I’m lucky, I guess

By Erik | Published: September 6, 2009

Apparently this attack on Word Press blogs is widespread. I’d been running 2.7.something up until yesterday, but I was lucky and my blog is still intact. Not that it would be a huge deal if it was invaded, anyway. Still… The really dumb thing is that since I was running 2.7.something, upgrading to the latest was as simple as hitting a button. In the past it was a little more complicated than that (which is why poor Andy Ihnatko got hit).

Since I’m in the middle of a little crash course in PHP/MySQL anyway, I should really take the three minutes to learn how to backup my database.

Posted in WordPress | Leave a comment

Snow Leopard “Drag to Dock” Exposé = D.O.A.

By Erik | Published: September 3, 2009

I’ll keep this quick. The “drag to dock” Exposé feature I’d seen a demo of wasn’t working on my computer. Dragging items to icons in the dock did nothing. Boo. I figured it was some sort of conflict with Launchbar. Or Default Folder X. Or maybe even Sprited Away. Or Dropbox. Grrr… Nothing made it work. Then I got a flash of inspiration while I was somewhere between sleep and consciousness this morning (as I so often do). Turns out the solution was as simple as this:

spring_loaded

Yeah, I had that box unchecked. I use the spring-loaded folders feature, I just don’t like it when folders accidentally open when I don’t want them to, so I’ve kept that unchecked and always just tapped the spacebar when I wanted to jump into a folder.

While I’m on the subject, the refinements that have been made to Exposé in Snow Leopard are very, very nice. At least if you, like me, are one of those folks who are really into the details and are possibly a little bit OCD. This nice little video on YouTube shows some of the refinements.

Posted in General Geekery, Mac | Leave a comment

The Semenya Caster Controversy

By Erik | Published: August 19, 2009

From this page:

“Caster has been the victim of some sensationalistic reporting from Australia. It seems that every time a talented young African runs well, the foreign press feels a need to question their gender and the legitimacy of their age. Sad.”


Talk about complete and utter bullshit. New young African superstars pop up just about every year or two but I don’t remember the last time anyone has questioned an athlete’s gender (questioning claims that certain athletes are young enough to compete in junior events is another story, however). There is very good reason for people to question whether Caster is “fully female.” I feel bad for Caster, however. I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt and assuming the following:

  • She’s lived her entire life as a female
  • She’s probably been given no real reason to think she’s anything other than a normal female and a gifted athlete
  • She’s being exploited by her athletic federation
  • And now she’s getting thrown to the wolves

This is not going to end well.

Posted in Track and Field | Leave a comment

Compiling SWFs from TextMate with the Flex SDK

By Erik | Published: August 17, 2009

I finally feel like I’m all growds up.

Perhaps some details about this transition will follow in the coming days. But let me just say that this is the post that finally got me up and running with the Flex 3.3 SDK and TextMate. I’m not sure how often I’ll use this method. It’s way too soon to tell one way or another. I’m only now trying to figure out what Flex can do compared to Flash. My impression is that Flex isn’t as adept at doing totally custom visual experiences, but I could very well be totally wrong about that.

Two quick notes:

  • I couldn’t figure out why the flashlog.txt output wasn’t getting updated each time I compiled the SWF. Turns out I simply wasn’t opening the SWF after compiling it. Gotta open the SWF to generate the output text!

  • Which leads me to wonder, from TextMate can I quickly compile the SWF and open it in the Flash Player right away?

Posted in ActionScript, Flash, Mac, TextMate | Leave a comment

Screencast Question – Voiceover Preference

By Erik | Published: August 13, 2009

What do you prefer? When screencasts are clearly narrated while they are being recorded, such as Merlin Mann’s desktop tour or when it is obvious (or at least appears obvious to me) that the voiceover was added after the video portion was recorded, such as this screencast about Blogo? (I should mention that the Blogo screencast isn’t the best example of when voiceovers go bad)

I’m more of a fan of the first variety, since it makes it much easier to follow along with what the presenter is doing. On the other hand, the second method allows the narration to be much more polished. In my mind it comes down to a decision between more natural vs. more polished (but not necessarily more professional).

What do you think?

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Two MacBook Pro features I like…

By Erik | Published: August 3, 2009

…that I didn’t think would be a big deal at all:

  • The LED backlighting that means the screen has no “warm-up” time when I lift the lid. The screen is instantly at the brightness you want. No waiting and adjusting. A very nice touch.
  • The multi-finger gestures on the trackpad. I’ve loved the two-finger scroll and right-click on my old MacBook. But the three-finger forward and back is awesome. And the pinch-to-zoom on web pages has come in handy a few times because things can look so small on the high-res screen.
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Now I’m happy… MacBook Pro Battery update

By Erik | Published: August 1, 2009

Check this out:

Battery

Delicious.

I switched to the integrated graphics in my 17″ MacBook Pro. Not only is battery life way ahead of what I was getting with the dedicated graphics, the machine runs a lot cooler and I don’t see any difference in performance. As long as I’m not playing 3D games (which I never do) or doing heavy lifting in Aperture, there is no reason to use the dedicated graphics. The only real downside is that a good chunk of RAM (maybe 200MB?) is sucked up to be used by the integrated graphics chip. Not a huge deal, though, unless, once again, I’m doing a ton of work in Aperture. I’ll have 8GB in this thing one day, though. Not a problem.

