macOS and Mac Software: We still exist!

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > macOS and Mac Software: We still exist!

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some kinda jackal: Feb 25, 2003; �
�

carry on then posted:

Oh good GOD I forgot how ugly this OS used to be.

# ? Jun 29, 2012 20:43

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# ? May 9, 2024 04:30

Star War Sex Parrot: Oct 2, 2003

Martytoof posted:

Oh good GOD I forgot how ugly this OS used to be.

Here you go, Marty:

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2011/05/mac-os-x-revisited/

# ? Jun 29, 2012 20:51

Wild EEPROM: Jul 29, 2011; oh, my, god. Becky, look at her bitrate.

Remember when early builds of Leopard had a completely transparant menu bar?

# ? Jun 29, 2012 21:29

vikingstrike: Sep 23, 2007; whats happening, captain

jwoven posted:

Remember when early builds of Leopard had a completely transparant menu bar?

This is still available in System Preferences....

# ? Jun 29, 2012 21:49

Wild EEPROM: Jul 29, 2011; oh, my, god. Becky, look at her bitrate.

vikingstrike posted:

This is still available in System Preferences....

No I mean completely transparent.

# ? Jun 29, 2012 22:15

vikingstrike: Sep 23, 2007; whats happening, captain

jwoven posted:

No I mean completely transparent.

Ahhhh, I had forgotten about that.

# ? Jun 29, 2012 22:30

carry on then: Jul 10, 2010; by VideoGames
(and can't post for 10 years!)

Martytoof posted:

Oh good GOD I forgot how ugly this OS used to be.

To be fair, it was competing with:

Sometimes I forget how gaudy the early 2000s were.

(as an aside, both those images came from http://guidebookgallery.org, an excellent gallery of old OSes that unfortunately was abandoned 6 years ago.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 07:41

Experto Crede: Aug 19, 2008; Keep on Truckin'

carry on then posted:

To be fair, it was competing with:

Sometimes I forget how gaudy the early 2000s were.

(as an aside, both those images came from http://guidebookgallery.org, an excellent gallery of old OSes that unfortunately was abandoned 6 years ago.

I think it's safe to say that operating system UIs went a bit mental in the early 2000s. With more graphics power, most of them went from the utilitarian and plain interfaces of the nineties to often gaudy colours and over the top visual effects. Basically like the internet was in the late nineties (but without the midi files).

As a side note, I always liked the Toasty Tech GUI Gallery

# ? Jun 30, 2012 08:50

Decius: Oct 14, 2005; Ramrod XTreme

carry on then posted:

Sometimes I forget how gaudy the early 2000s were.

(as an aside, both those images came from http://guidebookgallery.org, an excellent gallery of old OSes that unfortunately was abandoned 6 years ago.

Though at least you could set XP to classic mode in its boring-but-easy-on-the-eyes grey and blue scheme. And there were some relatively nice skins available (Watercolor XP which looks a lot like the inspiration for MS' Metro UI Desktop scheme)

# ? Jun 30, 2012 09:11

x-virge: May 25, 2003

carry on then posted:

(as an aside, both those images came from http://guidebookgallery.org, an excellent gallery of old OSes that unfortunately was abandoned 6 years ago.

Apparently the guy who ran GUIdebook is a UI designer at Google now.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 09:11

kapalama: Aug 15, 2007; EVERYTHING I SAY ABOUT JAPAN OR LIVING IN JAPAN IS COMPLETELY WRONG, BUT YOU BETTER BELIEVE I'LL ABOUT IT.

PLEASE ADD ME TO YOUR IGNORE LIST.

IF YOU SEE ME POST IN A JAPAN THREAD, PLEASE PM A MODERATOR SO THAT I CAN BE BANNED.

Flash is stopping everything on my computer pretty much anytime certain pages load in my browsers.

If I uninstall Flash, what will I lost the ability to do?

# ? Jun 30, 2012 13:21

8ender: Sep 24, 2003; clown is watching you sleep

Decius posted:

Though at least you could set XP to classic mode in its boring-but-easy-on-the-eyes grey and blue scheme. And there were some relatively nice skins available (Watercolor XP which looks a lot like the inspiration for MS' Metro UI Desktop scheme)

Watercolour was based on the "whistler" theme which was the theme in betas of Windows XP and almost the shipping XP theme. At the last second Microsoft realized they might have a clean tasteful design on their hands and took a poo poo on the whole operating system with Luna.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 13:24

FlashBangBob: Jul 5, 2007; BLAM! Internet Found!

kapalama posted:

Flash is stopping everything on my computer pretty much anytime certain pages load in my browsers.

