This screencast goes back to basics and explains usage and customization of the OS X dock along with a very nice little terminal command to give you a recent applications/recent documents icon in your dock.
I want to give special thanks to my friend Don McAllister, the godfather of Macintosh screencasting. Don showed pity on me and gave me some excellent screen resolution advice that helped make this new format look even better.
I’ve been getting emails from several readers about the site being down or really slow the last few days. I know. I’ve been communicating with my host and they are aware of it. Apparently the server that contains MacSparky is much in need of love and getting it. They promise. Hang in there with me and things should be much faster soon.
Continue reading
For the past few weeks I’ve been upsetting the Neighbors with a pair of Audioengine A5 speakers. Audioengine is quickly becoming the manufacturer of choice for high end self-powered computer and shelf speakers.
When you open the A5 box, you have have a near-Apple experience. Each speaker is in its own cloth sack with a third sack holding a variety of connectors and wires insuring you will get it connected to something soon. The next thing you will notice after you open the box is that these speakers are heavy. The left speaker (with the built in amp) is 14 lbs and the right is 9. The materials in the speakers is 1″ thick medium density fiberboard and they have a high gloss piano finish that is very attractive. For guts, the A5’s have Kevlar woofers and the silk dome tweeters. Because they are magnetically shielded, you can use them next to your monitor but an iPhone will cause interference unless you put it into “Airplane Mode”.
On the left A5 there are a variety of inputs including AC power, perfect for your airport express, two stereo inputs, and a USB port. The result of all of this is you can charge your iPod while putting audio into the A5’s or you can use Audioengine’s wireless transmitter, the AW1 to beam music into the A5’s from any source. One of the inputs and the USB port is actually on top of the speaker making it very easy to access with your iPod.
In order put them to the test, I plugged in my iPod and listened to a track from Chick Corea’s latest album, New Crystal Silence. It sounded fantastic but as I started to ramp up the volume, I began to hear some compression distortion. The speakers were so good that I could hear some of the compression mushiness. I bought that album from the Amazon service so I hooked up my computer and ran the 256 kb version and it sounded spectacular. Playing music that loud through a MacBook Air felt like delicious overkill. Of course this means I’m going to have to rethink my encoding presets but I can think of worse problems.
There are some very detailed specifications on the A5s at Audioengine’s website. I didn’t have the ability or knowledge to confirm those specifications but I can say that it did a remarkable job of reproducing the music at louder levels than I could ever get away with at the same time my wife is in the house. The highs were clear. the mids were full, and the bass was tight without a lot of that mushy thumping I’ve heard on virtually every other speaker in this price range. I played a variety of music styles through it and they all sounded very good. These speakers are good enough to get a visit from the police at any hour. I can think of no better compliment.
With onboard USB and AC power there are a lot of possibilities. In addition to using them from my computer and iPod, I also put them in the backyard one afternoon while we were barbecuing and streamed wirelessly with the AW1. I also took them with me when I gave a presentation that included some audio and music. They did an excellent job filling the room.
My favorite use for these speakers however is for my music studio. Well, I call it a music studio. Actually, it is a keyboard in my living room with a small table next to it for my Mac. But in my mind it is a music studio. Anyway, up until the A5s, the speaker system in the “studio” was a pair of $50 computer speakers with a small plastic subwoofer. All I can say is not .. any … more. These A5s are such a huge upgrade. It makes playing the piano so much more enjoyable. Also, when I play back with 15 tracks, the A5’s handle everything from the rolling kettle drum to the tinkling triangle.
I wouldn’t call the A5s an impulse buy at $349 but at that price they still are an excellent value. If you are looking for top quality self powered speakers, I wouldn’t think twice about it. They include a three year warranty. Audioengine knows how good their product is because they give a 30-day audition. That means if you don’t like them, you can send them back for a full refund. Once you try them out, however, I can’t really imagine sending them back. You can order them directly and get more information at audioengineusa.com.
Dear Reader,
This post was updated in 2013 with a fancy screencast. You should go there now.
————————————————
Here is one thing that has been driving me crazy for some time. I constantly find myself saving from Safari to PDF. Whether it is a utility bill or legal research, I have a fetish for saving PDF copies. The problem is that in order to do so you must click print, then the PDF button, then the “Save as PDF” button. Each step requires me to get the mouse in the right place and read the menu. Granted this is probably less than 10 seconds but I do it a lot and it makes me just a little bit nuts.
So I’ve been thinking about this and wondering if there is an Automator action or perhaps an Applescript that can simplify this. Well tonight I stumbled upon
an excellent hint at MacOSXHints
that address this very problem very easily through with a keyboard shorcut.
Here is the walkthrough.
Open your Keyboard Shortcuts tab in the Keyboard & Mouse system preference pane.
Click the “+” sign to add a new shortcut for all applications.
Then a box pops up asking for the command.
