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Archive for the ‘Development’ Category
Saturday, June 27th, 2009
So I rolled a new preview method into Default Folder X’s system-wide menus in the menubar. Now, not only can you browse all of your files and folders through its quick hierarchical menus, but you can see file previews in little bubbles, like this:
And if you hover over the menu item for a few seconds, that little preview will expand into a large one so you can see more details. Just browsing my hard disk with this has turned up ton of images and documents I didn’t know I still had!
This and a slew of other improvements are in the first beta release of Default Folder X 4.2.1. You can download a copy here to try it out:
http://www.stclairsoft.com/download/DefaultFolderX-4.2.1b1.dmg
There’s a full change log in the Beta Read Me file, and usual disclaimers about it being a prerelease version apply (it may have bugs, etc). I’d love to get some feedback on both the menu item previews and the other improvements, so grab a copy, give it a try, and let me know your thoughts!
– Jon
Posted in Default Folder X, Development, Leopard | 4 Comments »
Saturday, March 21st, 2009
Here’s another development build with refinements to Default Folder X’s new OpenMeta support:
http://www.stclairsoft.com/download/DefaultFolderX-4.2d10.dmg
Changes include:
- Made the autocompletion always respect the case of what you’ve typed, rather than forcing the capital or lowercase form you used last time.
- Fixed an OpenMeta problem that resulted in previous builds failing to start up under Mac OS 10.4.
- Changed OpenMeta tag fields so that it no longer selects all of the tags when Default Folder X first displays them.
- Fixed the localized nibs – they were not connecting the controls in the Spotlight comment window correctly.
- A new AppleScript command, ClearRecentFolders, clears the list of recently used folders in the currently active folder set.
- Corrected a bug that caused Default Folder X to print warning messages in the console like ” ** No alias data for item 0 (folder name) **” when there was a Smart Folder open in the Finder.
- Streamlined DFFinderWindowServer to minimize overhead.
Please keep the comments and feedback coming! As soon as I’ve got localization strings back, this version should be ready to roll. In the meantime, I’ll work on compatibility with future operating system changes 😉
Posted in Default Folder X, Development, openmeta | 2 Comments »
Friday, March 13th, 2009
There’s been quite a bit of debate in Ironic Software’s forums about OpenMeta. I was initially wary of some of the implementation details, but after discussing it with Tom Andersen, who wrote the OpenMeta code, I’m confident it will serve us all well. I’ve posted a summary of my thoughts on their forums at http://ironicsoftware.com/community/comments.php?DiscussionID=755/.
Now that I’m comfortable with OpenMeta’s direction, I’ve finished a pre-release build of Default Folder X that provides OpenMeta tagging support. You can download it here:
http://www.stclairsoft.com/download/DefaultFolderX-4.2d8.dmg
Please install it and have a look. I’d appreciate hearing your thoughts and reports of any bugs you find. The best way to submit your comments is via email to DefaultFolder@stclairsoft.com.
Thanks!
Posted in Default Folder X, Development, openmeta | 2 Comments »
Monday, February 2nd, 2009
Thanks to Rick Meikle’s careful detailing of exactly what has been wrong with Default Folder X’s “rebound” feature, I’ve now rewritten the rebound code to work much better. It’s in the latest development build of DFX, which is available here:
http://www.stclairsoft.com/download/DefaultFolderX-4.1.2d3.dmg
In addition, I’ve added a hidden option to display files as well as folders in Default Folder X’s hierarchical menus. When you select a file, the file dialog is taken to its parent folder and the file is selected if the current application can open it. To get to the switch to turn this on, go to Default Folder X in System Preferences and click on the “Settings…” button while holding down the Option key. Turn on the bottom checkbox in the window that comes up – it’s labeled “AlwaysShowFilesInMenus”.
As always, your comments, feedback, and bug reports are crucial to making better software, so speak up!
Tags:Default Folder X, Development, menus, rebound
Posted in Default Folder X, Development | 6 Comments »
Friday, January 23rd, 2009
Yes, I’ve been a negligent father – I didn’t blog about Ben’s release of Mathomatic for iPhone. It’s a very cool port of Mathomatic, an open source symbolic algebra engine that’s been around on the desktop for quite a while. Ben’s integrated it into a very slick package, and the equation formatting and display is really top notch.
Yeah, it’s pretty geeky, but I have to say it’s also VERY cool! Whether you’re doing homework, simplifying some equations for use in your own development work, or just want to be amazed at what you can do on an iPhone these days, it’s worth playing with – check it out!
