/dev/random

One of my favorite desktop applications, Delicious Library, is now available on the iPhone. The iPhone app is free, although it requires the desktop app since you can’t enter data on the iPhone.
If you have the latest version of Delicious Library on your Mac, when you open the iPhone app it will automatically connect and [...]

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I’ve been using Quicken 2006 and earlier versions for my personal finances for a long time. Recently it started corrupting my data files every few days. Thankfully Time Machine saved me when that happened.
Since that version is 3 years old, I thought I should probably upgrade to the newest version, so I checked quicken.com and [...]

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Unfortunately I have to be home next week, so I’ll be missing out on WWDC. I did get a chance to walk by Moscone West and take photos of Apple’s preparation for the event.

Could this be a prediction of a 32GB iPhone?

See the full gallery here.

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Daniel Jaikut asked why the default keychain in OS X keeps getting changed, which I’ve also noticed, as have a few other people. It seems to be related to XCode and usually manifests itself as a code signing error. If you look at the provisional profiles tab in XCode’s organizer window, you’ll see a warning [...]

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Although I fell in love with The Hit List’s beauty & simplicity, I find that I really need the ability to sync with my iPhone, so I took another look at Things and ended up switching back.
Now that I understand the proper use of areas vs. projects, I can live without folders or nested outlines. [...]

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One reason I use Google Reader is to share interesting articles in my shared items page. However, I find that I’m more productive when I use NetNewsWire, since I’m in control of how & when it fetches new items, so I spend less time reading news.
I’ve been looking for a way to share items in [...]

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I’ve found that my MacBook Pro is better as a desktop system, while my MacBook is more pleasant to travel with, so I’ve been looking for a good way to keep them in sync. After trying several sync utilities, I was surprised to find that Windows Live Sync is my favorite.
Windows Live Sync runs continuously [...]

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I own both Things and The Hit List (which I purchased as part of MacHeist 3), but I’ve been using The Hit List exclusively. With the release of Things 1.1.2 today I decided to take another look at it. After a short time I went back to The Hit List.
Things has two major advantages over [...]

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An application that I’m working on uses a SOAP web service to send user registration data to a server, which I implemented using Web Services Core Framework. After the user enters his details, I create a SOAP request to send it to the server:

NSDictionary* headers = [NSDictionary dictionaryWithObjectsAndKeys: soapaction, @"SOAPAction", "text/xml; charset=utf-8", @"Content-Type", nil];

fRef [...]

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Vampire Weekend’s self-titled debut was my favorite album last year, with its catchy blend of afro-pop with ska, classical, and indie pop sounds. This blog post offers some details and a great new song called White Sky. The new song is recognizable as Vampire Weekend’s style and sounds like a lost track from “Graceland”. I’m [...]

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My favorite iPhone twitter application, Tweetie, is now available for the Mac. It’s replaced Twhirl & Nambu as my favorite Twitter client.
Tweetie’s user interface is clean & gorgeous. It has the features I want in a Twitter client: separate views for friend’s tweets, replies, and direct messages, and makes it easy to track new tweets [...]

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XCode provides several ways to make your work easier by cutting down on repetitive typing. The simplest (from a usage standpoint) is text macros. You simply type an abbreviation and hit Escape to substitute it. A text macro can have variable substitutions where you can add text.
I’ve seen a few contradictory articles telling how to [...]

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The Hit List is the latest entry in the crowded field of GTD software for the Mac. The most notable thing about The Hit List is its beautiful, elegant user interface, simplicity, and speed. It has become one of my favorite applications because it just “feels right”.

The interface looks just like a note pad. To [...]

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There has been an explosion of new desktop Twitter clients recently. All of them offer some unique features.
I want a Twitter client to be lightweight and non-intrusive, like the old favorite, Twitterrific. However, it’s starting to show its age and it lacks a few features I want, such as showing replies & direct messages in [...]

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There has been a lot of controversy over MacHeist, accusing it of ‘cheapening’ or devaluing software. In reality it’s a good thing for developers by bringing in sales that they wouldn’t get otherwise.
Case in point: I have very little use for Kinemac or BoinxTV, so I never would have bought those products. I’m glad to [...]

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If you’re writing a Mac or iPhone application that supports localization, you should be aware that the language & locale could be different. The preferred language can be changed in the International preference pane by changing the order of languages in the list.

However, when you change the language order, it doesn’t change the locale, which [...]

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When I noticed the free iDrive backup utility at MacUpdate, I decided to download and try it, which requires signing up for the iDrive service. Big mistake. When you sign up for iDrive, you’re prompted to invite friends from your gmail address book. When you do so, it doesn’t give you an option to choose [...]

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Apple touts their new iPod Shuffle as the ultimate in simplicity, as it has no buttons. However, having too few buttons doesn’t make it simpler, when each button has multiple functions and Apple needs to post a knowledge base article telling how to use all of the functions.

The new iPod Shuffle uses a controller built [...]

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One thing that always bothered me about Safari was the inability to display formatted XML as Firefox and other Mozilla-based browsers do. Thanks to Marc Liyanage’s XML View Plugin, that’s no longer the case. Simply drop the plugin in ~/Library/Internet Plugins and restart Safari.

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I use my Drobo for Time Machine backups, which very quickly eats up disk space. With 2 drives installed, the Drobo had a capacity of a little less than 1TB, which was about half full. Since it has 4 bays, that leaves plenty of room for expansion.
Last week, a few places were selling the WD [...]

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