Type in the Command exactly as it appears: “Save as PDF…” For the ellipses, use the combination: option + semicolon. Don’t ask me why because I have no clue. Just do it.
For the keyboard shortcut use: command + P (I know this sounds like a conflict with the print shortcut, but trust me)
Now you are done.
Now go to your favorite webpage and hold down the command key and press “P” twice.
Bingo. “Save as PDF…” lickity split.
One challenge to using the MacBook Air is memory management. When working I typically run OmniOutliner, OmniFocus, iCal, Mail, Bento, and quite often some concoction of Parallels, Safari, Scriviner, Pages and Microsoft Word. I then spend my time bouncing back and forth between them as required. That is a lot of applications to keep in just 2 gigs.
I recently bought a $19 license to iFreeMem which seems to help. iFreeMem puts a nice little meter in my MenuBar.
When I notice the green area vanishing and the yellow and red areas getting too big, I simply click the MenuBar icon and the friendly one button fix drops down.
I then give it a clicky and it takes less than a minute to reshuffle the memory usually ending up with gobs of recovered memory. While it is running, the computer is frozen so that is a good time to go make tea. Things definitely run more snappy afterward. On my MacBook Air I do this two or three times a day. You probably get a better ‘flush’ with a restart but this is much easier and it is so gratifying watching the green pie grow.
I noticed that there are some Applescript hooks in iFreeMem too. I’m toying with the idea of designing a script or automator action around it but I’m not sure if that would be a good idea since I want to be in complete control of when my computer freezes for a minute.
Anybody else using iFreeMem or have suggestions for memory management?
The Airport Express has received a radio upgrade. It is now an “N” device and will not be responsible for slowing down you “N” network. I’m sure there is probably a good reason, but I really wish they had done this at the same time they released the “N” speed airport extreme.
The Airport Express is a device that should not be overlooked. For $100 you can stream music to your stereo, put a printer in the closet, get the internet to a computer with no wireless, hook your xbox into the network, or increase your network signal. Obviously you can’t do all these things at once but having it around sure is handy. Since Apple TV also does AirTunes, I was able to liberate mine from my stereo and now I’ve got it managing a printer that just does not like to play nicely off a USB hub.
I woke up this morning with an inbox full of ideas for recovering my photos that I posted I had lost yesterday. Thank you all for the advice. I actually downloaded a data recovery program this morning and when I went to access the card found the photos were still there. I told Aperture to delete them yesterday and I had just assumed it did. I guess Aperture was acting funny on several levels.
Either way, everything is back and being backed up as I write this. The best part of these hijinx however was the excellent emails and offers of help in my inbox this morning. Thank you all!
So today was Palm Sunday and my daughter sang in the church choir. It was a sunny day here in Orange County and I got some great photos not only of my daughter but also some of the gardens. So I was merrily cropping, tweaking, and rating while doing about seven other things on my MacBook Pro and managed to grind Aperture to a grinding halt.
I don’t know how I did it. I don’t know if it was Aperture or me, but the whole process cratered. I restarted and my Aperture library was completely torched. I could see pictures but not move them or use them. Moreover, the newest ones were garbled beyond all recognition. To add insult to injury, I had already wiped the memory card. After monkeying with it for an hour I finally surrendered and reloaded the last night’s version of the Aperture library (Thank you TimeCapsule) and everything is right but this morning’s pictures are gone. Don’t you just hate that feeling when you realize you’ve lost irreplaceable data? You’ll just have to trust me that they were fantastic pictures. In fact, now that they are gone I am already remembering them as much better than they actually were.
Anyway, I have to admit this is the first time in years that I lost something I hadn’t backed up. Just goes to show you can never be too careful on these things. For now on, the memory card does not get erased until the RAW photos are in two places. Live and learn.
After a bit of a hiatus, I’ve got the screencast train rolling again. I rebuilt the opening graphics, moved the hosting to libsyn, and I’m now publishing in Apple TV format. Finally, I’ve been able to ramp up the production values a bit with ScreenFlow.
This short screencast walks you through the process of setting up a smart playlist in iTunes that will allow you to sync 50 of your favorite songs to your iPod that you haven’t listened to in the last month. The smart playlist automatically updates itself so every time you plug in, you get new music.
You can get it through iTunes or right here.
The MacBook Air has now been in the wild for a few months and reviewed by just about every major technology journalist and pundit. So as I sit down to write this review I wonder what I could possibly add to the discussion. Maybe the answer is some perspective by someone who actually paid for it and has been using it, not for review purposes, but as a tool to get through my day.
Lets start with a few well-trodden points. I doubt there is any computer on the market that gives you less bang for the buck than the MacBook Air. For $1,800 you get 1.6 Ghz, 80 MB drive, and a single USB port. This is the least powerful laptop in the entire Apple lineup. In other words, if you choose your computer from a spreadsheet of features, move along, this is not computer you’re looking for. So is it overpriced and underpowered? I think that is a much more relative question than it initially appears.
