Pavansut on Mac

Designing Logos & Brand Personality

2009-08-07T11:32:00.001-07:00

Ever since I have used the earliest of Macs, I had always had the question of who designed the Apple logo, and why? Today as I was browsing some exchanges on Tidbits, I came across this interview of Rob Janoff, the designer who gave the world the original Apple logo. Its interesting to learn how Rob came upon designing various aspects of the logo, and what he feels about the changes the logo has undergone in the last few years. I myself have been inspired by the simplicity of Apple logo and overall design in designing the logo for my wife's online tea business and her online bespoke shirts business.

Read the interview if you are fascinated by this stuff. Its a must read for marketers whose job it is to design communication tools that humanize our products.

GIMP: Using Layers Mask To Improve Image

2008-11-24T01:26:00.000-08:00

GIMP Tutorial - How to make an ordinary picture dramatic

2008-10-15T20:09:00.001-07:00

Here is a easy technique to make an ordinary looking picture look more dramatic. Many thanks to Arun Vyas without whose creative eye, we wouldn't be witnessing this beautiful scene. Here is the tutorial. Enjoy!

This is what the original picture looks like. Original picture credit Arun Vyas of Nametheframe blog

..and this is what it looks like when we post process it using GIMP.

Are we reaching a tech bubble again?

2008-09-05T00:10:00.000-07:00

Reading this press release from Mosso brought back fond memories of another time when tech companies started giving themselves and their employees some seriously ridiculous names and titles.

Rackspace(R) Hosting's cloud division Mosso(R) (www.mosso.com), today announced that it has named technology industry and operations veteran Bruce Runyan Chief Uptime Officer. In this role, Runyan is responsible for ensuring that Mosso continues to provide a reliable and consistent customer experience as the cloud scales....

Chief Uptime Officer? Come on! I thought "Cloud computing" was ridiculous, but the "Chief Uptime Officer" title takes the cake!

We must be nearing another tech bubble.

Uninspiring Way To Display Photos - Picasaweb

2008-08-04T09:40:00.000-07:00

Google Photos Blog: Full-album Downloads
I have been using PicasaWeb ever since it was launched. One of the main reasons for using picasaweb for me was the close integration with Apple's photo program. Since its launch, the Picasaweb team has done a great job of providing us new functionalities such as the mobilepicasa (my favorite on iPhone), Geotagging of photos, and now, the ability to download entire album. This particular feature is very handy in distributing pictures to far flung family members.

Yet, lately I have been feeling rather depressed looking at the myriad different ways in which photos can be displayed using flash animation, and the pathetically uninspiring way in which my photos are displayed on Picasaweb! There are a gazillion ways of displaying photos attractively, but its a mystery as to why Google has decided against improving the way the pictures get displayed in Picasaweb. The way they are displayed currently, there is no way to put a border around the pictures, no special effects to transition between photos, and no way to move from one photo to a different one in a slide show.

People want their photographs to be displayed attractively so that they feel like sharing them with their family and friends. If Google were to improve upon this "usability" function, I think Picasaweb could quickly become the dominant way of sharing pictures on the web. Otherwise, it will remain only a marginal player to Flickr.

iPhone 2.0 update breaks Jailbreak

2008-07-13T17:26:00.000-07:00

I should have known it! As soon as I updated the iPhone to 2.0, Jailbreak installer and all the programs I had downloaded before are "GONE"! There are a few new apps on iTunes, but I find the process of downloading them extremely cumbersome. All apps have to be downloaded from iTunes, unlike the jailbreak installer which installs the apps wirelessly.

And none of my favorite apps are available yet on iTunes! There are others of course, but I miss the "Shoplist" app, the "chess game", "Go game" and many others which I found so invaluable over the last six months.

I guess I will have to "jailbreak" my iPhone again!

Copying a dvd to iPhone

2008-06-27T13:14:00.000-07:00

As you have it, I have to head over to Mexico again for a business meeting. This is my third trip to Mexico in six weeks and the prospect of watching the same movies on the plane sent me looking for a way to get some of the favorite DVDs in my collection on to the iPhone. A quick search led me to this website, which describes the process in detail.

