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DropJPEG 2.1b1 Now Supports PDF Conversions

DropJPEG is a little Cocoa program that converts images dropped on its icon into JPEG files. DropJPEG is has been tested and is compatible with the following image formats: TIFF, BMP, JP2, GIF, and PNG.

Version 2.1b1 adds paartial and much-needed support for Apple's PDF screenshot format in Jaguar, and adds support for MacPaint (.pntg), Photoshop (.psd), PICT, QuickTime Image (.qtif), SGI, TGA and Apple Icon image (.icns).

To use DropJPEG, just drag an image or a folder of images onto its icon. The images will then be converted to a JPEG. If your image's name is "mypic.tiff" then it will be renamed to "mypic.jpg" in the same folder.

It now works fine for me with those pesky PDF screenshots, although the developer warns that other PDF filesmay or may not work.

System requirements:
Mac OS 10.1 or higher

DropJPEG is freeware

For more information, visit:
http://www.kainjow.com/dropjpeg.html

Kunvert 1.0.1 Now Remembers Default Format; Supports French

Kunvert is an application to convert PDF files to JPEG or PICT, so you can easily use the screenshots made by Mac OS X 10.2 (Jaguar).

In adition it can convert more formats like gif, pict, bmp, and png, to jpg or pict. And even make an scale to it during conversion.

Available in English and Spanish, and now French

Just drop the files to convert onto the application icon, or to the program window.

In the preferences window you can choose some extra options, like Delete the original item after conversion or Quit the application when finished.

System requirements:
• Mac OS X 10.0 or higher

Kunvert is freeware  

For more information, visit:
http://www.kualosw.com/

Eudora Eudora 5.2b14

This beta of Eudora 5.2 for OS X cured the signature support problem I experienced in the b13 build, but b15 was released yesterday, and I haven't had time to download and try it yet. b14 seems to work great.

For more information, visit:
http://www.eudora.com/betas/?

Question on partitions and OSX
Changing default from Textedit to something else
Re: Musician Alert: Hot Deals Update
Productivity Complaints

Question on partitions and OSX

From Krishna M. Sadasivam

Hi Charles,

I'm an avid reader of your OSX Odyssey -- it's my favorite read on Applelinks! I do have a question on OSX. On my G4/Dual 450, I've partitioned my 30GB drive into two 15 GB drives. One partition is for OSX and the other for Classic. Currently my OSX partition has only 3GB of space left, while Classic has 10 GB available. (I spend 99.9% of my time in OSX). If I were to repartition the drive to allocate most of the space for OSX and 5 GB for Classic, would that result in any performance increase under OSX? I'm running Jaguar 10.2.1.

My somewhat limited understanding is that the UNIX side of OSX sets up swap space on the drive. Is that correct?

Thanks also for the tip on TigerLaunch 1.0 -- I downloaded it based on your recommendation and find it to be extremely useful!

Thanks again for all your help. I look forward to reading your articles.

Cheers,

-Krishna

Hi Krishna;

I'm up against the same problem on my 20 GB drive, on which the OS X partition is 4 MB, which seemed ample a year ago, but is no longer adequate with Jaguar. I've ben moving stuff out onto other partitions and using aliases to try and free up space.

Since you spend virtually all your time in OS X, I think your 5MB for Classic and the rest for OS X would be eminently sensible, if you don't mind the hassle of repartitioniung. However, as I understand it, so long as the swap file has adequate breathing room (somebody suggested a minimum of twice the amount of RAM you have installed), you would not likely notice a performance increase from extra free space that is not being accessed.

Try weeding your current OS X partition, and shift some non mission-critical stuff to your OS 9 partition, and see if things speed up.

Delighted that TigerLaunch is helpful, and thanks for reading.

Charles

Changing default from Textedit to something else

From Duane DeVries

Hello Charles,

I find your column to be most interesting and enlightening. I have a minor irritation that I hope you (or one of your myriad readers) can help with. I would like to have a different text editing program be launched INSTEAD of the Apple supplied textedit program. I am using OS X 10.1.5, I have searched the Apple knowledge data base, looked at MacFixit and any other places I could think of but have not found any way to do this. My biggest complaint in that the Apple program will NOT let me save a simple text document but insists on converting it to RTF format which I avoid like the plague (E-mail is so much simpler with plain text). Any ideas of how to change the default program?

Regards,
Duane De Vries (retired)
--
"Experience is what you get when you don't get what you want ...."

