Upgraded the CPU on my Mac Mini from Core Duo 1.6GHz to Core2Duo 2.33GHz – (instructions & discussion) Results are amazing, and the bump in performance, even during transcoding of video, is immediately noticeable.  Note that there was a dramatic increase in fan noise so hope you’ve got your Mini in a closet somewhere as I do.  (UPDATE:  Fan noise was due to broken heatsink screw.  Here‘s an example of why this upgrade was a great idea)
	Created a generic bootable USB OSX Leopard installer on a 16GB Thumb Drive – (instructions & instructions) Upgrades and refreshes are now a breeze.  It’s also got all of my (licensed) apps like Adobe CS and Microsoft Office on board in case I ever lose my hard drive, etc.
	Installed and began regularly using Sxipper for login automation – (install) Apart from making it WAY easier for me to log in to sites and keep track of all of my passwords, this has allowed me to emancipate myself from a broken Firefox configuration that I have beeb married to since the early Betas.
	Hacked my AppleTV and installed XMBC/Boxee – (instructions) Since I already store my media within iTunes, and since Boxee has very limited content avilable at the moment, this was FAIL.  I do find it interesting to see what others are watching, but the only active friend I have is Boxee CEO Avner Ronen.  If Boxee wants me to be a frequent user, it needs to allow me to subscribe to torrent feeds and automagically download the movies to my AppleTV.
	Maxed out the RAM on all of our Macs – (get some) RAM prices are artificially deflated thanks to the manufacturers vastly overestimating the demand for memory following the release of Windows Vista.  My friends @ CanadaRAM have great prices as a result.  Their loss is our productivity gain!

All in all my future wife was quite dismayed at the number of times I broke out the torx screwdriver and cracked open a computer on the ottoman while watching “Long Way Down” but I’m grateful it’s over with.  Happy New Year all!

UPDATED: One more Bonus thing I did!

Installed Nambu on my MBPro and iPhone for managing my Tweets etc. – (discussion & iphone app ) The Nambu Desktop app is in beta, so you can’t get it yet… but the iPhone cllient is available for cheap from the iTunes Music store.  Keep an eye on the Nambu web site for the launch of the Desktop client.  Nambu in both cases revealed a number of Direct Messages I never knew I had… twitter is notoriously bad at revealing these via its web interface.

Seeya.

I’m a busy guy and I have little tolerance for hassle on my Desktop. Recently I was having trouble meddling with a PDF somebody sent me, and in desperation I downloaded Acrobat Reader for OS X on to my MacBook Pro. Now, normally I don’t need Acrobat since OS X is able to view PDF files natively, within the Preview app. This is a godsend since Preview is a nice tight little piece of software that loads quickly and has a minimum of visual fuss.

This is not the case with Acrobat Reader. On average, the load time is about 20-25 seconds to execute AcroRead and load the file I’m trying to view, during which time I get to see who all the authors are (I don’t care) and exactly which module is being loaded on any given nanosecond. When the app finally starts up, of course, it asks if I want it to be the default PDF viewer. Being me, I always say “no” and check the “don’t ask me again” checkbox. Then the timer starts: at an interval of about 30 more seconds, Acrobat then spontaneously dies, no matter whether I’m selecting and cropping, or sitting and watching. Acrobat has also hijacked my viewing of PDFs from within Mail.app and god knows how many other applications, and I’m disinclined to hunt around in OS X to redirect viewing back to good ol’ Preview.

Nice! Thank god I know who all the developers are, I keep thinking, so that I can flame them via email. After deleting the application, of course, which I have now dutifully accomplished (see above).

Anyway, this is a lesson for Adobe, and software developers everywhere. The level of bullsh*t I will put up with from a powerful application like Photoshop, for instance, is far higher than my pain tolerance threshold for what is, ostensibly, a simple viewer. If you’re painting the ceiling of the Sistene Chapel, by all means hire Michaelangelo and take as many years as you want to “load”… but if you’re whitewashing the picket fence, get Huck Finn and give him an afternoon and a couple of root beers. Adobe is decidedly *not* good at whitewashing fences, allegorically speaking.

-Ian.

Old bits, but I read this in the Industry Standard last night on a plane.

http://www.planetpdf.com/mainpage.asp?webpageid78&nl

Finally, a search engine that includes the ability to index .PDF files on the web.

Adobe also lets you convert any file to .PDF online:

http://createpdf.adobe.com/

And… Of course, for those who didn’t know, Apple’s OS X renders its entire GUI in PDF natively. Nice.

-Ian.