Web Design

Donating for my Quicksilver 1Password Plugin

Patrick — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 23:11:50 +0000

If you’ve not heard about the 1Password Plugin I’ve developed for Quicksilver, then I suggest you check it out (along with Quicksilver!)

Since GitHub doesn’t allow input forms within the README files, the ‘Donate’ button is redirected to this page, from where you can donate.

I thank you all for your support, and look forward to developing some more! (Note that this isn’t a donate button for the work I’ve done on Quicksilver itself)

Updating Mac OS X 10.6.4 Snow Leopard ‘too many files’ problem

Patrick — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 13:17:18 +0000

Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.4 has been released, and I’m sure everyone is immediately rushing to download it.

I did the same, but was left staring at the message:

The Installer encountered an error that caused the installation to fail. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.

Retrying the Installer, booting into Safe Mode and downloading the combo update all failed to work.
Delving a little deeper into the Console log files (found by opening Console.app from Applications/Utilities, clicking ‘Logs’ and the left hand side, then install.log) revealed that my install was failing due to the message

The operation couldn’t be completed. Too many open files in system

How could this be possible? The installer was the only thing running for me, and I had plenty of RAM and disk space, so what gives?
It turns out that – from this handy post – Snow Leopard only allows each process to have a maximum of 256 files open at any one time.

You can change the defaults (as shown in the link above) by typing this command into terminal:

launchctl limit maxfiles 1000000 1000000

This will set the max files per process to 1,000,000, which is more than enough.
Trying the installer again having entered this command into terminal worked perfectly!

Let me know if it fixes your problem.

Shortening URLs in-house

Patrick — Thu, 27 May 2010 21:21:01 +0000

All websites now use URL extensions that redirect for easy to remember URLs.

A recent example is Google’s http://google.com/pacman – a simple / and one word is much easier to remember than say /google_pacman.html (which is still keeping it simple!)
(I’m sure if you looked into it, the files aren’t actually stored in a /pacman folder either )

There are URL shortening methods out there, such as http://bit.ly and http://tiny.cc, but I feel these don’t give you enough power for customisation. And what if you have your own domain that you want to use?!

I’ve made my own simple ‘Redirect Setup Script’ that enables you to create redirects with the click of a button.
You can view a demo here: http://patjack.co.uk/newurls (note this doesn’t actually set up any redirects on my site ) and see how easy it is.

My method uses PHP that appends the redirect to your root .htaccess file, and uses mod_rewrite. An alternative method would be to use a meta redirect, which I’ve included in the downloadable folder for those that might not have mod_rewrite on their servers. The downside to the meta redirect is that you need to actually create the folder and index.html file, the .htaccess method just uses the root .htaccess file.

To swap between using the .htaccess mod_rewrite method and the meta re-direct method, just open up ‘process.php’ and change the $use_htaccess from TRUE to FALSE.

The script also uses REGEX to make sure you don’t use some silly extension, or input an invalid URL.

To use, just download the folder from here

A quick example

I’ve set up a redirect for when I have a chocolate cake craving but don’t want to bake a whole cake. To see my secret, click through to http://patjack.co.uk/cake. Mmmmm…

Download: Script.zip

Here’s what gets appended to your root .htaccess and the index.html files respectively

.htaccess

RedirectMatch /".$_YOUR_EXTENSION."/.* ".$_URL_GOES_HERE." [R=301,L] RedirectMatch /".$_YOUR_EXTENSION." ".$_URL_GOES_HERE." [R=301,L]";
There’s a need for two redirects to catch both cases where you may browse to example.com/extension (with no slash) example.com/extension/ (with a slash) or anything else – example.com/extension/index.html

index.html

Redirect

Batch compress all files in a folder with YUI Compressor

Patrick — Mon, 24 May 2010 16:07:51 +0000

I’ve recently read up on the importance of site performance for search engine optimisation (SEO).

Google is saying that this year (2010) it may start using the speed your site loads as a factor in determining where your site shows up in its results list.

One great way of decreasing the load times of your site is to compress the CSS and Javascript.

Before…

After…

There are several methods out there, but Yahoo’s YUI Compressor is supposed to be the best.
The compressor is a java (.jar) file that you need to run from the command prompt or terminal. The biggest flaw in it’s design is that you can only compress one file at a time.

Here comes the solution!

I’ve created a small bash script (.sh) that you can double click to convert all the javascript / css files in a folder (and all folders recursively)

here it is:
#!/bin/sh for file in `find . -name "*.js"` do echo "Compressing $file …" java -jar min.jar --type js -o $file $file done

The file’s pretty self explanatory; it finds all the files ending in .js (you can change this to .css for CSS files) and performs the compress action on each file.

To get this to work, you must make the script executable (download mine at the end of this post) and have the YUI Compressor file in the same directory as the batch.sh script (note that it needs to be called min.jar)

From terminal, you just need to go to the directory with the javascript files in and type
./batch.sh
to run the script.

et voila!

