November 30, 2004
BPMI to Start Work on BPXL
BPMI.org is planning a Think Tank meeting in Miami on March 1st 2005 to talk about the future of BPEL. BPMI is planning to start work on a new standard called Business Process eXtension Layers (BPXL) that will help exchange information between process modeling tools and process management engines.
The original BPEL standard was developed through a OASIS Technical Committee. However BPMI see that this process would be too slow to develop the new standards and are therefore endeavoring to manage the new standards development themselves outside the confines of OASIS.
Links
Computer Business Review Article
BPMI.org
BPMI Think Tank Announcement
November 29, 2004
Advanced Configuration in Firefox
Want to be able to configure everything in Firefox 1.0? Well from reading the Wikipedia page on Firefox I have found that if you go to the page “about:config” a special configuration page is displayed. This page contains all the variables used within firefox and filter text box so you can easily find the variable you need to change.
An example use of this configuration page is to change the Firefox behaviour to display an alert box and display an error page, similar to that used by Microsoft Internet Explorer. First open the “about:config” page by typing the text (without quotes) into the address text box at the top of your browse and type enter. This will display the configuration page. Next type error in the filter text box, this will automatically filter the list to only display the “browser.xul.error_pages.enabled” preference. Double click the value to change it to “true” and that is it. You can test it by opening another window and entering a bogus address, an error page should be displayed rather than the common alert box.
Links
Firefox Wikipedia Page
Firefox Home Page
November 24, 2004
Modifying OSX Applications using Apple Developer Tools
Ever wanted to add a button or move something in a already built OSX application. Well you can using Interface Builder that comes for free in Apple's OSX Developer tools that are freely downloaded. The best way to understand how to do this is have a read of the article at MacDev Center here.
Links
Modifying Stickies Article
November 23, 2004
Yellow Dog Linux 4 Torrents Available
Four ISOs of Yellow Dog Linux 4 are available via BitTorrent from http://cvs.terraplex.com/~owen/ydl4_torrents. Yellow Dog Linux is a version of linux built to run on the PowerPC based CPUs as used in all Apple Macs.
Links
Yellow Dog Linux Site
Yellow Dog Torrents
PeopleSoft Support WSRP
PeopleSoft recently demonstrated their PeopleSoft Community Portal and PeopleSoft applications interoperate with other portal implementations using Web Service for Remote Portlets (WSRP).
Links
PeopleSoft Support WSRP Article
OASIS Web Services for Remote Portlets Technical Committee (WSRP TC)
WSRP 1.0 Standard
SOA in the UK Police
Here is a quick article about the UK Police using SOA concepts and Web Services to integrate their heterogeneous systems.
Links
UK Police and SOA article
WS-Reliability 1.1 Standard Approved
OASIS has announced that their WS-Reliability 1.1 standard for reliable messaging using web services has been approved by is members as an OASIS Standard. Here is a description of WS-Reliability 1.1 from the standard document itself:
“WS-Reliability is a SOAP-based ([SOAP 1.1] and [SOAP 1.2 Part 1]) specification that fulfills reliable messaging requirements critical to some applications of Web Services. SOAP over HTTP [RFC2616] is not sufficient when an application-level messaging protocol must also guarantee some level of reliability and security. This specification defines reliability in the context of current Web Services standards. This specification has been designed for use in combination with other complementary protocols (see Section 1.4) and builds on previous experiences (e.g., ebXML Message Service [ebMS].)”
See the links below to read more about WS-Reliability or to download the standard and associated schema files.
Links
WS-Reliability Article
WS-Reliability 1.1 Standard
OASIS Web Services Reliable Messaging Technical Committee (WSRM TM)
Adding AppleScript to Cocoa Applications
Here is an article documenting the method to enable AppleScript for the Cocoa applications that you may be developing.
Links
MacDevCenter: Making Cocoa-Java Apps Scripting Article
November 20, 2004
Sorting HTML Tables
Here is a great article on sorting HTML tables using Javascript and the Browsers DOM.
