Comments Open Again

On the advice of one of my wise readers I have installed mt-blacklist.

So I’ve opened comments again - and we’ll see what happens…

Another thing I love about the Internet

It has a bountiful population of Skilled Cynical Photoshoppers:

I.C.E.!

In Car Electronics don’t come much better than this:

A Mac installed into a car - with a suitably high level of fit & finish (as befits a car-mac!)

I was half-dreaming of doing something similar with my old Pismo powerbook - nice to see it can be done well. He even put an Ethernet switch in there - LAN parties on the move!

Secret Finder Shortcuts in Mac OS X Panther

Well - they’re not really secret - but you’d have to do a lot of googling to find them.

Get KeyCaps Back:

KeyCaps was an application from the Classic OS that showed what characters you get if you use various different key chords (especially useful for option-key-chords where the resulting character isn’t printed on the keyboard anywhere - e.g. the TradeMark)

In Panther the application has been consumed by the ‘Input’ Menu, but this isn’t obvious since you need to enable it in the ‘International’ System Preference Pane.

(p.s. a quick way to launch System Prefs for keyboard junkies is to press Option and one of the ‘media keys’ (i.e. mute, sound up/down, brightness up/down))

Add to Favourites in Finder

In Panther the Favourites folder has been replaced by the Sidebar - it’s an improvement, but the Favourites folder can be useful because it actually is a folder. The ‘Add to Favourites’ menu item in the Finder (and shortcut: command-T) have been replaced by an ‘add to Sidebar’ item.

They haven’t disappeared however - you just have to hold shift to get them back:

Alas it looks like the Command-Shift-F shortcut to jump to the Favourites folder has disappeared for good though (strangely the shortcut still works in Open/Save panels, but in Carbon Applications only.)

Drag Icon Proxies from the Dock (in Panther)

OK - not really a finder hint - but useful and not obvious:

I think that the Dock is great - it has a very simple UI and does many different things. (Tog thinks otherwise - but that’s another discussion.)

The icons in the dock are ‘proxies’ - this means that you can do things to the file that the icon represents - by doing it to the proxy icon. So you can drag a file out of the dock and on to a folder - and the original file will be moved to that folder. However - it’s not obvious that this is true - because when you drag a file (or application) from the dock it ‘poofs’. You can stop them poofing by holding down the Command button while dragging them.

Jump straight to the Search Box in Panther

The built-in search box in the Finder’s Toolbar in Panther is very useful - but it may not be entirely obvious how to get keyboard focus to it quickly- pressing tab may be your first thought (like tabbing up to Safari’s location and google boxes) - but this doesn’t work, because Tab in the Finder selects the next file (by alphabetical order).

There is a way to jump to the search box quickly though, just press Command-Option-F.

For loads of useful hints: MacOSXHints.com

Vodafone Customer Care

A transcript of my attempt to tell Vodafone that their web site isn’t working properly:

Call 1 -> 191 -> Voice Menu -> choose Billing Dept.:

me: “Hi, you website doesn’t have an option for sending feedback about the website itself - is there a department I could talk to about a problem with the online billing system?”

guy1: “Sure, they are called e-care - do you want me to put you through?”

me: “yes, please.”

< click > -> Back to Voice Menu -> choose Billing Dept. again:

me: “Hi, I’m trying to get hold of e-care - but your voice menu system doesn’t seem to have an option for that or anything like it. Do you have a number for them?”

guy2: “Yes, sure it’s xxx-xxx-xxx ”

me: “thanks.”

Call 2 -> xxx-xxx-xxx -> Same voice menu -> choose billing.

me: “Hi, I am trying to get through to e-care - number I was given dumps me in the same voice menu and there don’t seem to be any suitable options for them: Do you know how to get hold of e-care?”

lady1: “OK, the trick to that is not to choose anything from the menu - just wait for all the talking to end and don’t press anything and you should get them.”

me: “OK, thanks.”

Call 3 -> xxx-xxx-xxx -> Voice Menu again - > don’t press anything -> get a bit of silence then a constant tone.

