EchoTech » Mac OS X

iPhone OS 4.0 aka Mac OS X Touch 1.0 [updated x4]

Richard Stelling — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 00:06:15 +0000

Time to jump on the rumour mill and predict, with scary accuracy what Apple’s event due to take place at the end of January (’10), will hold.

Update: Looks like once again I have been spot on with my Apple predictions. I have linked to stories confirming my assertions where appropriate.

Mac OS X Touch

The new name for iPhone OS. Currently the iPhone OS runs on iPhone’s, iPod’s and inside developers Mac Pro’s.

It’s time for a name change — Mac OS X Touch 1.0. It will effectively be iPhone OS 4.0, we might get a few 3.x updates to smooth the transition but by the end of 2010 iPhone OS will be dead — Long live Mac OS X Touch.

Features

These features all taken form my musings on Twitter.

Naming

UPDATE: Touch OS 4.0
UPDATE: Mac Touch OS 4.0

API

Voice Control API
Low level camera API
Bluetooth API
launchd API (instead of multi-process support)
Data detectors API
Advanced gesture API
Advanced iSync API (for 3rd parties)

Updates

USB support (for iSlate)
Extra non-standard WebKit extentions
Definitely no Flash support
Multi-camera support (see Apps below)
Video output
~~Handwriting recognition~~

Interface Updates

Animated springboard icons
Advanced App management
Lock App positions in springboard

Apps

RELEASED: iWork App (instead of file system) [MacRumours.com] [AppleInsider]
iChat [Orange Exec Confirms Apple Tablet Is On The Way]
UPDATE: Remote Desktop App (iPad Only)
UPDATE: Apple TV App (iPad Only)

Displaying Twitter messages using Growl

Richard Stelling — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 14:36:21 +0000

It’s been well-over a year since I hacked the the first few lines of code for Trowel, the open source, Perl solution to your Twitter and Growl needs.

I must confess there was no great plan I just needed a solution, but looking at the comments the above posts generated, so did many of you.

Now Roland van Ipenburg has cleaned up the original code you can download the latest version. But for completeness I have reproduced it below.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w # -*- cperl; cperl-indent-level: 4 -*- use strict; use warnings;


## no critic qw(ProhibitLongLines)

# $Id$

# $Revision$

# $HeadURL$

# $Date$

## use critic
use utf8;

use 5.008000;
our $VERSION = '0.01';
use Date::Format;

use Digest::MD5;

use Encode;

use File::HomeDir;

use File::Slurp;

use File::Spec;

use Getopt::Long qw(:config no_ignore_case);

use IO::File;

use Imager;

use LWP::Simple;

use Log::Log4perl qw(:easy get_logger);

use Mac::Growl;

use Net::Twitter;

use Pod::Usage;

use Set::Scalar;
use Readonly ();

## no critic qw(prohibitCallsToUnexportedSubs)

Readonly::Scalar my $EMPTY   => q{};

Readonly::Scalar my $NEWLINE => qq{\n};

Readonly::Scalar my $COMMA   => q{,};

Readonly::Scalar my $ESCAPE  => q{%};
Readonly::Scalar my $APPLICATION       => q{Growl+Twitter=trowel};

Readonly::Scalar my $NOTIFICATION_NAME => q{New Tweet};
Readonly::Scalar my $DEFAULT_FORMAT   => q{%u: %t};

Readonly::Scalar my $MAX_TWEETS       => 200;

Readonly::Scalar my $MAX_TWEETS_INIT  => 5;

Readonly::Scalar my $DISPLAY_INTERVAL => 4;

Readonly::Scalar my $POLL_INTERVAL    => 37;

Readonly::Scalar my $AVATAR_WIDTH     => 32;

Readonly::Scalar my $AVATAR_HEIGHT    => $AVATAR_WIDTH;
Readonly::Scalar my $CACHE_DIR => File::Spec->catdir( File::HomeDir->my_home(),

    qw{Library Caches GrowlHelperApp} );

Readonly::Scalar my $TID_FILE       => q{tweet.id};

