Subtle Coolness

The secret to downloading Firefox 3 as soon as possible? Search Google for “mozilla mirrors”.

I like Gmail, and I like that I can read my email in Apple Mail using IMAP. But I don’t like that the chat transcripts don’t download with the rest of my email. Does anyone know how to make that happen?

A few months ago I purchased a computer. For the first time in my life. It is a new-to-me Apple PowerBook G4 I bought off the son of a coworker of Rebecca. I have used Apple’s Mac OS X quite a bit at school and always preferred it to my Windows XP (and my Linux!), but Apple computers are expensive. So I got a good deal, and bought it, and have experienced no remorse whatsoever.

Now with my job I have been supporting some Apple computers rather closely, and learning so much more about the operating system, specifically how I can configure just about anything with the Terminal. You know, type type type? Text-only? UNIX? It really is great.

In a way, learning and using Linux (i.e. UNIX (i.e. POSIX)) for my server has prepared me for Mac OS X and helped me to appreciate it more.

Also, there is remote administration. I can see the computers without leaving my desk. I can control them, even if someone else is logged in and using them. That would probably be a bit freaky: you’re mousing around when suddenly, the mouse is moving on its own and there is nothing you can do about it.

I haven’t tried that on anyone yet.

Here is the problem I ran into, however: I want to change a setting, but to do so I need to take control of the computer and open System Preferences, &c. I don’t want to interrupt the user to do it. I was considering this, when I remembered all the times I read tips online for configuring Mac OS X before I actually owned such a computer, and I remembered that the tip-giver would almost always give a Terminal command to effect the change, and said Terminal command would almost always begin with defaults.

So, I did some digging and learned about the defaults command, and, long story short (“Too late!”), I came up with these magic words:

defaults delete /Library/Preferences/com.apple.loginwindow PowerOffDisabled

This command shows the Restart and Shutdown buttons on the login window (so you can turn off the computer without logging in first). Having a Terminal command to do this is great because I can run such commands on the computers I administer without interrupting the current user. All behind the scenes. It is very clever.

It looks like all my dreams have come true in the form of Tumblr.

Until Google releases Socialstream, I will endeavor to collect all my content that I have scattered across the network, and consolidate it here.

• The blog, for the moment, is right here. I am considering moving it to Blogger. But not very seriously.
• Photographs are at Flickr. My other option was Picasa Web Albums, but I like a lot of the features Flickr has that Picasa does not. Google can’t be the greatest at everything, friend. I am working on moving over any photos I have left on this site.
• You will find videos at YouTube. These are few, but available nevertheless. I suppose I could have used Google Video, but Google owns both sites anyway. Note to self: if you ever get into making videos more seriously, look into Vimeo.
• I keep my bookmarks at del.icio.us. I think you should, too. At least, your public ones. If you use del.icio.us, let me know so you can be in my network!
• If you don’t know my email address, here’s a hint: my name is William and my website is subtlecoolness.com. If you are my friend on Facebook, you can get my telephone number and a lot of other contact information from my profile page.

My master plan is to just fetch everything from those sites and weave it all together here. But all in good time, friend.