my photostream

Gay for Ross

Gazing up at this storefront, I thought, "Huh. It kinda looks like Ross is throwing it's arms open to the lesbian community." I like the multiracial touch too. (Blondes and brunettes of course being two of the world's main ethnicities.)

OSX 10.6 Time Machine Exclusions

A while back, I had come across an article recommending that one optimize their Time Machine backups by excluding certain system and library folders from backup. The reason of course being that OSX isn't smart enough to exclude certain caches on its own.

People were saying to exclude

~/.Trash
/.Trashes
/Library/Audio
~/Library/Caches
/Library/Caches

Well, I just wanted to let the Internet know that this is unnecessary (under Snow Leopard at least). Apparently you can exclude things without them appearing in the TM Preferences list (like when Parallels has it's "Do Not Back Up With Time Machine" checkbox. You can use this to cut down on the size of your TM exclusions list.

Evernote

Evernote is a great cloud-based, multiplatform webclipper and notebook application. It's been really useful in keeping my notes in sync between my work computer (via web), home (Mac native app), and sometimes my iPod Touch (native app). However it really is inexcusable that it is missing a couple basic features.

You can't search for exact phrases, and symbols are ignored. So searching for "www.microsoft.com" returns all instances of "www", "microsoft", and "com". Imagine wading through a long webpage with multiple instances of those components.

Evernote is currently at Mac v1.8.2 and Windows v3.x. It has been around for 3 years, and gets a patch at least once a week. So why is it still missing basic features that are a no-brainer for note taking program?

How to Cancel the Examiner and Save the Planet

Many of you in SF might be vexed to be recieving unwanted SF Examiner newspapers every day of the week. I know we in my household bloody well feel that way. However, since we never signed up for it, I was at a loss for how to unsubscribe (turns out it's free, and yet the city allows this spam to go unchecked).

I found this link through Yelp forums. Hopefully it will work. We'll see in a few days:
http://www.examiner.com/delivery/cancel/

Exploring the Palm Pre Plus (Verizon) - Part 1

I've been getting tired of my Palm Centro (already obsolete at time of release). Although the frequent crashes suck, the PIM functions and physical keyboard rock, as well as the ability to go sans data plan. I decided to finally upgrade to a more modern phone and get a data plan at the same time. The Pre Plus has a physical keyboard, would let me stay with Verizon, and seems pretty slick. This is my user diary for the unit I bought on 2/12/2010.

After my first day of use...

1.Good: Universal Search and Phone app
You have rapid and flexible access to all contact options. Want access to a dial pad to to key in a number that isn't already in your phone? Run the phone app. From here you can use the touchscreen dial pad, or type using the keyboard. At the bottom are touchscreen buttons for voicemail and the call log.

As with Blackberries, it will intuit whether you are trying to look up a contact or dial a raw number. You don't need to hold the option key to switch to numeric mode to enter digits, just press the corresponding keys and it will know you are dialing digits (unless you happen to have a contact named "frtgder"). The Phone app will show you any contacts that match your search, and allow you to select any of their corresponding phone numbers to dial. However, you will not be able to send SMS, email, or IM.

Not to worry though, all you need to do is enter Card View or the Launcher, and start typing. This is called Universal Search. As with the Phone app, it will show you any matched contacts, except that in this view you will have the full range of options to call/SMS/email/IM. If you entered a string of numbers, you can also raw dial that number! Furthermore, you have the ability search Google, Google Maps, Wikipedia, or Twitter for whatever you entered. I think this is brilliant. I can look people up and contact them in multiple ways from one easy to access screen, and Universal Search is actually intelligent enough to know what I'm trying to do.