The Author – Bart Busschots
Creative Commons
Unless otherwise stated, the content on this site is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution, Noncommercial, No Derivative Works 3.0 License
Sep
29
RedHat Need to Learn Some Common Sense
Filed Under System Administration, Computers & Tech on September 29, 2006 | 5 Comments
I’ll hold my hands up now and say this will be a rant post. I’m annoyed. I’ve just wasted and entire afternoon at work because of pure and utter idiocy by the RedHat people. I don’t suffer fools well so that also adds to my annoyance 🙂 Read more
Sep
25
The Easy Way To Join PDFs on OS X
Filed Under Computers & Tech on September 25, 2006 | 8 Comments
Something you have to do from time to time is assemble a PDF out of pages from other PDFs or images. I had to do this today. I was writing a report in Open Office. I exported the report to PDF to send it but then wanted to attach a few appendices to that PDF file so I would only have to email one file rather than a collection of files. TBH I expected to be able to do this kind of thing very easily with Preview by just dragging and dropping things around but no, not happening. So, off to Google I went and I found a simply excellent freeware App that lets you do this in a really simple and easy way.
[tags]OS X, PDF, Freeware[/tags] Read more
Sep
16
iTunes 7 – Solutions to Audio Book and Download Problems
Filed Under Computers & Tech on September 16, 2006 | 2 Comments
This is a follow-on to the article iTunes 7 – Not The Success It Could and SHOULD Have Been
I’ve spent quite a big of time trying to solve my iTunes 7 problems and a lot of time on the Apple discussion boards and I’ve now got solutions to most (obviously no movement on the reverse-sync thing).
First, an update on album art which is a reply to Des’ comment that they have too few covers. They seem to have added many more over the last day or so, because I just got covers for about 20 albums which they didn’t have covers for on the first day iTunes 7 came out.
Now, on to the meat and bones, my most serious problem, not being able to download my purchased items, has been solved. Though not by Apple support. As well as lodging a support call I also started a thread on their forms and that’s where the solution came from: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=643636&tstart=0. I did get a response from Apple but it was massively disappointing. It was a stock answer that simply ignored the information I had given in my message to them pointing out that I had already tried what they just gave me as a ‘solution’. They got a very grumpy reply from me!
Next, onto not being able to move items from Music to Audiobooks. I mentioned that I had tried iTunify and that it had not worked. Well it had sort of worked. What the program did not tell you what that you have to remove the items from your library (being sure to click ‘keep files’ when asked) and then re-add them. When you re-add them they will go into the right place. Again this solution is courtesy of the Apple forums: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=640125&tstart=0
Just one more follow-up, my problems with iTunes 7 constantly re-starting itself when I closed it have not come back. I guess it was just a glitch that was sorted out by a reboot (how Windows like!).
Although my big problems with iTunes 7 have now been solved I shouldn’t have to spend hours getting up and going when I update a program. Apple took their eye off the ball on this one. Lets hope this is not the way things will be from now on with Apple software updates.
[tags]iTunes, iTunes 7, Apple, Audiobooks[/tags]
Sep
15
iTunes 7 – Not The Success It Could and SHOULD Have Been
Filed Under Computers & Tech on September 15, 2006 | 11 Comments
The recent Apple event to launch the new iPods, and new iTunes & store, was up to Apple's normal high standard. It all looked great and Steve even managed to get not just one but two "oh and one more thing …" bits in (obviously making up for not including one at the WWDC this year). Also, for the first time in my life I'm actaully tempted by an iPod Shuffle! The preview of iTV also looked very interesting, though in this neck of the woods ITV means something else!
Upon installing iTunes7 my first impressions were also very good. Sure, I think the new blue logo is a step backwards, and the new colour scheme has gone a bit too goth for my tastes, but no one can deny that the new interface is very slick. The promise of reverse-syncing also appealed to me. But then it all just went a bit pear-shaped!
[tags]iTunes, iTunes 7, Apple[/tags] Read more
Sep
10
Free Astronomy Software on Mac OS X – Installing KStars
Filed Under Computers & Tech, Science & Astronomy on September 10, 2006 | 19 Comments
If you run Windows the question as to which free sky mapping software to install is trivial, install Cartes du Ciel. If you run Linux, the question is equally as trivial, use KStars. However, if you run Mac OS X things have traditionally not been so good. I have not found a single good free sky mapping program for OS X. So, instead I have switched my attention to getting either the Linux option or the Windows option working on the Mac.
I had hopped that CrossOver Mac would run Cartes du Ciel but it does not. I tried both V2.7 and the version 3.0 beta but, although both installed, neither worked. 2.7 did run better than 3.0 but failed to render the actual maps so it was still useless! That leaves us with just KStars. This does work on OS X but installing it is not as straightforward as one would hope.
[tags]Astronomy, OS X, Mac, KStars[/tags] Read more
Sep
2
At Last – Windows Apps on my Mac WITHOUT WINDOWS
Filed Under Computers & Tech on September 2, 2006 | 14 Comments
Yesterday, Codeweavers released a public beta of CrossOver Mac. This software lets you run Windows programs on Intel Macs without rebooting, without running a virtual machine, and best of all, without installing Windows at all. I've been waiting for this since the switch to Intel, to me this is the Holly Grail! I don't consider BootCamp to be a proper solution, you have to buy Windows and you have to reboot to change OS. Parallels is a step in the right direction, but you still have to buy Windows and you have a large overhead because you have to run two OSes at the same time. CrossOver on the other hand utilises WINE technology to allow Windows Apps run straight on OS X. Your Windows Apps even share your regular file system and home directory. This means you have one file system, the OS X one, so your files are all in the one place and your Windows Apps are subject to OS X's security restrictions. The minute I read the news report on this I downloaded the beta and installed it. This is a quick review of my first impressions.
[tags]OS X, Windows, WINE, CrossOver[/tags] Read more