The Mind of Dr. Mac

The other day I was cleaning up my hard disks by throwing away unneeded files and folders. When I tried to empty the Trash, this is what I saw:

An hour later there were still 2,775,000+ files left to be deleted. At that rate it would have taken several months to empty the trash… so I downloaded a little app called Super Empty Trash, launched it, selected All Volumes from its Delete files from window:

A few minutes later all 2.75 million files and folders were gone!

Kudos to SuperEmptyTrash’s creator, Marco Balestra, for making such a useful little tool and for distributing it at no charge. Thanks, Marco!

Download it here: SuperEmptyTrash for Mac OS X.

Press and hold the Command + Control + D keys and move your cursor over any word (”Mother” below)
in almost any cocoa application including Mail, Safari (shown below), iChat, and many more, and
the handy little Dictionary/Thesaurus pop-up, (it’s built into Mac OS X) appears:

(Note: Don’t do it over the word “mother” if you’re easily offended or have kids nearby.
As you can see, I had to blur the second definition for your protection. Just trust me
on this and don’t even think about trying it.)

Evan Gross’s Spell Catcher X is one of my favorite must-have utilities and a program I’ve been recommending for years at its list price of $39.95. Now MacUpdate is offering it for half-price TODAY ONLY ( (Mon Feb 02, 2009).

To read a rave review I wrote for The Mac Observer (and playfully titled Who Kneads Spill Chicken?), click here.

To get your copy of Spell Catcher X for half-price ($19.95 vs. $39.95) click here. And while you’re there, be sure to read all of the comments about Spell Catcher X and you’ll see I’m not the only one who loves it!

P. S. Thanks to MDJ: The Daily Journal for Serious Macintosh™ Users, for pointing out this deal in today’s MDJ newsletter. For more info on MDJ click here.

There are some times — like when you’re watching a DVD movie or burning a DVD with iDVD — that you don’t want your Mac to sleep. Sure you can open the Energy Saver and/or Desktop & Screen Saver System Preference pane and make your adjustments there, but wouldn’t it be nice if you could suspend both — sleep and screen saver — with a single click? 

Well you can. All you need is a copy of Caffeine, a freeware application from Lighthead Software. Launch Caffeine and a little coffee cup icon appears in your menu bar, like this:

To turn Caffeine on and stop your Mac from using its screen saver or sleep temporarily, just click the coffee cup icon in the menu bar and it will fill with coffee to let you know it’s turned on, like this: 

To change the default duration Caffeine is enabled, Command + click the coffee cup icon in your menu bar and make your selection from the Caffeine menu that appears, like this:  

How can you not love that? It’s free, it’s easy to use, and it’s handy as all heck!

Click here to learn more about and/or download a copy of Caffeine.

Those nice folks over at MacHeist have set up a Mac Giving Tree and are giving away four great programs today absolutely free. The programs are:

• 1Password: Password manager that goes far beyond Safari’s AutoFill (retail price $39.95).
• Synergy: Fantastic tiny iTunes controller for your menu bar (retail price 5€). 
• iConquer: The original game of world conquest, kind of like RISK (retail price $25.00).
• Enigmo 2: A terrific puzzle game from Pangea (retail price $19.95).

So what are you waiting for? To grab your goodies, click here. But you better hurry… it’s only good today (Christmas Day).

(A tip of the hat to Chris Breen for the Twitter tweet that reminded me to tell you about this very cool deal.)

Here’s a tip I saw in the December issue of one of my favorite newsletters, Jay Nelson’s excellent Design Tools Monthly.

Speaking of which, this post has now officially turned into two tips for the price of one…

The first tip is that if you’re not familiar with Design Tools Monthly (A.K.A. The Executive Summary of Graphic Design News), you should be. In a nutshell, each issue of DTM is filled to the brim with tips, bug fixes, industry news, software & hardware updates, font news, and much more, all delivered in a concise bite-sized chunks with no filler or fluff. Every issue is brimming with useful, helpful, and just plain wonderful tips, hints, news, and products. Click here to visit the DTM Web site, then download the free sample issue and see for yourself.

