Sveinbjorn Thordarson

I can't believe it! Dark Castle is back!

"Yesterday, over breakfast, I made a Freudian slip. I meant to ask my wife to pass the butter, but instead I said, 'You bitch! You've ruined my life!'"

Platypus 2.1 is out thanks to some hard work this afternoon -- grab the release here. I've also written some tutorials on how to achieve various goals using Platypus.

Judging by the amount of mail I've received recently on the subject, there's a fair amount of people that will be pleased to know that I've been working on Platypus, with a 2.1 release due soon. Changes include a new and improved ScriptExec binary written in Objective C, a fix of the dreaded "Is Droppable" bug and correctly passed $1-$* to the script app.

While browsing FreshMeat.net I found a very clever project called CocoaDialog, which enables you to construct simple user interface dialogs from shell scripts. This is ideal for use with Platypus. The CocoaDialog application can be placed within the Platypus app bundle and called from its arbitrary location via the $1 variable.

Work has started on two new projects:  a kernel extension manager called Aardvark (frontend for kextstat/kextload/kextunload) and BezelSwitch, a configuration utility/PreferencePane for manipulating, disabling and/or modifying the Bezel Server in MacOS X.

I've been having some trouble with the Bezel Server in MacOS X (you know, the one that displays the centered semi-transparent volume and brightness change images). Sometimes the interface becomes unresponsive and the server takes forever to respond to the button presses. My solution: disable the server. Hence BezelSwitch a small Platypus app that toggles the server on and off.

Internet access at last. I am no longer in Mozambique but in South Africa. More specifically, I am in Kruger Park, a gigantic expanse of African wilderness roughly the size of Israel. So far I have seen impala, wildebeests, elephants, rhinos, giraffes, waterbucks, mongooses, vultures, but, alas, no lions. I return to Maputo tomorrow, where I will hopefully get the opportunity to post more news.

Well, I'm off to Mozambique tomorrow, a gruellling 10-hour flight into the murky depths of Africa, with a stopover in London and Johannesburg. I'll be keeping an account of my stay, so you can follow my experiences on the continent ;).