Hi Duane;

There is a utility called OpenUsing Contextual Menu Plugin that is used to open a file using an application other than the file's creator, by taking advantage of MacOS 8's contextual menu. The plugin can also convert creator codes and file types to suit the chosen application.

You can find more info here:
http://www.home.aone.net.au/carter/software/software.html

However, I think it only supports the Classic OS.

I would be surprised if one of the many Finder hacks available for OS X doesn't have this function, but I can;t recall specifically. If anyone knows, please let us know.

Charles

Re: Musician Alert: Hot Deals Update

From Martin A. Totusek

Musician Alert: Hot Deals Update
Monday, October 28, 2002
By Applelinks Senior Editor John H. Farr

1) Clicking on the link at bottom of the article takes you to:

Macintosh Products Guide | Page Not Found

Sorry, either the page you tried was not found or the search you conducted did not find any matching records.

If you think you have found an error with the site, please let us know.

Thank you.

Click here to return to the Macintosh Products Guide.

2) The actual page at: ,
along with the other pages still plainly shows (like MacFixIt.com has again recently pointed out in general) that the majority of actual professional Musician products are not yet developed, or completed, or available at this time for OS X, even with the "Core Audio" API being out.

As I've pointed out previously:

Until if and when everything is re-written completely from scratch from the ground up (as OMS (Open Music System} and FreeMIDI and all programs requiring OMS and FreeMIDI are completely blocked by the kernel in OS X), most programs will require being booted under versions of Mac OS 8 and 9 (another strike against OS X only booting), the majority of the Music world cannot even try to use OS X. It can take years for complete re-writes to be completed, even if the "Core Audio" API is a little easier to use, and provided that all the companies are willing to pay for the development costs to OS X, on top of their DOS, Windows and Traditional Mac OS development thus far. "Yellow Box" aka "Cocoa" is also still an incomplete programming language in development. Note: Most of the programs have to be completely rewritten for "Cocoa" simply to be able to function under and use the Mach micro-kernel in OS X.

-Martin A. Totusek (Musician)

Productivity Complaints

From Frederico

Hi Charles,

I've been following your OS X Odyssey series somewhat over the past year, and lately, like other readers, am really starting to question how and why you are, as you claim, 20%-30% (or one-two hours a day) slower in OS X versus OS 9 on the same hardware. I don't argue for one second that X isn't slower than 9 on certain hardware, especially in Finder and scrolling as you complain; only that it's not as bad (or even noticeable, depending on work habits), overall, as you purport to most of us X advocates. My point is, your voice as a notable Mac commentator takes an extreme position, based on your unique and very-uncommon work habits, and does measurable damage to Apple's bottom line.

I'd absolutely love to come watch you work for a day or two; I'm certain it would be a real treat in quirkiness abound, as your descriptions of yourself over the years as technology-resistant (bordering on Ludditeism [sic]) and purely self-taught, adding to that your environmental and ergonomic disorders, seem to make you a very, very unique case. E.G., I've never heard of anyone, short of severely physically disabled persons, use multiple input devices in the simultaneous manner you do -- use multiple devices, yes, indeed, but your double-input select-scroll-select routine must be a sight to behold.

However, rather than argue with you that you and your work habits are wrong I'll simply concede that your work habits are yours; to try to retrain you to work more efficiently at your age would likely cost far more than adapting hardware to suit who you are and how you choose to work.

On that note, could you please remind both me and your readership once again why you lock yourself into the most-expensive Mac hardware going; i.e., the PowerBook? I seem to recall that you simply prefer the form-factor; that actual portability has little or nothing to do with it; that your environmental disorders and available desk space simply dictate it "easier" to shield yourself from gaseous emissions on a smaller, all-in-one unit, than a larger, more-displaced array of equipment. Am I correct?

Further, you don't seem to argue that your work output under OS 9 would be substantially better even with a dual-gig PowerMac G4; that you've reached a certain plateau in power that as a writer any upgrades (under OS 9) would net you only a cumulative few seconds or just a couple of minutes per day; not worth the (perceived) cost, correct?

If so, your productivity complaints will haunt you from here to the next plateau in Moore's Law (eternity, if you stray beyond merely typing and assembling words) as long as you remain on PowerBooks, because the bottleneck you are encountering under OS X is not so much in the processor speed (as I understand it you even have maxed your Pismo out with a G4-500 upgrade) or RAM (you have 640MB, yes?), but in your video accelerator limitations (and to a lesser but very real degree, your hard disk and bus speed), and the fact you can't upgrade that component - ever.