If I uninstall Flash, what will I lost the ability to do?

You will lose the ability to use Flash.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 13:28

rookieone: May 25, 2004; A small town never forgets

kapalama posted:

Flash is stopping everything on my computer pretty much anytime certain pages load in my browsers.

If I uninstall Flash, what will I lost the ability to do?

The other option would be to install a browser extension like Flashblock or ClickToFlash to only show the flash content you really want to see. It has a couple of nifty features like automatic HTML5 for Youtube etc.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 13:55

Bob Morales: Aug 18, 2006; ~~Just wear the fucking mask, Bob~~

I don't care how many people I probably infected with COVID-19 while refusing to wear a mask, my comfort is far more important than the health and safety of everyone around me!

kapalama posted:

Flash is stopping everything on my computer pretty much anytime certain pages load in my browsers.

If I uninstall Flash, what will I lost the ability to do?

Remove it. Then install Chrome and when you need to visit a page that uses or requires Flash, use Chrome.

Then use Safari/Firefox for everything else.

# ? Jun 30, 2012 15:03

Shaocaholica: Oct 29, 2002; Fig. 5E

Are there any video players still being supported for PPC builds? Are any of them any good?

# ? Jun 30, 2012 15:22

kapalama: Aug 15, 2007; EVERYTHING I SAY ABOUT JAPAN OR LIVING IN JAPAN IS COMPLETELY WRONG, BUT YOU BETTER BELIEVE I'LL ABOUT IT.

PLEASE ADD ME TO YOUR IGNORE LIST.

IF YOU SEE ME POST IN A JAPAN THREAD, PLEASE PM A MODERATOR SO THAT I CAN BE BANNED.

Bob Morales posted:

Remove it. Then install Chrome and when you need to visit a page that uses or requires Flash, use Chrome.

Then use Safari/Firefox for everything else.

Oh wow this is exactly what I want. CHrome has flash built in so if I have to I can use Chrome..

Thanks!

# ? Jun 30, 2012 15:28

Granite Octopus: Jun 24, 2008

This is what I do. The whole-system-jolt while it waits for Flash to spool up is infuriating to me. Hence none of my Macs have it installed anymore. What I don't get is how it appears to be getting worse with every version.

Although what's more annoying is how YouTube has started preventing you from playing HTML5 video back on the desktop, so instead I manually switch the user agent to iPad while in Safari to get the sweet sweet h264. Hopefully they wont catch on for a little while...

# ? Jul 1, 2012 11:34

kapalama: Aug 15, 2007; EVERYTHING I SAY ABOUT JAPAN OR LIVING IN JAPAN IS COMPLETELY WRONG, BUT YOU BETTER BELIEVE I'LL ABOUT IT.

PLEASE ADD ME TO YOUR IGNORE LIST.

IF YOU SEE ME POST IN A JAPAN THREAD, PLEASE PM A MODERATOR SO THAT I CAN BE BANNED.

Granite Octopus posted:

This is what I do. The whole-system-jolt while it waits for Flash to spool up is infuriating to me. Hence none of my Macs have it installed anymore. What I don't get is how it appears to be getting worse with every version.

Flash has steadily become less and less reasonable to allow to run to the point that it seems like all anyone is trying to do is actually justify why iOS avoids it completely. I thought uninstalling Flash would cost me something other than freedom from a bunch of ads and non-responsive page loads.

Seriously why did I not uninstall Flash a while ago? Do I really need to see all those flash ads?

There ought to be a law(TM): Once every thee years, software companies will not be able to continue feature bloat/creep, nor issue major point releases and instead be required to optimize code, and increase security without trying even slightly increase 'capability'.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 13:12

Diabolik900: Mar 28, 2007

I've had Flash uninstalled for over a year now. The only part that's annoying is how many sites have HTML5 versions of their video content, but won't show them unless you change your user agent. Sites really should go HTML first, and then just have Flash as a fallback if they're gonna have it at all.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 13:56

kim jong-illin: May 2, 2011

Is there a shortcut or extension that will let me print directly to .pdf from Safari?

