Gabe Weatherhead is one of my favorite Mac bloggers and now he’s started a podcast, Generational. I joined Gabe for episode one where we talked about sharing the technology love.

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I’m pleased to announce the update to Paperless is now live both in the Apple iBookstore and in PDF form.

Why An Update?

It always made me a little crazy with my prior books that I couldn’t update them. I was in Barnes and Noble just the other day looking at a copy of iPad at Work on the shelf. By and large, the book held up pretty well. However, there are a few areas in it that I would desperately like to update. Of course that’s not possible given that most of the copies are sitting on people shelves and I don’t have control over the digital copies either. The ability to update a book was one of my big motivations to self-publish.

The Paperless Update

As soon as Paperless shipped, I began making a list of things I wanted to update. I found a couple of amusing/horrifying typos. But moreover, the workflows evolved. I became even more reliant on OCR technologies and some of the software got better, including the TextExpander 4.0 update. I also received a lot of feedback from readers with questions that should’ve been addressed in the book. For instance, exactly how do you compress a PDF file to save size?

The update includes several new screencasts and updates prior screencasts. It also includes additional sections addressing the above questions and more. (For instance, I added a section pointing out similar applications to Hazel and TextExpander on the Windows PC side of the fence.) This is an update, not a second edition. A lot of the book remains the same.

Getting the Update

To get the update in iBooks, delete the current version of the book on your iPad, go to the iBookstore, and re-download. Apple will already remember that you purchased it and you will not have to pay again. In the process, you will lose annotations that you made to the prior version. Sadly, there is no delta update mechanism for books. We are pioneers together.

If you purchased the PDF version, go back to your original confirmation email and just downloaded again. If you’ve run out of download tokens, send me a note.

While it’s downloading, you may want to go eat a cookie or, better yet, make some cookies from scratch and then slowly eat them. The book file even bigger than it was before. The download is going to take a while. It took me 30 minutes this morning.

I hope everyone enjoys the update. I put a significant amount of work into preparing it and I love the fact that I can write books this way. Sometimes I think I’m living in the future. Don’t be surprised if there’s another update to Paperless sometime next year.

What’s Next?

On the general topic of the Field Guides, the next book is so close to submission that I can taste it. I’ve written it with a co-author, someone most readers of MacSparky will already know and love. I can’t wait to tell you more. Stay tuned.

Here is a nice explanation of the (sort of) new Launchbar/ 1Password integration. I’m finding this really useful. I run several apps through the Launchbar search bar including 1Password and Fantastical. I am, however, to see Launchbar get some UI love.

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My thanks to muvichip for sponsoring MacSparky.com this week.

Watching a movie in the post-DVD world is a mess. Blu-Ray startup times are measured in dozens of minutes. Digital is faster, but good luck finding your movie. If you find it, you’d better not get interrupted because you’ve got 24 hours to watch it!

There has to be a better way.

muvichip is the first global, solid-state, movie distribution media that can be used anywhere and on any device that has a USB port, and, when paired up with the muvifi or muvifi+ streaming device, you can watch a movie on ANY device. Studios are excited to distribute their movies on muvichip, and national stores want to stock it.

But we need your help.

We’re running a funding campaign on IndieGoGo to get our first batch out the door. You can be the first to order the muvifi and your favorite movies on the muvichip by helping to fund us on IndieGoGo. You’ll only be charged if we hit our funding goal.

Help us make the future of movie distribution that combines the ease of use of digital with the quality and catalog of DVD/Blu-Ray.
Sponsorship by The Syndicate

The new Mac Power Users episode is up. Jim Dalrymple filled us in on his writing, web, and music workflows. I would have considered it a personal failure if we did not get at least one classic Dalrymple belly-laugh during this recording. Thankfully, Jim obliged.

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I really enjoyed myself last year attending the Mac Computer Expo in Petaluma. This year I can’t attend (calendar conflict) but sure wish I could. If you are near Petaluma, California on October 6, I recommend it.

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I just discovered some new Mail plug-ins and they are all on sale. Now’s your chance.

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Thanks to Harvest for sponsoring the RSS feed this week.

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Sponsorship by The Syndicate

Often I share OmniOutliner files with collaboration partners via a shared Dropbox folder. In doing so you have to be very careful not to have both people making changes at the same time. OmniOutliner hates that. It is not alone. A lot of apps don’t appreciate multiple authors making changes at once. It can lead to data loss and, in extreme circumstances, the end of days.

So on my appearance on the CMD+Space podcast, I talked about my goofy way of sharing these types of files. I’ve received several requests for clarification so here goes.

First, create the shared Dropbox folder and move your file in.

Next, Create a new text file in TextEdit and save it to the shared folder. Name the file “File Log”.

You can either leave the file blank or put in a running list of changes. I usually do the latter with a time/date stamp.

Whenever you want to open the working file (in this case an OmniOutliner file), put a red Label on the text file. This way, if your fellow collaborator stumbles into the folder to open the file, they can see a red label, telling them to stay out. It is like leaving a sock on the dorm room door. Well, sort of.

When you are done, update your change log in the File Log text file and then change the file label to green. If you and your collaboration partner use a little discipline you can collaborate without stepping on any toes.