Sunday, February 4, 2007

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) (4 сообщения)

The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)  RSS  The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
http://www.tuaw.com
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  • 1Passwd 2.3 brings new UI, folders, 1Click Login Bookmarks and more to browser keychain tool

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    1Passwd from Agile Web Solutions is one of those browser addons that just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy, as if its developers had an epiphany while laying in a field of not-too-prickly grass on a perfectly warm, sunny day, asking themselves: "how can we make the world a better place?"

    Which browser does 1Passwd work with, you ask? Why, just about all of them. This password and identity manager integrates with nearly every major Mac OS X browser, including Safari, Firefox, Camino and OmniWeb, as well as DEVONagent and even NetNewsWire, to bring Keychain nirvana and multiple identity autofill to website forms (that's right: Firefox can use the Keychain, thanks to 1Passwd). In other words: it's an über-Keychain for your browsers, allowing you to stop caring about which one you're using, where you saved that forum's password or how you're going to fill out the umpteenth store registration. And as you might have guessed from my introduction: I kind of like 1Passwd, and a recent upgrade to v2.3 offers even more to rave about.

    Most noticeably, the new version ushers in a fresh new UI, shedding the old 'n busted brushed metal for the unified look that's all the craze with 3rd party developers and lovers of good-looking software. Don't be fooled though; the new features are far more than skin deep. Folders and smart folders are now in full effect, allowing for more flexible organization of your unruly collection of logins. Another really slick new feature is 1Click Login Bookmarks, which allow you to save a bookmark with specific login credentials - perfect for sites at which you have multiple credentials. Goodbye, tedious logging in/out all day!

    Plenty of other new and updated features are detailed in this blog post, and many of 1Passwd's major features, such as Firefox integration and Palm/Treo syncing, have screenshots or video demonstrations on its product page (scroll down for all the goods). A demo is available, while a single license costs a mere $30, with a 3-license family pack for $40.
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  • Mac-compatible USB MIssile Launcher at Last

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    Continuing the spirit of Erica's crazy USB peripheral posts from last week, now comes news that one of the most tragic of Mac deprivations is finally at an end. I speak, of course, of the lack of Mac drivers for the USB Missile Launchers released back in 2005, and available from ThinkGeek.com. Refusing to stand for the gross injustice of the Windows-only software, David Wilson has hacked his USB Missile Launcher driver for OS X. His driver seems to work both for the original USB Missile Launcher and a similar USB Rocket Launcher.

    David's USB Missile Launcher Software is Open Source and a free download, though of course you'll need the launchers which run about $40 and are sadly out of stock at the moment at ThinkGeek. Nonetheless, the day has finally dawned for Mac cubicle warriors to compete with their Windows counterparts on an even playing field. A big TUAW 'attaboy for David!
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  • Nike+ website adds 'Map it' feature

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    Legions of iPod nano toting runners track their workouts using the Nike+ website. I am not one of them (though I am getting in shape, sadly running has never been attractive to me), however, I still think the website is neat. Nike has just added a cool new feature to the Nike+ website: 'Map it.' Map It allows you to map your run using Google Maps. You can choose to make these maps public, or to keep them private (I can imagine some people might not want the world to know where they are running). You can then associate past, or future, runs with this new map to keep track of how you are doing. Pretty neat, though it would be even better if you could map your routes automatically using GSP. But you know what they say, baby steps (ha!).

    Thanks, Bob.
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  • To Tag or Not to Tag: Punakea and SpotMeta

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    Everybody knows about the endless wars: Mac vs. PC, Coke vs. Pepsi, Tags vs. Hierarchical Filing... Well, okay, so the last one isn't quite as long-running, but it does seem like a point of controversy. A nice article on theappleblog about Spotlight and meta-data has gotten me thinking again about the whole tagging thing. The file folder metaphor is so strongly embedded in the way many of us long-time computer users think that it's sometimes hard to appreciate the benefits of new ways of doing things. I still instinctively crave hierarchical folder systems and was very happy, for instance, when iTunes finely gained folders (and remain annoyed that Yojimbo doesn't support nested Collection Folders). That said, as big of a stick in the mud as I normally am, del.icio.us (especially with Pukka) and some other tagging implementations have finally got me seeing that tags are definitely useful. At the end of the day, of course, there's no need to choose since neither filing method is exclusive of the other, so I think I'll continue to use both for the foreseeable future.

    All of that was a lead-in to a couple of applications that make tagging with OS X easier. Of course, the best thing would be if Leopard included an official tagging mechanism, rather than the improvised systems involving Spotlight comments, but even if it does not there are some tools out there worth looking at if tagging is your thing. First there's Punkaea (donation requested) from nudge:nudge. Punakea features a drawer that pops out of the side of your screen onto which you can drag and drop files. When you do so, it will pop up a small dialog allowing you to define tags for that file. You can then search for tags with Spotlight or use the Tag Cloud within Punakea's browser window to find your files. Punakea can even be set to manage files you drop into it. That is, you can define a folder for Punakea to manage, and whenever you drop a file onto Punakea's application icon it will ask you for the tags and then move that file to the folder, in essence creating a non-hierarchical filing system.

    SpotMeta a new open-source project from Ben Summers takes a different approach, which is more integrated into the Finder, but also seems a bit more limited as to the practical number of tags possible. With SpotMeta you must first define your tags or "keys"in the application, and then whenever you want to tag a file, you just right-click in the Finder and select "Edit Metadata with SpotMeta...". (or alternatively you can select the file and then hit SpotMeta's Hotkey combo). This will bring up an editing window in which you can chose one of your pre-defined "keys" or tags. Finally, when you want to find you tagged files, you can just use Spotlight directly or search by Kind with the Finder search box.

    Of course, in addition to these two applications, there's also the very handy File Tagging plugin for Quicksilver.

    Thanks to Steve for the SpotMeta tip!

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