So I downloaded Handbrake from here, and loaded it up on the computer. Second, I inserted the DVD into the carousel, and opened Handbrake. Clicking "Source" allowed me to select the Video folder of the DVD, upon which the program started reading all the files.

In order to code the file for iPhone, the how to website recommends several steps. But Handbrake also has some presets such as the ones shown here. I simply selected the preset for iPhone and started the process of encoding the files to be iPhone ready.

ShopList and Mobile ToDoList for iPhone

2008-06-24T19:44:00.000-07:00

One of the best uses of iPhone is that of a GTD device. I use it often and frequently as a place to keep lists of things to do. Before Jailbreak, I could use only the notes feature of iPhone for keeping lists, but now, I have two apps that keep me Notes happy! The first one is a little program called "ShopList" by some one named FSaint who posts his development of this app at
http://mazinger.cs.yale.edu/iphone-apps/zips/ShopList.zip

Best way to load this is to go to the sources and add the above url in the Installer app of the jailbroken iPhone. Be sure to include the full url and the app will install itself.

My opinion, this is a top notch app. Although its designed to be a shopping list, I use it mainly as a list generator. The app allows you to create different lists. So I have a list for "Sprycel Speakers Update", and another for "Brand Planning". Its two line interface is very useful. I use the top line to describe the main task, and the second line to describe it in detail. When you create a task, it saves under "Need" category. Once I am done with the task, I simply check if off, and the task rolls down to "Have" category.

There are a couple things about this app that I like. First, I like its simplicity. Its an app to make a list, nothing more, nothing less. Sometimes its better to have a simple app rather than one with a lot of bells and whistles, to keep the app from distracting one from its main purpose. The second thing I like about this app is the fact that although its a "Shopping List" app, it does allow you to keep any other kinds of lists.

However, I would change a few things. First the two categories - if its possible, it would be nice to have these categories be customizable. Instead of "Need" it would be nice to have the ability to call it - "Things to Do", or have the ability to change the "Have" to 'Done". Second, it would be nice to be able to move the tasks up and down in terms of priority, so that I can have the most important task at the top. I don't need any other bells and whistles to make this app more useful.

The second app I have used a lot is the "Mobile Todo List" from the folks at include7, a Switzerland based outfit. This app is also installed through the installer on a jailbroken phone.

I will be honest, before I came across Shoplist, I started using MobileToDoList2, and actually I liked it quite a bit in the begining. The interface is not too different from the ShopList interface, but this app is a tad more sophisticated. For instance the MTDL2 has the ability to multiple levels of lists, create priority and even set alarms! The app promises to hide the task after a certain number of days, and even auto order the list.

But there in lies the problem with this little app. Although its feature rich, over time I got weary of all the inputting that needs to be done to just generate a list of tasks! While initially I loved the idea of multiple levels of lists, in the end I came away convinced that I don't really need multiple levels. I would much rather have separate lists of tasks than have multiple levels. No doubt, others will disagree, but in my opinion, this app tries to do too many things for too many people.

There are other problems too. For instance, the prioritization doesn't seem to work all the time. Some times it prioritizes, and other times it doesn't. And I think it has something to do with the tasks that are over due, but its not so obvious to trouble shoot this problem. Another point, some times the tasks refuse to 'die'! In other words, some times the task that has been completed continues to show beyond the time period you would like it to.

MobileToDoList2 has a lot of promise, but I think its trying to do too much and this is making the app a bit more difficult to use. My preference is for an app that is somewhere in between ShopList and MobileToDoList2. And to the best of my knowledge, none out there is working on this happy medium.

Crowdsourcing

2008-03-19T05:36:00.000-07:00

This looks interesting! Certainly the name sounds very interesting, but I wonder how much business they actually do. How big is "crowdsourcing" as a business opportunity?

