Dec 31
…later 2007!
Dec 26
Lots of people say that the “Desktop” is a bad thing but it’s really not. It’s a visual place for things that you are working on right now. Here’s a guy that snapped his work space everyday for the last year and made those images into a movie.Link
Dec 24
Craig wants to know all about configuring his network.
Dec 20
Here’s the changes you can expect to see for 2008:
- Forum
- More Articles
- Links to products we recommend
- How to Videos (like Makes Weekend Project)
- Projects
- Upgrade Check Lists
- Library
- Example Code
- More geek guests
- New Logo and Site Redesign
Please stand by.
Dec 18
Why bother learning Quartz Composer? It works practically every where in apps like Final Cut Studio, Motion, iTunes, Keynote, QuickTime and embedded on a web page. Both artists and programmers alike can do great things with QC.
You don’t need Leopard to get started with QC but to take advantage of new features you’ll need it installed. From a learning point of view it doesn’t matter if you start in 10.4 or 10.5. Either is fine. However, you may find it confusing at first. Be sure to examine all the examples found in the Example folder. Which can be found in /Developer/Examples/Quartz Composer.
Inputs can be practically anything! iSight camera, keyboard, RSS feeds, MIDI and Bluetooth devices like a Wiimote, and USB devices like a Guitar Hero Guitar or a Wacom tablet.
A good guide to getting started can be found on Apple.com.
http://developer.apple.com/graphicsimaging/quartz/quartzcomposer.html
The link to the very cool digital level meters is here:
http://www.coremelt.com/products/products-for-final-cut-studio/download-veeyou.html
Other visual programming languages mention are
The Audible book pick: The Puppet Masters Correction: In the show we said the ATI buy direct was store.ati.com. It’s not. Use the link shop.ati.com instead.
Dec 17
Want proof that if you have a problem all you have to do is tell what your problem is and somebody listening on the intercom will solve it for you? I was complaining that maps.google.com didn’t parse a two line address that got pasted into the search field. The first line makes it and the second line is disappeared. An address has to be on one line to get pasting to work. That you have to pre-format makes the experience less like the magic that it could be.Enter the magic: googmappin.com takes your address that is formatted on multiple lines and feeds it to google correctly formatted. So cool. Follow the link then drag the URL to your Bookmarks bar in Safari or Bookmark it (Command-D) to the Bookmarks bar and name it maps. Now when you need a map just click that button and paste the address.
Dec 15
Here’s something that we’ll cover in a future show. It’s a Automator action that allows you to run a Python script just like how you can run AppleScript. Link.
Dec 11
Ignore the specs, the price and focus on what you really need your Mac to do.
Dec 06
Automator is a powerful but confusing tool. Generally speaking Automator isn’t going to be much use to you unless you have something you need to do over and over again. If you haven’t used Automator much you’ll run into the first common problem of automation. Which is by the time you figure out the automation you could be done with the task if you did it yourself. But this is more of a lack of knowledge problem. You have to be familiar with what Automator can do before Automator can do for you.
There are 262 or so actions built in depending on what you have installed. iWork 08 installs a bunch on its own for example. Automation tasks can be sorted by Task or by Application. Some tasks are listed in Other.
I learned some new things about my apps. For example in the Contacts app you can add fields. I dididn’t know that you could. Like b-day. URL. Maiden name (seems to take you back to a time when you’d slay the dragon by saying that).
One confusing thing about automator is that there often is no last step. Like Save for example. An output of a module is always the last step. You can see the results using the View Results module or in Leopard click on the Results button to see what happened.
When making a Automation that starts with the Finder you need to always start with “Get Selected Finder Items”. Without this step what you drag and drop to your Automator app will get ignored.
An interesting app is one called Do It. But it turns out you don’t need to download it to make it. All you have to do is add a “New iCal Events” to a workflow then in the Options box click the “Show this action when the workflow runs.” Turns out there are lots of automation actions that could be made using this option.
After you make a “app” make it look unique by changing it’s icon. Click on the automation then press Command - I for Get Info. Click the icon then paste to change icon. You will have to get a new icon from someplace like IconFactory first.
Some practice Automations that you can make are:
1. Make is a Renamer. Make start with “get selected finder items”
2. Make a resizer
3. Make a recorder
4. Make a PDF contact sheet
Note: the example Automator actions for the above will be posted by Dec 10th. In the meantime try to make them yourself.
Apple has a large number of pre-made Automator actions that you can download for free. Here’s the link.
