Christian Geekery

I have been using Google Chrome almost exclusively since extensions became available to the Mac in the dev channel.  Today I worked out the last issue that I had with not being able to log in to Springloops, and discovered that there is an alpha version extension for 1Password.  Chrome is so much faster then Firefox, perhaps a bit faster then Safari, and I have some very useful extensions!  I may have reached the tipping point where I will no longer fall back on Firefox and Safari for more then testing.  Not bad at all!

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I want to mention two items that I have not seen much discussion about with snow leopard.

The first thing I want to mention is that I am pleasantly surprised with how cool my Macbook Pro seems to be running after the upgrade. As I am writing this, my Macbooks overall temp is a mere 113 degrees F. Normally while playing music and all my normal apps are open, I see around 140 degrees F. This is interesting since at the same time everything seems a bit quicker then before.

The second is a gripe, a major one for me at least. The so called Cisco vpn support is only partial. It does not support UDP NAT tunneling. The VPNs that I connect to use UDP. Yes I do have a working Cisco VPN client that now works. But Apple got my hopes up that I would be able to connect to my VPNs without having to run a seperate client, only to be dashed against the rocks of disappointment. I really hope that they get this fixed and put in the next patch.

Overall I am very pleased with this update. I had very little problems with compatibility with my most important applications (with the exception of the cisco vpn client.). The system is faster, and even seems to run cooler.

I have not yet found the right background image to do the sci-fi themed geektool based desktop that I have in mind. However I did create this one to use for now, until I either find or create the right sci-fi based background for the desktop that I really want.

I have been using GeekTool for a very long time now to show system info on my desktop, but without any imagination as to making it look cool. Then the other day I saw some very artistic implementations on flicker. I borrowed this one for my self for a while, but now have some very cool ideas how to do something similar, but with a more sci-fi bent.

I have been using Gmail as my central online communications hub for a long time now. I was using Mail.app to pop my mail from Gmail until about month ago. Now with all the improvements to the Gmail interface I even stopped using my local mail client with great success. All my email accounts get forwarded to my Gmail account with one exception that I kept out of the loop as a backup for when Gmail goes down (yes even the best systems will have downtime). I get far less spam this way since Gmail’s spam filters are better then any others that I have used. My iPhone takes advantage of Gmail’s imap service so that I have access to my mail when I am without a system.

Now with all these new fast browsers running around the net, the question becomes… Which is the best browser for Gmail? continue reading…

I am one of those command line dinosaurs that still find the keyboard more efficient for most tasks. Don’t get me wrong, I really appreciate a well thought out Graphical UI like what I enjoy on my Macs. It is just that I do most of my real work inside terminal windows connected to *nix systems. This work style makes pausing to use the mouse to launch a program, send an email, find a file, print something, or any number of tasks seem inefficient to me.

continue reading…