Its been a year with this Mac Book Pro that I am using so I thought that I would round up with my top ten Mac software - the software that I would install first of all after a crash.

1. Quicksilver. This is a must have on the Mac. I find out something new about it every week if not everyday and it makes using OS X even easier and more streamlined. For instance, finding a contact and then sending an SMS through Skype can be achieved in a few keystrokes, far faster than clicking around in the GUI.

2. NetNewsWire Pro. Now free to download, I had a paid version of this and its the best way to read newsfeeds that I have come across. It syncs with a web version so I can still access the my newsfeeds when I am away, and there are clients for other platforms including Windows Mobile.

3. Knox. I use this to keep all my important documents and things that I don’t want to go missing. It backups to my USB thumbdrive everyday, and its easy to backup online.

4. SSHFS and MacFuse. Easy easy way to mount external SSH shares onto the desktop.

5. Address book, Apple Mail and iPhoto. At first I stayed away from the integrated applications, but they are REALLY integrated, and work so well together the extra functionality that you get from using them together is well worth the switch.

6. Adium. The best chat client that I have found for instant messaging on OS X. It doesn’t have all the features that individual applications might have (voice and webcam for one). But sometimes you just don’t need that, and really Skype running along side is better for this. If it had all the features of Skype it would be really the true all rounder.

7. Unison. I use Usenet alot. Its a great news client. Perhaps the best on any platform at the moment.

8. Textmate. Perhaps the best editor on OS X - I tried many until I paid up and bought Textmate. Its strong bundles and integration with SVN plus the nice support for Django wins for me.

9. MarsEdit. Great blog posting tool.

10. Versions. This is quite new but it makes working with SVN just a little easier.

This is a work in progress for installing ffmpeg on OSX by a custom compile

This is another thing that I have needed to do and decided to put what I am doing in a blog post, I might need it in the future or it might be helpful for others.

So firstly download LAME - this is needed for supporting MP3 audio files, such as those in FLV and also for vorbis support. LAME src can be located on sourceforge.

Unarchive the file (lame-3.98b6 at the time of writing )

CD lame-3.98b6
./configure --with-vorbis
make
sudo make install

The first time I did this I noticed a problem running make so I “make clean” and then went through the process again.

Next up we want support for AAC audio, and you can get packages called FAAD2 and FAAC from www.audiocoding.com/downloads.html for these and then unarchive them ( FAAD 2.6.1 and FAAC 1.26 at the time of writing).

CD faad2
autoreconf -vif
./configure --without-bmp --without-xmms --without-drm --without-mpeg4ip
make
sudo make install

Then faac

CD faac
./bootstrap
./configure --with-libmp4v2
make
sudo make install

x264 ( http://www.videolan.org/developers/x264.html )

CD x264
./configure --enable-pthread --enable-pic
make
make install

liba52

wget http://liba52.sourceforge.net/files/a52dec-snapshot.tar.gz
tar -xzvf a52dec-snapshot.tar.gz
CD a52dec-0.7.5-CVS/
./configure
./configure --enable-libmp3lame --enable-x264 --enable-liba52 --enable-GPL

And for amr_wb and amr_nb go into their directories and do the following:

./configure
make clean
make -j2 > /dev/null
sudo make install

Basically the -j2 switch is for enabling dual cores when compiling.

Now we get around to compiling ffmpeg itself:

./configure --enable-shared --disable-mmx --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libamr-wb --enable-libamr-nb --enable-nonfree --disable-vhook
make clean
make -j2 > /dev/null
sudo make install

And that should be it though I am currently trying this configuration and it seems to work well:

./configure --enable-shared --disable-mmx --enable-libmp3lame --enable-libamr-wb --enable-libamr-nb --enable-nonfree --enable-libx264 --enable-libfaad --enable-GPL --disable-vhook

Well it appears that Address book in Leopard has got a pretty nasty bug/feature with importing archived address book items.

When I make large changes to my Address Book I have got into the habit of backing up, and with Plaxo and several other services and devices syncing off it I can often need it.

Today somehow my address book contacts got really messed up and I thought “well lucky me I have backups from when it was last in good shape, so no problem, I will just import the backup”. Unfortunately it appears that the import of Address Book archives is broken.

Address Book archives the address book items into a abbu file. This appears to be a special file format that is in reality a folder containing Metadata, images and other files quite like the location:

~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/ (hidden on my mac for some reason).

When I went to use the import facility it asked whether I wanted to overwrite the existing contacts (I did) but then nothing. There was information in the console, but it was different everytime and not one import. Looking on the web, I could see that I wasn’t the only one with the problem, and there was no solution. So I looked to myself to find out how to get it back.

Now please understand that this isn’t a recommended solution and I don’t know how it could possibly effect someone else if they tried this, so do so at your own risk, but I had nothing to lose.

Firstly, I deleted all the files under ~/Library/Application Support/AddressBook/ with Address Book closed. Then I opened Address Book, I created a new contact, then I imported the abbu file. I got all my contacts back and they all look intact from the last backup.