Links
HTML Table Sorting
Mac OSX Searching: LaunchBar vs Quicksilver
I have been using Objective Development's LaunchBar software for quite some time to quickly launch applications on my Macs. LaunchBar is a brilliant piece of software, but today one of my friends told me about Quicksilver that provides a very similar capability but for free (really it is donateware). For the price do not think that this is a shoddy piece of software as it is not this at all, in fact it is much better than some software you can pay quite a lot for. Quicksilver also has the concept of plugins that allows for additional modules to be added so as new application are developed and people want to search through files in these applications or connect to the application's internal database these plugins can be used. Already quite a number of plugins are available including ones to connect to iChat, Apple Address Book, Firefox, iPhoto, Sherlock, Entourage and many more. In comparison Quicksilver is much faster to use than LaunchBar and the ability to extend quicksilver means it will be more capable over time and support many more applications than LaunchBar could hope for.
Links
LaunchBar Site
Quicksilver Site
Quicksilver Plugins
November 18, 2004
External Firewire RAID drive
I use external firewire and USB hard drive solutions all the time to more data around or backup data on my systems. Here is a new Firewire enclosure that provides RAID solution in a very G5 Mac looking case with excellent cooling capabilities. The drive uses Firewire 800 to provide the high speed data access to the drive. The drive is being marketed for video and audio professionals but is also perfect for any geeks out there who want the best hardware money can buy, you know who you are!
Links
G-Raid Site
November 15, 2004
Scrolling on Mac Trackpads
While browsing through the new software on MacUpdate I found SideTrack, which I have seen before but this is the newest and latest version. SideTrack is a replacement driver for the Mac trackpads on all Apple laptops that provides some of the more advanced features that the PC users take for granted. One of my favourite features is ability to use the side of the trackpad for scrolling. SideTrack also has corner tapping, which allows you to select an action to occur when you tap the trackpads corner area. It is very flexible and allows you to customise the speed of scrolling and even the size of the special areas. If you are using a Apple laptop I would extremely recommend giving this a go.
Links
SideTrack Home Site
MacUpdate Site
Prettier Form Widgets in Firefox on Mac
Firefoxy 1.1 has just been released that allows you to easily change the widgets used on the mac firefox to the a much prettier set. The new widgets look like this:
And are easily applied by dragging your firefox application onto the firefoxy application. To undo you simply follow the same dragging process. I have also noticed that these same new widgets are already installed in the G5 Optimised build that I blogged earlier.
Links
Download Firefoxy
G5 Optimised Build Blog
November 13, 2004
Apple Bundle Powerbook with Airport Extreme
Ok I have a interesting tid bit of information from my local Mac Reseller here in Canberra, Australia. Apple seems to have deal on at the moment only available from Apple stores (not online) that allows people to buy a powerbook and get a FREE, yes free Airport Express. This is a great deal as I have been wanting a new Airport Express and as part of a recent acquisition of a new powerbook to replace the one stolen from me recently I also gained a new Airport Express. The promotion only last to very early in December and I am not sure how widespread the offer is, Canberra only, Australia only or all Apple stores. So if you were thinking about buying a new powerbook now would be the time.
Links
Apple Airport Express
Apple Powerbook
November 12, 2004
Australian Toilet Map
This may have been one of the saddest or most useful things (depending how you look at it ) the Australian government has ever done. They have created a complete web site that maps all the public toilets around Australia. On the site you can find the location of public toilets at any location. You can even plan your trip with the toilet stops along the way using the functions on the site.
Links
Australian Toilet Map Site
Firefox Mac Optimised Builds
Do you have a G4 or G5 mac and use Firefox? If you do then you will like the following links. Neil Lee has created a build of Firefox 1.0 that has been optimised for use on the G5. Users have reported that there is noticable difference to the original version. I will have to wait to monday as my G5 is at work, but my powerbook uses the G4 chipset and there is also a version created by Kai Rune optimised for the G4. Got to love geeks and the pursuit for ever faster processing.
