[geeks] Apple software: the stuff you "gotta have"

[N. Miller]

On Oct 9, 2007, at 9:10 PM, Shannon Hendrix wrote:

>
>> * TextMate for script/programming for the syntax coloring and auto-
>> indent.  I like it better than BBEdit and TextWrangler.  Emacs @ the
>> command line otherwise.  I might prefer TextWrangler if regex was
>> more important to me, as my understanding is that TextWrangler is top
>> dog there.
>
> My problem is I have vi programmed at very low levels in my neural
> network.  I'm still not sure what to do about a code editor.  I can
> use other editors well enough for things like email, even though it
> annoys me, but for other things I'm wondering if I'll want to try and
> get a "vi widget" to plug into other apps.

I know what you mean, but as an emacs user.  I would love to find one  
text editor for all platforms that has emacs key bindings and was  
easy to integrate as the default text editor for all apps.  At least  
it's easy to swap control & caps on the Mac.

>> * MAMP for *painless* Apache2+MySQL stack
>
> Fortunately I have an external server for that kind of stuff.

Me, too.  But if you're off at the library working, or somewhere else  
where access to your test boxes is slow or fiddly, a local stack is a  
nice to have.  I replicated my subdirectory structure from the Linux  
test box locally so one easy rsync command (minus the db) sets me up  
to go out of the house.

> Amarok has gotten faster in the last year, so it might run OK now.  I
> know it was slow even on my KDE system with a dual-core Opteron CPU,
> until about 6 months ago, when it seemed to make another big speed
> increase.

I think it was just the conspiracy of MySQL plus 10K+ library of  
songs.  The box only had 512MB at that time iirc, as well.

>> * NeoOffice.
>
> I got that, but I'm having trouble with it.  It's huge, and it does
> really funky things with fonts.  For example, loading docs from my
> Linux box it doesn't get the fonts right, and even when I change to a
> font the Mac has, sometimes bold won't work, just for example.
>
> Maybe it is just a file format issue or something I've done wrong.

I haven't had the need to use it much, so maybe I shouldn't have put  
it on my favorites list, really.  Anyone want to comment on Pages as  
a replacement for Word and similar.  Bonus points for comments about  
it's page layout capabilities.

>
> One thing I need to figure out is how to make my CIFS and other
> remove server mounts come up automatically.  You'd think since this a
> Mac, it would be some obvious setting that handles that.

A quick google turned up a few articles, including this by Mike  
Bombich: <http://www.bombich.com/mactips/automount.html>  Looks like  
it requires *nix geekery.  One thing I really like about the Mac  
community is that there's a lot of good info out there, and it's  
relatively easy to find.  Not like searching through all the chaff  
you have to do when you've got a Linux problem you need to resolve b/ 
c of the 15 million flavors of Linux.  (Maybe that's why I prefer  
Solaris, too?)

> I will not install any version of hack/dungeon/etc on my machine ever
> again.
>
> Never.
>
> I mean it.

Sorry if I touched a nerve there. ;-)  That's how I got my RSI, so I  
can relate.  I suck so badly at it these days I rarely can play more  
than a half hour or so.

=Nadine=