Readonly::Scalar my $ENCODING       => q{utf8};

Readonly::Scalar my $AVATAR_TYPE    => q{jpeg};

Readonly::Scalar my $ERR_MODE_SLURP => q{quiet};
Readonly::Array my @CSV_OPTIONS        => qw(exclude include sticky);

Readonly::Array my @NET_TWITTER_TRAITS => qw(InflateObjects Legacy);

## use critic
Log::Log4perl->easy_init($INFO);

my $log = get_logger();
my %options = (

    format   => $DEFAULT_FORMAT,

    poll     => $POLL_INTERVAL,

    interval => $DISPLAY_INTERVAL,

);

foreach my $csv (@CSV_OPTIONS) {

    $options{$csv} = [];

}
Getopt::Long::GetOptions(

    \%options,                  q{username|s=s},

    q{password|p=s},            q{interval|i=i},

    q{poll|l=i},                q{exclude|x=s@},

    q{sticky|t=s@},             q{include|I=s@},

    q{output|o},                qq{initials|n:$MAX_TWEETS_INIT},

    q{format|f=s},              q{config|g=s},

    qq{retrieve|r:$MAX_TWEETS}, q{help|h},

    q{verbose+},                q{exclude_self|X},

    qq{width:$AVATAR_WIDTH},    qq{height:$AVATAR_HEIGHT},

    q{man},

) or Pod::Usage::pod2usage(2);

$options{help} && Pod::Usage::pod2usage(1);

$options{man} && Pod::Usage::pod2usage( -verbose => 2 );
# Gather comma seperated items or items from multiple options into a set:

foreach my $csv (@CSV_OPTIONS) {

    $options{$csv} =

      Set::Scalar->new( split /$COMMA/xsm, join $COMMA, @{ $options{$csv} } );

}

$options{exclude_self} && $options{exclude}->insert( $options{username} );
my @names = ($NOTIFICATION_NAME);

$log->debug('Register notifications');

## no critic qw(prohibitCallsToUnexportedSubs)

Mac::Growl::RegisterNotifications( $APPLICATION, \@names, [ $names[0] ] );

## use critic
my $twitter = Net::Twitter->new(

    username => $options{username},

    password => $options{password},

    traits   => \@NET_TWITTER_TRAITS,

);
my $last_id =

## no critic qw(prohibitCallsToUnexportedSubs)

  File::Slurp::read_file( File::Spec->catfile( $CACHE_DIR, $TID_FILE ),

    err_mode => $ERR_MODE_SLURP );

## use critic

my $switch = 0;
$log->debug('Entering poll loop');

while (1) {
    $log->debug('Getting timeline');

    my $ar_timeline = $twitter->friends_timeline(

        $last_id

        ? { count => $MAX_TWEETS, since_id => $last_id }

        : { count => $options{initials} }

    );
    while ( my $tweet = shift @{$ar_timeline} ) {

        $log->debug( 'Processing tweet ' . $tweet->id );

        if ( !$switch ) {

            $last_id = $tweet->id;

## no critic qw(prohibitCallsToUnexportedSubs)

            File::Slurp::write_file(

                File::Spec->catfile( $CACHE_DIR, $TID_FILE ), $last_id );

## use critic

            $switch++;

        }

        next if ( skippable($tweet) );

        my %tweet_data = get_data($tweet);

        if ( $options{output} ) {

## no critic qw(RequireCheckedSyscalls)

            print $tweet_data{body}, $NEWLINE;

## use critic

        }

        else {

            growl( $tweet, \%tweet_data );

        }

    }

    $switch = 0;

    $log->debug( 'Wait ' . $options{poll} . ' seconds' );

    sleep $options{poll};

}
sub skippable {

    my $tweet = shift;

    return ( $options{exclude}->has( $tweet->user->screen_name )

          || !$options{include}->is_null )

      && !$options{include}->has( $tweet->user->screen_name )

      && !$options{sticky}->has( $tweet->user->screen_name );

