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I’ve been using TextMate for about a week now, and while it’s almost universally an incredible piece of magical software, I have been keeping a list of things that could use tweaking (you know, to make it even magicaller).

• Arrange Windows. BBEdit’s got a great way to tile open windows. It’s very handy to compare multiple open documents. Would be very handy in TextMate. Something like “tile all open windows in evenly spaced columns” or “tile them all in equal-sized windows arranged nicely across that 20 inch cinema display”
• Split window view. Terminal has it. XCode has it. BBEdit has it. Makes it really easy to work on 2 different parts of the same document.
• Reindent code. Like Tidy does for HTML. But for other code. JEdit has a pretty good one. XCode’s got a really good one. It makes it very easy to keep source code looking clean and tidy. Bonus points for optionally adding documentation stubs for languages that use that sort of thing (javadoc tags, etc…) It looks like I could mess around with the Bundle Editor for various languages, but having this as stock behaviour would be a better way to share with the rest of the class.
• HTML and CSS reformatting – flat, compact, hierarchical. It’s surprising how handy that is. Sometimes having the Official Tidy Cleanup Version isn’t what you need.
• Tear-off bundle palettes. The “Select Bundle Item” menu/palette is close, but not task-specific. It’s not as handy having to constantly search for a function. I’d like to just tear off the HTML, or CSS, or maybe both.
• Search all open files – if I’ve got a bunch of files open, from various locations (and perhaps on different servers) – they won’t be in the same Project, so I can’t use Find in Project.

Thanks to Scott for linking to this in his del.icious.net linkstream. It’s a nearly-year-old article about implementing a “learning object repository” using the Small Pieces philosophy. For me, the takeaway message was a reinforcement of something I’ve been seeing a lot of lately.

My feeling is that the Capital R “Object” Repositories beloved of systems designers of the old fashioned IMS school are rapidly losing currency in higher education, but – bizarrely – gaining credibility among decision-makers in the schools sector.

It’s amazing just how many questions I’ve been getting about CAREO recently. From all over the place, from various levels of administration.

Just as the main CAREO project website went dark due to lack of provincial support. And the CAREO repository itself is slowly failing while being neglected on life support.

It seems as though we went through a phase where the IMS/Large Tools approach was favoured, and that’s how many of us mocked up the first round of Learning Object Repositories. But – we were a couple of years too early. The whole “Web 2.0″ thing wasn’t quite there as a concept yet, otherwise I’m positive that’s the tack we would have taken.

It’d be a shame to have others doomed to repeat our entire process. We tried the Repository approach. It didn’t work too well. Learn from that and start with the Small Pieces Loosely Joined / Web2.0 approach.

TextMade is my current favorite text editor. But, while editing some files on our main Drupal server, I noticed it was leaving some ghost files around. The filenames were all prefixed with “._” so they didn’t show up in the Finder, or in normal ls -l lists. From the text that was displayed in Drupal, it looks like it was storing things like cursor position and text selection in a file that was edited by TextMate.

Normally not a big deal, but Drupal was picking them up as potential themes and modules, and dutifully listing them, and choking on the included cursor/selection info. I did some poking around and found the answer (sometimes, RTFM really helps, and TextMate has a really good built-in manual). Here’s the scoop:

19.4 Extended Attributes (Metadata)

Starting with Tiger, OS X supports setxattr and friends.

TextMate makes use of extended attributes to store the carets position, bookmarks, what text is folded and is likely to make further use of extended attributes in the future.

For filesystems which do not natively support extended attributes (like network mounted disks), OS X instead stores the extra information in a file named ._«filename», where «filename» is the name of the original file.

Since not all users think that this extra (hidden) file is worth having in order for TextMate to remember state, it is possible to disable the use of extended attributes by quitting TextMate and running the following from the shell:

defaults write com.macromates.textmate OakDocumentDisableFSMetaData 1

So, the strange files, named “._whateverFileIWasEditing.php” are created by TextMate when editing files on a non MacOSX-Tiger system. Like, say, a MacOSX Panther Server volume mounted via Appleshare. Easy fix, but it probably could have been a checkbox rather than a hidden defaults value.

