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What's New the last days about Mac Developers
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| last updated: Thu, 29 Jan 2009 07:40:55 GMT |
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| Wed, 28 Jan 2009 07:30:00 -0800 Resolve an iChat login issue with certain Netgear routers |
A few months back, I replaced my FIOS router when the Verizon-provided model died one day. The replacement worked OK, except for an annoying issue with DNS: every so often, seemingly randomly, my Macs would cease to load any web pages, just sitting there with a "looking for macosxhints.com" message. Clearly, there was some sort of DNS problem, but it had me stumped. It didn't matter if I set the DNS on the Mac or on the router, nor which DNS I told it to use. After a few minutes of not working, DNS would magically begin working again, for some other random period of time. (I'm not going to list the router I used, as I'm not sure it's a general problem with this brand; it may be something peculiar to my setup.)
Finally sick of trying to solve this problem, I replaced the router with a Netgear WNR3500 Gigagbit Router (about $105 at various places). Once connected, t...
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| Wed, 28 Jan 2009 07:30:00 -0800 10.5: CUPS and Open Directory printers in OS X Server |
 Well, this one had been plaguing me ever since which switched our systems over to Leopard in Summer 2008. I found very few hints and nothing that really led to a solution. The following isn't a true solution either; it's more of a brute-force work-around. As of the writing of this post, we are running 10.5.6 across the board and still require this workaround.
First, the problem: You upgraded to Leopard Server and want to push printers out to your clients. You set up your Open Directory (OD) workgroups and computer groups, configure your printers on your print server, then drag them into the User's Printer List in Workgroup Manager (WGM). Check your clients, and sure enough -- all the printers are there, happy as can be. You go on with your day.
In no time at all, everyone is calling because the printers aren't responding as intended. Printers pause for users at random, and ...
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| Wed, 28 Jan 2009 07:30:00 -0800 Use a Front Row plug-in to shut down a Mac |
I bought a Mac Mini to use as a media center. Great, except I found an important feature lacking: you need a keyboard to shut it down (unless you buy Remote Buddy, which for me, was no solution for several reasons). I adapted the frontpython code a bit and created an icon. Et voila: a Shut Down plug-in for Front Row.
You can download it freely from dinkytunes.com; if you like it, please leave a message at the website.
[robg adds: I've seen a number of posts on various sites about how to shut down from Front Row without a keyboard attached. I've mirrored the current version of the file [6.2MB download] here on macosxhints for easier downloading. If you're reading this hint sometime after its posting date, however, you may want to use the linked site, as there may be updates there that won't be r...
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| Tue, 27 Jan 2009 07:30:04 -0800 Create unmirrored Photo Booth movies |
Although Photo Booth 2.0.3 allows one to flip (Command-F) previously captured photos and auto-flip (Shift-Command-F) new photos to an unmirrored -- "correct," some would say -- orientation, the application makes no such provision for movies made with Photo Booth. Other applications, such as QuickTime Pro and iMovie, do create unmirrored video, but lack the real-time access to image effects that Photo Booth provides.
A recent question in the macosxhints forums, and some similar posts in Apple forums, sent me in search of a Photo Booth solution. It turned out to take only a small tweak to one Quartz composition inside the Photo Booth application package to produce unmirrored movies. Note that to edit the Quartz composition, you'll need Xcode installed.
- Make a backup of Photo Booth so that you can return easily to the application's original behavior if desired.
- Control-click on the Pho...
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| Tue, 27 Jan 2009 07:30:03 -0800 Create keyboard shortcuts for stubborn Cocoa apps |
If you're missing a keyboard shortcut for a menu item in one of your apps, and the Keyboard Shortcuts tab of the Keyboard & Mouse preference pane doesn't get you anywhere, you can use Interface Builder to assign one. It's easy.
As an example, I've added a shortcut to the View » Sort Subscriptions By » Unread Count menu item in NetNewsWire, since I like to have my feeds sorted by the number of unread posts while I'm reading them. I got fed up with always having to choose it from its buried sub-menu via the mouse.
You need Interface Builder for this hint, and it's part of Xcode (formerly Developer Tools) that you can download for free from Apple after you've registered as an ADC member, which is also free. This hint involves digging into the application's contents, so if you're afraid you might break something, it's probably best to make a backup of the application. However, any change made with IB is easily...