That's the price you pay for choosing compact portability, and rather than whine that Apple can and should (I disagree strongly for technical reasons on both points) make OS X as fast as OS 9 on the same hardware (ain't gonna happen), you need to alter your configuration to adapt to the requirements of the software you choose.

So, back to choice. If you can, as you say, get substantially more work done in OS 9, then why on Earth would you move to OS X? As a writer, I see no need for you to move even beyond System 7 or OS 8, for that matter. What's that, you say? You need to move to OS X in order to remain relevant to your audience? Well, that's different, then. Upgrades to maintain pace with your industry is a painful, but necessary matter. So, what's stopping you?

With the figures you assert, I'm baffled as to how you can stomach a week of your life. I would be sick to know that 20%-30% of my work output is lost to waiting for a piece of hardware to complete a task -- at least when I know that replacing that hardware is possible, and financially viable. You seem to take the standpoint that it is not viable; that it's Apple's fault, instead. I can't accept that.

For the value of your G4-upgraded Pismo (US$1200-$1500; CA$2000-$2350), you could easily replace it with a desktop system that includes, most importantly, a much faster graphics card, an equal or faster CPU, not to mention faster, larger, cheaper everything-else, as well as a decent LCD display that at least rivals, if not surpasses your 14.1" Pismo LCD; in short, enough hardware to more than equal your OS 9 Pismo performance under OS X.

I'd be willing to bet that some money could be left over to go towards building real, effective environmental protections, as well. Even if it didn't, at least here in the US, any investments in such needs are tax-deductible as either business or medical expenses; if it's a diagnosed and confirmed disorder, it is likely covered by insurance or Social Security, as well as numerous work-retraining program compensation funds.

Regardless, even if it cost you a thousand dollars out of pocket to upgrade, your increased productivity would pay off the investment in just a few months, if not less than several weeks. (This assumes that you can sell every man-hour you can produce, as opposed to having only one set of tasks that you get paid X amount of dollars for no matter how long it takes).

So, how about it, Charles? If a G4-500 Pismo running OS 9 makes you about as productive as you can be as a writer, then why not resolve your OS X woes by turning your Pismo into a G4-500+ Desktop with fast ATi Radeon or nVidia graphics? I'll be happy to not only help you spec it out and find the least-expensive parts, but help you design the environmental controls, too. Heck, I'm so tired of your focus on how slow OS X is (not), and the damage that is doing to Apple's bottom line (and my stock portfolio), that I'll build the whole shebang to your specs for cost of materials only.

For reference, I own and manage a number of small enterprises, some of which are Mac-related or Mac-dependent; one area one of my firms specializes in is Mac consultancy and productivity, including building custom Mac hardware and hardware deployment. Basically, building custom systems such as you would require is within our specialty.

Also, for reference, I imagine that the core of my work is very similar to yours; I spend my day reading and writing; assembling text and content from numerous sources to produce articles, contracts and manuals; i.e., technical writing; as well as my work as a coder in various languages. I can easily imagine the number of times you need to scroll, select, cut, copy, paste, format, reference, open, close, save, save as, publish, repurpose, catalog, etc., etc.

I, too, lament many productivity losses from OS 9; Popup folders chief among them. I freely admit that for the one area of my work as a writer (due to the need to source from thousands of clippings and reference docs daily) I was more productive under OS 9; however, OS X offers enough elsewhere to make the transition necessary, and overall more than worthwhile. For me, the addition of two monitors and a number of GUI enhancing shareware options have effectively replaced pretty much everything I miss in OS 9. Yes, it sounds expensive, cumbersome and extreme, but my work demands it, so therefore it is justified and happily undertaken.

Finally, for the bulk of my day, I use a G4-533 Digital Audio with 1.5GB CL-2 RAM; and six screens (all Quartz Extreme-enabled) via Radeon 8500 AGP and Radeon 7000 PCI; I have two keyboards; use two mice, one trackball, a Wacom pad and various other input devices. However, I can get an awful lot of basic writing done while away from the office on an old PowerBook Wallstreet 233, yes, running OS X and using ViaVoice, so I know full-well how much slower many tasks are, especially Finder ops; but it's still more than useable and meets my expectations (if not desires). I would absolutely love a pretty, new, dual 1.25GHz PM MDD, but, like you, I just can't justify the cost just yet, as one can only type so fast; all new, heavy-duty hardware goes to the artists and coders who need every ounce of power we can afford. Happy, or sad (depending on your POV) to say, two year-old hardware (which, BTW, was purchased at clearance prices) provides me plenty of plateau such that I'm not left watching the spinning rainbow long enough per week to justify an upgrade -- yet. Depreciation and write-offs, however, will make it possible after the first of the year. [grin]

Sorry this was so long; I guess I've had a lot of pent-up response to your OS X series.