Update – an ever better option

If you put the batch.sh file in your /usr/local/bin folder then you’ll be able to use the command anywhere from within terminal (it must be chmodded a+x) I’ve made a file called ‘yuicompress’ which means, if placed in the /usr/local/bin folder (you need root access) you can type ‘yuicompress’ in terminal to get the command to work!

Type
yuicompress arg
where arg is either ‘css’ or ‘js’ (no quotes) to compress CSS or JavaScript respectively.
The one thing you need to do with this new script is place the min.jar (or compressor.jar as I’ve renamed it) in a global place. I chose ~/Library/Application Support/YUICompressor/compressor.jar

Download the files below and place the yuicompress in /usr/local/bin, and the YUICompress folder in ~/Library/Application Support/YUICompressor/compressor.jar to get this to work from any older on your Mac/Unix box

Downloads:
Script: Batch Convert for YUI Compressor
YUI Compressor: YUI Compressor .jar file
Chmodded yuicompress script & YUICompressor folder:

1Password Plugin for Quicksilver

Patrick — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 14:58:00 +0000

I’ve recently developed a 1Password plugin for Quicksilver that gives you the ability to open up Go & Fill items in 1Password, as well as giving you an action to ‘Go & Fill…’ directly from Quicksilver.

To download this plugin, go over to my Github repository.

If you like the plugin then please do donate to the project – but note that this isn’t for the work I’ve done on Quicksilver itself, just the 1Password plugin.

If there’s something missing from the plugin, or you’ve found a bug then let me know – although do read the README first over at Github.

Mac OS X Dock Resource Folder

Patrick — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:50:08 +0000

We all know that we should back up all the time, especially if we’re going to go tinkering with OS X’s insides.
Seeing someone had accidentally messed up their dock resources folder (found in /System/Library/Core Services/Dock.app/Contents/Resources) I posted in the macrumors forums with a download link for the folder in question.
A year or so later I removed the file from my hosting, only to be bombarded with emails and PMs from others who’d done exactly the same thing – who’d have thought it!

Below you can find a link to the dock resources folder for Snow Leopard.

I’ve been asked for Leopard and other OS X versions of the folder. If you have these then do email them to me so I can add them here!

Snow Leopard 10.6.1: 10.6.1 Resources.zip
Snow Leopard 10.6.3: 10.6.3 Resources.zip

And for the future?

Always make a backup!

Toggling Caffeine with Quicksilver to keep your Mac awake

Patrick — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 22:46:41 +0000

Caffeine is a tiny little app that keeps your Mac awake when needed; be it when you’re watching a video (for some reason, Adobe Flash doesn’t keep your Mac awake), reading something off your screen, or anything else.

It sits in the menu bar waiting to be summoned when needed, and dismissed just as easily.

Being the lazy type I am (thanks to the inevitable Quicksilver), dragging the mouse over to click the icon is just too much work. Below is an applescript which I run from Quicksilver with 3 key presses (I could set it as a trigger if I really wanted) and it switches it on or off, or even opens it if it’s not running.

tell application "System Events" if exists (process "Caffeine") then tell application "Caffeine" if active is false then turn on else turn off end if end tell else tell application "Caffeine" to activate end if end tell

This will launch the app if it’s not running. If it is running it’ll check to see if your Mac is on Caffeine (i.e. if it’s turned on) and carry out the required action.

This is all possible thanks to Caffeine being scriptable. It’s always great when developers add applescript support as well as others to their apps – it makes the Mac experience that bit more cosy.

You can download the applescript here
I’ve even added the right icon to the script

All that needs doing is setting up a trigger in Quicksilver, or placing it in
~/Library/Application Support/Quicksilver/PlugIns/Extra Scripts.qsplugin/Contents/Resources/ExtraScripts.

Done!

Toggle Keyboard Viewer in Snow Leopard 10.6

Patrick — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 10:50:47 +0000

Ever since upgrading to Snow Leopard, one function I’ve missed is the ability to toggle the Keyboard Viewer on and off with an applescript.
It looks like Apple modified the Keyboard Viewer utility for Mac OS X 10.6 (or a possible tablet, who knows…) and the old applescripts don’t work.

I’ve finally come across a method for getting this to work in Snow Leopard again, although it’s not as easy as it was in Leopard, and it seems to be as slow as hell to open.

Check out Nicholas Riley’s tiny app (only 6 lines of custom code!) that fixes this:
http://github.com/nriley/keyboardViewer (download)

Once that’s downloaded and installed (you need to go into terminal and move it, or just navigate to /usr/local/bin/ and paste it there), you can then use the applescript listed on the App’s homepage to get it working in applescript.
tell application "System Events" if exists (process "Keyboard Viewer") then click process "Keyboard Viewer"'s window 1's buttons whose subrole is "AXCloseButton" else do shell script "/usr/local/bin/keyboardViewer" end if end tell

I have modified this slightly, as the ‘click process’ part of the applescript uses a deprecated method (Apple’s own fault) and could become obsolete at any point. I just used a simple killall command in its place

tell application "System Events" if exists (process "Keyboard Viewer") then do shell script "killall KeyboardViewer" else do shell script "/usr/local/bin/keyboardViewer" end if end tell

And now, my trusty Cmd + Optn + Ctrl + K Quicksilver trigger is back!

iTunes – ‘Random’ Shuffle & Recently Unplayed

Patrick — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 22:23:20 +0000

Listening to music whenever at my Mac, I’ve come to realise iTunes shuffle doesn’t actually shuffle as you might expect.
That is, it’s not completely random. Tracks are selected based on skip count and play count.
If you’ve skipped a track a few times, it’s less likely to be played in shuffle mode than those with a higher play count.