}
sub get_data {

    my $tweet      = shift;

    my %tweet_data = (

        n => $tweet->user->name,

        u => $tweet->user->screen_name,

        t => $tweet->text,

        d => $tweet->created_at,

        l => $tweet->user->location,

    );

    while ( my ( $key => $value ) = each %tweet_data ) {

        ( defined $value )

          && ( $tweet_data{$key} = Encode::encode( $ENCODING, $value ) );

    }

    $tweet_data{$ESCAPE} = $ESCAPE;

    my $map =

      qq{(?
    $log->debug( 'Using map ' . $map );

    my $re = qr{$map}imsx;

    $tweet_data{body} = $options{format};

## no critic qw(ProhibitUselessRegexModifiers RequireLineBoundaryMatching)

    $tweet_data{body} =~ s/$re/$tweet_data{$1}/gxs;

## use critic

    return %tweet_data;

}
sub growl {

    my ( $tweet, $hr_tweet_data ) = @_;

    my $avatar = get_avatar( $tweet, $hr_tweet_data );

## no critic qw(prohibitCallsToUnexportedSubs)

    Mac::Growl::PostNotification(

        $APPLICATION,

        $names[0],

## no critic qw(ProhibitAccessOfPrivateData)

        $hr_tweet_data->{n},

        $hr_tweet_data->{body},

## use critic

        $options{sticky}->has( $tweet->user->screen_name ) ? 1 : 0,

        0,

        $avatar

    );

## use critic

    sleep $options{interval};

    return;

}
sub get_avatar {

    my ( $tweet, $hr_tweet_data ) = @_;

    my $avatar_url = $tweet->user->profile_image_url->as_string;

    my $avatar_file =

      File::Spec->catfile( ($CACHE_DIR), Digest::MD5::md5_hex($avatar_url) );

    $log->debug($avatar_file);

    my $fh = IO::File->new();

    if ( !$fh->open(qq{< $avatar_file}) ) {

        LWP::Simple::mirror( $avatar_url, $avatar_file );

        my $img = Imager->new( file => $avatar_file );

        my $thumb = $img->scale(

            xpixels => $options{width},

            ypixels => $options{height}

        );

        $thumb->write( file => $avatar_file, type => $AVATAR_TYPE );

    }

    $fh->close();

    return $avatar_file;

}
exit;
__END__
=encoding utf8
=head1 NAME
trowel - display Twitter messages with Growl.
=head1 VERSION
This is version 0.01. It's based on

L
=head1 SYNOPSIS
	trowel -u -p [options]
=head1 DESCRIPTION
Shows the tweets entering a users Twitter timeline as Growl notifications,

including the avatar of the tweep. The format is the message in the

notification is configurable and the avatars are scaled to fit in the standard

Smoke Theme and cached locally.
=head1 DEPENDENCIES
L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L

L
Issue the following command in a Terminal to install these modules:
	sudo /usr/bin/cpan -i Date::Format Digest::MD5 Encode File::Slurp \\

	File::Spec Getopt::Long IO::File Imager LWP::Simple Log::Log4perl \\

	Mac::Growl Net::Twitter Pod::Usage Set::Scalar Readonly \\

	&& sudo /usr/bin/cpan -fi File::HomeDir
=head1 INCOMPATIBILITIES
=over 4
=item * File::HomeDir fails tests when it is being installed as root because

the user root doesn't have some special Folders only normal users have. It can

be installed as root by forcing the install with the -fi option.
=back
=head1 DIAGNOSTICS
This module uses Log::Log4perl for logging.
=head1 BUGS AND LIMITATIONS
=over 4
=item * This script aims to be compatible with the original version or

trowel, but it it not bug-compatible
=item * A missing password option isn't interactively requested later
=item * The format processing is improved so C<%%> can be used to display a

single C<%> and substitutes containing formats aren't clobbered.
=item * The location is not the location of the tweet, but of the account
=back
=head1 CONFIGURATION
To use this script you'll need an account at the Twitter micro-blogging