ZiPhone - Hack For iPhone

2008-03-15T11:54:00.001-07:00

I have been waiting for Apple to open the iPhone SDK for a while, and recently they did open iPhone for others to develop games and other apps. But it will be a while before new apps become available. So I couldn't resist the temptation to download ZiPhone. ZiPhone downloads Installer onto the main desktop, which when cilicked, opens up a whole new world of apps to you! So now I have many many apps to play with - including Chess and Go games, a to-do list maker, an ebooks reader etc.

Undoubtedly there will be many new and interesting apps that will come to us soon via Apple website. But in the meanwhile, I can put my iPhone to a better use with ZiPhone.

Happy iPhoning!

UPDATE:-------------
Well, as I expected things didn't go smoothly. The new apps worked fine, and so I thought everything was fine. But then I realized that I was not receiving any phone calls, I wasn't able to receive my messages, and finally the podcasts were not working. PANIC CITY!!
A quick google search indicated that I wasn't alone. However the fix to these problems didn't seem simple. So I basically gave up and decided to reset the settings, erasing all the contents. After I erased all the settings and contents (Settings > General > Reset >Erase All Contents and Settings ) and restored the older version, the installer was still in my iPhone, the new apps were also still there, but I started receiving the phone calls, and could listen to the messages as well. So all is well! Whew!

Why "Register" the database in Open Office

2007-12-16T12:18:00.000-08:00

When you create a database from scratch in Open office, it asks you if you want to "register the database". Not wanting to make the information public, so far I have been refusing to register the database. But today, I decided to try out what happens if I do register the database, and stumbled upon its real use. It seems when you register the database, you are not registering it with the rest of the world, but rather with your copy of Openoffice! So, if you want to access the database for use in another document, now you don't have to add the database source in preferences - it just shows up there!

To see if the database is registered, simply click F4, and you will see if its there or not. If its not there, then you can add it in the preferences section of the program. But if you "registered" it during creation of the database, then there is no need to worry - it will be there once you save the database.

I think this is a very misunderstood element of database in Openoffice.

The Leopard is out

2007-11-05T01:54:00.000-08:00

Unless you've been living under a rock, you know that the Leopard is out. But it will be a while before I get to tame the beast. U see, I have a trusty old Imac 800 mhz, which will probably break at the demands of the beautiful cat.

May be its time to buy a new computer altogether!

1052 - Column 'products_id' in from clause is ambiguous

2007-06-05T17:18:00.000-07:00

Recently I tried to set up the "Separate Price Per Customer" contribution of Oscommerce for my wife's wholesale tea business, Jaya Teas. Setting up the contrib itself was not a problem, and I thought all was well with the site. I went in and created my own account, and was pleased with the effect. Then, I tried to implement the "retail to wholesale conversion of my account, and to my horror, as soon as I logged in as a wholesale customer, the entire right side of the website was disfigured with following error:

1052 - Column 'products_id' in from clause is ambiguous

select p.products_id, pd.products_name, IF(pg.customers_group_price IS NOT NULL,pg.customers_group_price, p.products_price) as products_price, p.products_tax_class_id, p.products_image, s.specials_new_products_price from products p, products_description pd, specials s LEFT JOIN products_groups pg using (products_id, customers_group_id) where p.products_status = '1' and p.products_id = s.products_id and pd.products_id = s.products_id and pd.language_id = '1' and s.status = '1' and s.customers_group_id= '1' order by s.specials_date_added desc limit 10

[TEP STOP]

You can see this better in this image

PANIC!!!

As is natural, panic was my first reaction. I had had the wholesale site up for a while, and if I had paid attention to this before, I would have noticed this problem, but this was the first time I was noticing it. What had caused this? I had not made any changes recently, so what could have caused it? After some thinking I realized that this problem may have been caused due to the installation of the "Separate Price Per Customer" contrib, and that calmed me down a bit. I knew that once the source of the problem had been identified, the solution could not be too far away.

Google to my rescue:
I googled the query "1052 - Column 'products_id' in from clause is ambiguous", which gave me confirmation that indeed the problem was with this contrib. One particular entry was very specific about the probem and its solution.

