Gist TextMate Bundle updated for Yosemite
Thanks to Michael Sheets, the Gist TextMate bundle now works in TextMate 2 on Yosemite. The issue was that the UI code in TextMate 2 relied on Ruby 1.8, and Ruby 1.8 is deprecated and no longer installed in OS X 10.10. Michael created a shim to fake Ruby 1.8 until such time as the code base moves to Ruby 2.0, implemented the change in the Gist bundle and it’s working now.
Create a Bootable OS X Installer Drive
Dan Frakes (@DanFrakes), previously of MacWorld fame, provides easy to follow instructions on how to create a bootable OS X 10.10 Yosemite installer USB drive on his personal blog. I’ve always done this and I recommend you do too. Link: How to make a bootable OS X 10.10 Yosemite installer drive Yep, mine is a R2D2 8GB USB Drive (called a Star Wars MIMOBOT) I found at the checkout at Kinokuniya in New York several years ago.
TimeToCall Removed from App Store
I have removed TimeToCall from the App Store effective today, for several reasons: I did not update it for iOS 7 (or iOS 8) and it’s starting to look shabby. I never made any worthwhile money from it or received blog pageviews from it. There are newer and better products out there. I do not want to clutter the App Store with yet another abandoned product. It no longer showcases my development capabilities, they are far better now.
Any hint of humanity is valued
For decades we have had corporatization, mass-production, and everything becoming the same, having personality drained from it. That became what was common and what was the norm. And then in the last, you know, 5, 10 years, this concept of like the artisanal, the special, the hand-made, like this is coming back … [interruption edited out] … I think the reason why everyone loves all this hand-made crap today is because they are starved for authenticity after decades of mass-market personality-less crap, and they are starved for uniqueness, they are starved for personality and they are starved for authenticity and for people to talk to them like, you know, talked to like an adult please.
Standard Markdown
Looks like Jeff Atwood (@CodingHorror), John MacFarlane, David Greenspan of Meteor, and folks from StackExchange, Github and Reddit have put their money where their mouths are and released the first version of Standard Markdown at http://standardmarkdown.com. I believe this will be the future of John Gruber’s (@daringfireball) Markdown. Up until now, I have relied on Fletcher Penney’s (@multimarkdown) MultiMarkdown on the desktop for all my documents because of its consistency, ubiquity and wonderful extensions for writers (including tables and footnotes).
The Quick Code Cleanup
The quick code cleanup is a process whereby you run through some or all of the files in a software project and tidy them up. Think about it as the regular tidying of your desk (or room) and filing things away – versus the rearranging and rewiring of a full code refactor. You can get a lot more done on a tidy desk. Quick code cleanups can and do include some minor refactoring, but they are mostly about renaming items, reformatting code and commenting on or cleaning up messy sections.
Aral on Spyware 2.0
That word is spyware. Let me state it plainly: Google is a spyware company. Facebook is a spyware company. Any company whose products spy on you is a spyware company. Aral Balkan https://aralbalkan.com/notes/spyware-2.0/ The first step in understanding and defeating something is to call it what it is. Read Here Follow the author as @hiltmon on Twitter and @hiltmon on App.Net. Mute #xpost on one.
Quote of the Day
In sum and once again: Amazon is not your friend. Neither is any other corporation. It and they do what they do for their own interest and are more than willing to try to make you try believe that what they do for their own benefit is in fact for yours. John Scalzi http://whatever.scalzi.com/2014/08/09/amazon-gets-increasingly-nervous/ Replace Amazon with any company name of your choice and this remains 100% true. Follow the author as @hiltmon on Twitter and @hiltmon on App.
An Xcode C++ Client-Server Development Trick
I’m working on a C++ product that has a series of client executables that need to talk to a server executable. And they all share a lot of common code. The traditional approach to build and debug this pattern is to create a library of the common code in one project, a separate server project and another client project, then jump between windows to edit and compile where needed. But I am often coding on my trusty 13" MacBook Air screen and it’s just too tiny to have all these Xcode windows open with their console windows visible.
WordCounter
WordCounter by Christian Tietze (@ctietze) does one thing, and does it well: It counts the number of words you type in registered applications and displays the total on the menu bar. Most writers I know use several different software tools while writing, like nvAlt for notes, Byword for short pieces and Scrivener for the big things. But each of these has a separate word count (if at all). WordCounter brings them all together in one.