service. The avatars used are scaled to 32x32 to fit as graphic in the default

Smoke theme of Growl. The scaled avatars and the file containing the id of the

most recent tweet displayed are stored in the cache folder of GrowlhelperApp

in L<~/Library/Caches>.
=head1 USAGE
	trowel -u  -p  [-p -x -t -I -o -f -g

	-h -v -vv -vvv]
=head1 REQUIRED ARGUMENTS
=over 4
=item * B<-u> B<--username> The username of the Twitter account to connect to
=item * B<-p> B<--password> The password of the Twitter account to connect to
=back
=head1 OPTIONS
=over 4
=item B<-u> B<--username> Twitter username
=item B<-p> B<--password> Twitter password
=item B<-i> interval between displaying tweets
=item B<-l> time between polls of Twitter feed
=item B<-x> list of users to exclude
=item B<-X> B<--exclude-self> exclude yourself
=item B<-t> list of users who's tweets are sticky, -x and -i will override

this
=item B<-l> list of users to include
=item B<-o> output to STDOUT only, by-passing Growl, use this for piping to

another application
=item B<-n> initial number of Tweets to request, default is 5
=item B<-f"

"> format of the Tweet

%u - user

%t - tweet

%d - date time

%l - location
=item B<-g> B<--config> a configuration file that sets command line

parameters, this function is not implemented
=item B<-h> B<-help>
=item B<-v> verbose mode
=item B<-vv> very verbose mode
=item B<-vvv> debug verbose mode
=item B<-man>
=back
=head1 EXIT STATUS
The exit status is determined by L

=over 4
=item * 1 
=item * 2
=back
=head1 EXAMPLES
trowel -u -p
 -i5 -l180 -f"%t %d"

-ttwitter,stephenfry,rjstelling

-Iguykawasaki,twitter,stephenfry,TechCrunch,rjstelling
=head1 AUTHOR
=over 4
=item * Roland van Ipenburg  C<<  >>
=item * Echotech L
=back
=head1 LICENSE AND COPYRIGHT
Copyright (C) 2009 by Roland van Ipenburg
This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify

it under the same terms as Perl itself, either Perl version 5.10.0 or,

at your option, any later version of Perl 5 you may have available.
=head1 DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY
BECAUSE THIS SOFTWARE IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY

FOR THE SOFTWARE, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN

OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES

PROVIDE THE SOFTWARE "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER

EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED

WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE

ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE SOFTWARE IS WITH

YOU. SHOULD THE SOFTWARE PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL

NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR, OR CORRECTION.
IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING

WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR

REDISTRIBUTE THE SOFTWARE AS PERMITTED BY THE ABOVE LICENSE, BE

LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL,

OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE

THE SOFTWARE (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING

RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A

FAILURE OF THE SOFTWARE TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER SOFTWARE), EVEN IF

SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF

SUCH DAMAGES.

=cut

Twitter & Growl — real world solutions

Richard Stelling — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 17:23:08 +0000

By-far-and-away the most popular blogs I have ever written are How To: Growl and Twitter and Twitter + Growl = Trowel v1.0.

These simple how to’s, provide a solution to a simple problem. How do I pipe my Twitter time line to Growl?

It shames me to say this but I no longer use my own solutions. If I ever get the time I might write a fully Cocoa native solution, but for now here is my real world guide to Twitter and Growl.

Tweetie

Adium

Both these application support Growl, they do have limited features but will the best solution for the vast majority of users.

Apple’s Misdirection? [Updated]

Richard Stelling — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:59:30 +0000

Over the last year this blog has argued the case for Apple’s mobile device strategy, I think this post sums it up nicely.

However, while I and every other tech journalist and blogger have been concentrating on the hardware, Apple has been secretly (duh!) plotting its most audacious product to-date.

NB: This is simply speculation, if anyone at Apple is reading this please don’t blacklist me I have Apps to sell.

Remember what everyone said about the iPod? Overpriced, under powered. Remember what everyone said about the iPhone? Overpriced, underpowered, crappy network. What will they say about the Tablet/Slate? Overpriced! underpowered! Can you seen the pattern?