I'm doing online practice questions and like to print the answers to .pdf for later revision but it's tedious to have to keep clicking the little PDF button on the print options. It would be nice if I could just hit a shortcut, enter the name and have the page automatically printed to .pdf to a specific directory.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 17:43

japtor: Oct 28, 2005

There isn't, but you might be able to AppleScript/Automator something up and stick it in as a shortcut. I can probably try making something up later today when I get back if no one else does first.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 17:54

some kinda jackal: Feb 25, 2003; �
�

e: uhh wrong thread

# ? Jul 1, 2012 17:59

Manky: Mar 20, 2007; Fun Shoe

VLC 2.0.2 dropped, and it is good (and has a Terry Pratchett joke!?). Release notes. Big change I care about : removal of the font cache. Big change some will care about : retina display support.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 18:24

crazysim: May 23, 2004; I AM SOOOOO GAY

kim jong-illin posted:

Is there a shortcut or extension that will let me print directly to .pdf from Safari?

I'm doing online practice questions and like to print the answers to .pdf for later revision but it's tedious to have to keep clicking the little PDF button on the print options. It would be nice if I could just hit a shortcut, enter the name and have the page automatically printed to .pdf to a specific directory.

I'm not sure if a CUPS PDF style printer would work for this. It might be worth looking into that. The automator one sounds better though.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 19:21

Bonobos: Jan 26, 2004

What's the easiest, most idiot proof way to convert my DVD movie collection into HQ iTunes compatible movies these days?

I already have Ripit (which is an awesome DVD ripper to rip into ISO, I know it can encode, but this again doesn't do anything for tagging). So basically I am looking for something I can just take the file I ripped with Ripit, and encode it into a high-quality movie format (auto-tagged would be ideal) so that I can play it in iTunes / iOS devices.

I read that iVi, iFlicks and Roadmovie would do what I am asking, but I can't seem to find a consensus on which is best. Handbrake seems that it has way too many options (and I no idea which settings would look the best while taking the least amount of space). Also, that doesn't help with the tagging, which I believe it doesn't do last I checked. I also read that there is an automated version of Handbrake, but I can't seem to find it (anyways I read its based on an old version and is unstable). I have roughly about 300+ movies to convert, so I would like something automated if at all possible.

Since I would like to do this only once I do not mind spending money to get a better product...any suggestions?

# ? Jul 1, 2012 21:29

kapalama: Aug 15, 2007; EVERYTHING I SAY ABOUT JAPAN OR LIVING IN JAPAN IS COMPLETELY WRONG, BUT YOU BETTER BELIEVE I'LL ABOUT IT.

PLEASE ADD ME TO YOUR IGNORE LIST.

IF YOU SEE ME POST IN A JAPAN THREAD, PLEASE PM A MODERATOR SO THAT I CAN BE BANNED.

kim jong-illin posted:

Is there a shortcut or extension that will let me print directly to .pdf from Safari?

I'm doing online practice questions and like to print the answers to .pdf for later revision but it's tedious to have to keep clicking the little PDF button on the print options. It would be nice if I could just hit a shortcut, enter the name and have the page automatically printed to .pdf to a specific directory.

japtor posted:

There isn't, but you might be able to AppleScript/Automator something up and stick it in as a shortcut. I can probably try making something up later today when I get back if no one else does first.

I can't believe it, japtor missed one! (Only saying it because japtor always knows the answer. Thanks for all the other times.)

CUPS PDF, as crazysim notes, is the answer*. CUPS PDF is really great for exactly what you are looking for. One quick tip for it: put a alias to the CUPS PDF spool folder in the sidebar otherwise the annoyance becomes hunting down the CUPS PDF spool folder.

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/20219/cups-pdf/

*but it's not perfect. It may not work in Lion, and the things it prints are larger than they need to be.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 22:04

kapalama: Aug 15, 2007; EVERYTHING I SAY ABOUT JAPAN OR LIVING IN JAPAN IS COMPLETELY WRONG, BUT YOU BETTER BELIEVE I'LL ABOUT IT.

PLEASE ADD ME TO YOUR IGNORE LIST.

IF YOU SEE ME POST IN A JAPAN THREAD, PLEASE PM A MODERATOR SO THAT I CAN BE BANNED.

Bonobos posted:

What's the easiest, most idiot proof way to convert my DVD movie collection into HQ iTunes compatible movies these days?

I already have Ripit (which is an awesome DVD ripper to rip into ISO, I know it can encode, but this again doesn't do anything for tagging). So basically I am looking for something I can just take the file I ripped with Ripit, and encode it into a high-quality movie format (auto-tagged would be ideal) so that I can play it in iTunes / iOS devices.