Now, in need of some kind of method to make sure ALL of my tracks get played (I had some un-played from over a year ago because of iTunes’ lack of shuffling) I set up my own custom smart playlist to sit alongside the ‘Recently Played’ playlist.

Recently Unplayed

This is a fairly simple filter that does what it says on the tin.

I set up the filter as below:

My Recently Uplayed Playlist

The last 3 filters just get rid of the junk and make sure it’s only music. You must make sure ‘Live updating’ is ticked.

Now, I can listen to my music on a 40 day or so (for me) rota, with about 50 songs in my playlist at any one time; and this playlist is still on shuffle so it’s never the same

If you’re thinking ‘but I like the way iTunes works. I don’t want to listen to the tracks I’ve skipped!’, then my reasoning would be DELETE THEM!

Hope this helps someone… it took me a while and a bit of searching to find out that iTunes (and apparently iPods as well) don’t really have a random shuffle.

Wild Camping in France

Patrick — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 18:36:04 +0000

Wild camping is one of those things that many people want to do, but are scared of trying as they’re not sure of what to expect.
It doesn’t help that the internet is bare (for once!) of information on the matter. There don’t seem to be any good guides or tips anywhere – probably because it’s not ‘technically’ legal.

Having wild-camped with my sister and friend for the first time in France for 2 weeks this summer (’09), I’m fairly clued up as to the “dos” and “don’ts”, and also a lot less scared as to what might happen!

Below is a recap of our experiences. You’ll find info on the good and bad places to wild-camp in France. I’m sure this info is valid for any European country: Spain, Germany, Italy – you name it!

A recap of our experiences;

Camping Spots

The Good

Picnic (or Pique-nique in French) spots

These are generally quite easy to find, and often offer great camping spots with benches for cooking / eating and sometimes toilets! Every time we followed a picnic sign, we ended up in a secluded spot, quiet after 20h00.

Lakes & Other geographical features

Tying in with the idea of picnic spots, these areas generally have a fair number of picnic spots close by. If not, they can still be good options. Lakes and other large geographical features tend to be away from built up areas and offer spectacular places to camp for the night.

Don't worry about the signs

Forests & Forest Track

Another good one here, as there’s shelter and they’re often pretty close to life so you’re not stuck out in the middle of nowhere. You do need to look out for signs of activity though! A busy forest being cut for logging is not good (see below!)

Farmers!

We only ever did this once and it turned out well. If you’re ever stuck, just go knock on someone’s door (hopefully you can speak the language!) and ask if you can camp or if they know of anywhere to go. We did this one night and were directed to a nunnery – the best camping spot we found!

Camping at the nunnery

The Bad

Tracks or People’s driveways

Yes, as stupid as it might sound, this did happen. You’d probably think “who in their right mind would camp next to someone’s house, on their land?” and the answer would be YOU; if light was fading, you were hungry and just wanted somewhere to sleep.

Anywhere showing recent signs of activity

We came across these spots a few times. Vineyards, forests with logging going on are all not good! This is really only relevant for places you *shouldn’t* really be. Picnic spots show signs of activity, but are generally accepted for camping.

This brings up the important point that you shouldn’t leave it too late to start looking for camping spots. We did several times, and it mostly meant an uncomfortable night’s sleep (although it did pay off once, leading us to the nunnery!)

Transport

Now we did all of this with a trusty Peugeot 306, and it would have been hell without it.
I guess you could do it on foot, but it would make life a lot more difficult – if you found yourself in a dodgy area with dusk approaching you’d be stuffed.

Accommodation & Cooking

We invested in Quechua (from Decathlon) pop-up tents which, after 2 weeks of setting up camp at dusk and leaving at dawn were a godsend (literally take 10 seconds to put and AND down!). I’d recommend these tents to anybody who’s camping anywhere; they’re cheap and extremely cheerful.

We also bought a portable gas stove – not one of the cheap screw-on tops for gas canisters, but the more sturdy black-box gas stoves for ~£12.99.

One of the Campingaz CP250 gas cartridges (long, tall and thin) would last about 3-4 hours of cooking, just over a week.
Incase you’re worried. These CP250 gas cartridges, as well as other CP206bp cartridges can be bought in France, and I guess most of Europe.

Facilities

Generally, we didn’t have many problems with being smelly or dirty – we’d stay in a campsite every few days to clean up, or go to a beach and wash. In France there’s almost always a shower at the beach.

Outcome

I’d recommend wild-camping to anyone. You won’t get pestered by the law enforcers as long as you’re tidy and quiet.
It’s a great experience, and best of all – it’s free!