So what is the point then of the MacBook Air? My answer to that question starts with my penmanship. Very few people have seen my handwriting for a reason. It’s terrible. I type everything. I’ve typed everything since the first time I sat down at a Radio Shack Color computer in 1981. Add to this the fact that I write a lot. Finally, throw into this melting pot of consumerism the fact that I am frequently not at my desk. I have a knack for getting stuck in places like offices, courthouses, airplanes, and hotels just to name a few. As much as I love my 17″ MacBook Pro, it is not the easiest device to bring into these locations. It requires a separate bag and it is heavy. Likewise, I use a computer in most meetings I attend. Again while the 17″ MacBook Pro truly is a desktop replacement, it also creates something akin to the Berlin Wall between me and the person at the other side of the table. I’ve always been aware of these shortcomings at a certain level but never really prepared to do much about them. I’ve never owned more than one computer at a time.
This is what Apple does. They figure out things like this and fill a need. My initial reaction to the MacBook Air was “sexy … but too expensive” That initial impression was based on looking at the feature list and not the utility. Then I started reading the reviews (Curse you John Gruber!) and thinking about the Berlin Wall and my inability easily carry my MacBook Pro on my travels. Well we all know how the story ends. I spent more money than I probably should have and now find myself for the first time ever having two computers I can call my own.
So how am I using this device? For me it is the perfect writer’s machine. A comfortable keyboard, a fantastic screen, and plenty of horsepower to drive things like Scrivener, Word, and the Omni Applications. For that purpose the MacBook Air is ideal. It goes just about anywhere and gives me access to my favorite applications in no time at all.
Knowing its limitations and its advantages, I’m finding it very useful. It fits in my briefcase along with the other detritus I tend to carry around and presents me with near instant access to my files with just a flip of the lid. Add to that other common computer applications like email, browsing, and Keynote and I have everything I need to perform about 70% of what I do at a computer on me at all times.
As a lawyer, I often find myself at the mercy of guys who wear black robes and don’t necessarily care about my inconvenience. As a case in point, I was attending a hearing this week where the Judge suddenly stopped me and explained he had a luncheon and would be back in “around two hours”. With the benefit of this tiny waffle computer in my bag those two hours were not lost. I got myself OmniFocused, returned email, and wrote a contract. So that is fine and dandy you say but couldn’t I have done that on a MacBook and saved myself a lot of money? Well to be honest, yes. But while I’m on the subject of honesty I don’t know if I would be carrying a MacBook at all times in my bag. You can not understate how thin this computer is. If you haven’t got your hands on one, you should. Or perhaps you shouldn’t.
It is engineered like no computer I have ever seen. The profile looks a lot more like something you should attach to to the wing of an airplane rather than use while sitting inside it. Beauty has its costs though. The sole usb port drops down on a self enclosed flap. It kind of reminds me of the door to the Bat Cave. My concern though is that you have to wriggle the usb cord to pull it out and over time that little flap is going to take a beating. Likewise, my friend Allison Sherridan points out that the MagSafe adapter is different from all other Apple laptops. Instead of plugging straight in, it runs up the side of the computer. This is because of that slick airfoil-like profile. The problem is, that from some angles, it doesn’t pop out as easily as the standard MagSafe adapter. In that case, the MacBook Air could actually end up taking flight.
So I told you about how 70 percent of my computing is handled with the MacBook Air. Unfortunately for the other 30 percent, it is completely inadequate. This is not a machine to produce video or music production. It is really not fair comparing the performance issues to my MacBook Pro. The MacBook Air has a slower processor, a slower hard drive, and less RAM. Regardless, I generally find the biggest interruption to my writing process is not missing clock cycles but instead misfiring brain synapsis. Apparently my brain doesn’t always keep up with 1.6 ghz.
I did, however, push Air a bit with my photo rig. I’ve got Aperture and Photoshop installed and while they aren’t as snappy as on my MacBook Pro, it is viable. Another issue with photo editing is I have to keep my library on an external USB drive so there is one more cause for a slowdown. I wouldn’t want it as my only photo machine but in a pinch, it will work. I’m planning on taking it on vacation with me and leaving the MacBook Pro home.
Speaking of the drive, I have strangely not had any problem living with an 80 gigabyte drive. As I write this, I’ve used 40 gigabytes and have 33 remaining. I’m sure I’ll find a use for that additional space but I already have everything I need for what I do on the MacBook Air.
I toyed with the AirDisk function but it was too slow for me. It was going to take hours to install iWork. Instead I pulled a very old USB external DVD drive out of mothballs. This was purchased for a PC several years ago but the MacBook Air recognized it with no difficulty.
In summary, I am loving my new Mac. It is so thin. I can take it anywhere that I can take a pad of paper. As a result, it is often close by and suddenly “dead time” is becoming “productive time”.