Alex Hardy

You know, the Mac’s Finder is a great piece of work. Simple to use and pleasant to look at, it’s fine for general purpose use. If like most people, ninety percent of your computing life is lived between your browser, email, music, photos and Microsoft Office then it is more than enough for your needs.

However, some of us crave something rather more powerful, less candy-coated. Graphical flourishes may be new to users of Windows Vista, but the novelty of scaling, shadows and transparency wore off for us five years ago. We have needs that Apple are not hurrying to address.

We want a discreet, flexible alternative to the dock. We build websites and applications so we want to access files in several places without having to constantly press F9 for Exposé. We’re heartily tired of having to open image files from list view just to find out their pixel dimensions.

Enter DragThing and Path Finder, you heroes of the shareware world!

Have a look at this screengrab (300k) to see my desktop.

I’ve used DragThing ($29) since the Mac OS 9 days, and it’s a fantastic way to get to the items that you use most. You can make docks and put anything you like in them, configuring them to pretty much any arrangement and style you like. I’ve got a ‘process dock’ for running apps and two little tabs at the bottom-right that I keep apps in.

On the other hand, my relationship with Path Finder ($34.95) has been a bit on-and-off. I used it on my iBook, but found it slow in comparison to the Finder on that humble little computer. I’ve recently tried it again and it offers a compelling replacement.

Dubbed “The Finder for grown ups” by MacUser, it does away with brushed metal and replaces it with a clean, consistent style. Among its features (which you can see on the screengrab) are tabbed windows, a directory crumbtrail, a ‘Drop Stack’ for putting items on as you move them around and *sweet relief* an ‘info’ column where you can see image dimensions.

These applications play nicely with each other (an option in DragThing turns on Path Finder support), and I have merely scratched the surface of their capabilities. At a little over £30 for them both, it’s a deal.

I’m in the midst of poking around in code, so I thought I’d open the old browser testing can of worms. Here are the browsers I prioritise in order:

1. Firefox (Mac)
2. Safari (Mac)
3. Firefox (PC)
4. Internet Explorer 6 (PC)
5. Internet Explorer 7 (PC)

[EDIT] To clarify, the list is the order that I test in, not of importance. That order would go: IE6, IE7, Ff (PC), Safari (Mac), Ff (Mac).

The Mac browsers are higher up the list because I work on the Mac. It makes sense to use the tools at hand. I have two reasons for placing a higher priority on testing in IE6 than IE7, its majority market share and simply that IE7 is a marked improvement. If your web page renders acceptably up to the point of testing it in IE7 you’ll probably find no issues at all. Mercifully there are ways to run both IEs without needing two PCs.

Where it comes to minority browsers like Opera I take a more relaxed view. If the latest version of the browser renders the page in an acceptable manner, then it’s fine. Users of such applications are technically savvy enough to have actively chosen their browsers. It’s safe to assume that they maintain up to date software. It isn’t worth the time and effort it takes to hack your way around the quirks of obsolete software. For this reason I’ve (reluctantly) abandoned testing in IE5 for the Mac.

I use the word acceptable rather than identical. When testing a web page you should view it in isolation - the question isn’t “does it look the same?” because pixel-perfect reproduction from one browser to the next is an impossible goal. The subtly different text sizes, line spacing or even anti-aliasing alone will see to that. The question is “does it look right?”

In case you wondered which browser I prefer, let me spell it out

So, you web designers out there: what’s your take on this issue?

Before I apply the design to this blog, it seemed a good idea to move to the latest version and make some adjustments.

The backup -> install -> restore settings process of a software upgrade is somewhat reminiscent of the part in Jurassic Park where they turn the park systems off, not exactly sure that they’ll come back on again properly. Samuel L Jackson gets eaten by a velociraptor for his trouble… Oops.

Thankfully the ‘raptors didn’t get out this time, but there were some minor casualties. A couple of my plugins are not working quite right at the moment, but the glitches are in the backend so they aren’t show stoppers.

I think one or two comments might have been incorrectly identified as spam and deleted by an newly installed and incorrectly set up Akismet plugin. I’ve sorted the issue now, so if you commented on a post today and it doesn’t show up, I apologise. Please post again

… it’s the sound of Windows Vista launching. No, that’s not a joke about the general apathy surrounding the most important Windows since the hot topic was “who’s better: Blur or Oasis?”