But what made people buy these slow and expensive gadgets — especially when there were obviously superior competitors? iTunes. You heard me, iTunes, I’m no fan — believe me. Even on the Mac is a painful, bloated experience and I’ve heard on Windows is enough to dive you insane. But the infrastructure is what matters.

The humble iPod (later the iPod Classic) had one competitive advantage; a simple, (relatively) cheap and legal way to buy music. The iPhone now has 100,000+ Apps many free (FREE!) and many pointless. But it has an eco-system, and Apple own the infrastructure.

How will this help the iDevice/SteveSlate/WebBook? Applications. Not Apps. Not Widgets. Applications, fully functioning multi-featured Applications. Like Tweetie for Mac or any of the excellent games form Ambrosia.

Apple is going to do for regular software what it’s done for mobile Apps. The same walled garden, with the same terrible approval process and the same $99/year fee.

And as a software developer, I can’t wait. Being listed on the iTunes App Store for Mac will be a sign of quality and a guarantee to users of no viruses or Trojans.

Developers will be able to sell more applications and make more money. Users will have access to 1000s of Apps all with a ‘guarantee’ of quality and all in one place, rated and reviewed. Apple will be happy because it will totally own the device.

The process for developers will be easy, download a provisioning profile form ADC, recompile your application, submit to Apple (wait 4 weeks) and bingo, your application is in front of 20 million people.

So, while we have all been arguing about hardware specs, Apple have been building data centres and working on iTunes X (10).

This will change the way software is sold (certainly on the Mac) and hand Apple a massive piece of the pie. Microsoft have been trying to do this for years, but Apple have almost stumbled upon it. But I can’t help wondering if Steve had this in-mind back in 2001?

Recently Phil Schiller has defended the current App Store:

“We’ve built a store for the most part that people can trust,” he says. “You and your family and friends can download applications from the store, and for the most part they do what you’d expect, and they get onto your phone, and you get billed appropriately, and it all just works.”

I think this adds weight to my argument, Apple want to build a closed, secure eco-system.

iDevice 1.0

Richard Stelling — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 11:44:56 +0000

Here is a quick rundown of what an Apple iDevice will (might) be like. I’ve been an Apple watcher for years and never been surprised by what they do and don’t release.

First off release date, its quite obvious that the release of any iDevice won’t be at this years WWDC. We haven’t seen the rash of rumours (or chatter) that accompany any new Apple release. A September/October time-frame is more likely, ready for the holidays.

The look ‘n feel, is almost more important to Fanboys then price, battery or even if it exists at all. CNET are suggesting a 7-8 inch screen, thats just wrong. 10-12 inches is the sweet spot.

Full disclosure time, I’m an Apple developer and it means I’m bound by NDA about discussing specifics of the iPhone OS 3.0, however it’s quite obvious that more work has gone on behind-the-scenes than we might be lead to believe. Independent resolution, a file-system (ZFS?), external storage, multiple processes are all things we can expect in an iPhone OS deployed on any new iDevice.

Apple has (some what unwittingly) created an immense ecosystem with the App Store, it not about to hamstring this by releasing low-cost, low-powered devices. Expect any new device to be at least as powerful (and feature equivalent) as the current 2nd Generation iPod Touch. Any talk of no wireless or smaller screens is laughable.

One thing to keep in mind, Apple has been here before. It invented the Netbook with the eMate in the late 90’s. Don’t think it’s forgotten this, expect this to be pushed in schools as e-readers, teaching aids etc.

The processor will be the most innovative feature of the iDevice, possible multi-processors and GPU’s all utilised by Grand Central. It won’t allow you to run Photoshop but it will allow HD movies and OpenGL ES games to sing!

The battery, I always feel sorry for Apple when they release a new product. They always get slammed for the battery life, it’s not like they do it on purpose. If there was a 20 hour battery that weighed less than a ton and didn’t cost 1 million pounds they’d use it. Right? The other bone of contention is removable-vs-fixed. It is nearly always portrayed as a negative to have a fixed battery, never mind the increased battery life etc. Why is this, well it’s simple, Technology is written about by Tech Journalists. Tech Journalists travel a lot with their laptops and need 10’s of hours of battery life, so for the last decade they have all been carrying 3, 4 or 5(!) extra batteries. They think this is normal. It’s not. Batteries cost £40-£60 (well Apple batteries do), normal people can’t claim them on expenses, so we make do.

