Earlier I don’t think I was sufficiently effusive of Script Debugger 4.
It’s goddamn fantastic.
It manages to make Applescript suck so much less that you almost sorta forget that it sucks in the first place.
It’s expensive and big and complex, but I’ve written like 15 non-entirely-trivial Applescript thingees in the past 2 days. That’s more Applescript than I’ve written since I moved to the Mac in 1999.
It’s that awesome. Go buy it, now.
A bit of a plug here: Applescript is still a completely wretched piece of vomit covered in AIDS and fail, but you can wipe a little of the fail off with Script Debugger.
Now to convince my boss to drop the dosh on it TO MAKE THE FUCKING PAIN STOP.
TUAW has a post, “Remove iTunes DRM easily and quickly with iMovie HD“, which talks about exactly that: the old iMovie/iTunes DRM “loophole”.
But the inexplicably, it goes on to say:
This makes you question why DRM is there in the first place.
It … does? 3 words, TUAW: Cory. Motherfucking. Doctorow. You can positively hear him jumping up and down saying “ARE YOU SHITTING ME?”. He has from time to time posted the occasional remark on the topic, in the general direction of Cupertino …
Maybe my dad’s not hip to the fantastic world of DRM, but anyone hip enough to know they need to break the DRM has already questioned why it’s there in the first place. UH DUH?
These days I can’t seem to settle on an editor I love. For a long time, I loved BBEdit. Then TextMate came along and did all the things BBEdit didn’t seem interested in doing. I then started doing more and more complicated things with dynamic languages, and spent a while adrift in IDE land. Lately I’m back in BBEdit land, just to see what’s going on, and I’m finding myself in the same place I was when I stopped using it.
It’s unlikely the next BBEdit will materialize any time soon; unless they’re baking a new version, BBEdit will pretty much continue to itself for the foreseeable future (after all they only shipped 8.7 in August of this year, and it was a pretty big upgrade). Maybe something at Macworld, although Macworld no longer seems like a totally awesome time to update things.
I have a strange editor fetish, if it wasn’t clear by now.
But anyway, here’s my list.
“Today, we are lowering the price of the iPhone.”
“FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU FUCK YOU”
Briefly:
a 2Ghz Mini vs a 2Ghz iMac, each w/ 2GB of RAM, are $1024 vs $1349, respectively. That’s $325 on the face of things, for a decent monitor (but a 20″ widescreen monitor can be had from Dell for a helluva lot less (the “Good” 20″ Widescreen is $269). And what else?
* A decent video card, for starters. The 950 supports OmniDazzle, for instance, and I assume the Dashboard water-droplet effect, but it’s not going to exactly light the room up with performance.
* 250GB Serial ATA vs a 160GB 5400 RPM laptop drive. Does anyone even ship a laptop with shitty 5400RPM drives?
* iMac is arguably expandable (at least a new HD and another stick of RAM, I think?)
* iMac comes with keyboard and mouse (about, what, $50?)
So when you diff it, the extras - a little bit better hard drive, a much better video card, some fit/finish, and a decent monitor - makes the iMac about the same value as the Mini.
Basically unless you already have a monitor that pwns, why bother with the Mini? (Conversely, get the iMac if you’re looking for a new monitor)
Gateway Timeout
The following error occurred:
[code=GATEWAY_TIMEOUT] A gateway timeout occurred. The server is unreachable. Retry the request.Please contact the administrator.
How is it a service can be simultaneously unpopular and crushed to dust by traffic?
http://dougscripts.com/itunes/ixarch/arch.php?my=2007-07#071707a
Chris Shull’s “Get Lyrical” script — v2.3 was posted yesterday — apparently only retrieves lyrics for “Billie Jean” by Michael Jackson.
Draw your own conclusions about the nature of the Universe.
The boss just left to get us iPhones.
So now the question is: When nagios generates an alert, it goes to (phone number)@(verizon.com or some shit). The phone rings not long after the alert goes out.
But the iPhone, she no support the “push” email. So, what to do? YAPS? Is there some other way to send an SMS that will make the phone make a ringy-dingy at 2am when a box thrashes to death?
Update: Nearly everything says, “This is what they mean when they say iPhone isn’t business ready”. It would appear that the SMS app doesn’t treat messages like a short email; unless told otherwise, we’ll get no ringy-dingy and thus, what is probably the primary business case for our phones goes poof.
Now, I’ve been told I should be using YAPS+modem anyway and maybe now’s the time. Problem still remains: gotta get the data to the phone.
Sigh. So other than a phone that sync to my desktop with reasonable aplomb, and some cool features, I guess, no iPhone for me.
We’re getting our iPhones tomorrow, once we work out how to have the company pay for them all (and assuming there are still 4 available in NoVA, and we can figure out a way to get 4 of them). So it’s Xmas in July, really. Like a kid I’m counting the minutes.
Tog posted a bit about the iPhone:
It really is wonderful that, in an industry rife with companies striving for mediocrity, one company is still doing things right.
But he’s committing one of the classic blunders; no, not starting a land war in Asia. He is confusing mediocrity with worse-is-better, although in practice they’re the same thing. The Zune pretty much is a non-starter vs iPod, but that gives it better survival characteristics, as it’s built on the computer virus that is Windows. As I shopped around for a new phone for my wife, I marvelled at the insipid, awful design, only to remember, “no one gives a shit”, because phones are built on the virus of fickle, non-technical consumers.
Also, I think I really need to start working on dealing with my depression. I really can’t continue to focus effectively on the physical if the mental isn’t 100%, too. I’m pretty sure my continual ennui at work is not some vague metaphysical dissatisfaction, but a pronounced downspike. Rough seas ahead; but if I can remake my body, I guess I can do the same to my brain. Right?
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