macosxhints.com application tips

Two AppleScripts for unmounting, mounting local disk volumes

Tue, 15 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

These AppleScripts are related to this hint. Both can already be found in the replies to the hint topic post, but I'm resubmitting them so that they will appear together.

The first is an improved version of the original AppleScript which presents a dialog box from which a selection of local volumes to be ejected can be made. An example of its usefulness might be that it provides a reliable method for quickly ejecting a MacBook's mounted local volumes for users on the go. I've configured it as a "Run AppleScript" step for an Automator-based Mac OS X Service called "Unmounter" and assigned it the keyboard shortcut of (Command-Control-Shift-E) in System Preferences on my system.

The second is a more robust version of the AppleScript included in my first reply to the original hint topic. It attempts to automatically unmount all unmountable local volumes, and if it finds none, attempts to mo ...

Copy partially played Audiobooks to a playlist

Tue, 15 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

iTunes Smart Playlists don't offer a criteria to find tracks which have been partially played. While "Last Skipped" is an option, this track property may not be set if the track wasn't actually skipped and was merely stopped.

However, if a track's "Remember playback position" option is set (and most audiobooks have this set by default) the track's AppleScript bookmark property will contain the number of seconds that a track has advanced before being stopped. Thus, any track with a bookmark value greater than zero would have been partially played.

Here is an AppleScript that will copy all the tracks in the "Books" library to a new playlist named "Partially Played". Each time it is run it will update the "Partially Played" playlist.

property nameOfPlaylist : "Partially Played"

tell application "iTunes"
	try
		set thePlaylist to some playlist whose name is nameOfPlaylist
	on error
		set thePlaylist to (make playlist with properties {nam ...

Drag files from Safari 5 Downloads popup

Mon, 14 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

I recently tried to drag from Safari's Downloads popup and found that if you drag from the icon of the downloaded file, you can move it where you want.

Click on an icon in the Downloads popup and drag it to any folder, or even onto a Dock icon to launch a file you've just downloaded with a specific application.

[kirkmc adds: This seems obvious, but there's no hint here for it. There have been hints about double-clicking an icon in the Downloads window to open it, copying and pasting URLs from the Downloads window, and the keyboard shortcut to show the Downloads popup (Command-Option-L).]

Remove rubber band scrolling in most apps

Thu, 10 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

Combining some findings from a recent hint and on Apple's forums, I've finally found a way to disable the annoying rubber-band scrolling in most applications. All the credit goes to those guys as they did the initial investigation.

It works in applications like:

Finder
Mail
Preview
TextEdit
Xcode

and probably in most applications that use the standard UI (the string to be used in defaults appears in AppKit.framework). It doesn't work in Safari or iTunes.

In Terminal type:

defaults write -g NSScrollViewRubberbanding -int 0

It should work after you relaunch your applications.

To undo this change, run this command in Terminal:

defaults delete -g NSScrollViewRubberbanding

[kirkmc adds: Works as described. I haven't tested many apps, so feel free to post which o ...

Remove scrolling elasticity in Xcode

Tue, 08 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

Mac OS X Lion introduced iOS-style scrolling elasticity. Do you think it's annoying, and it slows you down while working in Xcode? Here's how to remove it.

Copy this Xcode plugin to the following directory:

~/Library/Application Support/Developer/Shared/Xcode/Plug-ins/

You should create the directories if needed.

Enjoy!

Option-up arrow and Option-down arrow cycle through sent messages in iChat

Wed, 02 May 2012 07:30:00 -0700

When focus is in the text entry field in an iChat chat window, holding option and using your up and down arrow keys cycles through the previous messages you've sent. This is very similar to how Terminal lets you cycle through previous command just using the up and down arrow keys.

[kirkmc adds: I actually spotted this a while ago. I'm not sure why it's there; and I don't really see any use for it, other than, perhaps, to find a text you sent to someone without scrolling in the window, and then copy it to send to someone else. This works in Lion; can anyone confirm that whether works in earlier versions of OS X or not?]

Reduce the size of Google Chrome

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

]Google Chrome keeps older versions of its web browser causing it to balloon in size. I noticed that the Google Chrome App on my Mac was 1.2 GB. That seemed a bit portly for a web browser. Upon looking into the app's bundle, by right-clicking and choosing Show Package Contents, I found multiple old versions of the app, all which appeared to be nearly identical. I removed all but the most recent version and everything appears to run correctly and the app size is now a much more slim 113 MB.

[kirkmc adds: Interesting. On my Mac, in the bundle, in Contents > Versions, there are, indeed, two versions of Chrome. This presumably has something to do with Chrome's silent updating. (Queries on Twitter suggest that this is the norm; a number of people replied that theirs was around 220 MB, as was mine.) Make sure you keep the one with the highest version number. You could also, of course, just download a new copy.

