archives.) Mac OS X developers should really stop using Stuffit for their distributions.
Google Reader Notifier
Google Reader Notifier is a small application that lists the unread posts in the Mac OS X menu bar. This works pretty well, but there are some things that I would change:
- Have a preference screen that lets you enter your Google username and password. (Currently it uses the cookie stored in Safari, when you log in with that browser.)
- Display the unread posts in submenus for each feed.
[via Hawk Wings]
Tangerine thoughts
I have been using Tangerine for a couple of days, and I like it. I really like the interface for displaying playlists. Playlists are displayed as a horizontal list of album artwork. When you select a track, a popup appears with the track information. Tangerine also has the ability to upgrade itself (which all applications should do)
The main benefit of Tangerine is to generate playlists of similar music. I wanted to create a playlist that I could listen to walking to and from the train.
Dashboard KickStart
I use Dashboard widgets several times a day. The only annoyance is that the first time activating the Dashboard after logging in takes a long time to load all of the widgets. Until the widgets load, the computer is pretty much unusable.
Dashboard KickStart is an application that solves this problem. When you login or wake from sleep, the application quickly opens and closes the dashboard. This means that all of the widgets will have been initializes when you want to use them
iAlertU
iAlertU is a neat little application that may help to secure your MacBook or MacBook Pro. When enabled, it uses the sudden motion sensor to detect movement. When movement is detected, the an alarm is sounded, and a picture of the person moving the computer is taken. (Assuming that the are in front of the computer.)
There are some things that I would love to see fixed in iAlertU
- Have the alarm played through the speakers, even when headphones are plugged in.
- Have iAlertU startup, even before users login. This will allow the alarm to continue even after a hard reboot.
- Have an iAlertU screen saver, that automatically arms when the screen saver enables.