It appears that the problem is with the syntax of "product_id" in a file called specials.php in

catalog/includes/boxes/specials.php

The entire block of code is in this file, and just sleuthing the problem was beyond me, but Jan Zonjee, a PHP expert figured it out that for some reason, MySQL isn't able to recognize what product_id stands for. So, in this code, we need to be specific about it. This is done by replacing

using (products_id, customers_group_id)

with

on (s.products_id = pg.products_id and s.customers_group_id = pg.customers_group_id)

I quickly FTPd to the directory, made a copy of specials.php file (as a back up just in case something goes wrong again), and then implemented the change.
Lo and behold, the error is gone!!

I love open source software! Thank you Jay Zonjee!

Creating A Lable Template for Apple Pages

2006-12-18T22:10:00.000-08:00

If you have been using the Apple Pages program, you are in for a surprise. Some of the most basic templates are missing.

There is a lot to love about Pages, but Apple should have thought about developing commonly used templates first or at least encouraged the users to develop those templates. For example, if you use Avery labels, it is likely that you will be looking for templates to the labels for your run of the mill work - such as creating labels!!

I know you are saying why create labels in Pages when you can use Address Book to do the same thing. But there are times when you need just a sheet of labels. For instance, my wife needs a sheet of labels to label the caddies of tea she sells in her business - Jaya Teas. I looked around and did not find any thing suitable. So I did the next best thing - started to create one. And now that I have created one, I don't see a reason for not sharing it with others. You are welcome to it here... but if you want to know how I did it, here's how I created the return address label template Avery 5167:

Open a blank document. Click open the inspector. In the page lay out, I changed the Right and left margins to 0.25 inches each. Then I changed the Top margin to 0.5 inches. I left the bottom margin to 0. Why? I'll tell you in a second.

I also reduced the header and footer values to zero each.

Knowing that the lables are 4 columns x 20 labels on each sheet, after clicking into the page, I selected the Columns icon and inserted 4 columns.

Then, I inserted a table into the first column by selecting, Insert > Table from the menu. This brings up a 4x3 table with a header row. I reduced the number of columns from 3 to 1, and increased the number of rows from 4 to 80.

Unselect the header button, and the Automatically Resize button in the Inspector. Don't ask me why, just do it.

Then I adjusted the column width and table height. The Avery label is 1.75 inch wide and 0.5 inches tall. Since the four column layout only allows for 1.68 inches of writing space per column, no matter how hard you try to increase the width to 1.75 inches, the program will revert it back to 1.68 inches. However, the height will adjust to 0.5 inches. This is because, you had earlier reduced the bottom margin to zero. If you were to leave the bottom margin at 0.5 inches, you will not be able to get 0.5 inches height for each of the labels (..and what ever you put in the bottom lables will actually print just a bit above, causing misalignment). But if you reduce the bottom margin to zero, the table will adjust itself.

Print out the page and see if the table aligns well with your label sheet.

Now, there is one more step left - removing the table border. Click on the table so that the entire table is selected, not just one cell. Then, selct the "graphics inspector' (the one with a square and a circle in the icon). Click the black color box next to stroke, and in the box next to brightness scale, change the number from 0% to 92% (or 95% of you like). This will render the border of the cells barely visible and they won't print well on the labels (you don't want them to print on your labels). However there is enough of an outline left for you to discern when you need to type in something.

Thats it. Save the template as AV5167 or OL25CX or what ever brand's code you want to use. So, next time you need it, it will be right there for you.

Again, if all you need is a return label template, just click here and download it...open it in Pages, and save it as a template.

Enjoy!

Installing Scribus on Mac

2006-04-30T16:55:00.000-07:00

What is Scribus:
Scribus is a desktop layout software along the lines of Quark and InDesign. But Scribus is an open source application, so it can be downloaded from its website and run on your computer for free. Scribus uses cutting edge technology and is a highly manipulable tool in the hands of an expert. At the same time, Scribus is a very nice application for novices trying to learn DTP.

Scribus is rapidly developing into a very mature application, and I can attest to this by saying that I have created a lot of professional documents (catalog, letter heads, sales materials) using Scribus. Printers will accept the Scribus generated PS file, as well as the PDF file without any hesitation.