Expect decent battery life, but not amazing.

Back in the late 90’s when Steve came back to Apple he gave a Keynote (I have it on VHS somewhere), where he talked about the similarities of digital watches and computers (bare with me). He pointed out that in the 80’s the average American household had 1 digital watch and today (late 90’s) it’s 8 (NB: I’m writing form memory but the point stands). This is the overriding aim for Apple; 2 x Desktop or Laptop, 4 x iDevices (including iPhones and iPods).

What does this last paragraph mean? The price will be such that you can buy multiple iDevices for your home and family. They might even sell them is packs of 3 or 4! And if you’ve got a Time Capsule (or other compatible NAS) your ‘profile’ will follow you.

“Pick up the iDevice in the kitchen and search for a recipe, move to the lounge and use the iDevice there to read a book downloaded from Amazon. Each of the kids will have their own for IM, Twitter, Facebook etc. You iPhone will wirelessly sync all new contacts, photos etc. After dinner you can all sit around the AppleTV and view the photos you all took on you iPhones and camera equipped iPods. Then watch a movie downloaded form iTunes.”

Twitter + Growl = Trowel v1.0

Richard Stelling — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 17:58:29 +0000

You may have already read my how-to on integrating Twitter and Growl but this is the upgrade! I will go through the code for those interested, please help me improve the code by leaving a comment, good or bad.

I have some quite ambitious plans for this project, but this is not the time to bore you with promises, so vaporware it will remain – for now.

I’d like to start by thanking everyone who has commented on this project so far – it’s been such a big help, keep them coming.

What’s new?

If you can’t see a feature you requested its not because I am ignoring it, it’s simply I haven’t got round to it or it been superseded. As alway comments will always be read so you can always bug me there.

1. Profile images now supported

2. Run in the background and optionally use launchd

3. Sticky notifications for selected users

4. Loads more command line options

Bugs Fixed

UTF-8 encoding issue.

Download

Download here. Remember you’ll need some command line experience. See an example launchd plist file here.

Install

Installation is relatively simple, you will need to install some Perl modules, refer to the previous post for details.

Running

NB: I have split this command for ease of readability.

$ ./trowel -u <> -p <> -vv \

-I guykawasaki,twitter,stephenfry,rjstelling,macrumors,2009show \

-t twitter,stephenfry,rjstelling

-I tells the script what to notify you about

-t makes the notification sticky

Know Issues

There does seem to be an issues when running in launcd mode where Tweets are duplicated, any testing and info you can supply on this bug will help no end.

Documentation

NAME
		trowel - display Twitter messages with Growl.

SYSOPSIS
		trowel -u -p [options]

EXAMPLES
		trowel -u  -p  -i 5 -l 180 -f "%t %d" \

		-t twitter,stephenfry,rjstelling \

		-I guykawasaki,twitter,stephenfry,rjstelling

OPTIONS
		-u, --username
			Twitter username

		-p, --password
			Twitter passord, if omitted it will be

		 	requested interactively

		-i
			interval between displaying tweets

		-l, --poll
			time between polls of Twitter feed

		-x, --exclude
			list of users to exclude

		-t, --sticky
			list of users who's tweets are sticky,

			-x and -i will override this

		-I, --include
			list of users to include

		-o
			output to STDOUT only, by-passing Growl,

			 use this for piping to another application

		-n
			initial number of Tweets to request, default is 5 

		-f ""
			format of the Tweet
				%u - user
				%t - tweet
				%d - date time
				%l - location

		-g, --config
			a configuration file that sets command line

			parameters, this function is not implemented

		-h, --help
			show this help 

		-v
			verbose mode

		-vv
			very verbose mode

		-vvv
			debug verbose mode

How To: Growl and Twitter

Richard Stelling — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 11:12:08 +0000

THIS POST HAS BEEN SUPERSEDED BY Twitter + Growl = Trowel v1.0

OK, so I’m new to Twitter. I didn’t (don’t) get it. Who wants to know what I’m doing? Well as I keep telling myself thats not the point. The point is to spread information, I had a lot of fun on Election night tweeting away about the coverage and calling states (I was surprisingly accurate).

