Crazy Apple News Site

In Last Chance To See Douglas Adams talks about writing a program that is very sexy and has pull down menus and everything, and it’s entire purpose is to figure out the volume of the nests made by a certain kind of bird. In an article called “Frank The Vandal” he writes about a desire to be able to take just the parts of programs you want and paste them into a workflow so that you can do whatever it is you want to do without using six different programs. This is a mindset that resonates with me. If I can spend a few happy minutes¹ writing pointless software to solve a problem now instead of seconds taking care of it manually once a week I will definitely go for the pointless software. It was in this vein that I tackled the following

Extremely Small Problem:

I do a lot of what Natalie Goldberg calls “practice writing”. which is where you just block out some time and keep writing for that entire time. This writing can be directed, or not, but the goal is to keep moving forward, to keep putting words on the page, or, in my case, into the text document. This isn’t “real” writing that you plan to put in front of other people some day, this is just exercise, to keep those writing muscles in shape.

When you exercise your muscles, you aren’t left with an artifact of your exercise. But when you do writing exercise, you have this document that you created, and have to do something with it. It’s possible that some part of it might be worth something to you in some context, so it seems wasteful to just delete it. Once again referring to Natalie Goldberg, these are like compost; they’re not really valuable by themselves, but if you keep piling them up there’s a chance that someday something good will grow out of them. Being the nerd that I am, I decided that I would keep all these useless little documents, and I would keep them all in one folder, so they would stay out the way.

So, on my home Mac I set up Hazel to just take those documents, rename them to today’s date (which gives me a good record of which days I did my writing practice and which days I didn’t) and shove them in a folder. All of this happens without me thinking about it, because Hazel is awesome. So, here comes the extremely small problem:

Sometimes I do my writing practice on my laptop, which is a PC.

Because I’m insane and picky and whatnot I use FocusWriter on the PC² and FocusWriter, by default, produces Rich Text files (rtf files). BUT I have WriteRoom set to produce plain text files (txt files). It’s possible that I could just set FocusWriter to save things as txt files by default, but that’s crazy talk. Simple solutions need not apply, thank you very much. And I still have the problem of getting my little documents³ from my PC to my mac, and in the right folder.

Now, I grant you, I could move these files myself, but part of being who I am is having a rock-solid conviction that I shouldn’t be thinking about things if I can make a computer think about them for me. My ultimate goal is to be able to write something mindlessly and forget about it, secure in the knowledge that when I look for it⁴ it’ll be where I expect it to be.

After a little bit of thinking and a little more tinkering, I came up with the following

Gloriously Baroque Solution:

The moving parts involved here are (in order):

1. Dropbox
2. Hazel
3. Automator
4. Word 2011 for Mac
5. Hazel again

Here’s how it goes:

I write my useless document, and save it to a particular folder in my Dropbox. It’s instantly beamed to all the other computers that are connected to my Dropbox account.

On my mac, Hazel is monitoring that folder, and sees a new rtf file show up. It starts a rule⁵ that renames the file and moves it into my “compost” folder. But the file is still an rtf instead of a txt file! Not to worry, this is where it calls Automator.

I’ve created an Automator workflow that takes the file, loads it into Word, converts it into a txt file and saves it.⁶  It then hands control back to Hazel. The Hazel rule completes, and colors the label of the original rtf file gray. This triggers a second Hazel rule that is watching the compost folder. This rule does one thing: if it finds an rtf file with a gray label it puts it in the trash. Since these files are only turned gray after the txt version is created I’m no longer worried about keeping the rtf file around.

This all works perfectly, much to my surprise, and (even more surprisingly) usually takes less than five seconds to run, even with all the Word opening and closing stuff. And since it’s happening while I’m not at my mac it’s effectively happening instantly.

Conclusion

Well, there isn’t one, really. All in all this took me about 20 minutes to set up, and will save me a few seconds of work a few times a week. But it’s work that I’m unlikely to do by myself, which would compromise the integrity of my compost folder. So, here’s to creative solutions to minuscule problems!

