mac

A really nice post about using the Mac clipboard in Python. Specifically, the script adds a nice bit to filter the clipboard content type. The entire site is great.

A new Mac bundle provider (or at least new to me). I like the build-to-order option of just choosing things I want, but I really like the business policies. TheMacBundles’ cooperative marketing model brings unprecedented value to consumers while also returning to developers an exceptionally high percentage of the revenue produced by the sale of their software. Additionally, TheMacBundles’ no-fine-print policy means that purchasers of its bundles get the same software, support, licenses, and upgrade benefits that apply to users who pay the full price for the software.

There are several options for Simplenote and Dropbox text editors on the Mac. I happen to prefer NVAlt1. Here are some of the amazing things that NVAlt can do (unless you RTFM you probably will miss them). I use the latest, very stable, public beta. Some of these features may be beta only. You’ll figure it out. I have faith in you. Markdown <li>Markdown preview</li> <li>Markdown autocompletion</li> <li>Markdown wrapping.</li> <li>Export the HTML from the preview.

I've been fiddling with my Hazel Dropbox to FTP rule lately. But in the middle of it, I received a polite prompt to make it work with Amazon S3 instead. I'm a sucker for learning something new so I made this Python based Hazel rule. I Installed the boto module for working with Amazon AWS. This is a mature library of methods for doing all sorts of stuff with Amazon AWS.

Read Later is one of my favorite Mac apps and one that I use the heck out of. Macstories points out how good it is getting for Pocket users1. What a great app for archiving. Still on my wish list: support for downloading a lot more records and better search functionality. Those are minor wishes. I don't use Pocket. I already have too many buckets. ↩

As I have said before, Samsung copying Apple doesn't bother me that much. Neither does HP copying Samsung copying Apple.

Michael likes where Evernote is going with their acquisitions of Skitch and Penultimate. I'm not as enthusiastic. Background I was an ardent Evernote user from the early days. I started exploring it when it was still web centric. When Phil Libin focused like a laser on the Mac, I was thrilled. I pumped massive amounts of info into it. I had two pro accounts just to support the company. My enthusiasm waned when I wanted to extract my info into an archive.

Jeff Atwood writes about a viable tech support solution for family members. This was the first I had heard about Geekatoo. It sounds promising, but I would be extremely troubled sending a stranger to my mother's house to do IT support. It sounds like it worked out well for Jeff though. Since my Mom got an iPad, she has little need for tech support outside of the typically awful ISP hardware.

My desktop Mac is an iMac with a 250GB SSD boot drive and a 2TB secondary drive. When I first set it up, I elected to keep my Dropbox folder on the 2TB disk and use a symlink from the SSD to the new location. This worked flawlessly. That is, until AppStore apps started to get ready for sandboxing. My understanding is that sandboxing requires an app to declares what directories they need access to.

A good resource for figuring out file types and finding applications to open them. It works for Mac, iOS, Windows and Linux.