things mac

Enable "single window mode" in Safari 3.1

2008-07-01T00:20:00.000-07:00

It's about time Safari added this feature. Just do the following in the terminal:

defaults write com.apple.Safari TargetedClicksCreateTabs -bool true

NB: I've read complaints about this not working in the Safari 4 developer preview.

setting up subversion over svn+ssh

2008-06-26T01:06:00.000-07:00

Consolidating this process, so I don't forget it:

create user svn
lock svn account (sudo passwd -l svn)
sudo -u svn -s
go to /home/svn/
svnadmin create [repository directory here]
chmod g+s [repository directory]/db

URL of repository will be: svn+ssh://username@hostname/home/svn/[repository directory]

Be sure to follow these tips from the svn book:

All of your SSH users need to be able to read and write to the repository. Put all the SSH users into a single group. Make the repository wholly owned by that group, and set the group permissions to read/write.
Your users need to use a sane umask when accessing the repository. Make sure that svnserve (/usr/local/bin/svnserve, or wherever it lives in $PATH) is actually a wrapper script which sets umask 002 and executes the real svnserve binary. Take similar measures when using svnlook and svnadmin. Either run them with a sane umask, or wrap them as described above.
When BerkeleyDB creates new logfiles, they need to be owned by the group as well, so make sure you run chmod g+s on the repository's db directory.

The umask point can be accomplished by using scripts like this:

$ cat /usr/local/bin/svn

#!/bin/sh

umask 002
/usr/local/subversion/bin/svn "$@"

LockTight -- lock your computer with a shortcut

2008-06-17T16:59:00.001-07:00

One of the frustrating things on the Mac is the lack of the ability to lock your computer with a simple keyboard shortcut. Fortunately, there is a little program called LockTight which comes to the rescue.

Synchronize two directories (local or remote)

2008-05-28T14:26:00.000-07:00

Found a neat utility called Unison which does two way synchronization between two directories (as opposed to rsync which AFAIK is only one way). It seems much easier to use than rsync, as well. You simply use a command like so 'unison /path/to/dir1 /path/to/dir2'. If you want to sync with a remote directory, you can use ssh in the path specification (ssh://username@foo.org/path/to/dir/).

It works with Linux, Mac, Windows (I found it on MacPorts for the mac).

Customize your app switching behavior

2008-05-23T10:45:00.000-07:00

The utility is Witch.

Nice utility to manage sleep vs safe sleep vs hibernate behavior of mac

2008-05-23T10:40:00.000-07:00

It's called SmartSleep. Check it out here.

Strange results on live search

2007-12-12T10:58:00.001-08:00

A friend of mine and I were messing around with live search, and we noticed some dubious sponsored links associated with certain keywords.

Easily edit Cocoa KeyBindings files

2007-12-04T19:46:00.000-08:00

Want to add some new keyboard shortcuts to all cocoa programs? Use a key bindings file.

This free program will help you edit them:

http://www.cocoabits.com/KeyBindingsEditor/

Set default application for file types

2007-11-15T00:32:00.001-08:00

Use the RCDefaultApp preference pane.

Prevent .DS_Store file creation on network drives

2007-11-15T00:00:00.000-08:00

defaults write com.apple.desktopservices DSDontWriteNetworkStores 1

Show hidden files in Finder

2007-11-08T20:02:00.001-08:00

Ever want to be able to access files that begin with '.' via the Finder? It's simple, open up Terminal and type:

defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1

Then to apply the setting immediately:

killall Finder

blog why

2007-11-08T19:59:00.000-08:00

This blog is primarily to help me remember different tweaks I've made on my mac, so that when I need to set up another mac in the future, I have all the information easily accessible.