Yet, he goes on.

UI Fix-it Apps Rant: Fantastical

Thu, 18 Apr 2013 11:05:00 -0500

I do not care to entertain the makers of alternate UIs for built-in functions of a computer unless they provide extraordinary value beyond the default option.

Fantastical

Fantastical currently allows entry for a due date on a new reminder, but does not support the “remind me on” or “remind me at a location” features of the Mountain Lion Reminders app. Furthermore, the Due Date setting is only able to input a date and not a time beyond the preferences for default reminder times.

“Put the broken AppleTV in your bag tonight at 9pm” makes sense to me as a reminder item but not a calendar event, because were I to miss the alert on my phone that evening, the next morning at least I’d be able to see the item in my to-do list and curse my previously exhausted self. As a calendar item, if I miss the alert, I’m likely to never see it again since my work Calendar app is set to only display work hours.

Similar value is added by the location features of Reminders.

Entering a reminder AND a calendar item defeats the purpose of being able to set a reminder time on a single item. Entering the reminder via Fantastical and then editing the details in Reminders defeats the purpose of using a third-party app.

Verdict

Looks nice; won’t buy.

Conclusion

Even if they fixed this above issue, they try to support calendar and reminder in both Apple’s Calendar and Reminders, but also for BusyCal and Outlook. It’s likely that one customer group’s needs or requests will affect the experience of others, and one person’s workflow ends up trying to change mine.

No thanks.

Besides, with the Forstall/Ive switch up, the likelihood of Reminders and Calendar being “fixed” in how they handle pop-out windows for edits may change, perhaps rendering the need for this UI-fix unnecessary. Sure, in that time a year or more could pass before delivering the “good version” of these built-in apps, but at the same time Fantastical doesn’t demonstrate enough competency in completely overhauling the problem it meant to fix.

gingerhaze: Prometheus sequel idea: Vickers survived getting...

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 16:19:51 -0500

gingerhaze:

Prometheus sequel idea: Vickers survived getting smushed, bums a ride in Shaw and David’s sweet new alien ship. Cue wacky space road trip movie with three people who hate each other.

At some point they play a game of “keepaway” with David’s head as the ball.

I would be less confused by this than the original Prometheus.

Scripting Controllermate to Change Function Key Row Behavior

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 19:57:00 -0500

Using ControllerMate 4, I created a page for enabling mouse configuration for StarCraft 2 that swaps back when I tab out to Safari or Finder (anything not SC2). Using the above scripts as a starting place, I added AppleScript blocks that specifically enable or disable the Function Key behavior, as well as set up a fallback trigger.

My modified scripts uses a shell script to test the current value of the F-key row state, decides if it should swap the value and if it should display a message if changed. I’m displaying my message via Notification Center with the help of this trick. All my Macs are 10.8, so it doesn’t check for version number or that terminal-notifier.app is properly installed into ~/Applications/.

ControllerMate 4 configuration

Scripts

Function Swapper.applescript

tell application "System Preferences"
    set current pane to pane "com.apple.preference.keyboard"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    if UI elements enabled then
        tell tab group 1 of window "Keyboard" of process "System Preferences"
            click checkbox "Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys"

            if (do shell script "defaults read -g com.apple.keyboard.fnState") = "1" then
                set fnStateRead to "Special Keys - Volume, iTunes..."
            else
                set fnStateRead to "Function Keys - F1, F2, F3..."
            end if

            do shell script "~/Applications/terminal-notifier.app/Contents/MacOS/terminal-notifier -message \"Function Swapper, an AS &amp; Shell script\" -title \"" &amp; fnStateRead &amp; "\"  -activate com.orderedbytes.ControllerMate4"

        end tell
    else
        tell application "System Preferences"
            set current pane ¬
                to pane "com.apple.preference.universalaccess"
            display dialog ¬
                "UI element scripting is not enabled. Check \"Enable access for assistive devices\""
        end tell
    end if
end tell

tell application "System Preferences"
    quit
end tell

Function Function.applescript

tell application "System Preferences"
    set current pane to pane "com.apple.preference.keyboard"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    if UI elements enabled then
        tell tab group 1 of window "Keyboard" of process "System Preferences"

            if (do shell script "defaults read -g com.apple.keyboard.fnState") = "0" then

                click checkbox "Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys"

                set fnStateRead to "Function Keys - F1, F2, F3..."

                do shell script "~/Applications/terminal-notifier.app/Contents/MacOS/terminal-notifier -message \"Function Swapper, an AS &amp; Shell script\" -title \"" &amp; fnStateRead &amp; "\"  -activate com.orderedbytes.ControllerMate4"

            end if
        end tell
    else
        tell application "System Preferences"
            set current pane ¬
                to pane "com.apple.preference.universalaccess"
            display dialog ¬
                "UI element scripting is not enabled. Check \"Enable access for assistive devices\""
        end tell
    end if
end tell

tell application "System Preferences"
    quit
end tell

Function Special.applescript

tell application "System Preferences"
    set current pane to pane "com.apple.preference.keyboard"
end tell

tell application "System Events"
    if UI elements enabled then
        tell tab group 1 of window "Keyboard" of process "System Preferences"

            if (do shell script "defaults read -g com.apple.keyboard.fnState") = "0" then
            else

                click checkbox "Use all F1, F2, etc. keys as standard function keys"

                set fnStateRead to "Special Keys - Volume, iTunes..."

