Category: mac

Theft-prevention for your Mac

Last year, I wrote about some folks in San Antonio who lost a couple of iMacs to theft. The SAPD reports that crime went up last year from 2006, and I have heard, secondhand, from a crime-statistician that there has been a marked increase again in 2008.
It goes without saying that portable computers are even more vulnerable than desktops, and it’s inconvenient to use on them the security cables I mentioned in the previous post.

So here are a few software-plus-service packages that people should know about. One of them you may already be using:

Back to My Mac

Since Leopard came out, the MobileMe-né-.Mac service has offered a feature called Back to My Mac. I’m not going to dwell on this, because it is one of the least reliable things Apple has ever produced, but it is worth mentioning that it did help one user reclaim her stolen MacBook.

Paid services: MacPhoneHome and Undercover

These are really cool services, and quite inexpensive. I really like that they involve one-time fees, with no monitoring charges. The first one, MacPhoneHome, has been around for awhile, along with its cousin PCPhoneHome. They purport success, and the $30 tag is great. But my main man Erick recently uncovered Undercover, which has a phenomenal feature set, and is clearly designed by Mac lovers. I’m sure both of these services would have roughly the same chance of recovering your property — may you never have to find out — but Undercover just feels like a better product.

Dynamic DNS

I also won’t spend much time here either, ‘cos it would have to get technical. Quick definition: Dynamic DNS uses a free service such as dyndns.com to translate an IP address — be it your home or office internet’s ever-changing IP, or whichever connection your laptop happens to be using a the moment — into a hostname, e.g. johnqmacbook.dyndns.org. So I have a program called DNSUpdate continually reporting my MacBook Pro’s external IP address to DynDNS. It’s a system-level process that starts at bootup, so the hope is that, if someone swiped my laptop and fired it up, it would reports its address, and just maybe Johnny Law could work with the relevant internet service provider to track down that last-known location. It’s a long shot, but the other services discussed here partially bet on the same probability.

Stop Time Machine from nagging about every external disk

Straight from afp548.com:

Wednesday, January 09 2008 @ 09:37 pm CST
Contributed by: macshome

TipsA while back I posted a tip on a useful, but little known, preference setting for dealing with the Kerberos Agent dialog box. Today I’m posting another little known setting to handle an even more annoying box. The time machine “Use this disk for backup?” dialog.

The scenario is like this. Every time you plug in a different external disk time machine asks if you want to use it for backups. This is fine for the home user that can just click the No button, and get on with life. This is a giant pain in a managed deployment though as the setting is set per machine, not disk. Imagine if you have 3,000 Macs and 500 external disks that float around. That’s a lot of nag windows and a lot of chances for users to screw up. What we need is a way to set a policy that tells time machine to not ask about every disk that is plugged in. That way we can guide the users to the correct result. Here it is (one line):

defaults write com.apple.timemachine DoNotOfferNewDisksForBackup -bool YES

As with the Kerberos setting, I would push this with policy so that you don’t need to touch every Mac by hand.

Totally great enhancements to OS X

I’m editing this from my old web page. I’ll do an updated list soon; meanwhile I tweaked this, struck out some old stuff, and emboldened my favorites. Since I’ve been blogging, I’ve posted many more entries like this, but I want to preserve this list as a sample of the Mac tweaks I use all the time. I believe that the key to making OS X work best for you is to customize it. There are so many fantastic 3rd-party apps and add-ons out there, and often for free. The modern Mac can handle more of these tweaks than one might think, and without hiccupping a bit. If I like them, and they’re shareware, I’ve paid the few bucks, and they’ve had a great effect on my productivity. (Note: this list is mostly not about stand-alone applications, but rather plug-ins that modify the operation of the Mac.)

SMARTreporter – get notified if one of your hard drives is going to fail. Of course, even if it does, you’re fine, because you’re backing up every day, right?

MondoMouse – I’m putting this so close the top because I’m totally in love with it! Resize or move windows without clicking on a window handle. Totally crucial for smaller screens, especially.

Déjà Vu – If you’re not backing up every day, you will lose something precious at some time in your computing life. I may not even touch your computer if you don’t have an external backup. So, we can use Déjà Vu to schedule backups. Plug in your Firewire drive, and enjoy peace of mind. SuperDuper and ChronoSync are also fantastic. Slightly different tools for different situations. Time Machine is an amazing piece of software, but after almost a year with it, I still find it very hard to trust as one’s exclusive backup method. We almost always have at least a SuperDuper clone on a separate partition. (By the way, if you were wondering, Apple’s Backup is kind of terrible, but the next version of OS X —10.5 Leopard, due this Spring — will include a program called Time Machine that promises a great new era in backups.)

