Mac OS X Lion – 10.7.3 update

The 10.7.3 update is recommended for all OS X Lion users and includes general operating system fixes that improve the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac including fixes that:

• Add Catalan, Croatian, Greek, Hebrew, Romanian, Slovak, Thai, and Ukrainian language support
• Address issues when using smart cards to log into OS X
• Resolve issues authenticating with directory services
• Address compatibility issues with Windows file sharing

For detailed information on this update, please visit this website: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5048.

For information on the security content of this update, please visit: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222.

How to setup Django and MySQL-python on Mac OS X Lion

Django is an excellent web-framework written in Python.

Here is a quick setup guide for installing Django and MySQL-python on Mac OS X Lion.

Setup Django

– Download latest Django here

– At this point I am assuming that you are familiar with the Terminal, so simply execute the following commands on your Downloads folder:

tar -xzvf Django-1.3.1.tar.gz
cd Django-1.3.1
sudo python setup.py install

Test Django installation

Type on the Terminal:

python
import django
print django.get_version()

Setup MySQL-python package

Download the latest MySQL (64-bit, tar archive) here

– Extract tar contents
– Rename folder to “mysql”
– Copy folder to /usr/local/
– You should now have mysql installed on /usr/local/mysql

Download the latest MySQL-python package here

Type on the Terminal:

tar -xvzf MySQL-python-1.2.3.tar.gz
cd MySQL-python-1.2.3

Edit site.cfg on your favorite text editor and change the mysql path as below: mysql_config = /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysql_config

You are now ready to build and install MySQL-python:

sudo python setup.py build
sudo python setup.py install

Edit your ~/.bash_profile, add the following line:

export DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/local/mysql/lib/

If you are already using MAMP you still have to follow the above MySQL installation process, as MAMP by default doesn’t include the required header files to build MySQL-python.
Moreover if you prefer MAMP, you don’t have to run mysql from /usr/local/mysql.
On your settings.py remember to set “127.0.0.1” as your preferred db host in case that “localhost” doesn’t work.

Test MySQL-python installation

Restart Terminal and type:

python
import MySQLdb

If you are not getting any errors at this point, then you are all good to go!
I’d suggest starting from the Django’s excellent introductory tutorial.

PHP: How to json_encode numbers properly

Here is a handy tip about PHP’s json_encode function.

In some cases numeric data may  appear as numeric strings, for example 1 as “1”. While consuming the json data on a client app that would mean an extra parsing to get for example an int from the string.

The solution is to simply use an extra option (JSON_NUMERIC_CHECK) on the json_encode function call:

<?php echo json_encode($data, JSON_NUMERIC_CHECK); ?>

I have to point out that this option requires a PHP version of 5.3.3 or higher.

Mac OS X Lion – Remove “All My Files” from Finder

Finder on Mac OS X Lion by default is always showing “All My Files” on every new window. Well to be honest not even once I found it useful, never used it since the first install.

Even if you are a geeky Terminal fan,  there are always times that you start up Finder, and you need to get faster to your important files. Most of the times I am looking for something in the Documents folder/subfolders, so here is how I have set it as the default Finder directory:

Go to Finder, main menu -> Finder -> Preferences… -> General -> and select your favorite folder in “New Finder windows show” option as shown in the screenshot below.

You can also remove “All My Files” from the Finder’s sidebar as well, just right-click and remove it, or uncheck it from Preferences -> Sidebar.

Christmas Carols Karaoke app for iOS

Christmas Carols Karaoke app offers 15 classic Christmas carols and songs. All songs come with lyrics and melodies, giving you the option to sing along with your loved ones!

Available Christmas Carols/Songs:

– Deck The Halls
– Frosty The Snow Man
– Here Comes Santa Claus
– Jingle Bells
– Jingle Bell Rock
– Let It Snow
– Little Drummer Boy
– Oh Christmas Tree
– Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree
– Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer
– Santa Claus Is Coming To Town
– Silent Night
– Twelve Days Of Christmas
– We Wish You A Merry Christmas
– White Christmas

Christmas Carols Karaoke – iTunes Link

Save iPhone battery – 5 tips for iOS 5 that work

Smartphones are always running low on battery, and iPhone is definitely one of them. The release of iOS 5 has brought fantastic OS/app improvements, however the battery life has been negatively affected. Here are 5 tips that actually work, i.e. save precious battery time for your iPhone 3GS/4/4S handset.