Then I used Plaxo to sync them back to the service…

This looks like a really nice stand for Apple computers with an integral 4 port USB hub. Raising the display might also help usability because I feel the default position is slightly too low.

You can get them from Macessity.

Today I purchased the MacHeist bundle of OS X software. This will be available for the next 5 days and includes quite a few applications and gives a major saving on buying them alone for the amazingly cheap price of $49. On top of this it also gives money to charity. The included applications are:

• 1password - a password manager. I currently use KeepassX because its cross platform
• CoverSutra - a iTunes player
• Cha-Ching - A personal money organiser. One of the reasons that I bought this
• iStopMotion - For create stop animations using still and video cameras
• Awaken - A alarm clock for Mac
• Speed download - Looks like a very nice download manager
• Appzapper - for cleanly removing applications. Recommended
• TaskPaper - Simple GTD organiser
• CSSEdit - As it say a simple CSS Editor
• Snapz Pro X - for screencaptures and screencasts. I really wanted this
• Pixelmator - Image editor
• Wingnuts 2 - A game.

Of course a lot of users will not need all these applications, or it would be unusual, but even on one application you can make a saving and give money to Charity.

I don’t think its too late to provide some predictions for 2008, so here are mine.

3D Printers
We are going to be seeing a lot more on the subject, although they have been out for a while I think this is going to be the year that we are going to be hearing alot more about 3D printers and 3D printing methods, and seeing a lot more things they can do. Also the price will drop I am sure meaning that there are more around to play with.

Phones
I think the phone market will see some much better models this year, coming from the increased R&D that the iPhone would have produced. Touch screens are already advancing as proved by new models from Samsung, and software will bound to improve. Microsoft will lag behind as usual. The Samsung model SCH-W559 I am particularly interested in checking out as it has a vibrating touch screen (called VibeTonz) that provides feedback to make it feel like a mechanical device.

OS X viruses or worms.
Apple and OS X are proving increasingly popular due to ease of use and maintenance, but these increase in popularity could mean that we see an increase in nefarious activity on the platform. This is might not be as bad as it seems, it is built on quite a stable secure platform and will lead to increased security on applications and service running on the system.

Facebook backlash.
Facebook is not the elegant social networking site it once was. Too many applications, services and third parties are in on the act and now it looks like a complete mess. It might be just me but it also seems that the hosting is always one step behind. I have heard that the next release they are working on is for collapsable menus and for hiding things, but I have already taken off information from the service.

One of my favourite applications and one of my most used applications on the Mac is NetNewsWire from Newsgator and it has been since I started using it. I have found it to be the best way to deal with Newsfeeds for me, the integration of browser, the ease of use and probably the way it syncs with its online counterpart has kept me away from other solutions.

My first thoughts when I found out that it was now free was “I paid for that!” but it only took me a couple of seconds to realise that I had already got my moneys worth and if others can now take advantage of this then all the better for everyone. After all I got it when it was bundled with Marsedit, another program that sees a lot of usage. MarsEdit has been aquired by Red Sweater software now

NetNewsWire has now been updated to version 3, and I was also really happy to see that the Windows Mobile version of Newsgator, Newsgator Go is now also a free download. I had tried the trial of this on my windows mobile and was very impressed but hadn’t got around to purchasing it. Now its another free download and perhaps one of the most useful on the Windows Mobile platform.

Well done to Newsgator for this.

When running screen sometimes there is a problem using the backspace or delete key and you get the dreaded “Wuff Wuff” message.

Try editing

~/.bashrc

And adding:

alias screen='TERM=screen screen'

Leopard ships with the latest version of Safari, and there has been much talk that Apple has disabled the use of 3rd party plugins which is bad news for fans of plugins such as the wonderful inquisitor.

Well if you download the latest version of inquisitor and are still having problems, try deleting the Input Managers folder under ~/Library and then installing again.

This has been probably blogged several million times now, but I am really enjoying the latest release of OS X - 10.5 also know as Leopard.

Lots has been written about it including a really good review over at Arstechnica, but for me most of the downsides they note are ignorable.

1. The 3D dock - I really don’t notice it in every day action anymore, it might be because I am using Quicksilver but its not so bad.
2. The semi-transparent menu bar - well I changed the background to black and white Leopard fur and it looks good.
3. Time-machine - I am not using it at the moment.
4. Stacks - useless until you create your own that makes sense to you.

The upsides for me:

1. Spaces. I have been waiting for this built into the OS for ages..
2. Terminal. Tabbed and better its a much needed improvement.
3. Speed. It does seem faster.
4. Mail. Improved and with some nice new features
5. iChat. I am actually using this now.
6. Network configuration. This makes much more sense now.

Not currently using:

1. Coverflow in the finder. Well I did use it once. Only once apart from playing
2. Time Machine. My external drive is almost out of space, and I have a good backup system in place anyways.
3. The server integration. Doesn’t seem to work as I need it to.

All in all a worthwhile upgrade despite some negative comments.