I seem to be the only person on the planet not getting into the whole Talk Like a Pirate thing. I’ve got a problem glorifying piracy. The world has enough pirates right now.

I know I’m overreacting, and being overly sensitive about this. But, what’s next? Talk like a rapist day? Talk like a murderer? Kidnapper? I mean, those are all pirate-related activities. How about Talk Like a Decent Human Being Day? I’d be up for that one…

btw, I’m not totally humorless about this – Evan’s upcoming birthday party is pirate themed. But, without swords. Arrrrrr.

I've been using BBEdit for what feels like a decade – it was the late '90s, anyway.

I just switched to TextMate. It's an amazing little editor, that feels like it's taken the best parts of XCode, BBEdit, JEdit, and many others, and mashed them all into one slick and powerful little app.

Here's probably the coolest feature (well, the coolest feature that I've discovered today, anyway). The HTML bundle has a "Validate Syntax (W3C)" action, which sends the contents of the document (or selection) to the W3C HTML syntax validator. The resulting page is then modified by TextMate, such that clicking the error/warning links in the report take you to the correct line in your source document. When I tried that the first time, I was stunned. But, of COURSE that's how it SHOULD work. Very cool.

TextMate W3C HTML Validator Integration

The other really handy thing it has over BBEdit is autocompletion. It'll complete html tags, code function names, and lots of other goodies. That's such a timesaver. Why doesn't BBEdit have that?

It's got the document/project drawer from JEdit, and tabs for open documents. It's got code folding. It's got a bundle that lets you send a project to XCode to be compiled, run and debugged. It's got syntax and code colouring for just about any language out there. It's got a Webkit-powered Preview window that actually lets you edit the previewed document, and creates acceptable code.

I've put in a request for a TextMate license, but if that doesn't get approved in time, I'll be pulling out my Visa card and buying one myself. I keep catching myself saying "heh. that's exactly how it SHOULD work." It's not perfect, but it's close.

The eMate 300 I ordered on eBay finally arrived this afternoon – the mailperson decided to leave the package on my front step in the rain/snow.

I fired it up, and aside from the battery being dead (it’s only a decade old), it works great! The previous owner left it in Classroom Mode so I had to perform the über-hard reset (hold down the power key, tap the reset button on the bottom, and keep holding until the reset prompts come on screen). That got it back to factory condition – but I lost the installed copy of Works, and there were no install CDs provided. Doh. Off to unna.org…

I have to say – Newton OS 2.1 is pretty darned sweet. The thing just hums along nicely, and everything just seems to work as expected. The handwriting/printing recognition is nearly flawless – and when it has problems, it’s obviously a result of my less-than-legible printing.

The form factor is pretty sweet, too. It’s slightly smaller than a 12″ iBook, with a shorter screen. The built in keyboard is pretty nice, and would make long writing sessions (or just correcting the occasional recognition error) go quicker. The backlight is nice, too. My MP120 doesn’t have one, and it makes it nearly unusable when not in a very brightly lit room.

It must have been pretty sweet to have a classroom full of these puppies, with the classroom dock and charging station, and each student having their own eMate (and private account on it, too). I haven’t seen anything quite as well thought out since. That’s a bit of a shame in and of itself.

I’ll post some pics to Flickr when I get the chance – probably after installing some apps on it to show what it looks like. Evan’s going to LOVE this thing, since he can draw on it, as well as practicing his new letters. That should be fun. And it’s supposed to be rather ruggedized, so it might survive more than 30 seconds with The Boy™.

Playing with Newton OS 2.1 has me wanting a full MessagePad 2100, though. Man, that would be sweet. 10x faster than the eMate, in a hand-held form factor for easier handwriting. Slap in an 802.11b card and you’re online, too. I’ve got to start rummaging through my couch cushions for some spare twonies for eBay…

This post is brought to you by the words “pretty” and “sweet”, apparently. Man, do I need a Reader’s Digest subscription. Ways to Enrich Your Word Power, anyone?

There are posters and stickers all over campus right now, pointing people to the new UNow.ca site. The goal is to provide easy ways for people to keep up to date on news and events on campus. There's even a downloadable widget available.