                do shell script "~/Applications/terminal-notifier.app/Contents/MacOS/terminal-notifier -message \"Function Swapper, an AS &amp; Shell script\" -title \"" &amp; fnStateRead &amp; "\"  -activate com.orderedbytes.ControllerMate4"

            end if
        end tell
    else
        tell application "System Preferences"
            set current pane ¬
                to pane "com.apple.preference.universalaccess"
            display dialog ¬
                "UI element scripting is not enabled. Check \"Enable access for assistive devices\""
        end tell
    end if
end tell

tell application "System Preferences"
    quit
end tell

roderickin: Turn your key, sir!

Wed, 27 Mar 2013 17:18:22 -0500

roderickin:

Turn your key, sir!

But if you don’t sign in, you can only read the first...

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 11:25:40 -0600

But if you don’t sign in, you can only read the first answer of why Quora won’t connect you to the other answers.

designstroy: (via gregg_koenig) Nothing can kill the Grimace

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 21:45:13 -0600

designstroy:

(via gregg_koenig)

Nothing can kill the Grimace

FB Auto-Poker

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 14:47:00 -0500

FB Auto-Poker:

This exists: http://bit.ly/NYYR6I

"At least Facebook cuts down on the number of chain FWD emails."

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 13:47:56 -0500

“At least Facebook cuts down on the number of chain FWD emails.”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

"Resharing and “likes” appearing in the news feed are the cancer that’s killing /b/..."

Thu, 26 Jul 2012 13:46:01 -0500

“Resharing and “likes” appearing in the news feed are the cancer that’s killing /b/ *cough* I mean Facebook…”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

"My favorite people: When leaving a voice message, say what the issue/reason is, phone number, name,..."

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 13:30:10 -0500

“My favorite people: When leaving a voice message, say what the issue/reason is, phone number, name, phone number again.”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

Jack Daniel's has a very nice trademark lawyer

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 09:14:32 -0500

Jack Daniel's has a very nice trademark lawyer:

Wow, there exist friendly and helpful trademark/IP lawyers?

http://bit.ly/O8EBz2

Daisy likes Mike (Taken with Instagram at Mill Valley...

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 07:04:11 -0500

Daisy likes Mike (Taken with Instagram at Mill Valley Apartments)

Photo

Sat, 21 Jul 2012 12:54:08 -0500

Photo

Fri, 20 Jul 2012 22:46:56 -0500

"“Toys are expenive” I know, how are we going to save for Daisy’s college in this..."

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 19:40:20 -0500

“

“Toys are expenive”

I know, how are we going to save for Daisy’s college in this economy?

”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

wget mirror a tumblr site

Wed, 18 Jul 2012 16:48:00 -0500

Thanks to a subtlety in one wget manual, the trick to making wget mirror a tumblr site while also grabbing the images found on the “media” tumblr subdomains and yet not downloading all of tumblr (or at least the social network of your target site) is the dot prefix when specifying allowed domain spanning.

-D .media.tumblr.com,targetsite.tumblr.com

Here’s my script for nabbing an entire tumblr site which also ignores any images less than the “1024” size.

#!/bin/bash
#
# TumblrDownloader - Mirror the content of a tumblr URL
#
#   Script written by Mike Cramer, started April 16, 2012.
#   If released to the public, assume this is under a BSD/GPL style license.
#
#   Questions about this script? Send a message to kiodane [at] Google's email service.

tumblrURL=$1

mkdir -p $tumblrURL
cd $tumblrURL

wget -mpNHk -D .media.tumblr.com,$tumblrURL -R "*avatar*","*\?*","*_[0-9][0-9][0-9].*" http://$tumblrURL -o wgetLog.txt

cd ..

echo
echo '#################'
echo Done with $tumblrURL
echo '#################'

"Fun, phone crashed so it wouldn’t wake up."

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 15:59:11 -0500

“Fun, phone crashed so it wouldn’t wake up.”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

Photo

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 15:58:34 -0500

"Wilted lettuce, way too much mayo, and the tomatoes were mush. Odd how a normally fancy sandwich and..."

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 12:08:40 -0500

“Wilted lettuce, way too much mayo, and the tomatoes were mush. Odd how a normally fancy sandwich and salad can put me in the mood for raman.”

- from Mike Cramer’s Facebook

Just Plain Batty

Tue, 17 Jul 2012 11:16:05 -0500

Just Plain Batty