If you want to turn off this automatic updating, s ...

Get rid of intermittent SSH_AUTH_SOCKET environment variable from SSHKeychain

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

SSHKeychain used to set the SSH_AUTH_SOCK environment variable to something like /tmp/50x/SSHKeychain.socket, but even getting rid of SSHKeychain didn't get rid of the environment setting.

I used to use a great little program called SSHKeychain to maintain my ssh world on OS X. Even after Apple's keychain started dealing with ssh-agent properly, I still kept SSHKeychain around for the convenience of maintaining my ssh tunnel configurations in one place.

However, there was an occasional mismatch between the SSHKeychain way of doing things and the Apple keychain way, and SSHKeychain seemed to have fallen into disrepair, with no maintenance (on SourceForge at least) since 2007.

A few months back, I finally got rid of SSHKeychain, and started having problems.

There was apparently a phase-of-the-moon dependent race condition (somewhere) that clobbered the Apple keychain setting of SSH_AUTH_SOCK with a setting left over from SSHKeychain. This man ...

Fix some iChat connection problems

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

There are days when I cannot connect to iChat's servers - well, actually to the AIM servers that iChat uses. The fix is simple yet odd. I use SSL with iChat, and all it takes to get the connection is to turn it off. Go to iChat > Preferences > Accounts, click on your account, then click on the Server Settings tab. You must be offline to make changes here. If you have Use SSL checked, uncheck it, then connect. Disconnect, then reconnect it, if you still want to use SSL. I don't know why this works, but it does.

Convert multiple text files to Mail notes

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

I have been using plain text files (.txt) for storing my notes since the arrival of Notational Velocity a while ago. When I saw that Mountain Lion will have a dedicated Notes app, I decided it would be great to switch over to Mail's notes system in preparation for the new OS.

I couldn't find a suitable method for rapidly importing my text notes into apple mail, so I combined a script found on MacRumors with some python, which can then be packaged into a Service using Automator ("Service receives selected files and folders").

import sys
import os
print sys.argv
for filename in sys.argv[1:]:
    print filename
    text = open(filename,'r').readlines()
    title = os.path.splitext(os.path.basename(filename))[0]
    text = title +'\n'+' '.join(text)

    # Store file contents in clipboard
    outf = os.popen("pbcopy", "w")
    outf.write(text)
    outf.close()

    cmd = """osascript< < END
	tel ...

Make Mail badge report only personal emails

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

The Mail applications can report the number of unread e-mails via a badge on the application�s Dock icon. It would be more useful if the badge showed more relevant personal e-mails (sent to you personally and not to a mailing list, ord sent from somebody you know). This way the user is interrupted less often, while still keeping track of relevant emails. Recently, Gmail has offered a way to prioritize emails (Gmail > Settings > Personal level indicators). The good news is that a similar technique can be used in Mail.

To have the personal emails reported, first create a �Personal email� rule. To create a rule in Mail, choose Mail > Preferences > Rules, then click on "Add rule." Name the rule �Personal email� and select the following:

The rule should match any of the following conditions
"Sender is in my Previous Recipients"
"Sender is in my Address Book"
"Perform action": flag emails with a gray flag

Next, create a ...

Long list of defaults commands

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 07:30:00 -0700

If you've been around this site for a while, you know that the "defaults" command in Terminal can do a lot. It can set many hidden settings and preferences in Mac OS X, and in individual applications.

Mathias Bynens has posted a long list of these commands on github. I haven't looked closely, but I'm willing to bet that some of them haven't been posted here as hints yet.

There used to be a great tool called Secrets, which was a preference pane, and which allowed GUI access to many of these commands. Alas, Secrets hasn't been updated for Lion, so using Terminal is the best way to apply these commands.

If you're unfamiliar with how to use these commands, here's what you need to know. Open Terminal (in /Applications/Utilities), then paste one of the commands into Terminal and press Return. The commands in the list are the parts that begin with "defaults," such as:

default ...

10.7: Disable folder drop-down in Terminal menu bar

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 07:26:00 -0700

In 10.7, Apple changed Terminal to include a drop-down path icon in the window's title bar, similar to what you get in Finder and many other applications.

While some may like this, the problem is that it actually changes the window's title, as seen by applications (such as our own window manager, Moom). For instance, run this command in 10.7's Terminal...

osascript -e "tell application \"Terminal"\ to return name of window 1"

...and you'll see the current folder reflected in the window title. If you'd rather not have the path there, the fix is simple. Just add this command to your .profile file (or whatever file you use to init your Terminal windows):

unset PROMPT_COMMAND

Save the .profile file, close and open a new Terminal window, and you'll see that the folder drop-down has vanished fro ...