 

But, this widget isn't a Widget. It's a Windows .exe application. Leaving us MacOSX users out in the dark.

Except, we already have Widgets, and they're easy to use and create. I recreated the basic functionality of the Windows widget in under 2 minutes, including the time to find, download, and figure out the configuration of the Widget. Here's how:

1. Download RSSBean from Apple's Dashboard Downloads site.
2. Configure it with this RSS feed, taken from the new UofCZine site (which is what I think the Windows widget is using as at least part of its data source).
3. There is no step 3.

UCalgary Dashboard Widget

I could have taken some time to customize a new Widget based on RSSBean, including UCalgary colours and graphics, but that isn't necessary. And might have taken an extra 10 minutes. Also, this Widget is free, required no committees, and involves no licensing fees or software maintenance contracts with consultants (I'm not sure if any of those apply to the Windows widget).

Update: I took a few minutes to whip up a more robust Widget. It's based on the News Reader Widget, and all I did was replace the default feeds. I've added a few of the Gauntlet student paper feeds as well, but 2 of them are currently invalid RSS so they won't display. I'll leave them in, just in case the Gauntlet folks fix the feeds. Here's a screenshot, and the downloadable version is attached to this post.

UCalgary News Reader Widget

By the way, by FAR the longest part of this process was just finding RSS feeds for stuff on campus. Hopefully that will change as more sites get using Drupal (and the template is fixed to expose RSS feeds).

It's taking some time to get the Podcasting program off the ground here at UCalgary. In the meantime, here's a preview of our beta distribution system.

UCalgary Podcast Distribution (beta)

I've heard rumours that we're working on a more scalable system, and I'm looking forward to that. The dubbing facility is just about maxed out at the moment… 

There has been much talk and hype about Peak Oil – the fact that the global production of petroleum is about to reach its maximum level, after which it will start to decline until it eventually becomes a scarce resource and we all have to scavenge in landfills for decades-old plastic to recycle.

It may not be as soon as some think. The Saudis are estimating about 4.5 trillion barrels left. Here in Alberta, we’re sitting on an estimated 1 trillion barrels locked in the Athabasca tarsands.

So, Peak Oil may be years or decades away. Unfortunately, that isn’t necessarily a good thing. As we’re all happily buying Hummers and Escalades to drive through Raunchy Ronald’s Drive Thru™, we’re continuously pumping carbon that had been naturally sequestered deep underground, into the atmosphere. The atmosphere can’t hold all of that carbon without leading to the global warming effects we’re observing now. The real, and more immediate, danger isn’t running out of oil. The danger is in not running out soon enough.

The atmosphere will hit maximum carbon load, and then we’ll have to be spending insane amounts of energy working to pump all of that carbon back into stable reservoirs. Sequestering underwater has me just a little bit nervous.

Here’s the parodox. We may manage to delay Peak Oil, at the cost of accelerating global warming. The irony is, if we’d have hit Peak Oil already, our impact on the environment would already be starting to decelerate (not decrease, just slow down for awhile before beginning to reverse).

Unfortunately, I’m not sure we’re (as a species) smart enough to Do The Right Thing any sooner than we absolutely have to, if then. If there’s oil left to burn (even at $300 per barrel) you’d better believe someone will be ready to burn it. Years from now, students will shake their heads in disbelief when they read about what we did with the limited petroleum resource.

I’m pretty hooked on the new games for the iPod. I’ve already bought 4 of them, and am trying to hold back from buying the rest. (I know – I should have bought the bundle, but I didn’t think I’d want them all…)

They’re really great implementations, most are likely better than their desktop counterparts due to being better suited to a circular controller. I’m addicted to Zuma. Like a junkie.

But… The games seem to suck the soul out of the battery even faster than playing a video does. I played a game on the bus ride home tonight (it was raining, and I wussed out and left the bike at home) and it killed about half of the battery. That makes about an hour of gameplay on a fully charged battery? That can’t be right.

I’m hoping it’s just a battery life calibration issue, rather than an actual drain. I can always pack an extra long extension cord so I can get my fix of Zuma…

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