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

SuperDuper smart update – new computer – old clone

By Erik | Published: August 1, 2009

When I moved from my iMac to my new MacBook Pro, I used Migration Assistant to move all my stuff over to the new machine. When it was time to make my first SuperDuper clone of the new machine, I thought I’d try to use SuperDuper’s Smart Update function to clone my new computer to the external hard drive that had a clone of the old hard drive.

Have I lost you yet?

Smart Update

My thought was that the data on the new hard drive would be pretty close to what I had on the old hard drive, so I could probably save some time by using Smart Update. I was correct. I did save a good chunk of time. A whole bunch of files still needed to be copied to the external clone, but I think it would have taken at least twice as long to do a full, fresh backup of the new computer. Thought I’d share this little tip to those of you who already use SuperDuper and are moving to a new computer.

Posted in General Geekery, Mac | 1 Comment

“Fun” with the iTunes Store

By Erik | Published: August 1, 2009

Today I tried to download an update to an iPhone app and was greeted by this:

Update Account

Okay, so the AIM username I’ve been using to buy stuff from iTunes isn’t allowed anymore. Lame, but I’ve also wanted to ditch that account and switch to my Apple ID. Looks like this is my chance. So, I click on the Update Account button and get this:

Get Started

I click the Continue button and get this awesome response:

Error

I get that over and over again throughout the day. When I finally got the screen I was really looking for, I was prompted to pick an Apple ID (which is just your full email address) and password. I go ahead and punch in my current Apple ID and password, hit Continue, and get shut out. It won’t let me use my current Apple ID. What?! I have to pick a new one? So I’ll have one Apple ID for the Apple Store and the Apple forums and another simply for iTunes? This is exactly what I’m trying to avoid.

Sure, I can login to iTunes with my current Apple ID and the stuff I bought with my old AIM ID will still play because my computer is authorized to do so. But what happens when I get a new computer and try to authorize it? It no longer takes my AIM ID. I’m screwed. What’s going to happen when I try to update the iPhone Apps I bought with the AIM ID? Well, it doesn’t exactly work. This is what happens:

  • iTunes tells me I need to update some iPhone Apps that I bought with my AIM ID. At least I still have the 1 in the circle next to my Applications in my iTunes LIBRARY. And that Applications page says “1 Update Available” on the bottom of the screen.
  • I click that “1 Update Available” button
  • …and since I’m currently signed in with my existing Apple ID, I get this message:

No Updates

By the way, I can’t sign back into iTunes with my AIM ID. I’m currently screwed. I can’t update my apps. Thanks Apple.

The solution is simple: Let me update my iTunes account by using my existing Apple ID. It is crazy that I have to pick another Apple ID just for iTunes. The fact that an Apple ID is an email address makes this all the more ridiculous. Make it happen!

UPDATE – Sunday, August 2, 2009

Looks like I’m forced to get another Apple ID just for iTunes, but I’ve been getting this message when I’ve tried over the past couple of days. This is beyond stupid, Apple.

Error

Posted in Mac | 2 Comments

ActionScript TextFormat.font values

By Erik | Published: July 30, 2009

One thing I have to do a lot with ActionScript 3 is make TextField instances at run time that use something other than the default font. One way that I’ll do that is like this:

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// make a new TextFormat object and set its "font" property
var myFormat:TextFormat = new TextFormat();
myFormat.font = "Arial";
 
// then make the TextField and apply the TextFormat to it
var tf:TextField = new TextField();
tf.defaultTextFormat = myFormat;

(This doesn’t deal with actually making sure that the font you want to use is embedded in the movie, but that’s another story.)

One part of this that’s been a bit of a mystery to me in some cases is exactly what to set as the TextFormat.font property. And, as you’ll see, there’s good reason to be a little confused, depending on what font you want to use. What you see in the CHARACTER portion of Flash’s PROPERTIES panel doesn’t always match what you need to type in as the TextFormat.font value. For example, if you want to use the following font:

Arial Regular

You need to type the following:

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myFormat.font = "Arial"

That’s fairly straightforward, I guess. This one is a little less straightforward:

Meta Thin

…and the code you need to type to Flash:

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myFormat.font = "Meta-Thin"

Where did that hyphen come from that goes betwee “Meta” and “Thin”? And how would I know I need to insert when, if I wanted to use Arial Bold, I’d simply type:

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myFormat.font = "Arial Bold"

There’s no hyphen in that one. Mysterious.

Even worse, check this one out. Suppose you want to use this specific style of The Sans:

Thesans Sansplain

Guess what name you need to plug into the TextFormat.font property…

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myFormat.font = "TheSans Plain"

Hmmm… How in the hell would you ever figure that out? And is there any logic here? And where do I find the string to type in for the TextFormat.font property?

The Solution

Turns out, there is an easy way to figure out exactly what to type in for the TextFormat.font property. It’s a bit of a hack, but it gets the job done. The process goes like this:

  1. Make a dynamic text field in the Flash authoring tool and set its font to the font name you are trying to figure out.
  2. Give that dynamic text field an instance name (let’s use “myField” in this example)
  3. Then type this code into the ActionScript panel:
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trace(myField.getTextFormat().font)

That’s it. When you test the movie, the Output panel will print out the ActionScript version of the font name, which is exactly what we are looking for.

Posted in ActionScript, Flash | 4 Comments

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