BigDiver

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Archive for September 2009

Configure Home/End Key Bidings on Mac OS X

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Hi I feel that this  a prety common request: Bind the Home/End keys to move to the beginning and end of lines respectively.

In Mac OS X (10.5 and 10.6) some applications use the Cmd-Rigt and Cmd-Left to perform these actions but, call me old fashioned, I like to use Home and End instead.

It is actually very easy to change the Cocoa Key bindings for any user under Mac OS. Just follow these steps:

  1. Create a file called DefaultKeyBinding.dict in ~/Library/KeyBindings directory
    mkdir ~/Library/KeyBindings
    cd ~/Library/KeyBindings
    touch DefaultKeyBinding.dict
  2. Edit your DefaultKeyBinding.dict file so it contains:
    {
    /* home */
    "\UF729"  = "moveToBeginningOfLine:";
    "$\UF729" = "moveToBeginningOfLineAndModifySelection:";
    
    /* Cmd-Left */
    "@\UF702"  = "moveToBeginningOfLine:";
    "$@\UF702" = "moveToBeginningOfLineAndModifySelection:";
    
    /* Cmd-Right */
    "@\UF703"  = "moveToEndOfLine:";
    "$@\UF703" = "moveToEndOfLineAndModifySelection:";
    
    /* end */
    "\UF72B"  = "moveToEndOfLine:";
    "$\UF72B" = "moveToEndOfLineAndModifySelection:";
    
    /* page up/down */
    "\UF72C"  = "pageUp:";
    "\UF72D"  = "pageDown:";
    }
  3. Restart the Cocoa Application.

This example works very well with TextMate.

In order to bind other keys you need to find their Scan code, and you can use the following modifiers
For more information please check this article

Written by bigdiver

September 11, 2009 at 7:26 pm

Snow Leopard Upgrade breaks a ton of apps

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After having done the Snow Leopard upgrade from leopard 10.5.8 a week ago, I have to say I am disappointed!

A lot of my applications just crash, Xcode and Mac Ports had to be reinstalled, Apache and PHP reconfigured by hand, reinstall MySQL, among others.

I have yet to see any real performance improvements, for example the Terminal application is very slow (over 10s) to give me a prompt.

I did get some 10Gb back from my HDD but… I am considering doing a fresh install. Am I back on Windows?

very sad…

Written by bigdiver

September 11, 2009 at 7:14 pm

Posted in Apple, Snow Leopard

Tagged with , ,

Facebook Privacy Settings to Play Mafia Wars Safely

with 3 comments

So you’re so hooked on Mafia Wars that you are considering adding total strangers as your friends so your Mafioso list can grow and make you stronger?

There were a couple of hacks around the web that used to work that would add a user to your Mafia without being your Facebook friend but, at least the ones I know don’t work anymore.

If you know one that does please leave a comment.

Fortunately Facebook’s privacy settings are pretty flexible and complete, so you can change your them on your Facebook account and disable updates to the Mafiosos you do not really know.

  1. When adding a Mafioso Friend for the first time click the add button, but select add to list and create you Mafia list. I called it “Mafia”
    Adding new Friends to a ListType “Mafia” in the “Create New List” box and press Enter.
  2. Now click “Settings” on the top right corner of your Facebook Menu bar, and select “Privacy Settings”

    Facebook Privacy Settings
    Click “Profile”.

  3. Select any of the options you would not like to share with your Mafia Wars friends and click “Customize”
    Customize Privacy Settings
  4. Add the “Mafia” list created in step 1 to “Except These People” In the Customization pop-up.
    Cutomized Facebook privacy, to exclude Mafia Wars
    After you click Ok, you should get something like this
    Do not show personal info to Mafia list
  5. Repeat for all the other settings and do not forget to change the settings on the “Contact Information” tab as well or you will be sharing your cell phone with strangers… not a good prospect!
  6. Click “Save Settings” on the bottom of the screen.

Written by bigdiver

September 10, 2009 at 2:35 pm

Upgrading the MacBook Air to Snow Leopard (Mac OSX 10.6)

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I have to say that my experience upgrading both my Macs to Snow Leopard has been mixed. It was easy as clicking the Install button on the iMac, it was a nightmare on the Macbook Air.

First I used the Remote CD installation process, started the Macbook Air, mounted the remote CD from the iMac and proceeded to run the “Install Mac OSX.app”. After agreeing to the license agreement the installation utility told me that the disk did not have enough free space. Despite the fact that the disk had 21Gb of free space!