Call 4 -> xxx-xxx-xxx -> Voice Menu -> (cellular) Network dept. for a change

me: “Hi, I know it’s not your department, because you’re Network…”

lady2: “No, we’re Billing.”

me: “hmmm, I see - do you know how to get hold of e-care? I tried not pressing any of the options on the voice menu, it just hung-up on me.”

lady2: “It’s a hidden option - option 6, try that - but I heard that other people were having problems getting through too. We’ve been having problems with our switchboard - for the last four months. I’d try again a bit later.”

me: “…. right. Thanks very much. Glad to see that one of the world’s largest telecoms companies has it’s phones working properly.”

lady2: [laughs]

Nintendo announces new Handheld

I read on Slashdot that Nintendo have announced a new handheld games device to be released later this year. The most notable feature seems to be the fact it has two screens…

Game and Watch is back!

Naked

I’m not signing-up - why don’t you try it?

Bad CSV files

Before XML, back in the mists of the 20th century people needed a way to get datasets between databases. They came up with a system called CSV:

Comma-Separated Variable (C-S-V)
A file format used primarily to transfer basic data between databases and spreadsheets. Each line (up to the carriage return) is considered a record. Fields within each record are divided by a comma. Each line must have the same number of fields (commas). If a comma or leading and/or trailing blanks appear in any field value the field must be enclosed by quotes (”) to indicate the information is data and not a field divider.

Vodafone and BT now offer online billing - which is nice - and they also provide CSV files to download that contain the bill data. This is even nicer - since you can squirt it into MySQL (or any other DB) and you’ve got a digital record of all your outgoing phone calls.

What’s not so nice is when Vodafone doesn’t create it’s CSV files properly.

Below you will see two views of part of my bill -

This one is from the online bill

This one is the CSV file.

The value that represents the volume of data transferred during a data call contains a comma 15,801 BT. This a problem - because commas define value boundaries - so any DB trying to import the file will get out of sync and split the value into two new values 15 and 801 BT. This then causes all data after this value (in this line) to be put in the wrong field.

Sigh..

The designers of CSV realised that commas in values would cause a problem - so they added the ability to “encapsulate” the values in inverted commas - Then there’s no problem because the computer importing the file knows that since the comma is within the “” marks it does not designate the start of a new value.

Does vodafone encapsulate their values to avoid this? No.

Why can’t big companies - get basic IT right? It makes you wonder how well their complex IT systems are run….

Of course the Vodafone web-site feedback form has no option for feedback about the site its-self.

No more comments

Really bored of Comment-spam-Scum.

So I’ve disabled comments on new posts.

Fantasy Gadget List

I (like many geeks) have a fantasy-gadget list that I always have in my head - things that anyone can easily live without, but you’d buy instantly in a gluttonous consumer-therapy binge if you won the lottery tomorrow:

Here’s a snapshot of my list:

SkyPlus - a PVR that works with the UK’s digital broadcasting near-monopoly.
A Scanner with a Document Feeder - for easier Paper to PDF
A SpeedTrap Detector - for the car. The UK is riddled with Gatsos.
A DAB digital radio tuner for my computer - alas there is none that works with OS X (as far as I know.)
A SqueezeBox - Wireless Audio Streaming to normal Hi-Fi devices.
New head unit for my car - One that works with the Mini’s steering wheel controls and allows a connection to 1st Gen iPods.
Bluetooth Handsfree Kit for my car - my headset works, but is fiddly to get in the ear.
Optical In/Out for my G4 Server (which holds my music) - £70 seems a bit steep for a slight improvement in audio out.

a G5 of course!

Exchange Rate

The $ exchange rate to Sterling is (at the time of writing) 0.551815

A Dual 2GHz G5 (with a few extras) on the US Apple Store is $3,273.00 = £1,806.09

On the UK store an identically spec’ed machine is £2,517.99

Grr…

What is Mac OS X

Amazingly detailed article on how Mac OS X works (aimed at UNIX-type people). Hardcore Geek-stuff.

Link Here.