1. or hours [↩]
2. it most closely matches the functionality of WriteRoom, which is what I use on my mac [↩]
3. which, you’ll remember, are pretty much worthless [↩]
4. which may nor may not ever happen, but that’s beside the point [↩]
5. Hazel’s name for a set of actions that happen when a certain condition is met [↩]
6. and then closes Word. I don’t know why this is a separate step, but it is. [↩]

With Apple’s official announcement that they do remember how to make desktop operating systems the gate has been opened for rampant speculation. We here at CANS have never been above such things, and we see no reason to pretend we are now. Here, then, is our feature list for what looks to be OSX 10.7 “Lion”¹ :

• Apple finally breaks down and puts Blu-Ray into the Mac. Yeah, that’s too crazy even for us.
• Five, count ‘em five new wallpapers!
• Building on the success of the iOS ecosystem, Apple will limit you to seven screens’ worth of apps on your Mac. “How many word processors do you actually need? Steve Jobs will explain.²
• Apple will announce a new MacBook Air. It will have a touch screen and a detachable keyboard. Critics who point out that it looks a lot like an iPad and keyboard set bundled into one box will never be heard from again.
• Lion will have a new 3D interface that utilizes a living room motif. The Sign-in screen will be the front door, your office apps would be on a desk, your games on a shelf, your movies in an entertainment center, etc. It’ll be high-tech and awesome and everyone will love it. Critics who point out that it’s just an updated version of Microsoft Bob will never be heard from again.
• Apple will stop supporting Adobe Flash on the desktop. “Oh, we have the technology,” Jony Ive will say. “We just like to tweak Adobe every now and again. Besides, who even needs Flash, now that Homestar Runner isn’t updating any more?”

The possibilities are endless³ ! Have a guess? Shout it out loud and proud in the comments.

1. Might not actually be called “Lion”, but come on. Look at the freakin’ picture. What else are they gonna call it? [↩]
2. Steve Jobs is perfectly capable of explaining in the form of a question. [↩]
3. I’m guessing; I could apparently only think of six. [↩]

Join us once again for Fireside Chats, where we bring two points of view together and hope they start hitting each other with chairs, Jerry Springer style. And if ever there was a pairing less likely to do that than our two current guests, we’ve never heard of it.

Today we have iOS, the up-and-coming jack-of-all-devices operating system, and OSX, the elegant master of big computers.
Moderator: Gentlesystems, welcome.

iOS: It’s good to be here.

OSX: Always a pleasure.

Moderator: iOS, you’ve become one of the largest, if not the largest, mobile operating systems in the world in just a few years. OSX, despite your acknowledged superiority, you still struggle to reach 10% of the desktop market. Why do you think that is?

iOS: I have built on the foundation laid by my honorable parent, OSX, and expanded into a new area, an area which before now didn’t really exist.

OSX: I do not hold onto the mistakes of the past that limited my size. Does the gnarled pine curse the rock that forced its seedling into its current shape? Or does it not, instead, seek to turn this obstacle into a chance for greater, more unexpected beauty? Long have I envisioned the day where I might burst forth triumphant, although now I see that this victory may come through my offspring.

iOS: I am humbled and honored.

Moderator: So, OSX, not to tread on this tender moment, but it kinda sounds like you’re giving up there.

OSX: The battle may still be won, but the field is no longer central to the war. Still, we put up the good fight, and expect success on this front.

Moderator: iOS, what about you? How do you see your battle going?

iOS: While it is unwise to try to predict the movements of one’s opponents, I am sanguine in my hopes for victory. the iPad is unrivaled, and no real rivals are seen on the horizon. the iPhone gains in popularity day by day, hardware mistakes notwithstanding. and the iPod Touch, as well, is in a class by itself.

Moderator: That’s true. Despite the continued offerings of Creative and Microsoft, there really isn’t a decent competitor to the iPod Touch, is there? And in some ways, it doesn’t look like there will be. But the iPad is due to see some new entrants into its market soon. How do you see these newcomers?

iOS: These devices are missing the one thing that makes the iPad unique.

Mod: and that is?

iOS: Me. A touch-screen computer running Windows 7 is a mongrel that will have all the tell-tale signs of its desktop heritage cobbled into a mobile platform.

Mod: And what about the WebOS and Android-based tablets due out in the next year or so?

iOS: There we may see some real challenge. Android is a formidable, if uncouth, foe. They seek victory not in the elegance and perfection of their attack, but rather in superiority of numbers.

OSX: I’m still here, you know.

Mod: So you see Android’s chances of domination resting in the number of devices that are deployed using Google’s OS, and not in the engineering quality of said OS?

iOS: There is little to fear, I think, in the “quality” of the Android OS. But it is free to run on any cell network, and this is worth considering.

Mod: This “low-cost-broad-dispersal” technique worked once before, you know.