Links
G4 Optimised Firefox Link
G5 Optimised Firefox Link
November 11, 2004
DVD Cases
If you are packaging up videos or what a different case for your software you can't go past the cases for sale at JewelBoxing.com. I am amazed that they can create a whole site just about cases but there is actually quite a lot of content describing the product and how it works. There are also quite a few very nice examples of people using the JewelBoxing products. I am interested in this to potentially package up some of the software that I am writing in my spare time.
Links
JewelBoxing.com
November 10, 2004
Delicious Library Released
Ok this has got to be one of the most gorgeous software packages to be released for the mac. Delicious Library by Delicious Monster is a Book/CD/DVD/Games library that allows you to categorise and manage your collections. The key features of this application are:
- Gorgeous user interface
- Connects to Amazon to get the cover images of items and description details
- Can use your iSight or Bluetooth scanner to read the bar codes of items when importing
- Allows you to manage others who borrow items from your library
For a very good (and lengthy) article about Delicious Library head over to Ars Technica and for you visual people out there it has screenshots.
Links
Ars Technical Review
Delicious Library Site
Download Applications
Mozilla Firefox 1.0 RC2 Available
Mozilla Firefox 1.0 Full Version has been released. This is the final 1.0 release of firefox ready for primetime.
Links
Download Firefox 1.0
Firefox Home Page
November 08, 2004
Java Server Faces Console for Eclipse
Just reading the RSS feed for the Eclipse plugins and I noticed this program called Faces Console. This application is a standalone Swing application that can manage your JSF applications and tag libraries. The console can also be used within Eclipse by right clicking on the JSF file and selecting to open it in the Faces Console.
November 07, 2004
Clipboard Sharing (OSX and Windows)
That have been numerous occasions where I have needed to share small amounts of text or images between multiple computers that are running different operating systems. I have just found a cool little program by Porchdog Software called Spike. Spike allows you to copy anything to share areas so that any other user also running spike on your network can access these shared items. All items are encrypted and are shared automatically. The discovery of other Spike users happens automatically via the use of Zeroconf, otherwise known as Rendezvous. Spike is available for OSX and Windows and can be downloaded here.
Links
Spike Homepage
Spike Download
November 04, 2004
Mozilla Firefox 1.0 RC2 Available
Mozilla Firefox 1.0 Release Candidate 2 is now available on their FTP server. The developers believe they have fixed the bugs with the software update feature and are requesting users to test heavily the site authentication features and extension installs from update.mozilla.org. Download it today and support Firefox's spread around the Internet and overthrow the badly implemented Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Links
Download Firefox 1.0 RC2
Firefox Home Page
Interested in OSX Tiger's Spotlight Feature?
Apple has released a quick article that descries the new Spotlight feature that will be available in the new OSX Tiger operating system to be released early in 2005. This is not an article for the general user but is intended for all you OSX developers out there who are curious about how spotlight will work and how to develop programs to make use of its capabilities. If you are not a developer but are still a complete mac geek and want to know everything about the mac then it is still a good read.
Links
Apple Spotlight Developer Overview Article
November 02, 2004
OSX Tiger to have Burnable Folders and Smart Folders
AppleInsider is announcing that the latest beta of OSX Tiger released to developers has one new feature and a revised feature. The revised feature was present in earlier beta releases, this was to create smart folders that are now integrated with OSX Tiger's Spotlight searching capabilities. This allows users to create folders that can automatically fill themselves with the files that meet the smart folders capabilities. The second new feature is a Burnable folders. These allow for files to be dropped in a burnable flagged folder that creates a link to the original file rather than copying (or moving) the original file. By only creating a link to the original means that if the original contents change then when you initiate the burn the updated contents will be used. This feature will allow me to create release CDs for software that I build and then I can just update the original files and whenever I burn the CD I will always get the latest versions.
These are two of the new features in a long list of amazing capabilities to be seen in the future version of Apple's OSX operating system. I do not know about you but I can not wait for this next major release, I am already thinking of the cool ways that I can use some of these features.
Links
AppleInsider Article