The one thing that did annoy me was it added another website to check – not just a lunch but a refresh every 5 minutes. Something had to be done.

For anyone who has Adium installed on their Mac, you will be aware of Growl it’s a notification system that has yet to reach it’s full potential. As with background messages I wanted my incoming Tweets to be shown in small unobtrusive transparent bubble.

To cut a long story short – I couldn’t find anything. I found a few Ruby scripts (that didn’t work), I tried some nice applications but I didn’t want to run another app I wanted Growl!

So an hour or 2 or Googling and research for scripts I found some Perl modules that I could combine to produce the desired output.

My steps and code are listed below, its not 100% fool proof – please leave comments on how I can improve it.

1. Installing the Modules

You will need only 3 modules Mac::Growl, Net::Twitter and Date::Format, if your lucky Date::Format might even be already installed. Type the following commands into terminal.

$ sudo perl -MCPAN -e shell

This will launch a CPAN command line session to install the modules type (at the prompt):

> install Mac::Growl

Agree to any dependancies, when it done type:

> install Net::Twitter

Again agree to all dependancies, and lastly:

> install Date::Format

> exit

If you had any problems it may be because You need Apple’s Development tools installed, these are a free download form Apple. Please leave any problems in the comments.

2. Coding

Now for the code, just copy the following into a empty text file and save as some thing sensible like growl_tweet.pl:

#! /usr/bin/perl -wT

use Mac::Growl ':all';
use Net::Twitter;
use Date::Format;

my $app    = 'Growl/Twitter';
my @names  = ('New Tweet');

RegisterNotifications($app, \@names, [$names[0]]);

my $tweet = Net::Twitter->new( username=>'##REPLACE WITH USERNAME##', password=>'##REPLACE WITH PASSWORD##' );

my $last_id = undef;
my $switch = 0;

while(1)
{
 my @tt = ();

 if($last_id)
 {
 @tt = $tweet->friends_timeline({count => 200, since_id => $last_id });
 }
 else
 {
 @tt = $tweet->friends_timeline({count => 5 });
 }

 foreach my $t (@{$tt[0]})
 {
 if(!$switch) { $last_id = $t->{id}; $switch++; };

 PostNotification($app, $names[0], $t->{user}{screen_name}, $t->{text});

 printf("%s: %s\n", $t->{user}{screen_name}, $t->{text});

 print "sleep 4\n";

 sleep(4);
 }

 $switch = 0;

 print "sleep 37\n";
 sleep(37);
}

exit;

3. Running

Now, simply run the script:

$ perl ./growl_tweet.pl

And bingo! All your tweets appear! Leave a comment if it works and especially if it doesn’t – if there is enough interest I might consider adding features and real installer!

4. Here’s one I made earlier

If you would like the code, you can down load it here (with out any formatting issues).

http://www.echo-technology.co.uk/development/twitter+growl/growl.pl.txt

MacWorld ‘08 Predictions

Richard Stelling — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:00:02 +0000

There are two reasons I am writing yet another hackneyed MacWorld prediction entry:

I always get it right but never tell anyone
Cash in on all the loverly Apple keywords, like sub-notebook, MacTouch and new iPhone

With all that unpleasantness over with I can begin. We all know Mr Jobs prides him self on secrecy and clandestine projects but the simple fact is Apple is a business and needs to make money and a quick look over their aging product line tell us 90% of the keynote.

Preemptive Strike

As to ruin the narrative of this entry Apple have this week released update Xserves and Mac Pros. I won’t insult your intelligence dear reader with the pretense that, if I had written this entry last month I would of predicted these update before January 12th. But I would of.
So, one nil to me. Ok one all.