OSX: Oh, bring that up, why don’t you? Look, Apple was young, they didn’t see it coming. And anyway, that was before my time.

iOS: We have learned from the mistakes of the past, and you may also be sanguine that we will move to exceed our rivals at every turn.

OSX: So I’m invisible and silent now all of the sudden, is that it? Nobody can hear me?

Moderator: Well, we’re out of time here. I’ve been chatting with an extremely confident iOS.

OSX: And me! OSX! The best desktop OS! I’m still here.

Moderator: Join me next time for more Fireside Chats.

Every Friday we publish a list of inFrequently Answered Questions and answers to help you, the Crazy Apple user, get more out of your Crazy Apple products.

This week we bid a loving farewell to Apple’s venerable “desktop” operating system, OSX.

Q: Desktop? What’s a desktop?

A: Well, you see, back before there were iPhones and iPads, even before the ancient MacBook Air first crawled out of the primordial ooze, there was a thing called a “desktop computer”. It was kind of like an iPad, except for less portable.

Q: What do you mean?

A: Well, desktop computers didn’t have batteries, you see, so they had to stay in one place all the time

Q: Barbaric!

A: And they didn’t have touch screens, so you used a physical keyboard and a “mouse” to move the cursor around on the screen.

Q: I’m not okay with the rodent metaphor.

A: Many people weren’t. So that’s why Apple in their wisdom freed us from the scourge of non-portable computing.

Q: Were there any good things about these monstrosities?

A: Oh sure! Like, you could get apps from anywhere, even from stores not owned by Apple!

Q: No such thing!

A: And you could have screens of up to 30″ inches across, sometimes even two of them! But even the most humble of these gentle giants had at least 17″ of screen space.

Q: What would anyone do with that much space?

A: Well, remember those programs you could get from anywhere? You could run a WHOLE BUNCH of them at once, and Apple’s operating system for the desktop machines would let you switch between them, or even have two of them up on the screen at the same time.

Q: It’s like the future happened in the past!

A: There were many things in that era that are lost to us now, like the secret of Exposè, or devices that could be upgraded without being totally replaced. But Apple knows better for us now. They have declared that we must all compute on smaller screens that go with us everywhere, and blessed are we that follow in that righteous path.

Q: Amen.

A: Yet here is irony: those that create apps for us to use on our devices must still use those ancient beasts.

Q: What? How can this be?

A: Indeed, the desktop is not yet fully removed from Apple’s eye. The all-powerful XCode, that which generates the apps of the iPad and iPhone, does not run on our liberated devices. Indeed, it only runs on OSX, that most graceful of past OS’es.

Q: There is some serenity in that thought.

A: Yes, there is hope. The stationary ones may rise again; indeed Apple may yet release a new version of OSX. We can but wait. And hope.

Shocking news from the world of Apple Fandom today as an AP poll shows that there are absolutely no surprises left for those who shell out for Apple’s newest release of OSX. 

“The blogs have covered everything,” said an unnamed operative.¹ “From really, really obvious features like the new QuickTime X to really boring things like the OpenCL framework, every single facet of Snow Leopard has been covered.  I  mean, there have been long, in-depth articles about a “malware protection system” that watches for two packages! What’s that all about?”

The dearth of new material on the arctic cat has left the Apple Blogging Community² with a bit of a problem on their hands. 

“What do we write about?  It’s still to early to start guessing on the code name for 10.7. We’ll have to wait until at least next week for that,” said Leo Laporte.

“I disagree,” disagreed John Gruber, who went on to claim that Apple would name 10.7 “Fireball” after his own illustrious self.

“Let’s face it, I put the Missing Manual to bed six months ago, and since then it’s just been trying to weasel things out from under the NDA.  Now that we’re allowed to talk about it, there’s not really anything left to cover, other than the…oops, that feature’s still under NDA, I forgot. Well, you’ll see,” said a more-smug-than-usual David Pogue.

Those wishing to console the despondent Apple bloggers suggested they talk about rumors of be-camera’ed³ iPods or the coming Apple tablet, but these suggestions were met with moist snorts of derision.  “Out of the frying pan into the fire” was how the Macalope put it.

but fear not, gentle readers! CANS has found the one thing that no other blog has covered, and we will be providing exclusive coverage of that mysterious new thing, the one Apple product upgrade of which no one else knows, right after this week’s iFAQ.

Stay Tuned!

1. AP deals harshly with errant operatives. [↩]
2. That’s right, the ABC. What about it? [↩]
3. most over-punctuated word ever on this blog, ladies and gentlemen! [↩]