After some digging I found out that PGP Whole Disk Encryption is not compatible with Snow Leopard, and PGP advised users to decrypt the disk before upgrading.

So I decrypted the disk and restarted the Installation process, only to find out a new error! Damn.

The install app now told me that the Machintosh HD, the only disk, in my Macbook Air, was not a bootable disk and could not install to it. I did some more web searching and some people reported the error to related to the partition format, not being GUID.

Disk Utility in Snow Leopard

I checked with Disk Util and it was indeed GUID. So using Disk Util I added a new partition with 1Gb, using the free space, this procedure rewrote the new partition table to disk and after I was able to finally install Snow Leopard.
When Snow Leopard was installed I used Disk Util again to delete the 1Gb partition and recover the disk space.

If Disk Utility gives you disk verification errors, you need to repair those before resizing your partitions. If you repair the disk multiple times and it still gives you the same errors then you should run the Remote Install Mac OS X application on another Mac. If you only have a Windows as a second computer check this the “How to use Remote Disc” article on Apple’s support site.

Boot your MacBook Air directly into the Snow Leopard CD. Just start the Air and hold the option key until you see the list of disks you have to boot from. If the Remote Install Mac OS X application is running on your other computer the Snow Leopard will show up here.

Remote Install Mac OS X

Have you had Snow Leopard upgrade issues?

Written by bigdiver

September 8, 2009 at 7:49 pm

Posted in MAC OS

Tagged with ,

iPhone Development

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Started developing my first iPhone App, it is going to be a sort of a game/funny app.
Having some difficulty adapting to the programming model, but that is always the case when taking on a new language, and SDK.

The project is coming along nicely and I hope to have it ready in the next couple of weeks.

For a newbie like me the book Beginning iPhone 3 Development: Exploring the iPhone SDK
was a huge help and save a lot of frustration with good examples and simple approach.

Hope they can help you as well.

Written by bigdiver

September 5, 2009 at 10:01 pm

Posted in Apple, Mobile Phone

Tagged with

TeraStation and Apple Time Machine

with 2 comments

Finally I got my iMac backing up to the TeraStation using Time Machine by following the instructions on this site.

The trick was creating the Sparse file by hand, after enabling the use of network volumes. I am using AppleTalk to mount the TeraStation share for the backups, and I setup a different share just for the backup files.

If the file “com.apple.timemachine.supported” does not get created automatically by Time Machine you’ll have to create it yourself.

Some sites discourage the use of SMB, all I can say is that the referenced procedure only worked for me with AFP. Maybe your mileage will vary.

Time Machine

Great job Newb @ MacTimes!
Thanks!

Written by bigdiver

September 4, 2009 at 4:08 am

Posted in Apple, MAC OS, TeraStation

Repair Disk problems on your TeraStation

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If you suspect your TeraStation HDDs are failing and need to recover before it is too late you should use xfs_repair. You’ll need to unmount the XFS volumes before you can use the repair tool

unmount /dev/md2

 

If you try to unmount the TeraStation’s data disk (/dev/md2) and you get a device busy check if you have the media server running and the unmount again.

umount /dev/md2
Device is Busy

 

Go to http://your_terastation_ip:8080/ and select disable.

umount /dev/md2

 

Now you can run XFS Repair

xfs_repair

Written by bigdiver

September 2, 2009 at 3:31 pm

Posted in TeraStation

PS3 YLOD Fix is now available

with 7 comments

Saw on Youtube that you can now fix the PS3 YLOD (Yellow Led Of Death) at home. The procedure is not for the technically challenged but it seems to work.

Full instructions can be found from the original author (Gilksy)can be found at the Playstationlifestyle.net web site

This will help all that no longer have a valid warranty on the box, but I would suggest sending your PS3 back to Sony if you do. I have not tried it my self, and some people have reported that the fix is only temporary, but that it does work.

If the overlying cause of the PS3 overheating is not resolved, i.e. you cram it back in an enclosed space,  it is only natural that it will overheat again and the YLOD will come back. So if you go through the trouble of fixing it yourself make sure it stays fixed by having sufficient airflow to the box.

YLOD seems to be a sprawling business on eBay, just search for PS3 YLOD and a ton of fixing services will show up :)

Have you tried it? Did it work for you?

Written by bigdiver

September 2, 2009 at 2:28 pm

Posted in PlayStation 3

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