Organize videos by group in iTunes

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

In iTunes, there are two ways to categorize your videos: as either Movies or TV Shows. I use the Movies category for very large files, and put everything else in TV Shows, because in the TV Shows library, iTunes allows you to create groups. I've created groups called You Tube Videos, Home Videos, Work Stuff, etc.

To create a group, first make sure both TV Shows and Movies are visible in the iTunes source list. If they're not, go to iTunes' General preferences and check Movies and TV Shows in the Show section.

Next, import your new movie into iTunes by dragging it to the source list where these libraries display. In most cases, iTunes will categorize it as a movie. Select the movie and press Command-I to display the Info window. Click on the Options tab, then, under Media Kind, choose TV Show. If it's as short video, you might want to uncheck Remember Playback Position, because you will most likely always want to start these types of files from the beginning ...

Export PDF to Dropbox directly from iOS device

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

My workflow often involves taking Word Documents and manipulating them with handwritten annotations on my iPad. With this method, I can immediately take a downloaded .docx (or presumably any other MS Office file), convert it to a PDF, get it into my Dropbox, and finally my annotation app; all without leaving the iPad. While it may seem clumsy at first, it only takes four easy steps.

You will need the Pages app, the Dropbox app, a Dropbox account, and a a send to dropbox account.
1. Import your document into the Pages app.
2. Tap the wrench and select "Share and print."
3. Email a PDF to your @sendtodropbox address.
4. Check out the "Attachments" folder in Dropbox (or your desired Dropbox-linked 3rd party app).

[kirkmc adds: I haven't tested this.]

Decompress zip archives that expand to .cpgz archives

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

I'd come across this before, and it was very annoying. Last night, I downloaded a zip archive of freely-distributed MP3 files, and when I double-clicked it to decompress it, all I got was a .cpgz file. This is apparently a zipped CPIO archive file. Double-clicking that file just created the zip file again, and this was an endless loop

Searching on Google, I saw that plenty of people had come across this problem, and offered a number of suggestions, none of which worked for me. Some articles suggested that the download might have been corrupted, but as this was a very large file, I didn't want to try and download it again.

The solution for me was to use the free The Unarchiver, which has turned out to be a Swiss army knife for decompressing many obscure types of archives. Opening the file with The Unarchiver decompressed it correctly.

I didn't think of it at the time - and I have since deleted th ...

Delete Mail messages with Control-H keyboard shortcut

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

The other day on Twitter, Macworld senior editor Dan Frakes mentioned that he had accidentally discovered an undocumented keyboard shortcut to delete messages in Mail. My guess is that he just leaned on his keyboard, but he figured out, after deleting a number of messages, that this shortcut is Control-H.

This makes sense, as this is the Unix keybinding for the Backspace or Delete key (see this Wikipedia article), and OS X uses these shortcuts, at least in Cocoa applications; you can use the Control-H shortcut to delete text in those applications that use the Cocoa text input framework. But its use to delete messages in Mail is interesting. If anyone discovers other apps where this works, post them in the comments.

Google Earth for iOS opens .kmz files from websites or sent by e-mail

Tue, 20 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

The latest update to Google Earth for iOS, version 6.2, can open .kmz or .kml files on websites, but you can also e-mail these to yourself to use on your iPhone or iPad. If you're in the desktop version of Google Earth, right-click on a link and choose Email..., and a new message will be made with the .kmz file as an attachment. When you receive this on your iOS device, tap and hold, then open the file with Google Earth.

[kirkmc adds: This works as described. I have to say, the only time I ever open Google Earth is to follow the route of the Tour de France...]

Resolve GarageBand Export Songs to iTunes timeout

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

Apparently, there are cases when exporting a song from GarageBand to iTunes results in a time-out. Apple has published a technical note explaining that this may occur if there are any open dialogs in iTunes. Make sure to close all such windows in iTunes - such as the Preferences or Info windows - before exporting songs from GarageBand.

iTunes: Auto-convert music files to bit rates other than 128 kbps

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 07:30:00 -0700

iTunes 10.6, just out, has a new feature that some music lovers will appreciate. In the past, you could auto-convert music files when syncing them to an iPod or iOS device, but only to 128 kbps. Now, with iTunes 10.6, you have three options: 128, 192 and 256 kbps. This is available in the Options section of the Summary tab for an iPod.

[kirkmc adds: While not strictly a hint, but rather a heads up for a new feature, this is a one that many iTunes users have been hoping for. I blogged about it, but thought it would be useful to have it here as well.]