Now, here’s the actual tip about auto-deleting ZIP files after extracting the contents:

You probably know that when you double-click a ZIP file its contents are extracted. Once I’ve extracted the goods, I usually don’t need the ZIP file any more, so I drag it to the Trash.

I’ve always wondered why ZIP files weren’t smart enough to drag themselves to the Trash after revealing their treasures. In a second I’ll show you how to make ZIP files do just that.

But wait, there’s more: With the advent of Mac OS X Leopard and its Downloads folder, most of the ZIP file action ends up taking place there. Well, I like the idea of downloaded files going into the Downloads folder but I prefer the extracted files to appear on the Desktop until I figure out what I want to do with them.

This tip lets me do that too…

Here’s how:

1. Open the CoreServices folder (Hard Disk/System/Library/CoreServices).

   

2. Launch the Archive Utility application.

   

3. Choose Archive Utility–>Preferences.

   

It turns out this “hidden” Archive Utility application is responsible for what happens when you expand a ZIP archive. So, as you can see in the top half of the Archive Utility Preferences window above, I’ve configured mine so expanded files are saved to my Desktop and the ZIP archive file then moved to the Trash. I’ve also made it so when I create a ZIP archive (by right-clicking and choosing “Compress”), the ZIP file appears on the Desktop automatically, making it easier for me to drag it into a Mail message (which is almost always what I do after creating an ZIP archive file.

On Tuesday Apple announced that the upcoming Macworld Expo (January 5-9 at The Moscone Center in San Francisco) would be the last one it attends… Furthermore, it also revealed that Steve Jobs would not be delivering his trademark keynote address, but would be presented by Phillip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing instead.

Here is the complete text of the press release: 

CUPERTINO, Calif., Dec. 16 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Apple(® today announced  that this year is the last year the company will exhibit at Macworld Expo. Philip  Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing, will deliver  the opening keynote for this year’s Macworld Conference & Expo, and it will be  Apple’s last keynote at the show. The keynote address will be held at Moscone West on  Tuesday, January 6, 2009 at 9:00 a.m. Macworld will be held at San Francisco’s  Moscone Center January 5-9, 2009.   

Apple is reaching more people in more ways than ever before, so like many  companies, trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its  customers. The increasing popularity of Apple’s Retail Stores, which more than 3.5  million people visit every week, and the Apple.com website enable Apple to directly  reach more than a hundred million customers around the world in innovative new ways.

Apple has been steadily scaling back on trade shows in recent years, includingNAB, Macworld New York, Macworld Tokyo and Apple Expo in Paris.  

I wrote a column expressing my personal thoughts on it, which  will appear Tuesday in the Houston Chronicle. While I was gathering the information I needed to opine intelligently, I read many other opinions of this news. Here are a few I found quite interesting: 

This is a BusinessWeek column dated December 15 (the day before Apple dropped its bombshell). Consider whether it might have played a part in Apple’s announcement the next day: Steve Jobs Will MAY Be At Macworld Expo, Event Manager Says

Jason Snell, Editorial Director and head honcho at Macworld magazine, had this to say: Apple at Expo: What went wrong?

An insightful column with predictions by Chuck La Tournous (for the Mac Observer): It’s the End of the World as We Know it (and I Feel Fine)

Brad Stone for the New York Times: Apple’s Chief to Skip Macworld, Fueling Speculation

Edward C. Baig and Jon Swartz for USA TODAY: Steve Jobs skips Macworld; Apple denies health rumors

Some opinions from troubleshooting guru and founder of MacFixIt, Ted Landau (for the MacObserver): The End of Macworld Expo

And last but not least, a juicy, tabloid-style tell-all story of Steve Jobs and Macworld Expos in the past written by David Bunnell, founder of Macworld Magazine and Macworld Expo (for SFGate): Steve Jobs didn’t make the first Macworld, either

There is one more thing… Before the ink was dry (or the electrons were settled) on the Apple press release, a site that parodies the press release – AppleCancelledChristmas.com — appeared on the Web. Not my favorite Apple parody but good for a giggle.

Sweet!