There’s much debate about what Vista means - is it more secure or will the UAC nags desensitise people so much that they carelessly *OK* any prompt that appears (thereby making it less secure)? - are the additional bells and whistles timely enhancements or is it lip gloss on an old hag? Are the various multimedia apps a shameless rip off of iLife, or an essential response to the demands of today’s user?

MS, just like Apple, has its hardcore supporters and detractors. Reality (read: “the market”) lies between. The Apple camp who see Vista’s lukewarm reception as the beginning of MS’ end are deluded. The business world and most homes have computers that Mac OS X would refuse to run on. The greatest threats to MS are open source software (eg: OpenOffice.org) and Internet services (eg: Google).

It would please me to see Apple regain some market-share through Mac OS X and the so-called “iPod halo effect”. 10%, 20%? Who knows… Maybe that would bring the games developers. In any case, Apple will remain a niche player, and this is how it must be.

This has nothing to do with Mac snobbery - just realism. Apple users rejoice in the Mac’s simplicity, and pour scorn on MS’ uphill battle to rally countless disparate components together and call it a platform. To their credit they do a remarkably good job. Now flip it. Go to the Apple Store. You’ll find two classes of laptop, and three classes of desktop computer. Imagine that this was all the choice there was. Sound appealing?

If Apple became the dominant platform, the aspects that users praise as its key virtues would become its worst crimes. The only way to compete with MS would be to open Mac OS X to run on generic hardware. If they did, any stability advantages would disappear. Apple also consistently prove that they don’t have the manufacturing capacity even to satisfy the demand they have now. Fancy waiting six months for your new computer?

It works to think of the Mac as the Milan catwalk, or the Tokyo concept cars of computing. Ideas filter through to the mainstream, to George at Asda. Windows is a Ford Focus. Vista was never going to roll out to an Apple-style ta-dah: it will be routinely installed on every PC sold from now on. In three years’ time, most users will be on Vista. The ones that matter will anyway - the ones that spend money on such things.

It’s a fait accompli. The most important thing is that it appears to be a significant improvement. I’m looking forward to trying it out.

Lightroom has launched, with Aperture squarely in its sights.

… but enough about Adobe’s lousy design.

These applications target professional and “prosumer” photographers, who naturally want to work with RAW image files. They offer powerful management, adjustment and workflow solutions without many of the design features of Photoshop - which may be surplus to such a user’s requirements.

Last year, rumour and counter-claim circulated around the quality of the original version of Aperture and the fate of its development team. Now at version 1.5.2 one can only assume that the application’s birth pains are behind it and take it on current merits.

What Lightroom loses from Aperture’s head-start, it may regain through aggressive pricing (at $199 it is $100 cheaper than Aperture) and Adobe’s clever extension of the Photoshop name, which will lend it instant credibility. You may be of the opinion that using Photoshop’s name to bolster a fledgling app weakens Photoshop, but that depends on whether you consider Photoshop to be a brand in the first place.

I consider it a product, and one so entrenched that there is little that could possibly do it harm. Adobe does risk confusing customers (…is it a cut down Photoshop? …where does Photoshop Elements fit in? …how does it stand alongside the CS family?), but clearly communicating what Lightroom is, and more importantly what it isn’t will alleviate that issue.

Superficially, there isn’t much to choose between them so I hope Adobe will offer a trial of Lightroom. Aperture offers a 30-day trial, and to be able to test drive them for comparison would be useful to many. It remains to be seen whether Macromedia’s culture of offering trials for their products will seep into Adobe.

Mostly, I’m pleased that Lightroom and the recently announced return of Premiere to the Mac signify that Adobe has regained some competitive spirit, and is no longer content to sit on its laurels.

If you make websites, then you need to test under different browsers. Microsoft Internet Explorer is the most widely used browser by an overwhelming majority, but doesn’t really like to exist in more than one version under a Windows install. If you have access to several computers, you can keep one using IE6 and another using IE7. This is a solution, but far from ideal.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way though I found Multiple IE Installer on Google while testing my folio page under IE6.