I read that iVi, iFlicks and Roadmovie would do what I am asking, but I can't seem to find a consensus on which is best. Handbrake seems that it has way too many options (and I no idea which settings would look the best while taking the least amount of space). Also, that doesn't help with the tagging, which I believe it doesn't do last I checked. I also read that there is an automated version of Handbrake, but I can't seem to find it (anyways I read its based on an old version and is unstable). I have roughly about 300+ movies to convert, so I would like something automated if at all possible.

Since I would like to do this only once I do not mind spending money to get a better product...any suggestions?

HandBrake is really smart about making iTunes capable vids. Unlike other transcoders I have used, it never make an unnecessarily large file because it never upscales the resolution, which is a problem with others I have used. Also tagging is a pain.

The automated part is not as good as it should be, because the 'automation' requires direct interaction to add things to the queue. But once you learn the trick of cmd+B adding to the queue it saves some time. It is part of the regular distribution.

# ? Jul 1, 2012 22:16

hannibal: Jul 27, 2001; [img-planes]

Bonobos posted:

What's the easiest, most idiot proof way to convert my DVD movie collection into HQ iTunes compatible movies these days?

I already have Ripit (which is an awesome DVD ripper to rip into ISO, I know it can encode, but this again doesn't do anything for tagging). So basically I am looking for something I can just take the file I ripped with Ripit, and encode it into a high-quality movie format (auto-tagged would be ideal) so that I can play it in iTunes / iOS devices.

I read that iVi, iFlicks and Roadmovie would do what I am asking, but I can't seem to find a consensus on which is best. Handbrake seems that it has way too many options (and I no idea which settings would look the best while taking the least amount of space). Also, that doesn't help with the tagging, which I believe it doesn't do last I checked. I also read that there is an automated version of Handbrake, but I can't seem to find it (anyways I read its based on an old version and is unstable). I have roughly about 300+ movies to convert, so I would like something automated if at all possible.

Since I would like to do this only once I do not mind spending money to get a better product...any suggestions?

It's not as automated as you like but this is what I do:

- Rip DVDs and Blu-Rays with my Windows PC (using AnyDVD - can't help you on the Mac side here but seems like ripit will do the job)
- Use Handbrake, with AppleTV2 preset
-- I'm ripping mine for my AppleTV, and these rips seem to work ok with my iPad, although I guess you can use the Universal preset too
-- I don't usually alter the settings, except subtitles if necessary (Handbrake nightly build has BR subtitle support) and I usually leave the audio as-is unless it's an old movie with 2-channel sound only, where I take out the AC3 track and just leave AAC in
- Use iDentify to tag with metadata and cover images for the AppleTV

Works fine for me. I've gone through most of my DVD/BR library this way.

# ? Jul 2, 2012 01:51

Yeast: Dec 25, 2006; $1900 Grande Latte

Is using Ripit a redundant step? I thought Handbrake could take a DVD and produce an ATV2 encoded file straight out of it?

# ? Jul 2, 2012 04:06

Bonobos: Jan 26, 2004

Yeast posted:

Is using Ripit a redundant step? I thought Handbrake could take a DVD and produce an ATV2 encoded file straight out of it?

Guess it is redundant, though I read that ripoff is supposedly better at ripping. Got the program a while ago and it's never given me a problem or error ripping a disc so I just continued to use it. The program is literally just 'hit this button and get an image in your folder'. To be honest I wouldnt even bother encoding the movies if I could just tag the files / use them with iOS.

The more I read though, the more I am leaning toward iVi or Roadmovie or iFlicks over handbrake since it will automagically locate the correct tags and decode at the same time. Sounds like I need to read up on this some more.

# ? Jul 2, 2012 05:34

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I had a MobileMe account that I just switched to iCloud (I'm a slowpoke, sue me), and I have a few questions -

1. I have two accounts: an account that I use for iTunes purchases and the MobileMe-now-iCloud account for syncing across devices and other goodies. I never use the MobileMe email address. Is there any reason not to ditch the MobileMe account and just use the iTunes purchases account for everything?

2. What happens if I try to back up to iCloud but my backup is >5GB? Does it do a partial backup, or force me to delete stuff before another backup happens?

# ? Jul 2, 2012 06:41

japtor: Oct 28, 2005

kapalama posted:

I can't believe it, japtor missed one! (Only saying it because japtor always knows the answer. Thanks for all the other times.)