1. Manage Notifications

One of the most important new iOS 5 features is the Notification Screen. Enabling Notifications is a must for the iOS experience, however you should manage the applications that make use of it. Go to Settings -> Notifications and select the apps that you really want to be sending Notifications, leave out all others.

2. Manage Location Services

Similarly to the Notifications logic, manage the applications that you want to be accessing the Location Services (GPS). Go to Settings -> Location Services and turn off Location where is unnecessary.

3. Disable Bluetooth

In case that you don’t need the Bluetooth feature, just turn it off. Go to Settings -> General -> Bluetooth and turn if off.

4. Disable Local Weather

The Weather app on iOS 5 is improved, featuring a handy Weather Widget for the Notifications screen. By default the Weather Widget is looking up via GPS the current location and displays accordingly the weather data. If you are not constantly on the road or just not interested you will save some battery by turning it off. Go to the Weather app -> press “i” on the lower right corner -> turn off Local Weather option.

5. The Time Zone option

iOS 5 has a time zone option, which when I turned it off had a positive impact on the battery life. It’s quite hidden, so make a note of this post in case you need to find it again for your – or a friend’s – device. Go to Settings -> Location Services -> scroll all the way to the bottom -> System Services -> turn off “Setting Time Zone”. You can also experiment with some other options on that screen, please leave a comment if they do make a difference!

There are also some other more drastic measures that will save you battery, however they are ruining the iOS 5 experience. Like for example disabling iCloud or completely disable Notifications, but as a power user I am against them.

Mac OS X Lion – Disable app resume and window restore functionality

I have been using Lion since the release day 1, and about 10 days later I am pretty confident that the whole OS behaves faster and smoother than Snow Leopard. However one of the main Lion new features, application resume and windows restore functionality, seems to cause some delays while opening or closing apps. I can see their icon bouncing on the dock a bit longer than it used to be.

Therefore today I decided to completely disable it, and here is how I did it:

System Preferences -> General -> Remove the check from “Restore windows when quitting and re-opening apps”.

You can immediately test it with Terminal, start Terminal cd into a directory and quit.
If the above option is disabled, the next time you start Terminal you will be in your default directory.

And here is the magic, if you need to resume a window, even with the global option being disabled, simply press command-option-q to quit the app. Again you can try it with Terminal, command-option-q and restart will get you back to where you were (resume!).

Mac OS X Lion – exit Terminal from full-screen mode

Mac OS X Lion supports full-screen mode for most apps, something extremely useful.
You can enter and exit the full-screen mode by pressing command-shift-f (at least that works for Google Chrome, check the first comment after the post), or look for the arrows icon on the top right corner of your app window.

Terminal app supports full-screen as well, however the keyboard screenshots do not work as expected. Upon entering the full-screen mode, there isn’t an obvious way to exit it.

You will have to move your mouse/cursor to the top, wait for the menu bar to appear, and click on the arrows icon. Easy, ain’t it, if you just know where to look at!

** Edit:  command-option-f also does the trick, thanks johnie.

Mac OS X Lion – remove login/username from menu bar

One of my first customizations after installing Mac OS X Lion was to remove the annoying login – username option from the top menu bar. And to explain “annoying”, I find it quite too long displaying my Name Surname, and an option that I would never need to use, as there’s only a single user on my Mac.

Removing it is quite easy: hold command button and drag it off the menu bar.

If you really want to keep it, you can reduce its length to the username or to an icon:

System Preferences -> Users & Groups -> Login Options -> (Click on the bottom left lock if everything is greyed-out) -> Show fast switching user menu as… -> Check/uncheck to show/hide it, or use the drop-down menu for the various options.

Mac OS X Lion – How to install Java

Mac OS X Lion doesn’t include a Java runtime environment on the default installation.
However Apple has immediately released Java as a separate download.

The first package of Java for Lion can be found on the following link: http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1421

The download size is 62.53MB and installs Java SE version 1.6.0_26.