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I've used Eudora since before home Internet access was available in this neck of the woods (I had a library account), starting with version 1.5. Over the years and many subsequent Eudora versions, I've encountered very few Eudora bugs, at least ones that significantly cramped my style, but a couple of weeks ago open Eudora 6.0 windows stopped responding to mouse clicks to bring them forward when they were behind windows of other apps. There was also new, wonky behavior in which the frontmost open Eudora window would refuse to stay frontmost if you clicked into another application. This was, to say the least, extremely annoying. I tied running system maintenance and diagnostic routines and got a clean bill of health. I tried trashing the Eudora plist files and downgrading to version 5.2.1, but no joy. The problem was driving me nuts and had me seriously casting about for a possible replacement application for Eudora as my main email management app. for the first time ever (more on that quest in a moment). However, happily, I finally discovered the culprit, and the remedy was dirt simple. Since Windowshade X version 3 came out a couple of months back I've been using its very cool minimize in place feature to thumbnail my Eudora In, OUt, and Personalities windows to the bottom left of the screen. It dawned on me that the Eudora glitch showed up around the same time as I upgraded Windowshade X to version 3.1 a couple of weeks back. Experimentally, I tried windowshading the open Eudora windows instead of minimizing them and voila! -- the window glitch instantly disappeared. What sandbagged me was that there had been no problem with the minimize in place function with the earlier versions of Windowshade X 3, and it doesn't seem to affect any other application that I use excpet for Eudora. I miss the convenient thumbnail access to these frequently accessesed Eudora windows, but windowshading to the title bars is a very tolerable substitute, and I'm glad to have Eudora working properly again, because I wasn't able to find anything to satisfactorily replace it. There are a number of other OS X email apps available of course, and I didn't sample all of them in my Eudora replacement recce, but the deal-breaker issue I kept running up aganst is that most email apps don't seems to support cutting and copying of header information. With Eudora and the other email app I use regularly, Nisus Email, you can copy the header info along with the body text in one fell swoop and paste it into a text editor or whatever. With Mozilla ThunderBird and a couple of others I checked out, I couldn't copy message header info to the clipboard at all, which makes these clients unusable for my purposes. Another Eudora feature I didn't find adequately analogized in other email apps is its incredibly flexible and comprehensive array of send options, such as "Send Again" for cloning email messages. Some of the other email clients have interesting features, but nothing comes close to Eudora as a do-all email client. 10.2.8 Busts Batteries MacFixIt reports that most Apple portable owning readers who upgraded to OS 10.2.8 before Apple pulled the uptater have reported that Mac OS X 10.2.8 indicates battery time is shorter than it actually is, but for some drastically diminished battery performance has stuck even after they downgraded to OS 10.2.6. One reader with a Dual USB 600 MHz iBook says that before the 10.2.8 upgrade actual battery life was around 2 hours and 20 minutes with max CPU and screen brightness. After the update, the indicator had dropped to 1 hour 16 minutes when the battery was fully charged. Reinstalling 10.2.6 did not restore normal battery life. There was a similar issue with the Mac OS X 10.2.4 update on iBooks on some PowerBook models, requiring a battery replacement to rectify. One would think that they would have been aware of this bug a second time around, but apparently not. Another good reason to wait a few weeks after any OS update is released to see what the lay of the land is after the smoke clears and the dust settles. Kernel panics revisited Dock Preferences and Finder Preferences Issues 30 Things That Need Fixing In OS X Low End Mac's Jeff Adkins has posted a bunch of reader suggestions for things to fix in OS X. Ones that particularly resonated with me were:
• One we discussed recently here on Odyssey: - Add a save state of apps to the machine, so I can reboot to eliminate weird problems, or shutdown for some reason or another, and then return all my apps to their saved state. Much like Virtual PC does.
• Window Manager needs to be fixed so that when you switch applications by option-clicking an open window in a background application, all windows in the current application consistently hide. Similarly, clicking on the icon of an open but hidden app in the Dock should consistently bring up all windows for that application (instead, sometimes one has to click twice to bring up all application windows).
• AppleScript recordability. Even though only a few apps in OS 9 were recordable (i.e. you could open up Script Editor, push "Record", do a task in a recordable app, and Stop when you were finished). Not only was that a great way to create a simple script, but it also provided a great springboard from which to write more complex ones.
From Jim Dickey Charles, In my daily Mac readings online, I discovered the following about properly ejecting mounted disks (iPods, etc.) under system X. You might recall that I wrote you about my daughter's iBook crashing under OS X with kernel panics. I finally fixed it by just running Disk Utility/Disk Warrior many times. Here is the note about not properly unmounting some Firewire and USB disks. 1. Unplugging a mounted device without ejecting it will panic the kernel, present you with a spinning beach ball and not let you access any part of the system -- only a restart saves it. 2. Plugging in certain USB/FireWire devices will panic the kernel and present you with a restart in 3 languages screen. OS X is 100% unsuitable for mission critical work until those are fixed. Like Red Hat/SuSE, the kernel needs to be untouchable/uncrashable under all circumstances except no power. That Apple could ship an OS with "server" in the name that I can stop cold by plugging in a USB drive is just laughable.
This was on Low End Mac's site:
Like the above writer, I am totally dismayed that Apple actually SELLS (my own thoughts) an operating system that can render your Mac unusable by just unplugging your iPod. My daughter forgets sometimes, and just unplugs the iPod, thus causing kernel panics. As always, I really enjoy your work for us Mac users, especially iBook/PowerBook segment. God's best be yours,
Jim Dickey
Hi Jim;
Thanks for the kind words about my work. I see you read Jeff Adkins' article too.
As we've discussed before, USB peripheral issues do seem to initiate kernel panics in OS X. I haven't had one now for several months, but I've been cautious about plugging and unplugging USB devices when the machine is running, although keyboards and mice don't seem to cause difficulty.
I'm dismayed that Apple releases operating system updates that can nuke your portable's battery (see above).
Charles
Dock Preferences and Finder Preferences Issues From Jonathan Tyzack Hi Charles, I get the impression from Patrick Taw's letter that you have possibly misinterpreted the problem re: folders moving when dragging something to the Dock (or maybe its me? ;-). I think he meant the effect whereby a gap appears between two items in the Dock (which happens so that you can add the dragged item at that location). Patrick, to avoid this you simply hold down the command key as you drag the file - this stops the folders (or apps) from shifting away from each other to make the gap, thus making drag and drop to a folder icon easy. Incidentally, that was one of the things I missed from my top annoyances list - spring loaded folders opening in the "wrong" view. As yet, the only way I've found to get windows to open the way I want them to, is to change the view for each window individually (spring the window, alter the size and view to how you want it, close again - without ever touching the contents - and the next time it is spring-opened, it will be in the desired layout). The Finder preference setting to always open new windows in Column view apparently has no effect as far as I can tell... Nisus Thesaurus - yes, very much agreed, yet another good freeware Service addition (that also compliments OmniDictionary very nicely).
Cheers,
Hi Jonathan;
You may very well be right about a misapprehension on my part. Perhaps Patrick will let us know. In any case, thanks muchly for the supplementary insights.
Charles
The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here: Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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