Tags:algebra, iPhone, math, symbolic
Posted in Development, iPhone, Random Ramblings | 1 Comment »
Friday, January 23rd, 2009
I’m very excited about Ironic Software’s establishment of OpenMeta, a new standard for storage of tag metadata on OS X. Storing spotlight keywords in the Finder/Spotlight comments of files has always been problematic, but up until now, it was the best solution available if you wanted general-purpose access to the tags via Spotlight.
Now OpenMeta uses the metadata capabilities in HFS+ to uniformly store tag information – and provides open source code to make it easy for developers get on board. Ironic’s Deep application uses it, and Gravity Applications’ new Tags app is doing it too – you can assign tags to files, email messages, photos – it’s very slick and oh-so-much-better on a technical level – we just have to get more people to adopt it! As always, one of the missing pieces is being able to tag documents as you’re saving them – Default Folder X already supports this using the traditional Spotlight comments, so it makes all the sense in the world for DFX to support OpenMeta.
So in answer to all the emails I’ve been getting – YES, Default Folder X will adopt the OpenMeta standard (while still supporting Spotlight comments too, for those of you that aren’t ready to switch).
Tags:deep, openmeta, save dialog, spotlight, tags
Posted in Default Folder X, Development, Leopard | 11 Comments »
Sunday, November 16th, 2008
Andy Finnell makes a lot of sense in How to Price Your iPhone App out of Existence.
Since the opening of the app store I’ve felt that the $0.99 (or thereabouts) pricing model isn’t sustainable – Andy lays that out in thorough detail.
He does make one point I’d argue with, however. His assertion that developers should charge a price that’s high enough to keep them in business is backwards, in my opinion. Developers should charge a price commensurate with the value of their software to users. If I write an app that only appeals to 5 people and I need $50,000 a year to live, it’d be ridiculous to ask those 5 people to pay $10,000 / copy. If it’s worth $50 to them based on what it can do, then that’s what it’s worth. If that’s not enough to pay the bills, then I shouldn’t be writing that application, or should look at changing something (the feature set, advertising, or marketing) to make it more viable. Of course, we often don’t know the correct formula at the outset, but in the case of iPhone apps, it seems clear that charging $0.99 is not going to enable you to really support or update it long-term (where “long-term” is more than a few months).
Posted in Development, iPhone | No Comments »
Monday, November 3rd, 2008
We just released an update to HistoryHound! If you’re already hooked on it, just go download the new version – it will automatically recognize your existing registration number. If you haven’t tried it yet, this is a great time to take a test drive – let HistoryHound compile its index of all the pages in your browser history and bookmarks, and then you can do an instantaneous search for any word that appears anywhere on one of those pages.
The includes the ability to index web archive files – something that’s incredibly helpful for users that save web archives of pages for archival or offline viewing. The cool thing about it is that when one of those pages comes up in your HistoryHound search results, clicking on it loads the page from the web archive into HistoryHound’s built-in browser, so you don’t even need an internet connection to search and browse the contents of your web archives.
This release also fixes a bug that could cause HistoryHound to mysteriously crash while indexing in the background on some users’ Macs. So download it and let HistoryHound simplify that tangled web you’ve downloaded!
Posted in Development, HistoryHound | No Comments »
Wednesday, October 8th, 2008
 It’s out! HistoryHound 1.9.5 has now been officially released, bringing a huge speed improvement, support for all of the latest Mac web browsers, the ability to search by date, and a host of other refinements and fixes to our browser searching utility. Full details are available on the HistoryHound Release Page
Thanks to all of the beta testers, localizers, and HistoryHound fans that have supported and tested the various iterations along the way. You guys have made this a great utility for all of us!
Posted in Development, HistoryHound | No Comments »
Sunday, August 31st, 2008
HistoryHound 1.9.5 is finally getting close to finished! With the public release of 1.9.5b1 we’ve got support for NetNewsWire and other WebKit-based apps working well again, as well as further speed increases in downloading, indexing and searching. You can find things you’ve looked at before, no matter which standalone or embedded browser you were using at the time.
Existing HistoryHound users already know how powerful its targeted searching can be – for those of you who haven’t tried HistoryHound, get the scoop at http://www.stclairsoft.com/HistoryHound/ or download the beta directly from http://www.stclairsoft.com/HistoryHound/beta.html
Tags:bookmark, browser, history, HistoryHound, searching
Posted in Development, HistoryHound | No Comments »
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