AppleScript and Automator – Yes, I know these are built-in, but the point is fantastic sites such as Doug’s AppleScripts for iTunes and automator.us and Automator World are just fantastic for boosting one’s efficiency.

LaunchBar – The future of search was in our hands well before Tiger was announced! I can’t wait to see how LB incorporates with Apple’s next-generation operating system.

Quicksilver – A lot like LaunchBar, but free and with all kinds of neat little plug-ins built in. Quicksilver can also replace Spark to launch apps with keyboard shortcuts. I prefer the LaunchBar/Spark/Synergy/PTHPasteboard setup, mostly because Quicksilver ran a little slow on my PowerBook. Now that I’ve added memory to my laptop, I might give QS another try.

Default Folder X – How to get to favorite and recent files instantaneously. Tried-and-true since OS 9. Fantastic in a production environment.

PTHPasteboard – This free multi-item clipboard dramatically reduces my having to switch between applications. Keyboard activated, of course, or what would be the point. (BTW, Quicksilver has this, and Spark, and Synergy, all built-in.)

Spark – Set up your own shortcut keys

Unsanity haxies – These folks have been the most consistently great developers for minor-but-major add-ons for OS X. Check out:

  • WindowShade – Bring back that useful little OS 9 feature
  • Menu Master – instantly assign a keyboard shortcut to any menu item

Peter Maurer – I don’t use these so much anymore, but Maurer’s stuff is genius, much like the Unsanity group. He does Butler, which is a lot like LaunchBar and QuickSilver, but you should also look at:

  • TextExpander – Autocompletes text that you type frequently (the company SmileOnMyMac bought it from him recently)
  • Witch – Enhances the Apple-Tab application switching to include all open windows

Salling Clicker – the best reason to buy a Bluetooth phone
So cool, and man I miss it from my Sony-Ericsson & Treo days, but it ain’t available for the iPhone. The developer comments here.

MailUnreadStatusBar – puts a count of unread e-mails in your menu bar
Or you could go for Inbox Zero.

Synergy – best-of-breed iTunes control

You Control – I gotta admit, for a one-stop package, it’s worth every cent.
Haven’t used it in a while. It seemed to take a lot of resources.

MenuCalendarClock – iCal integration in a highly configurable menu-bar clock. And now there’s a new, free menu bar widget called MagiCal that does much of the same thing.

Text Wielder – a collection that will show in the Services submenu of any Cocoa (OS X-native) application. Look for more Services, such as CalcService, on VersionTracker. (Note: The link to TextWielder will begin downloading the disk image.)
Services were a fine idea, but they just never seem to have made it.

SBook – convert text to an Address Book card
Definitely made moot by Leopard’s Data Detectors

Just good software:

VueScan – The best scanning software available, and compatible with just about any scanner you can plug into your Mac

GraphicConverter – a great “can opener” for hundreds of kinds of image files

Confirmed: Only install apps via iTunes

The guys on MacBreak Weekly back up what I've experienced: Installing apps via App Store on the iPhone just spells trouble. Do it only through iTunes.

UPDATE: This … umm … feels less true, and since iTunes 8, the process of downloading and updating apps is a lot better. But I’ve got a lot of hope placed in iPhone software 2.1, coming out tomorrow, as my 3rd-party apps just started crashing again, after a full 2 weeks of stability.

I BLOODY HATE SYNCING

Jerked with Google Apps & Calendar today for an hour. Several
roadblocks, making it basically unusable as a collaborative tool. And
today, Google Calendar just got CalDAV. And it shows up in iCal!
And … it doesn't sync from iCal to the iPhone, over MobileMe or
otherwise.

Sonuvafrackin'bloodylichenlickin'skeetersuckin'sackin'frassin'mulletmuncher
!

I don't want 3rd-party, $$$-eating shareware conduits. I don't want
miscegenatin' web services. I just want to have one calendar that me
and a partner can edit and share.

I'm so sick of this, I can't see straight. (SSX Blur snowboarding on
the Wii might have something to do with that.)

ARRRRRRRRRRRRGH!!!!

Original iPhone successfully transformed into iPod touch

I didn't have to jailbreak it, or wipe it, or anything. I just popped out the SIM card (using the ultra-modern, paper clip-emulating Jonathan Ive-designed "extraction tool" supplied with my iPhone 3G), and I've got an iPod touch to give my daughter (and a home remote, and perhaps necessary as a spare lest my 3G suffer a mishap). Freakin' awesome!

iPhone Friday: Epic clusterf**k + happy ending

This from the NY Times:
This from “Sluggo”:
AT&T sucks… so does Apple for forcing them on us, very un-Apple-like behavior if you ask me.