Cheers
Frederico

Hi Fredrico;

When I embarked on this Odyssey, I posited it as one man's experience along the road to OS X. I've always endeavoured to be up from about the issues that were relatively unique to my personal situation and circumstances, which, as you suggest, are not mainstream. On the other hand, an awful lot of others, who do not contend with the health and physical disability travails that I do, have tendered similar complaints about OS X's sluggishness (even on faster equipment than mine), and its Finder shortcomings and angularities (some of which you concede in your own letter), so I don't think my critique has been at all "extreme."

I switched to working mainly on a PowerBook back in the mid-'90s, on a machine (PB 5300) that I had no environmental emissions problems with, so while laptops are relatively easy to contain for environmental isolation, that is not the main reason I use them. I just like them! (see my The Road Warrior column on MacOpinion this week for more on this topic). I also regularly use a UMAX S-900 tower, with which the chemical emissions issue is dealt with by routing the exhaust from the cooling fans out of my workspace with some simple fabricated ducting, so actually, desktop machines can be simpler to manage in that context.

As for the two-mouse input thing, while I did discover it out of desperation, and it made it possible to continue working when I otherwise couldn't have, it is so much faster and more efficient, I would continue using the technique even if my physical disabilities were no longer an issue. I have endeavoured to qualify and not belabor this point, but since it posed such a formidable (and unanticipated) roadblock to my using OS X for production, I have needed to address it by way of explanation. Wtih my recently discovered Wacom Graphire2 mouse kludge, that problem has been dealt with significantly, but I still find OS x slow.

As for government compensation, tax-breaks, etc., for persons with Environmental Illness, I wish! Not here in Canada. For the record, I have been diagnosed by several certified (MD) specialists in Environmental Medicine at a government run research facility affiliated with Dalhousie University here in Nova Scotia, where I have been a patient since 1991, but this type of illness remains hotly controversial, and those in the medical profession who take it seriously (often those who are afflicted themselves) are a beleaguered minority. But that's another movie.

Sure, a cutting-edge, faster Mac would no doubt mitigate some of my speed complaints with X. However, I'm temperamentally inclined to speak as an advocate for the very large constituency of Mac users who run more modest machinery and can't afford to upgrade their system every 18 months, or sensibly resist that concept even if expense is not an inhibition. I think any commodity that costs as much as computers do should have a useful service life of at least five years. Apple sells OS X as officially supporting machines back to 233 MHz G3s. I think it's legitimate commentary to report on how X fares on supported hardware that isn't the latest and greatest. And should portable users be second-class citizens in the Mac community?

I'm also, as you may have inferred, by nature a "the Emperor has no clothes" contrarian. The enthiusiast hype about how wonderful OS X is, too often accompanied by gratuitous and scornful trashing of the OS that got most of us here, has been just too much for me to take without comment. My critique of OS X has been honest and unbiased. I would have loved it to be better than the old Classic OS from day one on substance and merit, but it wasn't. When it is, I'll say so.

As for your stock portfolio, that's not my problem. I vigorously resist the postulate that Mac-oriented journalists should pull their punches for fear of negatively impacting APPL valuations. I doubt that my ruminations have much effect anyway, but part of my role is as a critic, and meaningful criticism implies negative commeentary when it's called for.

I make no apologies for my efforts in personal Mac evangelism over the years. I've sold a lot of computers for Apple, and helped a lot of Mac users to enjoy a more satisfactory experience with their machines. I continue to vigorously reccommend the Mac to the not inconsiderable numbers of folks who seek my input, both on and off the Web, and I advocate that new users learn OS X and not bother with OS 9.

But I shall continue to call the shots as I see them in this Odyssey and my other Mac journalism scribblings.

Philosophically, my contention is that the OS should harmonize and conform to the way I want to do things (the traditional Macintosh way), rather than me having to conform the doing things the OS's way (the traditional Microsoft/Windows way). OS X is getting better (with a lot of help from the shareware developers) in this regard. I'm using X right now. But it has a way to go yet.

Charles

The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here:
http://www.applelinks.com/news/odyssey/

CM

Charles W. Moore

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