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| Tue, 27 Jan 2009 07:30:02 -0800 10.5: Fix a non-functional Kotoeri Dictionary |
This tip is for users who use Japanese text input. Because in Japanese it is possible to use unusual characters to represent a particular sound sequence, Mac OS X has a dictionary feature called "Kotoeri" that allows you to add new combinations of sounds and characters to the dictionary. This can also be used to map other characters together. So, for example, on my system if I want to put the macrons over the o's in Tōkyō, I need only enter Japanese input mode and press "o" twice then select ō from the list of suggested characters.
Unfortunately, it is also possible for one's Kotoeri dictionary to become corrupt. If this happens, Mac OS X will not learn the new mappings you add to your dictionary. To solve this problem, use the following procedure.
First open the Kotoeri dictionary application (also known as "WordRegister" and located at /System » Library » Inp...
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| Tue, 27 Jan 2009 07:30:01 -0800 Use Xbench to fix screen burn-in |
Here's a novel use of Xbench, akin to using "Skin So Soft" as a greenie bug repellant on the New Jersey shore: Use Xbench to fix screen burn-in.
I was away for winter break, and my iMac froze shortly after I left, with the Flurry screensaver running. It froze for a month, and burned a swirl into the upper middle of my iMac screen. I normally have a solid blue desktop; it looked after this like a piece of blue cardboard that had gotten bent, and was a deeper blue along the crease. This persisted for days.
Does your head ever make you want to scratch it from the inside? I felt this way about my iMac display, no amount of pressure from the outside would help, what was needed was some serious scratching from the inside. So I downloaded Xbench, ran the Quartz Graphics Test, and quickly moved the window to the location of my screen trouble. I repeated this perhaps a dozen times, and I can no longer see any trace of the problem.
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| Mon, 26 Jan 2009 07:30:04 -0800 Enable mounting of remote CD/DVDs on any Mac |
The CD/ROM in my computer busted, so I decided to try to remotely mount the CD from another computer on mine. I know the MacBook Air can do this, so I reasoned that any Mac could. It turns out it is possible, but the solution is far from obvious -- after much searching, I found the solution here.
Here's a quick synopsis. Go to System Preferences » Sharing, and enable 'DVD or CD Sharing.' (I think you need to do this on both machines -- the one with the drive and the one without the CD/ROM drive). Then, on the computer that does not have the CD drive on it, go to a Terminal window and enter:
$ defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser EnableODiskBrowsing -bool true
$ defaults write com.apple.NetworkBrowser ODSSupported -bool true
Reboot this machine, and when the reboot is finished, you'll see the remote CD/DVD under...
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| Mon, 26 Jan 2009 07:30:03 -0800 Easily combine images into a single document |
I often need to combine a number of .jpg images into a single document. Regrettably, the Windows world always seems to do this by creating a presentation, but I prefer to keep PDF files instead as they are quicker to open. A number of hints have discussed this task, but all that I have seen seem to require specialised software or scripting or both.
In OS X, the easiest way is to open the images in Preview, click in the thumbnail tray, choose Edit->Select All, then File->Print Selected Items. In the print dialog, choose the PDF button, then select the Save as PDF-X item. You'll be asked where to save the file, and you're done.
Another way, if you have Keynote from iWork, is to drag the images onto Keynote's slide thumbnail pane, select all of them, then export them as a PDF. This way, you can also export them as a presentation if you prefer.
Incidentally, if you receive Powerpoint documents that you'd prefer to store as, say, PDF documents instead, ju...
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| Mon, 26 Jan 2009 07:30:02 -0800 10.5: Run all Time Machine backups manually |
Having finally got Time Machine to work on my NAS following the other hints on this site, I came across a big problem. I set up Time Machine on my laptop, which is not always connected to my home network. When out on the road, it would try to sync and fail, which was good. However, when I am out and about, I also use my VPN to connect back to my house. This, I found, would allow Time Machine to back up. At first thought, that sounds good ... but doing so when connecting via 3G really doesn't work well.
So I changed the configuration of Time Machine such that it would not automatically backup, but rather do it when I tell it to do so. Go to System preferences » Time Machine, and make sure 'Show Time Machine status in the menu bar' is checked, then turn off Time Machine.
Now in the menu bar at the top of the screen, click the Time Machine icon and select Back Up Now when...
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let me know which book it was and what version, so I can fix the download link properly on the server.
cheers..." target="_blank">TidBITS: TidBITS |
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| last updated: Wed, 28 Jan 2009 23:23:36 GMT |
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