I love applications that serve their purpose with little-to-no user interface. Something as simple as adding a calendar to your desktop should not require much, if any, work on my part. Thankfully, there is just such an app available for the Mac, and it’s free! (more…)
Category: Mac & OS X
Archiving emails from OSX’s Mail application
There are lots of ways to archive old emails from OSX’s Mail application for later reading. Many of them require you to work with another piece of software, some require you to “restore” an .mbox file to the proper folder – and almost all of them require you to launch Mail in order to actually read the archived email. While most archiving apps offer plenty of flexibility, they can be more trouble than they’re worth if your needs are simple, and you don’t have the budget for 3rd party apps. If you’re looking for something a little easier with less bells and whistles, I’ve got a quick solution for you. (more…)
Free application icon screensaver
While the true usefulness of screensavers can be debated (screen burn-in for the most part is a thing of the past), there’s no debating that they’re just plain fun to look at.
Econ uses the icons in your Applications folder to create a nifty screensaver of the icons flying through space. The video above is rather choppy, but the actual screensaver is quite fluid, and looks awesome on a large screen.
Using a PC is as easy as 1-2 3
I love the “Get a Mac” ads. They’re clever, and most times make me laugh. This one takes the cake… Here are the steps PC lists in the ad: 1. Remove unneeded bloatware 2. Configure security settings 3. Download and install OS security patches 4. Restart 5. Download / install extra security programs 6. Restart 7. Download / install drivers for peripherals 8. Restart 9. Remove optional Windows components 10. Update new virus list 11. Run full system virus scan 12. Update new malware list 13. Run full system malware scan 14. Download / install application updates 15. Restart 16. Clean out system registry 17. Repair corupt system registry 18. Defragment hard drive 19. Free up disk space 20. Scan disk for errors 21. Run system file checker 22. Read online instruction manual 23. Cross fingers
Tweetie for Mac: The good, the bad, and the beautiful
Looking at the screenshots of Tweetie, the latest Twitter desktop app from atebits, tells you all you need to know about the look & feel of of the app – it’s simply gorgeous. Fluid animations and an easy-on-the-eyes color scheme make looking at Tweetie as much fun as using it.
Tweetie for Mac
Using Automator to batch rename files
Often you might find you have a folder containing hundreds of files, and you want to rename them all. Obviously, you don’t want to do this manually, it would take forever. You could download a shareware application to do the job, but that’ll cost you. Luckily you can use Automator to make the process more efficient. 
Mac OSX Tips has a quick tutorial to show you how to batch rename files using an Automator workflow, and it won’t cost you a dime.
Suitcase Fusion 2 now compatible with Tiger
Extensis has released an update to Suitcase Fusion 2, their industry-leading font management application, bringing full Mac OSX 10.4 (Tiger) compatibility. Version 13.1 also includes a number of new features and fixed issues, including:
- New ability to search for fonts by the “Date Added” to Suitcase Fusion.
- Added ability to search by “Keyword” with the QuickFind tool.
- New “Library” column in the Fonts pane shows where your fonts are located.
- Updated font corruption warnings when adding fonts.
- Ability to disable warnings from Suitcase Fusion 2.
- Plug-in manager improvements, including the ability to install more than one copy of a plug-in for multiple versions of a host application.
- Automatic removal of obsolete plug-ins.
- Suitcase Fusion 2 users on Mac OS X v10.4 (Tiger) now have access to plug-ins for Adobe CS4 and Quark 8.
This is a free update for all current Suitcase Fusion 2 users. It’s easy to upgrade your current installation if you have Suitcase Fusion 2 currently installed. To update, from the Suitcase Fusion 2 menu, choose Check for Updates and follow the instructions to download and apply the update.
Safari 4 Top Sites vs. Firefox Fast Dial extension
The recently released Safari 4 introduced a new feature called Top Sites which places thumbnails of your most recently visited sites in a tab for easy clicking. Firefox has had a similar feature for quite some time in the form of an extension called FastDial. So which one is more useful? Obviously, it depends on which browser you use. Here’s a quick comparison of each. (more…)
Creating image mosaics
Creating an image mosaic can be a fun and creative way to spice up your personal or commercial project. Depending on your needs, there are a few different resources available to help you out with what would be virtually impossible to do manually unless you had an enormous amount of patience and an endless supply of images to work with. 
The Image Mosaic Generator is a Web-based image mosaic creator. This Web app allows you to upload the full sized image you wish to create a mosaic of, then wait while it does its magic. The process if fairly quick, and you can download the final result. You have no control over the images used to create the mosaic, but it’s certainly the fastest and easiest way to go about creating the mosaic. For those who need much more control over the mosaic, you can try Funtastic Photos, which I reviewed for Macworld’s Gems blog here. An image mosaic feature is built-in. It’s a great program that does a whole lot of other things beyond creating image mosaics. 
For a more dedicated image mosaic creation app, the best one I’ve come across is MacOSaiX. This dedicated image mosaic creation app has been around for a long time, and is probably the most customizable app for creating image mosaics. It offers the ability to choose which photos are used to create the mosaic from images you already have on your Mac, or use Google or Flickr image searches to find more. You can also have it use Font Glyphs if you so choose. MacOSaix is also quite intelligent when choosing which photos are used where in the final Mosaic, based on the color found in the images. You can also choose which shape the photos are, and how many tiles (images) are used to create the final mosaic. Be warned though, the larger the mosaic you wish to create, the longer it will take to create. And by longer, I mean REALLY LONG, as in hours in some cases. But the results from MacOSaiX are stunning to say the least, and well worth the wait.
Preview your Photoshop brush sets without loading them
If you’ve followed this site for any amount of time, you no doubt noticed that I have a great fondness for Photoshop brushes. I download every decent brush set I come across. My custom brushes folder has hundreds upon hundreds of brush files. One thing that has always bugged me is that in most cases, I have no idea what ALL the brushes look like before I bother loading them into Photoshop to preview. Most sites that offer brushes create a preview image that shows off only one or two of the brushes in the set, and typically they apply other Photoshop effects to make them look better in the preview. Thankfully, the options I’ve covered below make previewing your brushes easier. (more…)