Yeah, they do suck. I’m nonplussed at how badly today has gone. I mean, I’m comfortable and happy sitting at a restaurant with wifi, but that’s blissful ignorance, ‘cos I can’t receive any phone calls and don’t know who might be trying to get ahold of me. The grilled salmon at Luca is helping, too.

I don’t guess Apple had much choice but AT&T. Anyone who pays attention to the mobile communications market, and I mean worldwide, knows that a manufacturer has to choose a partner provider, or they can’t get a deal anywhere. It’s like the guy with the greased hair at the high school dance trying to put his hand on every sophomore girl’s ass, and pretty quick he’s got no one to dance with.
It’s also important to remember that, according to reports, Apple did offer the iPhone deal to Verizon, who said that Apple drove too hard a bargain. I know, you’re shocked. So, I’m gonna posit that Verizon is the second best provider in the States to AT&T. Better coverage, slightly more fascistic, about the same level of customer service. Sprint sucks rhino, and T-Mobile rates high in customer support, and terrible in connectivity.
So maybe if you can’t get Verizon, you go with AT&T. It’s possible, too, that the Verizon deal was itself a myth: AT&T is the only GSM provider worth its weight, and GSM is quickly becoming the world standard. Apple doesn’t want to make two iPhone models, one for GSM and one for CDMA, a whole different chipset.
Whether you’re a consumer or a manufacturer, whichever provider you marry, bring a jar of Vaseline to the nuptial consummation.
Perhaps Apple couldn’t have avoided this fiasco. What carrier on earth is used to thousands of devotées showing up, some a week early, to buy a bloody mobile phone on day of launch? We hoped Apple would have been able put up the infrastructure to handle the traffic. It was iTunes that was reporting the failure, but who knows whose servers were at fault?
Ah well. 6 hours after I got started, I have an new, activated iPhone 3G. 
I was without a connection for maybe 2 hours. 
My voicemail has been deleted, but I did take screenshots just in case. 
My original iPhone remains a wireless iPod, which is awesome. 
I’ve got GPS, good fast internet, and a bunch of cool apps. 
There are also more cool apps that cost more than I feel like paying. 
I don’t have copy & paste. 
I don’t need MMS. 
I haven’t tried the 3rd-party video recorder. 
I’m still with godawful AT&T, but I have an unlimited-minutes plan at a reasonable price (not more than I was paying before).
Today was a good day.

It’s twoo! It’s twoo!

Originally posted last Thursday night, but it didn’t go through:

I just put iPhone software 2.0 on my gen 1 phone. I got a bunch of free apps on, and Cro-Mag Rally. So far so good. The Mail app is  
improved nut I don’t see much else yet. And I have to reset sync history I think before contacts & calendar are going to work right. But in the meantime… Whoop!

LogMeIn available for Mac… um… last year

Oh, man, this is top notch: LogMeIn, probably the leading package that let’s you control your computers from afar, finally came out with a Mac controller for their Free package, and … I guess I’m the last to know about it.

Doh!
Previously we have been able to control PCs with LogMeIn, because it has been browser-based, and the same company has had Hamachi, a free VPN thing that I always meant to play with, but didn’t like that I had to use a 3rd-party app to do it. But now LMI has a plug-in to install on the Mac. Very very sweet.

So, I was talking with a new client who lives a little ways out of San Antonio, and we were discussing the methods I use to provide support, and he said, “Well, you could always connect to me with LogMeIn.” 
Hernh-wha?!
Sho’ ’nuff: About 20 minutes later, I had an account at LogMeIn and was able to access my own computer from afar. I had set up a VPN for this already, but LogMeIn is way easier. I can’t believe they released it to beta a year ago, and went 1.0 in December, but anyway I’m glad to have it now!
Now, they don’t have their Pro version available for Mac, so you can’t grab files or print remotely like you can with a VPN, so that latter option might still be preferable for many folks, perhaps with Hamachi and perhaps with the iVPN solution I mentioned previously. But just being able to get to your screen is huge.
Incidentally, security goes like this: You have a password to log in to your LogMeIn account, and then to control your computer you need to enter the name and password for your user account. 
And what do we learn from this? Pleeeeeeease make sure you have good, strong passwords on all of your accounts, both online and on your computer, and please don’t use the same password for every frackin’ thing you do!
Log me up, Scotty.