Portable Success

Lets start off with what has over the last 3 year become the bed rock of Apple’s resurgence, the MacBook Pro. The MacBook line is in desperate need of a make over but it the Pro version that you can bet the farm on.
Intel announced new processors (immediately incorporated into the Desktop and Server lines) so we can reason the MacBook Pro updates will be more significant. But how significant? I’m going to stick my neck out and list all the updates I expect to see:

Processor upgrade (duh!) – 45-nm Penryn procesors at 2.4GHz to 2.8GHz
Graphics upgrade – an NVIDIA with 256MB as standard up to 512MB in top models
Thinner enclosure – not by much maybe 20%-25%
LED backlight screen – I’m just jumping on the bandwagon with this
Longer battery life – nothing revolutionary here, all down to the processors and screen
Gesture Pad – enhanced and much bigger track pad that will respond like the iPhone interface with; stretching, pinching, scrolling and all that CoverFlow goodness.
Blu-Ray Drive – high end models only or possibly on a ‘built to order’ only option
Mac OS X 10.5.2 – like shooting fish in a barrel!

So, 8 prediction for the MacBook Pro – check back after the Keynote to see how I scored. What this will mean for the more consumer focused MacBook it’s hard to say, but here we go:

Processor upgrade
Screen upgrade
Price drop

Only time will tell, but I don’t expect anything more than modest upgrades to the MacBooks. The upgrades will only bring the low end portables in line with the new Sub-Notebook and help define the product lines.
The real interesting thing about the new portable is its name. Looking back over the product lines we can surmise it will follow the Apple convention and take the moniker of Mini, Nano or Touch. These are surly different beasts.
The MacBook Mini/Nano – a sub-notebookw with 13″ screen no internal optical drive, SSD hard disk and about a micron thick.
The Mac Touch – the long rumored and tablet Mac, all kinds of wireless including GMS/GPRS and WiMax but only a 64GB SSD hard drive. It wont be locked to a carrier like the iPhone but will take an optional SIM card for true mobility. It’s just a big fat iPhone.

Don’t Touch

I don’t think we’re be seeing the Mac Touch this time, mainly because of the same confusion you found when reading the previous paragraph and I felt writing it. To be a success it has to have so much and still I can see no market. It would just be too expensive.

Less is More

So that leaves us with the The MacBook Mini/Nano – we have a Mac Mini so to avoid the confusion The MacBook Nano will be born. As far a product positioning is concerned the MacBook Nano will sit between the MacBook and MacBook Pro and be priced accordingly. Below is a list of of expected features (by no means exhaustive):

13″ Screen, LED backlight
64GB – 128GB SSD hard drive
1GB RAM
Touch interface/Trackpad similar to the new MacBook Pro’s
WiFi – all flavors a/b/g/n
USB 2.0 – possibly mini-USB
Very thin – is this a feature?
45-nm Penryn processor at 2.1GHz
Non-removable battery (but it lasts 12 hours)
Mac OS X 10.5.2
iPod style universal docking port
Multi-Colourd – Apple uses this neat trick to reinvigorate ‘old’ lines, expect this on updated MacBooks too.

Wow! It’s like I have a crystal ball. Well, that’s not all we still have the Apple TV and Mac Mini to look at. This is where my predictions tend towards guess work as opposed to the well thought out and meticulously researched prose above.
I can however, say with some degree of certainty that if the Apple TV is not update next week, it’s dead. If it does get a second bite at the home entertainment cherry it will see a MAJOR upgrade; more Mac OS X like features, Safari, Blu-Ray (you heard me right!), bigger hard drive and iPod dock.

Mini Minor

I have even less of an idea about the Mac Mini – they are great, I’d love to see an upgrade and a price drop. But the updated Apple TV might just incorporate all the features.
So there you go, 100% guaranteed to happen next week* or never. Please feel free to rant about how wrong I am going to be – I will be publishing the emails of those that make fools of them selves.
One last thing… iPhone update, a new 16GB version followed by a modest price drop, oh and a iPhone Nano. * Not a guarantee.