Scribus is available for Linux, Windows and Mac OSX. So if you are looking for a good DTP software but do not have the moolah to buy Quark or InDesign, get the next best - Scribus. Scribus can be downloaded from http://www.scribus.net. Mac officianadoes can download the software from http://aqua.scribus.net/

Installing Scribus on Mac:
AquaScribus provides detailed instructions for downloading and setting up the software on Mac. But the instructions and download links are set up in such a way that they get to be confusing. So here are simplified instructions for Mac users:

1. Download Libraries A. Double click on the Libraries A folder, and drag all the subfolders to /Library/Frameworks
2. Download Libraries B, Double click on the Libraries A folder, and drag all the subfolders to /Library/Frameworks
3. Download Ghostscript files, drag the entire Ghostscript.Frameworks folder to /Libraries/Frameworks folder. Remember, unlike the subFolders in LibrariesA and B, we are dragging the entire Ghostscript.Frameworks folder to /Libraries/Frameworks folder.
4. Download the Scribus application and drag the application to the Applications folder

You are now ready to use Scribus. But before you do a lot of work on it, we need to tell Scribus where the Ghostscripts folder is located. Lets do this now:

5. Open Scribus application, Go to Edit->Preferences->External Tools. Under Postscript Interpreter, Click on change, and copy this into the box

/Library/Frameworks/Ghostscript.framework/bin/gsc

6. Now, lets activate color management. Click on the umbrella, and simply click the box which will activate the color management.

This is it! Simple isn't it? Well don't thank me. Thank Andreas Vox who is responsible for putting this package together.

Openoffice labels templates

2006-02-17T16:59:00.000-08:00

World Label has put together a lot of templates for labels that they sell. Here is the link...

OO Labels Templates

iLife 6: Is it worth investing?

2006-02-12T06:07:00.000-08:00

Rob Pegoraro writes in todays Washington Post that Apple's iLife 6 adds quite a few new features to the iLife suite. iLife now has a new tool called iWeb for creating websites and writing blogs. iPhoto has been improved to hold a lot more photos and allow for photocasting. But all this comes at a steep price - a $79 cost, with no discount for upgrade.

But if you've already paid for iLife '05 and don't have a hankering for podcasting or blogging, you should think hard about jumping on this year's release.

I tend to agree. Its tough to shell out $79 year after year for the same suite with some additional benefits. I can already do much of what iPhoto does with the help of GIMP, Cyberduck, Gallerie and other open source programs. Apple has made quite a cash cow out of its iLife suite. But come on Apple, give us a break. No upgrade price? Now thats not fair.

Nothing works like a "slap"

2006-01-17T15:01:00.000-08:00

I remember when I was very little, we used to have a TV with rabbit ears antenna. Every once in a while, the screen would start showing disturbances, and it was always a challenge to keep the image on the screen clear. My father found out that the best solution for this was to slap the TV on its side a couple of times. And invariably the TV picture would clear up!

I remembered this story yesterday as I started using the key board on my Mac. What happened is this. I was putting in new floor boards in my office for which reason I had to move the desk around. As luck would have it, this crappy desk (which is relatively new mind you) gave way and the whole thing came tumbling down. I had removed my Mac from the desk to lighten the load, but not the key board. The key board landed on the floor with a loud thunk, with the mouse going flying into the corner of the room! This key board had been giving me fits because its "Control" and "option" keys on the left side had been stuck.

To make long story short, yesterday when I put the desk back together and connected the key board, what joy! The stuck keys had gotten unstuck! Moral of the story, I would have saved myself a lot of aggravation if only I had dropped key board earlier. I have been treating the key board with utmost respect and all I got was grief. One loud slap on its side (or "thunk", in this case) and its gotten back in line!

Unfortunately though, while the keys have come unstuck, they still do not do their function - they are just dead keys! Any one has ideas how to fix these keys??

What is lost with IE gone?

2005-12-19T09:51:00.000-08:00

Mac platform just lost a major supporter – Internet Explorer. The tea leaves have been around for any one who cared to read them. With the introduction of Safari by Apple, it was but a matter of time that Microsoft pulled the plug on IE.

