Saturday, July 12, 2008
Your House Is Too Big
If your biggest problem is that your wireless router doesn't reach all the rooms in your house, you're a lucky guy.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Oh, That Again
Every so often, I start up my Mac, and it's extremely sluggish ... maddeningly so. Simple tasks lock up and stall. Every time, I find myself cursing and asking " What the hell is ... " and then the answer comes. Software Update.
Why is the Software Update background check so overwhelming to the system? What exactly is the problem? I can run 4 networked applications all at the same time, and the performance of all 4 applications is acceptable, but if the Software Update system is checking the mothership for available updates, it brings my system to a crawl. WTF, Apple ???
Next problem ... I go to the Dock and bring up the menu for Software Update and select " Quit ". The menu item highlights as normal and I think " Ok. Problem solved. Back to what I was doing. " No.
Why the hell is Software Update the only program on the damned box to which " Quit " doesn't mean quit ??? If there's someone who needs help with this concept, " Quit " means this: The application closes any open windows, saves any pertinent data, and then terminates quietly.
Ignoring the user's instruction to quit is Bad.
Why is the Software Update background check so overwhelming to the system? What exactly is the problem? I can run 4 networked applications all at the same time, and the performance of all 4 applications is acceptable, but if the Software Update system is checking the mothership for available updates, it brings my system to a crawl. WTF, Apple ???
Next problem ... I go to the Dock and bring up the menu for Software Update and select " Quit ". The menu item highlights as normal and I think " Ok. Problem solved. Back to what I was doing. " No.
Why the hell is Software Update the only program on the damned box to which " Quit " doesn't mean quit ??? If there's someone who needs help with this concept, " Quit " means this: The application closes any open windows, saves any pertinent data, and then terminates quietly.
Ignoring the user's instruction to quit is Bad.
Monday, April 21, 2008
Leave Your Car At Home Tomorrow ( Earth Day )
If you can, why not leave your car at home tomorrow? Wouldn't that be a great way to support Earth Day?
The realities of life won't let everyone do this, but if you can ... give it a try ... for just one day.
Maybe you could arrange to get a ride with someone. Maybe you could ride your bike. Maybe you could take a train or bus to work. Maybe you could work from home.
The advantages of not driving go beyond the emissions from your car. Traffic congestion ruins everyone's gas mileage. The more cars on the road, the worse everyone's mileage gets. ( And of course, more emissions per car per trip is bad. ) Even if you have a super clean burning engine or a hybrid, you still add to the congestion if you're on the road.
The realities of life won't let everyone do this, but if you can ... give it a try ... for just one day.
Maybe you could arrange to get a ride with someone. Maybe you could ride your bike. Maybe you could take a train or bus to work. Maybe you could work from home.
The advantages of not driving go beyond the emissions from your car. Traffic congestion ruins everyone's gas mileage. The more cars on the road, the worse everyone's mileage gets. ( And of course, more emissions per car per trip is bad. ) Even if you have a super clean burning engine or a hybrid, you still add to the congestion if you're on the road.
Friday, April 04, 2008
Time Is Not Money
Forget what you've been told. Time is NOT money. Time is far more valuable than money, and far more scarce.
Given an unlimited amount of time, you can easily find way to make money. Regardless of how much money you have, you cannot make time.
You may be able to go out and raise money. You can hit up your friends, family, maybe even venture capital firms, but no one can give you more time. Once it's gone, there is no more.
Why do I bring this up?
If there's a way that spending money will help you do things, then spend the money. Life is all about doing things, whether that's accomplishing things at work or at home, going on memorable vacations, creating something out of nothing, raising a child, writing a song, ... Money is ... well ... just a way to buy the things you need.
If the thing that you're trying to accomplish doesn't get done, it doesn't matter how much money you've saved, you've failed.
Spend the money. Use the time you saved to do something great.
Given an unlimited amount of time, you can easily find way to make money. Regardless of how much money you have, you cannot make time.
You may be able to go out and raise money. You can hit up your friends, family, maybe even venture capital firms, but no one can give you more time. Once it's gone, there is no more.
Why do I bring this up?
If there's a way that spending money will help you do things, then spend the money. Life is all about doing things, whether that's accomplishing things at work or at home, going on memorable vacations, creating something out of nothing, raising a child, writing a song, ... Money is ... well ... just a way to buy the things you need.
If the thing that you're trying to accomplish doesn't get done, it doesn't matter how much money you've saved, you've failed.
Spend the money. Use the time you saved to do something great.
Tuesday, April 01, 2008
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Blogging
As of this morning, I am guest blogging on the Group News Blog. That means probably one post a week or so. My first one is echoed at Mischievous Ramblings II, which also now has my history from the first MR, although some comment dates are wrong. I hope to get MRII operational at the original MR URL shortly.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Change the Look of the Dock
I really dislike the new appearance of the Dock in Leopard -- the new 3D low-contrast glassy appearance. From what I hear, this was a matter of bitter debate at Apple, and that's good, because there's a built-in way to change it.
You may have noticed that the Dock changes when it's on the side of the screen. I like that appearance much better. It has better contrast and a much cleaner look, so I can recognize the icons more quickly.
You can get the dock-at-the-side appearance all the time by setting a preference from the command-line.
Enjoy.
p.s.
Hey, SJ, if you're listening ... this choice belongs in the preference pane for the Dock, so that users who want (or need) higher contrast in the Dock could more easily improve their Mac OS X experience.
You may have noticed that the Dock changes when it's on the side of the screen. I like that appearance much better. It has better contrast and a much cleaner look, so I can recognize the icons more quickly.
You can get the dock-at-the-side appearance all the time by setting a preference from the command-line.
mike$ defaults write com.apple.dock no-glass -boolean YES
mike$ killall Dock
Enjoy.
p.s.
Hey, SJ, if you're listening ... this choice belongs in the preference pane for the Dock, so that users who want (or need) higher contrast in the Dock could more easily improve their Mac OS X experience.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)