It’s freeware, not exactly bug-free and probably breaks the IE license agreement in all sorts of ways (so don’t come crying to me if you try it and things go horribly wrong) but it appears to work. I’m currently looking at my page in IE6 and IE7.

My page has some IE6 glitches. Better sort them, then. Ho hum.

I’ve been looking for a solution to getting photos online. I’ve noodled around with Flickr, Picasa and Ringo but I’ve pretty much dismissed Ringo because I’ve not found a satisfactory way to upload images in bulk.

Since the Mac is my weapon of choice, I import and organise my photo collection with iPhoto. Picasa looks like a very capable equivalent for Windows users, but it’s unavailable for the Mac - presumably because Google chooses not to fight a preinstalled app. They support it instead, by providing handy free Mac tools in the form of an iPhoto export plugin and a standalone uploader application.

The Picasa Web Albums website isn’t bad for a relatively new offering and is tempting because it means I can just use my existing Google account. It does lack a lot of things though, like tags*, visitor comments and is presented with Google’s usual design style - which is minimal to say the least.

In the other corner, Flickr provides links to third party tools that do the same job, although the iPhoto plugin charges a £12 registration fee.

I think Flickr wins for me because it can easily be incorporated into an Automator workflow: a Photoshop actions pack and Flickr upload plugin are freely available. This will be useful for a freelance project that I have on the cards…

For my money, Flickr is a cooler website and the Photo Album WordPress plugin is the icing on the cake. All I need to confirm now is that my phone identifies itself properly to iPhoto as a Sony Cybershot - that would be sweeeeeet **

Expect to see my humble attempts at photography on these pages in future!

[CORRECTION] *Picasa Web Albums does have tags.

[UPDATE] **It does indeed!

Today I had cause to reinstall Adobe Creative Suite 2 (CS2). In the absence of a convenient uninstaller I had to read the PDF file to do the job manually. As I got grumpier by the minute from failed attempts to reinstall CS2, I had time to reflect on Adobe products in general. I thought to myself “what was the last really compelling version of Photoshop?”

Having started using Photoshop extensively at version 4, I would say that Photoshop 7 is the most important release so far. I could quite happily use it even today in place of CS2 (which is Photoshop 9 in all but name).

Some of the great stuff we got between versions 4 and 7:

• The History palette (multiple undos woohoo!)
• The Actions palette (sooooo much time saved on repetitive tasks)
• Improved type controls (although it still isn’t all that great)
• Layer effects
• Layer sets (grouping layers together for easy manipulation)
• The Healing brush (brilliant, so much better than the clone tool for removing imperfections from images)
• Imageready integration (I was finally able to dump Fireworks for web graphics output)

Between 7 and CS2 we were treated to:

• A horrible nagging three disc installer
• A horrible nagging updater (“…the updater must update itself before it can check for updates…”)
• That Adobe Bridge bullshit that noone ever uses
• Annoying changes to the layer selection system
• A poorly conceived rebrand of the applications in the collection, that sacrifices easy recognition for brand uniformity - putting Adobe’s corporate vanity ahead of user’s needs

Photoshop CS3 promises an even worse icon design and universal binary versions of the applications. It’ll be a worthwhile upgrade for the performance boost on Intel Macs alone, but you could have ignored CS and CS2 entirely.

It seems to me that the Adobe of recent years is more busy pushing the perception that its products are great than working on the reality. As the second largest software company after Microsoft though, it appears that there’s almost noone left with the nerve to challenge them.

Meanwhile back in web development land, I found a nifty little web app the other day that I thought I’d call attention to.

CSS Tweak squeezes your CSS files down in size. It will remove comments and white space, as well as optimise declarations for fonts, backgrounds, borders and lists.

It’s probably best to postpone using it until you’ve finished your work, then run it on a duplicate of your CSS file (uploading the duplicate in its place). The reason being that the file will be not so readable after CSS Tweak has done its work.

Nifty stuff - every little helps, and there’s even a Dashboard widget.

If like me you’re using WordPress to get your fevered rantings out there, you really must check out WP Tiger Administration v3.0 by Steve Smith.

A simple plugin install, it does away with the out-of-the-box WP admin, and replaces it with a slick, subtle interface. Fantastic stuff!