For web developers, its one headache less. IE has been less and less compliant with the W3C standards and to try and accommodate a small user base has been a pain in the neck. That said, loosing a competitor in a market place is generally not good, especially one with so much muscle. It takes the drive to improve products out of the businesses. There are a lot of other competing technologies in web browsing that are available. But I have been less than thrilled with “Fire Fox” (even though every body and their brother seems to recommend Firefox), and even less thrilled with Camino. Both seem like unfinished products, and are good enough, but not very good.

In the end, Apple will have to carry the burden of developing Safari. Safari is a good browser, and I have no complaints with it. But I hope that with IE gone, Apple will spend MORE resources, and not less, on further development of Safari.

Comics using GIMP and Inkscape

2005-10-30T02:37:00.000-08:00

GIMP and Inkscape are two of my favorite opensource programs. But both programs are tough to learn for any one who hasn't used graphics programs before. That is why I am thrilled that John Bintz wrote this detailed tutorial on how to digitize comics using these two programs.

The tutorial is quite detailed and contains a lot of pictures so you will learn exactly how John imports and places the comics on a digital page. He doesn't unfortunately go into the details of coloring the comics.

Now, its entirely possible to color the comics in GIMP, and the here is the link to a tutorial to do just that on GUG (GIMP user group - a great place for GIMP tutorials by the way).

You can also create beautiful bubbles in GIMP and type the text into them using a script written by Tomcat.

So, what are you waiting for! Go ahead, publish your first comic strip. And let me know so I can put a link to it on this site.

Configuring OpenOffice 2.0

2005-10-15T07:52:00.000-07:00

So, then, now that you have Openoffice 2.0 installed on Mac (If not, read the previous entries on installing OO2.0 here), and have installed the Mac Fonts, you must be rearing to use it. So you double click the OO icon, and Xterm opens up and Openoffice spashscreen comes up. Open office window is open, and boy does it look nice!

But soon you realize that OpenOffice is configured to work with Windows key boards. In other words, Copy command is CTRL C, not Apple C. You can change this easily, by changing the preferences in X11.

Now that you have selected only the "System Keyboard Layout", you can use the mac based commands Apple C for copy, Apple V for paste etc.

Installing OpenOffice 2.0 on Mac

2005-10-14T16:07:00.000-07:00

If you were to go to the OpenOffice website it would seem that while the rest of the world has access to version 2.0 of Openoffice, Mac users would have to wait another few years. Well, not so. Below is the link for the Mac build of release candidate 1.9.128. So, download away and enjoy!

http://ftp.stardiv.de/pub/OpenOffice.org/contrib/MacOSX/

This is not a native port, and requires Apple's x11 which is free to download from Apple's website. It is also advisable to have the XCode installed from the Panther dvd.

Setting up Fonts for Openoffice

2005-10-14T15:10:00.000-07:00

One problem with the X11 based Openoffice RC 2.0 that has been ported to Mac is that it does not automatically create the ttf fonts from Mac fonts. So here is a way to address this situation. This will require a two step process:
1) First download the stable version of Openoffice (1.1.5) from here

2) Run the installer once it is downloaded. This installer comes with a program called "fondu" which converts all the mac fonts into ttf fonts.

3) Once the program is installed in the applications folder, dig into the folder called "share". There should be another folder in there called "Fonts" All the ttf fonts will be in the "truetype" folder. Select all.

4) Now Ctrl click on "Openoffice" (2.0) icon in the Applications folder, and navigate to the Fonts folder.
/Applications/OpenOffice.org 2.0/Contents/openoffice1.9.130/share/fonts/truetype

5) Now go back to the fonts folder of 1.1.5, where you had selected the fonts. Option click on the selected fonts, and drag them to the truetype folder of OpenOffice 2.0 version.

Thats it! Next time you click on Openoffice2.0, it will show all the fonts you have on your mac.

Now you can conveniently delete the OpenOffice 1.1.5 version from Applications folder.