CUPS PDF, as crazysim notes, is the answer*. CUPS PDF is really great for exactly what you are looking for. One quick tip for it: put a alias to the CUPS PDF spool folder in the sidebar otherwise the annoyance becomes hunting down the CUPS PDF spool folder.

http://www.macupdate.com/app/mac/20219/cups-pdf/

*but it's not perfect. It may not work in Lion, and the things it prints are larger than they need to be.

And looking at Automator/AppleScript now...there doesn't seem to be a direct way of doing it :psyduck:

. The closest thing I can find is through UI scripting.

If CUPS-PDF doesn't work (I had it working before but had some annoying file owner/permission issues) there's some shareware AirPrint stuff like Printopia. I originally got it for AirPrint (of course) but noticed that the Printopia printers showed up and work as regular printers for Macs too.

Whatever the case if you have one of those PDF printers installed you can make an Automator service for it and apply a keyboard shortcut so you don't have to go to the print dialog at all! The script itself:

code:

tell application "Safari"
	print the front document with properties {target printer:"printer name"} without print dialog
end tell

And screenshot to show the specifics of what to do (more or less):

# ? Jul 2, 2012 10:12

Laserface: Dec 24, 2004

Can anyone recommend an MSN chat client that is not adium and does the following?

allows custom text sizing in both typing and chat window
tabbed chat windows
minimal fluff (display icons, chat buttons)

MSN for mac is literally better than the windows version by a million miles, I just wish it would remember that I want to hide the stupid pop-out display icon tray and give me the option to choose the color of the chat window.

alternatively if there is also a A-patch style thing for MSN on mac then just give me that.

# ? Jul 2, 2012 11:23

Boris Galerkin: Dec 17, 2011; I don't understand why I can't harass people online. Seriously, somebody please explain why I shouldn't be allowed to stalk others on social media!

Manky posted:

VLC 2.0.2 dropped, and it is good (and has a Terry Pratchett joke!?). Release notes. Big change I care about : removal of the font cache. Big change some will care about : retina display support.

That's great. I was wondering what the hell a font cache was in VLC and why it needed to build one just to display videos.

# ? Jul 2, 2012 14:37

Catalyst-proof: May 11, 2011; better waste some time with you

One of my friends has a Macbook Air on Lion where opening Mail.app causes an infinite number of Mail.app windows to continuously open. I removed the ~/Library/Mail directory, and had them re-enter their mail account information; upon doing so Mail.app started doing the same thing. Has anybody ever seen this behavior?

# ? Jul 2, 2012 15:15

Shaocaholica: Oct 29, 2002; Fig. 5E

Its been 2 years since this article was written:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/3759/mac-os-x-steam-performance-half-life-2-episode-2-still-slower-than-windows

Have things gotten better for Macs since?

# ? Jul 2, 2012 16:51

chimz: Jul 27, 2005; Science isn't about why, it's about why not.

Shaocaholica posted:

Have things gotten better for Macs since?

Yes, some of the point updates for Snow Leopard which dropped after that article was written and Lion itself contained major speed improvements for 3D graphics in OS X. I don't think you'll get the exact same performance as in Boot Camp, but it's not half bad anymore. I've started playing most Steam games in OS X even though I have a perfectly good Boot Camp partition.

# ? Jul 2, 2012 17:07

Bob Morales: Aug 18, 2006; ~~Just wear the fucking mask, Bob~~

I don't care how many people I probably infected with COVID-19 while refusing to wear a mask, my comfort is far more important than the health and safety of everyone around me!

Fren posted:

One of my friends has a Macbook Air on Lion where opening Mail.app causes an infinite number of Mail.app windows to continuously open. I removed the ~/Library/Mail directory, and had them re-enter their mail account information; upon doing so Mail.app started doing the same thing. Has anybody ever seen this behavior?

I think for most apps that gets stored in a plist - the default location should be ~/Library/Preferences/xxxxx, check if there is one for Mail in there

# ? Jul 2, 2012 17:26

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# ? May 9, 2024 04:30

Bob Morales: Aug 18, 2006; ~~Just wear the fucking mask, Bob~~

I don't care how many people I probably infected with COVID-19 while refusing to wear a mask, my comfort is far more important than the health and safety of everyone around me!

Never seen this before in Safari

Base 2010 i3 iMac + Lion

# ? Jul 2, 2012 17:32

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > macOS and Mac Software: We still exist!

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